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The article presents a textual history of Chinese author Hong Mai's massive compendium of anomalous events, the "Yijian zhi" (YJZ). It is a collection of what post-Enlightenment Western-trained scholars would call supernatural events, as well as newsworthy accounts and anecdotes, originally featuring 420 juan, or chapters. The collection focuses on contemporary religious ideas, and helps understand much about Song Dynasty's women's social status, Confucian scholars' religious tenets, the ruling elite's understanding of the fall of the Northern Song.

The article presents a commentary of the books "The Structure of Chinese Rural Society: Lineage and Village in the Eastern New Territories," and "Emperor and Ancestor: State and Lineage in South China," by David Faure. For thirty years, Faure has worked at the deconstruction of an image of an eternal, unchanging China. China, according to that image, was a society dominated by Confucian literati from powerful lineages, the gentry.

This article discusses the religious career and self-immolation (which involved public acts of burning the fingers and body) of the sixth-century monk, Sengyai. The author discusses the sources for a study of his life, and translates the extant biographical materials. He demonstrates that self-immolation was a practice open to multiple interpretations, and that Sengyai's act was understood as one of cosmic significance in a religious milieu in which recent political events such as the fall of the Liang dynasty were interpreted as signs of the decline of the dharma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the nature and cultural meaning of agriculturally produced grains in late classical and early medieval China. Dietary regimens of practitioners during those periods to make them transcendents; Religious practices in offering sacrifices to the gods and spirits of grains in the country; Implication of cultivating and eating grains for the social status of dwellers in agricultural communities.

Examines the use of the label Ru among twentieth-century popular Chinese religious groups, specifically Confucianism. Ru in Taiwanese popular religion; Spirit-writing movement in Taiwan and on mainland China; Teachings of the Confucian tradition.

Argues that there is little evidence of anything resembling an independent or self-conscious Pure Land tradition in medieval China. Views on how scholars misconstrued the notion of 'Ch'an/Pure Land syncretism; Role of Amitabha's Pure Land in Chinese Buddhism.

Investigates Buddhist-inspired options that were offered to lay people and at people's motivations for making specific religious decisions in the Lower Yangzi region in China during the period from A.D. 1100 until 1340. Definition of a religious option; Origin of the important monastic Tiantai tradition of Buddhism; Factors contributing to the success or failure of beliefs and practices.