Nalanda University and the suppressed Buddhist Identity

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Colombo, Sri Lanka -- This entire project led by Dr. Amrtya Sen must be made the basis of a wide ranging discussion in the Buddhist world in respect to the direction, organisation, content of teaching, and aims and objectives that this proposed Nalanda International University is being encouraged to adopt.

The historic Nalanda University was essentially a Mahayana Buddhist Center of learning and had as its Directors (or Rectors) some of the learned Buddhist Monks then existing.

One reputed writer Alexander Berzin (2002) says:

"In the Indian Mahayana Buddhist monasteries, such as Nalanda, monks studied four systems of Buddhist tenets. Two – Vaibhashika and Sautrantika – were subdivisions of the Sarvastivada school within Hinayana. The other two – Chittamatra and Madhyamaka – were subdivisions within Mahayana."

Wikipedia says:

"Nalanda was one of the world's first residential universities, i.e., it had dormitories for students. It is also one of the most famous universities. In its heyday, it accommodated over 10,000 students and 2,000 teachers. Chinese pilgrims estimated the students between 3,000 and 5,000.

The university was considered an architectural masterpiece, and was marked by a lofty wall and one gate. Nalanda had eight separate compounds and ten temples, along with many other meditation halls and classrooms. On the grounds were lakes and parks. The library was located in a nine storied building where meticulous copies of texts were produced. The subjects taught at Nalanda University covered every field of learning, and it attracted pupils and scholars from Korea, Japan, China, Tibet, Indonesia, Persia and Turkey. During the period of Harsha, the monastery is reported to have owned 200 villages given as grants."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nalanda

Among some of its famous Abbots were: Shakyashribhadra.  The scholar Dharmakirti (ca. 7th century), one of the Buddhist founders of Indian philosophical logic, as well as and one of the primary theorists of Buddhist atomism, taught at Nalanda. Both Mahayana Buddhism and Nalanda University influenced each other.

The old Nalanda University was a not secular University by any means. It had a Buddhist Character for over 700 years right from its beginnings in the Fifth Century A.D ( reign of Sakraditya ) until its unfortunate end in 1193, when the Nalanda University was sacked by Bakhtiyar Khilji, a Turk. The Persian historian Minhaj-i-Siraj, in his chronicle the Tabaqat-I-Nasiri, has reported that thousands of monks were burned alive and thousands beheaded as Khilji tried his best to uproot Buddhism.

The burning of the library had continued for several months and "smoke from the burning manuscripts hung for days like a dark pall over the low hills."

The last throne-holder of Nalanda, Shakyashribhadra, fled to Tibet in 1204 at the invitation of the Tibetan translator Tropu Lotsawa (Khro-phu Lo-tsa-ba Byams-pa dpal). In Tibet, he started an ordination lineage of the Mulasarvastivadin lineage to complement the two existing ones.

New proposed Nalanda International University

Nalanda University (also known as University of Nalanda) is the name of a proposed university in Rajgir, near Nalanda, Bihar, India. The first academic session is set to start from 2014.The university is a plan for reviving and re-establishing Nalanda University.

The University of Nalanda is proposed to be established under the aegis of the East Asia Summit (EAS), as a regional initiative. The NMG also has representatives from Singapore, China, Japan and Thailand.

The Governing Board of Nalanda University consists of:

Amartya Sen - Professor at Harvard University.Sugata Bose - Professor at Harvard University.Wang Bangwei - Professor at Peking University.Wang Gungwu - Professor at National University of Singapore.Susumu Nakanishi - Professor at Kyoto City University of Arts.Meghnad Desai - Emeritus Professor at London School of Economics.Prapod Assavavirulhakarn - Professor at Chulalongkorn University.George Yeo - Former Minister for Foreign Affairs of Singapore.Tansen Sen - Associate Professor at Baruch College, CUNY.Nand Kishore Singh - Member of Parliament - Rajya Sabha, India.Chandan Hareram Kharwar - Pune university - India.

Comment

There is a huge difference in the scope and direction of the old and the proposed new Nalanda University.

Whereas eminent Buddhist scholar monks were the rectors of the famed old Nalanda University, in the proposed new set up there does not appear to be a single Buddhist monk on the Board of Governors. The overwhelming majority of the Governors have ' secular' credentials including the leader of the Project,  Amartya Sen - Professor at Harvard University. Lay Buddhists are very much in the minority on the Board of Governors. There is no Sri Lankan presence on the Board  despite this country's claim to have the oldest continuing Buddhist civilization in the world.

Most of Sen's public pronouncements on this subject lately have been on the wisdom and validity of ' Secularism' over and above the innate value and depth of the Indian spiritual Heritage which includes Buddhism. It shows that it pays to be a secularist even for an Indian in Western Professional and academic circles. But it is tantamount to blasphemy to downsize your own i.e. Indian wisdom and religious heritage, merely to display that one is on the right side of intellectual fashion in the West. Amartya Sen illustrates this proposition vividly.

It is unlikely that some one from the Middle East or Muslim country would try to create a secular place of learning on top of a destroyed site of a reputed Islamic Tertiary Institution.

That is unthinkable.

In Buddhist and Hindu societies 'secularists' have come to the fore and are now engaged in a state of play going virtually unchallenged downsizing the influence and scope of the traditional religions which built the unique civilizations that we find in India and Sri Lanka and still attract the attention and wonder of the world.

Related story: Nalanda Without Buddhist Participation?

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New university at Kapilvastu to be centre for Buddhist studies

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Lucknow, India -- Uttar Pradesh will get another university at Kapilvastu in Siddharthnagar district. Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav is likely to lay the foundation stone of the university on September 10.

At present, UP has 13 state universities, including UP Rajshri Tandon Open University, Allahabad.

In the annual budget of 2013-14, the government had proposed setting up two new universities, one at Allahabad as the existing Allahabad University has been given the status of a central university, and another at Sidharthnagar, which is the home district of Assembly Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey.

The proposed university will come up at Kapilvastu, a Buddhist religious place situated on the Nepal border, which is 14 km from Naugarh, the headquarters of Siddharthnagar district.

The Higher Education Department has approached the Tourism Department for handing over its 50 acres of land at Kapilvastu for setting up the new university.

"As many as six sites were inspected at Siddharthnagar district for the university. The Tourism Department has 90 acres in Kapilvastu. We have requested for transferring 50 acres from it for setting up the new university," said Anita Mishra, Special Secretary of Higher Education.

The Tourism department is likely to hand over the land to the Higher Education Department for setting up the university.

The proposed site has been inspected by Speaker Pandey, who has also been named Lok Sabha candidate by the Samajwadi Party from Domariyaganj parliamentary seat. Presently, the seat is represented by Jagdambika Pal of the Congress.

SP leaders from Sidharthnagar said the university would be developed as a centre for Buddhist studies.

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Monk fights UK university over inheritance

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Sedgwick, Maine (USA) -- A Zen Buddhist priest, longtime social justice advocate and author of a leading manual on prison chaplaincy, has come to legal blows with the University of Nottingham, claiming in a U.S. court that the U.K. institution wrongfully used duress to convince his father to bequeath the entirety of a $3 million estate to the school while leaving the priest and his two disabled children with $5,000.

The Rev. Kobutsu Malone, whose prison and death row chaplaincy has led him to numerous states, asserts in the action in the New Jersey court, that his father, Kevin B. Malone, a Roman Catholic who never attended The University of Nottingham, was moved to cut off his only child and grandchildren only after the priest wrote a letter detailing sexual, physical and emotional abuse he and his classmates suffered while enrolled as students at New Jersey's Bergen Catholic High School in the 1960's. 

"The Execution of the Holy Spirit" (which can be viewed at http://www.bergencatholicabuse.com) was published in 2002, and was later posted to a blog on the Internet.  Several dozen other former Bergen Catholic students, now men in their sixties, some prominent in the local community, have added their own first-person accounts of enduring sexual abuse at Bergen Catholic similar to that recounted by the Rev. Malone.

Unbenownst to the Rev. Malone until after his father's death in 2011, Kevin B. Malone removed the Rev. Malone and his two sons from his Will 32 days after "The Execution of the Holy Spirit" was published.

http://www.ethelandkevinmalone.com/

In documents filed with the court, the Rev. Malone has argued that his father disregarded his deceased wife, Ethel's, wishes that their estate should be divided between their son and two grandchildren. A pair of reciprocal wills made by the Rev. Malone’s parents in 1997, granted the remainder of their joint estate, now totaling over $2 million, to the Rev. Malone and his two minor children.

The documents charge that Kevin B. Malone changed his will six times following his wife's death, erratically changing both beneficiaries and executors.  For a time, Oxford University was to have been a beneficiary but was ultimately bested by the University of Nottingham, after a vigorous campaign by the institution.

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Buddhist University to become medium of service to humanity: Chief minister

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BHOPAL, India -- Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has said that Sanchi Buddhist and Indic Studies University will pave way for world peace by becoming a medium of serving humanity. Chouhan was discussing issues of university's studies, teaching and research with members of the university's advisory committee here on Wednesday.

Chouhan, committee members Gese Semten, Dr Siddheshwar Rameshwar Bhatt, Prof Shrikant Kondapalli, Prof Jiyo Liang, Dr Lokesh Chandra, Prof Mithila Prasad Tripathi, Prof Krishna Bihari Pandey and Nirmala Sharma and principal secretary culture Basant Pratap Singh were present at the meeting.

Chouhan said that dimension of Sanchi Buddhist and Indic Studies University should be such that the institution is able to give new vision and direction for welfare of human beings. He said that scholars from all over the world should be consulted for this. The conclusions drawn from their brainstorming will be implemented by the state government. There will be no paucity of funds for this work.

He said that university's academic session should be started with studies and teaching of Buddhist and Indian philosophies. He said that human values are declining in the indiscriminate race for development. Only Indian philosophy can give a new direction towards prevention of human values' decline.

It was informed during discussions that outlines have been drawn to start teaching work of the university from next academic session. A meeting to this effect will be held in February where decisions about syllabus and teaching activities will be taken.

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Georgia State University students joints the temple stay program at Un Mun Sa temple.

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Cheongdo, South Korea -- On March 13th, a group of students from Georgia State University joined the Un Mun Sa temple Temple Stay program for 2 nights and 3 days.

<< Un Mun Sa, located in Cheongdo

Together, they practiced eating out of the bowl (balwoo kongyang), making lotus lanterns, and practiced various Buddhist rituals such as the morning and evening chantings and the 108 prostrations.

These students experienced Korean Buddhism through various activities that they would have never experienced else where.

Their day begins at 3am with their morning chanting session.

Georgia State University and Un Mun Sa temple have been accepting students every 2 years from 2003 as a Korean culture experience program.

These students also receive “hwa-du” (meditation keyword) from their masters during their stay to reflect upon.

The Temple Stay program provided a unique opportunity for the students to experience traditional culture and the lifestyle of Buddhist monks in this ancient temples that have carried on the heritage of Korean Buddhism for the last seventeen hundred years.

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Hindus hail inclusion of Pagan/Wicca holy days on Vanderbilt University calendar

Nevada (US), August 21 (ANI): The Hindus have commended prestigious Vanderbilt University (Nashville, Tennessee, US) for including Wicca/Pagan holy days on its calendar on "religious holy days and observances" for 2011-2012.

Vanderbilt has mentioned Samhain-Beltane, Yule, Ostara Equinox, Mabon, and Beltane-Samhain as Wicca/Pagan holy days on this calendar. It also mentions Christian, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish, Baha'i, Taoist and Confucian holy days. Hindu holy days mentioned are Diwali (Deepavali) and Maha Shivaratri.

Welcoming this inclusion and calling it "a step in the right direction", distinguished Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) on Sunday, said that all religions were different ways to relate to the Divine, different responses to the Reality and were a positive sign of God's generosity.

Zed, who is president of Universal Society of Hinduism, stated that a more inclusive understanding of religion was needed and we should learn to live together with mutual loyalty despite our seriously different faiths.

He urged world religious leaders to leave behind selfish motives and work together for greater ideals.

Zed pointed out that awareness about other religions thus created by this calendar would make Vanderbilt students well-nurtured, well-balanced, and enlightened citizens of tomorrow.

A policy manual of Vanderbilt says: "A goal of Vanderbilt University is to foster an open and diverse society where the rights of all members of the community are respected."

Vanderbilt, an internationally recognized research university founded in 1873 under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, has consistently ranked as one of the nation's top 20 universities, with several programs and disciplines ranking in the top 10.

With total net assets of 4.3 billion dollars and five Nobel Laureates, its 330 acres campus is home to more than 300 tree/shrub varieties and a registered National Historic Landmark.

It has about 13,000 students with women outnumbering men, admission selection rate of less than eight percent, over 300 clubs/organizations, over 120,000 living alumni, a library containing over eight million items, and its annual undergraduate tuition is about 39,000 dollars. Mark F. Dalton is Chairman of its Board of Trust, while Nicholas S. Zeppos is the Chancellor.

Hinduism is oldest and third largest religion of the world with about one billion adherents and moksh (liberation) is its ultimate goal.

TheFreeDictionary.com defines Pagan as "An adherent of a polytheistic religion in antiquity...", while it defines Wicca as "A polytheistic Neo-Pagan nature religion inspired by various pre-Christian western European beliefs..." (ANI)

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