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)
“Conversation ... is like the table of contents of a dull book.... All the greatest subjects of human thought are proudly displayed in it. Listen to it for three minutes, and you ask yourself which is more striking, the emphasis of the speaker or his shocking ignorance.”
—Stendhal [Marie Henri Beyle] (1783–1842)
“Such as boxed
Their feelings properly, complete to tags
A box for dark men and a box for Other
Would often find the contents had been scrambled.”
—Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)