Engaged Buddhism in the West

This chapter identifies challenges facing Engaged Buddhism in the West and proposes new models of ethical interpretation to account for its originality and persistence. Taking Engaged Buddhism to mean the application of Buddhist principles and practices to address social sources of human suffering and environmental harm—in contrast to other modes of Buddhist ethics, such as discipline, virtue, and altruism—we consider the degree to which Buddhist social engagement has been embraced, repudiated, or ignored by influential Buddhists and by the sponsors of mindfulness meditation programmes that have proliferated in the West. In comparing these expressions of contemporary religion and secularity, we find a range of conditions for the practice of Engaged Buddhism. We conclude by offering John Dewey’s pragmatism and Joanna Macy’s systems theory as resources for Engaged Buddhist ethics, as supplements to the virtue ethics and consequentialism others have proposed to account for traditional Buddhist ethics.

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Masculinity and Femininity: Comparing and Contrasting Two Modern Buddhist Movements in Taiwan, Foguang Shan and Ci Ji

Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review ◽

10.5840/asrr202011167 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 34-50

Author(s):

Yu-Shuang Yao ◽

Keyword(s):

Human Life ◽

Chinese Mainland ◽

Modern World ◽

Chinese Buddhism ◽

The West ◽

Very Old ◽

Modern Chinese ◽

The Chinese Mainland ◽

Engaged Buddhism ◽

Humanistic Buddhism

This article examines how modern Chinese Buddhism has been influenced by its interactions with the modern world. For our purposes, ‘modern Chinese Buddhism’ refers to a form of what has become known in the West as ‘Engaged Buddhism,’ but in Chinese is known by titles that can be translated as ‘Humanistic Buddhism’ or ‘Buddhism for Human Life.’ This tradition was initiated on the Chinese mainland between the two World Wars by the monk Tai Xu (1890–1947). Its main branches have flourished in Taiwan, whence two of them have spread worldwide. The most successful, at least in numerical terms, has been Fo Guang Shan (the Buddha’s Light Mountain) and Ci Ji (the Buddhist Compassion and Relief Society), the former founded by a personal disciple of Tai Xu, Xing Yun, the latter founded by Zheng Yan. Both of them are now very old but remain powerful charismatic leaders.

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Water and American Government: The Reclamation Bureau, National Water Policy, and the West, 19021935. By Donald J. Pisani. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002. Pp. xviii, 394. $49.95.

The Journal of Economic History ◽

10.1017/s0022050703542322 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 63 (3) ◽

pp. 906-908

Author(s):

MARK KANAZAWA

Keyword(s):

Water Policy ◽

University Of California ◽

American Government ◽

The West ◽

National Water

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Enumeration and Identification of Asbestos Fibres in Water

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s042482010005264x ◽

1974 ◽

Vol 32 ◽

pp. 526-527 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

O. Mudroch ◽

J. R. Kramer

Keyword(s):

Water Supply ◽

Water Samples ◽

Drainage Basin ◽

Lake Superior ◽

Research Work ◽

List Type ◽

The West ◽

Asbestos Fibre ◽

Amphibole Asbestos

Approximately 60,000 tons per day of waste from taconite mining, tailing, are added to the west arm of Lake Superior at Silver Bay. Tailings contain nearly the same amount of quartz and amphibole asbestos, cummingtonite and actinolite in fibrous form. Cummingtonite fibres from 0.01μm in length have been found in the water supply for Minnesota municipalities.The purpose of the research work was to develop a method for asbestos fibre counts and identification in water and apply it for the enumeration of fibres in water samples collected(a) at various stations in Lake Superior at two depth: lm and at the bottom.(b) from various rivers in Lake Superior Drainage Basin.

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The fight to save Uganda’s White Rhino

Africana Newsletter ◽

10.1017/s0568160x00000125 ◽

1964 ◽

Vol 2 (01) ◽

pp. 6-12

Keyword(s):

The West ◽

West Nile ◽

White Rhino

In the West Nile District of Uganda lives a population of white rhino—those relies of a past age, cumbrous, gentle creatures despite their huge bulk—which estimates only 10 years ago, put at 500. But poachers live in the area, too, and official counts showed that white rhino were being reduced alarmingly. By 1959, they were believed to be diminished to 300.

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