Abstract
Contemporary Buddhist violence against minority Muslims in Myanmar is rightfully surprising: a religion with its particular moral philosophies of non-violence and asceticism and with its functional polytheism in practice should not generate genocidal nationalist violence. Yet, there are resources within the Buddhist canon that people can draw from to justify violence in defense of the religion and of a Buddhist-based polity. When those resources are exploited in the context of particular Theravāda Buddhist practices and the history of Buddhism and Buddhist identity in Burma from ancient times through its colonial and contemporary periods, it perpetuates an ongoing tragedy that is less about religion than about ethno-nationalism.
Highlights
The Precept of Non-Violence and the Philosophy of PacifismBuddhism’s first precept is to avoid killing any living being, not just people but even the most insignificant of animals
Contemporary Buddhist violence against minority Muslims in Myanmar is rightfully surprising: a religion with its particular moral philosophies of non-violence and asceticism and with its functional polytheism in practice should not generate genocidal nationalist violence
It explores these elements within the context of Theravāda Buddhism in colonial Buddhist groups in Myanmar (Burma) and contemporary Myanmar
Summary
Buddhism’s first precept is to avoid killing any living being, not just people but even the most insignificant of animals. In the 1970s, communist victories in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia spawned a militant anti-communist Buddhist nationalist movement in Thailand, led by monk Phra Kittivuddho, whose “Nawaphon” movement considered it a monk’s sacred duty to defend the Thai nation and religion with violence if necessary. His slogan “Killing Communists is Not a Sin” was an exception due to national emergency, he contended, as communists were “not complete persons” but rather “destroyers of. Nation, religion, or monarchy who are bestial”; and he offered a form of “double effect” argument in advising that monks “must not intend to kill people, only to kill the Devil” presumably residing within the offenders.
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