¹ Throughout this essay I shall use Theravada Buddhism as my standard representative of the Buddhist tradition. This branch of Buddhism is found today in most parts of South and Southeastern Asia. It contrasts with the Mahayana tradition of East Asia in doctrine, social organization, ritual, among other things. The chief reasons I have chosen this form of Buddhism for comparison with structuralist thought are three: (1) the ideas of Theravada Buddhism seem more closely related to Levi-Strauss's ideas than those of other forms of Buddhism; (2) only one documented account of Levi-Strauss's encounter with a Buddhist society exists, a meeting that took place in the early 1950s in Theravadin Burma; and (3) because Theravada Buddhism is in many ways logically and historically the most ‘primitive” form of Buddhism we know, it serves ably the purpose of comparison. On the one hand, simplicity makes the conceptual task of comparing systems of thought, complex even under normal circumstances, all the easier. On the other hand, since in some way the classic ideas of all Buddhist traditions can be seen to develop from seminal ideas and oppositions in Theravada Buddhism as revealed in the Pali Canon, a comparison that begins with Theravada Buddhism has at least a good chance of representing the broad traditions of Buddhism. This is not however necessarily to echo the beliefs of modern Theravada orthodoxy: some forms of Mahayana Buddhism are just as, or even more, ‘primitive” than forms of Theravadin belief and practice. I want only to agree with those who have made the case for the extraordinary antiquity and primitiveness of much of the Pali Canon and current Theravadin belief and practice.

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¹⁴ Ibid., p. 120.

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⁵⁹ Ibid.