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Volume 31 2024

Buddhism and the State

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ISSN 1076-9005
Volume 31, 2024

Buddhism and the State: Rājadhamma after the Sattelzeit

Lajos Brons

Rājadhamma is a list of ten royal virtues or duties that occurs in the jātaka tales and that has been influential in Southeast Asian Buddhist political thought. Like pre-modern political thought in Europe—that is, thought before the Sattelzeit—Buddhist political thought lacks a concept of the “state” and is concerned with kings and similar rulers. Here I propose a modernized interpretation of rājadhamma as virtues/duties of the state.   Read article

Volume 31 2024

Economic Justice in the Buddhist Tradition

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Volume 31, 2024

Economic Justice in the Buddhist Tradition

Christopher Queen
Harvard University

Buddhism is widely associated today with progressive values and exemplary models of economic life. The idea of “Buddhist economics” was paired with the slogan “small is beautiful” by the economist E. F. Schumacher in 1973. Voluntary simplicity, renunciation, and a middle path between self-indulgence and self-denial are seen as keys to sustainable levels of acquisition and consumption. Buddhist kindness and compassion are thought to inspire charitable giving to the poor, and right livelihood to promote occupations of service to society. Yet the history of Buddhist economics does not always support these assumptions. Traditional beliefs in karma and merit-making do not align with modern ideas of justice. We examine the Buddhist record in areas of social equality, property, natural resources, products, wealth, income, jobs, and taxation. Each section surveys Buddhist economics in the Theravāda cultures of South and Southeast Asia; the Mahāyāna cultures that flourished in India, China, Tibet, and East Asia; and the modern period, marked by the rise of Engaged Buddhism in Asia and the West. At each stage we find distinctive teachings and practices in the economic sphere. Read article

Volume 31 2024

Buddhist Performing Arts in Modern Thai Buddhism

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Volume 31, 2024

Buddhist Performing Arts: Thematizing Gender and Developing a New Pedagogy in Modern Thai Buddhism

Martin Seeger
University of Leeds

Apirak Chaipanha
Burapha University

Naris Charaschanyawong
Independent Scholar

This article sets out to describe and reflect on the development, execution, and impact of two devised theatre performances that the authors of this paper designed as an innovative and effective way of engaging audiences with Buddhist teachings and gender issues in Thai Buddhism. Based on long-term research into the biographies, soteriological practice and teaching, and veneration of historical Thai female Buddhist practitioners, each of these two plays was staged publicly twice in or near Bangkok in 2018 and 2019 respectively. We will discuss how the educational potential of performing arts can be harnessed to change understandings of audiences and performers or, at least, prompt their curiosity in the study of Buddhism, both as a doctrinal system and in terms of aspects of current religious practices, understandings, and perceptions. Read article

Volume 31 2024

Memento Mori in Dōgen’s 12 Fascicles Collection

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Volume 31, 2024

“The Shadow of the Whip:” Memento Mori in Dōgen’s 12 Fascicles Collection (十二卷本集)

Steven Heine
Florida International University

This paper offers a reexamination and reevaluation of the philosophical meaning and significance of Dōgen’s 道元 (1200-1253) last text that was left unfinished shortly before he died and was lost for centuries after that. The main message of the work concerns the inviolability of karmic causality (inga 因果) and the need to offer sincere repentance (zange 懺悔) for offenses committed. For various reasons, I refer to the final text as the 12 Fascicles Collection (Jūnikanbon-shū 十二卷本集) instead of using the customary moniker of the “12-fascicle Shōbōgenzō” (Jūnikanbon Shōbōgenzō 十二卷本正法眼蔵), which implies it is one of several versions of Dōgen’s masterwork. The title of this paper, drawn from a passage in the “Shime (Four Horses)” fascicle of the Collection, highlights that a true Buddhist practitioner learns to respond to an awareness of the imminence of finitude and mortality like a proverbial splendid horse that spontaneously “races off upon seeing the shadow of the whip” (mi ben’ei nigyō 見鞭影而行). This image suggests the steed does not suffer the rider’s reprimands, or to put it another way, a true aspirant need not be prodded to obey the law of causality because he knows how to conduct himself in a principled way in every circumstance. The 12-Fascicles Collection should also be seen as the result of Dōgen’s effort to curate the legacy of his general instructional outlook by rewriting or recasting some of his earlier essays and themes while crafting a timeless primer of basic Buddhist tenets. Its memento mori approach has a resonance with Kamakura-period deathbed practices and morality tales (setsuwa bungaku 説話文学). Read article

Volume 31 2024

A Comparison Between the “Gift Debate” in French Postmodern Thought and Dāna-Pāramitā in Mahāyāna Buddhism

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Volume 31, 2024

Emptiness and Otherness: A Comparison Between the “Gift Debate” in French Postmodern Thought and Dāna-Pāramitā in Mahāyāna Buddhism

Mingyi Xiao
University of California, Santa Barbara

This article delves into the intersection of Western postmodern thought’s “gift debate,” rooted in Marcel Mauss’s work and continued by Jacques Derrida and Jean-Luc Marion, and Mahāyāna Buddhism’s practice of dāna (almsgiving). Examining parallels, the paper identifies resonances in two dimensions. Firstly, in the realm of truth, the wisdom of “three-fold emptiness” in Madhyamaka Buddhism offers insights into the paradoxical nature of the gift, reconciling Derrida’s scarcity and Marion’s abundance perspectives. Secondly, ethically, the emphasis on the “other” in the gift prompts reflection on dāna’s motives, deepening our understanding of self-other relationships in Buddhism. This exploration seeks to facilitate a comparative dialogue between postmodern thought and Mahāyāna Buddhism, unraveling philosophical, ethical, and religious dimensions within the act of giving.
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Volume 31 2024

Review: Precepts, Ordinations, and Practice in Medieval Japanese Tendai

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Volume 31, 2024

Precepts, Ordinations, and Practice in Medieval Japanese Tendai. Studies in East Asian Buddhism 31. By Paul Groner. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2022, xvii + 376 pages, ISBN 978-0-8248-9274-6 (hardback), $68.00, 978-0-8248-9328-6 (paperback), $20.00.

Reviewed by Bryan D. Lowe

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Volume 31 2024

Special Issue in Honor of Charles Hallisey

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Volume 31, 2024

Becoming a Student, Remaining a Student, Never Less than a Student: A Special Issue in Honor of Charles Hallisey

Karen Derris, University of Redlands
Natalie Gummer, Beloit College
Maria Heim, Amherst College

This Special Issue in honor of Charles Hallisey is edited by three friends and colleagues who began studying with him in the 1990’s. We asked twenty-four contributors—drawn from Hallisey’s students and colleagues—to reflect in short essays on how Charles Hallisey’s work on “moral anthropology” has influenced their work in Buddhist ethics and literature. Hallisey’s felicitations of two of his own teachers begin the collection, and an Afterword by Wendy Doniger completes it. We also include a consolidated transcript based on two interviews with Hallisey conducted by Natalie Gummer in the Summer and Fall of 2023. This introduction sets out some of the interventions of Hallisey’s work in Buddhist ethics and the major themes of the contributors.
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Volume 31 2024

From Metaphors to Life in Tibetan Settlements and Back Again: Space, an Important Factor for Resilient Response to the Suffering Caused by Armed Conflict

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Volume 31, 2024

From Metaphors to Life in Tibetan Settlements and Back Again: Space, an Important Factor for Resilient Response to the Suffering Caused by Armed Conflict

Diane Denis
Rangjung Yeshe Institute, Katmandu University

This paper is concerned with the interface between Buddhism and humanitarian principles in the context of the forced displacement of civilians due to armed conflict. It seeks to highlight how humanitarian activities can be informed by a resilience-oriented language and by its landscape of dignity. At issue are not only the repercussions of wartime violence, but also the problems of how we conceive the harm done and its effects, and how we account (or not) for resilient responses. By drawing on the spiritual, philosophical, and psychological insights of Tibetan Buddhist textual traditions, some effects of violations of international humanitarian law (IHL) are addressed. Inspired by Lewis’s ethnographic research in Tibetan settlements, this paper focuses on the metaphor of space and related life-enhancing “technologies.” In so doing, it also contributes to the discussions over some of the potential problems with the trauma/victim narrative as addressed by sociologist Fassin. The main aim is to contribute to scholarly discussions on forced displacement, and to inform aid agencies and policy-makers who can contribute to lessening the suffering of all those who may be involved or unwillingly caught in armed conflict.
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Volume 31 2024

Phases of the Buddhist Approach to the Environment

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Volume 31, 2024

Phases of the Buddhist Approach to the Environment

Johannes Cairns
University of Helsinki

Various typologies of Buddhist ecophilosophies have been proposed but they have overlooked temporal dynamics and the relationship between beliefs and practice. I address this research gap by proposing a three-tier diachronic scheme. The first premodern phase featured a mixed bag of attitudes and behaviors in relation to ecology, with some being supportive of environmental ethics and others subversive. The second phase arose with the early counterculture environmental movement and consisted of ecophilosophies and activism with limited influence. The third phase started in the mid-1990s with political acknowledgement of the ecocrisis and has gained momentum. It consists of global adoption of ecophilosophies and environmental practices, including conservative Asian organizations, and new radical ecology. The dynamics indicate that a tradition of accommodating to prevailing political paradigms may have obstructed Buddhist environmentalism in the past but could facilitate it in the future.
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Volume 30 2023

Indian Traditionalism in Eihei Dōgen’s Shoaku makusa

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Volume 30, 2023

Indian Traditionalism in Eihei Dōgen’s Shoaku makusa

Victor Forte
Albright College

Eihei Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō fascicle Shoaku makusa (“Not Producing Evil”), was presented during the early period of his career, while leading a small group of monastic and lay followers at the Kōshōji temple in Kyoto. Derived from the early Buddhist universal precept and inspired by the Indian ideal of bodhisattvic moral freedom within the dharmadhātu, this work primarily served as a corrective for antinomian inherent awakening doctrine. The ethical implications of this corrective are best understood in the context of Indian Mahāyāna philosophy, an often-overlooked influence on Dōgen’s thought. Not only are such influences to be found in the Shoaku makusa fascicle, but throughout Dōgen’s career, in earlier works like the Shōbōgenzō zuimonki, and later fascicles like Sanjūshichihon bodaibunpō, “The Thirty-seven Factors of Awakening,” and Hotsu bodaishin, “Raising the Mind of Enlightenment,” which were also concerned with the meaning of moral practice from an Indian Buddhist standpoint.
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Volume 30 2023

Abandoning the Monastic Training Rules in the Pāli Canon

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Volume 30, 2023

The Function and Contemporary Role of sikkhāpaccakkhāna (Abandoning the Training Rules) in the Pāli Canon

Chandima Gangodawila
Ronin Institute

This article examines the intricacies of abandoning the monastic training rules (sikkhāpaccakkhāna) in key Pāli sūtta and Vinaya texts to better understand how these textual sources, in addition to early modern Sri Lankan monastics as well as the contemporary saṅgha, have understood the abandonment of the training rules not as a spiritual failure, but rather as a set of pragmatic monastic principles that emphasize the retention of monkhood and the continuity of the Buddhasāsana. To demonstrate this, I propose an innovative approach to examining the first pārājika (concerning sexual intercourse) in relation to the sikkhāpaccakkhāna by considering Pāli sūttas, Vinaya texts, and the example of noncelibate seventeenth-century Laṅkān gaņinnānse (non-bhikkhu monks). I conclude by arguing that the contemporary Sri Lankan saṅgha can use sikkhāpaccakkhāna to avoid falling into the first pārājika, which provides a basis for reordination and thus a more human-centered framework for supporting the stability and duration of the Buddhasāsana.
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Volume 30 2023

Buddhism and the Role of Ritual in Processing Grief and Ambiguous Loss

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Volume 30, 2023

The Missing and Their Families: Buddhism and the Role of Ritual in Processing Grief and Ambiguous Loss

Alex Wakefield
Independent Scholar

This article considers the support that Buddhist ritual practices may offer families and relatives of missing people. Families of missing individuals experience a specifically defined form of grief known as ambiguous loss. Such loss is usually denied the traditional funerary or commemorative practices of other forms of bereavement. Nevertheless, psychologists and humanitarian organizations stress the importance of such practices and their socio-cultural context as a way for families to effectively process ambiguous loss. I highlight the value in these practices coming from Buddhist religious groups within Buddhist communities, while noting that disappearances often present exceptionally difficult circumstances for many religious traditions, including Buddhism. Examples are drawn from the Pāli Nikāyas supporting the argument for a “reconfiguration” of ritual to meet these needs, and case studies are cited to demonstrate religious communities supporting, via ritual practices, families of missing individuals. I therefore propose ritual as an element of Buddhist praxis that may effectively address the psychological and social requirements for families of missing people.
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Volume 30 2023

Legal Reasoning About Displacement and Responsibility

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Volume 30, 2023

Legal Reasoning About Displacement and Responsibility: A Dialogue Between the Buddhist Monastic Discipline and IHL

Christina A. Kilby
James Madison University

Civilian displacement is a common consequence of armed conflict with grave humanitarian implications. In this article, I analyze Buddhist codes of monastic discipline in order to illuminate how these legal traditions have reasoned about the significance of home and the harms of displacement. I then bring my findings into conversation with the legal reasoning that international humanitarian law (IHL) requires of parties to armed conflict whose decisions may result in displacement of civilians. I argue that both IHL and the Buddhist monastic codes take into account responsibility for the causes of harm, for direct harm, and for the reverberating fallout of harm. By exploring the ethical values and reasoning habits that these two traditions hold in common, Buddhist actors—in military and civil society—may strengthen their commitment to prevent displacement and to protect displaced people and their hosts during times of conflict.

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Volume 30 2023

Review: New Perspectives in Modern Korean Buddhism

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Volume 30, 2023

New Perspectives in Modern Korean Buddhism: Institution, Gender, and Secular Society. Edited by Hwansoo Ilmee Kim and Jin Y. Park. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 2022, ix + 334 pages, ISBN 978-1-4384-9131-8, $99.00 (hardback), 978-1-4384-9132-5, $36.95 (paperback).

Reviewed by Kevin Cawley

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Volume 30 2023

“Meditation Sickness” in Medieval Chinese Buddhism and the Contemporary West

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Volume 30, 2023

“Meditation Sickness” in Medieval Chinese Buddhism and the Contemporary West

C. Pierce Salguero
The Abington College of Penn State University

A certain percentage of people report experiencing adverse mental and physical side effects from practicing meditation. Contemporary scientific literature and personal reports from meditators are beginning to document the phenomenon, but centuries-old Buddhist texts also warned about the dangers of “meditation sickness.” Writings from medieval China not only identify the adverse mental and physical symptoms that can arise in the course of meditation practice, but also explain why these occur and how they can be effectively treated. Might these materials contain important therapeutic in-formation that is relevant for meditators today? What would be required to make this historical knowledge accessible for contemporary practitioners and clinicians? And do our disciplinary norms as religious studies scholars even allow us to ask such questions?

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Volume 30 2023

Review: Buddhism and Comparative Constitutional Law

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Volume 30, 2023

Buddhism and Comparative Constitutional Law. Edited by Tom Ginsburg and Benjamin Schonthal. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022, xx + 384 pages, ISBN 978-1-00-928604-6 (hardback), $125.00, 978-1-00-928601-5 (e-book), $125.00, 978-1-00-928602-2 (open access PDF): https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/buddhism-and-comparative-constitutional-law/36B349A13BAFF639EC6E737A9C9FB186.

Reviewed by Miguel Álvarez Ortega

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Volume 30 2023

Review: Buddhism and Waste

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Volume 30, 2023

Buddhism and Waste: The Excess, Discard, and Afterlife of Buddhist Consumption. Edited by Trine Brox and Elizabeth Williams-Oerberg. Bloomsbury Studies in Material Religion. London: Bloomsbury, 2022, 208 pages, ISBN 978-1-3501-9553-0 (hardback), $115, 978-1-3501-9554-4 (e-book), $103.50.

Reviewed by Mark Speece

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Volume 30 2023

A Tibetan Approach to Moral Phenomenological Praxis

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Volume 30, 2023

Lta sgom spyod gsum: A Tibetan Approach to Moral Phenomenological Praxis

Colin H. Simonds
Queen’s University at Kingston

This article unpacks the Tibetan framework of lta sgom spyod gsum, or view, meditation, action, and relates it to the Buddhist ethical project of moral phenomenology. It first investigates how the framework has been defined and used both descriptively and practically in Tibetan primary texts. It then nuances this usage by identifying key aspects of its deployment in Tibetan contexts, including how view is prioritized among the three limbs, how the unity of view and action is the intended fruition of practice, and how there is a specific order of operations in its implementation. This article then relates lta sgom spyod gsum directly to the ethical project of moral phenomenology and demonstrates how it can be mobilized as the practical arm of this unique¬ly Buddhist ethical theory. Thus, this article presents a robust reading of lta sgom spyod gsum in Tibetan Buddhist contexts, contributes to the ongoing development of the ethical theory of moral phenomenology, and provides further avenues for engaging the Tibetan Buddhist ethical tradition with the moral issues facing us today.

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Volume 30 2023

Are Ethnocentric/Nationalist Buddhists Engaged Buddhists? Certainly Not.

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Volume 30, 2023

Are Ethnocentric/Nationalist Buddhists Engaged Buddhists? Certainly Not.

Sallie B. King
James Madison University

This is a brief response to Donna Lynn Brown’s article, “Beyond Queen and King: Democratizing ‘Engaged Buddhism’,” (Journal of Buddhist Ethics Vol. 30, 2023) and indirectly to others who have argued that ethnocentric and/or nationalist Buddhism could be a part of Engaged Buddhism. To this question, I will argue that this is not possible. Secondarily, I take up the question of the “oneness” of Engaged Buddhism.

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Volume 30 2023

Engaged Buddhism at Sixty-Five

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Volume 30, 2023

Engaged Buddhism at Sixty-Five: Nuancing The Consensus

Christopher Queen
Harvard University

After more than 65 years of public activism and social service by engaged Buddhists in Asia and the West, it is time to reconsider the nature of engaged Buddhism and how faithfully it has been represented by scholars. In “Beyond Queen and King: Democratizing ‘Engaged Buddhism,’” Donna Lynn Brown argues that the category should be expanded to include “overlooked Buddhists” who may have traditional, ethnic, national, state-supported, or conservative orientations; those who perform social service; and those who engage in violence. Furthermore, Brown claims that engaged Buddhism is a narrative imposed by Western scholars on Asian Buddhists who may not know or approve of it. In this response, I will focus on three characteristics of engaged Buddhism that Brown and other scholars she cites have misunderstood or rejected in their critique: (1) the practice of compassionate service by engaged Buddhists; (2) the commitment of engaged Buddhists to nonviolent social change; and (3) the decentralized, hybrid, and evolving nature of engaged Buddhist ideology and praxis which reflects the contribution of voices and values from Asia and the West.

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Volume 30 2023

Review: Buddhism under Capitalism

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Volume 30, 2023

Buddhism under Capitalism. Edited by Richard K. Payne and Fabio Rambelli. London: Bloomsbury, 2022, 280 pages, ISBN 978-1-350-22832-0 (hardback), $90.00, 978-1-350-22833-7 (paperback), $29.95, 978-1-350-22835-1 (e-book), $26.95.

Reviewed by Stephen Christopher

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Volume 30 2023

Democratizing “Engaged Buddhism”

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Volume 30, 2023

Beyond Queen and King: Democratizing “Engaged Buddhism”

Donna Lynn Brown
University of Manitoba

What counts as Buddhist social engagement? Why, in Buddhist Studies, do certain forms of engagement and certain Buddhists often not count? This article argues that the limits that scholars Christopher S. Queen and Sallie B. King placed around Buddhist engagement in the 1990s—limits that produced a rough consensus in Buddhist Studies—should be democratized to include all Buddhists and their social engagement. For years, criticism of these limits and research that circumvents them have appeared without seriously undermining them. However, 2022 may mark a turning point. In that year, two publications, by Paul Fuller and Alexander Hsu, offered comprehensive and convincing arguments for considering all Buddhists’ socially oriented activities “engaged.” This article examines the consensus on the nature of Buddhist engagement, its origins in activism, research that dissents from it, and critiques it has faced. The article assesses dissent and critiques and considers why, until recently, they have had little effect. It then discusses why Fuller’s and Hsu’s publications represent a turning point and proposes new areas of research beyond those even these two scholars suggest.

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Volume 30 2023

Review: Buddhist Visions of the Good Life for All

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Volume 30, 2023

Buddhist Visions of the Good Life for All. Edited by Sallie B. King. Routledge Critical Studies in Buddhism. Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2021, xvi + 256 pages, ISBN 978-0-367-56181-9 (hardback), $160, 978-1-00-310045-4 (e-book), $44.05.

Reviewed by Timothy Loftus

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Volume 29 2022

Ethos of the Great Perfection

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Volume 29, 2022

Ethos of the Great Perfection: Continual Mindfulness According to Patrul’s Foundational Manual

Marc-Henri Deroche
Kyoto University

This article investigates the role of mindfulness in the so-called foundational practices exposed in Dza Patrul Orgyan Jigme Chökyi Wangpo’s (1808–1887) famous manual, Words of My Perfect Teacher, which belongs to the Dzogchen lineage of the Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse within the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. It argues that, according to these spiritual instructions, the continual exercise of mindfulness, meta-awareness, and carefulness forms the “ethos of the Great Perfection”—the constant ethical base and the consistent way of life that supports the path of Dzogchen. Sources of Words of My Perfect Teacher (including Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra) and selected passages are analyzed in order to elucidate Patrul’s moral philosophy of mindful awareness and self-examination. The mnemonic, reflective, and attentional facets of the cultivation of mindfulness all work to internalize the ethical principles that govern the conduct of life, shaping new habits, exercising free will, and forming moral agency. They define the very ethos that articulates the value system and the re-orientation of attention. Such deliberate moment-by-moment mindfulness paves the way for discovering “instantaneous awareness,” the distinctive feature of Dzogchen, and for resting in its uninterrupted flow, from within to respond compassionately to other individuals and various circumstances.

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Volume 29 2022

Principles for Jōdo Shinshū Social Engagement

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Volume 29, 2022

Principles for Jōdo Shinshū Social Engagement

Jeff Wilson
Renison University College, University of Waterloo

Despite omission from much of the record of scholarship on Engaged Buddhism, Jōdo Shinshū Buddhism has significant potential for positive involvement with social causes. Here I propose six principles based on elements of the Jōdo Shinshū teachings that might inspire or inform efforts at reducing harm in the world. I further provide some examples of social engagement from Jōdo Shinshū history that demonstrate how they might be applied.

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Volume 29 2022

Review: Buddhist Philosophy of Life from the Vimalakīrti Sūtra

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Volume 29, 2022

Living Skillfully: Buddhist Philosophy of Life from the Vimalakīrti Sūtra. By Dale S. Wright. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021, 176 pages. ISBN 978-0-19-758735-5 (hard-back), $29.95/ 978-0-19-758737-9 (e-book), $19.99.

Reviewed by Christopher W. Gowans

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Volume 29 2022

Review: A Philosophical Exploration of Buddhist Ethics

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Volume 29, 2022

Buddhist Ethics: A Philosophical Exploration. By Jay L. Garfield. Buddhist Philosophy for Philosophers. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021, xiv + 231 pages, ISBN 978-0-19-090763-1 (hardback), $99/978-0-19-090764-8 (paperback), $24.95/978-0-19-090766-2 (e-book), $16.99.

Reviewed by Amod Lele

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Volume 29 2022

Review: Buddhist Statecraft in East Asia

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Volume 29, 2022

Buddhist Statecraft in East Asia. Edited by Stephanie Balkwill and James A. Benn. Studies on East Asian Religions 6. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2022, x + 191 pages, ISBN 978-90-04-51022-7 (open access e-book: https://brill.com/downloadpdf/ title/61003.pdf)/978-90-04-50961-0 (hardback), $125.00.

Reviewed by Yilun Zhai

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Volume 29 2022

Shabkar’s Narrative Argument for Vegetarianism and the Ethical Treatment of Animals

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Volume 29, 2022

Taking Animals Seriously: Shabkar’s Narrative Argument for Vegetarianism and the Ethical Treatment of Animals

Rachel H. Pang
Davidson College

Shabkar Tsokdruk Rangdrol’s (1781-1851) collected works present one of the most sustained treatments of vegetarianism and animal ethics in Tibetan literature. His arguments for vegetarianism adopt two main formats: philosophical prose and narrative. In this essay, I analyze Shabkar’s implicit argument for vegetarianism and the ethical treatment of animals in the narrative passages of his autobiography that describe his interactions with animals. By including animals as significant interlocutors in his autobiography, Shabkar reframes the relationship between animals and humans to be less anthropocentric and more based on the ideal of impartiality (phyogs ris med pa). In turn, this serves as an implicit narrative argument for the adoption of a vegetarian diet. This mode of argumentation differs from the majority of arguments for vegetarianism in Tibetan Buddhist literature which tend to be more philosophical in nature. Shabkar’s narrative mode of argument is an example of the “act of social imagination” first identified by Charles Hallisey and Anne Hansen in South and Southeast Asian Buddhist narratives. These types of narratives cultivate an ethical ideal in an audience by prompting the audience into an “act of social imagination” that in turn forms the foundation for moral agency.

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Volume 29 2022

Thich Nhat Hanh’s Ecological Humanism

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Volume 29, 2022

Collapsing Space and Time: Thich Nhat Hanh’s Ecological Humanism

Victor Thasiah
California Lutheran University

Identifying with non-human organisms, such as flora and fauna, and non-living members of the natural world, such as winds and clouds, was central to Thich Nhat Hanh’s (1926–2022) practice of Buddhism and conduct of resistance during the Vietnam War. This deep affinity with nature enabled him to “become himself” and sustain his public service and humanitarian work under duress. We examine Nhat Hanh’s extended accounts of identifying with the natural world during the war, relevant material from his 1962–1966 memoirs and 1963 poem “Butterflies over the Golden Mustard Fields.” They set out what we call his ecological humanism, his paradoxical overcoming of self-alienation through a close rapport with relatively wild nature. With no critical biography yet available, this focused, ecocritical interpretation, the first of its kind on Nhat Hanh during this major period, contributes to a better sense of the making of this global Buddhist influencer, who at the time was nominated by Martin Luther King, Jr. for the Nobel Peace Prize.

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Volume 29 2022

Review: Aesthetic Education at Tibet’s Mindröling Monastery

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Volume 29, 2022

A Buddhist Sensibility: Aesthetic Education at Tibet’s Mindröling Monastery. By Dominique Townsend. New York: Columbia University Press, 2021, 272 pages, ISBN 978-0-231-19487-7 (hardback), $120/978-0-231-19487-7 (paperback), $30/978-0-231-55105-2 (e-book), $29.99.

Reviewed by Nancy G. Lin

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Volume 28 2021

Aquinas and Mipham on Military and Punitive Violence

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Volume 28, 2021

Aquinas and Mipham on Military and Punitive Violence: A Tribute to Michael Jerryson

Damien Keown
Goldsmiths, University of London (Emeritus)

The claim that Buddhism is exclusively a “religion of peace” has been shown to be untenable. Buddhism now faces the challenge of explaining how the pacifist spirit of its teachings can be reconciled with its well-documented recourse to military and punitive violence. Buddhism is not the only religion to face this challenge, and we first consider the Christian stance on violence as formulated by St. Thomas Aquinas before turning to the views of the Tibetan polymath Jamgön Mipham. We consider to what extent the views of the two thinkers are compatible and conclude with a suggestion as to how what Michael Jerryson calls “the quandary of Buddhism and violence” might be resolved.

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Volume 28 2021

Review: Jewish Encounters with Buddhism

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Volume 28, 2021

American JewBu: Jews, Buddhists, and Religious Change. By Emily Sigalow. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2019, 280 pages, ISBN 978-0-691-17459-4 (hard-back), $29.95/978-0-691-22805-1 (paperback), $21.95.

Jewish Encounters with Buddhism in German Culture: Between Moses and Buddha, 1890–1940. Palgrave Series in Asian German Studies. By Sebastian Musch. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019, ix + 289 pages, ISBN 978-3-030-27468-9 (hardback), $99.99/978-3-030-27471-9 (paperback), $69.99/978-3-030-27469-6 (e-book), $54.99.

Reviewed by Mira Niculescu

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Volume 28 2021

Buddhist Ethics as Moral Phenomenology

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ISSN 1076-9005
Volume 28, 2021

Buddhist Ethics as Moral Phenomenology: A Defense and Development of the Theory

Colin Simonds
Queen’s University at Kingston

This article defends and develops the categorization of Buddhist ethics as moral phenomenology. It first examines the use of the term in Western philosophical settings and compares it to how the term is employed in Buddhist settings. After concluding that Western ethical comportment and Buddhist moral phenomenology are commensurate terms, it explores how moral phenomenology has been understood in Buddhist contexts and considers the evidence scholars have used to make this interpretation. The article then looks to the Tibetan Buddhist tradition for further evidence of a moral phenomenological approach to Buddhist ethics and analyzes further proof of this interpretation. Finally, issues that emerge from a moral phenomenological approach to ethics are addressed from a Tibetan Buddhist perspective to strengthen this interpretation and offer moral phenomenology as a viable alternative ethical system.

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Volume 28 2021

Pāli Vinaya Conceptions of Sex and Precedents for Transgender Ordination

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Volume 28, 2021

On Pāli Vinaya Conceptions of Sex and Precedents for Transgender Ordination

Brenna Grace Artinger
Independent Scholar

In this article I evaluate ideas of sex and behavior in Pāli Vinaya texts in order to better understand the roles of such terms and their consequences on monastic inclusion. I then contend with the ramifications of such terms on present-day considerations of ordination for transgender individuals, and the ways in which Vinaya texts provide legal precedent for such possibilities.

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Volume 28 2021

Mountain Propitiation Rituals in Human-Environmental Ethics in Sikkim

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Volume 28, 2021

Living with the Mountain: Mountain Propitiation Rituals in the Making of Human-Environmental Ethics in Sikkim

Kalzang Dorjee Bhutia
University of California Los Angeles

In 2019, a debate erupted in the eastern Himalayan Indian state of Sikkim over whether the Indian Government should allow climbers to attempt to summit Mount Kanchenjunga, the world’s third highest mountain, located on the western border of Sikkim and Nepal. For local communities in Sikkim, Kanchendzonga, as the mountain is known, is seen as the protector deity of the land and its human and nonhuman inhabitants. Summiting him is considered deeply disrespectful. Ritual and textual traditions in contemporary west Sikkim provide insight into how local Buddhists create and reaffirm their relationship with Kanchendzonga and provide context for understanding the 2019 debates. These traditions outline appropriate ethical behavior and function pedagogically to demonstrate how the mountain and humans have historically engaged in forms of reciprocal care, healing, and protection, and how they can continue to do so, thereby ensuring a generative future for all of Sikkim’s transdimensional residents.

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Volume 28 2021

Review: Choreographing the End of Life in Thailand

1 Comment
ISSN 1076-9005
Volume 28, 2021

The Spirit Ambulance: Choreographing the End of Life in Thailand. California Series in Public Anthropology 49. By Scott Stonington. Oakland, California: University of California Press, 2020, xvi + 187 pages, ISBN 978-0-520-34389-4 (hardback), $85.00/978-0-520-34390-0 (paperback), $29.95/ 978-0-520-97523-1 (e-book), $29.95.

Reviewed by Sean Hillman

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Volume 28 2021

The Existential and Soteriological Value of Saṃvega/Pasāda in Early Buddhism

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Volume 28, 2021

Aesthetic Emotions: The Existential and Soteriological Value of Saṃvega/Pasāda in Early Buddhism

Lisa Liang and Brianna K. Morseth
Dharma Realm Buddhist University

Across the globe, our continued existence in light of present conditions is uncertain. Rapid spread of disease and risk of complications endanger the human population. Such challenging circumstances may shock and devastate us, inducing mass panic and pandemonium amid the pervasive threat of pandemic. Yet according to Buddhist philosophy, existential unease can also spawn deep transformation. In this paper, we examine a pair of aesthetic emotions (saṃvega/pasāda) from the early Buddhist tradition that together hold the potential to induce critical reflection and productive engagement in response to existential threat. By referring to saṃvega/pasāda as aesthetic emotions, we intend to draw out their distinctive, often visually-oriented soteriological function. While initially disorienting and perhaps even paralyzing, saṃvega and pasāda are ultimately reorienting and motivating factors on the path to liberation from the suffering entailed by cyclic existence.

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Volume 28 2021

Review: Wilfrid Sellars and Buddhist Philosophy

3 Comments
ISSN 1076-9005
Volume 28, 2021

Wilfrid Sellars and Buddhist Philosophy: Freedom from Foundations. Edited by Jay L. Garfield. Routledge Studies in American Philosophy. London and New York: Routledge, 2019, 254 pages. ISBN 978-0-367-11209-7 (hardback), $128/978-1-03-209415-1 (paperback), $39.16/978-0-429-02794-9 (e-book), $44.05.

Reviewed by Matthew T. Kapstein

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Volume 28 2021

Buddhist Lessons in Pandemics and Politics

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Volume 28, 2021

Coronavirus and Ill-fated Crowns: Buddhist Lessons in Pandemics and Politics

Alexander McKinley
Loyola University Chicago

Synthesizing three retellings of the story about the Buddha curing a plague in the ancient city of Vesāli, this article argues that lessons from the narrative can help us analyze the modern coronavirus pandemic and critique political responses to it. From the ancient Pāli commentary of Buddhaghosa to Sinhala vernacular retellings by a medieval monk named Buddhaputra and a colonial-era layman named Vijēvikrama, the critical force of the story has seemingly grown over time. Along the way, these authors emphasize how the endless expansion of the city due to the material desires of its rulers was bound to exacerbate suffering by their grasping at impermanent forms. This philosophical insight is applicable to current problems, where the limitless materialism of global capitalism has also been overextended, altering climates and ecologies to generate new pathogens like the coronavirus. Countries that promised uninterrupted economic growth during the pandemic have in turn suffered its worst consequences. The story of Vesāli therefore remains ripe for many more retellings in the modern world, teaching that attention to a higher ideal of transcendent truth is more fruitful than material enrichment alone.

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Volume 28 2021

Review: The Meaning of Life in Asian and Western Thought

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Volume 28, 2021

Cross-Cultural Existentialism: On the Meaning of Life in Asian and Western Thought. By Leah Kalmanson. London and New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2020, 194 pp., ISBN 978-1-350-14001-1 (hardback), $115.00.

Reviewed by Nathan R. B. Loewen

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Volume 28 2021

Is Buddhism Individualistic? The Trouble with a Term

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Volume 28, 2021

Is Buddhism Individualistic? The Trouble with a Term

Donna Lynn Brown
University of Manitoba

Western scholars have been calling expressions of Buddhism “individualistic”—or denying the charge—since the 1800s. This article argues that “individualism” and related terms are sometimes problematic when applied to Buddhism. Because they are associated with Western modernity, they contribute to hegemonic discourses about Asia and Buddhism, skew representations, and reinforce stereotypes. Because their referents have been many and varied—including escaping caste and family, asociality, lay practice, and racism—their use leads to imprecision, confusion, and lack of comparability among analyses. And because they have moral connotations, they can blend observation with valuation and polemic. The article examines selected scholarly works that maintain or deny that Buddhism is individualistic, highlights problems associated with the term, and concludes that, in many cases, more precise and less value-laden descriptors should be found.

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Volume 28 2021

Review: The Teaching and Practice of Avataṃsaka Buddhism in Twentieth-Century China

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Volume 28, 2021

The Huayan University Network: The Teaching and Practice of Avataṃsaka Buddhism in Twentieth-Century China. By Erik J. Hammerstrom. New York: Columbia University Press, 2020, 288 pp., ISBN 978-0-231-19430-3 (hardback), $65.00.

Reviewed by Gregory Adam Scott

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Volume 28 2021

Review: Mindfully Facing Climate Change

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Volume 28, 2021

Mindfully Facing Climate Change. By Bhikkhu Anālayo. Barre, Massachusetts: Barre Center for Buddhist Studies, 2019, 206 pp., ISBN 978-1-7067-1988-5 (paperback), $9.95. Open access e-book: https://www.buddhistinquiry.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/MindfullyFacingClimateChange.pdf.

Reviewed by Abhinav Anand

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Volume 28 2021

Review: Buddhism, Politics, and Violence

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Volume 28, 2021

If You Meet the Buddha on the Road: Buddhism, Politics, and Violence. By Michael Jerryson. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018, 240 pp., ISBN 978-0-19-068356-6 (hardback), $115.00.

Reviewed by Manuel Litalien

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Volume 27 2020

Bodhisattva Relations with Machines?

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Volume 27, 2020

True Love for the Artificial? Toward the Possibility of Bodhisattva Relations with Machines

Thomas H. Doctor
Kathmandu University Centre for Buddhist Studies at Rangjung Yeshe Institute

Given our increasing interaction with artificial intelligence and immersion in virtual reality, which epistemic and moral attitudes towards virtual beings might we think proper, relevant, and fulfilling? That is the basic question that this article wishes to raise. For the main part, it presents a descriptive analysis of our current situation, which is meant to expose features of artificial intelligence (AI) and virtual reality (VR) that seem both salient and easily aligned with central Buddhist concerns. Developed without any requirement for, or expectation of, the existence of real subjects and selves, Buddhist views and practices clearly resonate with the assumptions of unreal mind and mere appearance that are associated with AI and VR. Yet Buddhists famously also declare that the illusion-like nature of things does not negate, but in fact entails, universal care and deep meaning. I conclude by suggesting that such doctrinal claims may be tested for practical relevance in the present and emerging world of interconnectivity and illusion.

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Volume 27 2020

Climate Justice: Some Challenges for Buddhist Ethics

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Volume 27, 2020

Climate Justice: Some Challenges for Buddhist Ethics

Simon P. James
Durham University

It has often been suggested that the Buddhist teachings can help us to meet the moral challenges posed by the climate crisis. This paper, by contrast, addresses some challenges the topic of climate justice presents for Buddhist ethics. Two arguments to the effect that Buddhist ethics is incompatible with calls for climate justice are considered and rejected. It is then argued that for Buddhists such calls must nonetheless take second place to the paramount concern with overcoming suffering.

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Volume 27 2020

Conference: Exploring Convergences Between Buddhism and International Humanitarian Law

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Volume 27, 2020

International Webinar Series on Buddhism and International Humanitarian Law

First in the series: Exploring Convergences Between Buddhism and International Humanitarian Law: An Introduction

Wednesday December 16th, 4:00-5:30 p.m. Bangkok/Jakarta time (9:00-10:30 a.m. UK time; 2:00-3:30 p.m. EST).

Speakers:
Prof. Peter Harvey, University of Sunderland, Emeritus
Prof. Kate Crosby, King’s College London
Dr. Asanga Tilakaratne, University of Colombo, Emeritus
Dr. Sunil Kariyakarawana, Buddhist Chaplain for the UK Armed Forces
Andrew Bartles-Smith, International Committee for the Red Cross, Regional Manager for Humanitarian Affairs in Asia

Moderator: Dr Pyi Phi Kyaw, Shan State Buddhist University

With simultaneous translation into Sinhala, Thai, Burmese, Indonesian

For information on the Webinar, and how to register so as to get the Zoom link for the event, click here: https://www.icrc.org/en/event/webinar-series-convergences-between-buddhism-and-ihl

Volume 27 2020

The Institutionalization of Feminine Enlightenment in Tibet’s First Khenmo Program

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Volume 27, 2020

Tilling the Fields of Merit: The Institutionalization of Feminine
Enlightenment in Tibet’s First Khenmo Program

Jue Liang and Andrew S. Taylor
University of Virginia

This article documents the history and social effects of the khenmo (mkhan mo) program at Larung Gar (Bla rung sgar), the first institution in Tibet to systematically grant nuns advanced Buddhist degrees. We argue that Jigme Phuntsok (’Jigs med phun tshogs, 1933-2004), Larung’s founder, started the program in hopes of challenging the public perception of women as incapable of advanced learning. Legitimating nuns as a field of merit for donors represented an important step in his larger project of changing the status of nuns and women in Tibetan society more generally. We begin with a brief history of Larung, demonstrating how Jigme Phuntsok’s singular vision of gender equality in Buddhist education and practice led to the arrival of thousands of nuns to his small encampment. We proceed to give an overview of the khenmo program, including its curriculum and degree requirements. We conclude with an examination of the social effects of the khenmo movement, exploring how the presence of educated nuns is changing both women’s self-understandings of their own practice and lay attitudes toward women’s religious capacities. Read article

Volume 27 2020

Violent Karma Stories in Contemporary Sinhala Buddhism

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Volume 27, 2020

Violent Karma Stories in Contemporary Sinhala Buddhism

James Stewart
Deakin University

Buddhism is a religion normally respected for its message of non-violence. In this article I will discuss how images of violence are used as a means to compel Buddhists to act in accordance with Buddhist ethical principles. This will be shown through the examination of a contemporary newspaper series from the popular Sinhala language Lankādīpa Irida periodical. In it, we find a series of karma stories that illustrate how examples of violence can be found in modern Buddhistic narratives, both in written and pictorial forms. In this article it will be argued that these modern narratives have a precedent in much earlier, and in some cases ancient, Buddhist writings and art. I will argue that these modern narratives deviate from canonical karma stories in that they focus on the maturation of karma in this life while the former focus on the afterlife. The purpose of these modern stories is to assure the reader of the reality of karma and to entertain the reader with gruesome stories that feature the death of moral transgressors. Read article

Volume 27 2020

Review: Readings of Śāntideva’s Guide to Bodhisattva Practice

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Volume 27, 2020

Readings of Śāntideva’s Guide to Bodhisattva Practice. Edited by Jonathan C. Gold and Douglas S. Duckworth. New York: Columbia University Press, 2019, 320 pp., ISBN 978-0-231-19267-5 (Paperback), $30.00.

Reviewed by Stephen Harris

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Volume 27 2020

A Tibetan Regent’s Economic Reforms and the Ethics of Rulership

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Volume 27, 2020

The Saṃgha and the Taxman: A Tibetan Regent’s Economic Reforms and the Ethics of Rulership

William K. Dewey
Rubin Museum of Art

This article examines how Tibetan Buddhists believed a state should be governed justly by considering the political agenda of the regent Ngawang Tsültrim (1721–1791) and how he was influenced by the Indian nītiśāstra tradition and similar indigenous traditions of ethical rule. Nītiśāstra originally, under Kauṭilya, promoted wealth and power. Later proponents (both Hindu and Buddhist) more strongly emphasized the primacy of Dharma and justice for the poor, and in this form it most influenced Tibetan Buddhist political thought, including the legislative decrees of Ngawang Tsültrim. He tried to relieve the Tibetan peasants from the heavy tax and labor obligations of the Tibetan social system, and otherwise pursued economic justice. In so doing, he also wanted to ensure that resources continued to flow to the Saṃgha, the supreme field of merit. Accordingly, the decrees targeted aristocratic rather than monastic corruption. They prioritized the maintenance and reform of existing economic obligations over economic development or redistribution of wealth. Ngawang Tsültrim’s decrees demonstrate a tension within the nītiśāstra tradition which can also be found when today’s religions (including socially engaged Buddhism) pursue goals of social justice. These goals may conflict with the goal of spreading the faith, and especially with the social and financial structures that support religious institutions, but may be responsible for social ills. Read article

Volume 27 2020

The Buddha versus Popper: When to Live?

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Volume 27, 2020

The Buddha versus Popper: When to Live?

Jongjin Kim
Korea University
Rohit Parikh
The Graduate Center and Brooklyn College, City University of New York

We discuss two approaches to life: presentism and futurism. We locate presentism within various elements of Buddhism, in the form of advice to live in the present and not to allow the future to hinder us from living in the ever present now. By contrast, futurism, which we identify with Karl Popper, advises us to think of future consequences before we act, and to act now for a better future. Of course, with its emphasis on a well-defined path to an ideal future ideally culminating in enlightenment, Buddhism undoubtedly has elements of futurism as well. We do not intend to determine which of these two approaches to time is more dominant in Buddhism, nor how the two approaches are best understood within Buddhism; but simply we intend to compare and contrast these two approaches, using those presentist elements of Buddhism as representative of presentism while contrasting them with those elements of futurism to be found in Popper and others. We will discuss various aspects of presentism and futurism, such as Ruth Millikan’s Popperian animal, the psychologist Howard Rachlin’s social and temporal discounting, and even the popular but controversial idea, YOLO (you only live once). The primary purpose of this paper is to contrast one with the other. The central question of ethics is: How should one live? Our variation on that question is: When should one live? We conjecture that the notion of flow, developed by Csikszentmihalyi, may be a better optimal choice between these two positions. Read article

Volume 27 2020

Can an Evil Person Attain Rebirth in the Pure Land?

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Volume 27, 2020

Can an Evil Person Attain Rebirth in the Pure Land? Ethical and Soteriological Issues in the Pure Land Thought of Peng Shaosheng (1740-1796)

Hongyu Wu
Ohio Northern University

In Pure Land literature in China, it is not uncommon to find accounts about morally flawed or evil persons attaining rebirth in the Pure Land. The rebirth of evil persons in the Pure Land, in fact, is an issue that can work both for and against Pure Land proponents. On the one hand, the soteriological inclusiveness of evil persons can be employed by promoters to prioritize Pure Land belief and practice over other forms of Buddhist thought and practice. On the other hand, belief in the saving power of Amitābha Buddha might discourage people from doing good or, even worse, legitimize evil behavior—a point that critics both within and outside the Buddhist community were quick to point out. The moral failures of Pure Land practitioners surely garnered criticism and hostility that were directed both toward the individual and toward the Pure Land teachings—and, as Pure Land beliefs and practices in China were not sectarian, the misconducts of the Pure Land practitioners could eventually damage the reputation of the whole Buddhist community. This paper focuses on Peng Shaosheng, a Confucian literatus turned Buddhist layman and a prominent advocate of Pure Land practice, to examine how he employed a syncretic approach by drawing on concepts such as karmic retribution, sympathetic resonance (ganying), no-good (wushan), and ultimate good (zhishan) to develop a scheme that neither denied the saving power of Amitābha Buddha and supremacy of Pure Land practice nor endorsed “licensed evil.” Read article

Volume 26 2019

The Global Refugee Crisis and the Gift of Fearlessness

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Volume 26, 2019

The Global Refugee Crisis and the Gift of Fearlessness

Christina A. Kilby
James Madison University

This article is a critical-constructive application of the Buddhist ethical concept of the gift of fearlessness (abhayadāna) to the global refugee crisis and to nativist policy responses. Investigating classical South Asian literary sources on the gift of fearlessness, typically glossed as the offer of refuge or protection to those in danger, I present today’s refugee as situated at the nexus of two types of fear: the fear that drives vulnerable people to flee from harm and the fear that drives a potential refuge-offering state to close its borders or build walls. I argue that the gift of fearlessness, if extended beyond its classical scope to include the challenges of xenophobia and terrorism threats, is a capacious framework through which to probe the moral contours of contemporary refugee policy and the security concerns of states. Read article

Volume 26 2019

Recent Publications on Buddhism and Ecology

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Volume 26, 2019

Buddhist Responses to the Ecological Crisis: Recent Publications on Buddhism and Ecology

Christopher Ives
Stonehill College

A review essay on four recent publications on Buddhism and environmental issues: Ecodharma: Buddhist Teachings for the Ecological Crisis by David R. Loy; Ecology, Ethics, and Interdependence: The Dalai Lama in Conversation with Leading Thinkers on Climate Change, edited by John Dunne and Daniel Goleman; Green Buddhism: Practice and Compassionate Action in Uncertain Times by Stephanie Kaza; and Mountains, Rivers, and the Great Earth: Reading Gary Snyder and Dōgen in an Ecological Crisis by Jason W. Wirth. Read article

Volume 26 2019

Disengaged Buddhism

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Volume 26, 2019

Disengaged Buddhism

Amod Lele
Boston University

Contemporary engaged Buddhist scholars typically claim either that Buddhism always endorsed social activism, or that its non-endorsement of such activism represented an unwitting lack of progress. This article examines several classical South Asian Buddhist texts that explicitly reject social and political activism. These texts argue for this rejection on the grounds that the most important sources of suffering are not something that activism can fix, and that political involvement interferes with the tranquility required for liberation. The article then examines the history of engaged Buddhism in order to identify why this rejection of activism has not yet been taken sufficiently seriously. Read article

Volume 26 2019

Western Buddhism in the Russian Federation

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Volume 26, 2019

Western Buddhism in the Local Context of the Russian Federation: The Case of the Russian Association of Diamond Way Buddhists of the Karma Kagyu Tradition

Valentina Isaeva
Saint-Petersburg State University

How Buddhist organizations adapt to new environments appears to be the key question defining their activities and the possibility that they will attract new followers. This article considers the case of the Russian Association of Diamond Way Buddhists of the Karma Kagyu tradition in the context of the social and cultural milieu of the Russian Federation. In particular, it looks at significant features of historical development and legislative regulation of the religious sphere in Russia and how Diamond Way as a Western Buddhist organization has implemented culture politics to correlate its ethics with the local environment and to create cultural coherence with the broader Russian society. The research explicates four main guidelines of the culture politics of Diamond Way: (1) integration into the sociocultural environment of the city and the country; (2) assertion of its traditionality on the territory of the Russian Federation; (3) political neutrality in the public sphere; and (4) a variety of leadership styles. Read article

Volume 26 2019

Review: Buddhist Monastic Organization in Pre-Modern Tibet

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Volume 26, 2019

The Monastery Rules: Buddhist Monastic Organization in Pre-Modern Tibet. By Berthe Jansen. Oakland, California: University of California Press, 2018, xii + 284 pp., ISBN 978-0-520-96953-7 (Open Access e-book: https://www.luminosoa.org/site/books/10.1525/luminos.56), ISBN 978-0-520-29700-5 (Paperback), $39.95.

Reviewed by Brenton Sullivan

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Volume 26 2019

Sexual Misconduct in Early Buddhist Ethics

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Volume 26, 2019

Sexual Misconduct in Early Buddhist Ethics: A New Approach

Ven. Pandita (Burma)
University of Kelaniya

In this paper, I argue that (1) rape is not covered by the concept of sexual misconduct prohibited by the Third Precept of the universal Five Precepts morality in Buddhism; and (2) many problematic issues surrounding this precept go away when we interpret it in this way.
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Volume 26 2019

The Experience of Dukkha and Domanassa among Puthujjanas

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Volume 26, 2019

The Experience of Dukkha and Domanassa among Puthujjanas

Ashin Sumanacara
Mahidol University

In the Pāli canon, the terms dukkha and domanassa are used with reference to different types and degrees of suffering that must be understood according to context. This article first examines the meaning of puthujjana in the Pāli Nikāyas. It then analyses the contextual meanings of dukkha and domanassa, including a discussion of their types based on a thorough investigation of the Pāli Nikāyas. Finally, it examines the explanation in the Pāli Nikāyas of the arising of dukkha and domanassa, and, in particular, how lust, hatred, delusion and some other negative emotions are considered to cause physical pain and mental pain among puthujjanas.
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Volume 25 2018

Reply to Rick Repetti

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Volume 25, 2018

Talking Past Each Other? Reply to Rick Repetti

Karin Meyers
Insight Meditation Society

This essay is a response to Rick Repetti’s “It Wasn’t Me: Reply to Karin Meyers,” in respect to my article, “False Friends: Dependent Origination and the Perils of Analogy in Cross-Cultural Philosophy.” My article was written—at Repetti’s invitation—in response to his edited volume of essays on the topic of free will in Buddhism, Buddhist Perspectives on Free Will: Agentless Agency?—to which I am also a contributor (“Grasping”). In the article (for which Repetti was also the editor), I compliment Repetti’s analysis of the topic and his own substantive account of a Buddhist theory of free will, but am critical of the way he frames an affirmative answer to the question of why there should be a Buddhist theory of free will. My arguments concern comparative and historical method—namely, the importance of considering critical differences between Buddhist and Western ideas and what Buddhists have said when imagining what they can say about a topic. In his reply, Repetti wonders whether we have been talking past each other. Here I attempt to clarify the nature and scope of my critique and to correct some of the points on which Repetti seems to have misread it. Read article

Volume 26 2019

Buddhism and Capital Punishment: A Revisitation

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Volume 26, 2019

Buddhism and Capital Punishment: A Revisitation

Martin Kovan
University of Melbourne

The first Buddhist precept prohibits the intentional, even sanctioned, taking of life. However, capital punishment remains legal, and even increasingly applied, in some culturally Buddhist polities and beyond them. The classical Buddhist norm of unconditional compassion as a counterforce to such punishment thus appears insufficient to oppose it. This paper engages classical Buddhist and Western argument for and against capital punishment, locating a Buddhist refutation of deterrent and Kantian retributivist grounds for it not only in Nāgārjunian appeals to compassion, but also the metaphysical and moral constitution of the agent of lethal crime, and thereby the object of its moral consequences. Read article

Volume 26 2019

Conference: Reducing Suffering During Conflict

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Volume 26, 2019

Reducing Suffering During Conflict: The Interface Between Buddhism and International Humanitarian Law

International Conference of The International Committee of the Red Cross
Dambulla, Sri Lanka
4–6 September 2019

Though there are over half a billion Buddhists around the world, there has so far been no systematic and focused study of the interface between Buddhism and International Humanitarian Law (IHL). The core of IHL—also known as “the law of war” or “the law of armed conflict”—is formed by the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols. Its purpose is to minimize suffering during armed conflict by protecting those who do not—or no longer—participate directly in hostilities, and by regulating the means and methods of warfare.

Buddhism has grappled with the reality of war throughout its long history. But what guidance does Buddhism provide to those caught up in the midst of hostilities, and how do Buddhism and IHL compare in this respect? It is timely and relevant to explore these two distinct bodies of ethics and legal traditions from inter-disciplinary perspectives.

This conference, organized by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in collaboration with a number of universities and organizations, will explore correspondences between Buddhism and IHL and encourage a constructive dialogue and exchange between the two domains. The conference will act as a springboard to understanding how Buddhism can contribute to regulating armed conflict, and what it offers in terms of guidance on the conduct of, and behavior during, war for Buddhist monks and lay persons—the latter including government and military personnel, non-State armed groups and civilians. The conference is concerned with the conduct of armed conflict, and not with the reasons and justifications for it, which fall outside the remit of IHL.
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