Buddhist Teachings and Racial and Social Justice: Similar Paths to Peace Gomez MB

Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace Gomez MB Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace This discussion will summarize the direct ways Buddhist teachings, like social justice work, seek to investigate the way we construct and perceive the world in order to relieve the suffering of the world or achieve peace. It will review the teachings of the four noble truths, dependent origination, fabrications, and mindfulness as paths that can be used not only for relieving individual suffering but provide a framework for the path away from social injustice. Various non-Buddhist activists’ actions of love, non-harming, and non-violence-major Buddhist teachings- are presented as an example of how Buddhist teachings have been informing social justice work for years. This review brings together these concepts and practices in one short and summary reading to remind us how Buddhist teachings and social justice provide us the tools to understand injustices so as to arrive at peace in ourselves and the world. Background Social injustice exists when individuals treat each other unfairly based on discrimination according to some socially constructed label (race, class, gender, age, language, ability, etc.) and/or systemic government practices and policies which directly or indirectly treat different groups unfairly (housing, health, policing, labor, voting, environmental, education lawsi). The i Laws: Housing (ie. redlining, urban renewal; underfunding for public housing); Health Care (ie. coverage eligibility, mental health parity); Policing (ie. traffic stop, search and seizure); Labor (ie. worker’s rights, occupational health and safety); Voting (ie. voter ID, redistricting); Environmental (ie. clean water and air, industrial waste disposal); Education (ie. public school segregation; underfunding) Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace Gomez MB effect of these actions can be generally termed social injustice. Social injustice is a suffering where advocates/activists/organizersii determine the cause that when understood can result in developing a path toward ending the causes of the harm. [Activists’ work is often described as social justice work to highlight their action to address, directly or indirectly, the multiple social systems that interact to bring about a more just society.] The description of Buddhism and its general philosophy of peace and non-harming and its connection with social justice has been described previously (Bond) (S. King). The Vietnamese monk venerable Thich Nhat Hanh is one of the foremost teachers of mindfulness and socially engaged Buddhism: “Mindfulness must be engaged. Once we see that something needs to be done, we must take action. Seeing and action go together. Otherwise, what is the point in seeing?” (Hanh) Hanh’s teachings and actions are well documented since his activism to end the Vietnam War. The American monk venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi has also spoken of the need for Buddhist practitioners to engage in the world of social injustices as an extension of the Buddha’s teachings on social and community harmony (Bodhi). Other contemporary Buddhist teachers continue to interpret Buddhist teachings within the realm of racial and social justice, including angel Kyodo williams, Earthlyn Zenju Manuel, Lama Rod Owens, John Powell, Jan Willis, Ruth King and others. These teachings include analysis of racial, class, gender, sexual, and other oppressions within Buddhist spaces (williams, Owens and Syedullah; Ikeda; Duran) (R. King) (Manuel) (Willis) (AlanSenauke) (Glassman). Common amongst these teachers is their emphasis on the need for: spiritual spaces which do not bypass social injustices in an attempt ii Future references to advocates/activists/organizers will use the label ‘activists’. Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace Gomez MB to focus on oneness; greater inclusivity in practice communities in regard race, class, gender identity, sexual orientation, diverse abilities; interpreting the teachings within the context of society and its sufferings (williams, Owens and Syedullah; Ikeda; Duran) (R. King) (Manuel) (Willis) (AlanSenauke) (Glassman) (Schireson) (Powell). This essay will contribute to this growing literature and body of teachings by delving deeper into four specific Buddhist teachings as frameworks for how racial and social justice work can be interpreted and carried out. It will provide examples of how past and current social justice work already enacts these teachings. The four noble truths of social injustice The interpretation of Buddhism as a philosophy and a spiritual tradition rests on a journey toward waking up to a truth that releases everyone, not a chosen few, from suffering. There are multiple ways in which social justice and the teachings of Buddhism can be understood and practiced as similar paths toward freedom from the systemic and individual suffering of racism, classism and other forms of injustice. Buddhist texts documenting the teachings of the Buddha state: ‘And what do I teach? Suffering, its cause, its transcendence and the way leading to its transcendence’ (Nanmoli and Bodhi). These are the foundational Four Noble Truths of Buddhist teachings, each carrying with it a duty. The First Noble Truth, that suffering exists, is to be understood; the Second Noble Truth, the origin or cause of suffering, is to be abandoned; the Third Noble Truth, the cessation of suffering, is to be realized; the Fourth Noble Truth, the path leading to the cessation of suffering, is to be developed. Buddhist teachings emphasize that Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace Gomez MB when these Noble Truths are fully realized, one can put an end to all suffering. (Bodhi, Setting in motion the wheel of the dhamma) Such a framework can be easily interpreted and applied in the work of activists seeking an end to social injustice. The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism can easily be understood in the context of this noble path of justice seekers, Table I. Bhikkhu Bodhi states how effort is used to investigate or determine a suffering or hindrance: Instead of turning away from the unwanted [corrupt] thought [word, action], one confronts it directly as an object, scrutinizes its features, and investigates its source. When this is done the thought [word, action] quiets down and eventually disappears. For an unwholesome thought is like a thief: it only creates trouble when its operation is concealed, but put under observation it becomes tame (Bodhi, Right Effort: Samma Vayama). This investigation, this deep looking, requires identifying, meeting with, and determining how to resolve the suffering or the hindrance. Preparation for this investigation occurs through a process of stopping and stilling the mind so as to see clearly that which is usually obscured by distractions. Different forms of meditation support the mind becoming concentrated so as to investigate and see clearly through the normally busy and distracted thoughts. This clear seeing of oneself, one’s likes and dislikes, distinguishing between right and wrong, provides choice and intentionality in how one interacts in the world. Therefore a person is a justice seeker or Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace Gomez MB activist, simply by being aware of themselves. This occurs because social justice work does not occur only in a public setting of a protest march or sit-in. Justice work also occurs in the way we engage with each other at home, in the workplace, in spiritual centers, in the supermarket. Whether we are reflecting on the way we responded or didn’t respond to someone making a discriminatory statement, making up ‘facts’ or telling a lie, awareness of our framework of right and wrong moves us toward equity, justice. Clear seeing allows us act with intention toward truth and non-harming, justice lens, in all our interactions, individually and in community. Using the Second Noble Truth of Buddhism as an example of its application in the work of social justice follows. For example, to understand and transform current wealth inequity activists must look deeply into the history of racist US government policies that resulted in systematic economic disparity in employment, education, and housing. What was the path that led to a median wealth of $171,000 for white families while median wealth of black and Latino families is $17,600 and $20,700 respectively (Dettling, Hsu and Jacob)? Stopping to investigate the history of employment and land rights in cities across the US will aid in understanding how we came to this current outcome, and how we can end it. Forced displacement of the ancestors of African Americans and labor exploitation began almost 400 years ago in 1619 when the first enslaved Africans were brought to the Americas. After 264 years of slave labor, enslaved black Americans were freed into conditions of poverty. Forced displacement and the traumatic root shockiii effect, community disruption, and economic exploitation continued over the past 400 iii Root shock is the traumatic effect of uprooting people from their communities similar to the effect of uprooting plants from the soil. Buddhist teachings and racial and social justice: similar paths to peace Gomez MB years, with Jim Crow laws resulting in separate and unequal actions not only in housing but in all sectors of life in the late 1800s; redliningiv in the 1930s; unfair implementation

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