[Buddha-l] Dharmapala

[L.S. Cousins]

Dan Lusthaus wrote:

> You are basically attempting to trivialize my analysis by conflating it
>
> missionaries and their motives. I am not a Christian missionary. I am not
> even a Christian.
>
Well, I had kinda noticed that, Dan.

So it was rather entertaining to accuse you of Christian missionary 
tendencies. But the serious point that underlay my comment is that there 
is a tendency (in some forms of Mahāyāna and in those influenced by 
Mahāyāna exegesis) to give a triumphalist exegesis of early Buddhist 
texts which has many analogies with Christian triumphalist exegesis of 
the Torah.

> And I am not trying to undermine Buddhism, which is
> obviously what you think you feel called upon to defend from my imagined
> attack.
>

I didn't think you were trying to undermine Buddhism which can very well 
look after itself.

I did find the manner in which you were summarizing some of the early 
Suttas in that particular post rather unpleasant and offensive.
>
> On the contrary, I am intrigued by these episodes which, despite being
> isolated instances, did spawn further development in later Buddhist
> communities -- and precisely offered some of the canonical basis for
> large-scale Buddhist-sanctioned violence, such as putting the Gelugpas 
> into
> power. What intrigues is NOT that fact (though suppressing it or 
> trying to
> pretend it's all a mistake, or just "farting" as Erik suggests, is simply
> putting hands over one's ears and humming to oneself in order not to hear
> what is going on), but rather a fact that I consider much more important,
> namely that despite having a textual basis for forced conversions, 
> violence
> done in the name of religious authority (and Vajrapani plays EXACTLY that
> role later on), in most times and places Buddhists opted NOT to avail
> themselves of this. Why and how that is the case is what is important, 
> but
> one cannot even begin to analyze that without first acknowledging that 
> this
> is a legitimate issue.
>

I have not at all discussed later violence in Northern Buddhism. 
Obviously, people develop ideas and draw on new interpretations of old 
ones. But I need to read the book before I can assess some points.

> Similarly, one can try to minimize the violence done by Duṭṭhagāmaṇi, or
> quibble over whether the relic is in or on a lance or spear or staff.
>
The matter of Lances seems highly important to me :-)  And there is no 
question but that Geiger's translation exaggerates in places. There is a 
considerable difference between killing a large army (probably quite 
tiny by modern standards) and killing millions of people.

Good scholarship is built upon attention to detail. Like most other 
forms of craftmanship.

> However the quibbling resolves, in the end, the story itself remains 
> one of
> Buddhism establishing itself by military means -- one of the 
> cornerstones of
> Duṭṭhagāmaṇi's redemptive remorse is that he feels everything he did 
> (viz.
> the killing, etc.) was done for Buddhism and the Dhamma, not for 
> self-gain
> or personal conquest.
>
> The relic, like bringing the monks along on the march, serves a 
> protective
> talismanic function. One may also wish to minimize this story -- with its
> redemptive conclusion for someone with a lot of blood on his hands in the
> name of protecting and promoting Buddhism -- by questioning its 
> historicity,
> canonicity, etc.,
>
These are important questions when we discuss early Buddhism. You may 
find the arguments presented inconvenient and so wish to dismiss them as 
minimizing.
>
> but the basic fact is that, as ven. Vimaladhajja explains
> in the Kent essay it is a preferred topic for sermons given by monks to
> soldiers.
>
But are not the monks who preach to the army selected by the army ?
>
> Living Buddhism is not in the philological debates a handful of scholars
> have with each other, but much more in the sermons that disseminate the
> "message" and keep Buddhism alive and relevant to actual Buddhists. 
> And the
> indications are that it has always been so -- the number of sermons and
> their edifying topics among the Gandharan mss. attests to that as well.
>
And you think I don't know that ?
>
> The point is that once "stories" move into the oral dissemination 
> mode, they
> modify, become more relevant, take on novel aspects, etc. Once these
> modified versions become entrenched, and thus repeated and ingrained 
> in the
> cultural imagination, it makes little to no difference whether the events
> (Huineng, Vajrapani, Duṭṭhagāmaṇi, etc.) actually took place, or happened
> exactly as recorded in this or that text, or this or that version of the
> story in this or the other text. The version -- undergoing endless
> modifications -- in the cultural imagination is the one that counts, 
> that is
> "real" for its community. That, for better or worse, is the nature of
> Scripture and how Scripture -- as imagined -- can provide the 
> authoritative
> basis for a story that may not only veer from it but may directly 
> contradict
> it.
>
Exactly so. And that is why we cannot simply read back from later times 
and assume that this holds good for earlier periods.

But I would certainly not be prepared to dismiss history as a 
discipline. Nor would I want to think that there is no value in 
investigating the truthfulness of historical claims.
>
> This unique and very unusual pericope is found on only the two occasions
> in a very large literature. So you are blowing it up out of all
> proportion.
>
>
> No. These are not forgotten pericopes lost among countless other 
> obscure and
> little remembered passages and episodes from the scriptures. These were
> remembered and developed by the Buddhist communities themselves.
>
But there is no evidence that later Southern Buddhism ever uses the 
story of Vajirapāṇi in the way you propose.
>
> Jerryson's essay on the contemporary Thai soldier-monks proposes a simple
> notion that is worth considering in this regard. While we all agree that
> there has been a strong pacifist line to Buddhism, there nonetheless have
> been periods -- among all forms of Buddhism -- where violence and ways of
> sanctioning it have occurred. There is what Jerryson calls a "latent"
> militarism that only emerges in certain types of circumstances and
> occasions. It would be important to study and analyze what those
> circumstances are -- again, something impossible to do if one pretends 
> they
> don't exist or are not worth examining carefully.
>

I have no doubt at all that some Buddhists in later periods have adopted 
martial modes. Moreover, it is clear that Buddhism was eventually able 
to mount a miltary response to and defense against the violent advance 
of Islam. Without that it probably wouldn't exist today.

Lance Cousins