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The Pali canon shows a largely negative view of visual art. In ancient Indian culture, beauty is associated with sexual attraction, and has an erotic overtone. Concern with beauty conflicts with the Buddhist ideal of detachment from worldly pleasures. On the other hand Buddhists have created wonderful works of art, and monks can be painters or dancers. Pictures and performances are made as expressions of devotion, and as means of acquiring merit, and most importantly to convey a Buddhist message.

This paper examines the relationship between the monastic saṅgha and the Buddhist king as the dhammarājā in the context of good governance in the contemporary world, with a specific focus on the Cambodian perspective. Through an examination of the historical and philosophical foundations of Buddhist governance, it argues for the enduring relevance and applicability of these principles in today's diverse societies. A second line of argument explores how the saṅgha assembly, as a collective entity, contributes to the establishment of a just and harmonious society.
Keywords: Buddhist governance, Saṅgha, Dhammarājā, Dhammādhippateyya, Dhammocracy, Pāramī, Cambodia.

"While early Buddhists hailed their religion's founder for forging a path to enlightenment, they also exalted him as the paragon of masculinity. According to Buddhist scriptures, the Buddha's body boasts thirty-two physical features, including lion-like jaws, thighs like a royal stag, broad shoulders, and a deep, resonant voice, that distinguish him from regular men. As Buddhism spread throughout Asia and around the world, the Buddha remained an exemplary man, but Buddhists in other times and places developed their own understandings of what it meant to be masculine. Buddhist Masculinities brings together essays that explore the variety and diversity of Buddhist masculinities, from early India to the contemporary United States, and from bodhisattva-kings to martial monks. The contributors deploy the methods of religious studies, anthropology, art history, textual-historical studies, and cultural studies to explore texts, images, films, media, and embodiments of masculinity across the Buddhist world, past and present. Buddhist Masculinities turns scholarly attention to normative forms of masculinity that usually go unmarked and unstudied because they are "normal," and illuminates the religious and cultural processes that construct normative conceptions of masculinities in Buddhism"--

"This innovative collaborative work-the first to focus on Buddhist tourism-explores how Buddhists, government organizations, business corporations, and individuals in Asia participate in re-imaginings of Buddhism through tourism. Contributors from religious studies, anthropology, and art history examine sacred places and religious monuments as they have been shaped and reshaped by socio-economic and cultural trends in the region. Following an introduction that offers the first theoretical understanding of tourism from a Buddhist studies' perspective, early chapters discuss the ways Buddhists and non-Buddhists imagine concepts and places related to the religion. Case studies highlight Buddhist peace in India, Buddhist heavens and hells in Singapore, Thai temple space, and the future Buddha Maitreya in China. Buddhist tourism's connections to the state, market, and new technologies are explored in chapters on Indian package tours for pilgrims, thematic Buddhist tourism in Cambodia, the technological innovations of Buddhist temples in China, and the promotion of pilgrimage sites in Japan. Contributors then situate the financial concerns of Chinese temples, speed dating in temples in Japan, and the diffuse and pervasive nature of Buddhism for tourism promotion in Ladakh, India. How have tourist routes, groups, sites, and practices associated with Buddhism come to be possible and what are the effects? In what ways do travelers derive meaning from Buddhist places? How do Buddhist sites fortify national, cultural, or religious identities? The comparative research in South, Southeast, and East Asia presented here draws attention to the intertwining of the sacred and the financial and how local and national sites are situated within global networks. Together these findings generate a compelling comparative investigation of Buddhist spaces, identities, and practices"--

Over the centuries, Buddhist monks applied economic models in the operations of their monasteries to make them sustainable while also observing Buddhist principles. The large variety of economic practices observed demonstrate the creativity of monastics in acquiring the resources to support their large monasteries in a way that was viewed as compatible with Buddhist ethics embodied in the Noble Eightfold Path. Researchers have analyzed the integration of faith-based and financially related monastic needs for different countries in different eras. The Buddhist economics approach as it has been developed in the last 40-50 years aims to create an alternative worldview that challenges the main underlying assumptions of Western economics. The mainstream Western economics model is originally based on the following assumptions: rational, selfish behavior; profit-maximization; competitive markets; and instrumental use of the environment. Buddhist economics is based on a different set of assumptions: dependent origination ("pratityasamutpada"), where people are interdependent with each other and with Earth; people are aware of enlightened self-interest based on interdependence and thus are altruistic; firms care about the well-being of workers, customers, shareholders, and community; and all activities include caring for the environment. With these assumptions, the Buddhist economic model has shared prosperity in a sustainable world with minimal suffering as its goal.

"Die im 17. Jahrhundert nach Russland eingewanderten Kalmüken sind Buddhisten, wobei sich in der religiösen Praxis die Lehren Buddhas mit älteren schamanischen Vorstellungen vermischen. Der folgende Beitrag vermittelt einen Einblick in Kultur und Geschichte dieser in Westeuropa kaum bekannten kleinen Volksgruppe." (Autorenreferat)

Discusses the impact of changes in the membership of Soka Gakkai International in the US (SGI-USA). Although initially composed mostly of Japanese war brides, later recruitment efforts produced many non-Japanese converts; however, despite considerable Americanization, SGI-USA has continued to provide Japanese members a link with their heritage. Data from Hammond & Machacek's (1999) survey of 401 SGI-USA members show that Japanese membership has shifted from first-generation wives/service workers to second-generation, educated white-collar workers. Most respondents under age 44 were raised in Soka Gakkai, while the majority of older members were raised in other Buddhist sects. Almost 20% of younger members were reared in the Christian faith as compared to 10% of older members. Although concerns about the evils of political conflict were not replicated in the US, the emphasis on world peace & the environment has had a significant impact. It is contended that the centrality of inner-worldly asceticism has been a major factor in the ability of SGI-USA to serve an ethnically diverse membership. Limitations of the data are discussed. 8 References. J. Lindroth