The Buddha and the Terrorist

by Satish Kumar

Genres: Visionary & Metaphysical

Synopsis

Not every book will change your life, but any book can. Not every discussion will make a difference, but a conversation can change the world.

In this timely retelling of an ancient Buddhist parable, peace activist Satish Kumar has created a small book with a powerful spiritual message about ending violence. It is a tale of a fearsome outcast named Angulimala ("Necklace of Fingers"), who is terrorizing towns and villages in order to gain control of the state, murdering people and adding their fingers to his gruesome necklace. One day he comes face to face with the Buddha and is persuaded, through a series of compelling conversations, to renounce violence and take responsibility for his actions.

The Buddha and the Terrorist addresses the urgent questions we face today: Should we talk to terrorists? Can we reason with religious fundamentalists? Is nonviolence practical? The story ends with a dramatic trial that speaks to the victims of terrorism—the families whose mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters Angulimala has murdered. It asks whether it is possible for them to forgive. Or whether it is even desirable.

No one can read The Buddha and the Terrorist without thinking about the root causes of terrorism, about good and evil, about justice and forgiveness, about the kind of place we want the world to be, and, most important, about the most productive and practical way to get there.

Release date: September 1, 2006

Publisher: Algonquin Books

Print pages: 144

Sample

It is often said, accurately, that violence begets violence. There is a virus buried deep in all violence that is contagious, that inspires an equally brutal and mindless response. A terrorist blows up a bus, and an army comes out to settle the score. This exchange of violence and this contagion of terror have been handed down for eons from family to family and from nation to nation. It is a chain of terror made up of people gone amok with anger and those just as disturbed with their feelings of virtue and righteous vengeance.

But there is good news. The Gospel of Jesus, the Dharma of Buddha, the Tao of Lao Tzu, and the tariqa, or way of love, in Sufism all teach that you can let go of your grip on this chain. You can be free of it. When obscene violence interrupts your life, you don’t have to respond with virtuous, justified, and reasonable force. You can choose not to be part of the destructive cycle, and that choice not to participate is a first step toward peace.

But to step outside the circle of terror you have to do something quite unreasonable. You have to forfeit vengeance and abandon all reasonable expectations that the majority of your community, friends, and family may take for granted. You will probably have to go it alone and trust your spiritual instincts. You may appear passive and weak. Only you know the inner courage needed to overcome habits of vengeance and punishment that are assumed to be right and virtuous.

You need your spiritual instincts because the way out of violence depends on a great and penetrating vision. You have to understand radically that terrorism of all kinds is an insanity, whether it is the work of a band of renegades or the more sanctioned and public action of an army. You have to understand that violence, even when calculated, is the expression of a pained and twisted soul. It is the work of a spirit or urge that takes over a person or a people and blinds them to human solidarity and community. Your job, in the spirit of the Buddha and Jesus, is to calm the souls of everyone involved.

At root, the word “terror” means to quiver or tremble, like a bird in the hand or a leaf in the wind on a tree. It’s more than fear. Essentially it is a profound awareness of the power of life itself. A psalm from the Bible says, “The Lord most high is terrible.” And at the consecration of a church the choir sings, “Terrible is this place.” (In this old usage, terrible and terror are different forms of the same word.)

The Lord, the source of life, truly inspires terror because life is so mysterious and overwhelming and because it offers so much vitality and so much death. According to a classic definition, the holy is mysterium tremendum et fascinans, that is, a mystery that makes you tremble and fascinates you. The ultimate terror is a stark realization of the holiness and awesomeness of life.

But everything is subject to human neurosis and psychosis. It’s quite proper to tremble at the sight and feel of nature’s beauty and power, but it’s a travesty for anyone to force another to tremble at the sight of weapons and savagery. The most beneficial of things can be twisted into something dangerous and ugly. When that happens, we usually add an “ism” to the word. Community becomes communism, nationality becomes nationalism, and terror becomes terrorism. Terrorism is a sacrilege, and our task is to respond by restoring the holiness of life’s power.

Humans are always trying to usurp the power of life for their own purposes. In the National Museum of Ireland you can see and hear ancient and elaborate horns that were blown before battle to terrorize an enemy, and on the American plains warriors would deck themselves in war paint before fighting to instill fright. A husband raises his voice and smashes furniture to terrorize his wife.

It is tempting to respond to savage terrorism with violence that looks more civilized. We cover over our terrorism with a veneer of patriotism, piety, and justifications. But beneath all the formality we are blowing our horns like the Celts, convincing ourselves of our innocence as we arm our weapons.

Religions explain the human love of war as a misplaced and misunderstood version of the struggle with ignorance and blind passion. Many in Islam would say that jihad is primarily a spiritual battle for insight and tranquility. . .