Buddhist violence is not a well-known concept. In fact, it is generally considered an oxymoron. An image of a Buddhist monk holding a handgun or the idea of a militarized Buddhist monastery tends to stretch the imagination; yet these sights exist throughout southern Thailand.Michael Jerryson offers an extensive examination of one of the least known but longest-running conflicts of Southeast Asia. Part of this conflict, based primarily in Thailand's southernmost provinces, is fueled by religious divisions. Thailand's total population is over 92 percent Buddhist, but over 85 percent of the people in the southernmost provinces are Muslim. Since 2004, the Thai government has imposed martial law over the territory and combatted a grass-roots militant Malay Muslim insurgency.Buddhist Fury reveals the Buddhist parameters of the conflict within a global context. Through fieldwork in the conflict area, Jerryson chronicles the habits of Buddhist monks in the militarized zone. Many Buddhist practices remain unchanged. Buddhist monks continue to chant, counsel the laity, and accrue merit. Yet at the same time, monks zealously advocate Buddhist nationalism, act as covert military officers, and equip themselves with guns. Buddhist Fury displays the methods by which religion alters the nature of the conflict and shows the dangers of this transformation.

The book will inform Westerners about how the three primary Asian religions facilitate violence and conflict. Each of the three Asian religions selected, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Shinto, is defined and compared with the others and with the three Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam). Next these Asian religions are analyzed to see how each allows for violence and conflict. Then the nature of religious conflict within them is compared to the nature of religious conflict within two of the Abrahamic religions (Christianity and Islam). Religious-facilitated conflicts in Asia have already occurred for many centuries, are occurring today, and likely will continue to occur. Although Asian religions may profess to be peaceful, they still end up facilitating violence and conflict. It is important to enlighten both the American members of the armed forces currently stationed in the Asia-Pacific region (numbering over one hundred thousand) as well as American taxpayers, whose taxes pay for this security regarding the religious aspect of conflict in Asia.

Drawing on Buddhist treatments of violence, this book explores Buddhist invocation, support, or justification of war, conflict, state violence, and gender discrimination. In addition, it examines the ways in which Buddhists address violence as military chaplains, cope with violence in a conflict zone, and serve as witnesses of blasphemy to Buddhism.

Leading scholars working on Buddhism and politics in South and Southeast Asia add to current discussions regarding 'Engaged Buddhism' and the recent work on protests. The writers have mostly established themselves in their fields, offering a diverse approach and country-by-country coverage.

In the 20th and 21st centuries, where violence has scarred countless lives, the interplay between religion, politics, and conflict remains a complex web. Exiting Violence looks to untangle some of these knots, showing not only how faith can ignite bloodshed, but also how it can inspire peace and build bridges. Resulting from an international collaboration between the Fondazione Bruno Kessler, RESET-Dialogues Among Civilizations, and the Berkley Center for Religion Peace and World Affairs, this collection assesses the state of scholarship and explores the differing ways in which religion can contribute to societies and communities exiting situations of violence and hatred. From Biblical hermeneutics to Buddhism, from secularism to legal systems, Exiting Violence offers a nuanced and thought-provoking exploration of the multifaceted role religion plays in the human struggle for peace and justice.

This book provides a philosophical account of the normative status of killing in Buddhism. Its argument theorises on relevant Buddhist philosophical grounds the metaphysical, phenomenological and ethical dimensions of the distinct intentional classes of killing, in dialogue with some elements of Western philosophical thought. In doing so, it aims to provide a descriptive account of the causal bases of intentional killing, a global justification and elucidation of Buddhist norms regarding killing, and an intellectual response to and critique of alternative conceptions of such norms presented in recent Buddhist Studies scholarship. It examines early and classical Buddhist accounts of the evaluation of killing, systematising and rationally assessing these claims on both Buddhist and contemporary Western philosophical grounds. The book provides the conceptual foundation for the discussion, engaging original reconstructive philosophical analyses to both bolster and critique classical Indian Buddhist positions on killing and its evaluation, as well as contemporary Buddhist Studies scholarship concerning these positions. In doing so, it provides a systematic and critical account of the subject hitherto absent in the field. Engaging Buddhist philosophy from scholastic dogmatics to epistemology and metaphysics, this book is relevant to advanced students and scholars in philosophy and religious studies.

Through sections containing overview essays and reference entries related to particular religions, this resource explores the rise of religious violence, hate crime, and persecution around the world. Religious violence and persecution have been growing steadily both within the United States and around the world. Drawing on the expertise of a wide range of scholars, this current and comprehensive reference helps readers understand the persecution of members of particular faiths as well as violence committed by members of those faiths. In doing so, it promotes a greater understanding of the role of religion in global politics, domestic and international terrorism, and religious bigotry. The book contains sections on particular religious traditions from around the world. Each section begins with an overview essay surveying violence related to that particular religion, whether committed by or against members of that faith. Reference entries in each section then provide objective, fundamental information about particular topics related to violence and the religion discussed. The entries provide cross-references and suggestions for further reading, and the work closes with a bibliography of resources for further study.

"This Handbook provides a state-of-the-art exploration of several key dynamics in current studies of the Buddhist tradition with a focus on practice. Embodiment, materiality, emotion, and gender shape the way most Buddhists engage with their traditions, in contrast to popular representations of Buddhism as spiritual, disembodied, and largely devoid of ritual. This volume highlights how practice often represents a fluid, dynamic, and strategic means of defining identity and negotiating the challenges of everyday life. Essays explore the transformational aims of practices that require practitioners to move, gesture, and emote in prescribed ways, including the ways that scholars' own embodied practices are integral to their research methodology. The chapters are written by acknowledged experts in their respective subject areas and taken together offer an overview of current thinking in the field. The volume is of particular value to scholars who seek an orientation to current perspectives on important conceptual, theoretical, and methodological concerns that are shaping the field in areas outside their primary expertise. The inclusion of substantial, up-to-date bibliographies also makes the volume an important guide to current scholarship"--

This book is the first to critically analyze Buddhist-Muslim relations in Theravada Buddhist majority states in South and Southeast Asia. Asia is home to the largest population of Buddhists and Muslims. In recent years, this interfaith communal living has incurred conflicts, such as the ethnic-religious conflicts in Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. Experts from around the world collaborate to provide a comprehensive look into religious pluralism and religious violence. The book is divided into two sections. The first section provides historical background to the three countries with the largest Buddhist-Muslim relations. The second section has chapters that focus on specific encounters between Buddhists and Muslims, which includes anti-Buddhist sentiments in Bangladesh, the role of gender in Muslim-Buddhist relations and the rise of anti-Muslim and anti-Rohingya sentiments in Myanmar. By exploring historical fluctuations over time—paying particular attention to how state-formations condition Muslim-Buddhist entanglements—the book shows the processual and relational aspects of religious identity constructions and Buddhist-Muslim interactions in Theravada Buddhist majority states.

Many forms of Buddhism, divergent in philosophy and style, emerged as Buddhism filtered out of India into other parts of Asia. Nonetheless, all of them embodied an ethical core that is remarkably consistent. Articulated by the historical Buddha in his first sermon, this moral core is founded on the concept of karma—that intentions and actions have future consequences for an individual—and is summarized as Right Speech, Right Action, and Right Livelihood, three of the elements of the Eightfold Path. Although they were later elaborated and interpreted in a multitude of ways, none of these core principles were ever abandoned. The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Ethics provides a comprehensive overview of the field of Buddhist ethics in the twenty-first century. The Handbook discusses the foundations of Buddhist ethics focusing on karma and the precepts looking at abstinence from harming others, stealing, and intoxication. It considers ethics in the different Buddhist traditions and the similarities they share, and compares Buddhist ethics to Western ethics and the psychology of moral judgments. The volume also investigates Buddhism and society analysing economics, environmental ethics, and Just War ethics. The final section focuses on contemporary issues surrounding Buddhist ethics, including gender, sexuality, animal rights, and euthanasia. This groundbreaking collection offers an indispensable reference work for students and scholars of Buddhist ethics and comparative moral philosophy.