What are the damages of Buddhism? It depends on who you ask. We’re asking the Japanese army in 1930s Manchuria and its answer is as follows:
First, the problem lies in the monastic lifestyle. Time devoted to meditation, prayer, and study — is not dedicated to sewing, welding, or military training. The second problem: Abstinence from sex leads to low natural reproduction. This problem is severe when half of the population lives as monks. However, Buddhism has its advantages: Most importantly, it protects against communism, a perpetual threat when your’e so close to the Soviet border. Second, Buddhism develops self-discipline that can benefit all walks of life — perhaps similar to the Japanese’s successful attempt at instituting Zen customs for Kamikaze pilots. And third, Buddhism in Mongolia provided services that are beneficial to society: education and medicine. Although they were religious education and traditional medicine, there was, the Japanese believed, potential.¹
In the 19th century Russian policy discouraged the spread of Buddhism within their borders, among the Buriat-Mongols.² But in Russian thinking Buddhism mainly prevents one from becoming a fully Russian subject, faithful to the Tsar. Only baptism + renaming will pave the way for social acceptance.
The Chinese actually supported Mongolian Buddhism — through subsidies. In their view, Buddhism restrained their unruly neighbors, which shepherd their flocks so close to Beijing. This subsidy was seen as helpful, even after the collapse of the Qing Dynasty: the Republic of China continued under the Kuomintang Party.
The Japanese saw tried to realize the observed potential. Reforming Buddhism will help Japanese influence, which will help both as a defense against the Soviets and as a logistical base for the war against China. The principles of reform, in general, were: permitting sexual intercourse for monks; Severing Mongolian Buddhism from it’s Tibetan roots (both under the Gluk-mouth stream), and the conversion of traditional education and medicine into modern ones. In addition, it was decided to emphasize the contradictions between Buddhism and communism, contradictions that the Buriat-Mongols living in the Soviet Union tried to settle.³ In addition, the northern part of Mongolia, after it’s retirement from China as an independent country, was under the mantle of the USSR.
The Japanese reform could not be enforced from outside: they controlled, through the Manchuku puppet state, only some of the territory (and not most Mongols), and also wanted to maintain a positive attitude of the Mongolian tribes towards Japan’s territorial aspirations in the region. Therefore, the reform, it was decided, would be carried out by supporting monks with similar ideas, i.e. pushing “from within” in a way that would seem authentic.
Buddhism, therefore, began as an Indian phenomenon — although disappearing from India in the 12th century — and spread to Asia, where in every region it reached, it incorporated local myths and deities — in Siberia, the origin of the word “shaman”, it blended with indigenous worship. And, of course, in every area Buddhism had a different place in society, with the growth of the connection between the feudal state and the monasteries within it. When Buddhism spread to Mongolia in the 18th and 19th centuries, it stirred anxieties, hopes, and various attempts to profit in the various historical agents. Buddhism could manifest itself in a life of seclusion or glorious monasteries, as pacifism or — as in Sri Lanka and Myanmar of the 20th century — combined with nationalism, as part of a violent struggle between Buddhists and Muslims. Cultural phenomena have a tendency to do so, as we saw in the “The Age of Questions”: a trend spreads, shapes, and at some point really defines the age.⁴
The term “identity politics” was coined in 1977 by a Boston-based black feminist organization. The term has spread, and today I think everyone involved in socio-political discourse has encountered it. Today, to a large extent, it has become a derogatory nickname; Intellectuals on the right accuse leftist policies and initiatives of “identity politics,” that is, referencing a person’s gender / race / sexual orientation rather than meritocratic criteria. The left sometimes responds by saying that society has a bias against certain genders / races / orientations, and therefore needs to be corrected for. Even more, leftists sometimes claim that “there has always been identity politics, only so far it has worked in the service of straight white men.”
But not everyone approaches it that way. Dr. Avishai Ben-Haim, for example, decided to embrace the discourse fully, and bring it’s power to the right; Dr. Ofri Ilani, on the other hand, recently blamed identity politics for its ability to shift discourse from immediate issues (like the Palestinians) to far-away, cultural problems (Like racist representations in advertising). His thesis is also supported by those who point out the hypocrisy of the European adoption of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, while retaining the negative attitude towards Roma (Gypsies).
Many see identity politics as a foreign American import. For example, many in Israel rejected the resentment around usage of “blackface” in Purim, arguing that the problem stems from the American history of slavery, racism, and stereotypical representations aimed at humiliating blacks. Others answered that Ashkenazim who embody a “squealing” Mizrakhi character certainly fall under the same category.
What all this demonstrates, to me at least, is that Discourse cannot be escaped. Once a form of expression, a way of thinking, or a piece of culture “invades” a space — it will affect everyone. Some will respond in reaction, as the Russians have responded to Buddhism’s spread, some, like the Chinese, will offer support, and some, like the Japanese, will try to take advantage. Initially, I thought that this also proves, once again, the immense centrality of the US in the current cultural discourse, and in particular that the political-ideological discourse drives the other areas — and not, as before, the religious discourse. Today, rabbis are required to respond, positively or negatively, to what they perceive as “postmodernism,” “identity politics,” or “globalization.” In the past, the young State of Israel even blocked the entry of the Beatles, precisely because of such concerns.
But although the origin is certainly American, and the conversation has global tones — localization of the phenomenon still occurs. Like Buddhism, which incorporated local beliefs, identity politics annexed pre-existing trends: feminism, the Mizrakhi struggle, the national-religious stream in Orthodox Judaism. Buddhism to the Japanese could help the war effort — despite the extraordinarily peaceful nature of Buddhism, which negates violence. So too can identity politics be used to justify, say, women in certain combat roles. And, like the Russian and Japanese fear of Buddhism, the problem here may also be exaggerated by monstrous proportions — since the percentage of monks in the population, estimated at between a quarter and a half (!) Was found to be only 4% to 10%…⁵
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[1] Japanese imperialism and Mongolian Buddhism,
1932–1945, By Li Narangoa
Proper disclosure: The figure for the Japanese explanation that monks are 50% of the population is quoted in the article, but the book to which it refers does not say so. I decided to leave it in anyway, because this is from a respectable platform, and because I have not yet encountered a contradictory figure. For your consideration.
[2] https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=3110536862302329
[3] https://www.facebook.com/yotam.h.lev/posts/3133987056623976
[4] https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2374860935869929
[5] Missionary and Scholar: Russian Orthodox Archbishop Nil Isakovich’s Perception of Tibetan Buddhism in Eastern Siberia By Anna Peck, Cross-referenced with the 1897 Population Census
