The Religion of the Chinese

By De Groot, J. J. M.

Book Id: WPLBN0100247270
Format Type: PDF eBook:
File Size: 0.5 MB
Reproduction Date:

Title:	The Religion of the Chinese
Author:	De Groot, J. J. M.
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Non-Fiction, Religion., Confucianism
Collections:	Religious Literature Collection
Historic Publication Date:
Publisher:	1910


Citation APA MLA Chicago J. M. De Groo, B. J. (n.d.). The Religion of the Chinese. Retrieved from http://www.self.gutenberg.org/

Description
Description: J. J. M. (Jan Jakob Maria) de Groot, Ph.D., (1854-1921) was a Dutch Sinologist and historian of religion. In this scholarly book published in 1910, he details the history, rituals, and beliefs of the major traditional religions of China: universal animism, polydemonism, specters, ancestral worship, Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. He thought that one spiritual essence could be detected beneath a great variety of religious, philosophical, and even political expressions in China, and his lifework was the discovery and exposition of that essence. The reader should be mindful that this was written while China was still under its imperial system of government with an emperor at its head, prior to the revolutions which established a republic and later a communist system that eschewed any state religion. Currently China is officially an atheist country. The CIA World Factbook reports China's religions as Daoist (Taoist), Buddhist, Christian 3%-4%, Muslim 1%-2%. (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ch.html on Feb 4, 2013), therefore although this eBook is over 100 years old, it is still relevant to modern China's culture and traditions.