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 ‘essay’ 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 [...]
Advaita Vedanta: a Philosophical Reconstruction (1969) by Eliot Deutsch – a critical review
Posted in essay, non-dual philosophy on December 8, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
I Eliot Deutsch’s ‘reconstruction’ of Advaita Vedanta makes an inital claim of seeking “to approach Asian philosophy as material for creative thought” (Deutsch 1969, Preface) while recognising its status as “a religion as much as it is a technical philosophy…a way of spiritual realisation as well as a system of thought” (op.cit. p.4). Given this, [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
