Environment or earth sangha: Buddhist perspectives on our global ecological well-being

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Notes

 1. Among the notables I would like to mention are Schmithausen (1997), Tucker and Williams (1998), de Silva (1998), Harvey (2000, especially ch. 4 ‘Attitude to and Treatment of the Natural World’, pp. 150–86), Kaza and Kraft (2000), Badiner (2002), James (2004), Loy (2003), Cooper and James (2005), and Kaza (2005).

 2. This is a description of the task of theology as an academic discipline in line with that given by David Tracy in his essay entitled ‘Comparative Theology’ (in Mircea Eliade (ed). 1988. The Encyclopedia of Religion, vol. 14, New York: MacMillan, pp. 446–55), cited in Jackson and Makransky (2000, 1–2).

 3. Jackson and Makransky have themselves become more reticent in putting forward the use of this term ‘Buddhist theology.’ On their initiative, and supported by a growing circle of scholars, a new Group has been formed in the American Academy of Religion, called ‘Critical and Constructive Reflection in Buddhism,’ whose main purpose is to take up the tasks they have laid out in Buddhist Theology (but without using this designation). Among works that can be included in ‘Buddhist Theology’ are Aramaki (1992), Badiner (1990), Batchelor and Brown (1992), Habito (1997), Habito (forthcoming) Hakamaya (1990), and Macy (1991).

 4. See the second part of my Experiencing Buddhism: Ways of Wisdom and Compassion (Habito 2005) for a descriptive account of these five major traditions in historical development and contemporary manifestation.

 5. These included divine or heavenly beings endowed with long life-spans and with supra-human powers, as well as those kinds of beings who inhabit realms lower than the human: animals, fighting spirits, hungry ghosts, and hell-dwellers.

 6. These include the realms of: the followers of the Buddha who listen to his word (sravaka); those who attain enlightenment as solitary ascetics (pratyeka-buddha); those who are almost at the point of awakening but choose to postpone their arrival in order to help other beings still entangled in the cycle of birth-and-death (bodhisattva); and finally, the realm of Buddha. These four are regarded as superior to the realm of the divine beings of the Hindu pantheon, who may have supra-human powers but are themselves still caught in the cycle of birth and death.

 7. Abhidharmakosabhāsyam, ch. 3 (L. de la Valle Poussin, English trans. by Leo Pruden, pp. 365–71).

 8. Ian Harris notes that the cosmological framework presented in these two works in particular remain operative for present-day Buddhists (Harris 2001, 239; citing also Gethin 1998, 112–32).

 9. Some Pure Land thinkers, however, consider entry into Sukhavati as nirvāna itself.

10. The Pure Land teaching of Shinran, in thirteenth-century Japan, may not fall under this description in a clear-cut way, as it includes an affirmation of this-worldly reality based on a non-dual world-view. Again, I leave this for a future task in cooperation with Shinran's followers, who are also among those active in pursuing ecological questions in Japan and in the international scene. For example, a Research Institute based in Ryukoku University in Kyoto, Japan, a Shin Buddhist-sponsored institution, has embarked on a series of academic conferences and symposia on ‘Buddhism and the Environment,’ with a view to publishing the papers from these conferences, in Japanese and in English. See Richard Payne's forthcoming Buddhism and the Environment (provisional title, Wisdom Publications) for one collection of papers based on this series of conferences.

11. This is the key proclamation of Prajñāpāramitā sutras, and is found in succinct expression in the short version Prajñāpāramitā-hrdaya, or Heart Sutra.

12. Nagarjuna's Mulamadhyamika-karika, xxv: 19–20.

13. The question concerning the sentience of plants has been a point at issue since early Buddhist times (see Schmithausen 1991b), and Japanese Buddhist thinkers, notably Annen, in the tenth century, and his followers in the Tendai tradition, in expounding what is known as ‘Original Enlightenment Thought’ (Tendai Hongaku-shiso) fully affirmed ‘the Buddhahood of grasses and trees (sōmoku-jōbutsu)’ (see Sueki 1994). Japanese Tendai Original Enlightenment texts took the language of non-duality to the extreme, affirming the identity of polar opposites such as ‘Life and Death,’ ‘Birth-and-Death and Nirvāna,’ and, relevant to us here, ‘Sentient Beings and Environment.’ This last mentioned set makes an affirmation that bridges the traditional demarcation between sentient beings as subject to awakening, and the environment or ‘receptacle’ that contains them (eshō-funi). This is a doctrinal stance that has been recently highlighted by followers of Lotus Buddhism to ground ecological engagement in a contemporary context—see de Silva (1998, 32) referring to this term, although misspelling it. It is also relevant to note here that the Tendai Original Enlightenment doctrine has been the subject of harsh criticism by proponents of what is known as ‘Critical Buddhism’; notably Japanese scholars Noriaki Hakamaya and Shiro Matsumoto, who have pointed out heterodox strands they claim to have departed from the ‘pure’ Buddhism of Śākyamuni as dhātuvāda. On this debate, see Hubbard and Swanson (1997).

14. Some recent works on Buddhism and Ecology have noted these themes, and have also highlighted various formulations of a non-dual standpoint, such as the Avatamsaka, or Hua Yen sutra. See the essays in Tucker and Williams (1997), and also in Kaza and Kraft (2000).

15. In a plenary address at an International Conference on Buddhist Christian Dialogue, John Cobb, Jr., a Christian theologian, addressing the question of ‘Death and Dying in Buddhism and Christianity,’ broadened the scope of the theme, and focused not on death for individual human beings, but on the impending death of the Earth, as a vital concern for us all, irrespective of religious belief.

16. The oft-cited 1967 essay of Lynn White makes a cogent argument to this effect, while raising relevant questions that religious thinkers and scholars continue to address to this day (White 1967).

17. The text of his talk is published in Rockefeller and Elder (1992, 109–23); see pp. 116–17 for the citations.

18. To dismiss this as an example of eco-apologetics that is ‘unsupported by any textual, historical or cultural evidence,’ as Harris does (1995, 181), seems to be an overbearingly unfair judgment on the simple and straightforward talk of the Dalai Lama, speaking as a Tibetan Buddhist on the ecological question.

19. See the online source for the entire essay (Gyatso 2007).

20. David Eckel also focuses on the Dalai Lama's remarks, in an excellent essay entitled ‘Is there a Buddhist Philosophy of Nature?’ (Eckel 1997). Eckel is more appreciative of the nuances, the solid traditional Buddhist grounding, as well as the impact and implications of the Dalai Lama's address on this occasion, in contrast to Harris' outright dismissal.

21. See the essays of Donald Swearer, and of Lee Sponsel and Poranee Natadecha-Sponsel, in Tucker and Williams (1997, 21–44, 45–68).

22. Just as the members of the grassroots communities in Latin America and the Philippines, facing situations of oppression and poverty, were challenged and inspired to re-read their Christian scriptures, bringing forth what came to be known as theologies of liberation, such situations shed new light and open new horizons in hermeneutical strategies of Scriptural reading in Buddhist, and other religious communities as well.

23. The Boston Research Center, an institution supported by Soka Gakkai International, has taken the initiative of inviting Buddhists of different traditions to contribute to a volume entitled Buddhist Perspectives on the Earth Charter (Boston Research Center for the 21st Century 1997).

24. See my chapter on Lotus Buddhism in Experiencing Buddhism (Habito 2005).

25. See note 10.

26. See the essays of Habito, Loori, Kaza, and Yamauchi, in Tucker and Williams (1997).

27. See my essay in Tucker and Williams (1997, 165–75), and also Veitch (1996, 135–52), for descriptions of possible pitfalls for meditative practitioners, as well as possible ways meditative practice can support and enhance ecological engagement. See also the excellent study by Simon James on environmental ethics from a Zen perspective (James 2004).

28. See Kaza (2005) and Badiner (2002).

29. As there are a good number of works on socially engaged Buddhism readily available, I will not list them here. Among these, however, I would like to highlight Loy's (2003) Great Awakening, noting especially the subtitle Toward a Buddhist Social Theory. In this work, building up on his previous writings, Loy offers constructive insights on how key Buddhist notions can be applied toward a better understanding of our contemporary global society, in the socio-economic, political, cultural, ecological, and other dimensions.

30. See also Habito (2006a) for a more detailed development of this point.

31. Dogen's Shōbōgenzō, ‘This Very Mind is Buddha’ fascicle. This passage triggered a deep experience of Zen awakening in Yamada Koun, a renowned Zen Master who has authorized many teachers now leading Zen communities in different parts of the world. For this account of his experience, see Kapleau (1965, 212–14).

32. Eshō-funi, or ‘nonduality of environment and living beings,’ is a doctrinal expression from the Tendai tradition that articulates this vision, which can provide grounding and empowerment for active ecological engagement. See also note 13.

33. See especially Loy (2004, 1–47, 171–98).

34. David C. Korten's The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community (2006), written by a community organizer and scholar who has lived in different parts of the world in a span of several decades, is an excellent work outlining horizons for our future, incorporating some Buddhist principles and practices conducive to the transformation of our global society ‘from Empire to Earth Community.’