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27 Introduction Buddhist social ethic that is in accordance with the most basic Buddhist teachings, I take Buddhism back to its roots, referencing mainly the earliest texts whose legitimacy in the voluminous Buddhist literature is the most widely acknowledged and the least disputable. Chapter 2 examines the “Socio-Ethical Dimensions of Early Buddhism.” The ethical emphasis of the Buddha is manifested in his refusal to answer metaphysical questions, his redefinition of nobility, and his teachings with regard to the cultivation of wholesome states and wholesome conduct in this world. The Buddha’s nonviolent challenge to the social hierarchies is particularly significant if the religious, political, social, and economic situations of his time are put into consideration. The repeated injunction on the importance of associating with “good friends” (Påli: kalyå£a mitta; Sanskrit: kalyåna mitra) testifies to his grasp of the fundamental sociality of human existence. In addition, the institution of the full Sangha consisting of the four assemblies to a great extent challenges the normalized and naturalized hierarchies in society, de-essentializes classes and genders, and establishes the middle path between accepting the conventional way of life in its entirety and cutting off all connections with it. The androcentrism and classism that can be observed in the history of Buddhism, inasmuch as they result in the disregard, or even justification, of the sufferings of women and lower-class people, contradict the Buddha’s own teachings and therefore need to be critiqued. The Buddha recognized as being dukkha-producing the ways in which people had been relating to each other and treating each other, and he exemplified a way of actively responding to social problems in the world without being antagonistic. Having grounded this social ethic in early Buddhism and its texts, starting with Chapter 3, “A Feminist Exegesis of Non-Self: Constitution of Personhood and Identity,” I will cite poststructuralist feminist analyses and contemporary socio-economic studies, using them to reveal the subtleties of the Buddhist Dhamma as well as the blind spots of traditional Buddhist teachings and practices. Poststructuralist constructivist feminist theories can provide an exegetical framework for the Buddhist teaching of non-Self. Their convergence with the Buddhist analysis of the five aggregates helps bring forth more fully the dynamic construction of interrelational individual beings. The complex socio-psycho-physical entity that we usually call “self,” including its gendered aspect, is socially constructed as well as mentally constructed. The understanding of social conditioning can call into question the validity of traditional gender roles and gender hierarchy, which still pervade many Buddhist organizations and Buddhist countries. The Buddha himself did not honor any other traditional social hierarchies,125 28 This-Worldly Nibbåna and the fundamental Buddhist teaching of anåtta clearly does not support the idea that any social group is inherently superior to another. Neither the negation of “Self” in Buddhism nor the rejection of autonomous subject in poststructuralist feminist theories dissolves moral responsibility or moral agency. Chapter 4, “Person-in-KammicNetwork : Moral Agency and Social Responsibility,” investigates the social meaning of kamma, as well as the moral agency and responsibility that a constructed subject has in the constitution and reconstitution of both herself or himself and the socio-cultural contexts in which she or he is embedded. The teaching of interdependent co-arising deconstructs the concept of independent “Self” that stays uninfluenced by its surroundings, but by no means does it dissolve moral responsibilities of individuals. Quite the contrary, what is revealed by co-arising is the fundamental sociality and interconditionality of human existence. According to co-arising, an individual is constituted in the existing socio-cultural contexts, and the socio-cultural contexts are in turn constructed and reconstructed through individuals’ actions. It is in this light that the Buddha’s ethicization of the long-existing term kamma126 can be rightly understood. Inasmuch as a person interdependently coarises with the contexts she or he is in, and with the people around her or him, every volitional action functions to reconfigure the sociocultural contexts as well as one’s own personality and character, and every person is directly or indirectly responsible for the well-being of others. This complex social implication of interdependent co-arising can be further accentuated by taking a look at the contemporary socioeconomic and environmental studies on the global situations. What seems to be individual kamma more often than not has its social and even global impacts, and the cessation of dukkha depends on...

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