Exploring the Life and Teachings of Mahayana Buddhists in Asia

Buddhism is one of the world's oldest and largest religions having about 490 million followers. Mahayana Buddhists represent approximately two-thirds of the total Buddhist population. A large portion of Mahayanists resides in East Asia. They cannot be said to follow an undivided doctrine and have a unified religious lifestyle. Mahayana Buddhism, rather, consists of a multitude of ideas and practices with its followers holding various behaviors and attitudes. This book explores the lives and teachings of Mahayana Buddhists, who reside in Mainland China, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, and Myanmar, as well as in the ancient Gandhara region (today's north Pakistan and east Afghanistan). The time frame covered is from the beginning of the Mahayana movement in the Ancient Gandhara region in the first several centuries of the Common Era to the present-day lifestyle and practices of the Mahayanists as they respond to 2020's COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to the historical and doctrinal views of Mahayana Buddhism, the book features thematic chapters on topics, such as pandemic responses, Mahayana scriptures and sculptures, modern Mahayana teachings, charity, suicide, and ethnicity. The book also considers such social constructs as family and community and modern Buddhist movements in reshaping the traditional structures and cosmological beliefs of Chinese Mahayanists. In sum, this book is a unique effort to define the nature of Mahayana Buddhist life in the past and in the present as well as its teaching in Asia. It does so from various multidisciplinary perspectives.