[Buddha-l] Re: Marx and Buddhism

[David Roberts]

curt wrote:

> Dan Lusthaus wrote:
>
>> Buddhism literally crawled out of the swamps in India when it allied 
>> with
>> the Merchants, who not only helped them establish a major base in 
>> Gandhara,
>> but led them through the Silk Road from Parthia to China. Mahayana 
>> Buddhism
>> (e.g., Sambhoga-kaya) is capitalist through and through and through.
>> Buddhism survived when it did in Asia due to patronage from the upper
>> classes (merchants, officials, ruling classes), and it is similarly no
>> accident that those in the West most attracted to Buddhism continue 
>> to be
>> middle class or better.
>
> A bunch of merchants do not a capitalist ruling class make. 

Correct. There have always been merchants, under all economic systems, 
just as there have always been thieves, and the charitable. But there 
has not always been the Capitalist economic formation which, 
historically, arises, in Europe, as the Feudal economic formation 
subsides. The Capitalist economic formation has since become globalised, 
accurately predicted by Marx in the 1840s - he saw the beginnings of 
globalisation around 1492, some may recognise that date.

> First you have to have a sufficient mass of Capital to provide said 
> merchants with the wherewithall to make themselves into a ruling 
> class. This only came about via a series of unfortunate events known 
> as the "primitive accumulation" period (which was well over 10 
> centuries after Buddhism was spread along the Silk Road). And when I 
> say series of unfortunate events, I mean that the "enclosures" are 
> hardly even worth mentioning (compared to the genocide in the western 
> hemisphere, the african slave trade, etc). Buddhism is compatible with 
> being a merchant - and possibly even with being a Capitalist (although 
> I doubt it) - but Buddh-ism (emphasis on the "ism") is fundamentally 
> incompatible with Capital-ism. As "isms" go there could hardly be two 
> less suited to each other. Capitalism is a system in which only one 
> thing matters - Capital. Under Capitalism all of society becomes ever 
> more subordinated to the production of Capital. "Culture" itself is 
> reduced to mere advertising. "Politics" is reduced to a competition to 
> see who can "attract" more investments and create the best "business 
> environment". Corporations become "person-like" entities with "rights" 
> protected by the Constitution. 

And under Capitalism:

'All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man 
is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of 
life, and his relations with his kind.' Marx and Engels, /The Communist 
Manifesto/

So Capitalism seems not only incompatible with Buddhism but also with 
Conservatism. (Recommended: Marshall Berman, 1983, /All That is Solid 
Melts Into Air/: /The Experience of Modernity/, London, Verso)

David a.k.a Brother Howitzer of Courteous Debate**
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