An Ethics of Justice in Buddhism
seen in a Cross-Cultural Context
This article is a revision of a lecture
held at this Institute on 26 March 2009.

Michael von Brück

1. Introduction

THE semantics of concepts of justice is different in various contexts
and meaning systems, i.e. in more general political and social contexts and in the rational discourse of philosophy. The general politicalterm of justice is more confusing than helpful for a clear conceptualization, it might be treated more as a symbol in a mythological framework
than a concept. In this context justice is defined in terms of what it is notor metaphorically in differing categories: justice as impartiality, equality
etc. Thus, many a programmatic formula such as “International Movement for a Just World”1 expresses an utopia against the frustration withregard to social, economic and political conditions and calls for action toestablish a “just world” without defining what the standard of this action
must be in order to qualify as just and what exactly the notion of a “justworld” actually might mean conceptually. Certain political actions arecondemned from a certain standpoint, but the very foundation of any
standpoint remains controversial. “Just” or “unjust” are actions which
are determined according to the two standards of an Aristotelian suum
cuique and the principle of treating equal cases in equal ways. Here,actions and their results as well as human freedom of action and therespective responsibility are the matter of discussion. The problem is
how to establish criteria for what is regarded as being “equal”.2
Therefore, I may suggest, that justice could be discussed in two ways:
as an agreement or result of negotiation and better insight that is workedout between partners in social processes, and/or as a reflection of thecosmic order, the divine will or any pre-established harmony that is not
negotiable by human beings. Whereas the first assumption is reflected in
the theories of Aristotle, Rousseau, John Rawls3 and others, the second
one seems to be one of the basic contents of any religious world view,
including Buddhism. For Rawls, to think justice requires the task to158

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acknowledge interdependencies and mutual dependence of the different
factors and actors in societies on the basis of reflexive reason. In religions, however, it is the dharma, the commandment of God, the Tao or
the cosmic harmony or “symmetry” of forces that is the root cause forjustice in human relations.
A further remark may be helpful to locate the problem in its philosophical context. Justice could be generally defined as a principle whichstates that anybody should have or be given or be re-established in whatis due to him/her. What is due, however, is a result of social agreement,
at least in so far as it is mediated through processes of language. Aristotle’s distinction of iustitia distributiva and iustitia commutativa also
refers to a difference of general and particular justice that is mediatedthrough processes of communication, because both distributive justiceand equalizing or compensating justice refer to actions of individuals
linked in a community. Here, it is not important whether such a community is institutionally organized as a state or a church. However, it isobvious that under the present conditions any distribution of values,
goods, opportunities or means of communication is of cross-culturalimportance.
Justice is the realization that living beings depend on each other forthe very foundation of their lives. There never has been nor is an independent individuality or cultural self-sufficiency. Especially in a crosscultural context we not only need to be aware but practice the mutualinterdependency on all levels of life, i.e. with regard to body, mind andspirit. Thus, in short, my definition is:
Justice is equal opportunity for participation in all aspects of life, personal and social.

2. Justice in the Context of Mahayana Buddhism
Justice in Mahayana Buddhism can be interpreted on the basis of threefundamental insights.
1. It needs to be seen as the achievement of mental balance. This canbe acquired by spiritual practice. Balance in this respect is the mediation between cognitive and emotional qualities of the mind.
2. It can be understood on the basis of overcoming the kleshas (mentaldefilements) The most fundamental klesha is avidya with regard to
the status of the Ego. If the Ego is seen as an isolated entity whichmust fight for its place in society (justice), this is wrong, and it leads

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to craving or desire so that the Ego can establish its illusion by possessing, or the very attempt is frustrated so that hatred would be theresult. Here justice is realization that the individual is totally dependent.
3. This dependency is realized in the most basic concept ofpratityasamutpada (jap. engi), the co-dependent origination. If all isinterdependent, justice means a proper recognition (and behaviour)that only if things or people are being given their proper place wemay speak of justice.
Furthermore, Buddhist compassion (karuna) is based on wisdom (prajñå). Wisdom is the insight into the impermanence not only of things,
but also of our concepts, ideas, thought. Things, including our ideas ofjustice, are part of an interrelated network which appears in our perception and reflects in differentiating processes, including the processes ofconceptualization. Thus, even the concept of justice is related to allother aspects of life, and compassion as a skilful means (upaya) to attainto wisdom is nothing else than to present the saving presence of Buddha-nature in all situations of suffering. In Mahayana context justicewould be a realization of our Buddha nature, which is innate to all sentient beings. It is not dependent on status or any kind of social recognition, but it is dependent only on its own realization. To further the sameis the fundamental intent of the Bodhisattva. The Bodhisattva, therefore,
does not distribute anything (though this may be an upaya, a skilfulmeans), but he/she helps everybody to evolve its own possibilities. Inthis sense, justice is an attitude and action to look at and treat all sentient
beings with due respect, regard and love because they all have the same
Buddha-nature. Thus, it is not what beings look like at present but what
they are in their potential that guides the cognition, emotion and actionof a Bodhisattva. Not what a person does or has done, but what he/she ispotentially capable to do (because of the Buddha-nature) is what should
guide any proper and deeper looking view. This is remarkable: It is anethics not so much designed according to the present needs, but envisioned according to the possibilities of sentient beings. This allows theconcept of justice to be open and creative.
The more fundamental idea for the whole discussion, of cause, is thatof pratityasamutpada (jap. engi). Since all beings and events are primarily interrelated, there is no individual realization or individual good, but
a common good that needs to be realized by overcoming individualism
or any self-centered perspective. The ethics of justice is not so much acall to stimulate the will to do something, but a matter of insight into theAN ETHICS OF JUSTICE IN BUDDHISM

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real nature of things. It is insight which spontaneously allows for theright action, and insight is the realization that the “other” is not totallyother but a relation of my true self. It is an ethics of being, not of having
or doing. Therefore, spiritual development and right action are not twothings, but two aspects of the same personal growth. Justice is spiritual
realization and spiritual realization is justice.
To summarize: Justice is not just an act of human good will or political expediency, but it is a response to reality as it is, it is resonating withthe ultimate structure of reality, being in tune with “God’s will” or universal interrelatedness (pratityasamutpada), respectively.
2.1. Justice in Language
All language constructs are prapañca, as Nagarjuna argues. Language is
not expressing what is, but is based on a mental reaction towards reality
as humans perceive it under specific circumstances, in other words, language is karmically conditioned. We need to be aware that any discourse
concerning justice in a cross-cultural frame is bound to use a specificlanguage, in this case it is English or Japanese. This determines the rulesof the debate. We would play a different game if we were to talk inChinese or German or Hindi. This is not only a linguistic question, but aquestion of power: The language being used is the language of the one
who determines the rules. We cannot avoid talking in one language, andfor many historical and political reasons this is English. But we need tobe aware of the problem, for here we deal already with a major difficultyof the cross-cultural discourse in general. The language problem isdirectly linked to the question of justice. And awareness might at leastcreate the sensitivity in and among us, which is absolutely necessary fora dialogical partnership.

3. Justice as Realization of Plurality in Pluralism and Truth
3.1. Today there are no geographical areas left which would be closed
culturally and religiously, i.e. there are no cultural spaces with clear
boundaries and a rather consistent cultural background which would bebased on just one tradition. Rather, we have more or less mixed cultures
which are shaped by historical influences of different religions and various cultural systems. On the other hand, constructions of social identity
as well as religious socializations are being established through influences from within and from without. As a result there are specificprocesses of amalgamation which do produce all the time structures ofan ever higher degree of complexity. Especially the modern means and162

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ends of worldwide communication systems make it possible that different value systems, which may or may not have religious backgrounds,
are communicated in rather uncoordinated ways. At the same time evermore disparate religious, cultural and linguistic patterns of socialization,i.e. social and ethical values, are selectively mixed (consciously orunconsciously) and shape the pluralistic structures of our societies
which, at the basis, are fundamentally oriented on a consumerism that is
made possible by technological developments and political interests.
However, “religion” is not only a pattern of behaviour according to old
traditions that would give stability in recourse of a coherently constructed past, but religion more and more seems to become an important force
and factor in shaping the identities of individuals and groups in newways.
3.2 Different language systems and cultures organize their perceptionof reality in remarkably different ways and construct different systemsof categories. Therefore, we need meta-discourses on the conditions ofcross-cultural communication which requires that not one model be aplayer and ruler at the same time. That is to say, the rules of communication are to be created in the process of communication itself. Such discourses will not only reveal the muliplicity of foundations of values indifferent cultures but will also show how the dialectics of dissensus andconsensus is being shaped in a cross-cultural process of value-creation.
To acknowledge this dynamics is to establish the value of justice in therules for the communication process itself.
3.3. Truth is a matter of right perception and ethical distinction. Ethicalconcepts depend on a community which accepts those concepts intersubjectively. Here, we cannot go into the details of the philosophicalproblem of truth as it has been discussed in Western and other philosophical traditions.4 It suffices to keep in mind that any discourse on thisquestion needs to cultivate an awareness that the question itself is culturally conditioned: There is not one universal question of truth whichmight be answered in different material ways through cultural conditioning, but the very structure of the question of truth or the whole concept of truth is different in different cultures, both diachronically anddiatopically.
Thus, Indian Buddhism—and derived from it Vedantic philosophy—
developed the concept of satyadvaya, the two levels of being or truth(satya), viz. the conventional or relational level and the absolute orAN ETHICS OF JUSTICE IN BUDDHISM

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holistic level. This was modified in China where the model is not a hierarchy of levels but an organic harmony of the interplay of mutuallydependent forces. This Chinese concept of “truth” as the balanced harmony of mutually dependent forces or powers found its specific expressions in Confucianism, Taoism, Chinese and Japanese Buddhism etc.,
but it was always there and is a distinct paradigm compared to the Indian model of hierarchies and levels.5 Very different from the Indian andChinese concept is the Greek and European model of truth. But evenone culture develops different models of truth in the course of its history. So “truth”, i.e. the construction and methodology of truth, is also
subject to historical change.
Religious traditions are complex historical processes which construct
precisely those concepts for the sake of social and political coherence ofa given society. Expressed in a different way: Tradition is not something
given in the past, but a process of construction in the present. And
today, no doubt, it can be said that those processes—be it in India,
China, Japan or Europe or elsewhere—follow pluralistic patterns.

4. Consequences for Interreligious Discourse as a Foundationfor Ethics
The world is being perceived as oneness or one world only under theconditions of some kind of mystical consciousness, as it has been
expressed in different languages and cultures, but on the level of rational
thinking there is certainly a struggling multiplicity of claims which prevents oneness from becoming a historical fact. However, in spite of theirdifferences and competition religions have also been aware of this oneness, as a possibility at least, in terms of religious politics such as eschatological ideals, messianic expectations or utopian constructions of apurpose toward an end in history. I would like to argue that due to economic, demographic and technological developments during the lastcentury (especially the development in communication technology) thispossibility has become a political imperative.
Religions do not exist independently of their social and political role.
There are no simple and homogeneous religions, but always groups ofinterest and power within one religion which have different ethical priorities. Therefore the formulation of any general or cross-cultural ethics
needs to take care of the political implications. Taking into account thepresent shape of the world it is a matter of justice that the present statusquo which obviously is based on unjust international social and econom-

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ical as well as communicational structures shall not be continued.
Therefore, the credibility of the ethical debate depends both on the ability of all partners to understand the diverging view of the other partnerand on the willingness to share power.
To make it more clear: The cross-cultural ethical discourse is dependent on• economic relations between richer and poorer nations that are morejust than now;• the mutual recognition that one’s own identity shall not be worked
out at the expense of the other’s identity;• the insight that languages construct reality in different ways andthat the partner’s language is as valid as my own;
• the basic recognition that the partner has the same argumentative
rights as I have;• the insight that cultures (religions) are by no means monolithic but
broken by social interest groups, i.e. the Confucian or the Christianvalues do not exist but in forms differently interpreted. There areno single views and spokespersons for a tradition, but discourses ofdifferent interests within a tradition. These multiple views shouldcome into play when brought into the debate with multiple views inother cultures. In this way, the contradictions in each tradition arebeing revealed precisely by and in the cross-cultural debate onethics.

Conclusions
1. Under cross-cultural conditions any discourse on justice has to take
into account that there are different constructions of reality and ethical discourses. All modern pluralistic societies are not the productof just one tradition alone but of patterns of interference and mutuality of cultures.
2. In modern pluralistic societies the basic religious problem which
has consequences for the foundation of justice is the following: If—
in the jargon of the European Enlightenment thinkers—everybody
shall be saved according to his/her own beliefs and value systems(facon) it needs to be asked how any belief and value system isformed today. In traditional religions this happened:• by tradition,• by succession,• by discourse, especially when several traditions were at hand soAN ETHICS OF JUSTICE IN BUDDHISM

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that a conscious selection was required.
But modern religious socialization often lacks a critical aquiring of tradition, and instead of aquired knowledge people seek refuge in an
uncritical claim of possession (of truth, God, authority of the Guruetc.).6 On that basis it is difficult if not impossible to work out just rules
for the pluralistic interreligious and ethical discourse. To work out thoserules, however, is one of the most important and noble tasks today—forintellectuals in different cultures, for schools, universities, political organizations. What is necessary is a public and transparent discourse inwhich all groups, who want to do so, may participate in. Justice means
establishing global institutions which rule the globalized exchanges injust ways—the International Criminal Court is just a beginning. We doneed an international juridical system that takes care of rules for global
trade, exchange of money etc. in the same way as there are legal restrictions on the flow of capital and economic enterprise in the countries
with a socially controlled market economy. But we also need rules forcommunication and institutions which set and survey these rules.
We need local and international institutions which foster this crosscultural ethical discourse on a permanent basis so as to establish therules and methodologies of the discourse in the making. This is a matterof justice, and if these rules are not established in terms of fair participation of all cultures concerned, justice cannot be established, because
justice is a matter of equal distribution of opportunities both in the economic and the cultural field.
Notes
1
As an example see the journal JUST Commentary. International Movement for a
Just World, Petaling Jaya, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia, since 2000.
2A. de Jasay, Justice and its Surroundings, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2002
3In his theory of justice Rawls follows in principle a communication model in asmuch as justice to him is “fairness” as a model for communication, which is establishedin a common act of choice with regard to the principles which determine the basic duties
and rights and the distribution of goods. (J.Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Cambridge,Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press 1971, 3ff.: Justice as Fairness)
4I have discussed some basic methodological points concerning a cross-culturaldebate on “truth” in: M.v.Brück, Wahrheit und Toleranz im Dialog der Religionen, in:Dialog der Religionen 1/1993, pp. 3ff.
5Cf. M.v.Brück/W.Lai, Buddhismus und Christentum. Geschichte-Konfrontation,Dialog, München: C.H.Beck 1998., pp. 621ff.
6
This attitude might be called fundamentalism depending on the usage of this ratherunclear term.