Skip to main content

Issues of Impermanence: Christian and Early Buddhist Contemplations of Time

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Purgatory
  • 288 Accesses

Abstract

It is my thesis that Early Buddhism, Roman Catholicism, and the Protestant Reformation each developed constructs to address impermanence and unsatisfactory problems associated with time. I will explore these differences through the Roman Catholic Purgatory, the Protestant Reformation that rejected Purgatory, and Early Buddhism that saw enlightenment as an end to the ignorance of trying to make permanent that which is impermanent.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Pali Canon Buddhist Texts Referenced

  • I. B. Horner (tr.) (1999) The Middle Length Sayings, Vol. III (Oxford: Pali Text Society).

    Google Scholar 

  • C. Rhys Davids (tr.) (1980) The Book of the Kindred Sayings, Vol. III. (Oxford: Pali Text Society).

    Google Scholar 

References

  • L. Blanchard (2012) ‘Burning Yourself: Paṭicca Samuppāda as a Description of the Arising of a False Sense of Self Modeled on Vedic Rituals’, Journal of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies 2, 36–83.

    Google Scholar 

  • S. Collins (1996) Nirvana and other Buddhist Felicities (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

    Google Scholar 

  • B. Dessein (2016) ‘Progress and Free Will: On the Buddhist Concept of ‘Time’ and Its Possibilities for Modernity’, Asian Studies 4:1, 11–33.

    Google Scholar 

  • C. M. N. Eire (2010) A Brief History of Eternity (Princeton: Princeton University Press).

    Google Scholar 

  • F. J. Hoffman (1987) Rationality & Mind in Early Buddhism (Delhi: Motilal Banasaridass).

    Google Scholar 

  • D. Keown (2001) The Nature of Buddhist Ethics (New York: Palgrave).

    Google Scholar 

  • C. Ketcham (2015) ‘Meaning Without Ego’, Journal of the Philosophy of Life 5:3, 112–133.

    Google Scholar 

  • S. B. King (1991) Buddha Nature (Albany, NY: SUNY Press).

    Google Scholar 

  • J. Le Goff (1984) The Birth of Purgatory A. Goldhammer (tr.) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).

    Google Scholar 

  • J. Li (2016) ‘What is Time? Yogācāra-Buddhist Meditation on the Problem of the External World in the Treatise on the Perfection of Consciousness-only (Cheng weishi lun)’, Asian Studies 20:1, 35–57.

    Google Scholar 

  • P. Marshall (2015) ‘After Purgatory: Death and Remembeerance in the Reformation World’ in T. Rasmussen and J. O. Flaeten (eds.) Preparing for Death, Remembering the Dead (Gottingen: Vanderhoeck & Ruprecht, GmbH & Co.), pp. 25–44.

    Google Scholar 

  • D. Matsunaga and A. Matsunaga (1972) The Buddhist Concept of Hell (New York: Philosophical Library).

    Google Scholar 

  • H. S. Prasad (1991). Essays on time in Buddhism. Delhi, Sri Satguru Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • F. H. Ross (1953) The Meaning of Life in Hinduism and Buddhism (Boston: Beacon Press).

    Google Scholar 

  • J. D. Scotus (1994). Contingency and Freedom: John Duns Scotus Lectura I 39 A. Vos Jaczn, H. Veldhuis, A. H. Looman-Graaskamp, E. Dekker, N. W. Den Bok (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers).

    Google Scholar 

  • M. Siderits (2007) Buddhism as Philosophy: An Introduction (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing).

    Google Scholar 

  • M. Weber, R. Baehr, and G. C. Wells (2002) The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism And Other Writings (New York: Routledge).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2017 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Ketcham, C. (2017). Issues of Impermanence: Christian and Early Buddhist Contemplations of Time. In: Vanhoutte, K., McCraw, B. (eds) Purgatory. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57891-0_15

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics