Buddhism: steely creed in a saffron robe

Nobody does it quite like the Buddhists. Two and a half thousand years after its Hindu founder left his princely realm in Nepal to seek enlightenment, Buddhism remains a hip, top-of-the-range religion. It’s also a player. It shapes the fate of nations.

Outwardly at least, or at any rate from a western perspective, Buddhism is less strident than Islam and more approachable than Judaism. Its image is less tainted than the scandal-battered Christian churches. Buddhism is cool. It’s a terrific brand with a cracking USP: prince or pauper, you too can attain enlightenment — for free.

Buddhism gets a great press in the West, which is hardly surprising given its Hollywood A-list adherents like Goldie Hawn and Richard Gere, to name just two of its 530 million worldwide followers. And then there’s the Dalai Lama, the rock star of Buddhism, who is supposedly cooler and less stuffy than any Archbishop of Canterbury or Pope.

In the West Buddhism has long been the religion for people who don’t like religion. It’s a lifestyle choice — which is not to say that its tenets are not deeply-held, in some cases life-changing.

But it sometimes feels like wisdom in a shopping cart: courses advocating mindfulness, Buddhist retreats to suit every budget, $2000-a-night Buddhist-flavoured resorts in Bhutan, and all manner of remedies for the modern affliction of insatiable materialistic desires.

Its mantras and mystic formulas suggest preternatural bliss, wisdom, and moral grace for all. Enlightenment is Buddhism’s version of heaven, if you like, except that you don’t have to die to get there.

Like all religions, Buddhism will slowly succumb to consumerism. But, for now, it’s growing. In Asian countries such as Thailand, Cambodia and Laos, its message of simplicity and moderation is a powerful draw, especially for the left-behind.

The largest number of its adherents, much to the irritation of the Chinese Communist party, are in China. It’s seen (not without reason) as a political force that undermines the requirement of collective obedience to the party.

Why would you need the Thoughts of Xi Jinping, when a simple monk can offer you a path to tranquillity without expecting you to be a card-carrying party member?

The Falun Gong movement, a blend of Buddhism, Chinese folk religions and pseudoscience founded in 1992, is viewed with particular hostility in Beijing. After initially tolerating the group, the authorities cracked down hard in 1999, branding Falun Gong an “evil cult” and arresting thousands.

To witness modern Buddhism’s pulling power, come to Sukhothai, site of the first Thai kingdom, at a weekend.  Quiet, ancient, pastoral, Sukhothai is set in the middle of the rice paddies of central Thailand.

Far from the madding crowds, it’s the very opposite of party-going islands in the Andaman sea, the fleshpots of Pattaya or the frenzy of Bangkok. Sukhothai is quite soulful and very Thai.

The 13th-century city, less spectacular than Cambodia’s Angkor, is nevertheless a masterpiece of understated grace. It is hard not to be moved walking among the giant, sinuous, hand-carved buddhas, impossibly refined, even sublime.

There is a kind of weightless grace to these remarkable figures. This is art of the highest order, no less accomplished in its own way than that of Michelangelo’s Pietà. It’s very seductive.

Here you see old and young paying their respects with genuine reverence. Thailand is racing ahead as a modern country. Four-lane highways crisscross the country. Smartphones abound. Young Thais are as cool as they come.

But there’s something about Buddhism that keeps it anchored in Thai culture. Along with the monarchy, Buddhism is an indissoluble part of the national identity. This is partly a function of temperament. Thais prize stability and moderation.

Thais rowing in public is virtually unheard of. A religion that — ostensibly at least — abhors violence suits them perfectly. It provides social stability, a glue, in a country that still remains profoundly unequal. The deep bond between the clergy and the people is symbolised by the daily ritual of saibat or alms-giving.

The Sangha (or Supreme Council) exerts considerable political leverage. Even the military, the constant power behind the throne, defers to this body, which acts as a powerful brake on the ambitions of Thailand’s coup-happy military.

Saffron-robed monks from Tibet, where they doggedly resist Chinese rule, to the streets of Chiang Mai in northern Thailand or the ancient Lao capital of Luang Prabang swamped with tourists, wield a kind of moral authority that shapes events.

Who can forget the images of the self-immolating monk in Saigon in June, 1963, protesting against South Vietnam’s then President Ngo Dinh Diem’s persecution of Buddhists?

As I say, Buddhism gets a good press. Its popular image is of a belief rooted in non-violence. But Buddhism also has a really dark side. It can be violently chauvinist and blatantly racist. Buddhist nationalism is a force in Asian politics.

The persecution of the Rohingya in Myanmar is one example. Monks incite anti-Muslim violence. Thousands have died. A million have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh, which now hosts perhaps the biggest refugee camp in the world.

In Sri Lanka Buddhism continues to shape both the country’s domestic and foreign policy. The island sits like a small outcrop of India, whose 1.1 billion Hindus are seen by Buddhists as an existential threat to their faith.

The long war against Tamil separatists in the north of the island was largely driven by this fear. By the time the fourth phase of the war (from 2006-2009) ended, between 40,000 and 70,000 Tamils, mostly non-combatants, had been killed, according to the United Nations.

The Buddhist priesthood can side with the masses against state power, as it did in Myanmar (Burma) in 1989. Students took to the streets in 1988, when Aung San Suu Kyi, then leader of the democracy cause, visited Yangon’s Shwedagon Pagoda to call for an end to military rule. Monks joined the movement, which mushroomed into a peaceful mass uprising.

In America, where there are more than a thousand Buddhist communities, adherents are urging their followers to forsake the creed’s neutrality and fight Trumpism.

But Buddhism is, by definition, deeply traditional in nature and therefore susceptible to reactionary forces. Recently it’s been moving sharply rightward, in common with much of the rest of the world, startled by rapid change.

In Thailand this is portrayed as too much foreign influence polluting Thai nationalism. Sri Lanka’s Buddhist nationalists, having seen off the Tamil challenge, are mobilising against a perceived new threat: Muslims.

Buddhism seems also to have surfaced as a strand of the alt-right movement in the US. Elon Musk, scourge of all-things woke, recently posted a photo of his bedside table. It featured a replica of George Washington’s pistol, a cosplay gun, several cans of Diet Coke and a vajra, a five-pronged ritual implement used in Vajrayana Buddhism.

Buddhism is complicated. Its various iterations resemble a braided stream of several river currents, without one main current. It is also layered: surface serenity concealing a steely and often reactionary inner core.

Buddhism’s essential fatalism believes that we live in a perpetual cycle of birth and rebirth in which our past deeds determine our future existence. This too leans towards acceptance rather than upheaval.

Unsurprisingly, like the Catholic and Anglican churches, Buddhism’s monastic orders occasionally stray from the path to enlightenment. The sangha in Thailand has suffered a long line of scandals, ranging from child abuse to the embezzlement of temple funds.

The Buddhist hierarchy is the largest landowner in the country. One Thai temple was left empty in 2022 after all the monks were expelled for testing positive for drugs.

Back in Sukhothai’s historic park, there’s a son et lumière show. Its graceful stuppas containing ancient relics shimmer in the breeze. Little food stalls serving yummy Thai sausages and sticky rice feed the locals who come out at the start of the weekend. Hundreds of lotus-shaped candles placed on the monuments flicker in the warm and windless night.

This is a religion that is holding its ground in the face of bewildering change. Warts and all, that deserves our respect.

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