festivals
the bodhisattva Amitābha, into which a person strives to be reborn by
means of a combination of performing good deeds and faith, although a
shorter version of the basic text—Pure Land Sūtra—claims that only
faith and prayer are necessary. When Pure Land Buddhism enters Japan
during the Kamakura era (1185–1333), the fundamental tension between
works and faith continues to be discussed by thinkers such as Hōnen,
founder of the Jōdo (Pure Land) school, and his disciple Shinran (1173–
1262), who establishes the Jōdo Shinshu (True Pure Land) sect. Both
men agree that they are living during a dark period of history when the
doctrine of Buddhism finds itself in a state of decline, but they disagree
about the effort that a person can make to be saved, although they also
agree that faith is essential for salvation by means of the grace of
Amitābha.
Further reading: Kierkegaard (1954); Olson (2005, 2007); Otto (1928); Smith
(1979)
FESTIVALS
These are special times during the course of a year when ordinary work
is suspended while people celebrate some event. Often, social distinc-
tions are obliterated during festivals. During the Western medieval Feast
of Fools, the town fool becomes a monarch for a day, thereby overturning
the social order. Festivals can work to re-establish a relational bond
between a devotee and a deity. The festival’s ability to overturn pre-
established social structures and to reunite parties suggests that the festi-
val forms a basis for change and stability. Festivals represent a time that
is repetitive in two fundamental senses: it repeats actions of the divine
beings and often re-enacts the birth of the cosmos, and thereby represents
renewal. The Hindu Sastri festival celebrates, for instance, the victory of
Skanda, a son of the high god Śiva, over demonic beings, which saves
cultural order and ushers in a new age.
An essential feature of festivity is excess, a combination of destruction
and waste, accompanied by dancing, singing, eating, and drinking. This
joyous time is pure revelry, during which participants excessively over-
indulge with respect to festival activities. A wonderful example of such a
situation is the Holi festival in India celebrating devotion to Krishna,
during which devotees act as the deity’s cowherd companions by dousing
others with brightly colored dyes and water, and women beat men with
sticks and wet rags This represents a return to a primordial chaos that is