Sinister Way
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€83.99
A01=Richard von Glahn
afterlife
ancestors
ancient china
Author_Richard von Glahn
Category=NH
china
chinese history
chinese jia jiao
chinese religion
christianity
comparative religions
cult
death
deity
demon
demonic
demonology
demons
divine power
divinity
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
folk belief
folk religion
folklore
ghosts
goblins
god of wealth
gods
greed
han cult
imperial china
lust
nonfiction
popular religion
possession
religion
religious culture
salvific religion
shanxiao
sin
spirit of the dead
spirituality
supernatural
vernacular religion
vice
wutong
wutong cult
Product details
- ISBN 9780520234086
- Weight: 771g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 20 Apr 2004
- Publisher: University of California Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
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The most striking feature of Wutong, the preeminent God of Wealth in late imperial China, was the deity's diabolical character. Wutong was perceived not as a heroic figure or paragon of noble qualities but rather as an embodiment of humanity's basest vices, greed and lust, a maleficent demon who preyed on the weak and vulnerable. In "The Sinister Way", Richard von Glahn examines the emergence and evolution of the Wutong cult within the larger framework of the historical development of Chinese popular or vernacular religion - as opposed to institutional religions such as Buddhism or Daoism. Von Glahn's study, spanning three millennia, gives due recognition to the morally ambivalent and demonic aspects of divine power within the common Chinese religious culture.
Richard von Glahn is Professor of History at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the coeditor of The Song-Yuan-Ming Transition in Chinese History (2003) and the author of Fountain of Fortune: Money and Monetary Policy in China, 1000-1700 (California, 1996) and The Country of Streams and Grottoes: Expansion, Settlement, and the Civilizing of the Sichuan Frontier in Song Times (1987).
