Flourishing Fasts: Vegetarian Sects in Late Imperial and Modern Chinese Societies
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Nikolas Broy's study of China's vegetarian religious sects is less about diet than about social structure, regional identity, and religious continuity across centuries.
Focused on the Zhaijiao—groups that took shape in southeastern China during the Ming and Qing dynasties and remain active today in Taiwan—Flourishing Feasts examines how these sects functioned within a layered and often contested religious landscape.
Broy, an associate professor at Rikkyo University in Tokyo teaching East Asian history, culture, and religion, begins well before the Late Imperial period to establish the historical and religious background needed to understand how these groups emerged. What follows is not merely a portrait of the Zhaijiao themselves, but a richly detailed view of the social and religious structures in which they were embedded—structures that vary sharply by region and period.
This is not introductory reading. Its depth of documentation and attention to social, architectural, mythological, and historical detail will be most rewarding to readers with a grounding in Chinese religious history or a sustained interest in the region's complex social fabric
Hardcover. Color and black-and-white photos.
Published on December 1, 2025
