A Time to Heal

This is a painful one to write, and a topic that no matter how detailed and extensive it gets covered here, will never truly be long enough to adequately cover this sensitive issue and satisfy everyone on both sides of the aisle. Maybe that’s why I haven’t really treated it until now, because I know there is no way to ever get it right. For this reason, let me forewarn the reader that this post is not meant to give any kind of historical or political analysis, the likes of which can be found from far smarter scholars and activists, but to just add a few personal words.

As a Dhamma practitioner in Myanmar, the fury and inhumanity that even my closest Burmese friends, many of them living exemplary lives of spiritual practice and selfless giving, began to demonstrate towards the Rohingya issue was shocking and confounding for me. There is so much here to unpack, and forgive me if I do not do so at this moment. But a few words. Yes, I know the disastrous role that Facebook played in spreading misinformation and fueling raw emotion. And although no excuse, I could also see how the international media’s initial reporting of the issue played right into a sense of wounded pride that incited a need to defend; all the more so when it took on the shade of foreign non-Buddhists shining a critical light into members of the Burmese Buddhist Sangha. Perhaps rather than taking a moment to examine at face value the contents of the message being shown, it brought up knee-jerk painful reactive memories of past Western imperialists speaking different words, but in a similar tone, and with the active intent to place Burmese Buddhist in an inferior position.

Nonetheless, as it spiraled out of control, the stain left a sense of exasperation amongst that very small group of foreign meditators connected to the Golden Land. Some serious foreign practitioners, even monastics, who I knew literally left the country over this issue alone, so distressed they were at trying to follow an elevated path of noble teachings when such views were becoming so commonplace, even at monasteries. Others I know chose not ever to come here for practice, based on this. One particularly remote European monk mentioned how his daily silence was interrupted only by other monastics wanting him to edit their “Deal Malala” letters. As for me, I became increasingly more sorrowful, as one Dhammic role model after another failed to show the humanity and courage that reflected in all other parts of their being in my lifelong association with them.

To take a pause here, I do not mean to get into a debate about who did what to whom, who deserves what status, the sequence of aggressive escalation, or anything else. If we get into that, we’ll never get out. I want to instead spend a moment on the very idea of humanity. Whatever the outer circumstances, there is a basic humanity that grieves at the sight or even description of fellow humans enduring real suffering. For many, this basic human feature kicks on even when exposed to one’s so-called enemies in such a vulnerable position.

In other words, as a thought experiment, think about the place in the world which you have the most negative connotations and personal enmity. Now imagine that this community was bombed and the residents are left dead, wounded, scared, and traumatized; with more bombing raids on the way. To what extent would you celebrate that terror, and to what extent would you begin to soften and even recoil?

So regardless of what story we are choosing to believe, and what version we are putting up for debate, that sinking feeling that went down into the stomach of so many of us foreign yogis was in scarcely finding even an expression of basic humanity about the plight of so many downtrodden, to say nothing of the power of mettā that was part and parcel of any Buddhist meditation.

After all, mettā instructions affirm that we are to basically throw away the very notion of “right” and “wrong,” of “yours” and “mine”, of “he did this to me” and “I did this for him.” It is unconditional well-wishing. So to endure a basic obfuscation of this core principle was deeply dumbfounding and troubling for many of us, even those who were tucked away in remote monasteries scarcely following the news.

All of this came back to mind when I saw the following tweet:

There has been much made of what this uprising really represents, and what it is really aiming to accomplish. Is it to restore NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi? Is it to ensure that basic human rights are maintained? Is it to expand the very notion of inclusivity and representative democracy across all peoples, groups and regions?

When I read messages like the above, which are becoming increasingly common among Bamar Buddhists this month, I start to wonder if in the midst of this outer revolution, an inner revolution is also taking place. So then, this represents a unique moment where one is not only suffering as a victim, but also holding in this same awesome moment, a courageous reflection of how one has also been at different times, and to different people, an aggressor. For too long, those more progressive lay and monastic voices were silenced, either by self-doubt, self-censorship, peer pressure, or outright intimidation. Those that did speak were barely heard over the cacophony of the more aggressive voices. And with tweets like the above, I hope that these voices are finding the courage, integrity, and urgency to come out now.

It was something of an ironic contradiction that those same Bamar who only months ago were proudly telling the international community to stay out of their country's affairs, mind their own business, and accept it as an internal matter unrelated to them; are now calling that same international community back to intervene immediately. Such jarring whiplash cannot go unnoticed by oneself either, and that’s why it’s my hope that more and more are going through this internal reckoning of what their silence and implicit support may have created, perhaps indicated by this sign unveiled at a recent protest:

Of course, this is a reframing of the famous Martin Niemöller quotation, the Lutheran minister living in Nazi Germany, who said: “First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”

This is an extremely tumultuous moment shaping up in Myanmar history before our eyes, and forces and movements are taking sudden twists and turns that no one can predict. That the military could almost overnight succeed in uniting an entire diverse population of peoples— albeit, against them— could not have been predicted. Nor could the inner painful reckoning that at least some Bamar Buddhists are now undergoing.

At this time, I hope we can have understanding for those on all parts of this issue. I hope we can make space for actual reconciliation. I hope we can hold room for true forgiveness. I hope we can maintain belief in the power of change, and the ability for people to grow beyond who they once were or what they once believed or what they once did. I know it’s hard, but I hope it is possible.

A Bamar protestor carries a sign apologizing to Kachin and Rohingya.

“Myanmar military gave the wrong infos about the Rohingya case at that time to all over the country.”