Buddhists have perhaps surprisingly contended, interpreted, and even perpetrated violence throughout history, whether it be through more contemporary Buddhist acts or violence that has been around for centuries. Contemporary acts of Buddhist violence include monks participating in protests in Burma to stand up to government brutality, including the Saffron Revolution in 2007, which started when the government of Burma removed subsidies on fuel prices, causing prices on fuel and other items to rise. Violence has been around for ages in Chan Buddhism. A popular kōan, or story, in Chan Buddhism, called “Nanquan Kills the Cat”, discusses killing a cat with a sword. In Buddhism, you receive bad karma for doing bad things, but it is important …show more content…
People were being brutally attacked, injured, and even killed by the government military. The monks felt they had no choice but to step in for the greater good of the Burmese people. Initially, the community of monks began to deny alms from generals. They would turn their alms bowls upside down as a powerful sign of dissent towards the government. Monks moved from their typical peaceful and passive behavior to playing a powerful and strong activist role. The monks realized that in choosing to participate in the protests, they were going against their beliefs and likely inflicting some bad karma on themselves. Despite the issue of karma, the monks were willing to make this sacrifice because they knew that their actions would save many Burma protesters, including many young students, from suffering. In my opinion, this proves and reinforces the selfless nature of Buddhist monks. They are willing to look past their culture and beliefs, risk their personal safety and impact their karmic level if doing so helps others. Buddhist culture is powerful in Burma and the monks choice to actively protest gave a lot of hope and motivation to the …show more content…
In more contemporary Buddhist acts of violence, people may believe the monks are completely ignoring Buddhist tradition and culture by participating in the protests. If these things were going on in the world hundreds of years ago, I am not certain the monks would have joined the violent protests due to their culture and rules. I believe our world has become more progressive and acts that were once frowned upon are now more accepted and viewed as powerful and forward. People are starting to move past old, traditional values to accommodate the way the world is today. I don't advocate that the values and culture of Buddhism should be disregarded, but there should be some exceptions since there is clear reasoning and justification for some of the violence in Buddhism. The protests in Burma in which monks are participating in are just because they are challenging Burma’s cruel and immoral military government. The monks are being selfless in helping the people of Burma in these protests. The violence in Chan Buddhist stories is meant to push readers to acquire deeper understandings and learn lessons. Even though violence is not typically associated with Buddhists and looked down upon in their culture, certain violent acts can be justified if they are hindering violence being administered by bad and immoral people, aids others in the community, or if the violence
In The Quest of Democracy, Kyi argues that human rights is what democracy is and that democracy was always in Buddhist traditions. Once democracy became known in Burma, people got interested to know what democracy more in depth. It got people wanting to learn about modern politics and the nature of democracy. The idea of democracy was getting a good response due to a guarantee for privileges and freedom. However, it was also being questioned because how can they be sure that the system will always work. The burmese people became knowledgeable through Buddha. They had gone undergone through many
Topmiller, Robert J. The Lotus Unleashed: The Buddhist Peace Movement in South Vietnam, 1964-1966. Lexington, KY: U of Kentucky, 2002. Print.
Both the Buddhist monks and suicide bombers resort to violent means to try and enact a certain social change. The Buddhist monks that sacrificed their own lives believed they were just and right in fighting the religiously discriminatory government. If someone believes their fight is just and right and that their life is worth what they believe in, then violence on oneself in acts of civil disobedience is permissible. However, the actions of suicide bombers in the Middle East are not right because their suicides inhibit on the liberties of innocent people.
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton proves the point that violence can be justified if necessary. To inflict change in their lives people often fight with violence instead of peace to evoke change. The world strives for change everyday whether or not you like it. How the people create a change in society whether they use peace or war, it is up to them to decide how to modify our ever changing world. Violence and fight between the Socs and Greasers tells us that both can be justified if it inflicts positive change in society. ‘
The wars, the victories, the defeats and deaths arose from the warrior’s duty to the Buddhist Law. These warriors lived their duty and this is reflected through the tales that illustrate actions that include loyalty and respect towards other warriors.
The 1st Stasimon in Sophocles’ play ‘Oedipus the King’ is mainly showing the Chorus’ confusion in regards to Tiresias’ accusations made towards Oedipus. The Chorus seem terrified and powerless, and, like Oedipus, do not want to believe the accusations. They feel that the gods know the truth, yet will not reveal it, thus feeling as though the gods are of no real help. There are many issues and techniques to be discussed in regards to the 1st Stasimon, one of these being the significance of the section.
Through this we see that the author’s point of view is someone who understands that the events that took place that morning in Burma, were not humane and degrading.
The differences between the laity and monastic worshippers within Buddhist tradition are distinguished by the extent to which these two groups are willing to follow the middle-way as taught by Buddha. Typically, in order to have a functional Buddhist society, there must be the devout, and those who support the devout, giving aid in the form of food, monies, shelter, transportation, etc. The devout who sacrifice the purity of a true monastic lifestyle in order to support the community (who in turn are the recipients of merit or punya; a bank of ‘good’ actions tied to ‘good’ karma) (Gethin 101), from the monastic worshippers, are called the laity; upasakas (men laity) and upasikas (women laity). The monastics, or Bhikkhus (monks) and Bhikkhunis (nuns) are responsible for accepting the devotion shown by the laity, reciprocally, the laity are obliged to maintain devotion for “in order to be free from guilt […] the bases of a clear conscience [is] generosity and good conduct” (Ibid 83) . Good conduct is the realization and active partaking of the “eight significant dimensions [the Noble Eight-fold Path] of one’s behavior” (Ibid 82), which constitute right (in all actions of) understanding, thought, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness, and concentration (although not limited to, rather expanded upon realization). The importance of a laities duty within society is to support, through their livelihood, the only traditional Buddhist teaching available to them (Ibid 92). In order to adapt a Buddhist ideology, some conducts were left out of lay worship to support a less strenuous spiritual life (putting the emphasis on merit earned) in pursuit of maintaining a functional community. The purpose, to establish the five lay percepts ...
The lack of nationalism also proved to be a conflict for the people of Burma or Myanmar. The militaristic government’s philosophy of ruling isolated left people to live in absolute poverty and is a major human rights concern.
The study of Buddhism over the past century or so has resembled the encounter of the blind men and the elephant in many ways. Students of Buddhism have tended to fasten onto a small part of the tradition and assume their conclusions held true about the whole. Often the parts they have seized on have been a little like the elephant's tusks a striking, but unrepresentative, part of the whole animal. As a result, many erroneous and sweeping generalizations about Buddhism have been made, such as that it is 'negative', 'world-denying', 'pessimistic', and so forth.
Seeing the monks was deeply enlightening to me because it was new to see grown man live in humbleness and peace. They wore an orange robe over their bare upper bodies and a white fabric-pants to cover their lower bare bodies. It was clear to me that these monks were individual men indulged in a simple of life. Fortunately, I was able to make the connection between what we learned in my Introduction to Asia lecture and what was from the temple. In lecture we learned that Thailand was deeply rooted in Buddhism, and often time’s, young lay men would make a temporary journey to leave behind their belongings and possessions to live a life of humility as a monk. Carlos, shared some information about the monks stating they were men from Thailand who decided to take a great leap in leaving behind their families and duties in the Thailand economy to live a simple life that avoided stress and societal troubles similar to how monkhood was referred to in lecture. Eventually I was given the opportunity to speak to one of the monks. He stated that Wat Buddharangsi was a Buddhist community that was home to rotating monks from Thailand travelling all over the world. I asked him the principles that the monks live by, and he roughly gave me an ideas of Buddhist principles of—no stealing, cheating, adultery and rules that would inhibit a life of humility and simplicity. I also learned from the monk that they live their days through the kind hearts of others who donate food. If people did not come to donate food to the monks in a particular day, then they were fine with eating food from the previous day’s left overs. I know understand that Buddhism includes a sense of community and teamwork to support the men who took up the mantle as a
Understanding the Buddhist lifestyle requires learning about the background of the religion and the monks. Buddha set the teachings of Buddhism, also called the Dhamma-Vinaya. The code of conduct, called the Vinaya, teaches people aspiring to gain the monastic life of a monk to gain wisdom and mindfulness. Buddha set these rules for the well-being of the Bhikkus, or the monk. He set these rules to help create a peaceful atmosphere for the Buddhist community and to avoid corruption in the Buddhist community. All monks and/or nuns must not only follow these rules, but also many other rules and principles.
Another similar religion which includes the belief of non violence is called Buddhism which originated from India and has know made it way throughout the Asia. This is consider very highly by outsiders generalisations that it is a non- violent, peaceful religion. However scholarly work shows that medieval Buddhism did have elements of violent acts and justification for these acts. In Japanese Buddhism there are aspects of violent acts. Buddhist monks have trained warriors in martial arts for war.
While using violence to counteract violence may seem like a contradiction of sorts it is possibly the only recourse for the oppressed. It is impossible to create a formula of what works and doesn’t work in terms of emancipation because it is highly dependent on the particular situation but it is quite apparent that counterviolence is a necessary tool in this struggle. As we have seen, violence is not the only tool in liberation; the reconstruction of human ethics and perceptions is as, or more, important. Furthermore, it has been shown that sometimes nonviolence can create systemic change and that violence is not always applicable. Other times, violence is the only means to achieve true human emancipation.
In Buddhism’s most basic principles, it is understood that all beings have a right to live, life should respected and people should refrain from taking all life. Yet, currently in the country of Myanmar, extreme Buddhist monks are preaching religious superiority and leading a genocide on Myanmar’s minority religious people, especially Muslims, down to the women and children. To make matters worse Myanmar’s governing officials (exclusively Buddhist) have passed laws that assist in the persecution of minorities. There are some local reports that government authorities are tracking down and arresting religious minorities without reason. Then those who are arrested haven’t been seen or heard from since. With the known death toll of Myanmar Muslims and other minority groups increasing and the Myanmar government publicly admitting to “misplacing” huge numbers of people who fall into the religious minority, suspicions that the Myanmar government is assisting in this religious genocide have justifiably