Contents
The book focuses on the history of Zen Buddhism and Japanese militarism from the time of the Meiji Restoration through the Second World War and the post-War period. It describes the influence of state policy on Japanese Buddhism, and particularly the influence of Zen philosophy on the Japanese military.
A famous quote is from Harada Daiun Sogaku:
march: tramp, tramp, or shoot: bang, bang. This is the manifestation of the highest Wisdom . The unity of Zen and war of which I speak extends to the farthest reaches of the holy war .The book also explores the actions of Japanese Buddhists who opposed the growth of militarism.
The 2002 edition of Zen at War was followed by Zen War Stories, which further explores the intimate relationship between Japanese institutional Buddhism and militarism during World War II.
Read more about this topic: Zen At War
Famous quotes containing the word contents:
“How often we must remember the art of the surgeon, which, in replacing the broken bone, contents itself with releasing the parts from false position; they fly into place by the action of the muscles. On this art of nature all our arts rely.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The permanence of all books is fixed by no effort friendly or hostile, but by their own specific gravity, or the intrinsic importance of their contents to the constant mind of man.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“If one reads a newspaper only for information, one does not learn the truth, not even the truth about the paper. The truth is that the newspaper is not a statement of contents but the contents themselves; and more than that, it is an instigator.”
—Karl Kraus (1874–1936)