Thich Nhat Hanh

He was born in 1926 and became a monk at the age of 16. He later received a tertiary education in the West and taught at Columbia before returning to Vietnam. His tradition was a Vietnamese form of Zen that had adopted several Theravada meditation approaches.

During the Vietnam War between a Communist North and a Capitalist Christian South Vietnamese regime (allied with Western forces – note not West Vietnamese but Western in the global sense) he advocated Buddhism as a third way. He was again at Columbia in this period where he met Martin Luther King, Jr. He influenced King’s attitude to the war and King nominated him for a Nobel Peace Prize. He was also involved in non-violence movements in the US, generally.

He argued in these so-called ‘non-violence’ movements (that were often havens at the time for angry people) that peace was gotten at moment by moment by means of awareness and that angry actions lead to angry results. Therefore, he taught the angry people that they should always seek the place of compassion in their hearts if they truly sought peace. “Being peace” was the consistent somewhat mystical focus of his message and plans for the movements more so than “aiming for peace” without any internal thought for how that can come from an angry place. He talked of his philosophy of “Interbeing”. The basic idea was that the interconnectedness of all of us stressed in the Buddhist idea of dependent arising meant that we had (and were) a joint-being. So he advocated peace and compassion and said “to be is to interbe”. Non-violence naturally followed from interbeing. The link with Gandhi’s (and Buddhism’s) views of wisdom and compassion is also fairly clear.

The question arises whether the self-immolation practiced by several monks taught by Nhat Hanh as a result of the situation in Vietnam during the war is truly non-violent and/or righteous. Books of Buddhist Ethics usually provide extensive discussions of the issue of Buddhism’s approach to suicide in comparable circumstances. The monks were, of course, meditating and seated in the Lotus position. The Buddhist view of such things is not necessarily like the Western view, as I hope has become clear in the course of these posts. This is however at the extreme end of “Engaged Buddhism”.

There is a Mahayana tradition of self-immolation. See, for example, part 23 of the Lotus Sutra and there is also in some traditions a routine burning of parts of the body as an initiation rite for postulants to the vows of the religious life. The rationale for this latter rite at least is to signify the sincerity of the vow. Thich Nhat Hanh suggested that the self-immolation, too, was a sign of the sincerity of the monks who committed to it as a form of non-violent protest against the war and so was (and is) not comparable to either violence to other beings or mere suicide. The motive was regarded as the issue and the motivation here was the purest of compassion for the people of Vietnam. The monks had also first attempted other forms of action to address the issue including meditation and a letter-writing campaign so they further argued that the suicides and their publicisation were last resorts.

Many Buddhists do have a problem with it (as many Muslims and Christians reject suicide bombings and ‘abortion doctor’ killings for their own reasons). Part of the issue is the violence per se and part is that idea rejected so firmly by Gandhi that religion simply does not belong in politics or social policy to such a potentially revolutionary extent, Aung San Suu Kyi and the Dalai Lama notwithstanding. One may ask: did the ‘tactic’ of self-immolation achieve peace? It certainly produced an effect and that is perhaps more to the point for “Engaged Buddhism” as it was sincerely entered into. The issue may still remain: was that effect positive?

The next issue for Nhat Hanh may have been: is “Engaged Buddhism” what Siddhartha wanted his monks to do? The man himself spent 75 years as an enlightened being speaking mainly with Buddhist religious though, of course, we know he also gave advice to kings in that time. By comparing Buddhism with other religions, we may notice similar changes that may be attributable to modernity but also to the way of Siddhartha.

So any 'changes' may be doctrinally valid as well as modern but there is probably at least an element of modernity? The common theme of ‘modern’ religious observance (since the Christian Reformation at least) is that the rules of observance are to be understood personally rather than merely ‘handed down’ by scholars. So if a scholar says I can’t be a suicide bomber, ‘abortion doctor’ killer or self-immolator, my modern education tells me that I may also have an opinion on how I may observe my religion. I can read the religious texts for myself and in my own way. The Theravada tradition remains the most conservative tradition within Buddhism in this regard though even here this situation is not static. Buddhadasa Bhikkhu is a noted Theravadan activist, for example. Also, within India around the time of partition, quite apart from what Gandhi was doing, Buddhism achieved a large number of new converts as a protest by former Hindus at both the Hindu caste system and Islamic and Christian systems led by a leading ‘untouchable’ politician of the time. Other still earlier examples of modern “Engaged Buddhism” though they didn’t yet have that name were the 19^th Century Japanese lay movement and a 19^th Century movement inspired by a European convert. Not all of these movements are necessarily either right or wrong, however, from a 'true Buddhist' perspective.

So the locus of religious authority is the subject of a fraught debate within Buddhism just as it is in most religions today. Al Qaeda (much of the leadership is Western tertiary-educated) and “Engaged Buddhism” are perhaps the Calvinists and Lutherans of today in their religions dealing with an unprecedentedly educated mass audience. It can further be argued that, in the harsh environment which modernity can provide, it is virtually inevitable that a wide variety of solutions to problems might well urgently and sincerely be preached and earnestly and wholeheartedly be adopted by adherents to a wide variety of the consequent and inevitable sectarian divisions.

Nhat Hanh also met Thomas Merton, the Catholic writer, who apparently took an interest in the war (Merton, though sworn to silence as a Trappist monk, is a well-respected writer on spirituality and may have asked to meet Nhat Hanh - he was given permission from his superiors to meet him). He apparently greatly influenced Merton, who later wrote that monasticism may be a common ground and meeting point between religions. Incidentally, the Dalai Lama also met Merton and later planted a tree near his grave.

Today Thich Nhat Hanh lives in France where he runs an order and community that he founded called “the Order of Interbeing”. He was once expelled by the Communist government of Vietnam but was allowed to return to attend a conference recently to be a keynote speaker and has apparently returned since.