World history concepts and scope

Buddhism as a Counterweight to European Individualism and Exclusionism

I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul.' This phase embodies the spirit of Western philosophy and colonialization -- every man for himself. The ideal of the West can be summed up as follows: The world exists as a proving-ground of excellence, a challenge. People must demonstrate their merit, and their culture and their nation's merit. Western capitalism embodies the dog-eat-dog idea that the best man (deliberate use of the masculine pronoun) should win, as the person with the best goods and the greatest ingenuity in meeting the demands of the marketplace should be rewarded with success. How fitting that the nation of America was born through exploration, driven by the European Enlightenment demand to compete monetarily in the spice trade, by Columbus' own desire for self-enrichment, and the desire of the Spanish king and queen to prove the superiority of Christendom.

Although Buddhism has been called an outgrowth of Hinduism, it is important to examine the evolution of this historical tradition on its own. Buddhism provides a bracing, yet fulfilling counter-philosophy to much of Western ideology's focus on the self and self-actualization. It must be admitted that the Western stress upon individualism has born great fruit, to some extent. It has provided the intellectual foundation of modern democracy. The capitalist system allows for at least some dynamic change of class and circumstance. But focusing too much upon the self at the expense of the community can also lead to anxiety and to exclusionism. After all, if 'I' am so important, it is my spiritual, financial, or personal quest that is important, not yours. Western individualism has also created spiritual anxiety in the hearts of many Americans about keeping up with 'the Joneses' and fostered a sense of spiritual emptiness when material fulfillment does not create the promised sense of contentment and happiness in the heart of the competitive individual.

In contrast to Western individualism, Buddhism undercuts the separation between self and community, and stresses the sameness of all elements of the world, rather than their inherent distinctions. This also highlights a very important contribution of Buddhism to Asiatic history. Buddhism provided a counter to the Hindu caste system, and by stressing moderation and harmony with history and the elements, it also tempered the extremes of asceticism. 'Why is there suffering?' Buddhism does not attempt to answer this question. A pragmatic rather than an intellectual and theoretical religion at its core, Buddhism attempts to provide a way of dealing with the losses we all cope with in the world. Focus on the moment, the here and now -- seek the 'middle path.'

The "Heart Sutra," one of the most important texts of Mahayana Buddhism, sums up what Western existentialists have long despaired of -- the meaninglessness and void of all life. But in this sense of the void, "Because There is Nothing to Be Attained, the Bodhisattva Relying on Prajna Paramita Has No Obstruction in His Mind." In short, the Bodhisattva does not despair, the Bodhisattva accepts. The Bodhisattva, for example, on the mountain, does not despair like a Westerner: 'oh, I am a weak person, I can never climb the mountain,' the Bodhisattva simply lives in the moment, feels strength, and overcomes the challenge. The Bodhisattva does not compare him or herself to others and worry about the uncertain of the future, nor does the Bodhisattva compare and to him or herself in the past, or moan over a lost childhood. All that exists is the present. I am not that past or future 'self.'

This lack of individualism enables Buddhism to provide such an important counterweight to the excesses of individualism of the West. It provides a philosophical challenge the tendency to be overly obsessed with the failures of one's childhood and competing with others to win the next prize or to 'make it big.' Of course, it could be argued that this striving has resulted in many great things for Western civilization, and if Buddhism had been adopted wholesale throughout all civilizations, this emphasis on acceptance would leave many social injustices unchallenged, many uncharted territories unexplored. But on the other hand, a Buddhist would argue that if everyone embraced the Buddhist philosophy and saw no separation between themselves and other people, then injustices would end. There is no distinction between my own needs, or even my family's needs, and the needs of a beggar, or a supposed 'savage,' to use the discourse of Columbus. Rather, a Buddhist would counsel, all of us are made up of the same essence, or non-essence. We are all equally empty.

Buddhism made a great contribution to the artistic, philosophical, and literary legacy of Dynastic China, but China stands proud as a unique civilization of its own. Its civilization embraced Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism to varying degrees, although these philosophies should be analyzed as distinct as well as collectively. Confucianism, after all, reaffirms social hierarchies and stresses the need for the existence of these hierarchies. Confucianism proposes that for society to function there must be a sense of obligation between father and son, for example, and filial piety. Buddhism does not allow, at least not in its purest distillation, for such distinctions. Taoism also stresses bending with 'the way' of the world, rather than resisting the pressures of the world. "When we see beyond the desire to use names, we can sense the nameless cause of these effects. The cause and the effects are aspects of the same, one thing" reads one of the first affirmations of the Tao Te Ching. But these non-confrontational policies that stressed community over individualism did not dampen China's enthusiasm for seeing itself as a unique civilization. Confucianism also had an intense superiority within its ideology -- the emperor, after all (like the kings and queens of Christendom, like Isabella and Ferdinand) had the mandate of heaven. For example, during one voyage to India, in search of goods to enrich the nation like Columbus, the explorer Zheng He in a hurricane: "prayed to the Taoist Goddess known as the Celestial Spouse. In response, a 'divine light' shone at the tips of the mast, and the storm subsided. This heavenly sign -- perhaps the static electrical phenomenon known as St. Elmo's fire -- led Zheng He to believe that his missions were under special divine protection," just as Columbus saw his own mission as endorsed and validated by a Christian God ("Ancient Chinese Explorers: Part 2," NOVA PBS.org, Jan 2000).

Chinese explorers fought to win glory for their emperor and civilization, as Columbus strove to win glory for the Spanish King and Queen, and he was equally if not more convinced of his own civilization's superiority. And this quest, rather than affirming the similarities of all peoples, like Buddhism, was unapologetically exclusionary, as denoted in Chapter 1 of his Journal (which is really not a personal self-reflective essay, but directed to his patron king and queen): "as Catholic Christians and Princes who love the holy Christian faith, and the propagation of it, and who are enemies to the sect of Mahoma [Mohammed] and to all idolatries and heresies, resolved to send me, Cristobal Colon, to the said parts of India....after having turned out all the Jews from all your kingdoms...your Highnesses gave orders to me that with a sufficient fleet I should go to the said parts of India."