For one, because the suttas all state multiple times, directly, with no room for interpretation, that you shouldn't harm others.
>All
>tremble at the rod,
> all
>are fearful of death.
>Drawing the parallel to
> yourself,
>neither kill nor get others to kill.
>
>All
>tremble at the rod,
> all
>hold their life dear.
>Drawing the parallel to
> yourself,
>neither kill nor get others to kill.
— Dhammapada 129–130
>A disciple has faith in that teacher and reflects: 'The Blessed One in a variety of ways criticizes & censures the taking of life, and says, "Abstain from taking life." There are living beings that I have killed, to a greater or lesser extent. That was not right. That was not good. But if I become remorseful for that reason, that evil deed of mine will not be undone.' So, reflecting thus, he abandons right then the taking of life, and in the future refrains from taking life. This is how there comes to be the abandoning of that evil deed. This is how there comes to be the transcending of that evil deed.
— Samyutta42.8
And on and on and on. [1] You would absolutely expect other humans, who might live by codes with no such prohibitions, to behave differently.
[1] https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/study/nonviolence.html
That's just an interpretation by a Gora.
I can give you a similar interpretation by Wirathu or Anagarika Dharmapala that justifies the use of violence against those who supposedly stray against the path.
Unlike some other teachings, the Dhamma is not open to "interpretations": it's pretty explicit and not metaphorical at all. People twisting it for their ends simply produce counterfeit Dhamma that has nothing to do with the Buddha.
> People twisting it for their ends simply produce counterfeit Dhamma that has nothing to do with the Buddha
Sure, but at the end of the day, it is state backed Sanghs that set the tone, and the largest Sanghs (Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand) have aligned with an ethnonationalist view due to historical conflicts with Christian and Muslim evangelism, and how intertwined Buddhist revivalism was with their anti-colonial movements in the 19th and 20th century.
Buddhism in Western countries feels more "highbrow" and "humanist", but in the majority of countries where Buddhism has explicit state backing, it is majoritarian in nature due to the revivalist and anti-colonial movement in the 19th and 20th century, and it is those states that will set the tone for the religion, not a couple dozen thousand Westerners (excluding diasporas as they continue to follow their homeland traditons).
This is false because you're painting with overly broad strokes in the attempt to prove the point that "Westerners" don't get the reality on the ground in Buddhist countries (many don't, some do).
Technically, Buddhism is not a single religion, and even Theravada is not a monolithic tradition to get "the tone set by states". If anything, worldwide Buddhism is quite decentralized, and this has played a key role in preserving the Dhamma from being co-opted by state agendas.
It's not an interpretation. It is the foundational suttas of all of Buddhism themselves, which I have linked to. The Pali from which they are translated contain the same explicit prohibition against violence.
Quoting Buddhist theologians and scholars is not the same as quoting the suttas themselves, which I have done. Please stop making false claims here.
But the theologians (and mainstream ones at that) are the ones that set the tone and interpretation of a religion.
Just like how you quote a western raised and educated theologian's interpretations and translations.
This isn't to say Buddhism is a violent religion, but to deny that there is a very mainstream thread of majoritarianism in two of the largest Buddhist countries is ridiculous.
Edit: Cannot reply, but every group that uses a majoritarian lens in Buddhism uses the Upayakaushalya Sutra to justify their violence as an action for the greater good.
Fundamentally, a religion is about the interpretation, not the texts themselves.
And denying that Buddhist violence (that too backed by mainstream Buddhist ideologues in the largest Buddhist practicing countries in the world) is ridiculous. The 2019 riots in Sri Lanka, the Rohingya genocide, the whitewashing of the Burmese and Thai Military juntas, the whitewashing of dictatorship in Sri Lanka, and multitudes of other similar actions by the majority of the Sangh in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand highlights a significant strain of violence in Buddhism just like any other religion.
It is not an interpretation, it is a translation. I could just as well quote the Pali directly, which offers no such justification for the inherent violence you appear to claim (emphasis my own):
> Sabbe tasanti daṇaḍassa sabbe bhāyanti maccuno Attānaṃ upamaṃ katvā na haneyya na ghātaye. Sabbe tasanti daṇaḍassa sabbesaṃ jīvitaṃ piyaṃ Attānaṃ upamaṃ katvā na haneyya na ghātaye.
> This isn't to say Buddhism is a violent religion, but to deny that there is a very mainstream thread of majoritarianism in two of the largest Buddhist countries is ridiculous.
I never denied "majoritarianism". I denied that Buddhism condones violence, both in a plurality of Buddhist cultures and in the suttas themselves.
> And denying that Buddhist violence (that too backed by mainstream Buddhist ideologues in the largest Buddhist practicing countries in the world) is ridiculous.
You appear hellbent on conflating humans doing bad things on behalf of religious causes with Buddhism itself, which does not, in any way, condone any of the acts you've highlighted.
> $massacres highlights a significant strain of violence in Buddhism
If I tell you that a book that declares in the strongest possible language that no harm shall be done to rabbits was in fact a trick of the demiurge and that only true believers could discern the true message for why the mass murder of all rabbits in the world was good and then I tell you that I am the Prophet of the Book, the religion and its teachings would not change. I would just be some idiot who had murdered all the rabbits in the world.
The one who had lied and cheated and schemed would be responsible, not the author of the book or their teachings. They would have created a Bizarro World of their own creation that took its root in the misery of their own heart.
This Bizarro World is not Buddhism, was never Buddhism, and could not be Buddhism and I have the evidence from the words themselves that Buddhism is not of genocide, of hatred, and of bloodshed.
I'm not saying Buddhism (as in the precepts and tenets of the dharm) is warmongering, but a significant portion of organized and mass Buddhism does accept warfare as acceptable based on their own interpretations.
The issue I (and others in this thread) am taking offense to is saying "Buddhism" as an organized religion is opposed to warfare, when several major and mainstream Buddhist movements view warfare as acceptable.
And denying the impact of Anagarika Dharmapala and the anti-colonial movement in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand had on that lens is ridiculous.
And don't get me started about Tibetan Buddhism (yes, a completely different tradition than Theravada Buddhism, though even Theravada Buddhisms have incorporated local traditions), when the SFF and ITBP have very successfully merged the protection of Tibetan Buddhism with combat service back in my ancestral state, and how both Chinese and Indian state organizations have been playing a great game around the core fundamentals of Tibetan Buddhism itself.
And you are clearly disregarding a paper written at NTU by scholars who specifically studied the rise of Buddhist nationalism in South and Southeast Asia.
Buddhism as an organized religion is opposed to warfare. That is the mainstream and majority view and practice. It derives its legitimacy from the Buddhist suttas. The First Precept — "I undertake the precept to refrain from taking life" — is universal across Theravāda, Mahāyāna, and Vajrayāna traditions.
Nationalistic deviations exist, have existed and will likely continue to emerge. These are Buddhist in name only — political appropriations of a tradition that fundamentally rejects violence.
The Buddha's teachings are available to anyone, can be practiced by anyone, and are unbound by culture, nation, or ethnicity.
> The ocean doesn’t accommodate a carcass, but quickly carries it to the shore and strands it on the beach. In the same way, the Sangha doesn’t accommodate a person who is unethical, of bad qualities, filthy, with suspicious behavior, underhand, no true ascetic or spiritual practitioner—though claiming to be one—rotten inside, festering, and depraved. But they quickly gather and expel them. Even if such a person is sitting in the middle of the Sangha, they’re far from the Sangha, and the Sangha is far from them.
— Anguttara Nikāya 8.19
What is it to be unethical? The First Precept, which prohibits the taking of life, is the first qualification of an ethical person and the first qualification to be a member of the Sangha: the community of Buddhist practitioners that includes laypeople, monks and nuns.
You continue to play a game of qualifying Buddhism under what cannot be qualified. When pressed for first-party sources justifying violence in Buddhism, you come up empty-handed and instead return to nationalistic violence flown under a false flag that is an abomination to Buddhism. You go on to then state that a majority of organized Buddhist faith allows for warfare and violence, which is false. It simply is not true that a majority of Buddhist denominations agree that warfare and violence are acceptable means of conduct.
And now we're in a Buddhist version of Ghandi's comment that "Your Christians are so unlike your Christ"
If we say "we expect followers of X religion to be nonviolent because their holy texts explicitly say so" then I guess there aren't many religious people in the world. I see no reason to expect a self-identifying Buddhist to be less violent than a Christian or Muslim beyond pop culture stereotypes.
If I were a human who came from a warrior culture that revered battle as the One True Way to find liberation, I would fully expect that human to be more violent than one who has dedicated their life to a non-violent religion. Do you really believe otherwise?