How Buddhist and Christian Liberation Epistemologies Should Inform and Correct Each Other
Buddhist-Christian Studies 2019 DOI: 10.1353/bcs.2019.0018 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Buddhism |
| Citations | 2 |
| Key points | Argues that Buddhist and Christian liberation epistemologies each have blind spots that are revealed and corrected by learning from the other. Contemplative practice addresses deluded misperception, while social analysis addresses oppressive social structures; each is necessary to fully address suffering. |
Abstract
Buddhism has traditionally focused on epistemological and psychological causes of suffering in individuals: deluded perception, greed, and ill will.Buddhist compassionate action seeks to free people from those inner causes of suffering, through contemplative, ritual and ethical practices.Christian liberation theology focuses on oppressive social systems as main causes of suffering, and on socio-historical analysis and social activism to empower people to liberate themselves from those systems.Effective epistemological analysis and contemplative practice (Buddhism's focus) is necessary to address the first cause of suffering: deluded misperception and reaction, since social analysis alone does not remove the pervasive misperception that some persons matter more than others, an unconscious assumption that distorts everyone's attempt to build better social systems.Contemplative practices that deconstruct that delusive tendency also empower greater discernment, compassion and creative responsiveness for effective social action.On the other hand, social analysis (as in Christian liberation theology) is essential to address the second kind of cause of suffering, oppressive social structures, which, if not confronted, promulgate systemic harms while socially incorporating individuals into the first cause of suffering: delusion, greed and ill-will.This essay argues that Buddhist and Christian liberation epistemologies each have blind spots that are revealed and corrected by learning from the other.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on buddhism, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mental balance and well-being: Building bridges between Buddhism and Western psychology. | 2006 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Buddhist Modernism and the Rhetoric of Meditative Experience | 1995 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Buddhist and Psychological Perspectives on Emotions and Well-Being | 2005 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Too Early to Tell: The Potential Impact and Challenges—Ethical and Otherwise—Inherent in the Mainstreaming of Dharma in an Increasingly Dystopian World | 2017 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| From self to nonself: The Nonself Theory | 2016 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |