Open AccessSACRED PLACES IN BUDDHISM OR THE PLACE OF THE SACRED IN BUDDHISM
Author(s) -
Antoaneta Nikolova
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
revista de antropología y filosofía de lo sagrado/revista de antropología y filosofía de lo sagrado
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2603-6053
pISSN - 2530-1233
DOI - 10.24310/raphisa.2017.v0i2.4312
Subject(s) - buddhism , enlightenment , mandala , opposition (politics) , philosophy , meaning (existential) , aesthetics , epistemology , theology , politics , law , political science
Abstract: The paper aims to examine the meaning of sacredness in such a religion as Buddhism where there is no idea of God or any supernatural being. Instead, there are elaborated inner practices for achieving enlightenment. The paper consists of two parts. The first one analyses the place of the sacred in Buddhism considering the two important concepts of samsara and nirvana. The second part discusses sacred places in Buddhism comparing two different space structures: stupa as representative for a vertical structure and mandala for a horizontal one. On the base of juxtaposing these seemingly opposite concepts and structures the paper reveals that in terms of Buddhism the real sacredness is non-sacredness: a term that transcends the opposition sacred-profane and expresses the specific Buddhist vision of non-duality.Key words: Buddhism; sacred-profane; non-duality