Zen at War
by Brian Daizen Victoria · first published 2006
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> The idea that mindfulness creates better killers or justified immoral behavior also seems spurious to me Read Brian Daizen Victoria's Zen At War. OK, Zen, but the principle's the same. Effective mind training techniques sans ethical critique can create cooler killers & greed mongers. Mindfulness' popularity amongst the ethical hellscape of contemporary…
on “McMindfulness: How mindfulness became the new capitalist spirituality” ↗…Imperial Japan's use of suicide warfare."[1] Where a Japanese soldier in WW2 wouldn't do the killing, but his sword (?) This is seen that all ideology can be turned violent. [1] Brian Daizen Victoria, Zen at War (New York: Weatherhill, 1997).
on “Monks Behaving Badly: Explaining Buddhist Violence in Asia” ↗…found pro-war or pro-violence logic when in those contexts. The author looks for explanations of this contradiction in the Taoist elements of Zen. The article references https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_at_War, it is factual that (some) Zen leaders supported the imperial holy war in WWII. Enough that some contemporary leaders have issued apologies. I think the question is more similar to: Christianity has…
on “Zen and the Art of Divebombing (2016)” ↗> [Zen at War] meticulously documents Zen Buddhism's support of Japanese militarism from the time of the Meiji Restoration through the World War II and the post-War period. It describes the influence of state policy…
on “Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation” ↗…is considerable cherry picking along with cultural appropriation going on here. Buddhism has flavors that are worlds apart from what is described in the post. A spicy example is discussed in the book "Zen at War"[1]. Myanamar and Sri Lanka[2] have their own ultra nationalistic Buddhists movements. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_at_War [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinhalese_Buddhist_nationalism
on “The Zen of Quakerism (2016)” ↗