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Houtman, Gustaaf. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics: Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy. Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa Monograph Series No. 33. Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, 400 pp. ISBN 4-87297-748-3

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Chapter 19
Byama-so tayà:
social meditation and
the politics of influence

Aung San Suu Kyi, in response to a question a journalist posed about the sudden piety of the regime, said that ‘I would not like to judge other people's religious activities or attitudes and all I would say is that if there is real respect for the teachings of Buddhism on the part of the authorities, it is all to the good of the nation.’ However, to the regime's intolerance towards other religions she responded that ‘if that is so then it's a great pity because Buddhism after all teaches tolerance and loving kindness myitta so it would be against the essence of Buddhism to persecute anyone, whether on religious, political or any other grounds.’[1] The question arises whether Aung San Suu Kyi's view of Buddhism is substantively different from that practiced by the regime, and, if so, in what ways.

As I have already noted, senior NLD members stress a number of Buddhist practices. The most important is vipassana, which operates at the level of coping psychologically with imprisonment and repression. This is so, particularly with the older generation steeped in the teachings of Burmese Buddhism. Among the younger leaders, in particular those who fled from Burma to Thailand, no such emphasis can be discerned. A long absence from Burma has cut them off from these techniques for coping with personal suffering which are openly available in most parts of Burma.

Nevertheless, for Aung San Suu Kyi as a Buddhist, change in and purification of her own mind and attitudes is as important as, if not more important than, calling for a change in the attitudes of others, including one's enemies [O10].[2] She has admitted, during various interviews, to her own addressing of these failings through mental culture [C17]. Nevertheless, though she practices herself, she also has reservations that mental culture necessarily always leads to change in the person, for there are many people who practise ‘not just for days but for months’ without changing their attitudes [C18].

Samatha and vipassana

Vipassana

Many NLD members were sustained through their prison term by practising mental culture, in particular vipassana or ‘insight contemplation’. The practices, which Spiro – in his emphasis on Kammatic Buddhism over Nibbanic Buddhism – relegated to footnotes,[3] here take centre stage. The three most senior leaders of the National League for Democracy – Aung San Suu Kyi (General Secretary), Tin U (Deputy Chairman) and U Kyi Maung (Deputy Chairman) – practise vipassana.

Aung San Suu Kyi and Tin U practise in the tradition of the Mahasi Sayadaw, whereas U Kyi Maung and

(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p307/392

U Aung Gyi (formerly in the NLD) practise in the tradition of U Ba Khin. These two vipassana traditions were institutionalized by members of government concerned to reform government and society. The Mahasi Sayadaw was brought to Rangoon by former Prime Minister U Nu. U Ba Khin, in turn, was appointed by U Nu as Accountant General of Burma, who then went on to set up his own International Meditation Centre. Both vipassana traditions have a long history in anti-corruption campaigns and in the reform of bureaucracy.

Samatha

In all Burmese vipassana methods, samatha must be included, but not all samatha traditions need include vipassana. In particular some samatha practices, such as mindfulness of breath (anapana)[4] and the byama-so tayà or brahma-vihara practices of loving-kindness, have been incorporated into vipassana as part of a focus on the body and to create conditions favourable for the ‘crossing over’ into vipassana.

Nevertheless, samatha is what the Buddha practised prior to his enlightenment while he had not yet found the vipassana path, both in previous lives and in his life as Gautama before the age of forty. As a Buddha, competent in all forms of mental culture, he also practised samatha after his enlightenment.

The Buddha is supposed to have rejected most extreme forms of samatha practices of his time, particularly when practised for their own sake without follow-up with vipassana. Samatha is therefore ambiguous: at the level of technique, it is regarded as both preliminary to and supportive of vipassana, but at the level of its many pre- or extra-Buddhist hermetic practices, and in its identification with instrumental control over loki, it is regarded as non-Buddhist.

Samatha practice is readily characterised as leading to ‘mundane knowledge’ (loki pañña) and as concerned with ‘power’ in an instrumental sense to serve goals in this world. Unlike vipassana, which seeks to attain direct perception and transparency of all processes that actually take place in mind, samatha produces a mind-created state at will. In short, samatha creates worlds [loki], whereas vipassana breaks them down and sees them for what they are. The vipassana traditions most worried about the loki implications of samatha are the ‘dry’-visioned vipassana methods, including the method of the Mahasi Sayadaw. On the other hand, vipassana methodologies arising from the anapana tradition of the Ledi Sayadaw tend to involve more clearly identifiable samatha practice. The Hpa Auk Sayadaw, a new phenomenon in Burma, aims to scale the heights of both practices.

Samatha and political ideology

I have shown that the military (and those in search of ana) prefer the samatha traditions, since it permits control over loka, whereas the democracy movement (and those in search of awza) tend to stress samatha mainly as an avenue for emancipation from loka. At the level of formulating a clearly identifiable political philosophy, vipassana is not the most important practice, even among the senior leaders. By far the most important are those practices that bridge the mundane and the supra-mundane practices, and bridge collective and personal aspirations. These in particular refer to samatha. Thus, byama-so tayà, and in particular metta and karuna, are the formative practices for creating social and political bonds. Samatha is also important for finding legitimacy and support with monks famous for its practice, such as the Thamanya Sayadaw. Furthermore, the term sati, which produces the necessary one-pointed mind (concentration) in preparation for vipassana, also is of some political significance when it is interpreted as giving rise to political awareness in a multi-party system.

In sum, the political significance of Buddhist terminology revolves almost entirely around the samatha or ‘mundane’ (loki) element of Buddhist practice. Vipassana operates in the background as the purificatory element of last resort, as the final, highest and most noble goal of Buddhist practice, namely final release from samsara.

Byama-so tayà

Socialism

It has often been remarked that Burmese style socialism was ‘less influenced by the international socialist movement than by indigenous factors’.[5] Indeed, the indigenous factors ensured that communists from Russia and Vietnam simply could not recognize the content of Burmese socialism as socialist at all. The question, however, is what these ‘indigenous factors’ are, and whether these have actually been understood.

Though he had his reservations, Smith nevertheless argued that, compared to U Nu's religious democracy, Ne Win's socialism was evidence of a more secular and more pragmatic ‘ideology’, supplementing or even replacing ‘tradition’ as the ‘prime factor’ in the legitimation of the Burmese political system.[6] However, such an idea that Burma was on the move from Buddhist ‘tradition’ to secular ‘ideology’ after 1962 is deceptive for two reasons. First, as Smith also realised, it is a minority in Burma who view socialism as a secular ideology – most interpret it as a system based on traditional Buddhist values. Second, and this is more important, socialism has mostly not been conceived of as an ideology at all, but as a typically Burmese Buddhist practice, namely as byama-so tayà, a kind of social meditation.

Legal matters

Maung Maung, biographer of Ne Win, who in 1989 briefly became Burma's president, was appointed Chief Judge after the 1962 coup. He was responsible for revising the Burmese legal system. In January 1965, as part of his effort to ‘decolonise’ Burmese law, he made a judgment about whether an engagement between youngsters fitted into the Indian Contract, or the customary dhammathat law. In one case, the latter required no minimum age, but according to the former one of the parties was deemed too young to be engaged. Maung Maung decided that the dhammathat law applied and the fiancée could sue for breach of promise of marriage. The significant point is that in this judgment, Maung Maung invented a ‘new Burmese legal identity’, namely he appealed to lokapala tayà [elakpåltra:] or ‘the principles upholding the universe upon which the dhammathat rested’. Maung Maung himself characterised it as ‘non-oppression between man and man, and non-exploitation of man by man’.[7] Huxley identifies this with the Four Kings, representing the Guardians of the Universe and the four compass points. However, there are three other kinds of lokapala besides this, namely the Two (shame and fear), the Four (the byama-so tayà) and the Five (the five moral precepts). Though I do not have this source at hand, I am inclined to think that Maung Maung intended his revised legal system to appeal to the ultimate Burmese values in line with the adoption of the four byama-so tayà, a synonym of lokapala as set out below.

The Buddhicisation of socialism

Ne Win had become acutely aware that socialist ideology could not, in Burma at least, operate entirely as a secular ideology. The Sangha was outraged by the nationalisation of industry and the concentration of wealth in the hands of the government because it was depriving the Sangha of independent support, and if the State was not to support them, who would?[8] Ne Win Buddhicised his rendering of socialism more and more as time passed.

In 1965, the same year as Maung Maung's shift in legal interpretation, Ne Win repealed U Nu's acts in support of Buddhism.[9] Also in that same year, the Mahasi Sayadaw, who was the central person in U Nu's Buddhist reform, was invited to speak on Burmese radio for four successive rainy seasons between 1965–68, addressing the general public in Burmese on each of the four individual Byama-so tayà.[10] These were published in 1985 as The Preachings on Byama-so Tayà [òbhîsiur\tra:eta\ýkI:]. In the first broadcast, he explained how he usually preached about vipassana, but since it is difficult and not everyone could practise this, he wanted to benefit the general population by preaching on byama-so tayà. This could be practised by all, irrespective of ethnicity or religion.

By 1971, barely three years after the Mahasi finished his broadcasts, the BSPP prefaced the Burmese

version of every party document with byama-so tayà in a single page entitled ‘Our Belief’, characterising this practice as the foundation of socialism.

We seriously believe that people cannot be emancipated from their suffering because of the prevalence of the evil economic systems [wiqmsI:pæå:er:sns\Siu:] controlled by unjust and avaracious [wiqmelaB] people, who rule the roost and have disheartened the peoples of the world by overturning noble qualities such as considerate behaviour, and foist this upon people they do not understand. We believe that it is a serious matter that people cannot free themselves from suffering. That is why this Union of Socialist Burma wants to silence such avaracious system which seeks unjust prosperity, and which unjustly oppresses people. We seriously believe that we can build a socialist economy which has justice at its basis, and which permits citizens to collectively, through human effort, achieve a new society in which people enjoy themselves, and in which the Byama-so ta-yà can flourish, permitting people to liberate themselves from suffering [mtra:sI:pæa:RHHasa:eqa wiqmsns\m¥a:kiuK¥op\ôcim\:esôpI: tra:mH¥tm§kui AeòKKMeqa SiuRHy\ls\sI:pæa:er:sns\kiu tv\eSak\Niuc\mHqalH¥c\ òpv\qUlUTuAepåc\:qv\ lU>peyageûkac\. epÅ epåk\reqalUm§dukðAepåc\:mHlæt\eòmak\ûkl¥k\ òbhîsiur\tra:m¥a: Tæn\:ka:Niuc\mv\.qayaweòpaeqa lU>eBac\qs\ýkI:qiu>erak\rHiNiuc\mv\hu Ael:Ank\yuMûkv\qv\X] We vow that, according to these beliefs, even if we do not attain the final socialist goals, we will uplift our lives.

Until 1971 the Ne Win regime had fondly summed up Burmese socialism in ‘Our belief’ [kæ”N\up\tiu>f yMuûkv\K¥k\] as ‘No full stomach, no morality’. This had been incorporated in the first socialist document produced, namely in the nine-page document The Burmese Way to Socialism of 30 April 1962.

The Revolutionary Council of the Union of Burma does not believe that man will be set free from social evils as long as pernicious economic systems exist in which man exploits man and lives on the fat of such appropriation. The Council believes it to be possible only when exploitation of man by man is brought to an end and a socialist economy based on justice is established; only then can all people, irrespective of race or religion, be emancipated from all social evils and set free from anxieties over food, clothing and shelter, and from inability to resist evil, for an empty stomach is not conducive to wholesome morality, as the Burmese saying goes: only then can an affluent stage of social development be reached and all people be happy and healthy in mind and body.

This original statement was evidently a reaction to U Nu's emphasis on meditation. Borrowed from one of Aung San's speeches, some have translated it as ‘no full stomach, no morality’, and as ‘one can meditate only if the stomach is full’ (morality precedes meditation) or, in English terms, as ‘man does not live by bread alone’.[11]

By 1971 Ne Win realised that, in making this ideology so earthly and low-down, it had become associated with, and was an excuse for, corruption. With corruption cases pending, it was decided to follow his earlier statement of intention and to notch socialist ideology a little higher than the stomach, by incorporating another of Aung San's references, namely to byama-so tayà. This seems to have been discovered in the BSPP Internal Party Discussion Document, which also attributes it to one of Aung San's speeches.[12] From 1971 onwards, all Burmese BSPP documents dropped the reference to ‘Full stomach first, morality second’ and had substituted it with this paragraph added on the first page as ‘Our belief’.[13]

I have already noted above how Aung San referred to a ‘Socialism underpinned by byama-so tayà’ [òbhîsiur\tra:kiu AeòKñpueqa “SiurHy\ls\zc\:”],[14] and I have now shown how this became the core of socialist ideology as expressed by by the Ne Win regime. Saw Maung said about these practices that they are ‘not very difficult to practise’,[15] and through the Thirty-Eight Mangala this has been incorporated into official policy of the contemporary military regime, though not into their similarly named, but much less imaginative slogan today, namely of the People's Desire [òpv\qU>qeBaTa:X] [ZM3b]. What, we may ask, is the nature of this social and socialist form of meditation, this spiritualisation of politics?

Byama-so tayà and the moral precepts

In Pali the expression brahma-cariya is most readily identified with ‘good conduct’ [qusriuk\], such as taking the vows of abstinence, as included in the Eight, in the Nine and in the Ten Moral Precepts. Thus a distinction is made between the Four Kinds of Brahma-cariya, namely (1) abstinence practised by ordinary laity according to the moral precepts, (2) by monks according to the Vinaya, (3) by those who took the Buddha's teachings according to the Buddha's teachings, and (4) the practices of the ariya who were able to

cut off their attachments.[16]

The third of the Eight, of the Nine and of the Ten Precepts are all known as the injunction to ‘avoid ignoble practices’ or abrahma-cariya sila [AòbhîsriyqIl].[17] Furthermore, in a special group of Precepts observed at the time of the Kassapa Buddha in the conduct of Vajjian country, there were Five Precepts known as brahmacariya-pancama sila in which the third applied to temporary abstinence of sexual intercourse. When to these five is added the precept to take only one meal a day, then this is known as brahmacariya-pancama ekabhattika sila.[18] There is also a category of Five Precepts known as Kumara byama-cariya precepts [ekamròbhîsriyqIlm¥oi:], in which the fifth is celibacy.[19]

Byama-so tayà and the Thirty-Eight Mangala

The philosophical and political importance of byama-so tayà, however, is much broader than signifying abstinence and good conduct. This becomes particularly evident in its use as number 32, namely ‘pure life’, in the context of the Thirty-Eight Mangala in the Mahamangala Sutta (Discourse of the Supreme Blessings).

F. Renunciation of the Worldly Life (31–34).

[31] Tapo ca [31] To practise austerity,

[32] brahma cariyaca [32] and the practice of pure life,

[33] Ariya sacana dassanam [33] to have perception of Ariya [noble] truths

[34] Nibbana sacchi kiriyaca [34] to realize Nibbana (through Arhatta-phala)

Etam mangal muttamam this is the highest auspiciousness.

This has been defined in the new 1994 syllabus on training in Buddhist culture as ‘abstinence and the practice of noble practices’ [emTun\Am§ erHac\ûk¨\ñpl¥k\ekac\:òmt\eqaAk¥c\.k¥c\.òKc\:].[20] As Kyaw Htut points out, ‘many people think that brahmacariya practice only means abstinence from sex’, and there is a tendency to translate this as ‘celibacy’. However, he proceeds to argue that, since it is the previous [31] tapa mangala that involves the practice of renunciation of ‘the worldly life’ and taking up the life of ‘a bhikkhu or an ascetic or a hermit’, abstinence in the case of byama-so tayà is already assumed, so that this refers to something more. He says that Brahmacariya Mangala or the practice of the life of Purity in this context ‘should be taken to mean such practices which are based on tranquillity practice’.[21]

As in the case of tapa, he distinguishes a Buddhist from a non-Buddhist through this practice:

we find two categories; the Brahmacariya Mangala as practised by the ascetics outside the Buddha's teaching and the Brahmacariya Mangala as taught by the Buddha. The practice of the ascetics is the tranquillity practice (samatha), and it is by means of this practice that many ascetics attained jhanas (mental absorption) and abhinnas or supernormal powers. As a matter of fact, outside the Buddha's teaching, any form of practice that strives for the development of supernormal powers is Brahmacariya Mangala … the practice within the Sasana and outside the Sasana are quite different. The Brahmacariya practice under the Buddha's Teaching voids the two extremes of self-mortification and indulgence in sense pleasures, and is carried out steadily and steadfastly. Besides, the goal here is not tranquillity but the attainment of insight-knowledge (vipassana-ñana).[22]

He then says that ‘it is not easy to explain Brahmacariya practice as it can be interpreted according to context’, and contrasts tapa mangala as making for ‘moral purity’ (sila visuddhi), while brahmacariya mangala makes for purity of mind (citta visuddhi).

The significance of this pure life is that it lies exactly at the threshold between the mundane and the supra-mundane life. Indeed, it is the first thirty-two mangala, right up to byahma-so tayà that ‘pertain to mundane (lokiya) matters’, and the six that follow are lokuttara, of which the first two are practices, and the last four are results.[23] The implication is that, as the last of the mundane practices leading up to the supramundane and as the beginning of the final path, it empowers towards the final release, it permits vision of the unconditioned emptiness of nibbana upon which can be projected ultimate ideals of freedom and fulfilment.

Rahula and Brahmacariya pariyosana

This idea of byama-so tayà as a complete path based on charity, moral practice and mental culture is evident in the designation of The Ten Meanings of Brahma-cariya [òbhîsriyax yc\:qdãåx 10-òPa Ank\ehaX],[24] that ranges across charity and virtue, to the final consumption of the path in attaining to the fruits of ariya.

That brahmacariya means more than celibacy, as it also encompasses the largest, final stretch of the path of the pure life towards a final solution, is evident from the story of how Rahula was threatened by Mara who wanted to get at Gautama Buddha, his father. At that point Gautama said

(‘Hey Mara, a disturbing one! My beloved son) Rahula is one who has realized his goal that is Arahatship called Brahmacariya pariyosana. He is absolutely free from fear, he is purified of the hundred and eight kinds of real craving, he is devoid of the one thousand and five hundred mental defilments, he has uprooted the thorns and spikes of all existences such as sensual (kama), material (rupa) and immaterial (arupa). The body (of my son Rahula) in the present existence is his last body.[25]

The Buddha then proceeded to say that Rahula no longer grasped the five aggregates of the body and the mind as ‘I’, ‘mine’ and ‘my self’. Since Mara was grasped at that point as mental defilements underlying rebirth, Mara himself supposedly made his exit from that place. This conquest by the Buddha over Mara as both deity and the very universal causes of embodiment itself is celebrated in the epithet of the Buddhist as jhina. Múneinda (1817-1894) wrote Zeinathtá pakathani [Biography of the conqueror CeQMÊS:a\Qf P jhina pakasani].[26] This is a biographical account of the Buddha in terms of his epithet jhina [CeQ]. It has ten parts with ninty-eight sections in all, starting from the prayer of Gautama Buddha-to-be as hermit Sumedha, his enlightenment and reaching right up until the third synod by Shin Maukgaliputara. The designation jhina is explained here as overcoming ‘the five enemies’ [WaYm 5Sád], both within and without.

Brahma-cariya as recitation

The emphasis placed in Burmese Buddhism on byama-cariya as a broad path, including charity and the moral precepts, and as a way of life to be aspired to in the Mangala Sutta, means that even the body of thirty-three sutta texts recited for protection, namely the paritta, are sometimes referred to as a whole as ‘Recitation of brahma-cariya’ [òbhîsarIwt\ræt\s¨\].[27]

Byama-so tayà and brahma-vihara

The above examples, however, are not usually abbreviated in Burmese as byama-so tayà. It is only the Four brahma-vihara that are interchangeably referred to as The Four byahma-so tayà [òbhîsiur\ 4 på:], an abbreviation of the Pali brahma-cariya (so siur\ is derived from saríyá, P. cariya sriy).[28] In Burmese, when suffixed with ‘teaching’ [tra:x Dmî], this contraction is presumed equivalent to brahma-vihara.

At Gautama's birth an omen took place presaging his ‘attainment of four Sublime States (Brahmavihara)’. The omen was the immediate pervasion of ‘loving-kindness [metta] … among all beings at enmity with one another.[29] The Four brahma-vihara [òbhîwihar 4 på:] means ‘the Four Dwellings of Brahma’ as distinct from ‘the Four Brahma Practices’. However, Brahma also means ‘noble’, and it can also be translated as the ‘the Four Nobles’ or ‘the Four Noble Ways of Life’ .

The four practices [cariya] that make up brahma-vihara are conceived as leading to the highest abodes [vihara] in Buddhist cosmology, where material sexuality is not apparent with all its attendant problems, and where Brahmanas live by these four practices simply and without difficulties. Hence abstinence is already an attribute of this higher form of life. Indeed, the byahma-so tayà are also known as The Four Dwellings of Brahma [òbhîwihartra: 4-på:], in which reference is made to the way of life and practice of the Bra

hma kings.[30]

Brahma-vihara is a collection of four samatha meditation objects out of forty, namely ‘loving-kindness’ (metta), ‘compassion’ (karuna), ‘sympathetic joy’ (mudita) and ‘equanimity’ (upekkha). Commonly translated as ‘the Four Divine Abodes’ or ‘the Four Sublime States’, these are identified as Brahma practices and as leading to the Brahma heavens, the top heavens in Buddhist cosmology (which has thirty-one planes of existence). Their cosmological reach and positive influence on the world, from a Buddhist and a socio-political point of view, means that they are sometimes designated as ‘the Four Guardians of the World’ [elakpåltra:4på:].[31]

They are also known in Buddhist philosophy as ‘Illimitables’ (apamañña), as these are ‘the mental qualities to be developed and extended [limitlessly] towards all beings’.[32] By this is meant that ‘in their perfection and their true nature, they should not be narrowed by any limitation as to the range of beings towards whom they are extended. They should be non-exclusive and impartial, not bound by selective preferences or prejudices. A mind that has attained to that boundlessness of the Brahma-viharas will not harbor any national, racial, religious or class hatred.’[33]

These practices are based on moral conduct and concern conduct towards living beings (sattesu samma patipatti). Nyanatiloka has argued that they provide, in fact, ‘the answer to all situations arising from social contact. They are the great removers of tension, the great peace-makers in social conflict, and the great healers of wounds suffered in the struggle of existence. They level social barriers, build harmonious communities, awaken slumbering magnanimity long forgotten, revive joy and hope long abandoned and promote human brotherhood against the forces of egotism.’[34]

These practices are considered the foundation of Burmese collective life at the very early beginnings of Burmese history. Indeed, SPDC journalists portray artists from the Pagan period as expressing these brahma-vihara practices in their painting, which they interpret as uniquely Burmese.

The Bagan artist did not believe in naturalistic art. His art was something akin to the art of the moderns. He knew that a painting needed to exaggerate certain contrasts or to eliminate an enormous amount of detail. He knew that a painting needed to simplify to achieve art. Accordingly he was ready to exaggerate, eliminate or simplify. He was ready to pull his subject to pieces and to reassemble it in accordance with his vision. Because of the success of his effort he was able to give the impression of telling the truth about life around him. He brought out the force and quality of the original. Because of his skill he was able to express in art such concepts as compassion, joy and equanimity.[35]

The scriptural passage on brahma-vihara

I. Here, monks, a disciple dwells pervading one direction with his heart filled with loving-kindness, likewise the second, the third, and the fourth direction; so above, below and around; he dwells pervading the entire world everywhere and equally with his heart filled with loving-kindness, abundant, grown great, measureless, free from enmity and free from distress.

II. Here, monks, a disciple dwells pervading one direction with his heart filled with compassion, likewise the second, the third and the fourth direction; so above, below and around; he dwells pervading the entire world everywhere and equally with his heart filled with compassion, abundant, grown great, measureless, free from enmity and free from distress.

III. Here, monks, a disciple dwells pervading one direction with his heart filled with sympathetic joy, likewise the second, the third and the fourth direction; so above, below and around; he dwells pervading the entire world everywhere and equally with his heart filled with sympathetic joy, abundant, grown great, measureless, free from enmity and free from distress.

IV. Here, monks, a disciple dwells pervading one direction with his heart filled with equanimity, likewise the second, the third and the fourth direction; so above, below and around; he dwells pervading the entire world everywhere and equally with his heart filled with equanimity, abundant, grown great, measureless, free from enmity and free from distress.[36]

Samatha and cosmological attainment

In Burma by far the greatest emphasis is placed on the first two, and in particular on the first practice. Thus the four practices were collectively characterised by the Mahasi in Brahmavihara Dhamma in particular in terms of the very first practice, namely as ‘the systematic method of developing metta’.[37]

Aung San Suu Kyi's main emphasis throughout has been very much on the first two qualities, metta and

karuna. People should ‘concentrate on cultivating loving kindness and compassion’. From these two practices the third practice, sympathetic joy, ‘would naturally follow.’ However, upekkha, the fourth practice, is ‘well-nigh impossible for most ordinary beings’, as it stands for a ‘perfectly balanced state of the mind and emotions, a balance between faith and intelligence, between energy and concentration, between wisdom and compassion’ and is ‘non-preferential without inclination towards excess in any direction’.[38]

The social and political relevance of these practices correlates with the cosmological height to which these practices lead, permitting access to the top twenty heavens. The animal realm and the hells are the lowest five realms (nos 1–5), the human realm is number 5, the deities are 6–11, and the Brahma realms are nos 12–31. The first three practices – metta, karuna, mudita – enable the practitioner to reach up into the third rupa jhana leading up until realm no. 20.

However, the fourth practice – upekkha – enables achievement of the fourth rupa jhana up until realm no. 27. As Ko Lei puts it, equanimity is necessary to attain to these higher realms:

This is the reason: Metta, Karuna, Mudita Jhanas are associated with Sukha Vedana [feeling of pleasure]. The fourth Jhana is associated with Upekkha Vedana [feeling of indifference]. If, therefore, the yogi wants to go up to the fourth Jhana, he must change his object, after he has acquired the third Jhana, by means of one of these three Brahmavihara bhavanas. For example, the yogi is practising Metta bhavana. The object on which he concentrates is the mental image of the person, whom he loves and respects. Up to the same time of achieving the third Jhana, the yogi uses the same object. If, however, he wants to achieve the fourth Jhana, he must give up his original object of the mental image of the person, whom he loves and respects. He must concentrate on the mental image of a person, to whom he is indifferent. And while he has the third jhana, the jhanangas (parts of the Jhana) are Sukkha Ekaggata. However, from the very moment when the yogi achieved the fourth Jhana, the Jhanangas will be Upekkha Ekaggata.[39]

Though the highest realm that can be attained through these practices, this practice is also the least socially relevant. It is of some interest that in the book about Aung San Suu Kyi, the regime responded by saying that she writes well with literary talent, but that she does not practise what she writes herself. On the other hand, I have already noted that Saw Maung dismissed these practices as ‘easy’ and Burmese people criticise the military for having no metta.

Supernatural protection

The main agency responsible for protection, even in lower forms of Burmese magic, are the powers unleashed by recitation of the paritta, the words of the Buddha. The power of incantations (paritta) to overcome or dissipate danger is also ultimately based on the quality of metta of the reciter. The Four Accomplishments of a Reciter are: (1) The reciter must be capable of reciting passages, phrases and syllables of the Pali text with the correct mode of articulation, enunciation and accent; (2) He must have full and exact understanding of the Pali text he is reciting; (3) The reciter should chant paritta without expectation of gifts or presents.; (4) Paritta should be recited with a pure heart, full of loving-kindness and compassion. So ‘it is necessary to administer paritta according to the conditions laid down, with a heart full of loving-kindness, and compassion and resolute inclination towards release from the Samsara and curbing one's desire to receive offerings.’[40]

The SPDC takes paritta seriously, for on Burmese New Year, 17 April 1998, it organized a reciting of paritta, and poured the sacred water into the four lakes that supply Rangoon's water supply ‘for all the people of Yangon to be safe and free from harm and danger’.[41] After this ‘they also dispensed metta’.

Development

Aung San Suu Kyi's most explicit statements on this particular practice are to be found in her 11th Pope Paul VI Memorial Lecture, entitled ‘Heavenly abodes and human development’ presented on 3 November 1997.

In this, she argues that today we recognize that development can no longer be ‘measured purely in economic terms’, since it ‘includes socio-political factors’, and she suggests that ‘true development should also comprise spiritual cultivation’. She quotes Sulak Sivaraksa on ‘the spirit of Buddhist development’, who argued that ‘the inner strength must be cultivated, along with compassion and loving kindness’ and on the goals of Buddhist development as ‘equality, love, freedom and liberation':

… the means for achieving these lie within the grasp of any community from a village to a nation – once its members begin

the process of reducing selfishness. To do so, two realisations are necessary: an inner realisation concerning greed, hatred and delusion, and an outer realisation concerning the impact these tendencies have on society and the planet …

She concludes that

Paradise on earth is a concept which is outmoded and few people believe in it any more. But we can certainly seek to make our planet a better, happier home for all of us by constructing the heavenly abodes of love and compassion in our hearts. Beginning with this inner development we can go on to the development of the external world with courage and wisdom.

This echoes Rewatta Dhamma, who briefly acted as mediator between Aung San Suu Kyi and the SLORC, who said in his 1996 address to Asian leaders that ‘if the central human values of compassion and loving kindness were actually practised in our countries, we would soon find a solution to our problems, and our people would not be sacrificed on the altars of “security” or economic “development”.’[42]

U Nu expounded something akin to this view in 1960, when Thakin Tin, his finance minister, told the press that profiteering and black-marketing would be stopped by appealing to all business men ‘to observe the Buddha's teachings concerning metta’. However, the next year this policy was recognized to have failed and was abandoned, to be substituted by stern measures to control prices of essential commodities. Smith says about this that ‘whether the teaching of metta was seriously believed to be adequate, or was simply a rationalisation for inaction, in either case its use was rather pathetic’.[43] Though Smith's warning that metta should not substitute for sound economic policy remains valid, he did not seem to appreciate the intra-cultural significance of this concept (he also mistranslated metta as ‘all-embracing compassion’).

Politics

Byama-so tayà plays an important role in Burmese politics, as underlined by its frequent use in the speeches of kings and politicians.

The role of byama-so tayà in political crisis was already evident in Kyanzitha's time, for after he reconquered Pagan from a rebel, he promised to remedy the crisis by his superior loving-kindness and compassion so that the refugees could safely return to their homeland. Adapting a prophecy by Gavampati on behalf of the Buddha, the inscription (c 1102 A.D.) says: ‘of those torn from their dear ones, of those who were sick at heart, by a course of benefits, with water of compassion, with loving-kindness which is even as a hand, he shall wipe their tears, he shall wash away their snot … Like children resting in their mother's bosom, so shall the king keep watch over them and help them’ [D3].

Its value as a political instrument was repeatedly emphasised by the monk Wisara in his quest for national independence and the restoration of Buddhism.[44] It was also emphasized by U Nu during his position as Prime Minister of Burma between 1948–62 [E2], during the 1988 disturbances, and while engaged in setting up his political party at the end of 1989 [D2].

U Nu's emphasis on brahma-vihara was particularly pronounced from 1958, when the caretaker government took over. On 28 August 1988 U Nu was the first to declare a new political party, The League for Democracy and Peace [dImiukersINHc\.ôcim\:K¥m\:er:påtIx dI-ôcim\:APæµ>], followed by his declaration of a provisional government on 9 September. It is of interest that his main philosophy for democracy was known as the Byama-so Way [òbhîsuir\lm\:s¨\], and that his newsletter was known as the Brahmacariya Bulletin or in Burmese as the Byama-so Bulletin [òbhîsiur\qtc\:s¨\]. He was ‘disqualified’ by the military in December 1989 after he refused to call off his declaration that his party legally constituted the Government. He declared himself prepared to be killed and urged his followers ‘to strive for liberation through the Brahmacariyavada’.

We have already noted byama-so tayà as a major criticism of the SLORC regime by Tin U who proclaimed that by practising vipassana the generals will be able to ‘foster metta that way’ [C19]. Tin U also emphasizes that he himself learnt this in the course of his monastic education [D3], and sees what he learnt in the monastery as a turning away from ‘a shallow and fearful life’ associated with his life under the military [E1]. Nevertheless, U Kyi Maung points out that there are limitations to the non-violence strategy of metta and meditation in a situation of conflict [E4].

Aung San Suu Kyi, through her emphasis on brahma-vihara, aims to bring the military ‘into the fold’ of peaceful and harmonious government. However, at the same time, as Kyanzittha did with the refugees in his time, she addresses the numerous Burmese refugees in the jungle and in Thailand. She appeals for metta and karuna on the part of the Thai government [D5].

Aung San Suu Kyi isolates the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, ‘surely one of the leading authorities on, and practitioners of, loving kindness in our world today’ [D17]. Chinese repression of Tibet since 1959 means that the Dalai Lama faced a longer struggle than Aung San Suu Kyi, but both share a similar fate in their non-violent struggle against a totalitarian regime, for which both have been awarded a Nobel Peace Prize. It is interesting that both should find in brahma-vihara the main centrepoint of their politics.

As I will show, the first three brahma-vihara practices primarily serve as a way of forming bonds between individuals so as to make possible a sense of groupness. However, this works two ways, for different political factions have emphasized different ideas of the group, with military discourse sometimes one-sidedly using it to either claim ethnic exclusiveness or common Asian values.

Reconciliation with opposites and enemies

Vipassana teacher Rewatta Dhamma, who lives in a monastery and meditation centre in Birmingham, England, is the only person to have briefly secured the co-operation of both sides in an attempt to mediate between the SLORC and Aung San Suu Kyi. Though unsuccessful, these were the only hopeful signs of negotiation taking place.

It is significant that Rewatta Dhamma, who has known Aung San Suu Kyi from youth, has identified the brahma-vihara as a typically Burmese Buddhist instrument able to achieve reconciliation between the SLORC and NLD. He encouraged both the SLORC and NLD to develop these mental attributes saying that he sincerely hopes that ‘she [Aung San Suu Kyi] walks on well with loving kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity, principles taught by the Buddha, which the majority of the people of Myanmar appreciate … and have been principles the people of Myanmar have followed for centuries.’ He expects that ‘If Suu Kyi and the members of the SLORC abide by the principle of the Buddha's teachings and solve their problems, then they will succeed in building a democracy fit for Myanmar, and peace and stability will be restored to the land’ [D4].

In preparation for the attainment of ‘transcendental wisdom’ (lokuttara pañña) this practice affords engagement of this world (loki) in the broadest of frameworks, transcendent of its oppositional and confrontational differences. Indeed, the practise of metta teases out human relationships from the particular narrow, confrontational, political context as framed by the attitudes of the military regime. This mental quality permits compromise and negotiation. If the regime were to respond and develop metta, than this situation, Burmese feel, will contribute to a situation where negotiation may take place, and eventually a compromise may be reached [E5].[45] Senior NLD members suspect that regime members, too ‘yearn to have metta directed towards them rather than it being forced or coerced from people’ [E6]. Indeed, even other governments, such as in Thailand, should be appealed to for metta towards the plight of Burmese refugees and economic migrants who are threatened with deportation in ‘the Asian crisis’ of 1997–98 [D5]. However, Aung San Suu Kyi does not consider herself spiritually advanced enough to extend metta to the regime in an unqualified way [E7].

Also, metta is a mental process Burmese recognize as shared with other peoples and other religions, which makes it transcendent of the particular Burmese ethnic elements, and forges it into a suitable inter-cultural, inter-ethnic and inter-religious instrument [E19][E23][H8].[46] For example, Aung Ko, the chief actor in the film Beyond Rangoon, explains how the two very different characters in the film ‘meet and have a compassionate relationship … a love based on metta-, or loving kindness’, so that these two ‘slowly erase [their] differences in race, religion, color and culture when they journey together through turmoil … because of their regard for the five hundred and twenty-eight strands of metta (the basis for a pure compassionate love and affection)’.[47]

With metta, and the brahma-vihara as a whole, Aung San Suu Kyi believes that ‘all peoples and creeds can co-exist in peace, that whatever our race and religion, we can all learn to agree on certain basic values

essential for the development of human society’.[48] Such use of the concept of metta as reconciliative between diverse interest groups was also evident with U Nu, who argued in July, after his forty-five day meditation retreat, that the Shan's demands for a looser, more federalized type of constitution should be treated ‘with love’. At the time, as Trager understands it, ‘no one, least of all his Constitution Revision Committee concerned with the proposed amendments for the State religion and for the new states, knew how to interpret Nu's reference to the Buddhist doctrine of Metta.’[49] However, seen in the light of Aung San Suu Kyi's concern to reconcile opposites, the importance of metta becomes readily apparent.

It can play a cross-cultural, cross-ethnic and cross-factional role because, unlike the concept of Buddhahood or nibbana, it does not appeal to an exclusive central Buddhist teaching, but to a state of mind shared across peoples from different backgrounds.

Social bonding

It is significant that among these four brahma-vihara practices, the first two have the greater social and political implications, and it is these also that are most prominent in Aung San Suu Kyi's speeches and writings. Metta as a concept comes first, for it ‘forms the foundation of compassion’.[50]

As Rewatta Dhamma put it at the Asian Leaders conference, brahma-vihara is what all Buddhists practise and this provides Buddhist societies with the necessary social bonding mechanism:

The Mahayana specifically emphasises the enlightenment of all beings, and even we of the little tug-boat praise the triple gem of Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha, where Sangha means community – in a specific way the community of monks and nuns, but in a broader sense, of all beings. Every Buddhist tradition gives a central place to the Brahma-Viharas: Upekha (equanimity), Metta (loving-kindness), Karuna (compassion), and Mudita (joy in the joy of others), the last three of which are directly social.

It is, on the other hand, the last mental state – ‘equanimity’ – that has been selectively emphasized by King and Spiro as characteristic of ‘nibbanic Buddhism’.[51] In adapting Weber's position by arguing that nibbanic Buddhism is about ‘detachment’ and the ‘destruction of emotion’, King and Spiro conclude that Buddhism does not concern itself with this world.[52] However, this denies that ‘equanimity’ is not practised on its own, but in conjunction with the other three qualities of mind, in particular metta and karuna, which do engage the world and which are far more commonly used in everyday life and in political ideas.[53]

To understand why brahma-vihara, and in particular metta, plays such a central role in Burmese society we have to understand certain features of its socio-political organization. In Theravada Buddhist countries such as Burma, social organization lacks the concept of congregation or parish, in which large numbers of people are integrated by a regular weekly church meeting [H2]. The absence of the strong social and political bonds such congregations provide, one can say, is made up for by the concept of metta. The political significance of metta is captured in the way it is sometimes compared to ‘adhesion’: ‘the loka [world] is prevented from breaking up as if it is held together by [the glue of] metta’, and its practice will ‘prevent the loka from being disorderly’.[54] This underlies Aung San Suu Kyi’s aspiration for society to be ruled by metta, along with reason and justice; these are the true refuges of society [E8]. Such society unifies in a way quite opposite to what the military regime stands for, which does not unify by metta and which is, judging by its actions, devoid of metta [D1][D9]. The NLD feel that the regime perceives metta as a weakness, and feel it has to make it a more active metta [E9].

Aung San Suu Kyi, whose Buddhism has been characterised as ‘engaged Buddhism’ by the editors of a

volume on this subject,[55] herself characterises ‘engaged Buddhism’ as ‘active compassion[56] or active metta’. Such mental disposition stops the fighting and provides crucial support for overcoming fear and caring for the imprisoned and their relatives [D6]. These are a positive force ‘for the happiness of oneself, not just for others’, and, though it is extremely difficult for non-Burmese to understand, these are sufficiently popular concepts to be understood very well by the Burmese themselves [E9]. In addition, it is the form which the people's support takes for Aung San Suu Kyi, as the daughter of Aung San, who gave his life for the country [E10]. It is also the way in which NLD members work together [E11]. Aung San Suu Kyi herself copes by the social implications of it, for ‘the metta between us keeps us going’ [E12].

These three brahma-vihara practices, as pursued by the Sangha, represent ‘the social dimensions of Dhamma’ which provides ‘the guiding and softening influence which the ordained Sangha has traditionally exercised over rulers’. Its practice is part of its responsibility of both the sangha and government towards the common people [E13].

The regime's uses of byama-so

The military has consistently attempted to appropriate these mental qualities into their discourse. ‘Compassion’ and ‘kindness’ were already incorporated into The System of Correlation of Man and his Environment [D8], 1963. Indeed, its value was clearly emphasized even by Maung Maung, the civilian lawyer and writer who briefly headed the pre-SLORC regime, who addressed a television audience on the proposed multi-party elections in the wake of Sein Lwin's resignation saying that ‘the fire of anger can be extinguished with the cool waters of love and compassion’.[57] Furthermore, attempts have been made in the mass media to portray the army patronisingly as an adjunct to the metta of parents [E16] and even as a substitute for the metta of parents [E31]. The Karuna [Compassion] Foundation has recently come into existence which opens remote rural health clinics run by the Ministry of Trade, of which Tun Kyi was a life-time patron, and to which all big business, winning major government contracts, including foreign companies, were asked to make large donation.[58] In addition, the Army is portrayed in the national press as having treated Aung San Suu Kyi with unrecipocrated metta [E17], and Tin U's release from prison was also based on the army observing ‘the Buddhist tradition of keeping loving kindness in the fore of every deed’.[59]

Asian values and ethnic exclusiveness

Yet, in spite of the inter-ethnic and inter-religious dimension to brahma-vihara, the military use these practices, like everything else, as instruments for ‘consolidation’, unification and assertion of a common Burman or Asian ethnic identity.

The common Asian identity was emphasized by Chief Justice U Aung Toe in the context of one of the ASEAN meetings, in which he said that ‘although there may be some diversity between countries of ASEAN, we share the common sentiments of loving kindness, compassion and desire to help one another in times of need. They represent the noble spirit of the peoples of Southeast Asia’.[60]

Thahkin Kodawhmaing, the grandfather of Burmese political party organization, has emphasized the derivation of ‘Burman’ from ‘Byahma’. In doing so, he has forged samatha and brahma-vihara into possible nationalist instruments, as these reach into the Brahma heavens and are associated with the Brahma way of life. Metta, karuna and piti lead to ascent into the first three jhana, and upekkha leads to the fourth.

The sentiment is also conveyed by Thaung Lwin, who says that Burmese people believe that to practise brahma-vihara is to become a superior Burman (See Appendix I.9). There has been much emphasis on jhana

attainment through samatha in the nationalist movements of the 1930s, through which Thakhin Kodawhmaing and Saya San proposed to unite the opposition against colonialism. It is therefore no surprise that Aung San Suu Kyi's metta and karuna also has strong political overtones.

In The New Light of Burma, an article was published that indicates that the SLORC views Aung San Suu Kyi as operating outside the group, and as associating with foreigners. They agree that byama-so tayà is a typically Burmese practice:

WE Myanmar have Byamaso Taya the four cardinal virtues or sublime states of mind. These, namely metta, karuna, mudita, and upekkha are so deep profound that they can not be defined by such little words as love or kindness.

However, this same article then proceeds to attack Aung San Suu Kyi for associating with foreigners and hence forgetting about the third brahma-vihara, namely sympathetic joy (mudita) for her own Burman racial lineage in the process:

However deep and profound they [brahma-vihara practices] are to us, they may not be so for those who have forsaken their own lineage and origin, having a high opinion only of foreigners and taking them as their spouses.

Aliens may perhaps be able to understand and practise the essence of metta and karuna but they have no terminology to exactly define mudita. So we gradually came to realize that those who speak the Western tongue only with relish would not understand the meaning of mudita. As people without mudita are surrounding Daw Suu Kyi who had wrested back the party leadership position on the grounds that party backing was needed in politics, it must be said it is, in a way, natural to gradually become devoid of the four Byamaso Tayas.[61]

The above typically seeks to place Aung San Suu Kyi, and the opposition as a whole, within the ‘foreign’ and non-Burman camp by their inability to practice mudita. Or, as Nemoto would put it, the regime places them, the ‘Them-Burmans’ [qUtiu>bma] as opposed to their own designation of themselves, as within ‘Us-Burmans’ [tiu>bma] camp.[62] Such perverted use of byama-so tayà, which is intended as an open system tolerant of diversity, demonstrates that the regime ana style of interpreting this practice is unlikely to ever yield it the electoral awza they crave for.[63]

This debate about numerical lists of qualities is extended also to the issue of the Ten Mental Defilements. Aung San Suu Kyi had argued that primary emphasis on material development without of raising the quality of mental life, would merely feed an emphasis on greed, the first and most important kilesa that needs uprooting. However, a journalist of the regime responded that the pious meditators of Burma must realise that it is the last of the ten, namely ‘jealousy and envy’, that are most abominable, for ‘envy (issa) is common mostly among those who do not know the law.’ The author proceeded to identify Aung San Suu Kyi indirectly, saying that the fact that the SLORC had reunited all ethnic groups and had accomplished great infrastructural developments was a matter for rejoicing, but ‘that person [Aung San Suu Kyi] offers no help: indeed the person even trieds to obstruct and impede … a deed so vile and so abominable.’[64]

If Aung San Suu Kyi is portrayed here as the envious person, then it is Aung San Suu Kyi who has the better institutional memory. It was indeed the socialist motto ‘Morality (sila) can only be upheld when the stomach is full’[65] that became identified with such serious corruption that in 1974 it had to be changed to the ideology and practice of byahma-so-tayà. There was nothing to be jealous of, for a country run by army personnel who think primarily of their own stomachs causes great divisions within the country as a whole.

Detachment from power

Another example highlighting the use of byama-so tayà is Saw Maung's view that those who lost power, such as U Nu in 1962, should be prepared to detach themselves from it through practise of upekkha, the fourth meditation. His view is that U Nu should practise what is wrongly translated as ‘indifference’ (in SLORC-SPDC English this means ‘equanimity’), namely ‘indifference meditation’ (upekkha bhavana):

One says about the matter of 1962 and about ‘Give me back power’. Where is Upekkha bhavana’? ‘Upekkha’ means the ability to remain indifferent. I am telling these for ordinary people to think about.[66]

It is through the example of byahma-so tayà that Saw Maung proceeds to contrast Burmese against

western ways of democracy and development.

Metta and karuna[67]

I have already dealt with some aspects of metta and karuna under the previous section. However, here I would like to draw attention to particular features of metta and, to some extent, karuna. Metta or ‘loving-kindness’ is the most important mental state in Aung San Suu Kyi's thought, as she has used it persistently throughout her writing since her house arrest,[68] and karuna or ‘compassion’ comes close second in frequency.[69] It is also the most important quality of Burmese culture that Aung San Suu Kyi wishes to see preserved in the future [D7], and in that respect she is not alone, for in the book The history of Burmese culture it is indeed argued that this is the foundation of Burmese culture as influenced by Buddhism.[70]

Aung San Suu Kyi's first use of metta was about three paragraphs into her very first speech at Shwedagon, in which she made explicit some of the objections the Burmese had for her arrival on the Burmese political scene, namely, that having lived abroad and having married a foreigner she was not familiar enough with Burmese politics. To this she responded that ‘these facts have never interfered and will never interfere with or lessen my love (metta) and devotion for my country by any measure or degree [k¥mtiuc\:òpv\AepÅmHaTa:tµ. emt†aha By\liunµ>mHk¥Sc\:mqæa:Niuc\påBU:]’.[71]

However, her first major documented use of the term metta is in her speech at Insein on 25 June 1989, and it coincides with her criticism of Ne Win for dividing the army. She talks of countering the fear [eûkak\sit\] associated with life as a human being under the repressive regime:

We will have to strike back with metta. Let us cultivate and direct metta to our country. Let us direct metta to our people. We must cultivate courage to bear whatever suffering befalls us with metta and to face our problems by basing it on metta. To direct metta in this way is much-needed. Cultivate the courage that solves problems by the incessant development of metta. Only when courage is developed in this way, will we attain democracy within the year.

Xemt†aDåt\nµ.òpn\ôpI:eta. tiuk\rmHaBµX kiuy\.tiuc\:òpv\epÅmHaòpn\ôpI:eta. emt†aTa:ûkX kiuy\lUm¥oi:epÅmHa emt†aTa:ûkX dIliuemt†aTa:taeûkac\.miu>liu>Bapµ KMrKMrKMmy\SiuôpI:eta. emt†aAtæk\nµ> emt†akiu AeòKKMôpI:eta.òpqna Aa:luM:kuuirc\Siuc\my\Siutµ. qt†ikuiemæ:ûkpåX AµdIliuqt†ietæemæ:Niuc\my\Siurc\ k¥mtiu>liuK¥c\tµ.dImiiukersIsns\kiutNHs\tæc\: rmy\liu>k¥mtiu>yMuûkv\påty\X

Here it evidently represents a response to the military regime, and Winston King was right when he described metta as ‘the most emphasized of the positive Buddhist moral attitudes today’, which he related to a Buddhism ‘confronted increasingly by the activist and socially conscious culture of the West’.[72] This has been echoed by a student of Burmese political history who sees metta and non-violence as ‘the ethical well-springs for Buddhists on domestic polity as well as on problems of war and peace and international relations’.[73]

When we look back at the U Nu period we realise that metta served primarily as a way of introducing a sense of ethics into politics. During his 1959–60 campaign U Nu made statements about political principles involving sixteen rules for the practice of metta on the part of the public servant. Also, because of political leaders' inability to obtain the status of sotapana, he advocated that they should at least practise metta. U Nu advocated metta rather than sanctions by price-control committees. Also, he advocated metta in the Sino-Burmese border commission. However, it would be wrong to delineate metta as a modern political concept, for it was already greatly elaborated in the royal inscriptions.[74]

Metta has been described as ‘more powerful than the other three sublime mental states’,[75] and U Thittila goes so far as to sketch metta as the most important ingredient in the transformation of the Hindu ritual of sacrifice towards Buddhism, ‘a religion of understanding’ which liberates from slavery, stops wars, stops conquest and revenge, encourages the setting up of life-preserving and life-enhancing institutions such as hospitals, and asserts the equality of man.[76]

Metta Sutta (Hymn of Universal Love)

Who seeks to promote his welfare,
Having glimpsed the state of perfect peace,
Should be able, honest and upright,
Gentle in speech, meek and not proud.
Contented, he ought to be easy to support,
Not over-busy, and simple in living.
Tranquil his senses, let him be prudent,
And not brazen, nor fawning on families.

Also, he must refrain from any action
That gives the wise reason to reprove him.
(Then let him cultivate the thought:)
May all be well and secure,
May all beings be happy!

Whatever living creatures there be,
Without exception, weak or strong,
Long, huge or middle-sized,
Or short, minute or bulky,

Whether visible or invisible,
And those living far or near,
The born and those seeking birth,
May all beings be happy!

Let none deceive or decry
His fellow anywhere;
Let none wish others harm
In resentment or in hate.

Just as with her own life
A mother shields from hurt
Her own son, her only child,
Let all-embracing thoughts
For all beings be yours.

Cultivate an all-embracing mind of love
For all throughout the universe,
In all its height, depth and breadth –
Love that is untroubled
And beyond hatred or enmity.

As you stand, walk, sit or lie,
So long as you are awake,
Pursue this awareness with your might:
It is deemed the Divine State here.

Holding no more to wrong beliefs,
With virtue and vision of the ultimate,
And having overcome all sensual desire,
Never in a womb is one born again.

Myit-ta [emt†a], P. metta [emt†a], ‘loving-kindness’,[77] like meditation, is ‘increased’ or ‘cultivated’ [emt†apæå:ty\] by one's own mental application.[78] It is, however, also possible to ‘send metta’ [emt†apiu>ty\], which turns it into a social and political instrument with which one can benefit, but also overcome, the animosity of others. If these are technical terms, the concept is in more general use in the homily (lit. ‘letter of metta’ [emt†asa]), ‘wishing well’ [emt†aTa:qv\], ‘selflessness’ [emt†arix emt†arp\KM], and a ‘complementary gift’ [emt†alk\eSac\]. Negative qualities are associated with those who have no metta. In short, metta is a religious, but also a social and political instrument.

Metta has three important functions in Burmese society. First, at the mundane instrumental level, metta is a very powerful mental process which Buddhists believe removes all kinds of dangers and thus copes with fear. Whenever the Buddha or his disciples faced dangers he sent metta, and this was invariably successful in dissipating the dangers faced. This is how we must understand the Thai amulet cult in which the amulets, representing the fetishization of the inexhaustible metta of the saint, can be used to ward off danger.[79] However, in the Burmese context the commercialisation of charisma has not yet developed to the extent of Thailand where amulets are bought and sold, though it is applied to the selling of photographs of holy monks, wizards and the like. For the most part the Burmese still rely on a direct personal relationship with their monks (see also the section on ‘supernatural protection’ and paritta in this chapter).

Second, metta creates the right conditions for, and anticipates success in, mental culture. Immediately prior to his enlightenment Gautama spent many days practising metta-bhavana.[80] Metta relates to mental culture in two important ways. On the one hand, the practice of metta leads to samadhi. It is this combination of attributes – namely of loving-kindness and concentration (plus morality) – that are at the heart of the roles of the exorcist, the future king and the weik-za, for this practice permits access to, and permits one to benefit from the protection and knowledge of, the highest deities and Brahmas.[81] On the other hand, metta is conceived of as an important departure point for the practice of vipassana, for in its practice, ‘a primary task … is to watch that no deed, word of thought offends against the spirit of

unbounded loving-kindness (metta)’.[82]

Third, metta stresses the social elements of Buddhism and it permits the emergence of feelings of solidarity and the formation of a society. The Buddha-to-be was conceived by his mother while he himself was in a state of metta jhana.[83] Metta is presupposed to have important implications for other people than oneself, for this state of mind permits a transfer of benefits to others. As the Mingun Sayadaw put it, ‘those who receive metta not only love him who directs metta to them, but they show goodwill to one another under the influence of his metta’.[84]

Metta is therefore a crucial ingredient in the politics of crisis, namely in the context of electioneering and in the context of fierce opposition when one is left at great risk without instruments or authority to fight back by more powerful means. As Winston King once put it, it is part of Buddhist politics of persuasion (i.e. influence) rather than control (i.e. authority).

A set of eleven advantages of metta is often expounded, including: 1. Sound sleep with undisturbed mind; 2. Happily aroused from sleep; 3. No evil dreams;[85] 4. Having noble attributes, one will be subject to adoration and affection;[86] 5. One will be loved by devas; 6. One will be protected by devas[87]; 7. Invulnerability;[88] 8. Mind becomes quickly stabilised and calm; 9. Complexion of the face can become clear; 10. Death takes place without bewilderment or perplexity.

Metta and charity

The Buddhist concept of charity cannot be understood without understanding metta as practised by both the donor and the donee. It is said that offerings to a neutral person or an enemy should be done ‘in the same way’ as ‘to a dear person’, namely ‘with compassion and preceded by loving-kindness’.[89] Conversely, those who receive material support should attempt to give metta in return. For example, monks, only by developing metta on accepting offerings towards the donors, ‘shall be deemed to have accepted the gifts in the role of a real owner’. Not to send metta in this context, ‘will amount to taking things on loan for which he will have to account for’.[90]

This is why metta sutta is routinely recited at offerings, and why a crucial component of the water libation ceremony concluding the offerings includes the sending of loving-kindness to all sentient beings. It is to be practised by both the donor and the donee.

Furthermore, metta underlies the ‘(equally) sharing of merit’ [AmH¥ewqv\] derived from the donation with all sentient beings, which should always follow the donation, and neither the donor nor the donee should attempt to concentrate the benefits of metta solely for themselves or for their families.

Metta and the nine moral precepts

The significance of metta is further underlined as an extension of the regular Eight Precepts taken during duty days. The Nine Precepts [nwgçqIl][91] have not so far been discussed in the anthropological literature on

Burma. It has two special features. First, these precepts prepare for interaction with the supernatural (including those in the Brahma heavens), and are particularly popular with those who practise concentration meditation and wish to attain the jhanas. These precepts are commonly taken by those with a special spiritual goal such as seeking supernatural power, practising alchemy, attracting supernatural beings, or becoming a weik-za.[92]

It is worthy of interest to note that members of the regime have been taking the Nine Precepts at some special events. For example, it is a mark of their emphasis on metta as an avenue to power that on 22 April 1998 the SPDC, including General Than Shwe and many of his ministers, took the Nine Precepts at the enshrining of objects in the Nanda Loka Pagoda.[93] This coincided with the increasing interest on the part of high officials in the regime for the meditation methods of the Pa Auk Sayadaw, who encourages the taking of the Nine Precepts. These precepts have also occasionally been reported to have been taken by Buddhists more generally at festive days in the regime-conrolled press.[94]

Metta, freedom from fear and success in mental culture

There is a strong association between the practise of metta and mental culture in the forest. Thus, bodhisattvas characteristically develop metta towards all the animals in the forest. As the Buddha said in Cariya Pitaka: ‘when I was Suvannasama, living in the residence made ready by Sakka, I directed loving-kindness towards lions and tigers in the forest. I lived there being surrounded by lions and tigers, by leopards, wolves, buffaloes, spotted dear and bears. None of these animals was frightened by me: nor am I frightened [by] any of them. I was happy living in the forest as I was fortified with the powers of metta.’[95]

The strong power of metta is inherent in the metta sutta preached by the Buddha to five-hundred monks who were experiencing trouble practising their mental culture. The reason for the monks' trouble was that the deities who lived in the trees where they practiced were deprived of their homes, having to stay outside with their children, as they could not reside higher than the noble monks. Wanting back their abodes, they then began to create frightening appearances and emitted awful smells to deter the monks from their habitat.

The monks were unable to practise their mental culture and, intent on leaving, they consulted the Buddha who said that if they recited the metta sutta this ‘serves as a deterrent to the perils caused by those deities’, and would also ‘help towards better realisation of the Dhamma in the practice of Kammatthana [mental culture]’. The deities, because of their implementation of metta sutta, ‘were so pleased and happy’ that they went further than not troubling the monks, they assisted them in anyway possible. Consequently, all five-hundred monks gained enlightenment. This sutta is recited in Burma at every major donation, and on taking the moral precepts.[96]

The Metta Sutta has three parts representing distinct aspects of metta (see sutta).[97] The first part (lines 3–10) covers that aspect ‘which requires a thorough and systematic application of loving-kindness in one's day-to-day conduct’. The second part (lines 11–20) ‘expresses loving-kindness as a distinct technique of meditation or culture of mind leading to samadhi – higher consciousness induced by absorption’. The third part (lines 21–40) underlines ‘a total commitment to the philosophy of universal love and its personal, social and empirical extensions – loving-kindness through all bodily, verbal and mental activities.’[98]

The importance of using metta to placate the innumerable seen and unseen creatures is itself a justification for the institutionalization of practices that placate and please the spirits. Some Burmese, who frown on nat worship, have argued that nat shrines are ‘metta offerings’, i.e. they are an expression of metta rather than worship, and are therefore excusable.[99] Such view helps transcend Spiro's ‘psychological’ conflict between spirit-cults and Buddhism.

Metta and samatha

This metta ‘glue-effect’ that permits living beings to incline towards one-another positively is reinforced by its relationship to concentration meditation. Metta is one of the most important qualities in the development of the jhanas, ‘even if the feeling of metta, loving-kindness, is fostered for the very brief duration of a split-second, he who exercises this goodwill or benevolent feeling towards others may be said to be a person who is not devoid of jhana-contemplation’.[100] This is, of course, linked to mastery over the cosmology:

Herein [is wealth] that a brother abides letting his mind fraught with love pervade one quarter of the world, and so too the second quarter, and so the third quarter, and so the fourth quarter. And thus the whole wide world, above, below, around, and everywhere and altogether does he continue to pervade with love-burdened thought, abounding, sublime, beyond measure, free from hatred and ill-will.[101]

Practise of metta leads to a high as high as the Brahma heavens. ‘Loving-kindness is for the purpose of staying in the company of Brahmas as a companion, nay, it is a path leading one to become a Brahma’, so that ‘radiating the feeling of metta, loving-kindness, to all beings in the ten regions is the way or the path of practice to ascend to the Brahma world’.[102] Conversely, the Brahmas themselves have metta as their most suitable object of meditation.[103] As noted before, in the Brahma heavens life is long, relatively pleasurable and a temporary shelter from calamities.

In its relationship to the Brahma heavens, metta has the ability to overcome difference (as it knows no gender). The ability of metta to transcend difference motivated Aung San Suu Kyi to advocate its practice as a way of overcoming the gender-gap [E14], and of overcoming diversity of self-interest, which underlies ‘hardness, selfishness and narrowness’ associated with ‘greed’ [D1].[104]Indeed, one of its most important characteristics is its ability to integrate diverse peoples and to prevent discrimination of non-Buddhists [E15].[105]

This ability to overcome difference means that it is not only a useful instrument in strategies of warfare, but also in non-violent instruments such as law, medicine and ‘good’ political traditions in society, such as the higher ideals of monarchy, socialism, democracy. It reaches across boundaries and builds confidence in people, freeing them from fear where major changes are taking place.

However, when the regime emphasizes metta it has no particular universal applicability, but is almost exclusively in the self-serving context of the army. For example, the large number of soldiers fighting on the front-line has resulted in a large number of veterans who have lost limbs in the wars, and the army is ‘consoling’ them with the pretence that the people have metta for them:

As the Tatmadaw is providing every assistance for these disabled soldiers, the public is also taking part in the task with immense generosity, indicating the perpetual unity, goodwill and love between the Tatmadaw and the people toward building the nation's modem armed forces, he pointed out, urging military personnel to value the cetena and metta of the people.[106]

Metta and enlightenment

As the ninth of the Ten Perfections for Buddhahood (parami), metta is a crucial precondition for the attainment of enlightenment as a Buddha. Gautama Buddha-to-be practised metta bhavana upon conception in Queen Maya. It is also a crucial quality for his message being carried into the world and for saving the people, for ‘only by fostering infinite loving-kindness for them [all beings] can a Bodhisattva establish all beings in Nibbana’.[107]

Metta and Arimettaya

Arimettaya, the coming Buddha, is extremely important to millenarian politics of purity in Burmese crisis situations. This Buddha will appear after his counterpart, the universal king, restores order. This is the only Bodhisattva, capable of attaining Buddhahood in a single rebirth, that Theravada Buddhism shares with Mahayana Buddhism, and, as Jaini points out, ‘the name Metteyya itself, which expressed mastery over the metta-bhavana, a favourite form of meditation among the Theravadins, might have also contributed to the popularity of this bodhisattva …’.[108] The emphasis on loving-kindness among the millenarian cults coincides with their aim to time their rebirth at the time of Arimettaya's manifestation and with the cult of the universal king. Therefore, through the production of influence by means of metta, this reinforces the association between metta and authority. The Arimettaya cult is more evident, for example, in the pupils of the Ledi anapana than in the Mingun satipatthana tradition, and this is built into a complex attitude that also pertains to the greater proportional emphasis on metta and vegetarianism in the former.

Metta and authority

Nemoto's assertion that metta is the distinguishing feature of Aung San Suu Kyi's awza as opposed to that of the SLORC's is correct.[109] This permits us to understand the need, in Burmese politics, to incorporate reference to strife for Buddhahood, for that is to emphasize the metta that is a prerequisite to awza.

Since kings are commonly conceived of as bodhisattva, metta is a vital qualification for kingship. Hence, metta becomes an attribute of ‘good’ power. In this way, metta was part of Mindon's coronation ceremony, when it was directed ‘O King, … love compassionately everyone … treasure their lives as though your own … Look after everyone as though after yourself. Guard their welfare as though your own … Deign to watch over the country's inhabitants’ welfare …’[110]

In her essay ‘The true meaning of Boh’, aimed at the military regime, Aung San Suu Kyi portrays Aung San, once he attained political power, as able to ‘lay aside his sword without fear’ and ‘could say with absolute sincerity and a complete lack of self-consciousness that he would govern “on the basis of loving kindness and truth”’.[111]

Also, as Ko Lay put it, the Nine Precepts (including metta) are characterised as appropriate to universal monarchs.