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Five precepts
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 11/18/19

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The five precepts (Pali: pañcasīla; Sanskrit: pañcaśīla) or five rules of training (Pali: pañcasikkhapada; Sanskrit: pañcaśikṣapada[1][2])[note 1] is the most important system of morality for Buddhist lay people. They constitute the basic code of ethics to be undertaken by lay followers of Buddhism. The precepts are commitments to abstain from killing living beings, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying and intoxication. Within the Buddhist doctrine, they are meant to develop mind and character to make progress on the path to enlightenment. They are sometimes referred to as the śrāvakayāna precepts in the Mahāyāna tradition, contrasting them with the bodhisattva precepts. The five precepts form the basis of several parts of Buddhist doctrine, both lay and monastic. With regard to their fundamental role in Buddhist ethics, they have been compared with the ten commandments in Abrahamic religions[4][5] or the ethical codes of Confucianism. The precepts have been connected with utilitarianist, deontological and virtue approaches to ethics, though by 2017, such categorization by western terminology had mostly been abandoned by scholars. The precepts have been compared with human rights because of their universal nature, and some scholars argue they can complement the concept of human rights.

The five precepts were common to the religious milieu of 6th-century BCE India, but the Buddha's focus on awareness through the fifth precept was unique. As shown in Early Buddhist Texts, the precepts grew to be more important, and finally became a condition for membership of the Buddhist religion. When Buddhism spread to different places and people, the role of the precepts began to vary. In countries where Buddhism had to compete with other religions, such as China, the ritual of undertaking the five precepts developed into an initiation ceremony to become a Buddhist lay person. On the other hand, in countries with little competition from other religions, such as Thailand, the ceremony has had little relation to the rite of becoming Buddhist, as many people are presumed Buddhist from birth.

Undertaking and upholding the five precepts is based on the principle of non-harming (Pāli and Sanskrit: ahiṃsa). The Pali Canon recommends one to compare oneself with others, and on the basis of that, not to hurt others. Compassion and a belief in karmic retribution form the foundation of the precepts. Undertaking the five precepts is part of regular lay devotional practice, both at home and at the local temple. However, the extent to which people keep them differs per region and time. People keep them with an intention to develop themselves, but also out of fear of a bad rebirth.

The first precept consists of a prohibition of killing, both humans and all animals. Scholars have interpreted Buddhist texts about the precepts as an opposition to and prohibition of capital punishment,[6] suicide, abortion[7][8] and euthanasia.[9] In practice, however, many Buddhist countries still use the death penalty. With regard to abortion, Buddhist countries take the middle ground, by condemning though not prohibiting it. The Buddhist attitude to violence is generally interpreted as opposing all warfare, but some scholars have raised exceptions. The second precept prohibits theft. The third precept refers to adultery in all its forms, and has been defined by modern teachers with terms such as sexual responsibility and long-term commitment. The fourth precept involves falsehood spoken or committed to by action, as well as malicious speech, harsh speech and gossip. The fifth precept prohibits intoxication through alcohol, drugs or other means.[10][11] Early Buddhist Texts nearly always condemn alcohol, and so do Chinese Buddhist post-canonical texts. Buddhist attitudes toward smoking differ per time and region, but are generally permissive. In modern times, traditional Buddhist countries have seen revival movements to promote the five precepts. As for the West, the precepts play a major role in Buddhist organizations. They have also been integrated in mindfulness training programs, though many mindfulness specialists do not support this because of the precepts' religious import. Lastly, many conflict prevention programs make use of the precepts.

Role in Buddhist doctrine

Buddhist scriptures explain the five precepts as the minimal standard of Buddhist morality.[12] It is the most important system of morality in Buddhism, together with the monastic rules.[13] Śīla (Sanskrit; Pali: sīla) is used to refer to Buddhist precepts,[14] including the five.[1] But the word also refers to the virtue and morality which lies at the foundation of the spiritual path to enlightenment, which is the first of the three forms of training on the path. Thus, the precepts are rules or guidelines to develop mind and character to make progress on the path to enlightenment.[1] The five precepts are part of the right speech, action and livelihood aspects of the Noble Eightfold Path, the core teaching of Buddhism.[1][15][note 2] Moreover, the practice of the five precepts and other parts of śīla are described as forms of merit-making, means to create good karma.[17][18] The five precepts have been described as social values that bring harmony to society,[11][19] and breaches of the precepts described as antithetical to a harmonious society.[20] On a similar note, in Buddhist texts, the ideal, righteous society is one in which people keep the five precepts.[21]

Comparing different parts of Buddhist doctrine, the five precepts form the basis of the eight precepts, which are lay precepts stricter than the five precepts, similar to monastic precepts.[1][22] Secondly, the five precepts form the first half of the ten or eleven precepts for a person aiming to become a Buddha (bodhisattva), as mentioned in the Brahmajala Sūtra of the Mahāyāna tradition.[1][23][24] Contrasting these precepts with the five precepts, the latter were commonly referred to by Mahāyānists as the śrāvakayāna precepts, or the precepts of those aiming to become enlightened disciples (Sanskrit: arhat; Pali: arahant) of a Buddha, but not Buddhas themselves. The ten–eleven bodhisattva precepts presuppose the five precepts, and are partly based on them.[25] The five precepts are also partly found in the teaching called the ten good courses of action, referred to in Theravāda (Pali: dasa-kusala-kammapatha) and Tibetan Buddhism (Sanskrit: daśa-kuśala-karmapatha; Wylie: dge ba bcu).[13][26] Finally, the first four of the five precepts are very similar to the most fundamental rules of monastic discipline (Pali: pārajika), and may have influenced their development.[27]

In conclusion, the five precepts lie at the foundation of all Buddhist practice, and in that respect, can be compared with the ten commandments in Christianity and Judaism[4][5] or the ethical codes of Confucianism.[24]

History

The five precepts were part of early Buddhism and are common to nearly all schools of Buddhism.[28] In early Buddhism, the five precepts were regarded as an ethic of restraint, to restrain unwholesome tendencies and thereby purify one's being to attain enlightenment.[3][29] The five precepts were based on the pañcaśīla, prohibitions for pre-Buddhist Brahmanic priests, which were adopted in many Indic religions around 6th century BCE.[30][31] The first four Buddhist precepts were nearly identical to these pañcaśīla, but the fifth precept, the prohibition on intoxication, was new in Buddhism:[27][note 3] the Buddha's emphasis on awareness (Pali: appamāda) was unique.[30]

In some schools of ancient Indic Buddhism, Buddhist devotees could choose to adhere to only a number of precepts, instead of the complete five. The schools that would survive in later periods, however, that is Theravāda and Mahāyāna Buddhism, were both ambiguous about this practice. Some early Mahāyāna texts allow it, but some do not; Theravāda texts do not discuss this practice at all.[33]

The prohibition on killing had motivated early Buddhists to form a stance against animal sacrifice, a common ritual practice in ancient India.[34][35] According to the Pāli Canon, however, early Buddhists did not adopt a vegetarian lifestyle.[22][35]

In Early Buddhist Texts, the role of the five precepts gradually develops. First of all, the precepts are combined with a declaration of faith in the triple gem (the Buddha, his teaching and the monastic community). Next, the precepts develop to become the foundation of lay practice.[36] The precepts are seen as a preliminary condition for the higher development of the mind.[3] At a third stage in the texts, the precepts are actually mentioned together with the triple gem, as though they are part of it. Lastly, the precepts, together with the triple gem, become a required condition for the practice of Buddhism, as lay people have to undergo a formal initiation to become a member of the Buddhist religion.[27] When Buddhism spread to different places and people, the role of the precepts began to vary. In countries in which Buddhism was adopted as the main religion without much competition from other religious disciplines, such as Thailand, the relation between the initiation of a lay person and the five precepts has been virtually non-existent. In such countries, the taking of the precepts has become a sort of ritual cleansing ceremony. People are presumed Buddhist from birth without much of an initiation. The precepts are often committed to by new followers as part of their installment, yet this is not very pronounced. However, in some countries like China, where Buddhism was not the only religion, the precepts became an ordination ceremony to initiate lay people into the Buddhist religion.[37]

In China, the five precepts were introduced in the first centuries CE, both in their śrāvakayāna and bodhisattva formats.[38] During this time, it was particularly Buddhist teachers who promoted abstinence from alcohol (the fifth precept), since Daoism and other thought systems emphasized moderation rather than full abstinence. Chinese Buddhists interpreted the fifth precept strictly, even more so than in Indic Buddhism. For example, the monk Daoshi (c. 600–83) dedicated large sections of his encyclopedic writings to abstinence from alcohol. However, in some parts of China, such as Dunhuang, considerable evidence has been found of alcohol consumption among both lay people and monastics. Later, from the 8th century onward, strict attitudes of abstinence led to a development of a distinct tea culture among Chinese monastics and lay intellectuals, in which tea gatherings replaced gatherings with alcoholic beverages, and were advocated as such.[39][40] These strict attitudes were formed partly because of the religious writings, but may also have been affected by the bloody An Lushan Rebellion of 775, which had a sobering effect on 8th-century Chinese society.[41] When the five precepts were integrated in Chinese society, they were associated and connected with karma, Chinese cosmology and medicine, a Daoist worldview, and Confucian virtue ethics.[42]

Ceremonies

In Pāli tradition


In the Theravāda tradition, the precepts are recited in a standardized fashion, using Pāli language. In Thailand, a leading lay person will normally request the monk to administer the precepts by reciting the following three times:

"Venerables, we request the five precepts and the three refuges [i.e. the triple gem] for the sake of observing them, one by one, separately". (Mayaṃ bhante visuṃ visuṃ rakkhaṇatthāya tisaraṇena saha pañca sīlāniyācāma.)[43]


After this, the monk administering the precepts will recite a reverential line of text to introduce the ceremony, after which he guides the lay people in declaring that they take their refuge in the three refuges or triple gem.[44]

He then continues with reciting the five precepts:[45][46]

1. "I undertake the training-precept to abstain from onslaught on breathing beings." (Pali: Pāṇātipātā veramaṇī sikkhāpadaṃ samādiyāmi.)
2. "I undertake the training-precept to abstain from taking what is not given." (Pali: Adinnādānā veramaṇī sikkhāpadaṃ samādiyāmi.)
3. "I undertake the training-precept to abstain from misconduct concerning sense-pleasures." (Pali: Kāmesumicchācāra veramaṇī sikkhāpadaṃ samādiyāmi.)
4. "I undertake the training-precept to abstain from false speech." (Pali: Musāvādā veramaṇī sikkhāpadaṃ samādiyāmi.)
5. "I undertake the training-precept to abstain from alcoholic drink or drugs that are an opportunity for heedlessness." (Pali: Surāmerayamajjapamādaṭṭhānā veramaṇī sikkhāpadaṃ samādiyāmi.)

After the lay people have repeated the five precepts after the monk, the monk will close the ceremony reciting:

"These five precepts lead with good behavior to bliss, with good behavior to wealth and success, they lead with good behavior to happiness, therefore purify behavior." (Imāni pañca sikkhāpadāni. Sīlena sugatiṃ yanti, sīlena bhogasampadā, sīlena nibbutiṃ yanti, tasmā sīlaṃ visodhaye.)[47]


In other textual traditions

See also: Buddhist initiation ritual

The format of the ceremony for taking the precepts occurs several times in the Chinese Buddhist Canon, in slightly different forms.[48]

One formula of the precepts can be found in the Treatise on Taking Refuge and the Precepts (simplified Chinese: 归戒要集; traditional Chinese: 歸戒要集; pinyin: Guījiè Yāojí):

1. As all Buddhas refrained from killing until the end of their lives, so I too will refrain from killing until the end of my life.
2. As all Buddhas refrained from stealing until the end of their lives, so I too will refrain from stealing until the end of my life.
3. As all Buddhas refrained from sexual misconduct until the end of their lives, so I too will refrain from sexual misconduct until the end of my life.
4. As all Buddhas refrained from false speech until the end of their lives, so I too will refrain from false speech until the end of my life.
5. As all Buddhas refrained from alcohol until the end of their lives, so I too will refrain from alcohol until the end of my life.[49]

Similarly, in the Mūla-Sarvāstivāda texts used in Tibetan Buddhism, the precepts are formulated such that one takes the precepts upon oneself for one's entire lifespan, following the examples of the enlightened disciples of the Buddha (arahant).[45]

Principles

Precept / Accompanying virtues[10][22] / Related to human rights[50][51]

1. Abstention from killing living beings / Kindness and compassion / Right to life
2. Abstention from theft / Generosity and renunciation / Right of property
3. Abstention from sexual misconduct / Contentment and respect for faithfulness / Right to fidelity in marriage
4. Abstention from falsehood / Being honest and dependable / Right of human dignity
5. Abstention from intoxication / Mindfulness and responsibility / Right of security and safety


The five precepts can be found in many places in the Early Buddhist Texts.[52] The precepts are regarded as means to building good character, or as an expression of such character. The Pāli Canon describes them as means to avoid harm to oneself and others.[53] It further describes them as gifts toward oneself and others.[54] Moreover, the texts say that people who uphold them will be confident in any gathering of people,[13][55] will have wealth and a good reputation, and will die a peaceful death, reborn in heaven[45][55] or as a human being. On the other hand, living a life in violation of the precepts is believed to lead to rebirth in an unhappy destination.[13] They are understood as principles that define a person as human in body and mind.[56]

The precepts are normative rules, but are formulated and understood as "undertakings"[57] rather than commandments enforced by a moral authority,[58][59] according to the voluntary and gradualist standards of Buddhist ethics.[60] They are forms of restraint formulated in negative terms, but are also accompanied by virtues and positive behaviors,[10][11][22] which are cultivated through the practice of the precepts.[14][note 4] The most important of these virtues is non-harming (Pāli and Sanskrit: ahiṃsa),[34][62] which underlies all of the five precepts.[22][note 5] Precisely, the texts say that one should keep the precepts, adhering to the principle of comparing oneself with others:[64]

"For a state that is not pleasant or delightful to me must be so to him also; and a state that is not pleasing or delightful to me, how could I inflict that upon another?"[65]


In other words, all living beings are alike in that they want to be happy and not suffer. Comparing oneself with others, one should therefore not hurt others as one would not want to be hurt.[66] Ethicist Pinit Ratanakul argues that the compassion which motivates upholding the precepts comes from an understanding that all living beings are equal and of a nature that they are 'not-self' (Pali: anattā).[67] Another aspect that is fundamental to this is the belief in karmic retribution.[68]

In the upholding or violation of the precepts, intention is crucial.[69][70] In the Pāli scriptures, an example is mentioned of a person stealing an animal only to set it free, which was not seen as an offense of theft.[69] In the Pāli commentaries, a precept is understood to be violated when the person violating it finds the object of the transgression (e.g. things to be stolen), is aware of the violation, has the intention to violate it, does actually act on that intention, and does so successfully.[71]

Upholding the precepts is sometimes distinguished in three levels: to uphold them without having formally undertaken them; to uphold them formally, willing to sacrifice one's own life for it; and finally, to spontaneously uphold them.[72] The latter refers to the arahant, who is understood to be morally incapable of violating the first four precepts.[73] A layperson who upholds the precepts is described in the texts as a "jewel among laymen".[74] On the other hand, the most serious violations of the precepts are the five actions of immediate retribution, which are believed to lead the perpetrator to an unavoidable rebirth in hell. These consist of injuring a Buddha, killing an arahant, killing one's father or mother, and causing the monastic community to have a schism.[22]

Practice in general

Lay followers often undertake these training rules in the same ceremony as they take the refuges.[1][75] Monks administer the precepts to the laypeople, which creates an additional psychological effect.[76] Buddhist lay people may recite the precepts regularly at home, and before an important ceremony at the temple to prepare the mind for the ceremony.[2][76]

The five precepts are at the core of Buddhist morality.[46] In field studies in some countries like Sri Lanka, villagers describe them as the core of the religion.[76] Anthropologist Barend Terwiel [de] found in his fieldwork that most Thai villagers knew the precepts by heart, and many, especially the elderly, could explain the implications of the precepts following traditional interpretations.[77]

Nevertheless, Buddhists do not all follow them with the same strictness.[46] Devotees who have just started keeping the precepts will typically have to exercise considerable restraint. When they become used to the precepts, they start to embody them more naturally.[78] Researchers doing field studies in traditional Buddhist societies have found that the five precepts are generally considered demanding and challenging.[76][79] For example, anthropologist Stanley Tambiah found in his field studies that strict observance of the precepts had "little positive interest for the villager ... not because he devalues them but because they are not normally open to him". Observing precepts was seen to be mostly the role of a monk or an elderly lay person.[80] More recently, in a 1997 survey in Thailand, only 13.8% of the respondents indicated they adhered to the five precepts in their daily lives, with the fourth and fifth precept least likely to be adhered to.[81] Yet, people do consider the precepts worth striving for, and do uphold them out of fear of bad karma and being reborn in hell, or because they believe in that the Buddha issued these rules, and that they therefore should be maintained.[82][83] Anthropologist Melford Spiro found that Burmese Buddhists mostly upheld the precepts to avoid bad karma, as opposed to expecting to gain good karma.[84] Scholar of religion Winston King observed from his field studies that the moral principles of Burmese Buddhists were based on personal self-developmental motives rather than other-regarding motives. Scholar of religion Richard Jones concludes that the moral motives of Buddhists in adhering to the precepts are based on the idea that renouncing self-service, ironically, serves oneself.[85]

In East Asian Buddhism, the precepts are intrinsically connected with the initiation as a Buddhist lay person. Early Chinese translations such as the Upāsaka-śila Sūtra hold that the precepts should only be ritually transmitted by a monastic. The texts describe that in the ritual the power of the Buddhas and bodhisattvas is transmitted, and helps the initiate to keep the precepts. This "lay ordination" ritual usually occurs after a stay in a temple, and often after a monastic ordination (Pali: upsampadā); has taken place. The ordained lay person is then given a religious name. The restrictions that apply are similar to a monastic ordination, such as permission from parents.[86]

In the Theravāda tradition, the precepts are usually taken "each separately" (Pali: visuṃ visuṃ), to indicate that if one precept should be broken, the other precepts are still intact. In very solemn occasions, or for very pious devotees, the precepts may be taken as a group rather than each separately.[87][88] This does not mean, however, that only some of the precepts can be undertaken; they are always committed to as a complete set.[89] In East Asian Buddhism, however, the vow of taking the precepts is considered a solemn matter, and it is not uncommon for lay people to undertake only the precepts that they are confident they can keep.[33] The act of taking a vow to keep the precepts is what makes it karmically effective: Spiro found that someone who did not violate the precepts, but did not have any intention to keep them either, was not believed to accrue any religious merit. On the other hand, when people took a vow to keep the precepts, and then broke them afterwards, the negative karma was considered larger than in the case no vow was taken to keep the precepts.[90]

Several modern teachers such as Thich Nhat Hanh and Sulak Sivaraksa have written about the five precepts in a wider scope, with regard to social and institutional relations. In these perspectives, mass production of weapons or spreading untruth through media and education also violates the precepts.[91][92] On a similar note, human rights organizations in Southeast Asia have attempted to advocate respect for human rights by referring to the five precepts as guiding principles.[93]

First precept

Textual analysis


The first precept prohibits the taking of life of a sentient being. It is violated when someone intentionally and successfully kills such a sentient being, having understood it to be sentient and using effort in the process.[71][94] Causing injury goes against the spirit of the precept, but does, technically speaking, not violate it.[95] The first precept includes taking the lives of animals, even small insects. However, it has also been pointed out that the seriousness of taking life depends on the size, intelligence, benefits done and the spiritual attainments of that living being. Killing a large animal is worse than killing a small animal (also because it costs more effort); killing a spiritually accomplished master is regarded as more severe than the killing of another "more average" human being; and killing a human being is more severe than the killing an animal. But all killing is condemned.[71][96][97] Virtues that accompany this precept are respect for dignity of life,[62] kindness and compassion,[22] the latter expressed as "trembling for the welfare of others".[98] A positive behavior that goes together with this precept is protecting living beings.[11] Positive virtues like sympathy and respect for other living beings in this regard are based on a belief in the cycle of rebirth—that all living beings must be born and reborn.[99] The concept of the fundamental Buddha nature of all human beings also underlies the first precept.[100]

The description of the first precept can be interpreted as a prohibition of capital punishment.[6] Suicide is also seen as part of the prohibition.[101] Moreover, abortion (of a sentient being) goes against the precept, since in an act of abortion, the criteria for violation are all met.[94][102] In Buddhism, human life is understood to start at conception.[103] A prohibition of abortion is mentioned explicitly in the monastic precepts, and several Buddhist tales warn of the harmful karmic consequences of abortion.[104][105] Bioethicist Damien Keown argues that Early Buddhist Texts do not allow for exceptions with regard to abortion, as they consist of a "consistent' (i.e. exceptionless) pro-life position".[106][8] Keown further proposes that a middle way approach to the five precepts is logically hard to defend.[107] Asian studies scholar Giulo Agostini argues, however, that Buddhist commentators in India from the 4th century onward thought abortion did not break the precepts under certain circumstances.[108]

Ordering another person to kill is also included in this precept,[9][95] therefore requesting or administering euthanasia can be considered a violation of the precept,[9] as well as advising another person to commit abortion.[109] With regard to euthanasia and assisted suicide, Keown quotes the Pāli Dīgha Nikāya that says a person upholding the first precept "does not kill a living being, does not cause a living being to be killed, does not approve of the killing of a living being".[110] Keown argues that in Buddhist ethics, regardless of motives, death can never be the aim of one's actions.[111]

Interpretations of how Buddhist texts regard warfare are varied, but in general Buddhist doctrine is considered to oppose all warfare. In many Jātaka tales, such as that of Prince Temiya, as well as some historical documents, the virtue of non-violence is taken as an opposition to all war, both offensive and defensive. At the same time, though, the Buddha is often shown not to explicitly oppose war in his conversations with political figures. Buddhologist André Bareau points out that the Buddha was reserved in his involvement of the details of administrative policy, and concentrated on the moral and spiritual development of his disciples instead. He may have believed such involvement to be futile, or detrimental to Buddhism. Nevertheless, at least one disciple of the Buddha is mentioned in the texts who refrained from retaliating his enemies because of the Buddha, that is King Pasenadi (Sanskrit: Prasenajit). The texts are ambiguous in explaining his motives though.[112] In some later Mahāyāna texts, such as in the writings of Asaṅga, examples are mentioned of people who kill those who persecute Buddhists.[113][114] In these examples, killing is justified by the authors because protecting Buddhism was seen as more important than keeping the precepts. Another example that is often cited is that of King Duṭṭhagāmaṇī, who is mentioned in the post-canonical Pāli Mahāvaṃsa chronicle. In the chronicle, the king is saddened with the loss of life after a war, but comforted by a Buddhist monk, who states that nearly everyone who was killed did not uphold the precepts anyway.[115][116] Buddhist studies scholar Lambert Schmithausen argues that in many of these cases Buddhist teachings like that of emptiness were misused to further an agenda of war or other violence.[117]

In practice

See also: Religion and capital punishment § Buddhism, and Abortion in Japan

Field studies in Cambodia and Burma have shown that many Buddhists considered the first precept the most important, or the most blamable.[46][95] In some traditional communities, such as in Kandal Province in pre-war Cambodia, as well as Burma in the 1980s, it was uncommon for Buddhists to slaughter animals, to the extent that meat had to be bought from not-Buddhists.[46][63] In his field studies in Thailand in the 1960s, Terwiel found that villagers did tend to kill insects, but were reluctant and self-conflicted with regard to killing larger animals.[118] In Spiro's field studies, however, Burmese villagers were highly reluctant even to kill insects.[63]

Early Buddhists did not adopt a vegetarian lifestyle. Indeed, in several Pāli texts vegetarianism is described as irrelevant in the spiritual purification of the mind. There are prohibitions on certain types of meat, however, especially those which are condemned by society. The idea of abstaining from killing animal life has also led to a prohibition on professions that involve trade in flesh or living beings, but not to a full prohibition of all agriculture that involves cattle.[119] In modern times, referring to the law of supply and demand or other principles, some Theravādin Buddhists have attempted to promote vegetarianism as part of the five precepts. For example, the Thai Santi Asoke movement practices vegetarianism.[59][120]

Furthermore, among some schools of Buddhism, there has been some debate with regard to a principle in the monastic discipline. This principle states that a Buddhist monk cannot accept meat if it comes from animals especially slaughtered for him. Some teachers have interpreted this to mean that when the recipient has no knowledge on whether the animal has been killed for him, he cannot accept the food either. Similarly, there has been debate as to whether laypeople should be vegetarian when adhering to the five precepts.[22] Though vegetarianism among Theravādins is generally uncommon, it has been practiced much in East Asian countries,[22] as some Mahāyāna texts, such as the Mahāparanirvana Sūtra and the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, condemn the eating of meat.[10][121] Nevertheless, even among Mahāyāna Buddhists—and East Asian Buddhists—there is disagreement on whether vegetarianism should be practiced. In the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, biological, social and hygienic reasons are given for a vegetarian diet; however, historically, a major factor in the development of a vegetarian lifestyle among Mahāyāna communities may have been that Mahāyāna monastics cultivated their own crops for food, rather than living from alms.[122] Already from the 4th century CE, Chinese writer Xi Chao understood the five precepts to include vegetarianism.[121]

Apart from trade in flesh or living beings, there are also other professions considered undesirable. Vietnamese teacher Thich Nhat Hanh gives a list of examples, such as working in the arms industry, the military, police, producing or selling poison or drugs such as alcohol and tobacco.[123]

In general, the first precept has been interpreted by Buddhists as a call for non-violence and pacifism. But there have been some exceptions of people who did not interpret the first precept as an opposition to war. For example, in the twentieth century, some Japanese Zen teachers wrote in support of violence in war, and some of them argued this should be seen as a means to uphold the first precept.[124] There is some debate and controversy surrounding the problem whether a person can commit suicide, such as self-immolation, to reduce other people's suffering in the long run, such as in protest to improve a political situation in a country. Teachers like the Dalai Lama and Shengyan have rejected forms of protest like self-immolation, as well as other acts of self-harming or fasting as forms of protest.[60]

Although capital punishment goes against the first precept, as of 2001, many countries in Asia still maintained the death penalty, including Sri Lanka, Thailand, China and Taiwan. In some Buddhist countries, such as Sri Lanka and Thailand, capital punishment was applied during some periods, while during other periods no capital punishment was used at all. In other countries with Buddhism, like China and Taiwan, Buddhism, or any religion for that matter, has had no influence in policy decisions of the government. Countries with Buddhism that have abolished capital punishment include Cambodia and Hong Kong.[125]

In general, Buddhist traditions oppose abortion.[108] In many countries with Buddhist traditions such as Thailand, Taiwan, Korea and Japan, however, abortion is a widespread practice, whether legal or not. Many people in these countries consider abortion immoral, but also think it should be less prohibited. Ethicist Roy W. Perrett, following Ratanakul, argues that this field research data does not so much indicate hypocrisy, but rather points at a "middle way" in applying Buddhist doctrine to solve a moral dilemma. Buddhists tend to take "both sides" on the pro-life–pro-choice debate, being against the taking of life of a fetus in principle, but also believing in compassion toward mothers. Similar attitudes may explain the Japanese mizuko kuyō ceremony, a Buddhist memorial service for aborted children, which has led to a debate in Japanese society concerning abortion, and finally brought the Japanese to a consensus that abortion should not be taken lightly, though it should be legalized. This position, held by Japanese Buddhists, takes the middle ground between the Japanese neo-Shinto "pro-life" position, and the liberationist, "pro-choice" arguments.[126] Keown points out, however, that this compromise does not mean a Buddhist middle way between two extremes, but rather incorporates two opposite perspectives.[107] In Thailand, women who wish to have abortion usually do so in the early stages of pregnancy, because they believe the karmic consequences are less then. Having had abortion, Thai women usually make merits to compensate for the negative karma.[127]

Second precept

Textual analysis


The second precept prohibits theft, and involves the intention to steal what one perceives as not belonging to oneself ("what is not given") and acting successfully upon that intention. The severity of the act of theft is judged by the worth of the owner and the worth of that which is stolen. Underhand dealings, fraud, cheating and forgery are also included in this precept.[71][128] Accompanying virtues are generosity, renunciation,[10][22] and right livelihood,[129] and a positive behavior is the protection of other people's property.[11]

In practice

The second precept includes different ways of stealing and fraud. Borrowing without permission is sometimes included,[59][77] as well as gambling.[77][130] Psychologist Vanchai Ariyabuddhiphongs did studies in the 2000s and 2010s in Thailand and discovered that people who did not adhere to the five precepts more often tended to believe that money was the most important goal in life, and would more often pay bribes than people who did adhere to the precepts.[131][132] On the other hand, people who observed the five precepts regarded themselves as wealthier and happier than people who did not observe the precepts.[133]

Professions that are seen to violate the second precept include working in the gambling industry or marketing products that are not actually required for the customer.[134]

Third precept

Textual analysis


The third precept condemns sexual misconduct. This has been interpreted in classical texts to include adultery with a married or engaged person, rape, incest, sex with a minor (or a person "protected by any relative"), and sex with a prostitute.[135] In later texts, details such as intercourse at an inappropriate time or inappropriate place are also counted as breaches of the third precept.[136] Masturbation goes against the spirit of the precept, though in the early texts it is not prohibited for laypeople.[137][138]

The third precept is explained as leading to greed in oneself and harm to others. The transgression is regarded as more severe if the other person is a good person.[137][138] Virtues that go hand-in-hand with the third precept are contentment, especially with one's partner,[22][98] and recognition and respect for faithfulness in a marriage.[11]

In practice

The third precept is interpreted as avoiding harm to another by using sensuality in the wrong way. This means not engaging with inappropriate partners, but also respecting one's personal commitment to a relationship.[59] In some traditions, the precept also condemns adultery with a person whose spouse agrees with the act, since the nature of the act itself is condemned. Furthermore, flirting with a married person may also be regarded as a violation.[77][135] Though prostitution is discouraged in the third precept, it is usually not actively prohibited by Buddhist teachers.[139] With regard to applications of the principles of the third precept, the precept, or any Buddhist principle for that matter, is usually not connected with a stance against contraception.[140][141] In traditional Buddhist societies such as Sri Lanka, pre-marital sex is considered to violate the precept, though this is not always adhered to by people who already intend to marry.[138][142]

In the interpretation of modern teachers, the precept includes any person in a sexual relationship with another person, as they define the precept by terms such as sexual responsibility and long-term commitment.[135] Some modern teachers include masturbation as a violation of the precept,[143] others include certain professions, such as those that involve sexual exploitation, prostitution or pornography, and professions that promote unhealthy sexual behavior, such as in the entertainment industry.[134]
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Fourth precept

Textual analysis


The fourth precept involves falsehood spoken or committed to by action.[137] Avoiding other forms of wrong speech are also considered part of this precept, consisting of malicious speech, harsh speech and gossip.[144][145] A breach of the precept is considered more serious if the falsehood is motivated by an ulterior motive[137] (rather than, for example, "a small white lie").[146] The accompanying virtue is being honest and dependable,[22][98] and involves honesty in work, truthfulness to others, loyalty to superiors and gratitude to benefactors.[129] In Buddhist texts, this precept is considered second in importance to the first precept, because a lying person is regarded to have no shame, and therefore capable of many wrongs.[143] Untruthfulness is not only to be avoided because it harms others, but also because it goes against the Buddhist ideal of finding the truth.[146][147]

In practice

The fourth precept includes avoidance of lying and harmful speech.[148] Some modern teachers such as Thich Nhat Hanh interpret this to include avoiding spreading false news and uncertain information.[143] Work that involves data manipulation, false advertising or online scams can also be regarded as violations.[134] Terwiel reports that among Thai Buddhists, the fourth precept is also seen to be broken when people insinuate, exaggerate or speak abusively or deceitfully.[77]

Fifth precept

Textual analysis


The fifth precept prohibits intoxication through alcohol, drugs or other means, and its virtues are mindfulness and responsibility,[10][11] applied to food, work, behavior, and with regard to the nature of life.[129] Awareness, meditation and heedfulness can also be included here.[122] Medieval Pāli commentator Buddhaghosa writes that whereas violating the first four precepts may be more or less blamable depending on the person or animal affected, the fifth precept is always "greatly blamable", as it hinders one from understanding the Buddha's teaching and may lead one to "madness".[16] In ancient China, Daoshi described alcohol as the "doorway to laxity and idleness" and as a cause of suffering. Nevertheless, he did describe certain cases when drinking was considered less of a problem, such as in the case of a queen distracting the king by alcohol to prevent him from murder. However, Daoshi was generally strict in his interpretations: for example, he allowed medicinal use of alcohol only in extreme cases.[149] Early Chinese translations of the Tripitaka describe negative consequences for people breaking the fifth precept, for themselves and their families. The Chinese translation of the Upāsikaśila Sūtra, as well as the Pāli version of the Sigālovāda Sutta, speak of ill consequences such as loss of wealth, ill health, a bad reputation and "stupidity", concluding in a rebirth in hell.[16][150] The Dīrghāgama adds to that that alcohol leads to quarreling, negative states of mind and damage to one's intelligence. The Mahāyāna Brahmajāla Sūtra[note 6] describes the dangers of alcohol in very strong terms, including the selling of alcohol.[151] Similar arguments against alcohol can be found in Nāgārjuna's writings.[152] The strict interpretation of prohibition of alcohol consumption can be supported by the Upāli Sūtra's statement that a disciple of the Buddha should not drink any alcohol, "even a drop on the point of a blade of grass". However, in the writing of some Abhidharma commentators, consumption was condemned or condoned, depending on the intention with which alcohol was consumed.[153]

In practice

As for the fifth precept, this is regarded as important, because drinking alcohol is condemned for the sluggishness and lack of self-control it leads to,[69][154] which might lead to breaking the other precepts.[16] In Spiro's field studies, violating the fifth precept was seen as the worst of all the five precepts by half of the monks interviewed, citing the harmful consequences.[16] Nevertheless, in practice it is often disregarded by lay people.[155] In Thailand, drinking alcohol is fairly common, even drunkenness.[156] Among Tibetans, drinking beer is common, though this is only slightly alcoholic.[152] Medicinal use of alcohol is generally not frowned upon,[142] and in some countries like Thailand and Laos, smoking is usually not regarded as a violation of the precept. Thai and Laotian monks have been known to smoke, though monks who have received more training are less likely to smoke.[40][157] On a similar note, as of 2000, no Buddhist country prohibited the sale or consumption of alcohol, though in Sri Lanka Buddhist revivalists attempted unsuccessfully to get a full prohibition passed in 1956.[40] Moreover, pre-Communist Tibet used to prohibit smoking in some areas of the capital. Monks were prohibited from smoking, and the import of tobacco was banned.[40]

Thich Nhat Hanh also includes the aspect of mindful consumption in this precept, which consists of unhealthy food, unhealthy entertainment and unhealthy conversations, among others.[134][158]

Present trends

In modern times, adherence to the precepts among Buddhists is less strict than it traditionally was. This is especially true for the third precept. For example, in Cambodia in the 1990s and 2000s, standards with regard to sexual restraint were greatly relaxed.[159] Some Buddhist movements and communities have tried to go against the modern trend of less strict adherence to the precepts. In Cambodia, a millenarian movement led by Chan Yipon promoted the revival of the five precepts.[159] And in the 2010s, the Supreme Sangha Council in Thailand ran a nationwide program called "The Villages Practicing the Five Precepts", aiming to encourage keeping the precepts, with an extensive classification and reward system.[160][161]

In many Western Buddhist organizations, the five precepts play a major role in developing ethical guidelines.[162] Furthermore, Buddhist teachers such as Philip Kapleau, Thich Nhat Hanh and Robert Aitken have promoted mindful consumption in the West, based on the five precepts.[158] In another development in the West, some scholars working in the field of mindfulness training have proposed that the five precepts be introduced as a component in such trainings. Specifically, to prevent organizations from using mindfulness training to further an economical agenda with harmful results to its employees, the economy or the environment, the precepts could be used as a standardized ethical framework. As of 2015, several training programs made explicit use of the five precepts as secular, ethical guidelines. However, many mindfulness training specialists consider it problematic to teach the five precepts as part of training programs in secular contexts because of their religious origins and import.[163]

Peace studies scholar Theresa Der-lan Yeh notes that the five precepts address physical, economical, familial and verbal aspects of interaction, and remarks that many conflict prevention programs in schools and communities have integrated the five precepts in their curriculum. On a similar note, peace studies founder Johan Galtung describes the five precepts as the "basic contribution of Buddhism in the creation of peace".[164]

Theory of ethics

Studying lay and monastic ethical practice in traditional Buddhist societies, Spiro argued ethical guidelines such as the five precepts are adhered to as a means to a higher end, that is, a better rebirth or enlightenment. He therefore concluded that Buddhist ethical principles like the five precepts are similar to Western utilitarianism.[60] Keown, however, has argued that the five precepts are regarded as rules that cannot be violated, and therefore may indicate a deontological perspective in Buddhist ethics.[165][166] On the other hand, Keown has also suggested that Aristoteles' virtue ethics could apply to Buddhist ethics, since the precepts are considered good in themselves, and mutually dependent on other aspects of the Buddhist path of practice.[60][167] Philosopher Christopher Gowans disagrees that Buddhist ethics are deontological, arguing that virtue and consequences are also important in Buddhist ethics. Gowans argues that there is no moral theory in Buddhist ethics that covers all conceivable situations such as when two precepts may be in conflict, but is rather characterized by "a commitment to and nontheoretical grasp of the basic Buddhist moral values".[168] As of 2017, many scholars of Buddhism no longer think it is useful to try to fit Buddhist ethics into a Western philosophical category.[169]

Comparison with human rights

Keown has argued that the five precepts are very similar to human rights, with regard to subject matter and with regard to their universal nature.[170] Other scholars, as well as Buddhist writers and human rights advocates, have drawn similar comparisons.[51][171] For example, the following comparisons are drawn:

1. Keown compares the first precept with the right to life.[50] The Buddhism-informed Cambodian Institute for Human Rights (CIHR) draws the same comparison.[172]
2. The second precept is compared by Keown and the CIHR with the right of property.[50][172]
3. The third precept is compared by Keown to the "right to fidelity in marriage";[50] the CIHR construes this broadly as "right of individuals and the rights of society".[173]
4. The fourth precept is compared by Keown with the "right not to be lied to";[50] the CIHR writes "the right of human dignity".[173]
5. Finally, the fifth precept is compared by the CIHR with the right of individual security and a safe society.[173]

Keown describes the relationship between Buddhist precepts and human rights as "look[ing] both ways along the juridical relationship, both to what one is due to do, and to what is due to one".[173][174] On a similar note, Cambodian human rights advocates have argued that for human rights to be fully implemented in society, the strengthening of individual morality must also be addressed.[173] Buddhist monk and scholar Phra Payutto sees the Human Rights Declaration as an unfolding and detailing of the principles that are found in the five precepts, in which a sense of ownership is given to the individual, to make legitimate claims on one's rights. He believes that human rights should be seen as a part of human development, in which one develops from moral discipline (Pali: sīla), to concentration (Pali: samādhi) and finally wisdom (Pali: paññā). He does not believe, however, that human rights are natural rights, but rather human conventions. Buddhism scholar Somparn Promta disagrees with him. He argues that human beings do have natural rights from a Buddhist perspective, and refers to the attūpanāyika-dhamma, a teaching in which the Buddha prescribes a kind of golden rule of comparing oneself with others. (See §Principles, above.) From this discourse, Promta concludes that the Buddha has laid down the five precepts in order to protect individual rights such as right of life and property: human rights are implicit within the five precepts. Academic Buntham Phunsap argues, however, that though human rights are useful in culturally pluralistic societies, they are in fact not required when society is based on the five precepts. Phunsap therefore does not see human rights as part of Buddhist doctrine.[175]

See also

• Anagarika – one who keeps the eight precepts on a more permanent basis, or as preparation to ordain.
• Dhammika Sutta
• Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, five principles applied in geopolitics, for which the same term is used
• Five hindrances
• Five Virtues (in Sikhism)

Notes

1. Also spelled as pañcasīlani and pañcasikkhāpadani, respectively.[3]
2. The fifth precept has also been connected with right mindfulness.[16]
3. The 6th century CE Chāndogya Upaniśad contains four principles identical to the Buddhist precepts, but lying is not mentioned.[32] In contemporary Jainism, the fifth principle became "appropriation of any sort".[27]
4. This dual meaning in negative formulations is typical for an Indic language like Sanskrit.[61]
5. However, anthropologist Melford Spiro argued that the fundamental virtue behind the precepts was loving-kindness, not "the Hindu notion of non-violence".[63]
6. Not to be confused with the early Buddhist Brahmajala Sutta.

Citations

1. Getz 2004, p. 673.
2. Terwiel 2012, pp. 178–9.
3. Terwiel 2012, p. 178.
4. Keown 2013b, p. 638.
5. Wai 2002, p. 4.
6. Alarid & Wang 2001, pp. 236–7.
7. Keown 2016a, p. 213.
8. Perrett 2000, p. 110.
9. Keown 2016b, p. 170.
10. Gwynne 2017, The Buddhist Pancasila.
11. Wijayaratna 1990, pp. 166–7.
12. Gowans 2013, p. 440.
13. Goodman, Charles (2017). Ethics in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archivedfrom the original on 8 July 2010.
14. Edelglass 2013, p. 479.
15. Powers 2013, āryāṣtāṅga-mārga.
16. Harvey 2000, p. 77.
17. Osto 2015.
18. McFarlane 1997.
19. De Silva 2016, p. 79.
20. Keown 2012, p. 31.
21. Tambiah 1992, p. 121.
22. Cozort 2015.
23. Cozort & Shields 2018, Dōgen, The Bodhisattva Path according to the Ugra.
24. Funayama 2004, p. 98.
25. Funayama 2004, p. 105.
26. Keown 2005, Precepts.
27. Kohn 1994, p. 173.
28. Keown 2003, p. 210.
29. Cozort & Shields 2018, Precepts in Early and Theravāda Buddhism.
30. Gombrich 2006, p. 78.
31. Kohn 1994, pp. 171, 173.
32. Tachibana 1992, p. 58.
33. Harvey 2000, p. 83.
34. "Ahiṃsā". The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions. Oxford University Press. 1997. Archived from the original on 24 August 2018 – via Encyclopedia.com.
35. Mcdermott 1989, p. 273.
36. Kohn 1994, pp. 173–4.
37. Terwiel 2012, pp. 178–9, 205.
38. Kohn 1994, pp. 171, 175–6.
39. Benn 2005, pp. 214, 223–4, 226, 230–1.
40. Harvey 2000, p. 79.
41. Benn 2005, p. 231.
42. Kohn 1994, pp. 176–8, 184–5.
43. Terwiel 2012, pp. 179–80.
44. Terwiel 2012, p. 181.
45. Harvey 2000, p. 67.
46. Ledgerwood 2008, p. 152.
47. Terwiel 2012, p. 182.
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52. Tedesco 2004, p. 91.
53. MacKenzie 2017, p. 2.
54. Harvey 2000, p. 66.
55. Tachibana 1992, p. 63.
56. Wai 2002, p. 2.
57. Gombrich 2006, p. 66.
58. Keown 2003, p. 268.
59. Meadow 2006, p. 88.
60. Buswell 2004.
61. Keown 1998, pp. 399–400.
62. Keown 2013a, p. 616.
63. Spiro 1982, p. 45.
64. Harvey 2000, pp. 33, 71.
65. Harvey 2000, p. 33.
66. Harvey 2000, p. 120.
67. Ratanakul 2007, p. 241.
68. Horigan 1996, p. 276.
69. Mcdermott 1989, p. 275.
70. Keown 1998, p. 386.
71. Leaman 2000, p. 139.
72. Leaman 2000, p. 141.
73. Keown 2003, p. 1.
74. De Silva 2016, p. 63.
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77. Terwiel 2012, p. 183.
78. MacKenzie 2017, p. 10.
79. Gombrich 1995, p. 286.
80. Keown 2017, p. 28.
81. Ariyabuddhiphongs 2009, p. 193.
82. Terwiel 2012, p. 188.
83. Spiro 1982, p. 449.
84. Spiro 1982, pp. 99, 102.
85. Jones 1979, p. 374.
86. Harvey 2000, pp. 80–1.
87. Harvey 2000, p. 82.
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90. Spiro 1982, p. 217.
91. Queen 2013, p. 532.
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96. Mcdermott 1989, pp. 271–2.
97. Harvey 2000, p. 156.
98. Harvey 2000, p. 68.
99. Wai 2002, p. 293.
100. Horigan 1996, p. 275.
101. Wai 2002, p. 11.
102. Harvey 2000, pp. 313–4.
103. Keown 2016a, p. 206.
104. Mcdermott 2016, pp. 157–64.
105. Perrett 2000, p. 101.
106. Keown 2016a, p. 209.
107. Keown 2016a, p. 205.
108. Agostini 2004, pp. 77–8.
109. Harvey 2000, p. 314.
110. Keown 1998, p. 400.
111. Keown 1998, p. 402.
112. Schmithausen 1999, pp. 50–2.
113. Schmithausen 1999, pp. 57–59.
114. Jones 1979, p. 380.
115. Jones 1979, pp. 380, 385 n.2.
116. Schmithausen 1999, pp. 56–7.
117. Schmithausen 1999, pp. 60–2.
118. Terwiel 2012, p. 186.
119. Mcdermott 1989, pp. 273–4, 276.
120. Swearer 2010, p. 177.
121. Kieschnick 2005, p. 196.
122. Gwynne 2017, Ahiṃsa and Samādhi.
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126. Perrett 2000, pp. 101–3, 109.
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128. Harvey 2000, p. 70.
129. Wai 2002, p. 3.
130. Ratanakul 2007, p. 253.
131. Ariyabuddhiphongs & Hongladarom 2011, pp. 338–9.
132. Ariyabuddhiphongs 2007, p. 43.
133. Jaiwong & Ariyabuddhiphongs 2010, p. 337.
134. Johansen & Gopalakrishna 2016, p. 342.
135. Harvey 2000, pp. 71–2.
136. Harvey 2000, p. 73.
137. Leaman 2000, p. 140.
138. Harvey 2000, p. 72.
139. Derks 1998.
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143. Harvey 2000, p. 74.
144. Segall 2003, p. 169.
145. Harvey 2000, pp. 74, 76.
146. Harvey 2000, p. 75.
147. Wai 2002, p. 295.
148. Powers 2013, pañca-śīla.
149. Benn 2005, pp. 224, 227.
150. Benn 2005, p. 225.
151. Benn 2005, pp. 225–6.
152. Harvey 2000, p. 78.
153. Harvey 2000, pp. 78–9.
154. Tachibana 1992, p. 62.
155. Neumaier 2006, p. 78.
156. Terwiel 2012, p. 185.
157. Vanphanom et al. 2009, p. 100.
158. Kaza 2000, p. 24.
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160. สมเด็จวัดปากน้ำชงหมูบ้านรักษาศีล 5 ให้อปท.ชวนประชาชนยึดปฎิบัติ [Wat Paknam's Somdet proposes the Five Precept Village for local administrators to persuade the public to practice]. Khao Sod (in Thai). Matichon Publishing. 15 October 2013. p. 31.
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• Kaza, Stephanie (2000), "Overcoming the Grip of Consumerism", Buddhist-Christian Studies, 20: 23–42, doi:10.1353/bcs.2000.0013, JSTOR 1390317
• Keown, Damien (1998), "Suicide, Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia: A Buddhist Perspective", Journal of Law and Religion, 13 (2): 385–405, doi:10.2307/1051472, JSTOR 1051472
• Keown, Damien (2003), A Dictionary of Buddhism, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-157917-2
• Keown, Damien (2005), Buddhist Ethics: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-157794-9
• Keown, Damien (2012), "Are There Human Rights in Buddhism?", in Husted, Wayne R.; Keown, Damien; Prebish, Charles S. (eds.), Buddhism and Human Rights, Routledge, pp. 15–42, ISBN 978-1-136-60310-5
• Keown, Damien (2013a), "Buddhism and Biomedical Issues" (PDF), in Emmanuel, Steven M. (ed.), A Companion to Buddhist Philosophy (1st ed.), Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 613–30, ISBN 978-0-470-65877-2
• Keown, Damien (2013b), "Buddhist Ethics", in LaFollette, Hugh (ed.), The International Encyclopedia of Ethics, 9 Volume Set, The International Encyclopedia of Ethics, Blackwell Publishing, pp. 636–47, doi:10.1002/9781444367072.wbiee163, ISBN 978-1-4051-8641-4
• Keown, Damien (2016a), "Buddhism and Abortion: Is There a 'Middle Way'?", in Keown, Damien (ed.), Buddhism and Abortion, Macmillan Press, pp. 199–218, doi:10.1007/978-1-349-14178-4, ISBN 978-1-349-14178-4
• Keown, Damien (2016b), Buddhism and Bioethics, Springer Nature, ISBN 978-1-349-23981-8
• Keown, Damien (2017), "It's Ethics, Jim, but Not as We Know It", in Davis, J.H. (ed.), A Mirror is for Reflection: Understanding Buddhist Ethics, Oxford University Press, pp. 17–32
• Kieschnick, John (2005), "Buddhist Vegetarianism in China" (PDF), in Sterckx, R. (ed.), Of Tripod and Palate: Food, Politics, and Religion in Traditional China, Springer Nature, pp. 186–212, ISBN 978-1-4039-7927-8
• Kohn, Livia (1994), "The Five Precepts of the Venerable Lord", Monumenta Serica, 42 (1): 171–215, doi:10.1080/02549948.1994.11731253
• Leaman, Oliver (2000), Eastern Philosophy: Key Readings (PDF), Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-17357-5, archived (PDF) from the original on 8 August 2017
• Ledgerwood, Judy (2008), "Buddhist practice in rural Kandal province 1960 and 2003", in Kent, Alexandra; Chandler, David (eds.), People of Virtue: Reconfiguring Religion, Power and Moral Order in Cambodia Today, Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, ISBN 978-87-7694-036-2
• Ledgerwood, Judy; Un, Kheang (3 June 2010), "Global Concepts and Local Meaning: Human Rights and Buddhism in Cambodia", Journal of Human Rights, 2 (4): 531–49, doi:10.1080/1475483032000137129
• MacKenzie, Matthew (December 2017), "Buddhism and the Virtues", in Snow, Nancy E. (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Virtue, 1, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199385195.013.18
• Mcdermott, J.P. (1 October 1989), "Animals and Humans in Early Buddhism", Indo-Iranian Journal, 32 (4): 269–280, doi:10.1163/000000089790083303
• Mcdermott, J.P. (2016), "Abortion in the Pali Canon and Early Buddhist Thought", in Keown, Damien (ed.), Buddhism and Abortion, Macmillan Press, pp. 157–82, doi:10.1007/978-1-349-14178-4, ISBN 978-1-349-14178-4
• McFarlane, Stewart (1997), "Morals and Society in Buddhism" (PDF), in Carr, Brian; Mahalingam, Indira (eds.), Companion Encyclopedia of Asian Philosophy, Routledge, pp. 407–22, ISBN 978-0-203-01350-2, archived (PDF) from the original on 3 August 2018
• Meadow, Mary Jo (2006), "Buddhism: Theravāda Buddhism", in Riggs, Thomas (ed.), Worldmark Encyclopedia of Religious Practices, Thomson Gale, pp. 83–92, ISBN 978-0-7876-9390-9
• Neumaier, Eva (2006), "Buddhism: Māhayāna Buddhism", in Riggs, Thomas (ed.), Worldmark Encyclopedia of Religious Practices, Thomson Gale, ISBN 978-0-7876-9390-9
• Osto, Douglas (2015), "Merit", in Powers, John (ed.), The Buddhist World, Routledge, ISBN 978-1-317-42016-3
• Perrett, Roy W. (July 2000), "Buddhism, Abortion and the Middle Way", Asian Philosophy, 10 (2): 101–14, doi:10.1080/713650898
• Powers, John (2013), A Concise Encyclopedia of Buddhism, Oneworld Publications, ISBN 978-1-78074-476-6
• Queen, Christopher S. (2013), "Socially Engaged Buddhism: Emerging Patterns of Theory and Practice"(PDF), in Emmanuel, Steven M. (ed.), A Companion to Buddhist Philosophy, Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 524–35, ISBN 978-0-470-65877-2
• Ratanakul, P. (1998), "Socio-Medical Aspects of Abortion in Thailand", in Keown, Damien (ed.), Buddhism and Abortion, Macmillan Press, pp. 53–66, doi:10.1007/978-1-349-14178-4, ISBN 978-1-349-14180-7
• Ratanakul, P. (2007), "The Dynamics of Tradition and Change in Theravada Buddhism", The Journal of Religion and Culture, 1 (1): 233–57, CiteSeerX 10.1.1.505.2366, ISSN 1905-8144
• Schmithausen, Lambert (1999), "Buddhist Attitudes Towards War", in Houben, Jan E. M.; van Kooij, Karel Rijk (eds.), Violence Denied: Violence, Non-Violence and the Rationalization of Violence in South Asian Cultural History, Brill publishing, pp. 45–68, ISBN 978-9004113442
• Seeger, M. (2010), "Theravāda Buddhism and Human Rights. Perspectives from Thai Buddhism" (PDF), in Meinert, Carmen; Zöllner, Hans-Bernd (eds.), Buddhist Approaches to Human Rights: Dissonances and Resonances, Transcript Verlag, pp. 63–92, ISBN 978-3-8376-1263-9
• Segall, Seth Robert (2003), "Psychotherapy Practice as Buddhist Practice" (PDF), in Segall, Seth Robert (ed.), Encountering Buddhism: Western Psychology and Buddhist Teachings, State University of New York Press, pp. 165–78, ISBN 978-0-7914-8679-5
• Spiro, Melford E. (1982), Buddhism and Society: A Great Tradition and Its Burmese Vicissitudes, University of California Press, ISBN 978-0-520-04672-6
• Swearer, Donald K. (2010), The Buddhist World of Southeast Asia (PDF) (2nd ed.), State University of New York Press, ISBN 978-1-4384-3251-9
• Tachibana, Shundō (1992), The Ethics of Buddhism, Psychology Press, ISBN 978-0-7007-0230-5
• Tambiah, Stanley Jeyaraja (1992), Buddhism Betrayed?: Religion, Politics, and Violence in Sri Lanka, University of Chicago Press, ISBN 978-0-226-78950-7
• Tedesco, F.M. (2004), "Teachings on Abortion in Theravāda and Mahāyāna Traditions and Contemporary Korean Practice" (PDF), International Journal of Buddhist Thought & Culture, 4
• Terwiel, Barend Jan (2012), Monks and Magic: Revisiting a Classic Study of Religious Ceremonies in Thailand (PDF), Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, ISBN 9788776941017, archived (PDF) from the original on 19 August 2018
• Vanphanom, Sychareun; Phengsavanh, Alongkon; Hansana, Visanou; Menorath, Sing; Tomson, Tanja (2009), "Smoking Prevalence, Determinants, Knowledge, Attitudes and Habits among Buddhist Monks in Lao PDR", BMC Research Notes, 2 (100): 100, doi:10.1186/1756-0500-2-100, PMC 2704224, PMID 19505329
• Wai, Maurice Nyunt (2002), Pañcasila and Catholic Moral Teaching: Moral Principles as Expression of Spiritual Experience in Theravada Buddhism and Christianity, Gregorian Biblical BookShop, ISBN 9788876529207
• Wijayaratna, Mohan (1990), Buddhist monastic life: According to the Texts of the Theravāda Tradition(PDF), Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-36428-7, archived from the original on 24 August 2018
• Yeh, T.D.L. (2006), "The Way to Peace: A Buddhist Perspective" (PDF), International Journal of Peace Studies, 11 (1): 91–112, JSTOR 41852939, archived (PDF) from the original on 16 November 2009

External links

• For a Future to Be Possible: classic work about the five precepts, by Thich Nhat Hanh and several other authors
• The Mind of Clover: Essays in Zen Buddhist Ethics: by Robert Aitken, about the precepts in Zen Buddhism
• Excerpt from the Pāli Canon about the precepts, on website Access to Insight, archived from original on 7 May 2005
• Dissertation about the role of the precepts in modern society, and the aspect of heedfulness (apamada)
• Article with overview of the role of the precepts in Buddhist teachings, by scholar of religion Donald Swearer (registration required)
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Tue Nov 19, 2019 7:58 am

Spalding Symposium on Indian Religions
sponsored by the Spalding Trust
by spaldingsymposium.org
Accessed: 11/19/19

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.


Call for papers: 2020 Symposium Sep
by naomiappleton

We invite proposals for papers for the 45th Spalding Symposium on Indian Religions, which will be held at the University of Edinburgh, on 24th-26th April 2020. The theme this year is “Comparison(s)”. Our purview includes both religions of South Asian origin wherever in the world they are being practised, and those of non South Asian origin present within South Asia. We welcome papers based upon all research methods, including textual, historical, ethnographic, sociological and philosophical.

Presenters are allocated forty minutes for their paper and twenty minutes for discussion, and will normally be expected to pay their own conference registration and expenses. The Symposium fee, including food and accommodation, will be in the region of £245, with a non-residential rate of around £85. Registration details will be released in the new year. Limited financial assistance may be available for early career scholars or scholars from South Asia. If your participation depends upon such support please indicate this when you submit your abstract.

We also welcome proposals from doctoral students, who will be allocated twenty minutes for their paper and ten minutes for discussion, and offered free registration at the Symposium. PG papers need not address the symposium theme, though it is an advantage if they do so.

We are delighted to announce our keynote speakers: Dr Jacqueline Suthren Hirst, who recently retired from Manchester University, will speak on “A Life of Comparisons”, and Prof. Oliver Freiberger of the University of Texas at Austin, will speak on “Comparing Religion Within and Beyond South Asia”.

If you would like to give a presentation, please send a title and abstract (maximum 500 words) to Dr Brian Black, b.black@lancaster.ac.uk, by the end of November 2019.

Dates for 2020 event Jul
by naomiappleton

The 2020 Spalding Symposium on Indian Religions will be held 24th-26th April in Edinburgh, with the theme of Comparison(s).

A call for papers will be issued in early September, and booking will open in December/January.

Booking closed for 2019 symposium Apr
by naomiappleton

Booking is now closed. If you have booked then you should have received confirmation of all the arrangements and a copy of the final programme.

Booking open for 2019 Symposium Jan
by naomiappleton

Booking is now open for the 2019 Symposium, which will be held at the Storey Institute, Lancaster, from Friday 12th to Sunday 14th April. A provisional programme is below.

As always, we offer two booking rates: residential £190, non-residential £85

We do not offer a reduced rate for students or other unwaged attendees. However, if you are a PhD student or early-career academic in the UK and unable to access institutional funding please email naomi.appleton@ed.ac.uk as there may be some financial assistance available.

The residential rate includes two nights of accommodation, in this case at the Travelodge in central Lancaster, where we have secured preferential rates, with breakfast served at the Storey Institute.

Both the residential and non-residential rates include teas/coffees throughout, dinner Friday and Saturday, and lunch Saturday and Sunday.

Please note: We regret that we are unable to issue a visa invitation letter unless you are a speaker at this event. We can provide confirmation of your booking, but this will not normally be sufficient for a visa application.

Booking this year is through PayPal. You do not need your own account to book – if you follow the link it will give you the option of booking using a credit or debit card.

Residential rate: £190

Non-residential rate: £85

Draft programme for 2019 Symposium

Friday 12th April

2:00-2:15: Arrival; Welcome

2:15-3:30: Keynote Speaker: Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad (Lancaster University): Anger and Gender: A Sideways Look Through Rasa Theory at Draupadī and Bhīma

3:30-4:00: Break

4:00-5:00: Lidia Wojtczak (SOAS): Menstruation, Transgression and the Othering of the Female Body in the Sanskrit Tradition

5:00-6:00: James Mallinson (SOAS): Women and early haṭhayoga

Saturday 13th April

9:00-10:00: Veena Howard (California State University, Fresno): Queen Gāndhārī’s Mapping the Battlefield through the “Divine Eye:” Toward the Hermeneutic of Reversing the Masculine Gaze and Resisting Violence

10:00-11:00: Emily Hudson (Independent Scholar): Hard-Hearted Kings and Their Abandoned, Long-Suffering Queens: Gendered Aesthetics in the Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa

11:00-11:30: Break

11:30-12:00: Katie Work: (Lancaster): Gender Balancing in Vālmīki’s Rāmāyaṇa and the Adbhuta Rāmāyaṇa

12:00-1230: Joanna Gruszewska (Krakow): Dialogues between women and Brahmins in the Therīgāthā

12:30-1:00: Annalisa Bocchetti (Naples): Gender constructions in the theological dimension of the Sufi premākhyāns: a look at Usmān’s Citrāvalī

1:00-2:00: Lunch

2:00-2:30: Monika Hirmer (SOAS): Becoming the Goddess: Reimagining Gender and Motherhood in a Contemporary South Indian Śrīvidyā Tradition

2:30-3:00: E. Sundari Johansen Hurwitt (CIIS): The Goddess and Her Shadow:
Gender, Menstruation, Purity, and Power in Kumārī Worship in Assam

3:00-3:30: Ruth Westoby (SOAS): Rajas: female principle of the yogic body

3:30-4:00: Break

4:00-5:00: Ofer Peres (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem): Worldly Affairs: Femininity and Divinity in a Premodern Tamil Literary Work

5:00-6:00: Simon Brodbeck (Cardiff University): Patrilocality in the Harivaṃśa

Sunday 14th April

9:00-10:00: Marzenna Jakubczak (Pedagogical University of Cracow): The motif of tree goddess and women’s empowerment in the ancient and contemporary India

10:00-11:00: Paolo Rosati (Sapienza University of Rome): The origin of the yoni pīṭha in Tantric mythology: Gender dialectic and śakti’s supremacy at Kāmākhyā

11:00-11:30: Break

11:30-12:45: Keynote Speaker: Sondra Hausner (University of Oxford): Gender, Ritual, and Hierarchy: Ascetic Inversions at the Great Indian Kumbh Mela

12:45-1:00: Closing Remarks

1:00-2:00: Lunch, then departure

Call for papers, 2019 symposium Sep
by naomiappleton

We invite proposals for papers for the 44th Spalding Symposium on Indian Religions, which will be hosted by Lancaster University, 12-14 April 2019.

The theme this year is ‘gender’. Our purview includes both religions of South Asian origin wherever in the world they are being practised, and those of non South Asian origin present within South Asia. We welcome papers based upon all research methods, including textual, historical, ethnographic, sociological and philosophical.

Presenters are allocated forty minutes for their paper and twenty minutes for discussion, and will normally be expected to pay their own conference registration and expenses. The Symposium fee, including food and accommodation, is predicted to be £190, with a non-residential rate of £85. Registration details will be released in the new year. Limited financial assistance may be available for early career scholars or scholars from South Asia. If your participation depends upon such support please indicate this when you submit your abstract.

We also welcome proposals from doctoral students, who will be allocated twenty minutes for their paper and ten minutes for discussion, and offered free registration at the Symposium (including accommodation). Doctoral student papers do not have to address the theme of gender, but are more than welcome to do so.

We are delighted to announce our keynote speakers and their provisional paper titles:

• Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, Fellow of the British Academy and Distinguished Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy at Lancaster University: ‘Anger and Gender: A Sideways Look Through Rasa Theory at Draupadī and Bhīma’
• Sondra Hausner, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Oxford: ‘Gender, Ritual, and Hierarchy: Ascetic Inversions at the Great Indian Kumbh Mela’

If you would like to give a paper, please send a title and abstract (maximum 500 words) to Dr Brian Black, b.black@lancaster.ac.uk, by Friday 16 November 2018.

Plans for 2019 and 2020 Symposia Jul
by naomiappleton

After having an excellent time in Durham this past spring, we have provisional details for 2019 and 2020:

The 2019 Symposium will take place in Lancaster, 12th-14th April, with the theme of Gender. A call for papers will be circulated in August, and further details will be posted on the website.

The 2020 Symposium will be held in Edinburgh, dates tbc (but in April sometime), with the theme of Comparison(s).

After these two symposia, we will be looking for a new person (or people) to take on the running of the symposium. If anyone is interested in becoming the convenor, secretary or treasurer from 2020, or in finding out more about these roles, please let me know: naomi.appleton@ed.ac.uk.

Final programme for 2018 Symposium Mar
by naomiappleton

Booking is now closed, and we are all looking forward to the event. Registered participants will receive a copy of the Abstracts book and some helpful information about the venues etc by email next week. Here is the final schedule:

Friday 13th April

1.30pm Introduction and welcome

1.45-3.00pm Opening keynote: Professor Kunal Chakrabarti (JNU)- ‘Laksmi’s Other: Brahmanical Construction of a Negative Goddess’

3.00-3.30pm Tea and coffee

3.30-4.30pm Prof. Elizabeth M. Rohlman (University of Calgary) – ‘Regions and Regionality in the Mahāpurāṇas: The Literary Cultures and Religious Communities of Western India in the Markāṇdeya Purāṇa’

4.30-5.30pm Dr Marzenna Jakubczak (Pedagogical University of Cracow) – ‘Non-theistic devotion in the classical and neo-classical Sāṃkhya and Yoga

5.30-7.00pm Dinner at Lebeneat Restaurant

7.00-8.00pm Dr Brian Black (Lancaster University) and Dr Naomi Appleton (University of Edinburgh) – ‘Teaching Indian Religions in Schools’

Saturday 14th April

9.00-10.00am Dr Christopher V. Jones (University of Oxford) – ‘Mystery and Secrecy in the Mahāyāna: A Shared Theme in the ‘Lotus’ and ‘Nirvāṇa’ Sūtras’

10.00-11.00am Prof. Natalie Gummer (Beloit College, Wisconsin) – ‘Reassessing Rasa: Sūtras, Sovereignty, and the Ritual Substance of Speech’

11.00-11.30am Tea and coffee

11.30-1.00pm Postgraduate papers

Sophie Barker (Lancaster University) – ‘“Why Would I Want to Get Married?” Negotiating Permission for Renunciation in the Therīgāthā’

Sayori Ghoshal (Columbia University NY) – ‘Locating Race in the Question of Religion in modern India’

Güzin A. Yener (University of Oxford) – ‘Practices of Kurukullā: Feminine Wisdom of Love, Power and Magic in Tibetan Buddhism’

1.00-3.00pm Lunch and then free time to explore the city

3.00-4.00pm Postgraduate papers

Durga Kale (University of Calgary) – ‘Whole Cosmos in Her Bosom: The Making of a Multifarious Deity in Coastal Maharashtra’

Zuzana Špicová (Charles University, Prague) – ‘“He Never Touched the Ground”: Bhīṣma’s Two Falls’

4.00-4.30pm Tea and coffee

4.30-5.30pm Dr Elizabeth Cecil (Leiden University) and Dr Laxshmi Greaves (Independent Researcher, Cardiff) – ‘Adorning the Lord with Garlands: 
Liṅga Worship as Lived Religion in the Images of Early North India’

5.30-6.30pm Durham roundtable discussion featuring:

Rachel Barclay (Curator, Oriental Museum)

Robin Coningham (UNESCO Professor, Archaeology)

Yulia Egorova (Reader, Anthropology)

Jonathan Miles-Watson (Associate Professor, Theology and Religion)

Tanju Sen (Community Engagement Officer, Oriental Museum)

7.00pm Dinner at Claypath deli then evening of socialising

Sunday 15th April

9.00-10.00am Dr Mikel Burley (University of Leeds) – ‘Dance of the Deodhās: Divine Possession, Blood Sacrifice and the Grotesque Body in Assamese Goddess Worship’

10.00-11.00am Dr Garima Kaushik (Nalanda University) – ‘Socio–economic imperatives in the emergence of the Sapta Matrikas Iconography’

11.00-11.30am Tea and coffee

11.30-12.45 Closing keynote: Professor (Emerita) Eleanor Nesbitt (University of Warwick) – ‘Idolatry and ethnography: reflections on two centuries of western women’s writing about Sikhs’

12.45-1.00pm Closing remarks

1.00-2.00pm Lunch and then departure
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Wed Nov 20, 2019 4:03 am

Mandatory celibacy at the heart of what's wrong
by James Carroll
Jun 9, 2010

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.


The question is often asked, “Why should celibacy and chastity be a sine qua non rule and condition of regular chelaship, or the development of psychic and occult powers?” The answer is contained in the Commentary. When we learn that the “third eye” was once a physiological organ, and that later on, owing to the gradual disappearance of spirituality and increase of materiality (Spiritual nature being extinguished by the physical), it became an atrophied organ, as little understood now by physiologists as the spleen is — when we learn this, the connection will become clear. During human life the greatest impediment in the way of spiritual development, and especially to the acquirement of Yoga powers, is the activity of our physiological senses. Sexual action being closely connected, by interaction, with the spinal cord and the grey matter of the brain, it is useless to give any longer explanation. Of course, the normal and abnormal state of the brain, and the degree of active work in the medulla oblongata, reacts powerfully on the pineal gland, for, owing to the number of “centres” in that region, which controls by far the greater majority of the physiological actions of the animal economy, and also owing to the close and intimate neighbourhood of the two, there must be exerted a very powerful “inductive” action by the medulla on the pineal gland.

All this is quite plain to the Occultist, but is very vague in the sight of the general reader. The latter must then be shown the possibility of a three-eyed man in nature, in those periods when his formation was yet in a comparatively chaotic state. Such a possibility may be inferred from anatomical and zoological knowledge, first of all; then it may rest on the assumptions of materialistic science itself.

It is asserted upon the authority of Science, and upon evidence, which is not merely a fiction of theoretical speculation this time, that many of the animals — especially among the lower orders of the vertebrata — have a third eye, now atrophied, but necessarily active in its origin. [363] The Hatteria species, a lizard of the order Lacertilia, recently discovered in New Zealand (a part of ancient Lemuria so called, mark well), presents this peculiarity in a most extraordinary manner; and not only the Hatteria punctata, but the chameleon, certain reptiles, and even fishes. It was thought, at first, that it was no more than the prolongation of the brain ending with a small protuberance, called epiphysis, a little bone separated from the main bone by a cartilage, and found in every animal. But it was soon found to be more than this. It offered — as its development and anatomical structure showed — such an analogy with that of the eye, that it was found impossible to see in it anything else. There were and are paleontologists who feel convinced to this day that this “third eye” has functioned in its origin, and they are certainly right. For this is what is said of the pineal gland in Quain’s Anatomy (Vol. II. ninth edit., pp. 830-851. “Thalamencephalon” Interbrain): —

“It is from this part, constituting at first the whole and subsequently the hinder part of the anterior primary encephalic vesicle, that the optic vesicles are developed in the earliest period, and the fore part is that in connection with which the cerebral hemispheres and accompanying parts are formed. The thalamus opticus of each side is formed by a lateral thickening of the medullary wall, while the interval between, descending towards the base, constitutes the cavity of the third ventricle with its prolongation in the infundibulum. The grey commissure afterwards stretches across the ventricular cavity. . . . . The hinder part of the roof is developed by a peculiar process, to be noticed later, into the pineal gland, which remains united on each side by its pedicles to the thalamus, and behind these a transverse band is formed as posterior commissure.

“The lamina terminalis (lamina cinerea) continues to close the third ventricle in front, below it the optic commissure forms the floor of the ventricle, and further back the infundibulum descends to be united in the sella turcica with the tissue adjoining the posterior lobe of the pituitary body.

“The two optic thalami formed from the posterior and outer part of the anterior vesicle, consist at first of a single hollow sac of nervous matter, the cavity of which communicates on each side in front with that of the commencing cerebral hemispheres, and behind with that of the middle cephalic vesicle (corpora quadrigemina). Soon, however, by increased deposit taking place in their interior, behind, below, and at the sides, the thalami become solid, and at the same time a cleft or fissure appears between them above, and penetrates down to the internal cavity, which continues open at the back part opposite the entrance of the Sylvian aqueduct. This cleft or fissure is the third ventricle. Behind, the two thalami continue united by the posterior commissure, which is distinguishable about the end of the third month, and also by the peduncles of the pineal gland. . . . .

“At an early period the optic tracts may be recognised as hollow prolongations from the outer part of the wall of the thalami while they are still vesicular. At the fourth month these tracts are distinctly formed. They subsequently are prolonged backwards into connection with the corpora quadrigemina.

“The formation of the pineal gland and pituitary body presents some of the most interesting phenomena which are connected with the development of the Thalamencephalon.”

The above is specially interesting when it is remembered that, were it not for the development of the hinder part of the cerebral hemispheres backwards, the pineal gland would be perfectly visible on the removal of the parietal bones. It is very interesting also to note the obvious connection to be traced between the (originally) hollow optic tracts and the eyes anteriorly, the pineal gland and its peduncles behind, and all of these with the optic thalami. So that the recent discoveries in connection with the third eye of Hatteria punctata have a very important bearing on the developmental history of the human senses, and on the occult assertions in the text.

It is well known, (and also regarded as a fiction now, by those who have ceased to believe in the existence of an immortal principle in man,) that Descartes saw in the pineal gland the Seat of the Soul. Although it is joined to every part of the body, he said, there is one special portion of it in which the Soul exercises its functions more specially than in any other. And, as neither the heart, nor yet the brain could be that “special” locality, he concluded that it was that little gland tied to the brain, yet having an action independent of it, as it could easily be put into a kind of swinging motion “by the animal Spirits [364] which cross the cavities of the skull in every sense.”

Unscientific as this may appear in our day of exact learning, Descartes was yet far nearer the occult truth than is any Haeckel. For the pineal gland, as shown, is far more connected with Soul and Spirit than with the physiological senses of man. Had the leading Scientists a glimmer of the real processes employed by the Evolutionary Impulse, and the winding cyclic course of this great law, they would know instead of conjecturing; and feel as certain of the future physical transformations of the human kind by the knowledge of its past forms. Then, would they see the fallacy and all the absurdity of their modern “blind-force” and mechanical processes of nature; realizing, in consequence of such knowledge, that the said pineal gland, for instance, could not but be disabled for physical use at this stage of our cycle. If the odd “eye” in man is now atrophied, it is a proof that, as in the lower animal, it has once been active; for nature never creates the smallest, the most insignificant form without some definite purpose and use. It was an active organ, we say, at that stage of evolution when the spiritual element in man reigned supreme over the hardly nascent intellectual and psychic elements. And, as the cycle ran down toward that point when the physiological senses were developed by, and went pari passu with, the growth and consolidation of the physical man, the interminable and complex vicissitudes and tribulations of zoological development, that median “eye” ended by atrophying along with the early spiritual and purely psychic characteristics in man. The eye is the mirror and also the window of the soul, says popular wisdom, [365] and Vox populi Vox Dei.

In the beginning, every class and family of living species was hermaphrodite and objectively one-eyed. In the animal, whose form was as ethereal (astrally) as that of man, before the bodies of both began to evolve their coats of skin, viz., to evolve from within without the thick coating of physical substance or matter with its internal physiological mechanism — the third eye was primarily, as in man, the only seeing organ. The two physical front eyes developed [366] later on in both brute and man, whose organ of physical sight was, at the commencement of the Third Race, in the same position as that of some of the blind vertebrata, in our day, i.e., beneath an opaque skin. [367] Only the stages of the odd, or primeval eye, in man and brute, are now inverted, as the former has already passed that animal non-rational stage in the Third Round, and is ahead of mere brute creation by a whole plane of consciousness. Therefore, while the “Cyclopean” eye was, and still is, in man the organ of spiritual sight, in the animal it was that of objective vision. And this eye, having performed its function, was replaced, in the course of physical evolution from the simple to the complex, by two eyes, and thus was stored and laid aside by nature for further use in AEons to come.

-- The Secret Doctrine: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy, by Helena P. Blavatsky


Like all Catholics, I gratefully depend on the faithful ministry of the many good priests who serve the church. Yet I offer a broad critique of something central to their lives and identities -- the rule of celibacy. Many priests will recognize the truth of what I describe. I write from inside the question, having lived as a celibate seminarian and priest for more than a decade when I was young. In the Bing Crosby glory days, celibacy was essential to the mystique that set priests apart from other clergy, the Roman collar an “Open sesame!” to respect and status. From a secular perspective, the celibate man or, in the case of nuns, woman made an impression simply by sexual unavailability. But from a religious perspective, the impact came from celibacy’s character as an all-or-nothing bet on the existence of God. The Catholic clergy lived in absolutism, which carried a magnetic pull.

The magnet is dead. Celibacy cuts to the heart of what is wrong in the church today. Despite denials from Rome, there will be no halting, much less recovering from, the mass destruction caused by the priest sex abuse scandal without reforms centered on the abandonment of celibacy as a near-universal prerequisite for ordination to the Latin-rite priesthood.

No, celibacy does not “cause” the sex abuse of minors, and yes, abusers of children come from many walks of life. Indeed, most abuse occurs within families or circles of close acquaintance. But the ongoing Catholic scandal has laid bare an essential pathology that is unique to the culture of clericalism, and mandatory celibacy is essential to it. A special problem arises when, on the one hand, homosexuality is demonized as a matter of doctrine, while, on the other, the banishment of women leaves the priest living in a homophilic world. In some men, both straight and gay, the stresses of such contradictions lead to irrepressible urges that can be indulged only by exploitation of the vulnerable and available, objects of desire who in many cases are boys, whether prepubescent or adolescent. Now we know.

Celibacy began in the early church as an ascetic discipline, rooted partly in a neo-Platonic contempt for the physical world that had nothing to do with the Gospel. The renunciation of sexual expression by men fit nicely with a patriarchal denigration of women. Nonvirginal women, typified by Eve as the temptress of Adam, were seen as a source of sin.

But it was not until the Middle Ages, at the Second Lateran Council in 1139, that celibacy was made mandatory for all Roman Catholic clergy -- a reform bracing clerical laxity and eliminating inheritance issues from church property. But because the requirement of celibacy is so extreme, it had to be mystified as sacrificial -- “a more perfect way” to God. Monastic orders of both males and females had indeed discovered in such sexual sublimation a mode of holiness, but that presumed its being both freely chosen and lived out in a nurturing community. (Religious orders continue to this day with the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience as a proven structure of service and contemplation. The vows of such orders are a separate question.) But when the monastic discipline of “chastity” was imposed on all priests as “celibacy,” something went awry. The system broke down during the Renaissance and the Reformation, with the Counter-Reformation hierarchy more attached to it than ever.

From our sister publication: GSR in the Classroom is a supplementary curriculum for use in Catholic middle and high schools and faith formation programs. Learn more.

Not sex, but power was the issue. The imposition of sexual abstinence was a mode of control over the interior lives of clergy, since submission in radical abstinence required an extraordinary abandonment of the will. In theory, the abandonment was to God; in practice, it was to the “superior.” The stakes were infinite, since sexual desire marked the threshold of hell. The normally human was, for priests, the occasion of bad faith.

Obsessive sexual moralism, along with that bad faith, spilled out of pulpits. The confessional booth became a cockpit for screening “mortal sins,” with birth control emerging as the key control mechanism over the laity. If they were willing to abide by this intrusion and its burdens, it was only because the celibate priest could be seen to have made an even greater sacrifice. They were subject to an even greater control.

As is suggested by the contemporary hierarchy’s apparent equanimity about the exodus of tens of thousands of priests, and the crisis of ministry it has caused, church authorities will pay any price to maintain a vestige of that control. That is why bishops have exchanged their once ample influence on matters of social justice for a strident single-issue obsession with abortion, a last-ditch effort to control the intimate sexual decisions of laypeople. When it comes to their clergy, the single-issue obsession remains celibacy.

This nearly changed at the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), when the bishops prepared to reconsider both birth control and celibacy. Until then, an insufficiently historically minded church had regarded such contingent questions as God-given absolutes. What was the point of even discussing them, since change was out of the question? But change was suddenly in the air. What? St. Peter was married? Even before the council acted, the myth that these disciplines were eternally willed by God was broken.

The conservative wing of the hierarchy panicked. Pope Paul VI astonished the council fathers, and the Catholic world, by making two extraordinary interventions that violated the letter and the spirit of the council. In late 1964, just as the fathers were about to debate the question of “responsible parenthood,” the pope ordered them not to take up the question of “artificial contraception.” Snap! Birth control was “removed from the competence of the council.”

But there was every sign that the council fathers, when they inevitably took up the subject of the priesthood, were still going to discuss celibacy, as if change were possible there. Yet it was politically unthinkable that the church could maintain the prohibition of birth control, the burden belonging to the laity, while letting clergy off the sexual hook by lifting the celibacy rule. Therefore, in late 1965, Paul VI made his second extraordinary intervention to forbid any discussion of priestly celibacy. A council had initiated the discipline, but a council was now not qualified even to discuss it. The power play was so blatant as to lay bare power itself as the issue. And just like that, Catholics had reason to suspect that celibacy was being maintained as a requirement of the priesthood because of internal church politics, not because of any spiritual motive. God was not the issue; the pope was. The abrupt elimination of the mystical dimension of vowed sexual abstinence left it an intolerable and inhuman way to live, which sent men streaming out of the priesthood, and stirred in many who remained a profound, and still unresolved, crisis of identity. Paul VI sought to settle the celibacy question with his 1967 encyclical Sacerdotalis Caelibatus, which proved to be a classic instance of the disease calling itself the cure.

The celibacy encyclical, maintaining the weight of “sacrifice” on clergy, prepared the way for the laity-crushing Humanae Vitae in 1968, with its re-condemnation of birth control. In response to the pope’s initial removal of birth control from the “competence” of the council, one of its leading figures, Cardinal Leon-Joseph Suenens of Belgium, rose immediately with a warning; “I beg you, my brother bishops, let us avoid a new ‘Galileo affair.’ One is enough for the church.” Galileo was famously forced to renounce what he had seen through his telescope, an imposition of dishonesty. (“And yet it moves,” he was reported to have muttered under his breath.) Paul VI’s twin re-impositions of the contraception and celibacy rules plunged the whole church into a culture of dishonesty. Catholic laypeople ignore the birth control mandate. Catholic priests find ways around the celibacy rule, some in meaningful relationships with secret lovers, some in exploitive relationships with the vulnerable, and some in criminal acts with minors. If a majority of priests are able to observe the letter of their vow, how many do so at savage personal cost? Well-adjusted priests may live happily as celibates, but how many regard the broad discipline as healthy? Insisting that celibacy is the church’s “brilliant jewel,” in Paul VI’s phrase, defines the deceit that has corrupted the Catholic soul.

But the most damaging consequence of mandatory celibacy lies in its character as the pulse of clericalism. The repressively psychotic nature of this inbred culture of power has shown itself in the still festering abuse scandal. Lies, denial, arrogance, selfishness and cowardice -- such are the notes of the structure within which Catholic priests now live, however individually virtuous many of them nevertheless remain. Celibacy is that structure’s central pillar and must be removed. The Catholic people see this clearly. It is time for us to say so.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

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A List Of Fallacious Arguments
by Don Lindsay
September 16, 2013

"The jawbone of an ass is just as dangerous a weapon today as in Sampson's time."
--- Richard Nixon


Several of these have names in Latin, but I mostly ignored that and used English.

If anyone is bothered by my using "he" everywhere, note that "he" is the person arguing fallaciously.

• Ad Hominem (Argument To The Man)
• Affirming The Consequent
• Amazing Familiarity
• Ambiguous Assertion
• Appeal To Anonymous Authority
• Appeal To Authority
• Appeal To Coincidence
• Appeal To Complexity
• Appeal To False Authority
• Appeal To Force
• Appeal To Pity (Appeal to Sympathy, The Galileo Argument)
• Appeal To Widespread Belief (Bandwagon Argument, Peer Pressure, Appeal To Common Practice)
• Argument By Dismissal
• Argument By Emotive Language (Appeal To The People)
• Argument By Fast Talking
• Argument By Generalization
• Argument By Gibberish (Bafflement)
• Argument By Half Truth (Suppressed Evidence)
• Argument By Laziness (Argument By Uninformed Opinion)
• Argument By Personal Charm
• Argument By Pigheadedness (Doggedness)
• Argument By Poetic Language
• Argument By Prestigious Jargon
• Argument By Question
• Argument By Repetition (Argument Ad Nauseam)
• Argument by Rhetorical Question
• Argument By Scenario
• Argument By Selective Observation
• Argument By Selective Reading
• Argument By Slogan
• Argument By Vehemence
• Argument From Adverse Consequences (Appeal To Fear, Scare Tactics)
• Argument From Age (Wisdom of the Ancients)
• Argument From Authority
• Argument From False Authority
• Argument From Personal Astonishment
• Argument From Small Numbers
• Argument From Spurious Similarity
• Argument Of The Beard
• Argument To The Future
• Bad Analogy
• Begging The Question (Assuming The Answer, Tautology)
• Burden Of Proof
• Causal Reductionism (Complex Cause)
• Contrarian Argument
• Changing The Subject (Digression, Red Herring, Misdirection, False Emphasis)
• Cliche Thinking
• Common Sense
• Complex Question (Tying)
• Confusing Correlation And Causation
• Disproof By Fallacy
• Equivocation
• Error Of Fact
• Euphemism
• Exception That Proves The Rule
• Excluded Middle (False Dichotomy, Faulty Dilemma, Bifurcation)
• Extended Analogy
• Failure To State
• Fallacy Of Composition
• Fallacy Of Division
• Fallacy Of The General Rule
• Fallacy Of The Crucial Experiment
• False Cause
• False Compromise
• Genetic Fallacy (Fallacy of Origins, Fallacy of Virtue)
• Having Your Cake (Failure To Assert, or Diminished Claim)
• Hypothesis Contrary To Fact
• Inconsistency
• Inflation Of Conflict
• Internal Contradiction
• Least Plausible Hypothesis
• Lies
• Meaningless Questions
• Misunderstanding The Nature Of Statistics (Innumeracy)
• Moving The Goalposts (Raising The Bar, Argument By Demanding Impossible Perfection)
• Needling
• Non Sequitur
• Not Invented Here
• Outdated Information
• Pious Fraud
• Poisoning The Wells
• Psychogenetic Fallacy
• Reductio Ad Absurdum
• Reductive Fallacy (Oversimplification)
• Reifying
• Short Term Versus Long Term
• Slippery Slope Fallacy (Camel's Nose)
• Special Pleading (Stacking The Deck)
• Statement Of Conversion
• Stolen Concept
• Straw Man (Fallacy Of Extension)
• Two Wrongs Make A Right (Tu Quoque, You Too)
• Weasel Wording

Ad Hominem (Argument To The Man):

attacking the person instead of attacking his argument. For example, "Von Daniken's books about ancient astronauts are worthless because he is a convicted forger and embezzler." (Which is true, but that's not why they're worthless.)

Another example is this syllogism, which alludes to Alan Turing's homosexuality:

Turing thinks machines think.
Turing lies with men.
Therefore, machines don't think.


(Note the equivocation in the use of the word "lies".)

A common form is an attack on sincerity. For example, "How can you argue for vegetarianism when you wear leather shoes?" The two wrongs make a right fallacy is related.

A variation (related to Argument By Generalization) is to attack a whole class of people. For example, "Evolutionary biology is a sinister tool of the materialistic, atheistic religion of Secular Humanism." Similarly, one notorious net.kook waved away a whole category of evidence by announcing "All the scientists were drunk."

Another variation is attack by innuendo: "Why don't scientists tell us what they really know; are they afraid of public panic?"

There may be a pretense that the attack isn't happening: "In order to maintain a civil debate, I will not mention my opponent's drinking problem." Or "I don't care if other people say you're [opinionated/boring/overbearing]."

Attacks don't have to be strong or direct. You can merely show disrespect, or cut down his stature by saying that he seems to be sweating a lot, or that he has forgotten what he said last week. Some examples: "I used to think that way when I was your age." "You're new here, aren't you?" "You weren't breast fed as a child, were you ?" "What drives you to make such a statement?" "If you'd just listen." "You seem very emotional." (This last works well if you have been hogging the microphone, so that they have had to yell to be heard.)

Sometimes the attack is on the other person's intelligence. For example, "If you weren't so stupid you would have no problem seeing my point of view." Or, "Even you should understand my next point."

Oddly, the stupidity attack is sometimes reversed. For example, dismissing a comment with "Well, you're just smarter than the rest of us." (In Britain, that might be put as "too clever by half".) This is Dismissal By Differentness. It is related to Not Invented Here and Changing The Subject.

Ad Hominem is not fallacious if the attack goes to the credibility of the argument. For instance, the argument may depend on its presenter's claim that he's an expert. (That is, the Ad Hominem is undermining an Argument From Authority.) Trial judges allow this category of attacks.

Needling:

simply attempting to make the other person angry, without trying to address the argument at hand. Sometimes this is a delaying tactic.

Needling is also Ad Hominem if you insult your opponent. You may instead insult something the other person believes in ("Argumentum Ad YourMomium"), interrupt, clown to show disrespect, be noisy, fail to pass over the microphone, and numerous other tricks. All of these work better if you are running things - for example, if it is your radio show, and you can cut off the other person's microphone. If the host or moderator is firmly on your side, that is almost as good as running the show yourself. It's even better if the debate is videotaped, and you are the person who will edit the video.

If you wink at the audience, or in general clown in their direction, then we are shading over to Argument By Personal Charm.

Usually, the best way to cope with insults is to show mild amusement, and remain polite. A humorous comeback will probably work better than an angry one.

Straw Man (Fallacy Of Extension):

attacking an exaggerated or caricatured version of your opponent's position.

For example, the claim that "evolution means a dog giving birth to a cat."

Another example: "Senator Jones says that we should not fund the attack submarine program. I disagree entirely. I can't understand why he wants to leave us defenseless like that."

On the Internet, it is common to exaggerate the opponent's position so that a comparison can be made between the opponent and Hitler.


Inflation Of Conflict:

arguing that scholars debate a certain point. Therefore, they must know nothing, and their entire field of knowledge is "in crisis" or does not properly exist at all.

For example, two historians debated whether Hitler killed five million Jews or six million Jews. A Holocaust denier argued that this disagreement made his claim credible, even though his death count is three to ten times smaller than the known minimum.

Similarly, in "The Mythology of Modern Dating Methods" (John Woodmorappe, 1999) we find on page 42 that two scientists "cannot agree" about which one of two geological dates is "real" and which one is "spurious". Woodmorappe fails to mention that the two dates differ by less than one percent.


Argument From Adverse Consequences (Appeal To Fear, Scare Tactics):

saying an opponent must be wrong, because if he is right, then bad things would ensue. For example: God must exist, because a godless society would be lawless and dangerous. Or: the defendant in a murder trial must be found guilty, because otherwise husbands will be encouraged to murder their wives.

Wishful thinking is closely related. "My home in Florida is one foot above sea level. Therefore I am certain that global warming will not make the oceans rise by fifteen feet." Of course, wishful thinking can also be about positive consequences, such as winning the lottery, or eliminating poverty and crime.

Special Pleading (Stacking The Deck):

using the arguments that support your position, but ignoring or somehow disallowing the arguments against.

Uri Geller used special pleading when he claimed that the presence of unbelievers (such as stage magicians) made him unable to demonstrate his psychic powers.

Excluded Middle (False Dichotomy, Faulty Dilemma, Bifurcation):

assuming there are only two alternatives when in fact there are more. For example, assuming Atheism is the only alternative to Fundamentalism, or being a traitor is the only alternative to being a loud patriot.

Short Term Versus Long Term:

this is a particular case of the Excluded Middle. For example, "We must deal with crime on the streets before improving the schools." (But why can't we do some of both?) Similarly, "We should take the scientific research budget and use it to feed starving children."

Burden Of Proof:

the claim that whatever has not yet been proved false must be true (or vice versa). Essentially the arguer claims that he should win by default if his opponent can't make a strong enough case.

There may be three problems here. First, the arguer claims priority, but can he back up that claim? Second, he is impatient with ambiguity, and wants a final answer right away. And third, "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

Argument By Question:

asking your opponent a question which does not have a snappy answer. (Or anyway, no snappy answer that the audience has the background to understand.) Your opponent has a choice: he can look weak or he can look long-winded. For example, "How can scientists expect us to believe that anything as complex as a single living cell could have arisen as a result of random natural processes?"

Actually, pretty well any question has this effect to some extent. It usually takes longer to answer a question than ask it.

Variants are the rhetorical question, and the loaded question, such as "Have you stopped beating your wife?"

Argument by Rhetorical Question:

asking a question in a way that leads to a particular answer. For example, "When are we going to give the old folks of this country the pension they deserve?" The speaker is leading the audience to the answer "Right now." Alternatively, he could have said "When will we be able to afford a major increase in old age pensions?" In that case, the answer he is aiming at is almost certainly not "Right now."

Fallacy Of The General Rule:

assuming that something true in general is true in every possible case. For example, "All chairs have four legs." Except that rocking chairs don't have any legs, and what is a one-legged "shooting stick" if it isn't a chair?

Similarly, there are times when certain laws should be broken. For example, ambulances are allowed to break speed laws.

Reductive Fallacy (Oversimplification):

over-simplifying. As Einstein said, everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler. Political slogans such as "Taxation is theft" fall in this category.

Genetic Fallacy (Fallacy of Origins, Fallacy of Virtue):

if an argument or arguer has some particular origin, the argument must be right (or wrong). The idea is that things from that origin, or that social class, have virtue or lack virtue. (Being poor or being rich may be held out as being virtuous.) Therefore, the actual details of the argument can be overlooked, since correctness can be decided without any need to listen or think.

Psychogenetic Fallacy:

if you learn the psychological reason why your opponent likes an argument, then he's biased, so his argument must be wrong.

Argument Of The Beard:

assuming that two ends of a spectrum are the same, since one can travel along the spectrum in very small steps. The name comes from the idea that being clean-shaven must be the same as having a big beard, since in-between beards exist.

Similarly, all piles of stones are small, since if you add one stone to a small pile of stones it remains small.

However, the existence of pink should not undermine the distinction between white and red.

Argument From Age (Wisdom of the Ancients):

snobbery that very old (or very young) arguments are superior. This is a variation of the Genetic Fallacy, but has the psychological appeal of seniority and tradition (or innovation).

Products labelled "New! Improved!" are appealing to a belief that innovation is of value for such products. It's sometimes true. And then there's cans of "Old Fashioned Baked Beans".

Not Invented Here:

ideas from elsewhere are made unwelcome. "This Is The Way We've Always Done It."

This fallacy is a variant of the Argument From Age. It gets a psychological boost from feelings that local ways are superior, or that local identity is worth any cost, or that innovations will upset matters.

An example of this is the common assertion that America has "the best health care system in the world", an idea that this 2007 New York Times editorial refuted.


People who use the Not Invented Here argument are sometimes accused of being stick-in-the-mud's.

Conversely, foreign and "imported" things may be held out as superior.

Argument By Dismissal:

an idea is rejected without saying why.

Dismissals usually have overtones. For example, "If you don't like it, leave the country" implies that your cause is hopeless, or that you are unpatriotic, or that your ideas are foreign, or maybe all three. "If you don't like it, live in a Communist country" adds an emotive element.


Argument To The Future:

arguing that evidence will someday be discovered which will (then) support your point.

Poisoning The Wells:

discrediting the sources used by your opponent. This is a variation of Ad Hominem.

Argument By Emotive Language (Appeal To The People):

using emotionally loaded words to sway the audience's sentiments instead of their minds. Many emotions can be useful: anger, spite, envy, condescension, and so on.

For example, argument by condescension: "Support the ERA? Sure, when the women start paying for the drinks! Hah! Hah!"

Americans who don't like the Canadian medical system have referred to it as "socialist", but I'm not quite sure if this is intended to mean "foreign", or "expensive", or simply guilty by association.

Cliche Thinking and Argument By Slogan are useful adjuncts, particularly if you can get the audience to chant the slogan. People who rely on this argument may seed the audience with supporters or "shills", who laugh, applaud or chant at proper moments. This is the live-audience equivalent of adding a laugh track or music track. Now that many venues have video equipment, some speakers give part of their speech by playing a prepared video. These videos are an opportunity to show a supportive audience, use emotional music, show emotionally charged images, and the like. The idea is old: there used to be professional cheering sections. (Monsieur Zig-Zag, pictured on the cigarette rolling papers, acquired his fame by applauding for money at the Paris Opera.)

If the emotion in question isn't harsh, Argument By Poetic Language helps the effect. Flattering the audience doesn't hurt either.

Argument By Personal Charm:

getting the audience to cut you slack. Example: Ronald Reagan. It helps if you have an opponent with much less personal charm.

Charm may create trust, or the desire to "join the winning team", or the desire to please the speaker. This last is greatest if the audience feels sex appeal.

Reportedly George W. Bush lost a debate when he was young, and said later that he would never be "out-bubba'd" again.

Appeal To Pity (Appeal to Sympathy, The Galileo Argument):

"I did not murder my mother and father with an axe! Please don't find me guilty; I'm suffering enough through being an orphan."

Some authors want you to know they're suffering for their beliefs. For example, "Scientists scoffed at Copernicus and Galileo; they laughed at Edison, Tesla and Marconi; they won't give my ideas a fair hearing either. But time will be the judge. I can wait; I am patient; sooner or later science will be forced to admit that all matter is built, not of atoms, but of tiny capsules of TIME."

There is a strange variant which shows up on Usenet. Somebody refuses to answer questions about their claims, on the grounds that the asker is mean and has hurt their feelings. Or, that the question is personal.

Appeal To Force:

threats, or even violence. On the Net, the usual threat is of a lawsuit. The traditional religious threat is that one will burn in Hell. However, history is full of instances where expressing an unpopular idea could you get you beaten up on the spot, or worse.

"The clinching proof of my reasoning is that I will cut anyone who argues further into dogmeat."

-- Attributed to Sir Geoffery de Tourneville, ca 1350 A.D.


Argument By Vehemence:

being loud. Trial lawyers are taught this rule:

If you have the facts, pound on the facts.
If you have the law, pound on the law.
If you don't have either, pound on the table.


The above rule paints vehemence as an act of desperation. But it can also be a way to seize control of the agenda, use up the opponent's time, or just intimidate the easily cowed. And it's not necessarily aimed at winning the day. A tantrum or a fit is also a way to get a reputation, so that in the future, no one will mess with you.

This is related to putting a post in UPPERCASE, aka SHOUTING.

Depending on what you're loud about, this may also be an Appeal To Force, Argument By Emotive Language, Needling, or Changing The Subject.

Begging The Question (Assuming The Answer, Tautology):

reasoning in a circle. The thing to be proved is used as one of your assumptions. For example: "We must have a death penalty to discourage violent crime". (This assumes it discourages crime.) Or, "The stock market fell because of a technical adjustment." (But is an "adjustment" just a stock market fall?)

Stolen Concept:

using what you are trying to disprove. That is, requiring the truth of something for your proof that it is false. For example, using science to show that science is wrong. Or, arguing that you do not exist, when your existence is clearly required for you to be making the argument.

This is a relative of Begging The Question, except that the circularity there is in what you are trying to prove, instead of what you are trying to disprove.

It is also a relative of Reductio Ad Absurdum, where you temporarily assume the truth of something.

Argument From Authority:

the claim that the speaker is an expert, and so should be trusted.

There are degrees and areas of expertise. The speaker is actually claiming to be more expert, in the relevant subject area, than anyone else in the room. There is also an implied claim that expertise in the area is worth having. For example, claiming expertise in something hopelessly quack (like iridology) is actually an admission that the speaker is gullible.

Argument From False Authority:

a strange variation on Argument From Authority. For example, the TV commercial which starts "I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV." Just what are we supposed to conclude?

Appeal To Anonymous Authority:

an Appeal To Authority is made, but the authority is not named. For example, "Experts agree that ..", "scientists say .." or even "they say ..". This makes the information impossible to verify, and brings up the very real possibility that the arguer himself doesn't know who the experts are. In that case, he may just be spreading a rumor.

The situation is even worse if the arguer admits it's a rumor.

Appeal To Authority:

"Albert Einstein was extremely impressed with this theory." (But a statement made by someone long-dead could be out of date. Or perhaps Einstein was just being polite. Or perhaps he made his statement in some specific context. And so on.)

To justify an appeal, the arguer should at least present an exact quote. It's more convincing if the quote contains context, and if the arguer can say where the quote comes from.

A variation is to appeal to unnamed authorities.

There was a New Yorker cartoon, showing a doctor and patient. The doctor was saying: "Conventional medicine has no treatment for your condition. Luckily for you, I'm a quack." So the joke was that the doctor boasted of his lack of authority.

Appeal To False Authority:

a variation on Appeal To Authority, but the Authority is outside his area of expertise.

For example, "Famous physicist John Taylor studied Uri Geller extensively and found no evidence of trickery or fraud in his feats." Taylor was not qualified to detect trickery or fraud of the kind used by stage magicians. Taylor later admitted Geller had tricked him, but he apparently had not figured out how.

A variation is to appeal to a non-existent authority. For example, someone reading an article by Creationist Dmitri Kuznetsov tried to look up the referenced articles. Some of the articles turned out to be in non-existent journals.

Another variation is to misquote a real authority. There are several kinds of misquotation. A quote can be inexact or have been edited. It can be taken out of context. (Chevy Chase: "Yes, I said that, but I was singing a song written by someone else at the time.") The quote can be separate quotes which the arguer glued together. Or, bits might have gone missing. For example, it's easy to prove that Mick Jagger is an assassin. In "Sympathy For The Devil" he sang: "I shouted out, who killed the Kennedys, When after all, it was ... me."


Statement Of Conversion:

the speaker says "I used to believe in X".

This is simply a weak form of asserting expertise. The speaker is implying that he has learned about the subject, and now that he is better informed, he has rejected X. So perhaps he is now an authority, and this is an implied Argument From Authority.


A more irritating version of this is "I used to think that way when I was your age." The speaker hasn't said what is wrong with your argument: he is merely claiming that his age has made him an expert.

"X" has not actually been countered unless there is agreement that the speaker has that expertise. In general, any bald claim always has to be buttressed.

For example, there are a number of Creationist authors who say they "used to be evolutionists", but the scientists who have rated their books haven't noticed any expertise about evolution.

Bad Analogy:

claiming that two situations are highly similar, when they aren't. For example, "The solar system reminds me of an atom, with planets orbiting the sun like electrons orbiting the nucleus. We know that electrons can jump from orbit to orbit; so we must look to ancient records for sightings of planets jumping from orbit to orbit also."

Or, "Minds, like rivers, can be broad. The broader the river, the shallower it is. Therefore, the broader the mind, the shallower it is."

Or, "We have pure food and drug laws; why can't we have laws to keep movie-makers from giving us filth?"


Extended Analogy:

the claim that two things, both analogous to a third thing, are therefore analogous to each other. For example, this debate:

"I believe it is always wrong to oppose the law by breaking it."
"Such a position is odious: it implies that you would not have supported Martin Luther King."
"Are you saying that cryptography legislation is as important as the struggle for Black liberation ? How dare you !"


A person who advocates a particular position (say, about gun control) may be told that Hitler believed the same thing. The clear implication is that the position is somehow tainted. But Hitler also believed that window drapes should go all the way to the floor. Does that mean people with such drapes are monsters?

Argument From Spurious Similarity:

this is a relative of Bad Analogy. It is suggested that some resemblance is proof of a relationship. There is a WW II story about a British lady who was trained in spotting German airplanes. She made a report about a certain very important type of plane. While being quizzed, she explained that she hadn't been sure, herself, until she noticed that it had a little man in the cockpit, just like the little model airplane at the training class.

Reifying:

an abstract thing is talked about as if it were concrete. (A possibly Bad Analogy is being made between concept and reality.) For example, "Nature abhors a vacuum."

False Cause:

assuming that because two things happened, the first one caused the second one. (Sequence is not causation.) For example, "Before women got the vote, there were no nuclear weapons." Or, "Every time my brother Bill accompanies me to Fenway Park, the Red Sox are sure to lose."

Essentially, these are arguments that the sun goes down because we've turned on the street lights.

Confusing Correlation And Causation:

earthquakes in the Andes were correlated with the closest approaches of the planet Uranus. Therefore, Uranus must have caused them. (But Jupiter is nearer than Uranus, and more massive too.)

When sales of hot chocolate go up, street crime drops. Does this correlation mean that hot chocolate prevents crime? No, it means that fewer people are on the streets when the weather is cold.

The bigger a child's shoe size, the better the child's handwriting. Does having big feet make it easier to write? No, it means the child is older.


Causal Reductionism (Complex Cause):

trying to use one cause to explain something, when in fact it had several causes. For example, "The accident was caused by the taxi parking in the street." (But other drivers went around the taxi. Only the drunk driver hit the taxi.)

Cliche Thinking:

using as evidence a well-known wise saying, as if that is proven, or as if it has no exceptions.

Exception That Proves The Rule:

a specific example of Cliche Thinking. This is used when a rule has been asserted, and someone points out the rule doesn't always work. The cliche rebuttal is that this is "the exception that proves the rule". Many people think that this cliche somehow allows you to ignore the exception, and continue using the rule.

In fact, the cliche originally did no such thing. There are two standard explanations for the original meaning.

The first is that the word "prove" meant test. That is why the military takes its equipment to a Proving Ground to test it. So, the cliche originally said that an exception tests a rule. That is, if you find an exception to a rule, the cliche is saying that the rule is being tested, and perhaps the rule will need to be discarded.

The second explanation is that the stating of an exception to a rule, proves that the rule exists. For example, suppose it was announced that "Over the holiday weekend, students do not need to be in the dorms by midnight". This announcement implies that normally students do have to be in by midnight. Here is a discussion of that explanation.

In either case, the cliche is not about waving away objections.


Appeal To Widespread Belief (Bandwagon Argument, Peer Pressure, Appeal to Common Practice):

the claim, as evidence for an idea, that many people believe it, or used to believe it, or do it.

If the discussion is about social conventions, such as "good manners", then this is a reasonable line of argument.

However, in the 1800's there was a widespread belief that bloodletting cured sickness. All of these people were not just wrong, but horribly wrong, because in fact it made people sicker. Clearly, the popularity of an idea is no guarantee that it's right.

Similarly, a common justification for bribery is that "Everybody does it". And in the past, this was a justification for slavery.


Fallacy Of Composition:

assuming that a whole has the same simplicity as its constituent parts. In fact, a great deal of science is the study of emergent properties. For example, if you put a drop of oil on water, there are interesting optical effects. But the effect comes from the oil/water system: it does not come just from the oil or just from the water.

Another example: "A car makes less pollution than a bus. Therefore, cars are less of a pollution problem than buses."

Another example: "Atoms are colorless. Cats are made of atoms, so cats are colorless."

Fallacy Of Division:

assuming that what is true of the whole is true of each constituent part. For example, human beings are made of atoms, and human beings are conscious, so atoms must be conscious.

Complex Question (Tying):

unrelated points are treated as if they should be accepted or rejected together. In fact, each point should be accepted or rejected on its own merits.

For example, "Do you support freedom and the right to bear arms?"


Slippery Slope Fallacy (Camel's Nose)

there is an old saying about how if you allow a camel to poke his nose into the tent, soon the whole camel will follow.

The fallacy here is the assumption that something is wrong because it is right next to something that is wrong. Or, it is wrong because it could slide towards something that is wrong.

For example, "Allowing abortion in the first week of pregnancy would lead to allowing it in the ninth month." Or, "If we legalize marijuana, then more people will try heroin." Or, "If I make an exception for you then I'll have to make an exception for everyone."

Argument By Pigheadedness (Doggedness):

refusing to accept something after everyone else thinks it is well enough proved. For example, there are still Flat Earthers.

Appeal To Coincidence:

asserting that some fact is due to chance. For example, the arguer has had a dozen traffic accidents in six months, yet he insists they weren't his fault. This may be Argument By Pigheadedness. But on the other hand, coincidences do happen, so this argument is not always fallacious.

Argument By Repetition (Argument Ad Nauseam):

if you say something often enough, some people will begin to believe it. There are some net.kooks who keeping reposting the same articles to Usenet, presumably in hopes it will have that effect.

Argument By Half Truth (Suppressed Evidence):

this is hard to detect, of course. You have to ask questions. For example, an amazingly accurate "prophecy" of the assassination attempt on President Reagan was shown on TV. But was the tape recorded before or after the event? Many stations did not ask this question. (It was recorded afterwards.)

A book on "sea mysteries" or the "Bermuda Triangle" might tell us that the yacht Connemara IV was found drifting crewless, southeast of Bermuda, on September 26, 1955. None of these books mention that the yacht had been directly in the path of Hurricane Iona, with 180 mph winds and 40-foot waves.

Argument By Selective Observation:

also called cherry picking, the enumeration of favorable circumstances, or as the philosopher Francis Bacon described it, counting the hits and forgetting the misses. For example, a state boasts of the Presidents it has produced, but is silent about its serial killers. Or, the claim "Technology brings happiness". (Now, there's something with hits and misses.)

Casinos encourage this human tendency. There are bells and whistles to announce slot machine jackpots, but losing happens silently. This makes it much easier to think that the odds of winning are good.


Argument By Selective Reading:

making it seem as if the weakest of an opponent's arguments was the best he had. Suppose the opponent gave a strong argument X and also a weaker argument Y. Simply rebut Y and then say the opponent has made a weak case.

This is a relative of Argument By Selective Observation, in that the arguer overlooks arguments that he does not like. It is also related to Straw Man (Fallacy Of Extension), in that the opponent's argument is not being fairly represented.

Argument By Generalization:

drawing a broad conclusion from a small number of perhaps unrepresentative cases. (The cases may be unrepresentative because of Selective Observation.) For example, "They say 1 out of every 5 people is Chinese. How is this possible? I know hundreds of people, and none of them is Chinese." So, by generalization, there aren't any Chinese anywhere. This is connected to the Fallacy Of The General Rule.

Similarly, "Because we allow terminally ill patients to use heroin, we should allow everyone to use heroin."

It is also possible to under-generalize. For example,

"A man who had killed both of his grandmothers declared himself rehabilitated, on the grounds that he could not conceivably repeat his offense in the absence of any further grandmothers."

-- "Ports Of Call" by Jack Vance


Argument From Small Numbers:

"I've thrown three sevens in a row. Tonight I can't lose." This is Argument By Generalization, but it assumes that small numbers are the same as big numbers. (Three sevens is actually a common occurrence. Thirty three sevens is not.)

Or: "After treatment with the drug, one-third of the mice were cured, one-third died, and the third mouse escaped." Does this mean that if we treated a thousand mice, 333 would be cured ? Well, no.

Misunderstanding The Nature Of Statistics (Innumeracy):

President Dwight Eisenhower expressed astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans had below average intelligence. Similarly, some people get fearful when they learn that their doctor wasn't in the top half of his class. (But that's half of them.)

"Statistics show that of those who contract the habit of eating, very few survive."

-- Wallace Irwin.


Very few people seem to understand "regression to the mean". This is the idea that things tend to go back to normal. If you feel normal today, does it really mean that the headache cure you took yesterday performed wonders? Or is it just that your headaches are always gone the next day?

Journalists are notoriously bad at reporting risks. For example, in 1995 it was loudly reported that a class of contraceptive pills would double the chance of dangerous blood clots. The news stories mostly did not mention that "doubling" the risk only increased it by one person in 7,000. The "cell phones cause brain cancer" reports are even sillier, with the supposed increase in risk being at most one or two cancers per 100,000 people per year. So, if the fearmongers are right, your cellphone has increased your risk from "who cares" to "who cares".

Inconsistency:

for example, the declining life expectancy in the former Soviet Union is due to the failures of communism. But, the quite high infant mortality rate in the United States is not a failure of capitalism.

This is related to Internal Contradiction.

Non Sequitur:

something that just does not follow. For example, "Tens of thousands of Americans have seen lights in the night sky which they could not identify. The existence of life on other planets is fast becoming certainty!"

Another example: arguing at length that your religion is of great help to many people. Then, concluding that the teachings of your religion are undoubtably true.

Or: "Bill lives in a large building, so his apartment must be large."


Meaningless Questions:

irresistible forces meeting immovable objects, and the like.

Argument By Poetic Language:

if it sounds good, it must be right. Songs often use this effect to create a sort of credibility - for example, "Don't Fear The Reaper" by Blue Oyster Cult. Politically oriented songs should be taken with a grain of salt, precisely because they sound good.

Argument By Slogan:

if it's short, and connects to an argument, it must be an argument. (But slogans risk the Reductive Fallacy.)

Being short, a slogan increases the effectiveness of Argument By Repetition. It also helps Argument By Emotive Language (Appeal To The People), since emotional appeals need to be punchy. (Also, the gallery can chant a short slogan.) Using an old slogan is Cliche Thinking.

Argument By Prestigious Jargon:

using big complicated words so that you will seem to be an expert. Why do people use "utilize" when they could utilize "use"?

For example, crackpots used to claim they had a Unified Field Theory (after Einstein). Then the word Quantum was popular. Lately it seems to be Zero Point Fields.


Argument By Gibberish (Bafflement):

this is the extreme version of Argument By Prestigious Jargon. An invented vocabulary helps the effect, and some net.kooks use lots of CAPitaLIZation. However, perfectly ordinary words can be used to baffle. For example, "Omniscience is greater than omnipotence, and the difference is two. Omnipotence plus two equals omniscience. META = 2." [From R. Buckminster Fuller's No More Secondhand God.]

Gibberish may come from people who can't find meaning in technical jargon, so they think they should copy style instead of meaning. It can also be a "snow job", AKA "baffle them with BS", by someone actually familiar with the jargon. Or it could be Argument By Poetic Language.

An example of poetic gibberish: "Each autonomous individual emerges holographically within egoless ontological consciousness as a non-dimensional geometric point within the transcendental thought-wave matrix."

Equivocation:

using a word to mean one thing, and then later using it to mean something different. For example, sometimes "Free software" costs nothing, and sometimes it is without restrictions. Some examples:

"The sign said 'fine for parking here', and since it was fine, I parked there."

All trees have bark.
All dogs bark.
Therefore, all dogs are trees.


"Consider that two wrongs never make a right, but that three lefts do."

- "Deteriorata", National Lampoon


Euphemism:

the use of words that sound better. The lab rat wasn't killed, it was sacrificed. Mass murder wasn't genocide, it was ethnic cleansing. The death of innocent bystanders is collateral damage. Microsoft doesn't find bugs, or problems, or security vulnerabilities: they just discover an issue with a piece of software.

This is related to Argument By Emotive Language, since the effect is to make a concept emotionally palatable.

Weasel Wording:

this is very much like Euphemism, except that the word changes are done to claim a new, different concept rather than soften the old concept. For example, an American President may not legally conduct a war without a declaration of Congress. So, various Presidents have conducted "police actions", "armed incursions", "protective reaction strikes," "pacification," "safeguarding American interests," and a wide variety of "operations". Similarly, War Departments have become Departments of Defense, and untested medicines have become alternative medicines. The book "1984" has some particularly good examples.

Error Of Fact:

for example, "No one knows how old the Pyramids of Egypt are." (Except, of course, for the historians who've read records and letters written by the ancient Egyptians themselves.)

Typically, the presence of one error means that there are other errors to be uncovered.

Argument From Personal Astonishment:

Errors of Fact caused by stating offhand opinions as proven facts. (The speaker's thought process being "I don't see how this is possible, so it isn't.") An example from Creationism is given here.

This isn't lying, quite. It just seems that way to people who know more about the subject than the speaker does.

Lies:

intentional Errors of Fact. In some contexts this is called bluffing.

If the speaker thinks that lying serves a moral end, this would be a Pious Fraud.

Contrarian Argument:

in science, espousing some thing that the speaker knows is generally ill-regarded, or even generally held to be disproven. For example, claiming that HIV is not the cause of AIDS, or claiming that homeopathic remedies are not just placebos.

In politics, the phrase may be used more broadly, to mean espousing some position that the establishment or opposition party does not hold.

This is sometimes done to make people think, and sometimes it is needling, or perhaps it supports an external agenda. But it can also be done just to oppose conformity, or as a pose or style choice: to be a "maverick" or lightning rod. Or, perhaps just for the ego of standing alone:

"It is not enough to succeed. Friends must be seen to have failed."

-- Truman Capote


"If you want to prove yourself a brilliant scientist, you don't always agree with the consensus. You show you're right and everyone else is wrong."

-- Daniel Kirk-Davidoff discussing Richard Lindzen


Calling someone contrarian risks the Psychogenetic Fallacy. People who are annoying are not necessarily wrong. On the other hand, if the position is ill-regarded for a reason, then defending it may be uphill.

Trolling is Contrarian Argument done to get a reaction. Trolling on the Internet often involves pretense.

Hypothesis Contrary To Fact:

arguing from something that might have happened, but didn't.

Internal Contradiction:

saying two contradictory things in the same argument. For example, claiming that Archaeopteryx is a dinosaur with hoaxed feathers, and also saying in the same book that it is a "true bird". Or another author who said on page 59, "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle writes in his autobiography that he never saw a ghost." But on page 200 we find "Sir Arthur's first encounter with a ghost came when he was 25, surgeon of a whaling ship in the Arctic.."

This is much like saying "I never borrowed his car, and it already had that dent when I got it."

This is related to Inconsistency.

Changing The Subject (Digression, Red Herring, Misdirection, False Emphasis):

this is sometimes used to avoid having to defend a claim, or to avoid making good on a promise. In general, there is something you are not supposed to notice.

For example, I got a bill which had a big announcement about how some tax had gone up by 5%, and the costs would have to be passed on to me. But a quick calculation showed that the increased tax was only costing me a dime, while a different part of the the bill had silently gone up by $10.

This is connected to various diversionary tactics, which may be obstructive, obtuse, or needling. For example, if you quibble about the meaning of some word a person used, they may be quite happy about being corrected, since that means they've derailed you, or changed the subject. They may pick nits in your wording, perhaps asking you to define "is". They may deliberately misunderstand you:

"You said this happened five years before Hitler came to power. Why are you so fascinated with Hitler? Are you anti-Semitic?"


It is also connected to various rhetorical tricks, such as announcing that there cannot be a question period because the speaker must leave. (But then he doesn't leave.)

Argument By Fast Talking:

if you go from one idea to the next quickly enough, the audience won't have time to think. This is connected to Changing The Subject and (to some audiences) Argument By Personal Charm.

However, some psychologists say that to understand what you hear, you must for a brief moment believe it. If this is true, then rapid delivery does not leave people time to reject what they hear.

Having Your Cake (Failure To Assert, or Diminished Claim):

almost claiming something, but backing out. For example, "It may be, as some suppose, that ghosts can only be seen by certain so-called sensitives, who are possibly special mutations with, perhaps, abnormally extended ranges of vision and hearing. Yet some claim we are all sensitives."

Another example: "I don't necessarily agree with the liquefaction theory, nor do I endorse all of Walter Brown's other material, but the geological statements are informative." The strange thing here is that liquefaction theory (the idea that the world's rocks formed in flood waters) was demolished in 1788. To "not necessarily agree" with it, today, is in the category of "not necessarily agreeing" with 2+2=3. But notice that writer implies some study of the matter, and only partial rejection.


A similar thing is the failure to rebut. Suppose I raise an issue. The response that "Woodmorappe's book talks about that" could possibly be a reference to a resounding rebuttal. Or perhaps the responder hasn't even read the book yet. How can we tell ? [I later discovered it was the latter.]

Ambiguous Assertion:

a statement is made, but it is sufficiently unclear that it leaves some sort of leeway. For example, a book about Washington politics did not place quotation marks around quotes. This left ambiguity about which parts of the book were first-hand reports and which parts were second-hand reports, assumptions, or outright fiction.

Of course, lack of clarity is not always intentional. Sometimes a statement is just vague.

If the statement has two different meanings, this is Amphiboly. For example, "Last night I shot a burglar in my pyjamas."

Failure To State:

if you make enough attacks, and ask enough questions, you may never have to actually define your own position on the topic.

Outdated Information:

information is given, but it is not the latest information on the subject. For example, some creationist articles about the amount of dust on the moon quote a measurement made in the 1950's. But many much better measurements have been done since then.

Amazing Familiarity:

the speaker seems to have information that there is no possible way for him to get, on the basis of his own statements. For example: "The first man on deck, seaman Don Smithers, yawned lazily and fingered his good luck charm, a dried seahorse. To no avail! At noon, the Sea Ranger was found drifting aimlessly, with every man of its crew missing without a trace!"

Least Plausible Hypothesis:

ignoring all of the most reasonable explanations. This makes the desired explanation into the only one. For example: "I left a saucer of milk outside overnight. In the morning, the milk was gone. Clearly, my yard was visited by fairies."

There is an old rule for deciding which explanation is the most plausible. It is most often called "Occam's Razor", and it basically says that the simplest is the best. The current phrase among scientists is that an explanation should be "the most parsimonious", meaning that it should not introduce new concepts (like fairies) when old concepts (like neighborhood cats) will do.

On ward rounds, medical students love to come up with the most obscure explanations for common problems. A traditional response is to tell them "If you hear hoof beats, don't automatically think of zebras".

Argument By Scenario:

telling a story which ties together unrelated material, and then using the story as proof they are related.

Affirming The Consequent:

logic reversal. A correct statement of the form "if P then Q" gets turned into "Q therefore P".

For example,

"All cats die; Socrates died; therefore Socrates was a cat."

Another example: "If the earth orbits the sun, then the nearer stars will show an apparent annual shift in position relative to more distant stars (stellar parallax). Observations show conclusively that this parallax shift does occur. This proves that the earth orbits the sun." In reality, it proves that Q [the parallax] is consistent with P [orbiting the sun]. But it might also be consistent with some other theory.
(Other theories did exist. They are now dead, because although they were consistent with a few facts, they were not consistent with all the facts.)

Another example: "If space creatures were kidnapping people and examining them, the space creatures would probably hypnotically erase the memories of the people they examined. These people would thus suffer from amnesia. But in fact many people do suffer from amnesia. This tends to prove they were kidnapped and examined by space creatures." This is also a Least Plausible Hypothesis explanation.

Moving The Goalposts (Raising The Bar, Argument By Demanding Impossible Perfection):

if your opponent successfully addresses some point, then say he must also address some further point. If you can make these points more and more difficult (or diverse) then eventually your opponent must fail. If nothing else, you will eventually find a subject that your opponent isn't up on.

This is related to Argument By Question. Asking questions is easy: it's answering them that's hard.


If each new goal causes a new question, this may get to be Infinite Regression.

It is also possible to lower the bar, reducing the burden on an argument. For example, a person who takes Vitamin C might claim that it prevents colds. When they do get a cold, then they move the goalposts, by saying that the cold would have been much worse if not for the Vitamin C.

Appeal To Complexity:

if the arguer doesn't understand the topic, he concludes that nobody understands it. So, his opinions are as good as anybody's.

Common Sense:

unfortunately, there simply isn't a common-sense answer for many questions. In politics, for example, there are a lot of issues where people disagree. Each side thinks that their answer is common sense. Clearly, some of these people are wrong.

The reason they are wrong is because common sense depends on the context, knowledge and experience of the observer. That is why instruction manuals will often have paragraphs like these:

When boating, use common sense. Have one life preserver for each person in the boat.

When towing a water skier, use common sense. Have one person watching the skier at all times.


If the ideas are so obvious, then why the second sentence? Why do they have to spell it out? The answer is that "use common sense" actually meant "pay attention, I am about to tell you something that inexperienced people often get wrong."

Science has discovered a lot of situations which are far more unfamiliar than water skiing. Not surprisingly, beginners find that much of it violates their common sense. For example, many people can't imagine how a mountain range would form. But in fact anyone can take good GPS equipment to the Himalayas, and measure for themselves that those mountains are rising today.

If a speaker tells an audience that he supports using common sense, it is very possibly an Ambiguous Assertion.

Argument By Laziness (Argument By Uninformed Opinion):

the arguer hasn't bothered to learn anything about the topic. He nevertheless has an opinion, and will be insulted if his opinion is not treated with respect. For example, someone looked at a picture on one of my web pages, and made a complaint which showed that he hadn't even skimmed through the words on the page. When I pointed this out, he replied that I shouldn't have had such a confusing picture.

Disproof By Fallacy:

if a conclusion can be reached in an obviously fallacious way, then the conclusion is incorrectly declared wrong. For example,

"Take the division 64/16. Now, canceling a 6 on top and a six on the bottom, we get that 64/16 = 4/1 = 4."
"Wait a second! You can't just cancel the six!"
"Oh, so you're telling us 64/16 is not equal to 4, are you?"


Note that this is different from Reductio Ad Absurdum, where your opponent's argument can lead to an absurd conclusion. In this case, an absurd argument leads to a normal conclusion.

Reductio Ad Absurdum:

showing that your opponent's argument leads to some absurd conclusion. This is in general a reasonable and non-fallacious way to argue. If the issues are razor-sharp, it is a good way to completely destroy his argument. However, if the waters are a bit muddy, perhaps you will only succeed in showing that your opponent's argument does not apply in all cases, That is, using Reductio Ad Absurdum is sometimes using the Fallacy Of The General Rule. However, if you are faced with an argument that is poorly worded, or only lightly sketched, Reductio Ad Absurdum may be a good way of pointing out the holes.

An example of why absurd conclusions are bad things:

Bertrand Russell, in a lecture on logic, mentioned that in the sense of material implication, a false proposition implies any proposition. A student raised his hand and said "In that case, given that 1 = 0, prove that you are the Pope". Russell immediately replied, "Add 1 to both sides of the equation: then we have 2 = 1. The set containing just me and the Pope has 2 members. But 2 = 1, so it has only 1 member; therefore, I am the Pope."


False Compromise:

if one does not understand a debate, it must be "fair" to split the difference, and agree on a compromise between the opinions. (But one side is very possibly wrong, and in any case one could simply suspend judgment.) Journalists often invoke this fallacy in the name of "balanced" coverage.

"Some say the sun rises in the east, some say it rises in the west; the truth lies probably somewhere in between."


Television reporters like balanced coverage so much that they may give half of their report to a view held by a small minority of the people in question. There are many possible reasons for this, some of them good. However, viewers need to be aware of this tendency.

Fallacy Of The Crucial Experiment:

claiming that some idea has been proved (or disproved) by a pivotal discovery. This is the "smoking gun" version of history.

Scientific progress is often reported in such terms. This is inevitable when a complex story is reduced to a soundbite, but it's almost always a distortion. In reality, a lot of background happens first, and a lot of buttressing (or retraction) happens afterwards. And in natural history, most of the theories are about how often certain things happen (relative to some other thing). For those theories, no one experiment could ever be conclusive.

Two Wrongs Make A Right (Tu Quoque, You Too, What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander):

a charge of wrongdoing is answered by a rationalization that others have sinned, or might have sinned. For example, Bill borrows Jane's expensive pen, and later finds he hasn't returned it. He tells himself that it is okay to keep it, since she would have taken his.

War atrocities and terrorism are often defended in this way.

Similarly, some people defend capital punishment on the grounds that the state is killing people who have killed.


This is related to Ad Hominem (Argument To The Man).

Pious Fraud:

a fraud done to accomplish some good end, on the theory that the end justifies the means.

For example, a church in Canada had a statue of Christ which started to weep tears of blood. When analyzed, the blood turned out to be beef blood. We can reasonably assume that someone with access to the building thought that bringing souls to Christ would justify his small deception.


In the context of debates, a Pious Fraud could be a lie. More generally, it would be when an emotionally committed speaker makes an assertion that is shaded, distorted or even fabricated. For example, British Prime Minister Tony Blair was accused in 2003 of "sexing up" his evidence that Iraq had Weapons of Mass Destruction.

Around the year 400, Saint Augustine wrote two books, De Mendacio[On Lying] and Contra Medacium[Against Lying], on this subject. He argued that the sin isn't in what you do (or don't) say, but in your intent to leave a false impression. He strongly opposed Pious Fraud. I believe that Martin Luther also wrote on the subject.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Wed Nov 20, 2019 11:14 pm

German Theosophical Society
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 11/20/19

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The German Theosophical Society (DTG) was a theosophical association that existed from 1894 to 1902. Both Rudolf Steiner, the founder of anthroposophy, and his future wife, Marie von Sivers, had joined the DTG in 1902 and 1900 respectively, becoming members of the Theosophical Society Adyar (Adyar-TG).

History

The DTG emerged from the merger of the Theosophical Association and the Esoteric Circle, both of which originated mainly from readers of the magazine [Die] Sphinx. The esoteric circle was founded on November 3, 1893 in Berlin by Wilhelm Hübbe Schleiden, the Theosophical Association was founded in 1892 ibid, also by Wilhelm von Hübbe-Schleiden. Hübbe-Schleiden also acted as president of these rather loose and disorganized groups. They understood themselves as a branch of the Theosophical Society and therefore represented their doctrine. The merger also sought a tighter structure and reorientation towards the teachings of the Theosophical Society. The reunion took place on June 29, 1894, in the presence of Henry Steel Olcott, one of the founders and president of the Theosophical Society. Organizationally, the DTG was run as a branch of the European section of the Theosophical Society . Seat of the new society was Berlin. Wilhelm Hübbe Schleiden was elected President of the DTG.

The Theosophical Society split in 1895 as a result of Judge Case in two competing organizations. On the one hand the Theosophical Society Adyar (Adyar TG) and on the other hand the Theosophical Society in America , the DTG followed the schism of the Adyar TG direction under the leadership of Olcotts. In the following years, several smaller lodges were founded under the DTG umbrella

During these years numerous, sometimes competing, theosophical groups were founded throughout Germany, mostly with different goals, but each group relied on being in possession of the "true" and "right" theosophy. Hübbe Schleiden himself took part in a Theosophical Congress on August 25, 1901 to unite all different groups in Germany. However, no agreement could be reached. As a result, the members of the DTG, along with several like-minded theosophical groups on October 19, 1902 founded a separate German section of the Theosophical Society. In this DTG was integrated and thus went out as an independent organization.

Rudolf Steiner in the DTG

The Berlin Lodge of DTG was headed by Cay Lorenz Graf von Brockdorff as secretary, ranked he was under Wilhelm von Hübbe-Schleiden, the president of the entire (small) DTG group. [1]

On September 13, 1900, Rudolf Steiner gave a lecture in the literary circle "The Coming" about The Personality of Nietzsche. The audience included Count von Brockdorff and his wife Sophie Gräfin von Brockdorff. These were very impressed by Steiner's speech and then invited him to hold the same lecture again in their Berlin DTG box. Steiner accepted the invitation at the end of September 1900 and noticed for the first time that the listeners were more open-minded here for spiritual and, above all, supernatural teachings than he previously knew. Steiner himself remarked:

"Now I noticed that within the audience were personalities of great interest to the spirit world. Therefore, when asked to give a second lecture, I proposed the theme: "Goethe's Secret Revelation." And in this lecture, I became quite [...] esoteric. It was an important experience for me to be able to speak in words that were shaped out of the spiritual world, because until now, in my time in Berlin, I was forced by the circumstances to let the spiritual shine through my representations. "

- Rudolf Steiner : My life story [2]


The Brockdorffs invited Steiner to give lectures on a regular basis. From October 6, 1900 to April 27, 1901 Steiner lectured in a total of 27 lectures on the mysticism of the Middle Ages, these he published in 1901 in book form The mysticism in the rise of modern intellectual life . From October 5, 1901 to March 22, 1902, another 18 lectures followed, printed in 1902 under the title Christianity as a Mystical Fact . [3] [4] [5]

Already in November 1900, Marie von Sivers, Steiner's later wife, joined DTG and met Steiner during one of his lectures that same month. When at the end of 1901 Count Brockdorff wanted to resign from his secretary post due to age reasons, he asked Steiner if he wanted to become his successor. Steiner accepted on the condition that Sivers supported him in this activity. On January 17, 1902, Steiner, who until now had only been a guest, joined the DTG and became a member of the Theosophical Society Adyar. At the same time he also took over the office of secretary of the Berlin DTG Lodge. [3] [4] [5]

As already mentioned above, several like-minded theosophical lodges wanted to found their own German section of the Theosophical Society (DSdTG). At the end of April 1902, Steiner was approached with the idea of ​​becoming Secretary General of this DSdTG. He reasserted on the premise that Sivers would become his secretary. As a result, Steiner and Sivers traveled to London in July 1902 as official representatives of their lodge for a theosophical congress. Here they met with Henry Steel Olcott, then president of the Adyar TG, to receive from this a deed of foundation for the official founding of the DSdTG. On October 20, 1902 Annie Besant brought this document together with the certificate of appointment to the Secretary General to Berlin, where on this day the founding event of the DSdTG took place. [3] [4] [5]

Sources

1. Steiner & Spirit - Fruits of Anthroposophy: Steiner & Spirit Fruits of Anthroposophy ( Memento of 6 February 2009 in the Internet Archive )
2. Rudolf Steiner - My life: Steiner, Rudolf: My life (1923-25) ( Memento of January 16, 2006 in the Internet Archive ), page 200f.
3. Rudolf Steiner - My Life: Steiner, Rudolf: My Life (1923-25) ( Memento of 16 January 2006 in the Internet Archive )
4. Günther Wachsmuth: Rudolf Steiner's earthly life and work, from the turn of the century to death, the birth of spiritual science . Philosophical Anthroposophic Publishing House at the Goetheanum, Dornach 1964.
5. Gerhard Wehr: Rudolf Steiner, Life - Knowledge - Cultural Impetus . Diogenes, Zurich 1993, ISBN 3-257-22615-2 .

Literature

• Norbert Klatt: Theosophy and Anthroposophy, new aspects of her story from the estate of Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (1846-1916) with a selection of 81 letters . Klatt, Göttingen 1993, ISBN 3-928312-02-2.

Web links

• Overview of the TG in Germany
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Wilhelm Hubbe-Schleiden
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Accessed: 11/20/19

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In July 1884 the first German Theosophical Society was established under the presidency of Wilhelm Hubbe-Schleiden (1846-1916) at Elberfeld, where Blavatsky and her chief collaborator, Henry Steel Olcott, were staying with their theosophical friends, the Gebhards. At this time Hubbe-Schleiden was employed as a senior civil servant at the Colonial Office in Hamburg. He had travelled widely, once managing an estate in West Africa and was a prominent figure in the political lobby for an expanded German overseas empire. Olcott and Hubbe-Schleiden travelled to Munich and Dresden to make contact with scattered theosophists and so lay the basis for a German organization. It has been suggested that this hasty attempt to found a German movement sprang from Blavatsky's desire for a new centre after a scandal involving charges of charlatanism against the theosophists at Madras early in 1884. Blavatsky's methods of producing occult phenomena and messages from her masters had aroused suspicion in her entourage and led eventually to an enquiry and an unfavourable report upon her activities by the London Society for Psychical Research. Unfortunately for Hubbe-Schleiden, his presidency lapsed when the formal German organization dissolved, once the scandal became more widely publicized following the exodus of the theosophists from India in April 1885. Henceforth Blavatsky lived in London and found eager new pupils amongst the upper classes of Victorian England.

In 1886 Hubbe-Schleiden stimulated a more serious awareness of occultism in Germany through the publication or a scholarly monthly periodical, Die Sphinx, which was concerned with a discussion of spiritualism, psychical research, and paranormal phenomena from a scientific point of view. Its principal contributors were eminent psychologists, philosophers and historians. Here Max Dessoir expounded hypnotism, while Eduard von Hartmann developed a philosophy of 'individualism', according to which the ego survived death as a discarnate entity, against a background of Kantian thought, Christian theology, and spiritualist speculations. Carl du Prel, the psychical researcher, and his colleague Lazar von Hellenbach, who had held seances with the famous American medium Henry Slade in Vienna, both contributed essays in a similar vein. Another important member of the Sphinx circle was Karl Kiesewetter, whose studies in the history of the post-Renaissance esoteric tradition brought knowledge of the scholar magicians, the early modern alchemists and contemporary occultism to a wider audience. While not itself theosophical, Hubbe-Schleiden's periodical was a powerful element in the German occult revival until it ceased publication in 1895.

Besides this scientific current of occultism, there arose in the 1890s a broader German theosophical movement, which derived mainly from the popularizing efforts of Franz Hartmann (1838-1912). Hartmann had been born in Donauworth and brought up in Kempten, where his father held office as a court doctor. After military service with a Bavarian artillery regiment in 1859, Hartmann began his medical studies at Munich University. While on vacation in France during 1865, he took a post as ship's doctor on a vessel bound for the United States, where he spent the next eighteen years of his life. After completing his training at St Louis he opened an eye clinic and practised there until 1870. He then travelled round Mexico, settled briefly at New Orleans before continuing to Texas in 1873, and in 1878 went to Georgetown in Colorado, where he became coroner in 1882. Besides his medical practice he claimed to have a speculative interest in gold- and silver-mining. By the beginning of the 1870s he had also become interested in American spiritualism, attending the seances of the movement's leading figures such as Mrs Rice Holmes and Kate Wentworth, while immersing himself in the writings of Judge Edmonds and Andrew Jackson Davis. However, following his discovery of Isis Unveiled, theosophy replaced spiritualism as his principal diversion. He resolved to visit the theosophists at Madras, travelling there by way of California, Japan and South-East Asia in late 1883. While Blavatsky and Olcott visited Europe in early 1884, Hartmann was appointed acting president of the Society during their absence. He remained at the Society headquarters until the theosophists finally left India in April 1885.

Hartmann's works were firstly devoted to Rosicrucian initiates, Paracelsus, Jakob Boehme and other topics in the Western esoteric tradition, and were published in America and England between 1884 and 1891. However, once he had established himself as a director of a Lebensreform sanatorium at Hallein near Salzburg upon his return to Europe in 1885, Hartmann began to disseminate the new wisdom of the East to his own countrymen. In 1889 he founded, together with Alfredo Pioda and Countess Constance Wachtmeister, the close friend of Blavatsky, a theosophical lay-monastery at Ascona, a place noted for its many anarchist experiments. From 1892 translations of Indian sacred texts and Blavatsky's writings were printed in his periodical, Lotusbluthen [Lotus Blossoms] (1892-1900), which was the first German publication to sport the theosophical swastika upon its cover. In the second half of this decade the first peak in German theosophical publishing occurred. Wilhelm Friedrich of Leipzig, the publishers of Hartmann's magazine, issued a twelve-volume book series, Bibliothek esoterischer Schriften [Library of Esoteric Writings] (1898-1900), while Hugo Goring, a theosophist in Weimar, edited a thirty-volume book series, Theosophische Schriften [Theosophical Writings] (1894-96). Both series consisted of German translations from Blavatsky's successors in England, Annie Besant and Charles Leadbeater, together with original studies by Hartmann and Hubbe-Schleiden. The chief concern of these small books lay with abstruse cosmology, karma, spiritualism and the actuality of the hidden mahatmas. In addition to this output must be mentioned Hartmann's translations of the Bhagavad Gita, the Tao-Te-King and the Tattwa Bodha, together with his own monographs on Buddhism, Christian mysticism and Paracelsus…

If the German occult subculture was well developed before the First World War, Vienna could also look back on a ripe tradition of occult interest. The story of this tradition is closely linked with Friedrich Eckstein (1861-1939). The personal secretary of the composer Anton Bruckner, this brilliant polymath cultivated a wide circle of acquaintance amongst the leading thinkers, writers and musicians of Vienna. His penchant for occultism first became evident as a member of a Lebensreform group who had practised vegetarianism and discussed the doctrines of Pythagoras and the Neo-Platonists in Vienna at the end of the 1870s. His esoteric interests later extended to German and Spanish mysticism, the legends surrounding the Templars, and the Freemasons, Wagnerian mythology, and oriental religions. In 1880 he befriended the Viennese mathematician Oskar Simony, who was impressed by the metaphysical theories of Professor Friedrich Zollner of Leipzig. Zollner had hypothesized that spiritualistic phenomena confirmed the existence of a fourth dimension. Eckstein and Simony were also associated with the Austrian psychical researcher, Lazar von Hellenbach, who performed scientific experiments with mediums in a state of trance and contributed to Die Sphinx. Following his cordial meeting with Blavatsky in 1886, Eckstein gathered a group of theosophists in Vienna. During the late 1880s both Franz Hartmann and the young Rudolf Steiner were habitues of this circle. Eckstein was also acquainted with the mystical group around the illiterate Christian pietist, Alois Mailander (1844-1905), who was lionized at Kempten and later at Darmstadt by many theosophists, including Hartmann and Hubbe-Schleiden. Eckstein corresponded with Gustav Meyrink, founder of the Blue Star theosophical lodge at Prague in 1891, who later achieved renown as an occult novelist before the First World War. In 1887 a Vienna Theosophical Society was founded with Eckstein as president and Count Karl zu Leiningen-Billigheim as secretary.

-- The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence on Nazi Ideology: The Arisophists of Austria and Germany, 1890-1935, by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke


An easy Wikipedia search showed that many leading occultists and theosophists made pilgrimages to [Alois] Mailander and his Circle of Pansophists, known as the “Association of Promise” which he later opened in Dreieichenhain near Frankfurt.

Among the most well known members are Gustav Meyrink, Franz Hartmann, Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden, Franz Gustav Gebhard, and Karl Weinfurter. Many powerful influences came from [Alois] Mailander. Could this be the source for the occult revival?

Even Madame Helena Blavatsky once said of Mailander ‘that there was only one initiate in Germany and that he lived in Kempten, but that he did not belong to her school.’ According to Willy Schroedter, however, Madame Blavatsky did in fact belong to Mailander’s school. Steiner actually stated it was Blavatsky who broke away from the Rosicrucian Master she was associated with.…

The prominent Theosophist and occultist Wilhelm Hubbe-Schleiden was another individual acquainted with both Steiner and Mailander. Hubbe-Schleiden was the president of the German branch of the Theosophical Society of which Steiner was to become General Secretary, and in 1902 handed over the Presidency of the branch to Steiner. Hubbe-Schleiden later fell out with the German Pansophists, one reason being because he would not do the work prescribed to him by “Brother John.”

-- Uncovering the Secret of “THE M”: The Adept Behind the Western Tradition, by Richard Cloud


The Theosophical Society had established itself in Germany in 1884. The branch was founded in the "Occult Room" of the house in Eberfeld belonging to the husband of Marie Gebhard [Gustav Gebhard], a friend of H. P. Blavatsky and a former pupil of the french magician Eliphas Levi. The president was Dr. Wilhelm Hubbe-Schleiden, who had held diplomatic and civil service posts. After lengthy journeys in Equatorial Africa he had produced a series of works on foreign policy and the need for German colonial expansion; now he turned his energies to editing a Theosophical magazine. The next year saw the return to Europe (with the ailing Madame Blavatsky) of Franz Hartmann, a Theosophist of unsavory reputation. Hartmann had been born in 1838, served as a volunteer in the Bavarian artillery, then emigrated on impulse to America, where he qualified medically and took out American citizenship. Until 1883 he remained in the United States, becoming a coroner in Georgetown, Colorado, and a Spiritualist in New Orleans, where one of his patients developed mediumistic gifts which Hartmann was later to claim she had passed on to him. That year he sailed for India and joined the Theosophical Society at Adyar, where he was left alone to face the investigator of the Society for Psychical Research. His return to Europe was at first intended to be temporary, but on what was intended as a brief visit home he met Dr. Karl Kellner, the discoverer of a manufacturing process for cellulose. Hartmann adapted Kellner's idea to compound a drug to be inhaled against tuberculosis; and he established himself as director of an Inhalation Center in Hallein, near Salzburg. His prolific writing won his brand of Theosophy a substantial public, and he too began to publish a periodical.

By the turn of the century, most of the elements of the Occult Underground which were known outside Germany had secured some sort of foothold inside the country.

-- The Occult Establishment, by James Webb


German colonial-political writer and theosophist

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Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden

Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (born October 20, 1846 in Hamburg , † May 17, 1916 in Göttingen ) was a German colonial-political writer and theosophist .

Life

Hübbe-Schleiden was born on 20 October 1846 in Hamburg as the youngest son of the civil servant Wilhelm Hübbe and his wife Wilhelmine Maria Sophie Eleonore Schleiden. At the age of nine his mother died. He attended a Hamburg high school.

Hübbe-Schleiden studied economics and law . In 1869 he received his doctorate in Leipzig to the doctor of both rights . He was then admitted to the bar in Hamburg as a lawyer . With the approval of the Hamburg Senate, he led the double name Hübbe-Schleiden. During the Franco-German War he was Attaché at the German Consulate General in London .

Hübbe Schleiden undertook extensive travels through Western Europe and lived between 1875 and 1877 in Gabon , where he founded the trading house Bolton & Schleiden with Augustus S. Bolton. In 1877 he was charged in Gabon for involvement in a double murder and sentenced. He was able to contest the verdict but successfully and then returned to Germany.

He then worked as a tax secretary in Hamburg and acted as a champion for the German colonial aspirations in Africa and Asia, where he supported Friedrich Fabri and himself gained a certain notoriety. For this he also wrote several books, including Overseas Politics and Ethiopia .

In 1883 he learned about his acquaintance with the manufacturer family Gebhard in Elberfeld know the teachings of the represented by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky Theosophy, with whom he dealt from now on to the end of his life. On July 27, 1884, the theosophical partnership Germania was founded in Elberfeld in the house of the Gebhard family, to whose president Hübbe-Schleiden was elected. On this occasion, he met Henry Steel Olcott , who admitted him to the Theosophical Society a few hours before his election. Hübbe-Schleiden stayed for half a year as a guest of the Gebhard family in Elberfeld to build up the organization of the law firm. A few weeks after its founding, Blavatsky, the founder of the Theosophical Society , was invited by the Gebhards to Elberfeld for a rest. For a few weeks now Elberfeld was the headquarters of the Theosophical Society. The announcement of the Coulomb Affair in September 1884 and the Hodgson Report in December 1885 severely discredited Madame Blavatsky and Theosophy. Hübbe-Schleiden, like other prominent members, resigned from the law firm in order not to compromise himself in the scientific world, but remained a member in distant India. Left by its most respected members, the law firm was dissolved on 31 December 1886 again.

Since January 1886 Hübbe-Schleiden acted as editor of the himself since the autumn of 1884 planned and founded monthly Sphinx , whose appearance he could save by leaving. She devoted herself mainly metaphysical topics, but also had references to theosophy. Thus, Hübbe-Schleiden was able to keep alive interest in the Theosophy in Germany, which had been damaged in its reputation. Especially from the readership of this magazine, he was able to found in 1892 in Berlin, the Theosophical Association . This followed on 3 November 1893 the Esoteric Circle . These two organizations were united on June 29, 1894 in the presence of Henry Steel Olcott to the German Theosophical Society (DTG).

At the end of 1894, Hübbe-Schleiden traveled to India to learn about the spiritual power of yoga through her own experience. In 1896 he returned without any tangible result and continued to occupy himself with Theosophy despite this failure. The impressions of his journey he published in his work India and the Indians and in several travel letters from India in the magazine Sphinx .

During these years numerous theosophical groups were founded all over Germany, all with different goals, but each group relied on being in possession of the "true" and "right" theosophy. Hübbe Schleiden himself took part in a Theosophical Congress on August 25, 1901 to unite these different groups in Germany. However, no agreement could be reached. Thereupon the members of the DTG, among them Hübbe-Schleiden, who had protested against the foundation for a long time, founded on 19 October 1902, in the presence of Annie Besant , a separate German section of the Theosophical Society (DSdTG). This was now directly subordinated to the headquarters in Adyar. On Count von Brockdorff's proposal, Rudolf Steiner was elected Secretary General.

The inherent gap between Annie Besant and Steiner's conception of Christ increasingly entered the consciousness of society, and the differences finally seemed to become unbridgeable. Following a request from Annie Besant, Hübbe-Schleiden had since 1912 introduced the Order of the Star of the East in Germany, founded by Besant in India, which proclaimed the Hindu boy Jiddu Krishnamurti a world teacher. Thus he tightened the contrast not insignificant. When the board of the German section demanded the resignation of Annie Besant at the turn of the year 1912/13, the entire German section of Annie Besant, who knew how much the German theosophists were behind Rudolf Steiner, was abruptly expelled on 7 March 1913. As a precaution, Steiner had already founded an Anthroposophical Society in Cologne at the turn of the year 1912/13, which was now able to start work.

Annie Besant authorized Hübbe-Schleiden, whose loyalty she had previously assured, through a new foundation deed for the reestablishment of the German section. This now reduced to about a tenth of society was no longer going strong. After Hübbe-Schleiden initially acted provisionally as Secretary General of the new German section, Johannes Ludovicus Mathieu Lauweriks was elected in May 1913 as a full Secretary General, but Hübbe Schleiden remained the main figurehead of the small Adyartreuen group. Internal quarrels led to a steady loss of members, which was reinforced by the outbreak of the First World War . With Hübbe-Schleidens death on 17 May 1916 the DSdTG disintegrated.

On July 6, 1912, Hübbe-Schleiden applied for membership of the Rosicrucian Order " Order of the Temple of the Rosy Cross ". Whether he actually became a member is not known.

In addition, he was a member of the Munich local group of the Pan-German Association. [2]

Works

• Sphinx. (Monthly, as editor between 1886 and 1896)
• The existence as pleasure, suffering and love . Brunswick 1891
• The search of the master. Conversation of a church Christian and a mystic . Rohm, Lorch 1916
• German colonization . Hamburg 1881
• Ethiopia. Hamburg 1879
• Colonization Policy and Colonization Technique . Hamburg 1882
• Motives for an overseas policy of Germany . Hamburg 1881
• Overseas Politics, 2 volumes . Hamburg 1881-1883
• World economy and the driving force . Hamburg 1882
• Indian Diary 1894/1896. With notes and an introduction edited by Norbert Klatt. Klatt, Göttingen 2009, ISBN 978-3-928312-25-7 . Online: Indian Diary 1894/1896

Literature

• Emmi von Gumppenberg: Open Letter to Dr. Ing. Hübbe-Schleiden in response to his "Message of Peace" . Altmann, Leipzig 1913.
• Norbert Klatt: The estate of Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden in the Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Göttingen . Klatt, Göttingen 1996, ISBN 3-928312-04-9 .
• Norbert Klatt: Theosophy and Anthroposophy, new aspects of her story from the estate of Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (1846-1916) with a selection of 81 letters . Klatt, Göttingen 1993, ISBN 3-928312-02-2 .
• Thekla von Speer: Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden's "Memorandum", considered impartially . Philosophical Theosophical Publishing House, Berlin 1913.
• Carl Unger : Against literary buccaneerism! A clearance of Mr. Hübbe-Schleiden . Philosophical Theosophical Publishing House, Berlin 1913.

Web links

• Literature by and about Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden in the catalog of the German National Library
• Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden , detailed biography of the anthroposophical research center Kulturimpuls, biographies documentation (in the quick search "Hübbe" enter)
• Short biography in the German colonial lexicon
• Hübbe-Schleiden and the Theosophical Society
• Hübbe-Schleiden , bibliographic records in the database Lebensreform

Single proofs

1. Corinna Treitel: A Science for the Soul: Occultism and the Genesis of the Modern German , Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore MD 2004, p. 86f
2. Michael Peters: " All German Association (ADV), 1891-1939 ", in: Historical Dictionary of Bavaria.

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Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden
by Theosophy Wiki
Accessed: 11/20/19

Image
Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden

Image
Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden

Dr. Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (October 20, 1846 - Göttingen, May 17, 1916) was a German scholar greatly interested in geographical exploration and in German colonial politics. In 1884 he became the president of the Germania Theosophical Society and was the founder and editor of the Theosophical periodical The Sphinx. He was also a member of the Society for Psychical Research.

Early life, education, and professional career

Wilhelm Hübbe was born in Hamburg on October 20, 1846. He later appended the name "Schleiden" in honor of his maternal uncle Matthew Schleiden, a botanist from Münich. Wilhelm was the youngest of five sons of Dr. Hübbe, who was prominent in the legal world. His grandfather was an eloquent and broad-minded preacher. "Willi" thrived in his family life and at the local Gymnasium, then spent time at universities of Göttingen, Heidelberg, Münich, and Leipzig studying jurisprudence and political economy to take a Doctor of Laws degree.[1]

After a brief term of practice as an Attorney in his native town he, however, accepted the offer of a post in connexion with the German Consulate General in London [as attaché during 1870-71], subsequently entering one of the great London Banking Houses, in order to acquire a thorough knowledge of business routine...

After a short period spent in Spain, he returned to England, embarking thence with a British friend on an expedition to the West Coast of Africa, where by their mutual efforts a business undertaking was founded at Gaboon.[2]


Business activities did not interest the young man as much as the theory of colonial administration, so he returned to Hamburg to write in support of German colonization. "So far-seeing was this pioneer of a new movement that his books Ethiopia (written in 1878), and Oversea Politics (1880), still [in 1911] command respectful attention, and are indeed deemed classics in this particular branch of German literature."[3]

Theosophical involvement

Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden was greatly interested in Occultism. In the summer of 1884 he received from his friend Herr von Hoffmann the newly translated German edition of Esoteric Buddhism. Hübbe-Schleiden read the volume all night and soon afterward contacted Colonel Olcott.

Ascertaining from that gentleman that Madame Blavatsky was then in Germany at Elberfeld with Frau Gebhard, one of her earliest German adherents, he, with characteristic promptitude, set out for that town in search of the Founder of the Movement.

It was here, then, that on the 27th of July, 1884, the first German Branch of the Theosophical Society, styled "Theosophische Societät Germania" was founded in the presence of H. P. Blavatsky, Mr. A. P. Sinnett, and other members then in Germany, having for its President Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden, and for its Acting Secretary Herr Franz Gebhard... Among the names of those who then joined the Society may be mentioned such well-known men as Dr. Carl du Prel, the artist, Gabriel Max, Herr von Hoffman (before mentioned), Herr Direktor Sellin, as well as that gentleman's brother, and Herr Bernhard Hubo.[4]


His Theosophical activities took primarily a literary form, establishing a theosophical magazine called The Sphinx in the year 1886 in Münich.[5] It was published regularly for about ten years.

Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden, like William Quan Judge, received two unusual letters from the Mahatmas Koot Hoomi and Morya, which were called "certificates." This occurred in a railway carriage during a "propaganda" tour with Col. Olcott.[6] Each document stated clearly that The Secret Doctrine was a joint production of the Mahatmas with Helena Petrovna Blavatsky. He found them, evidently precipitated, in his copy of Richard Hodgson's S. P. R. Report. Geoffrey A. Barborka in his extensive analysis of the unusual style of handwriting of the letters, stated: "The point is here made that a precipitated message may be produced by one who knows how to do so in any desired style of writing![7]

Hübbe-Schleiden was instructed not to publish the letters, but he showed them to Judge on July 21, 1892. Mr. Judge received permission to print his copies two years after Blavatsky's death, and he did so in The Path, in 1893.[8]

Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden was mentioned in Mahatma Letter No. 132 and Mahatma Letter No. 139, in which Helena Petrovna Blavatsky corrected a misunderstanding of A. P. Sinnett about what she had said to the doctor concerning Chains and Rounds.

Later days and death

After a trip to India around 1896-1898, he returned to Europe and, as reported in The Theosophist,

[He] may be said to have devoted himself even more exclusively than before to the study of Esoteric Philosophy, making, indeed, his life-work an elaborate treatise on Reincarnation, bringing, moreover, this much argued and, in some quarters, fiercely combated question into line with the theories held by present-day European Science, in so impartial, and yet so convincing a manner that his labors may be regarded as constituting as great a gain to orthodox scientific literature, as they most assuredly are for his fellow Theosophists.[9]


Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden died in Göttingen, Germany on May 17, 1916.

Writings

Writings on political topics


Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden wrote several books:

• Ethiopien Studien Uber West-Afrika (1879).
• Uberseeische Politik 1881-1883 (1883).
• Das Dasein ALS Lust, Leid Und Liebe (1891).
• Indien Und Die Indier: Kulturell, Wirthschaftlich Und Politisch Betrachtet (1898). This work, India and the Indians, set out all the author had experienced in his 1896 travels in India. Annie Besant wrote that it "bears the imprint of a master-mind in all matters appertaining to the problem of Colonial Policy."[10]
• Englands Ende In Der Schlacht Bei Dorking.

Writings on Theosophical topics

In addition to his work as the founder and editor of the German-language Theosophical periodical The Sphinx, Hübbe-Schleiden wrote in English. The Union Index of Theosophical Periodicals lists 31 articles by or about Hübbe-Schleiden.

Additional resources

• "Hubbe-Schleiden, Wilhelm" in Theosopedia.
• Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden in Wikipedia.
• Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden in AnthroWiki, written in German.

Archival materials

Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden's papers and books were deposited at the Library of Göttingen University.

Articles

• Dr. Hubbe Schleiden on a Letter from the Mahatma K.H. published by Blavatsky Study Center
• Two Letters from H.P. Blavatsky to Dr. Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden published by Blavatsky Study Center
• Letter from Master K.H. at KatinkaHesselink.net

Notes

1. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine vol. I, (Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1993), [12].
2. M. G., "Theosophical Worthies: Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden," The Theosophist 32.7 (April, 1911), 115-119.
3. M. G., "Theosophical Worthies: Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden," The Theosophist 32.7 (April, 1911), 115-119.
4. M. G., "Theosophical Worthies: Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden," The Theosophist 32.7 (April, 1911), 115-119.
5. Geoffrey Barborka, The Mahatmas and Their Letters (Adyar, Madras, India: Theosophical Publishing House, 1973), 299.
6. M. G., "Theosophical Worthies: Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden," The Theosophist 32.7 (April, 1911), 115-119.
7. Geoffrey Barborka, The Mahatmas and Their Letters (Adyar, Madras, India: Theosophical Publishing House, 1973), 302.
8. The documents were published in The Path, vol. VIII, April, 1893.
9. M. G., "Theosophical Worthies: Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden," The Theosophist 32.7 (April, 1911), 115-119.
10. M. G., "Theosophical Worthies: Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden," The Theosophist 32.7 (April, 1911), 115-119.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

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German Agrarian League
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 11/20/19

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

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Image
The Executive Committee of the Bund der Landwirte in 1900, on the left Dr. Diederich Hahn, center Conrad Baron von Wangenheim, and to the right Gustav Roesicke

The Bund der Landwirte (Agrarian League) (BDL) was a German advocacy group founded 18 February 1893 by farmers and agricultural interests in response to the farm crisis of the 1890s, and more specifically the result of the protests against the agrarian policies of Chancellor Leo von Caprivi, including his free trade policies.[1][2]

Background

The Reichstag was dissolved in June 1878 because it refused Bismarck's Anti-Socialist Law.

The Anti-Socialist Laws or Socialist Laws (German: Sozialistengesetze; officially Gesetz gegen die gemeingefährlichen Bestrebungen der Sozialdemokratie, approximately "Law against the public danger of Social Democratic endeavours") were a series of acts, the first of which was passed on October 19, 1878 by the German Reichstag lasting until March 31, 1881, and extended four times (May 1880, May 1884, April 1886 and February 1888).[1] The legislation was passed after two failed attempts to assassinate Kaiser Wilhelm I by the radicals Max Hödel and Dr. Karl Nobiling;...

Emil Max Hödel (27 May 1857 – 16 August 1878) was a plumber from Leipzig, Germany and a propaganda of the deed anarchist, who became known for a failed assassination. A former member of the Leipzig Social-Democratic Association, he was expelled from the organization in the 1870s[1] and eventually became involved in anarchism.

Hödel used a revolver to shoot at the German Emperor, Wilhelm I, on 11 May 1878, while the 81-year-old and his daughter, Princess Louise of Prussia, paraded in their carriage.[2] Hödel was seized immediately. He was tried and convicted of high treason, and sentenced to death on 10 July by the Prussian State Court. Julius Krautz, Prussian state executioner, beheaded Hödel on 16 August 1878 in Moabit prison.[3][4]

Although Hödel had been expelled from the Social Democratic Party, his actions, and those of Karl Nobiling, were used as justification to ban the party through the Anti-Socialist Law in October 1878.

-- Max Hödel, by Wikipedia


Karl Eduard Nobiling (10 April 1848 – 10 September 1878) was a German attempted assassin, who in 1878 made an attempt on the life of Emperor Wilhelm I.

Nobiling was born in Kolno near Birnbaum (Międzychód) in the Prussian Province of Posen, where his father was the tenant of the local manor. He attended school in Züllichau (Sulechów) and studied political science and agriculture at the University of Halle and Leipzig University, where he received a doctor's degree in 1876. During his studenthood he may have had some minor contact with Socialist circles, though an affiliation with the contemporary Social democratic movement has not been conclusively established.

-- Karl Nobiling, by Wikipedia


... it was meant to curb the growing strength of the Social Democratic Party (SPD, named SAP at the time), which was blamed for influencing the assassins.

Although the law did not ban the SPD directly, it aimed to cripple the organization through various means. The banning of any group or meeting of whose aims were to spread social democratic principles, the outlawing of trade unions and the closing of 45 newspapers are examples of suppression. The party circumvented these measures by having its candidates run as ostensible independents, by relocating publications outside of Germany and by spreading Social Democratic views as verbatim publications of Reichstag speeches, which were privileged speech with regard to censorship.

The law also banned the display of emblems of the Social Democratic Party. To circumvent the law, social democrats wore red bits of ribbons in their buttonholes. These actions, however, led to arrest and jail sentences. Subsequently, red rosebuds were substituted by social democrats. These actions also led to arrest and jail sentences. The judge ruled that in general everyone has a right to wear any flower as suits their taste, but when socialists as a group wear red rosebuds, it becomes a party emblem. In a final display of protest against this clause of the anti-socialist laws, female socialists began wearing red flannel petticoats, and when they wanted to show a sign of solidarity, they would lift their outer-skirts. Female socialists, especially, would display in protest their red petticoats to the police, who were constrained by social norms of decency from enforcing this new sign of socialist solidarity.[2]

The laws' main proponent was Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, who feared the outbreak of a socialist revolution similar to the one that created the Paris Commune in 1871. Despite the government's attempts to weaken the SPD, the party continued to grow in popularity. A bill introduced by Bismarck in 1888 which would have allowed for the denaturalization of Social Democrats was rejected. After Bismarck's resignation in 1890, the Reichstag did not renew the legislation, allowing it to lapse.

-- Anti-Socialist Laws, by Wikipedia


Chancellor Bismarck in the newly elected parliament relied on a broad agro-conservative majority with the slogan: Agriculture is owed by the state the same attention as industry; if both do not go hand in hand, the strength of one will not suffice for a lack in the other.[3] Bismarck helped foster support from these conservatives by enacting several tariffs protecting German agriculture, and incidentally industry, from foreign competition.[4]

In the early 1880s agriculture employed more people than industry and trade combined. However, Germany was fast becoming an industrialized state with increased rural exodus to the cities. After Bismarck resigned in 1890 and Leo von Caprivi became chancellor, the demands of industry were much more compelling, and the free trade treaties with Russia and Austria as well as legislation favorable to industry was seen as a threat to agriculture.[5]

The inaugural meeting of the Bund der Landirte was held in the Berlin Tivoli Brewery and was attended by some ten thousand people.[6] It drew its support from the most Protestant areas of the empire, northern and central Germany, and particularly from Prussia. In May 1893, just three months after its establishment, it campaigned for farmers' rights and won over 140 of the deputies who were elected in July, or about one-third of the members of the Reichstag, including the influential group that would found the Economic Association (Wirtschaftliche Vereinigung) some years later with Wilhelm von Kardorff, Berthold von Ploetz and Diederich Hahn.[7][8]

Organisation

By the end of 1893 the BDL had over 200,000 members. Only about 1% were rural landlords, with 24% coming from large family-owned farms, and the rest being small plot and tenant farmers. However, the leadership were from that 1%, primarily the Junkers from the east Elbe region, Saxony and Pommerania.[9] Exemplifying this control was Conrad Freiherr (Baron) von Wangenheim, a Pommeranian with extensive estates, who was chairman from 1898 to 1920. Thus the organisation favored the landlord interests as well as playing up to the interests of the actual farmers. Both the landlords and the farmers felt the shifting of political and economic power away from the land, and desired to maintain their vested interests. As a result, they worked closely with the political parties most aligned with that interest, but most especially with the Conservative Party (DKP).

By 1897 the BDL was headed by a three-member Executive Committee, one of whom was the chairman. It had a number of divisions, a speakers bureau which sent out inspirational speakers to the farming villages in the less labour-intensive winter months, an electoral division to identify candidates to support and to lobby candidates into supporting BDL initiatives, during election run-ups they had a propaganda division that provided BDL viewpoints on the candidates. There was a separate lobbying division for elected members of the Reichstag. In addition the organisation provided things like purchasing cooperatives which offered economic benefits to the members and acted as incentives to retain membership. By 1913 the BDL had over 330,000 members, employed more than 350 staff at headquarters, and approximately 400 regional workers.[10][11]

Policies and goals

The goal of the BDL was to preserve the leading position of agriculture in the economy and politics of Germany. In one of the founding documents it says: "German agriculture is the primary and most important industry, the strongest support of the empire and of the several states. To protect and strengthen agriculture is our first and most serious task because by the blossoming and flourishing of agriculture, the welfare of all professions is secured."[12] But the BDL also came to the defense of the mom and pop shops as against big-city department store chains, they safeguarded the interests of the rural and small urban middle class, the shop assistants, rural workers, sailors and fishermen and small wine growers. Basically they took all non-industrial workers, and small businesses under their wing.[1]

The most major demand of the BDL was the restoration of protective tariffs on food stuffs.[13] Other major demands were:

• the introduction of a state monopoly on foreign grain cereal with guaranteed minimum prices for domestically produced cereals.
• the introduction of a dual currency. In addition to the gold and silver, bank notes should be reinstated. It was hoped that the associated inflationary effects would help relieve the burden on rural borrowers.
• stock market reform - specifically to abolish grain futures trading and the Commodity Exchange.

With these were a host of minor demands such as strengthening the disease control on meat imports, thus making them more expensive, and a ban on adding yellow food colouring to margarine, thus increasing the market for domestic butter. When the tariffs were raised in the Bülow tariff bill, the demand changed to defending the protectionist tariffs.[14]

BDL members, rural, conservative and generally Protestant, in general despised the immorality of city life, and often associated it with Jews.[13] They believed that Jews were genetically incapable of farming.[15] Within the BDL this anti-semitism served a unifying function to help bring together the divergent interests of the Junker landowners and Hessian peasants. This commonality allowed the BDL to form large voting blocks which helped sway many a rural election, using machine politics.[16]

The Pan-German League (German: Alldeutscher Verband) was a Pan-German nationalist organization which officially founded in 1891, a year after the Zanzibar Treaty was signed.[1]

Primarily dedicated to the German Question of the time, it held positions on German imperialism, anti-semitism, the Polish Question, and support for German minorities in other countries.[2] The purpose of the league was to nurture and protect the ethos of German nationality as a unifying force. By 1922, the League had grown to over 40,000 paying members. Berlin housed the central seat of the league, including its president and its executive, which was capped at a maximum of 300. Full gatherings of the league happened at the Pan-German Congress. Although numerically small, the League enjoyed a disproportionate influence on the German state through connections to the middle class, the political establishment and the media, as well as links to the 300,000 strong Agrarian League.[3]


-- Pan-German League, by Wikipedia


As the BDL grew in strength, the Conservative Party depended upon them more and more for the defense of conservative positions in the Reichstag and in regional assemblies. However, this dependence ultimately changed the character of the party. The goals of the old-time conservatives, empire and enforced morality, defense of "throne and altar", became less important, while higher income for agroproducers gained in importance. Sometimes conflicts arose between the BDL and the party, and the BDL would withdraw its support from a troublesome conservative candidate, or throw its weight on a parliamentary vote over to the minority parties. However, the BDL's attempt to act independently of the Conservative Party did not always work. Thus in the Reichstag elections of 1903 the BDL attempted to run their own candidates, however only four were elected to the Reichstag. After this failure, Conservatives and the BDL recognized their need for each other, and there was greater unanimity.[17]

In the areas where the Conservatives were poorly represented, for example, in the Province of Hanover, in Hesse and in the Palatinate, the BDL worked together with the right wing of the National Liberals. After all, the BDL had enlisted the support of about 60% of the National Liberal candidates for their programme before the general election of 1907. In parts of the southwestern states of Germany, the BDL operated in conjunction with or as the local farmers' union or league.[18]

The BDL met with some successes and some failures. After several years they brought down the Caprivi government over the question of tariffs. But they never got the strict import restrictions on grain that they desired. The BDL was particularly effective on small issues, where the Reichstag members were less committed to their constituencies, such as forbidding yellowing of margarine and stiff restrictions on brandy and sugar imports. On the political side they along with their political ally, the Conservative Party, were unable to prevent the fall of the Bülow government over budget issues and the reform of the inheritance tax in 1909.

Overall, the BDL operated a highly successful lobbying effort both within and outside the Reichstag and regional assemblies. The BDL solicited the various candidates before the elections and only supported those who affirmed in writing their support of the BDL programme. Contemporary critics claimed that this was an unconstitutional practice, but it wasn't legal challenged, and the loss of BDL support could be critical for a candidate. As the BDL was not a political party, they had representation in most of the parliamentary caucuses. After nearly every election there would be up to 100 Reichstag members who belonged to the BDL or were otherwise politically tied to them. In the Prussian parliament, the BDL could always rely on at least a third of the deputies.

During World War I, the BDL, consistent with its conservative position, had expansive war aims. At the beginning of the Weimar Republic, it merged with the Deutschen Landbund (German Agricultural League) and others to form the Reichslandbund (RLB) (German Empire Agricultural League) in 1921,[13] which then further merged with the Union of German Farmers to form the Grüne Front (Green Front). However, the strong Junker influence in the Grüne Front drove many farmers out.[19] Nonetheless in 1933 under the National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nazi Party) it became the Reichsnährstand (Reich Food Estate).[13]



Notes

1. Puhle, Hans-Jürgen (1971). "Der Bund der Landwirte im Wilhelminischen Reich: Struktur, Ideologie und politische Wirksamkeit eines Interessenverbandes in der konstituellen Monarchie 1893- 1914". In Rüegg, Walter; Neuloh, Otto (eds.). Zur soziologischen Theorie und Analyse. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. pp. 145–162. OCLC 78878922.
2. Scheck, Raffael (2008). Germany, 1871-1945: A Concise History. Oxford, England: Berg. pp. 61–62. ISBN 978-1-84520-815-8.
3. Der Landwirtschaft schuldet der Staat die gleiche Beachtung wie der Industrie; wenn beide nicht Hand in Hand gehen, wird keine ohne die andere stark genug sein sich zu helfen. quoted in von Kiesenwetter, Otto (1918). Fünfundzwanzig Jahre wirtschaftspolitischen Kampfes: Geschichtliche Darstellung des Bundes der Landwirte. Berlin: Bund der Landwirte. p. 14. OCLC 46253180.
4. Feuchtwanger, Edgar J. (2002). Bismarck. London: Routledge. p. 208. ISBN 978-0-415-21613-5.
5. von Kiesenwetter 1918, p. 14
6. Puhle, Hans-Jürgen (1975). Agrarische Interessenpolitik und preußischer Konservatismus im wilhelminischen Reich (1893-1914): Ein Beitrag zur Analyse des Nationalismus in Deutschland am Beispiel des Bundes der Landwirte und der Deutsch-Konservativen Partei (second ed.). Bonn-Bad Godesberg: Verlag Neue Gesellschaft. p. 34. ISBN 978-3-87831-061-7.
7. Puhle 1975, p. 35
8. Torp, Cornelius (2005). Die Herausforderung der Globalisierung: Wirtschaft und Politik in Deutschland 1860 – 1914 (The Challenge of Globalization: Economics and Politics in Germany 1860 – 1914). Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. p. 196. ISBN 978-3-525-35150-5.
9. Iggers, George G. (1978). "Preface". Two Lectures in Modern German History. Amherst, Massachusetts: Council on International Studies, State University of New York at Buffalo. OCLC 4362496.
10. Ritter, Gerhard Albert, ed. (1967). "Bund der Landwirte Verbandsgeschichte von 1918 (partial)". Historisches Lesebuch 2: 1871-1914. Frankfurt am Main: Fischer Bücherei. pp. 162–165. OCLC 489953883.
11. Nipperdey, Thomas (1992). Deutsche Geschichte 1866 - 1918, Band 2: Machtstaat vor der Demokratie. Münich: Beck. p. 584. ISBN 978-3-406-34801-3.
12. „Die deutsche Landwirtschaft ist das erste und bedeutendste Gewerbe, die festeste Stütze des Reiches und der Einzelstaaten. Dieselbe zu schützen und zu kräftigen, ist unsere erste und ernsteste Aufgabe, weil durch das Blühen und Gedeihen der Landwirtschaft die Wohlfahrt aller Berufszweige gesichert ist.“ quoted in Mommsen, Wilhelm (1951). Deutsche Parteiprogramme: Eine Auswahl vom Vormärz bis zur Gegenwart. Münich: Isar Verlag. p. 28. OCLC 3142603.
13. Biesinger, Joseph A. (2006). "Agrarian League (Bund der Landwirte)". Germany: A reference guide from the Renaissance to the present. New York: Facts On File. p. 207. ISBN 978-0-8160-7471-6.
14. Nipperdey 1998, p. 585
15. Richie, Alexandra (1998). Faust's Metropolis. New York: Carroll & Graf. p. 246. ISBN 0-7867-0510-8.
16. Nipperdey 1998, p. 586
17. Nipperdey 1998, pp. 586–587
18. Nipperdey 1998, p. 587
19. Barmeyer-Hartlieb von Wallthor, Heide (1971). Andreas Hermes und die Organisation der deutschen Landwirtschaft. Christliche Bauernvereine, Reichslandbund, Grüne Front, Reichsnährstand 1928 bis 1933. Stuttgart: G. Fischer. p. 80–82. ISBN 978-3-437-50155-5.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Thu Nov 21, 2019 3:52 am

Anton Drexler
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 11/20/19

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

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Image
Anton Drexler
Chairman of the Nazi Party
In office
24 February 1920 – 29 July 1921[1]
Preceded by Position established
Succeeded by Adolf Hitler (as Führer)
Chairman of the German Workers' Party
In office
5 January 1919 – 24 February 1920
Deputy Karl Harrer
Preceded by Position established
Succeeded by Position abolished
Personal details
Born 13 June 1884
Munich, German Empire
Died 24 February 1942 (aged 57)
Munich, Nazi Germany
Nationality German
Political party Nazi Party (1920–23, 1933–42)
Other political
affiliations German Fatherland Party (1917–18)
German Workers' Party (1919–20)
Occupation Politician
Awards Blood Order
Golden Party Badge

Anton Drexler (13 June 1884 – 24 February 1942) was a German far-right political leader of the 1920s who founded the pan-German and anti-Semitic German Workers' Party (DAP), the antecedent of the Nazi Party (NSDAP). Drexler mentored his successor in the NSDAP, Adolf Hitler, during his early years in politics.

Early life

Born in Munich, Drexler was a machine-fitter before becoming a railway toolmaker and locksmith in Berlin.[2] He is believed to have been disappointed with his income, and to have played the zither in restaurants to supplement his earnings.[3] Drexler did not serve in the armed forces during World War I due to being deemed unfit.[4]

Politics

Involvement in politics


During World War I, Drexler joined the German Fatherland Party,[5] a short-lived far-right party active during the last phase of the war, that played a vital role in the emergence of the stab-in-the-back myth and the defamation of certain politicians as the November Criminals.

In March 1918, Drexler founded a branch of Free Workers' Committee for a Good Peace (Der Freie Arbeiterausschuss für einen guten Frieden) league.[2] Karl Harrer, a journalist and member of the Thule Society, convinced Drexler and several others to form the Political Workers' Circle (Politischer Arbeiter-Zirkel) in 1918.[2] The members met periodically for discussions with themes of nationalism and antisemitism.[2] Drexler was a poet and a member of the völkisch agitators.

Founding of the German Workers' Party

Together with Harrer, Gottfried Feder and Dietrich Eckart, Drexler founded the German Workers' Party (DAP) in Munich on 5 January 1919.[2]

At a DAP meeting in Munich in September 1919, the main speaker was Gottfried Feder. When Feder's talk concluded, Adolf Hitler got involved in a heated political argument with a visitor, Professor Baumann, who questioned the soundness of Feder's arguments against capitalism and proposed that Bavaria should break away from Prussia and found a new South German nation with Austria. In vehemently attacking the man's arguments, Hitler made an impression on the other party members with his oratory skills, and according to him, the professor left the hall acknowledging defeat.[6] Drexler approached Hitler and gave him a copy of his pamphlet My Political Awakening, which contained anti-Semitic, nationalist, anti-capitalist, and anti-Marxist ideas.[2] Hitler claims the literature reflected the ideals he already believed in.[7] Impressed with Hitler, Drexler encouraged him to join the DAP. On the orders of his army superiors, Hitler applied to join the party.[8]

Once accepted, Hitler began to make the party more public, and he organized their biggest meeting yet of 2,000 people, for 24 February 1920 in the Hofbräuhaus in Munich. It was in this speech that Hitler, for the first time, enunciated the twenty-five points of the German Worker's Party's manifesto that he had authored with Drexler and Feder.[9] Through these points he gave the organisation a foreign policy, including the abrogation of the Treaty of Versailles, a Greater Germany, Eastern expansion, exclusion of Jews from citizenship.[10] On the same day the party was renamed the National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei; NSDAP).[11]

Following an intraparty dispute, Hitler angrily tendered his resignation on 11 July 1921. The committee members realised that the resignation of their leading public figure and speaker would mean the end of the party.[12] Hitler announced he would rejoin on the condition that he would replace Drexler as party chairman, and that the party headquarters would remain in Munich. The committee agreed; he rejoined the party as member 3,680. [13] Drexler was thereafter moved to the purely symbolic position of honorary president and left the party in 1923.[14]

Drexler was also a member of a völkisch political club for affluent members of Munich society known as the Thule Society. His membership in the Nazi Party ended when it was temporarily outlawed in 1923 following the Beer Hall Putsch despite Drexler not actually having taken part in the coup attempt. In 1924 he was elected to the Bavarian state parliament for another party, in which he served as vice president until 1928. He played no role in the Nazi Party's re-founding in 1925 and rejoined only after Hitler ascended to national power in 1933.[15] He founded a splinter group, the Nationalsozialer Volksbund, but this dissolved in 1928.[16] He received the party's Blood Order in 1934, and was still occasionally used as a propaganda tool until about 1937, but was never allowed any legitimate power within the party.

Death

Drexler died of natural causes after a lengthy illness in Munich in February 1942.[15]

Notes

1. Evans 2003, p. 180.
2. Kershaw 2008, p. 82.
3. "Anton Drexler". History Learning Site.
4. Dimuro, Gina (February 20, 2018). "Why Anton Drexler Was More Responsible For The Nazi Party Than Adolf Hitler". All That's Interesting.
5. Hamilton 1984, p. 219.
6. Kershaw 2008, p. 75.
7. Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf, 1925.
8. Evans 2003, p. 170.
9. Shirer 1960, p. 40.
10. Shirer 1960, p. 41.
11. Kershaw 2008, p. 87.
12. Kershaw 2008, pp. 100, 101, 102.
13. Kershaw 2008, p. 103.
14. Shirer 1960, p. 45.
15. Hamilton 1984, p. 220.
16. Zentner & Bedürftig 1991, p. 209.

References

• Evans, Richard J. (2003). The Coming of the Third Reich. New York: Penguin Group. ISBN 978-0-14-303469-8.
• Hamilton, Charles (1984). Leaders & Personalities of the Third Reich, Vol. 1. R. James Bender Publishing. ISBN 0-912138-27-0.
• Hitler, Adolf (1999) [1925]. Mein Kampf. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 978-0-395-92503-4.
• Kershaw, Ian (2008). Hitler: A Biography. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 978-0-393-06757-6.
• Mitcham, Samuel W. (1996). Why Hitler?: The Genesis of the Nazi Reich. Westport, Conn: Praeger. ISBN 978-0-275-95485-7.
• Shirer, William L. (1960). The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-0-671-62420-0.
• Zentner, Christian; Bedürftig, Friedemann (1991). The Encyclopedia of the Third Reich. (2 vols.) New York: MacMillan Publishing. ISBN 0-02-897500-6.

External links

• Mein politisches Erwachen; aus dem Tagebuch eines deutschen sozialistischen Arbeiters München, Deutscher Volksverlag 4th ed.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Thu Nov 21, 2019 4:08 am

Gottfried Feder
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 11/20/19

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

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Image
Gottfried Feder
Born 27 January 1883
Würzburg, Bavaria, German Empire
Died 24 September 1941 (aged 58)
Murnau am Staffelsee, Nazi Germany
Nationality German
Institution Berlin Institute of Technology
Field Urbanism
School or
tradition Nazism
Alma mater Humboldt University of Berlin
Contributions Nazism
Strasserism
Anti-capitalism
Planned community
Deep foundation

Gottfried Feder (27 January 1883 – 24 September 1941) was a German civil engineer, a self-taught economist and one of the early key members of the Nazi Party. He was their economic theoretician. It was one of his lectures, delivered in 1919, that drew Hitler into the party.[1]

Biography

Feder was born in Würzburg, Germany on 27 January 1883 as the son of civil servant Hanse Feder and Mathilde Feder (née Luz). After studying in classical Gymnasiums[citation needed] in Ansbach and Munich, he studied engineering in Berlin and Zürich (Switzerland). He then founded a construction company in 1908 that became particularly active in Bulgaria where it built a number of official buildings.

From 1917 on, Feder studied financial politics and economics on his own. He developed a hostility towards wealthy bankers during World War I and wrote a "manifesto on breaking the shackles of interest" ("Brechung der Zinsknechtschaft") in 1919. This was soon followed by the founding of a "task force" dedicated to those goals that demanded a nationalisation of all banks and an abolition of interest.

That year, Feder, together with Anton Drexler, Dietrich Eckart and Karl Harrer, were involved in the founding of the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party-DAP).[2] Adolf Hitler met him in the summer of 1919 while he was in an anti-Bolshevik training course at Munich university—funded by the army and organized by Major Karl Mayr—and Feder became his mentor in finance and economics. He helped to inspire Hitler's opposition to "Jewish finance capitalism."[3] Delivering political courses alongside Feder was Karl Alexander von Müller (son of Bavaria's Culture Minister) who spotted Hitler's oratorical ability and forwarded his name as a political instructor for the army—an important step in Hitler's career.[citation needed]

1920s

In February 1920, together with Adolf Hitler and Anton Drexler, Feder drafted the "25 points" which summed up the party's views and introduced his own anti-capitalist views into the program. When the paper was announced on 24 February 1920, more than 2,000 people attended the rally. In an attempt to make the party more broadly appealing to larger segments of the population, the DAP was renamed in February 1920 to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers' Party, NSDAP), more commonly known as the Nazi Party.[4]

Feder took part in the party's Beer Hall Putsch in November 1923. After Hitler's arrest, he remained one of the leaders of the party and was elected to the Reichstag in 1924, where he stayed until 1936 and demanded the freezing of interest rates and dispossession of Jewish citizens. He remained one of the leaders of the anti-capitalistic wing of the NSDAP, and published several papers, including "National and social bases of the German state" (1920), "Das Programm der NSDAP und seine weltanschaulichen Grundlagen" ("The programme of the NSDAP and the world views it's based on," 1927) and "Was will Adolf Hitler?" ("What does Adolf Hitler want?", 1931).

Feder briefly dominated the Nazi Party's official views on financial politics, but after he became chairman of the party's economic council in 1931, his anti-capitalist views led to a great decline in financial support from Germany's major industrialists. Following pressure from Walther Funk, Albert Voegler, Gustav Krupp, Friedrich Flick, Fritz Thyssen, Hjalmar Schacht and Emil Kirdorf, Hitler decided to move the party away from Feder's economic views. When Hitler became Reichskanzler in 1933, he appointed Feder as under-secretary at the ministry of economics in July, which appointment disappointed Feder, who had hoped for a much higher position.

Nazi Germany

Feder continued to write papers, putting out "Kampf gegen die Hochfinanz" ("The Fight against high finance", 1933) and the anti-semitic "Die Juden" ("The Jews," 1933); in 1934, he became Reichskommissar (Reich commissioner).

In 1939 he wrote Die Neue Stadt (the New City). This can be considered an attempt at Garden City building through the use of Nazi architecture. Here he proposed creating agricultural cities of 20,000 people divided into nine autonomous units and surrounded by agricultural areas. Each city was to be fully autonomous and self-sufficient, with detailed plans for daily living and urban amenities provided. Unlike other garden city theorists, he believed that urban areas could be reformed by subdividing the existing built environment into self-sufficient neighborhoods. This idea of creating clusters of self-contained neighbourhoods forming a mid-sized city was popularised by Uzō Nishiyama in Japan. It would later be applied in the era of Japanese New Town construction.[5]

However, despite its consistency with the blood and soil ideology of the Nazis, his concept of decentralized factories was successfully opposed by both generals and Junkers.[6] Generals objected because it interfered with rearmament, and Junkers because it would prevent their exploiting their estates for the international market.[7]

After the Night of the Long Knives in June 1934, where SA leaders like Ernst Röhm and left-leaning party officials like Gregor Strasser were murdered, Feder lost favor with Hitler and began to withdraw from the government,[citation needed] finally becoming Professor for Settlement Policy[8] at the Technische Hochschule Berlin in December 1936, where he stayed until his death in Murnau, Bavaria, on 24 September 1941.

Footnotes

1. Dornberg, John (1982). Munich 1923. New York: Harper & Row. p. 344. ISBN 978-0-06-038025-0.
2. Kershaw, Ian (2008). Hitler: A Biography, New York: W. W. Norton & Company, p. 82.
3. Kershaw, Ian (2001) [1991]. Hitler: A Profile in Power, Chapter I, London.
4. Kershaw (2008). Hitler: A Biography, p. 87.
5. Hein, Carola, Visionary Plans and Planners. In Japanese Capitals in Historical Perspective (Fiévé, Waley eds.) RoutledgeCurzon.
6. Grunberger, Richard, The 12-Year Reich, pp. 153–4, ISBN 0-03-076435-1.
7. Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich, p. 154.
8. Mühlberger, Detlef (2004). Hitler's Voice. The Völkischer Beobachter, 1920–1933. Vol. I: Organisation & Development of the NSDAP. Bern: Peter Lang AG. p. 28. ISBN 3-906769-72-0. Retrieved 2017-01-15.

See also

• Strasserism

External links

• Das Programm des NSDAP und seine weltanschaulichen Grundgedanken "The Program of the NSDAP and its Ideological Foundations" by Gottfried Feder at archive.org
• Programme of the Party of Hitler, the NSDAP and its General Conceptions in English
• Das Manifest zur Brechung der Zinsknechtschaft des Geldes "The Manifesto for Breaking the Chains of Gold" by Gottfried Feder at archive.org
• Feder's patent for an Apparatus for making concrete piles in the ground on Google Patents
• Newspaper clippings about Gottfried Feder in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW
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