A suffering (but not irreparable) nature: environmental ethics from the perspective of early Buddhism
2007; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 8; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/14639940701636091
ISSN1476-7953
Autores Tópico(s)Chinese history and philosophy
ResumoClick to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1. A sampling of prominent books focusing on Buddhist environmentalism: Badiner (1990 Badiner, Allan Hunt, ed. 1990. Dharma Gaia: A harvest of essays in Buddhism and ecology, Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press. [Google Scholar]), Batchelor and Brown (1992 Batchelor, Martine and Kerry Brown, eds. 1992. Buddhism and ecology, London: Cassell. [Google Scholar]), Kaza and Kraft (2000 Kaza, Stephanie and Kenneth Kraft, eds. 2000. Dharma rain: Sources of Buddhist environmentalism, Boston, MA: Shambhala. [Google Scholar]), Macy (1991a Macy, Joanna. 1991a. World as lover, world as self, Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press. [Google Scholar]), and Tucker and Williams (1997 Tucker, M. E. and Williams, D. R., eds. 1997. Buddhism and ecology: The interconnection of dharma and deeds, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Google Scholar]). 2. By 'early Buddhism' I mean the ideas contained in the Pāli Canon (mainly the Vinaya and the Pāli Nikāyas). All references to the Pāli Canon in this essay cite the editions published by the Pali text Society ( Dīgha Nikāya Dīgha Nikāya. 1890–1911. Edited by: Rhys Davids, T. W. and Carpenter, J. E. Vols I–III, London: Pali Text Society. Edit [Google Scholar] [T.W. Rhys Davids and J.E. Carpenter (eds), vols I–III, London: Pali Text Society, 1890 Dīgha Nikāya. 1890–1911. Edited by: Rhys Davids, T. W. and Carpenter, J. E. Vols I–III, London: Pali Text Society. Edit [Google Scholar]–1911], Majjhima Nikāya Majjhima Nikāya. 1888–1925. Edited by: Chalmers, R., Trenckner, V. and Rhys Davids, C. A. F. Vols I–IV, London: Pali Text Society. Edit [Google Scholar] [R. Chalmers, V. Trenckner, and C.A.F. Rhys Davids (eds), vols I–IV, London: Pali Text Society, 1888 Majjhima Nikāya. 1888–1925. Edited by: Chalmers, R., Trenckner, V. and Rhys Davids, C. A. F. Vols I–IV, London: Pali Text Society. Edit [Google Scholar]–1925], and Sa yutta Nikāya [L. Feer (ed), vols I–V, London: Pali Text Society, 1884 Feer, L., ed. 1884–1898. Vols I–V, London: Pali Text Society. Sayutta Nikāya, Edit [Google Scholar]–1898]. 3. See Harris (1994 Harris, I. 1994. Causation and Telos. Journal of Buddhist Ethics, 1: 46–59. [Google Scholar]) and Schmithausen (1997 Schmithausen, Lambert. 1997. The early Buddhist tradition and ecological ethics. Journal of Buddhist Ethics, 4: 1–42. [Google Scholar], 11). In Schmithausen's essay, he articulates what I take to be the greatest philosophical challenges to a Buddhist environmental ethics. So my essay is, in part, a response to that essay. 4. Of course, the skeptics are motivated by responsible scholarship, not a lack of sympathy with the environmentalist movements. I heartily agree with the view that any appropriation of the early Buddhist tradition for environmentalist purposes must accurately reflect sound textual and historical scholarship. 5. See, for example, Callicott (1995 Callicott, J. Baird. 1995. "Intrinsic value in nature: A metaethical analysis." Available from www.phil.indiana.edu/ejap/1995.spring/callicott.abs.html; INTERNET. [Google Scholar]). 6. See the Kaccāyanagotta Sutta at Sa yutta Nikāya 2.16–17. In the words of later Buddhist traditions, this is the denial that existents have own-being (svabhāva). 7. Most references to wilderness in the canonical sources occur in parables where wilderness is represented as a place of danger. See, for example, Dīgha Nikāya 2.343ff. 8. This is a term I borrow from American pragmatism. Emergentist (non-reductive) naturalism is what makes early Buddhism distinctive in comparison with other religious traditions (as well as with certain later forms of Buddhism). 9. Pāli words relating to the natural world include 'nature' (bhārol, pakati), 'natural' (nesaggika, pākitika, akittima), 'naturally' (pakatiyā, lokanimmānal), 'natural world' (loka), and 'natural phenomena' (dhammo). 10. See Cooper and James (2005 Cooper, David E. and Simon P. James. 2005. Buddhism, virtue and environment, Aldershot: Ashgate. [Google Scholar], 110). The lack of a general theory of nature does not mean that the early Buddhists had no conception of, or were not interested in, the 'natural.' On the contrary, they were intensely interested in specific natural processes (especially, the factors of sentience that are involved in the arising and cessation of suffering). The failure to develop a 'general' theory from specific instances is not uncommon in the Pāli Nikāyas. Much of this generalizing work, for better or worse, was attempted in the commentaries. 11. Dependent arising applied to the arising of dukkha can be found at Sa yutta Nikāya 2.17, Dīgha Nikāya, 2.55ff, Majjhima Nikāya, 1.261. 12. Sa yutta Nikāya, 4.15–20. 13. Some might argue that the regular references to devas in the early texts indicates belief in non-natural beings, and therefore a non-natural level of reality. But, with A.K. Warder, I would argue that the devas, too, belong to the 'natural' world (although this implies a more inclusive or extended version of naturalism than one typically finds in the West). The devas portrayed in early Buddhist literature are not permanent spiritual essences apart from the causally dynamic world. See Warder (1970 Warder, A. K. 1970. Indian Buddhism, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. [Google Scholar], 55). The karmic cycle of death and rebirth is likewise a 'natural' process in this broader sense. 14. Sa yutta Nikāya, 3.66–68. 15. Majjhima Nikāya, 1.108–114. The six modes of human consciousness are: visual consciousness, auditory consciousness, olfactory consciousness, gustatory consciousness, tactile consciousness, and mental consciousness. 16. See Dīgha Nikāya, 1.34ff 17. This is a paraphrase of a point made by the American pragmatist John Dewey (1938 Dewey, J. 1938. Logic: The theory of inquiry, New York: Henry Holt Publishing Company. [Google Scholar], 25). 18. An environmental ethics that accepts the human–nature dichotomy seems inevitably to get hung up on a constructive dilemma. If human values/concerns are imposed on the natural world, then the position is open to charges of anthropocentrism. If nature is to be valued 'for its own sake,' then somehow we have to read these values from nature itself (probably committing a naturalistic fallacy) and most human activities (like building houses or roads) would appear to be unethical. 19. Some might argue that to do so would commit the so-called 'naturalistic fallacy' of attempting to derive an 'ought' from an 'is.' 20. Sa yutta Nikāya, 4.51. 21. Sa yutta Nikāya, 3.119. 22. Control of the mind is central to the elimination of dukkha because it is the crucial link in the causal chain from which dukkha arises. But that does not mean dukkha is only a mental phenomenon. 23. Sa yutta Nikāya, 4.216. (Translation from Collins 1982 Collins, Steven. 1982. Selfless persons: Imagery and thought in Theravāda Buddhism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar], 192.) When the Buddha said that all constructed or conditioned things (sankhāras) are suffering, he means that what is 'constructed' or 'conditioned' by unenlightened experience is a form of dukkha. The person who is enlightened experiences the conditioned, but in such a case it does not produce dukkha. 24. Sa yutta Nikāya, 4.216. 25. See Sa yutta Nikāya 3.21ff for an example of how this idea of understanding the impermanent for what it is can be applied to the five aggregates. This leads to the abandonment of grasping after these impermanent phenomena as if they could be a person's self. That is not the same as saying such things are inherently bad. Of course, both the characterization and treatment of dukkha contain no reference to a permanent 'person' or 'self,' but only refer to the complex natural processes that we designate as a person. 26. If this essay were a longer treatment of Buddhist environmentalism, I would argue that nibbāna is precisely a reorganization and transformation of natural factors—much like a painting or a symphony is a reorganization of natural factors from which radically new meanings emerge. But such a claim is a hornet's nest of controversy, and my position in this essay does not depend on proving a particular interpretation of nibbāna. Furthermore, the escapist interpretation of Buddhism puts too much emphasis on enlightenment or nibbāna as an 'all or nothing' proposition—as if life has no meaning at all short of achieving full enlightenment. But the Buddha never said anything like that. The Buddha made it abundantly clear that there are very definite fruits of the virtuous life that are to be experienced in mundane (unenlightened) modes of living—the process of spiritual development, then, is largely continuous, even if enlightenment itself is portrayed as discontinuous with unenlightened living. 27. Sutta-Nipāta, verses 143–52. 28. Cooper and James (2005 Cooper, David E. and Simon P. James. 2005. Buddhism, virtue and environment, Aldershot: Ashgate. [Google Scholar]) make a similar point through their analysis of early Buddhism as a virtue ethics. They argue that the value of nature is not just a by-product of the Buddhist path, but is essential to it.
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