This essay considers some meta-ethical questions that emerge from a consideration of the phenomena of terrorism in the context of Buddhist metaphysics: what, in the Buddhist view, ultimately causes terrorism (and its subsidiary effects)? What resources do the Buddhist metaphysical claims of no-self, karma, emptiness and related concepts bring to a meta-ethical understanding of terrorism [...]
Archive for the ‘Buddhist philosophical’ Category
‘Freedom/Ignorance’: Buddhist-ontological non-duality and metaethics in an age of terror
Posted in Buddhist philosophical, essay, non-dual philosophy on May 30, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
The Burmese Alms-Boycott: Theory and Practice of the Pattanikujjana in Buddhist Non-Violent Resistance
Posted in Buddhist philosophical, Burma material, essay on April 17, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
This essay presents a general and critical historical survey of the Burmese Buddhist alms-boycott (pattanikujjana) between 1990 and 2007. It details the Pāli textual and ethical constitution of the boycott and its instantiation in modern Burmese history, particularly the Saffron Revolution of 2007. It also suggests a metaethical reading that considers Buddhist metaphysics as constitutive [...]
Ram Bahadur Bomjon, Buddha/boy of Nepal: between mirror and myth in a global Buddhism
Posted in article, Buddhist philosophical on December 1, 2011 | 1 Comment »
I In November 2005, Ram Bahadur Bomjon or the popularly known ‘Buddha Boy’, a Nepali youth who began meditating beneath a pipal tree in his local village of Ratanapuri, Bara district, in May of that year, claimed he would achieve full Buddhahood within six more years of deep meditative practice. Bomjon’s claim followed an initial [...]
Finding the ‘Middle Ground’: David Loy and the constructed self of Buddhism
Posted in Buddhist philosophical, talk/lecture on January 22, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
As a Zen Buddhist contemplative and philosopher, David Loy has articulated some significant theoretical shifts of emphasis in representations of Buddhist thought for about two decades. His recontextualisation of Buddhist doctrine also provides a philosophical underpinning to the kind of emergent dharma evident in a wide cross-section of contemporary Western Buddhist practice. Loy’s analysis implies, [...]
The Buddha’s Second Renunciation: doubt, groundlessness and autonomy in contemporary Western Buddhism
Posted in Buddhist philosophical, essay, talk/lecture on December 19, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
In his well-known advice to the Kalamas, who have expressed confusion and doubt around the truth-claims of different spiritual teachers, the Buddha makes a remarkable injunction. Walpola Rahula calls it “unique in the history of religions.” [1] In the Kalama Sutta, the Buddha says that Yes, it is proper that you have doubt, that you [...]
Satori in Paris – an interview with BeingOrdinary.org
Posted in audio interview, Buddhist philosophical, Burma material, interview on August 17, 2010 | 1 Comment »
This audio interview with Mike Kewley (in Paris, August 2010) from the eclectically superlative www.beingordinary.org, discusses some broad dimensions of Buddhist and ‘trans-Buddhist’ social awareness and daily-life practice with a view to collective social transformation. It considers how the dharma extends beyond a purely religiously-grounded ethical rationale, to embrace a larger secular spiritual vision as well, while still [...]
The Great Inland Sea: reflections on the buddhadharma in the post-secular age
Posted in Buddhist philosophical, essay on October 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Published 2008 Colloquy #15: www.colloquy.monash.edu.au/issue015/kovan.pdf This is a tripartite essay excerpted from a longer text which explores some of the central issues of a contemporary Buddhist ethics: how viable are Buddhist claims to awakening in relative terms? In which senses can they address the multitude of precipitous cultural, economic or religious determinations of different peoples with [...]
Alan Clements and the Second Crisis of Autonomy
Posted in article, Buddhist philosophical, Burma material on October 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
An article written in 2006 that looks at the historical continuity of an aspect of the spiritual (in this case Buddhist) path, in which the security and identity made with a larger authority, more or less benign, is definitively left behind. Alan Clements is a contemporary maverick on the global dharma stage, a former monk in the [...]
Violence and (Non-)resistance: Buddhist Ahiṃsā and its Existential Aporias
Posted in Buddhist philosophical, Burma material, essay on October 8, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Published in Journal of Buddhist Ethics # 16, 2009: http://www.buddhistethics.org/current.html A long essay looking at an episode described in Alan Clements’ book Instinct for Freedom. I consider the Buddhist ethical grounds for Burmese former monks taking up arms against their own military oppressors in the long resistance against the regime of General Than Shwe (and his [...]
