International network of committed Buddhists

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I nternational N etwork E ngagierter B uddhisten

The I nternational N etwork E ngagierter B uddhisten is a combination of individuals, groups and institutions in over 30 countries to promote Buddhism , human rights, social justice and concrete projects of all kinds arising from a Buddhist mind. The INEB was founded in 1989 on the initiative of Sulak Sivaraksa together with the patrons , the 14th Dalai Lama , the Vietnamese monk and Zen master Thích Nhất Hạnh and the Thai monk and Dharma teacher Buddhadasa Bhikkhu , as representatives of the three main directions of Buddhism. After his death, the patronage of the latter passed to the Cambodian Maha Ghosananda and from him to the Thai monk and scholar Kusalacitto . INEB networks local, national and global initiatives that work for a peaceful, humane, environmentally friendly and fairer way of life.

INEB Conference 2009 in Chiang Mai ; Monks from Sri Lanka give Sulak Sivaraksa a gift

network

The INEB was founded on the basis of kalyanamitta , the spiritual friendship of individuals with one another, and is still inspired by it today. The 36 founders included monks, nuns and lay people from eleven countries. The Buddhist Peace Fellowship (BPF) from the USA was a co-founder and is still connected to the INEB in solidarity. The INEB has an office in Bangkok , but it is not a hierarchically structured organization, but an open forum that offers committed Buddhists the opportunity to exchange ideas, link and coordinate activities. The network is based on international and intercultural contacts as well as on mutual respect and gender equality. All Buddhist schools and traditions can contribute. This diversity strengthens the understanding of the merging of meditation practice and social engagement on the basis of Buddhist values ​​and compassion.

INEB Conference 2009, concluding Peace Walk

Monks and nuns, monastery heads, heads of centers, academics, Dharma teachers and young activists meet to meditate together, to inspire one another and to present their own projects. Anyone who wants to make a contribution in the spirit of the Buddha's teachings to help people and other living beings as well as the environment in any way can contribute their idea, project or commitment. There are currently particularly active networks in the USA, India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan and South Africa, but also in Japan and South Korea.

The spectrum of topics that are discussed and actively addressed in the network is diverse, and the accents differ from group to group and from country to country: ethical issues, peace work, human and animal rights, social justice, environmental protection, development and refugee assistance, medical care, creation and support of NGOs , alternative forms of economy, freedom for Tibet , freedom for Myanmar, education and youth education, care for orphans, working with homeless people and prisoners, drug rehabilitation , HIV -Prevention and AIDS , hospice and palliative care , Reform of the Sangha , ordination of women, discrimination based on gender, sexual orientation , social status or ethnicity , as well as interreligious dialogue .

Committed Buddhism

Conference 2009, Prayer for Peace

Buddhism not only teaches renunciation of material possessions, detachment from attachment and reflection, which is why different forms of meditation developed in the various traditions, but also appeals through active, unlimited compassion ( karuna ) to responsible attention to other beings and to nature, such as for example shows the ideal of the bodhisattva . Overcoming the isolated ego and knowing that things are interdependent results in mutual understanding and commitment to the common world. Committed Buddhism wants to contribute to the realization of a global, non-violent and solidary “culture of awakening”. The Buddha's teaching on the connection between cause and effect is becoming more topical in the face of global crises, dependencies, challenges and sufferings. The INEB seeks answers and stimulates solidarity that is rooted in the Buddhist worldview. This is expressed in the well-known Tibetan mantra : om mani padme hum - “May all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering. May all beings be happy ”. Buddha himself developed a detailed analysis of the " conditional emergence " of class society, of violence and war based on possession and of crime based on poverty. In his actions, too, he gave orientation in the areas of the social (equality of all people, no class and racial barriers), gender relations (equality of men and women), the economy (self-limiting prosperity for all), politics (non-violence), the Administration (democratic self-responsibility), dealing with nature (not harming any being) and in many other questions of living together.

The spiritual content and goals of Buddhist teaching cannot be achieved without democracy, justice, non-violence, care for nature and solidarity among people. That is why Buddhism is always committed Buddhism. Meditation is then not an exit, but preparation for an entry into society and silence between committed phases. Mindfulness, ( vipassana ), one of the main themes in Buddhism, means to live consciously, which - especially today - also includes knowledge of global relationships. For example, any kind of discrimination or unrestrained consumerism and careless handling of resources is at the expense of others, which neither fits with the basic Buddhist attitude nor with the requirements of today. However, to be committed does not mean more activity or even more activism. Committed Buddhism is the conscious return from meditation to action, from the pillow to the workplace, from the meditation room to our living space, from the Sangha to society, from the hermitage in the mountains down to the market square. It is about leaving meditation without leaving meditation. Committed Buddhism shows how inner spiritual development and socio-ecological action can be combined in an effective synthesis. Mindfulness in pausing, becoming still and looking does not only take place in meditation, but flows into all activities.

Engaged Buddhism in Asia

history

With the cultural spread of the Bodhisattva ideal, the history of socially, even politically committed Buddhism began, and with the Indian ruler Ashoka, the history of Buddhism as the state religion . Public welfare, hospitals for the poor, the elderly and the sick, fair distribution of social wealth and a judiciary that was less aimed at punishment and more aimed at avoiding crime and improving the criminal are just some of the characteristics of the Buddhist welfare state created by Ashoka . With Ashoka's empire, Buddhism began to influence other Asian countries. With the Bodhisattva ideal and the myth of the Ashokan community, socially committed Buddhism had taken on a formative shape that had an impact over the centuries.

500 years after Ashoka, Nagarjuna's jeweled wreath of royal advice is another milestone in the social ethics of bodhisattva practice. The great philosophical founder of Mahayana Buddhism sees the transformation of one's own personality as the foundation of a Buddhist ethic of social action. The principle of non-violence is fundamental to Nagarjuna. Since violence only creates new violence, Nagarjuna also rejects the death penalty and calls - far ahead of its time - for rehabilitation measures for prisoners.

In China , Buddhism reached its greatest boom and expansion from around AD 200 to around AD 900, i.e. in times of great social and political unrest. The monasteries were characterized by a lively socially committed activity, for example through interest-free loans to impoverished farmers and through the construction of hospices and shelters for the persecuted or the homeless. In addition, the Buddhists were very creative in the development of new remedies and therapies in order to get rid of the previously large proportion of medicines made from animal ingredients. The social significance and impact of Buddhism was, however, a big thorn in the side of the Confucians who supported the state , so that there were also severe pogroms against Buddhists in China , with over two million monks and nuns killed and over 30,000 temples destroyed. Buddhism in China has not recovered from these devastating "purges" for centuries.

Buddhism suffered a dramatic decline during the centuries that large parts of Asia were ruled by European colonial powers. In Sri Lanka the monk sangha was almost exterminated by the Portuguese in the 16th century and Japan fell almost completely under the rule of Christianity at the same time. In Burma, Buddhism was among the Englishmen to the status of spirits and demons influenced folk superstition pushed back. This changed when, towards the end of the 19th century, the discovery of the "wisdom of the East" became fashionable in Europe and a growing anti-colonial movement emerged under socialist influence across Asia. In many Southeast Asian countries the teachings of the Buddha became the subject of identification in the struggle for national independence and social progress against the infiltration of European religion and the imposed Western lifestyle. In Burma and Sri Lanka, it almost seemed as if Buddhism would be reinstalled as the state religion. But both attempts to develop a "Buddhist socialism" had an inglorious outcome: the military regime in Myanmar (Burma), which came to power in the 1962 coup, practiced neither socialism nor Buddhism and practically eliminated the influence of the monks on society. Sri Lanka temporarily became dependent on large "socialist brother countries" while inwardly steering a fateful course of ethnic division, equating the survival of Buddhism with the supremacy of the Sinhalese people, turning Buddha-Dhamma into violent nationalism and marginalizing minorities .

With the Bodhisattva ideal and the myth of the Ashokan community, socially committed Buddhism had taken on a formative shape that had an impact over the centuries. Although Buddhism increasingly tended to form an alliance with the ruling classes in countries where it was able to stabilize itself over centuries, and in Tibet even assumed the form of a feudalist theocracy , it was always influenced by egalitarian, liberating and humanizing social forces.

Modern

The decades after the Second World War were dominated by the confrontation between the antagonistic systems of power and society, the democratic-capitalist West and the dictatorial-socialist East. The Buddhist countries of Asia were fatally victims of this conflict, as the wars in Indochina , Korea and Vietnam or the civil wars in Burma, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Cambodia show. Sri Lanka, Burma and China became socialist, Japan and Thailand capitalist, Vietnam and Korea were divided between the power blocs, Tibet, Mongolia and Sikkim were overrun and annexed, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia were mercilessly bombed. Both sides could find points of contact in the teaching and practice of Buddhism for these crucial tests. In some Buddhist reform movements in Asia, for example, the Bodhisattva ideal was a syncretistic mixture with European Marxism and socialism, there were various attempts to combine Buddhism and Marxism in terms of social policy in Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, China, Korea and Mongolia, all of which failed.

In the same way, there was a completely uncritical import of Western capitalism and consumerism in other Buddhist countries , as Ashoka's concern was also the creation of prosperity and economic freedom for the broader population. In both models of society, drives for the development and modernization of the respective country were seen serving the Buddhist goal. Such a confrontation could only come about because the central Buddhist principle, namely non-duality and non-adherence to all ideologies, was ignored and instead the western either-or-friend-enemy-thinking took over. Only the dire consequences of these events allowed many Buddhists in Asia to return to their own spiritual roots, to look for alternatives in social development and to develop a new "committed Buddhism" anchored in the Buddha Dhamma. The approach for this was found in a renewed and deepened insight into "paticca samupadda", the mutual conditioning of all beings and phenomena. All appearances are recognized as deeply connected with one another, emerging from one another, containing one another, which is what the modern term interbeing stands for.

Human suffering as a result of hunger, war, poverty, a lack of medical care and destroyed habitats caused committed Buddhist grassroots movements to develop in many Asian countries after the Second World War. Long before grassroots activities emerged in the West , Buddhist personalities and initiatives in Asia developed a diverse grassroots movement based on love and respect for fellow beings for the purpose of spiritual, social and cultural renewal. The following individuals and groups of committed Buddhism from the 20th century and from today should be highlighted as examples: the peace and social work of Thich Nhat Hanh in Vietnam in the 1950s and 1960s, Tibetan lamas , hospitals and hospices developing forms of non-violent resistance founding Taiwanese nuns, for the protection of the rainforest onset Thai monks, led by Buddhist monks peace marches in Cambodia , the broad social commitment lay Buddhist communities in South Korea and Japan as well as the movement of " Ambedkar -Buddhisten" in India, as untouchables to Date Converted millions to Buddhism in the 1950s.

Especially in Thailand there are numerous self-sufficient communities with the aim of a life in simplicity, as Buddha once lived. This movement was promoted primarily by a group of modern-thinking monks, the so-called "Development monks". In view of the enormous effects of the western culture of consumption, media and mass production, which is rolling across Asia, it is also increasingly monks who are taking on the painful consequences. In addition to the mentioned personalities Sulak Sivaraksa and Buddhadasa Bhikkhu , who developed the concept of a Dhamma socialism , the UNESCO Peace Prize Winners Phra Payutto and Phra Prachak from the group of so-called forest monks, who "ordained" jungle trees to prevent them from being cut down, should be mentioned protect multinational companies. From Sri Lanka the Sarvodaya Shramadana movement spread to India and other countries. It was initiated by the teacher AY Ariyaratne , who originally organized work holidays for urban students in poor areas so that they could get to know rural life. In Taiwan, it was Master Chen Yen (recipient of the UNPO Prize ) who stood up for the discriminated indigenous people. As a result, the Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation was created , which also operates its own hospitals, training and social facilities in other countries.

In addition, various groups in the network supported workshops for Buddhists and people of different faiths who suffer from social, political and economic pressures in order to be able to solve their problems themselves. For example, help for Burmese dissident groups, bridging function to international aid organizations, strategies for conflict management in Sri Lanka and Cambodia, Dhamma passing on for Cambodian lay people and monks after their extensive extermination by the Khmer Rouge as well as hospice programs for the terminally ill in Thailand. The INEB also works together with " Spirit in Education Movement " (SEM), a project also founded by Sulak Sivaraksa in 1995 in Thailand based on alternative education with topics such as deep ecology , life and death, alternative development, consumerism and rights of indigenous peoples .

Committed Buddhism worldwide

At the beginning of the 20th century, the Dharma came to Western Europe and North America; it has recently gained a foothold in Eastern Europe. The literary fathers of the beat generation of the 1950s such as Jack Kerouac , Allen Ginsberg , Gary Snyder were fascinated by the Zen spirit and the Bodhisattva ideal. During the Vietnam War , Americans were ordained Buddhist monks and sat with others on train tracks to stop military transports. The Buddhist Peace Fellowship , one of the most widespread Buddhist organizations in the West, was set up on the initiative of Zen master Robert Aitken Roshi . There, people like Jack Kornfield , Tetsugen Glassman Roshi, Baker Roshi , Christopher Titmuss , Philip Wahlen , Peter Matthiessen , Stephen Batchelor , Pema Chödrön , Joanna Macy , Joan Halifax , Arnold Kotler and Claude AnShin Thomas find a platform for their convictions.

Due to the goals of nonviolence and an alternative economy, as well as the abolition of gender discrimination, polarization between rich and poor, the dangers of nationalism, racism and the rule of multinational corporations, there is consequently a global commitment that goes beyond the countries of origin of Buddhism. The INEB therefore also has contacts to international organizations. The commitment of Western Buddhists is evident in a large number of communities and aid projects that are dedicated to development work or political freedom in Asia, such as fundraising for leprosy stations in Vietnam or for building schools for Tibetan refugee children and for orphans in Bangladesh . Support for the Tibetan people takes up the greatest part. In the USA and Germany, street retreats for the homeless and care for the dying in hospices were offered, in German-speaking countries initiatives were taken against factory farming in Austria and letter campaigns for the release of imprisoned Burmese monks were carried out, prison labor was performed in England and Buddhist meditation weeks took place in Auschwitz .

Outside Asia, there are currently committed Buddhists in most European countries as well as in Turkey , the USA, Canada , Mexico , Brazil , Argentina , South Africa , Australia and New Zealand .

literature

German

  • Brandon, David: Zen in the Art of Helping, Knaur-Verlag, Munich 1983.
  • Tendzin Gyatsho (14th Dalai Lama): In harmony with the world - Conversation with the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Lübbe-Verlag, Bergisch Gladbach 1993.
  • Dalai Lama / Jean C. Carrière: The Power of Buddhism and the State of the World - Living Consciously in Today's World, Herder Spektrum, Freiburg i.Br. 1998.
  • Geshe Thupten Ngawang : Frugality and Non-Injury - Nature and Spiritual Development in Tibetan Buddhism, Herder-Verlag, Freiburg i.Br. 1995.
  • Gerlitz, Peter: Man and Nature in the World Religions - Basics of a Religious Ecology, Primus-Verlag, Darmstadt 1998.
  • Macy, Joanna: The rediscovery of the sensual earth - ways to the ecological self, Theseus-Verlag, Berlin 1994.
  • Payutto, PA: Buddhist Economy - With the Right Intention to Prosperity and Happiness, Fischer Media-Verlag, Bern 1999.
  • Sangharakshita : Buddhism in the West - The Integration of Buddhism in Western Society, Do Evolution Verlag, Essen.
  • Sivaraksa, Sulak: Seeds of Peace - Vision of a Buddhist Social Order, Aurum Verlag, Braunschweig 1995.
  • Suzuki : Daisetz Teitaro, Karuna - Zen and the way of active love; The Bodhisattva Path in Buddhism, OWBarth-Verlag, Munich 1989.
  • Thich Nhat Hanh: Innerer Friede, Äußerer Friede, Theseus-Verlag, Küsnacht, 1987.
  • Thich Nhat Hanh: Fourteen Gates of Mindfulness to a Spiritual Engagement in the World, Theseus-Verlag, Berlin 1998.
  • von Allmen, Fred : Bodhisattvas at work (essay on socially committed Buddhism in Asia) from the book "Seeing with Buddha's eyes".

English

  • Badiner, Allan Hunt, Dharma Gaia - A Harvest of Essays in Buddhism and Ecology, Parallax Press, Berkeley 1990.
  • Batchelor, Martine / Brown, Kerry, Buddhism and Ecology, World Wide Fund for Nature, London 1992.
  • Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, Dhammic Socialism, Thai Inter-Religious Commission for Development, Bangkok 1986.
  • Jones, Ken, The Social Face of Buddhism - An Approach to Political and Social Activism, Wisdom Publications, London 1989.
  • Jones, Ken, Beyond Optimism - A Buddhist Political Ecology, Jon Carpenter Publishing, Oxford 1995.
  • Jones, Ken, Buddhism and Social Action, Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy 1981.
  • Payutto, PA, Buddhist Solutions for the twenty-first century, Buddhadhamma Foundation, Bangkok 1995.
  • Queen, Christopher S., Engaged Buddhism in the West, Wisdom Publication, Boston 1999.
  • Queen, Christopher S. / Sallie B. King, Engaged Buddhism - Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia, State University of New York, New York 1996.
  • Ratnapala, Nadasena, Buddhist Democratic Political Theory and Practice, Sarvodaya Vishva Lekha Publication, Colombo 1997.
  • Sandell, Klas (editor), Buddhist Perspectives on the Ecocrisis (with a Declaration of Environmental Ethics by HH the Dalai Lama), Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy 1987.
  • Sivaraksa, Sulak (editor), The Quest For A Just Society, The Legacy an Challenge of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, Santi Pracha Dhamma Institute, Bangkok 1994.
  • Sivaraksa, Sulak, A Socially Engaged Buddhism, Thai Inter-Religious Commission for Development, Bangkok 1988.
  • Titmuss, Christopher, The Green Buddha, Insight Books, Denbury 1995.
  • Titmuss, Christopher, Spirit for Change - Voices of Hope for a World in Crisis, Green Print, London, 1989.
  • Udomittipong, Pipob / Walker, Chris / Sivaraksa, Sulak, Socially Engaged Buddhism for the New Millenium, Essays in honor of the Venerable Phra Dhammapitaka (Bhikkhu PAPayutto) on his 60th birthday anniversary, Sathirakoses Nagapradipa Foundation, Bangkok 1999.
  • Watts, Jonathan / Senauke, Alan / Santikaro Bhikkhu, Entering the Realm of Reality - Towards Dhammic Societies, Suksit Siam, Bangkok 1997.

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