“The Relevance of Buddhism to Modern Society”
Presented by Professor Guang Xing, Centre of Buddhist Studies, the University of Hong Kong.
Date: Thursday May 31, 2007
Time: 3:00 – 5:00 PM
Place: Institute of Asian Research, C.K. Choi Building Room 120, 1855 West Mall
In contemporary society, there are many concepts influencing and affecting our lives, but the following six are important and frequently used in our daily life in the pursuit of happiness: democracy, freedom, liberation, equality, justice
and human rights. These six concepts are considered as the core of a secular society or state by many people. However, religion is generally viewed as something backward and detrimental to personal freedom and liberation. In this seminar, I will focus on the theoretical issues related to the six concepts by selecting passages from the Buddhist scriptures and discussing whether Buddhism teaches something compatible with the modern society.
Professor Guang Xing is the Tung Lin Kok Yuen Canada Foundation Visiting Professor in Buddhism and Contemporary Society at the Institute of Asian Research. He is the author of The Concept of the Buddha: Its Evolution from Early Buddhism to Trikaya Theory (Routledge 2005) and The Historical Buddha (Beijing Religion and Culture Publication, 2005). Currently, he is working on a monograph
project entitled “Filial Piety in Chinese Buddhism” and has already published a few chapters.
This lecture is made possible by the generous support of The Tung Lin Kok Yuen Canada Foundation.
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