BUDDHISM: FREEDOM FROM SELF AND OTHER AS COMPASSIONATE VIRTUOSITY

Transcription

1 BUDDHISM: FREEDOM FROM SELF AND OTHER AS COMPASSIONATE VIRTUOSITY The early Buddhist imaginaire: spiritual and political authority are divergent expressions of superlative commitment to enhancing the welfare of others birth prediction: either a world-liberating spiritual virtuoso or a world-conquering political leader Jatakas: Buddha s prior lives a record of perfecting bodhicitta and deepening bodhisattva vows capacities for realizing communal harmony and human-with-planetary flourishing I. Buddhist Origins Siddhartha Gautama (later known as Shakyamuni Buddha or the enlightened one of the Shakya clan ) born in what is now Nepal in the foothills of the Himalayas, most likely between 563 BCE (traditional date) and the mid-5 th century BCE (contemporary scholarship). Left home at 29, practiced various kinds of meditative/ascetic disciplines for 6 years, and then after enlightenment taught for 45 years, entering parinirvana at age 80. Buddha s authority is not that of divine prophet or omniscient deity, but as a teacher/therapist developed the world s first intentional community the Sangha to provide conditions in which the end of suffering/trouble might be pursued with vigor enjoined disciples to spread his Dharma (teachings) for benefit of all, speaking in vernacular, responding to questions and needs of others Importantly, on his deathbed, Buddha refuses to appoint a successor, insisting: Be your own lamps. Be your own refuges. Let the Dharma be your lamp. Let the Dharma be your refuge. Therigatha (73 nuns) and Theragatha (264 monks) enlightenment verses o 1 st Council convening 500 arahants occurs within a year of the Buddha s death over burgeoning dispute about the interpretation of the Vinaya o 2 nd Council occurs some 100 years later first split in Sangha between the Sthaviras and Mahasanghikas Over time, more divisions occur in both dispositions to Dharma and Sangha so-called 18 schools of Early Buddhism by the 2 nd century BCE, the emergence of the Mahayana traditions from end of the 3 nd century BCE, and Vajrayana traditions from about the 6 th or 7 th century CE. Buddhist history = emergence of distinctive ecologies of enlightenment Buddha Dharma: a system of strategies for authoring our own liberation from trouble/suffering. pivotal insight: all things arise interdependently o trouble and suffering mark errant patterns of interdependence o interdependence misdirected by: ignorance, habit formations, craving desire karma o interdependence directed away from samsara toward nirvana by: dissolving troubling karma cultivating wisdom, attentive mastery, moral clarity

2 Basic Buddhist practice as developing moral clarity (sila), attentive mastery (samadhi) and wisdom (panna) Moral clarity has two dimensions: scope and depth of considerations; actual conduct Attentive mastery the realization of awareness that is not buffeted by thoughts and feelings or caught up in sensory dimensions of action implies both focus and flexibility. emerges with energetic effort to realize mindfulness (satipaṭṭ hāna) associated samatha or calming/settling meditation and vipasannā insight meditation Wisdom emerges from insight into interdependence and results in the shutting off of polluting inflows/outflows (āsava) and mental defilements (kilesa). II. Buddhist Freedom The Buddhist realization that things arise interdependently = all things are ultimately relational. That is, nothing literally exists or stands apart from everything else. Buddhist liberation as healing the wound of existence or freedom from self and other the Middle Path is not a midway point between extremes, but rather moving perpendicular/oblique to the entire spectrum of troubling views early Buddhists often disparaged as slippery eels refusing to take a stand on anything o Sutta Nipata: most pernicious source of conflict: this is true; all else is false o as Nagarjuna would put it, Buddha taught for the relinquishing of all views Buddhist contrast is not sat/asat (true/not-true), but rather sat/musa (true/confused); Buddhist truth = truing relational dynamics (true friend) The Buddha s teaching of the 3 marks (trilaksana) brings this process of truing into practical focus an injunction to see all things as troubling, impermanent, and without essence/self Yet: Given the meticulous relation of cause and effect the operation of karma on what basis it is possible to embark on the holy life of realizing liberation? Since there is no beginning to the cosmos and since ignorance, too, is beginning-less, how can the suffering/trouble brought about by ignorant or hateful or jealous acts of the past ever be avoided? the response: The holy life can be lived precisely because of karma. In context of Indian cosmology, karma affects rebirth as hell-denizen, hungry ghost, animal, human, asura or god in accordance with rta o 6 gati as experiential/relational domains Buddha s innovation: delinking karma from any transcendent order; karma is the ongoing expression of emergent order Buddhist teaching of karma = an injunction to pay close and sustained enough attention to experiential/situational dynamics to witness how sustained patterns of our own valuesintentions-actions outcomes/opportunities o Buddhist practice as critique of self and critique of culture

3 Whoever is well embarked on the Buddhist Middle Path suffuses all 10 directions with the 4 apramana or immeasurable relational qualities of compassion, loving-kindness, equanimity and joy in the good fortunes of others living demonstration of the horizonless brahma-vihara or divine abodes of appreciative interdependence III. The Ideal and Real: Buddhist Communities and Buddhist Polities (Sakkapañha Sutta, DN 21) Why is the human road to hell is paved with good intentions? conflicts jealousy & greed fixed likes & dislikes craving desires dwelling on things papañca (Skt: prapañca) ending conflict, trouble and suffering = cutting through papañca. How? o kusala and akusala patterns of engagement and eventuality conflict resolution occurs only through resolutely and creatively enriching activity, enhancing relational quality, increasing situational value Imagining Buddhist Polity The origins of government: Aggañña Sutta (DN 27) critically subverts politics of caste and gender; performative vs essential identities no divine right of kings; political authority derives from response to troubling karma Envisioning the ideal polity: Mahāsudassana Sutta (DN 17) ideal realm heavily populated with humans as well as animal and plant species, in which a great diversity of foods, arts, social practices prevails. o urban pattern of life diverse roles, specialized talents, mutual contribution right rule and right to rule result from realizing conditions for a cultural ecotone in which differences activated as basis of diversity: mutual contribution to sustainably shared flourishing Even an ideal polity will collapse if not aptly sustained: Cakkavatti Sīhanāda Sutta (DN 26) issues of consultative leadership and the role of poverty loss of personal and cultural memory, loss of capacity for concerted attention and longterm commitments (moral distraction) ironic consequences of security via control Realizing Buddhist Polities Buddha advised kings, leaders of republics, traditional hereditary clan heads advocating movement perpendicular to spectrum of political systems o revise the meaning of leadership as a catalyst for realizing a qualitative shift in the full range of relationships constitutive of society Historical realization in the reign of King Asoka [born 304BCE; coronation, 270BCE; conquers Kalinga 262BCE; strong conversion experience, gives up predatory policies of Mauryan empire dies 232 BCE]

4 rock edicts in over 30 places in India, Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan=earliest decipherable corpus of written documents in India, high, 50 tons. o finite game of politics of power versus infinite game of politics of strength Contemporary South Asian Coda: India, Sri Lanka and Bhutan Buddhism in South Asia today is in some ways quite vigorous, but not without troubles. India: here, Buddhism has three kinds of presence: the Mahayana/Vajrayana religion of socalled tribals, primarily in the mountainous north; the Tibetan community in exile near Dharamsala; and a growing number of converts from the scheduled castes the Dalits. Dalit conversions inspired by untouchable independence activist Dr. B.R.Ambedkar Sri Lanka, at the southern extreme of South Asia, has had a continuous Buddhist majority since at least the 2 nd century BCE, and as documented in the Sri Lankan histories, the Mahavamsa (6 th BCE to 4 th CE) and Culavamsa (4 th to 19 th CE), Buddhism has there always been understood as central to Sinhalese national identity, with kings ultimately in charge of ordination. State and Sangha traditionally linked at elite levels. o At end of 18 th, century, increasing importance of local, lay Buddhists British enter 1796 and set about to convert population to Christian tradition o by 1850s Buddhist-nationalist publications role of Colonel Olcott and the Theosophists in internationalizing the movement late 19 th and early 20 th emergence of Protestant Buddhism : rational, scientific, pragmatic; Anagarika Dharmapala and identification of Buddhism and modern nation-state Post-independence decision to make Sinhala the national language no longer English, but also not Tamil and Sinhala both led to ethnic unrest from 1956 o Sarvodaya Shramadana founded in 1958 by A.T. Ariyaratne role of Sangha in state suppression of separatist movements from mid-1970s and civil war from often took a belligerently nationalist tone Bhutan is at the far northern reach of South Asia, nestled between India and China/Tibet, with close connections with Nepal, and Bhutanese culture is powerfully identified with Vajrayana Buddhist tradition. Unified by Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyal in early 17 th century Bhutan became embroiled in the great game in 18 th and 19 th centuries. preemptive election of Ugyen Wangchuk as king in 1907 Relative isolation through 1970s a new vision for Bhutan from the 4 th King, Jigme Singye Wangchuk, assumes throne at 16 in accelerated development, not on the globally dominant model, but along Buddhist inspired lines: GNH versus GDP: four pillars of sustainable development, cultural conservation, environmental conservation and good governance combine spiritual/material development Happiness not seen only as subjective well-being, but as a relational quality, understood in Buddhist terms, though formulated in an entirely secular language.

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