One of the things that really bothers me, and that I feel motivated to write about, is people trying to hijack Buddhism for their own purposes. So recently my attention was grabbed when I came across a talk by Mark Blum Associate Professor of Japanese Studies at the East Asian Studies department of SUNY Albany. Description:
"Environmentalism, Buddhism and Transcendentalism;" on April 3rd, 2008 as part of the Buddhist Studies Seminar at Columbia University. He explores how views of ecology among modern Eco-Buddhists might be grounded more in the philosophies of Transcendentalists such as Emerson and Thoreau than in Buddhist traditions.
The talk is 1 hour and 15 minutes long. I listened to the whole thing and attempted to take some notes. Some notable quotes and points from my notes are recounted below.
Blum: "In the process of two years of research, we discovered that there was no notion of 'nature' in Indian Buddhism."
Blum also says: "...what I discovered in trying to read through a lot of ecological Buddhist writings in the west, based in Buddhist thought...at least the American version of this...shares more with Transcendentalist thinkers like Emerson and Thoreau than it does with anything Buddhist."
The religious form of ecology, known as deep ecology or "ecological activism as spiritual path", originated in Europe. The term was coined by Norwegian philosopher Arne Næss in 1973.
One example that professor Blum gives of this becoming intermixed with Buddhism is "ecology monks" in Thailand ordaining trees.
What does it mean to ordain trees? Blum states, "The baptizing of trees by by monks in Thailand in the 20th century could have only happened because of the 20th century... because of the spread of the rhetoric of Transcendentalism from America to Thailand."
He mentions that bringing attention to ecological problems is good, but ordaining trees is just inconceivable within Buddhism. (In fact he can't help but snicker at the idea which is apparent in the audio.)
In Thailand, for exmaple, even though spirits who live in trees are revered, if something happens to a spirit's tree then the spirit simply moves to another tree. Even in this case, sacredness is not in tree but in the spirit itself.
Blum mentions parts of DN 27: The Agganna Sutta about how man affects environment and environment effects man. The interaction is moral, not about mutual dependence of man and nature. The main theme is that of attachment, the goal being to remove attachment to nature, not attach sacredness to it and embrace it or identify with it as some Eco-Buddhists have advocated.
Buddhist cosmology is hierarchical; animals are inferior to humans. Trees aren't sentient and don't even rate as part of a "realm". Animals are presumed to be unhappy and morally flawed; a more ideal world would have fewer animals in it. The Eco-Buddhist concept of humans and animals being part of the same realm (humans simply being more clever animals) is at odds with Buddhist tradition.
Blum relates the idea of the sacredness of nature in East Asian Buddhist writings to Taoist escapism and the animism popular in medieval Japan.
The second half of the talk focuses on American Transcendentalism and the idea of self in nature, the divine in nature, and transcending the self by getting back to "savage" nature, etc. Clearly these ideas are not Buddhist.
Henry David Thoreau advocated the idea of "self-transcendence in nature", transcendence of "who one is" by losing his consciousness of self "in nature." Thoreau held reverence for the wild and salvage, and faith in the salvation of self-discipline.
Thoreau: "It would imply the regeneration of mankind if they were to become elevated enough to truely worship sticks and stones." (Source) Not a very Buddhist idea.
Blum mentions that Thoreau and Emmerson were influenced by Asian philosophy, including Buddhism, which is perhaps why some transcendentalist philosophy does have some things in common with Buddhism, but it is not equivalent to Buddhism. Overall though, Transcendentalism comes from Unitarianism which was a Christian reaction against Puritanism.
Blum further mentions that there is nothing in Buddhism about agency in nature; earth is not a deity. This idea seems to have more to do with Unitarian or Transcendentalist ideas such as the presence of the divine in nature; nature IS God. (Similarly some have stated ideas such as nature IS Buddha but I can't remember at which point this came up in the talk.)
He at one point makes a comment about how National Socialism (Nazi Party) was very ecologically friendly and had many green policies, which he associated with rejection of Christian policies and beliefs. (A recent book that talks about this is Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg.) He doesn't really get into it but I think the lesson here is that it's important not to reject or embrace things for negative reasons (hatred of Christianity for example) as it often leads one to embrace other forms of hatred.
My Comments
Overall, though I do a poor job of taking notes and editing them, he makes a good case that religious environmentalism doesn't really have much to do with Buddhism.
The main legitimate ties I see with Buddhism and environmentalism are that of compassion and refraining from harmful behavior. Nature is not sacred, animals are not noble, but that doesn't mean that it's ok to harm them and that one should not seek to protect them from environmental hazards.
So I think that the main point is that any Buddhist environmental focus should be on non-harm and compassion rather than some sense of "sacredness" in nature, or out of some reaction to Christian ideas about nature belonging to humans. Ultimately what matters is reducing the suffering of beings and this can be done to some extent by protecting the environment, but it's not Buddhist to take action out of some abstract sense of "sacredness" of nature. Any action must be directed at reducing the suffering of humans and other beings, and working for their welfare.
Of course, in order do this it is important that one is doing it for the right reasons and not out of hatred as the Nazis possibly did. Hatred will lead to more hatred, and actions out of hatred, even if they seem good at first, may not continue to remain good if the real goal is to harm those you hate.
This is why the elimination of hatred through personal practice is so important, and unfortunately this is probably neglected by most people, especially those overly focused on the behavior of others.
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