Buddhism

Characteristics of Buddhism

The underlying reason for the complex interactions between Buddhism and political forces may be found in two characteristic features of the religion. First, we must look back to the story of the historical Buddha's decision to proclaim his teaching in the first place, which is a constitutive narrative both for his own biography and for the emergence of Buddhism as an organized religious system. The central story is that Gautama (in the 5th century BCE), though blessed with many privileges as a young man, passed through a personal heart-searching experience about human suffering, illness, old age, and death. Recognizing the transience of existence, he perceived the cause of suffering to lie in ignorance, desire, and attachment to transient things, while its resolution lay in knowledge and detachment. The understanding of all these relationships is summed up as his “enlightenment” or bodhi, which is why he was regarded as a buddha, an enlightened one. Had he preferred a quietist, personal resolution of these general questions of human existence, which according to the narrative he considered steadily as an option, the social impact would most likely have been nil. As it was, the very decision to proclaim his system of teaching (in Sanskrit dharma, in Pali dhamma) led not only to the first ordinations of monks but also to sponsorship by prosperous laity and royalty. This meant that a strong and active symbiosis with a supportive laity grew up from the very beginning, so that the social and political ramifications began to extend themselves in a continuous process.

Second, the concept of the “wheel turner” (in Sanskrit cakravartin, in Pali cakkavattī) is significant. On one hand, it is part of the mythologization of the figure of the Buddha himself, for he is regarded as having achieved the right to “turn the wheel of dharma.” However, the same concept is applied to kingship, for a “wheel-turning monarch” is one who claims the power of extending his rule to the four quarters of the earth, spreading stability in support of a moral society. When a suitable individual is reborn as a “great person,” with excellent qualities and at an appropriately high-class of society, he—presumed to be male—has the option of turning the wheel of dharma or of turning the wheel of political power. Ideally, therefore, a powerful and righteous king will be the contemporary and the patron of a living Buddha. This dual, tandem-like concept was later integrated under the concept of the “wonderful union of king and Buddha.” In some cases, such as [Page 162]the Tibetan model, this means that the incarnated spiritual leader or Dalai Lama is at the same time the political head of the population, which naturally causes a collision with any modern state such as China, with its secular ideological base. Tensions over this model may be seen to a lesser extent in Mongolia, Bhutan, and Nepal. In a variation of this union, certain kings or princes have been given the title of “Dharma King” (in Sanskrit dharmarāja), which has usually implied not only an elitist espousal of Buddhism, but also that they have authority, direct or indirect, over senior appointments in the monastic hierarchy, as frequently seen in premodern Japan.

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