Skip to main content
Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship

Zion Earth Zen Sky

Charles Shirō Inouye

ZEZS.jpeg


I am Japanese but was born and raised in rural central Utah. At first, my parents were afraid that our involvement with the Church would weaken our grounding in Japanese tradition. As it turned out, it only reinforced my interest in animism, Buddhism, and other aspects of Japanese culture. As a scholar of Japanese culture, I have discovered that Latter-day Saint culture and Mahayana Buddhist culture are similar in many ways, and that the paths to the building up of Zion, on the one hand, and to Zen enlightenment, on the other, are one and the same.

The genius of both faith traditions lies in how they push the abstract ideas of salvation down into the world of material practice. Raking sand in a Zen garden reminds us that mortality is similarly a “high maintenance” situation, where constant service is required if we are to grasp our purpose here on earth.

Buy Print $19.95

Charles Shirō Inouye

facultyInouye-150x150.jpeg
Charles Shirō Inouye is Professor of Japanese Literature and Visual Culture at Tufts University. He researches and teaches premodern and modern Japanese literature, including issues of figurality and the development of modern consciousness, gothic studies, realism, lyricism, and animism. He is author of Japanese Gothic Tales by Izumi Kyoka (University of Hawaii Press, 1996), The Similitude of Blossoms -- a Critical Biography of Izumi Kyoka, Japanese Playwright and Novelist (Harvard University Press, 1998), In Light of Shadows: More Gothic Tales by Izumi Kyoka (University of Hawaii Press, 2004), Evanescence and Form: An Introduction to Japanese Culture (Palgrave Press, 2008).

Additional Information

  • Publication Information

    Subject: Mormon Studies

    Publication Year: 2021

    Language: English

    Price: $19.95

    Imprint: Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship