Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-18T10:33:49.118Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Judging in the Buddha’s Court: A Buddhist Judicial System in Contemporary Asia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2020

Benjamin Schonthal
Benjamin Schonthal*
Affiliation:
University of Otago
*
E-mail: ben.schonthal@otago.ac.nz
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Drawing on textual and ethnographic research conducted over the last five years, this article analyses an important genre of judicial practice in South and Southeast Asia that has been almost entirely ignored by socio-legal scholars: Buddhist systems of judging. Using the judicial system of one monastic group in contemporary Sri Lanka as a case-study, it argues that Buddhist judging requires more than just the internalization of moral principles, as is often assumed. According to Buddhist (monastic) principles of judging, legal procedures—similar to those used in state legal settings—are equally essential. These procedures govern everything from making legal complaints, to the structuring of trials, to determining jurisdiction, and many other topics. By examining Buddhist judicial systems, this article not only casts new light on the pluri-legal landscape of Asia; it also offers new reflections on the intersection of religion-based and state-based systems of law in the contemporary world.

Keywords

BuddhismlawjudgescourtsSouth AsiaSoutheast Asia
Type
Judging and Judgment in Contemporary Asia
Information
Asian Journal of Law and Society , Volume 8 , Issue 2 , June 2021 , pp. 206 - 225
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Asian Journal of Law and Society

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

•

The author is grateful to David Engel and two anonymous reviewers for their very helpful feedback on drafts as well as to Prof. Asanga Tilakaratne, Ven. Raluwe Padmasiri, Bandara Herath, Dinushka Peiris, Amali Priyadarshani, Dinithi Ranasinghe, Tilak Jayatilaka, and Iromi Perera for their support and guidance during various phases of the project. Appreciation also goes to Deane Galbraith for editorial help. A significant debt of gratitude is owed to judges and judicial officials in the Rāmañña Nikāya for sharing their thoughts and time so generously with me. The research for this article was made possible by the Marsden Fund of the Royal Society of New Zealand, Grant Number OU01514.

*

Associate Professor of Buddhism and Asian Religions in the School of Social Sciences at the University of Otago in New Zealand. Correspondence to Ben Schonthal, PO Box 56, Dunedin 9054, New Zealand. E-mail address: ben.schonthal@otago.ac.nz.

References

REFERENCES

Anālayo, Bhikkhu (2013) “The Revival of the Bhikkhunī Order and the Decline of the Sāsana .” 20 Journal of Buddhist Ethics 110–93.Google Scholar
Ashin, Janaka, & Crosby, Kate (2017) “Heresy and Monastic Malpractice in the Buddhist Court Cases (Vinicchaya) of Modern Burma (Myanmar).” 18 Contemporary Buddhism 199–261.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berman, Paul Schiff (2010) “Towards a Jurisprudence of Hybridity Symposium.” 1 Utah Law Review 11–29.Google Scholar
Borchert, Thomas, & Darlington, Susan M. (2017–18) “Political Disrobing in Thailand.” 3 Buddhism, Law & Society 113–56.Google Scholar
Clarke, Shayne (2015) “Vinayas,” in Silk, J. A., ed., Brill’s Encyclopedia of Buddhism, Vol. 1, Leiden: Brill, 60–87.Google Scholar
Cohn, Bernard S. (1996) Colonialism and Its Forms of Knowledge: The British in India, Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Collins, Steven (1990) “On the Very Idea of the Pāli Canon.” 15 Journal of the Pali Text Society 89–126.Google Scholar
Crosby, Kate (2014) Theravada Buddhism: Continuity, Diversity, and Identity, New York: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Danet, Brenda (1980) “Language in the Legal Process.” 14 Law & Society Review 445–564.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Silva, Gihani (2016) “The Bhikkhuni Revival Debate and Identity Problems: An Ethnographic Inquiry.” 11 Journal of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies 52–70.Google Scholar
de Silva, Premakumara (2018) “Colonial Governmentality: Legal and Administrative Technologies of the Governance of Sri Pada temple in Sri Lanka,” in Borchert, T., ed., Theravada Buddhism in Colonial Contexts, New York: Routledge, 121–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Silva, Sepalika (2006) “Cultural Practice of Human Rights: An Anthropological Study of Human Rights in Sri Lanka.” PhD diss., University of California-St. Barbara.Google Scholar
Deinla, Imelda (2019) “Legal Hybridity, Trust, and the Legitimacy of the Shari’ah in the Bangsamoro.” 41 Law & Policy 198–219.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
D’Oyly, John (1833) “A Sketch of the Constitution of the Kandyan Kingdom.” 3 Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 191–252.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farrelly, Colin, & Lawrence, B. Solum, eds. (2019) Virtue Jurisprudence, London: Springer.Google Scholar
Fausbøll, Viggo, ed. (1880) Buddhist Birth Stories, Or Jatāka Tales (edited and translated version of Jātakatthavaṇṇanā), trans. Davids, T. W. Rhys, London: Trübner & Co.Google Scholar
French, Rebecca Redwood (2002) The Golden Yoke: The Legal Cosmology of Buddhist Tibet, Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications.Google Scholar
Gair, James W., & Karunatilaka, W. S. (1976) Literary Sinhala Inflected Forms: A Synopsis, with a Transliteration Guide to Sinhala Script, Ithaca, NY: South Asia Program and Dept. of Modern Languages and Linguistics, Cornell University.Google Scholar
Giunchi, Elisa (2010) “The Reinvention of Sharī‘a under the British Raj: In Search of Authenticity and Certainty.” 69 The Journal of Asian Studies 1119–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Government of Ceylon (1938) Ceylon Legislative Enactments, Colombo: Government Printers.Google Scholar
Government of Sri Lanka (1978) Constitution of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka (amended 2015), Colombo: Government Printers.Google Scholar
Heirman, Ann (2019) “Vinaya Rules for Monks and Nuns,” in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Holy See Press Office (2017) “The Pontifical Yearbook 2017 and the ‘Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae’ 2015,” Bulletin of the Holy See Press Office, https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2017/04/06/170406e.html (accessed 15 April 2020).Google Scholar
Kemper, Steven (1984) “The Buddhist Monkhood, the Law, and the State in Colonial Sri Lanka.” 26 Comparative Studies in Society and History 401–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kieffer-Pülz, Petra (2014) “What the Vinayas Can Tell Us about Law,” in Redwood French, R. & Nathan, M., eds., Buddhism and Law: An Introduction, New York: Cambridge University Press, 46–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kieffer-Pülz, Petra (2016–17) “Translocal Debates and Legal Hermeneutics: Early Pali Vinaya Texts in the Adjudication of Sīmā Procedures, c. 1200–1900 CE.” 2 Buddhism, Law & Society 103–58.Google Scholar
Kugle, Scott Alan (2001) “Framed, Blamed and Renamed: The Recasting of Islamic Jurisprudence in Colonial South Asia.” 35 Modern Asian Studies 257–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lammerts, D. Christian (2018) Buddhist Law in Burma: A History of Dhammasattha Texts and Jurisprudence, 1250–1850, Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Larsson, Tomas (2018) “Buddhist Bureaucracy and Religious Freedom in Thailand.” 33 Journal of Law and Religion 197–211.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lasine, Stuart (1989) “The Riddle of Solomon’s Judgment and the Riddle of Human Nature in the Hebrew Bible.” 14 Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 61–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lawan, Mamman (2014) “Islamic Law and Legal Hybridity in Nigeria.” 58 Journal of African Law 303–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindberg Falk, Monica, & Kawanami, Hiroko (2017–18) “Monastic Discipline and Communal Rules for Nuns in Myanmar and Thailand.” 3 Buddhism, Law & Society 39–68.Google Scholar
Loy, David R. (2009) “A Different ‘Enlightened’ Jurisprudence.” 54 Saint Louis University Law Journal 1239–56.Google Scholar
Malalgoda, Kitsiri (1976) Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, 1750–1900: A Study of Religious Revival and Change, Berkeley: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malvatu Chapter of the Siyam Nikāya (1984) Abhinava Katikāvata saha Baṇadaham Pota [The Modern Katikāvata and Preaching Book], Maradana: Samayawardhana Press.Google Scholar
Mamdani, Mahmood (2012) Define and Rule: Native as Political Identity, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dhammakusala, Mātatē (2001) Rāmañña Vaṃsaya [The Rāmañña Lineage], Colombo: Līlā Printers.Google Scholar
Mérieau, Eugénie (2018) “Buddhist Constitutionalism in Thailand: When Rājadhammā Supersedes the Constitution.” 13 Asian Journal of Comparative Law 283–305.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mourao, Paulo Reis (2011) “Determinants of the Number of Catholic Priests to Catholics in Europe—an Economic Explanation.” 52 Review of Religious Research 427–38.Google Scholar
Oldenberg, Hermann (1879–83) The Vinaya Piṭakaṃ, London: Williams and Norgate.Google Scholar
Rogers, John D. (1987) “Religious Belief, Economic Interest and Social Policy: Temple Endowments in Sri Lanka during the Governorship of William Gregory, 1872–77.” 21 Modern Asian Studies 349–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salgado, Nirmala S. (2019) “On the Question of ‘Discipline’ (Vinaya) and Nuns in Theravāda Buddhism.” 10 Religions 1–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (2014) “The Legal Regulation of Buddhism in Contemporary Sri Lanka,” in French, R. & Nathan, M., eds., Buddhism and Law: An Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 150–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (2016a) Buddhism, Politics and Limits of Law: The Pyrrhic Constitutionalism of Sri Lanka, New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (2016b) “Environments of Law: Islam, Buddhism, and the State in Contemporary Sri Lanka.” 75 The Journal of Asian Studies 137–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (2016c) “Securing the Sasana through Law: Buddhist Constitutionalism and Buddhist-interest Litigation in Sri Lanka.” 50 Modern Asian Studies 1966–2008.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (2017) “Formations of Buddhist Constitutionalism in South and Southeast Asia.” 15 International Journal of Constitutional Law 705–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (2017–18) “Litigating Vinaya: Buddhist Law and Public Law in Contemporary Sri Lanka.” 3 Buddhism, Law & Society 69–111.Google Scholar
Schonthal, Benjamin (forthcoming) “Buddhist Rules about Rules: Procedure and Process in the (Theravāda) Buddhist Legal System.” American Journal of Comparative Law.Google Scholar
Seeger, Martin (2008) “The Bhikkhunī-ordination Controversy in Thailand.” 29 Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 155–83.Google Scholar
Solum, Lawrence B. (2003) “Virtue Jurisprudence a Virtue-Centred Theory of Judging.” 34 Metaphilosophy 178–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Śrī Laṅkā Rāmañña Mahā Nikāya Pālaka Saṅgha Sabhā (2015) Śrī Laṅkā Rāmañña Mahā Nikāya Katikāvata [The Katikāvata for the Sri Lankan Rāmañña Fraternity], Colombo: śrī laṅkā rajayē mudraṇa depārtamēntuva.Google Scholar
Tonsakulrungruang, Khemthong (2019) “Toward a New Buddhist Constitutionalism: Law and Religion in the Kingdom of Thailand.” PhD diss., University of Bristol.Google Scholar
Tosa, Keiko (2013) “The Sangha and Political Acts: Secularization in a Theravada Buddhist Society.” 44 Internationales Asienforum 271–97.Google Scholar
von Hinüber, Oskar (1995) “Buddhist Law According to the Theravāda-Vinaya: A Survey of Theory and Practice.” 18 Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 7–46.Google Scholar
Weerasooria, Wickrema S. (2011) Buddhist Ecclesiastical Law: A Treatise on Sri Lankan Statute Law and Judicial Decisions on Buddhist Temples and Temporalities, Colombo: Postgraduate Institute of Management.Google Scholar
Whitecross, Richard (2013) “Separating Religion and Politics? Buddhism and the Bhutanese Constitution,” in Khilnani, S., Raghavan, V., & Thiruvengadam, A. K., eds., Comparative Constitutionalism in South Asia, New Delhi: OUP India, 116–44.Google Scholar
Winn, Peter A. (1991) “Legal Ritual.” 2 Law and Critique 207–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar