Buddhism is globally associated with non-violence, peace, and social justice. They are the principles that influenced Mauryan emperor Ashoka to give up arms after the Kalinga war in 261 BCE. Centuries later, ahimsa emerged as the centrepiece of Mahatma Gandhi’s campaign against colonial rule. And in distant America, Martin Luther King Jr adopted the same philosophy in the civil rights movement, all influenced by Buddhism.
But contrary to popular perception, Buddha’s message of peace and love has not always been embraced by his followers. Buddhism, like other religions, also has its share of fanatics who encourage and justify the use of violence for the protection of their faith, which, they insist, is under threat. Sonia Faleiro’s The Robe and the Sword: How Buddhist Extremism Is Shaping Modern South Asia takes a look at this darker version of Buddhism. The philosophy, she says, has been weaponised in some quarters “in the service of nationalism, and in support of governments embracing a global trend toward majoritarianism and autocracy.”
Faleiro’s writing is based on her travels through Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand, where she had extensive conversations with victims of violence who lost their homes to marauding mobs, the monks who encouraged the brutality with their hate speeches, and the few who dared to question the system. Her reporting is foregrounded with historical events and socio-economic conditions that fostered violent Buddhist nationalism in South Asia. Using her journalistic training, she tells the story as it is. Her language is restrained, shorn of sensationalism. Yet the cruelty inflicted on the minorities, particularly Muslims, comes through, making for a disturbing read.
The section on Sri Lanka details how the line between religion and politics has blurred. Major Sinhalese political parties in Sri Lanka consult the monks before taking any major decision, and are complicit when the clergy publicly sanctions discriminatory practices and the use of arms against the minorities.
The chasm between the Sinhala population and the minorities, according to Faleiro, has its roots in the country’s colonial past and the decades-long civil war, which pitted the Buddhist Sinhala population against Tamil Hindus demanding a separate homeland. However, the end of the civil war failed to restore peace as the need for an enemy led the Buddhist clergy and the political class to shift their target from Hindus to Muslims and Christians, seen to be beneficiaries of special privileges.
Though there has been no dearth of militant monks in Sri Lanka, Faleiro writes that Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara, founder of Bodu Bala Sena, stood out among them. Describing him as a “Buddhist monk with a spiteful tongue”, she says Gnanasara’s venomous speeches provoked mobs to indulge in rioting and destroy the homes and shops of Muslims. But the law could not touch him because of the political protection he enjoyed. “The yellow robes are untouchable,” she was told.
In Myanmar, monks have also stoked fears about outsiders to justify the abuse and torture of Rohingya Muslims. Faleiro writes that the role of Buddhist monks has changed and that they are no longer “meditative figures in saffron robes”. Their quiet, reflective sessions have given way to raucous, venomous speeches with many monks joining in acts of violence.
Myanmar also has a polarising figure in Ashin Wirathu, who founded the 969 movement with its focus on the boycott of Muslim businesses. The movement gave way to a structured organisation, Ma Ba Tha, which became so powerful that it succeeded in getting Parliamentary approval for Wirathu’s infamous race and religious laws.
The story is different in Thailand. The monarchy here exercises complete control over the clergy and the country’s vast network of temples, after the king took over the governing body of Thai Buddhism. Armed with powers to appoint and dismiss monks, the monarch has ensured that dissenting voices from the clergy are successfully silenced. On their part, the monks have endorsed military rule and supported the crackdown on protests. But there are signs of trouble in paradise. Flush with state funds and donations, rogue monks have been caught “snorting cocaine, driving luxury cars and behaving more like playboys than ascetics.”
In choosing to focus on the weaponisation of religion in Buddhist societies, Faliero narrates a tale of a religion that has shed its own ideals.