This study addresses the relationship between the veneration of Buddha relics and the appropriation of power in early medieval Japan. Focusing on the ninth to the fourteenth centuries, it analyzes the ways in which relics functioned as material media for the interactions of Buddhist clerics, the imperial family, lay aristocrats, and warrior society and explores the multivocality of relics by dealing with specific historical examples. Brian Ruppert argues that relics offered means for reinforcing or subverting hierarchical relations. The author's critical literary and anthropological analyses attest to the prominence of relic veneration in government, in lay practice associated with the maintenance of the imperial line and warrior houses, and in the promotion of specific Buddhist sects in Japan.

Ruppert's Jewel in the Ashes is an important contribution to the study of the material culture of Buddhism. Specialists in Buddhist studies, Japanese Buddhism, and Japanese religions will not be the only ones who will find this work of value. Historians of Japan, especially of the relations between social, political, and military powers and religion, will also find it rewarding, as will those interested in gender issues in medieval religion.
-- Richard K. Payne Journal of Japanese Studies