島津洋一：藏人自焚抗議 違背佛教倫常（Tibetan Suicide Protests Violate Buddhist Ethics）

〔本文譯自〕 新美國媒體（New America Media）｜2011年10月5日
(http://newamericamedia.org/2011/10/tibetan-suicide-protests-violate-buddhist-ethics.php)

島津洋一（Yoichi Shimatsu）

就在今年，中國四川省阿壩縣有5名僧人在Kirti（格爾登）寺（譯註：阿壩縣規模最大的格魯派寺院）自焚抗議。在自焚之前，他們呼籲中國當局允許十四世達賴喇嘛返鄉回國。在這起自焚事件之前，已有12名僧人、1名女尼自殺。

對達賴喇嘛而言，這些人的生命是祭品犧牲；雖然早些年他對自殺行為─共計17名信徒死亡─表示反對，但他現在的沈默意味著自焚是一個值得稱道的行為。

所有的宗教運動都有殉道者寧願死在沒有容忍心的敵人手中，也不願背叛自己的信仰。宗教戰爭中的蓄意自我犧牲─如穆斯林的人肉自殺炸彈─是有爭議的，也是更具理性的傳教士所反對的。完全有著不同的和平、繁榮景況的青藏高原，這種自焚的手段引發人們對於佛教對自殺的態度的嚴峻質疑。

發生在現代中國及越南的少數自殺抗議事件，是個人行為，而不是佛教宗派的政策。透過全球電視廣播的最有名事件，是66歲的越南僧人釋廣德（Thich Quang Duc）為了抗議南越天主教化政府的迫害而自焚。這起發生在1963年的自殺事件，促使吳廷琰總統（Ngo Dinh Diem）出面道歉，即便這並沒有導向釋廣德所訴求的改革。

藏人自焚事件未能透過傳訊傳達到各地。近年來，中國社會已經對宗教狂熱感到恐懼，其中很大的原因是，據稱是法輪功的成員在天安門廣場的自焚影像透過網路傳播，而該教派所主張的是一種偽造的、將宗教極端主義的陳腔濫調提升為精神病的形式。他們的主張未能激起人們的同情，他們的自焚引起社會的排斥。

少年時期結束

令人不安的一個問題是，自殺者的年紀──他們都很年輕，有些還只是青少年，不像以前都是年富力強的壯年男性。西藏正不斷的繁榮，僧人有機會到印度進修學習，為什麼會有人這麼年輕就拋棄大好前途？阿壩縣一名刑警告訴我，2008年暴動後警方搜查格爾登寺，搜出步槍、彈藥、以及色情DVD寶庫。這個發現令省級官員感到震驚而憂慮，因而重新容允轄內2000多名僧人恢復早已禁止的戀童癖傳統（譯註：即西藏僧人對寺內男童的雞姦）。

對這類性騷擾事件，藏人家庭的反應傾向於不安的一笑置之，因為寺院是受人尊敬的。男童遭到寺院資深僧人性侵而導致的心理影響，毫無疑問的類似於一些天主教神職人員的性侵受害者的終身創痛。未成年者受到侵略行為，有可能導致抑鬱和自卑，這使得一些青少年被操控而自願自殺。

道德與法律

四川警方人員和醫護人員主動介入每一起自焚事件：澆熄汽油火焰，將自焚者搶送到醫院，最後送入太平間。在今年的第一起案件中，警方逮捕3名年齡較大的僧人，他們鼓勵新進僧侶自焚。如果他們鼓吹受害人自殺死亡的罪名成立，將被判處謀殺罪。

國家介入宗教鼓吹自殺，是今天全世界都支持的道德主張，這最早是在西元四世紀時由北非希波奧古斯丁主教所制定。當時整個社會籠罩在羅馬帝國崩潰的悲情中，天主教神學家批評對手諾斯底主教鼓吹自殺、解脫於這個物質世界──在他們的宇宙觀中，物質世界是自由靈魂的監獄。儘管奧古斯丁倡導政教分離，但他仍然要求羅馬官員逮捕犯罪的高級神職人員，因為那些自殺事件實際上不是自願的，也是不法的。

後來，中世紀教會為了達到鎮壓的目的，扭曲奧古斯丁的合理主張，將之解釋為心靈經驗需要照顧並維護身體。這種合理導向生物需求的類似學說，早發展於千年前的悉達多喬達摩──歷史上的佛陀，祂的「中道」反對過度的苦行主義以及身體上的苦行。

佛教分為三個主要時期：以佛陀為模範生活的小乘佛教；納進佛教前的神祇及儀軌的大乘佛教；進行反教條儀軌的金剛乘佛教。藏傳佛教是金剛乘的一支，也稱為譚崔密宗，它出現在西元8世紀的絲路上。

身體的消費

早期的密宗行者抨擊正統佛教的嚴謹戒律，他們推動性儀軌、以及馬拉松式冥想來延長觀想，以便打破正統佛教的規範。比起基督教聖餐的麵包、酒，譚崔密宗的奉獻儀式更為寫實，金剛乘奉獻攝入的一點肉（頭髮和指甲）、上師的體液─象徵教義的傳承。這些儀軌是對佛教前時期的微弱迴響，那時是將犧牲祭品投入火中，以火供來滿足神祇。

因此，將身體投入火中的犧牲，被視為更高理由的最終獻供。這種最遠古的思想，促使偏激的譚崔密宗以及諾斯底教被歸為異教，因為它們牴觸原始佛教以及早期基督教的嚴謹邏輯及前進發展。

佛陀反對自殺，因為考慮到那是自我欺騙式的逃離苦難，因此，是不合業報的軌則的。只有在兩種罕見的情況下，自殺是無罪的─但不是贊成─僧人因為慢性疾病以及年紀太大而無法照顧自己時，可以安樂死。

佛教的八正道解釋說，只有清淨的自心、合宜的行為、道德的倫常關係可以積極影響混亂的世界。自殺不在道德地圖內，因為它除了回到別人的痛苦，哪兒也去不了。因此，達賴喇嘛應該教導年輕藏人、佛教團體的，不是為什麼不去死，而是應該如何活。


島津洋一，太平洋新聞社的前副主編，現任於一家以香港為基地的記者，他曾製作紀錄片「噶瑪巴的飛行」、「經幡」。他曾任中國四川省阿壩縣藏族自治區的環境顧問。

編者註：本文早期版本遺漏法輪功成員自焚圖片的真實性的爭論參考。現行版本已經修改，以更準確地反映的問題。




Tibetan Suicide Protests Violate Buddhist Ethics

New America Media, News Report, Yoichi Shimatsu, Posted: Oct 05, 2011

In just this year, five monks have torched themselves in protest at Kirti monastery, in the Aba district of China’s Sichuan Province. Prior to self-immolation, each monk called for Chinese authorities to permit the homecoming of the 14th Dalai Lama. The burnings follow upon earlier suicides by a dozen monks and a nun.

Although the Dalai Lama, for whom these lives were sacrificed, voiced opposition to an act of suicide years earlier, with 17 followers dead and counting, his present silence implies self-immolation is a commendable action.

All religious movements have martyrs who died at the hands of an intolerant foe rather than betray their faith. Deliberate self-sacrifice in religious warfare, as practiced by Muslim suicide bombers, is controversial and opposed by more rationalistic preachers. In totally different circumstances of peace and prosperity on the Tibetan Plateau, the resort to self-immolation raises hard questions about Buddhist attitudes toward suicide.

The infrequent suicidal protests in modern China and Vietnam have been solitary actions and not a policy of Buddhist sects. The most famous incident, broadcast worldwide over television, was the self-torching of 66-year-old Vietnamese monk Thich Quang Duc to confront persecution by the Catholic-run government of South Vietnam. His suicide in 1963 prompted President Ngo Dinh Diem to personal remorse, even if it did not lead to the desired reform.

The Tibetan immolations fail to get across the message. In recent years, Chinese society has developed a phobia toward religious fanaticism, largely due to online images of an alleged Falun Gong member's self-immolation at Tiananmen Square, which the sect claims is a fake, promoting the stereotype of religious extremism as a form of psychosis. Instead of arousing compassion for their cause, human torching led to ostracism.

End of Boyhood

A troubling question concerns the age of the suicide victims- all young, some still teenagers, rather than elderly men past the prime of life. With Tibet prospering and monks having the chance to study in India, why would anyone so young throw away a promising future? As told to me by an ethnic Tibetan detective in Aba county, a police raid on Kirti monastery in the wake of the 2008 riots resulted in the seizure of rifles, ammunition and a trove of pornographic DVDs. The community of 2,000 monks, as provincial officials discovered to their shock and dismay, had been tolerating the banned traditional practice of pedophilia.

Tibetan families tend to nervously laugh off the molestation issue since monasteries are respected institutions. The psychological effects of sexual abuse under a monastic seniority system are undoubtedly similar to the lifelong trauma experienced by some victims of the Catholic priesthood. Aggressive acts against minors have likely contributed to the depression and low self-esteem that allowed some youngsters to be manipulated into volunteering for suicide.

Morality and Law

Sichuan police officers and paramedics intervened in every immolation event, dousing the gasoline flames and rushing the patient to a hospital and later to a morgue. In this year's first case, the police arrested three older monks who had encouraged a novice to suicide. If found guilty for prompting the victim's death, they will be sentenced for murder.

The ethical argument for the state to intervene against religion-sanctioned suicide, which is today universally upheld, was first formulated by Augustine, the bishop of Hippo in 4th century North Africa. As social pessimism gripped the collapsing Roman empire, the Catholic theologian criticized rival Gnostic bishops for urging suicide as a release from the material world, which in their cosmology is a prison confining the free soul. Augustine, an advocate of separation of religion and state, nevertheless called on the Roman governor to arrest the offending prelates since the suicides were not actually voluntary and therefore unlawful.

Augustine, whose reasoned arguments were later twisted by the medieval church for repressive purposes, explained that spiritual experience requires the care and maintenance of the body. A similar doctrine of reasonableness toward biological necessity was developed a millennium earlier by Siddhartha Gautama, the historical Buddha, whose "middle way" opposed excessive asceticism and mortification of the flesh.

Buddhism subdivided into three major movements: Hinayana, based on the exemplary life of the Buddha; Mahayana, incorporating pre-Buddhist divinities and rites; and Vajrayana, practicing anti-dogmatic rituals. Tibetan Buddhism is a branch of Vajrayana, also called Tantrism, which emerged as a distinct school in the 8th century along the Silk Road.

Bodily Consumption

Early Tantric practioners, who assailed the constrictive rules of orthodox Buddhism, pushed the boundaries with sexual rituals and marathon meditation for attainment of visions. In consecrations more literal than the Christian communion with bread and wine, Vajaryana devotees ingested morsels of flesh (hair and nails) and body fluids from their teachers to symbolize the transmission of teachings. These ritualized feasts were a faint echo from the pre-Buddhist past when divinities were appeased with burnt offerings of sacrificial victims.

Sacrifice of one's body by fire is, therefore, seen as the ultimate tribute to a higher cause. This sort of primitivist thinking puts extreme Tantrism and Gnosticism into the category of heresy against the rigorous logic and progressive outlook of original Buddhism and early Christianity.

The Buddha opposed suicide, considering it a self-deceptive escape from the human condition of suffering and therefore undeserving of karmic merit. In only two rare cases did he exonerate - but not endorse - euthanasia by monks who were physically incapable of caring for themselves due to chronic illness and advanced age.

The Buddhist Eight-fold Path explains that a troubled world can be positively influenced only through clarity of mind, considerate behavior and ethical relationships. Suicide is off the moral map, since it leads nowhere but back to suffering by others. To young Tibetans and the Buddhist community, the Dalai Lama should therefore be teaching not why to die but how to live.


Yoichi Shimatsu, former associate editor with Pacific News Service, is a Hong Kong-based journalist who produced the video documentaries "Flight of the Karmapa" and "Prayer Flags." He has worked in the Aba Tibetan autonomous district in China’s Sichuan Province as an environmental consultant.

Ed. Note: An earlier version of this article left out reference to allegations disputing the authenticity of images involving the self-immolation of members of Falun Gong. The current version has been revised to offer a more accurate reflection of the issue.