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Asian Studies Review
ISSN: 1035-7823 (Print) 1467-8403 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/casr20
Constructing Buddhists in Sri Lanka and Myanmar:
Imaginary of a Historically Victimised Community
Dhammika Herath
To cite this article: Dhammika Herath (2020): Constructing Buddhists in Sri Lanka and
Myanmar: Imaginary of a Historically Victimised Community, Asian Studies Review, DOI:
10.1080/10357823.2020.1717441
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10357823.2020.1717441
Published online: 05 Feb 2020.
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Constructing Buddhists in Sri Lanka and Myanmar: Imaginary
of a Historically Victimised Community
Dhammika Herath
University of Peradeniya
ABSTRACT
Radicalised Buddhist movements in Sri Lanka and Myanmar have
been prominent as drivers of mistrust, tensions and violence directed
against Muslim minorities, particularly since the mid-2010s. This
article seeks to understand why ordinary monks, who exert tremen-
dous influence in these societies, have developed anti-Muslim senti-
ments and even endorse radical movements. To do so I analyse the
discursive construction of Buddhists as a historically victimised com-
munity and of Muslims as the most potent existential threat to that
community. The study uses an “empathetic”vantage point to analyse
the perceptions of Buddhist monks and laity, because resolving their
mistrust of Muslims requires a deeper understanding of their fears
and grievances. It delineates a narrative in which other religious
communities, historically, have encroached on the Buddhist sphere
by imposing limits on its rituals and conversion of Buddhists to other
faiths, and through the destruction of Buddhist heritage sites. Monks
and laity maintain discourses of fear, stemming from a substantive
basis of history in which the pre-colonial and colonial experiences,
neglect of local economies, invasions, and incursions into the
Buddhist community left a collective memory of injury and external
persecution. This narrative critically informs the feelings and beha-
viour of Buddhist monks vis-à-vis Muslims.
KEYWORDS
Buddhists; monks; Muslims;
conflicts; discourses of fear;
nationalism; riots; violence;
Myanmar; Sri Lanka
Radicalised Buddhist movements in Sri Lanka and Myanmar have propagated tensions
and violence against minority religious groups, particularly since the mid-2010s,
although radical movements are by no means new phenomena. Monks representing
recent radical movements have furthered a discourse of fear towards minorities, parti-
cularly Muslims. Sri Lanka and Myanmar have witnessed periodic riots targeting the
Muslim minorities with different degrees of intensity. Ordinary monks are important
actors, who exert tremendous influence on social and economic life, including inter-
communal relationships. Therefore, the academic scholarship needs to understand what
motivates ordinary monks to develop anti-Muslim sentiments, and in some cases to
endorse radical movements. Therefore, the main goal of this article is to elucidate the
discursive construction of the Buddhists as a historically victimised community, which,
according to radical movements, currently confronts the Muslims as an existential threat.
Hence, this article examines the perceptions of ordinary Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka
and Myanmar. In order to do this, I develop an “empathetic”vantage point, which is an
CONTACT dhammikaherath@pdn.ac.lk
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW
https://doi.org/10.1080/10357823.2020.1717441
© 2020 Asian Studies Association of Australia
attempt to examine the fears and grievances from an “insider”perspective in order to
generate insights into the underlying basis of the fears and grievances.
Based on the study, I argue that antagonism among ordinary Buddhist monks towards
Muslims is underpinned by a sense of historical victimhood. Buddhists in Sri Lanka and
Myanmar maintain a strong sense of past “injury”which informs perceptions in the
present. The informants of this study perceive that other religious communities, histori-
cally, have encroached on the Buddhist sphere by imposing limits on Buddhist rituals and
the conversion of Buddhists to other faiths, and through the destruction of Buddhist
heritage sites. Monks and laity maintain certain discourses of fear, which have emanated
from a substantive basis of history in which the pre-colonial and colonial experiences,
neglect of local economic systems, invasions, and incursions into the Buddhist commu-
nity had left them with a collective memory of injury and external persecution. This
narrative of historical injury and memory critically informs the feelings and behaviour of
Buddhist monks vis-à-vis Muslims. However, the radical actors and political agents have
exploited this sense of victimhood to cultivate prejudice and hatred against Muslims and
a general Islamophobia.
This study offers an important empirical contribution to the field of conflicts based on
religion, as it focusses almost exclusively on Buddhist monks, whose views and percep-
tions are given serious scrutiny and analysed within a broader cultural and political
context. An empathetic approach is more useful and effective than some of the existing
approaches to understand complex Buddhist–Muslim conflict(s) as it allows researchers
to get closer to informants, even those whose views we do not like. An empathetic
approach does not look at ordinary or political monks representing particular viewpoints
as irrational, violent or racist, but asks why people hold the views they hold, and attempts
to unearth the preconditions that fashion various viewpoints. Thus, this approach has the
potential to offer nuanced insights into the inner feelings of the monks.
The first part of the article briefly discusses the position of Sangha in Sri Lanka and
Myanmar in history through to the present. This is followed by a discussion of the actors
in conflict and the methodology used. The next section discusses the case of Sri Lanka in
relation to the overall goal of the article, followed by the case of Myanmar. These two
sections constitute the main body of this article where I engage in a detailed empirical
discussion on the factors, facets and dynamics of Buddhist–Muslim tensions, mistrust
and conflicts. The concluding section provides a critical discussion of the key findings.
The Position of Sangha (Monks) in Society
Buddhist monks have historically played a prominent role in the social and cultural develop-
ment of Sri Lanka and were intricately weaved into the everyday life-world of the Buddhists. In
pre-colonial history, Buddhist monks were advisers to royalty. Buddhist monks were impor-
tant actors in the affairs of the polity, nationalist movements and in the “defence”of Sasana
(Bartholomeusz, 1996; Frydenlund, 2018a; Gunawardana, 1976), a term that represents the
totality of Buddhist institutions, the monks, the laity and traditions. Monks were extremely
powerful in the transition of power from the last Sinhala royal lineage to the Nayakkars of
Indian origin in the Kandyan kingdom (Obeyesekere, 1995;Obeyesekere,2017).
1
During the
colonial period, monks were part of resistance movements. Post-independence, Buddhist
monks exerted substantial influence over nationalist politics including the electoral victory of
2D. HERATH
Bandaranaike in 1956 and key policies of the state (DeVotta, 2004; Nanayakkara, 2016;
Rambukwella, 2017; Rambukwella, 2018;Spencer,1990; Tambiah, 1986;1993). Monks played
an important role in founding Sinhala Buddhist nationalism. Sinhala Buddhist nationalism
defines Sri Lanka as Sihadipa (Island of Sinhalas) and Dhammadipa (Island destined to
preserve Buddhism), an ideology rooted in Mahawamsa, the great Chronicle (DeVotta,
2007). Presently, Buddhist prelates (abbots) and monks in general continue to wield enor-
mous social and moral influence over the lay Buddhist community including the top state
leaders and officials.
Similarly, Buddhist monks have historically been a source of moral and cultural devel-
opment in Myanmar, where monks had close relations with the polity (Bechert, 1973).
These relations during the monarchy were mostly reciprocal, giving legitimacy to each
other, but kings prevented the Sangha from becoming an independent centre of political
power (Gravers, 1999; Leach, 1973; Schober, 2006;2011;Smith,1965;Spiro,1982). During
the colonial period, influential monks such as U Ottama and U Wisara were active in
independence movements challenging British rule (Smith, 1965). The Sangha rose against
the junta through the “Saffron Revolution”during the period of military rule (McCarthy,
2008; Michael, 2013;Rogers,2008;Selth,2008; Stephen, 2008). Gravers (2015)identifies two
“major political positions”among the monks: those who were part of the Saffron Revolution
supported individual freedom, democracy and human rights, but those supportive of the
military regime espoused a “communitarian”ideology and nationalist obligations.
Actors in Conflicts
Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) initially emerged in Sri Lanka as a reformist movement claiming to
“purify”Buddhism within the community of the Sangha. Although it emerged as
a separate entity in around 2012, its progenitors had previously been active in nationalist
politics, including in the Jathika Hela Urumaya (Deegalle, 2016). BBS later metamor-
phosed into an ultra-nationalist movement claiming to defend Buddhism against threats,
primarily posed by Muslims, and to a certain extent, new Christian Evangelical missions.
BBS has been described as an illiberal movement that has acted as a “moral policeman”
(Silva, 2016). In addition to BBS, which was perhaps the most dominant among the
radical actors, Rawana Balaya and Mahason Balakaya (MB) have been responsible for
organising and carrying out attacks against Muslims. MB is considered to have engi-
neered the riots in Kandy in 2018, which were sparked when several Muslim youths killed
a Buddhist lorry driver after a minor traffic incident. Leaders of MB were remanded in
custody until November 2018 and were prosecuted for their role in the riots.
In Myanmar, the 969 and Mabatha are among the most important drivers of Buddhist
radicalism and anti-Islamic tensions (Crouch, 2016; Galache, 2013). “969”, established in
2012, is a loose network of monks, which claims to have the objective of protecting
Buddhism. Mabatha, set up in 2013, appears to be more formal in organisation, although
U Wirathu, a monk known for his extremely militant anti-Muslim campaign, is connected
with both movements. Mabatha stands for ma (race), ba (religion) and tha (sasana)–or
literally, the “organisation for the protection of race, religion and sasana”. Wirathu main-
tained connections with BBS, made a visit to Sri Lanka and held public speeches in 2014.
Mabatha had strong connections with the former semi-civilian government of Thein Sein,
who failed to move away from exclusionary and discriminatory policies against minorities
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 3
in Myanmar. 969 and Mabatha have used traditional means of preaching, teaching and
sermons as well as modern means of communication such as the internet, meetings and
print material to endorse hatred and violence against Muslims. Their social work and
engagement in education, however, have contributed to the popularity of these organisa-
tions (Frydenlund, 2018b;Kyaw,2016; Schissler, 2016;Schissler,Walton,&Thi,2017;
Walton & Hayward, 2014).
Methodology
This article results from a three-year qualitative comparative analysis of Myanmar and Sri
Lanka, mainly through the lenses of ordinary Buddhist monks. This study is based on 80
interviews. I interviewed 15 monks, four nuns and five lay people in and around Mandalay
(including Sagaing and Amarapura) in December 2015. I also interviewed 15 monks and five
lay people in and around Yangon in January 2017. Although these monks lived in urban areas,
there was variation in terms of regional origins. Except in eight cases, I conducted interviews
in Burmese with the help of translators. I further interviewed 40 monks from urban and rural
locations in Sri Lanka including Colombo, Kandy, Anuradhapura, Gall, Matara and Mannar
in June 2016 and the first half of 2017. Except in three cases, all interviews in Sri Lanka were
conducted in Sinhala. The interviewees in both countries were chosen using purposive and
snowball sampling. I also benefitted from the knowledge gathered in a larger project on
religious radicalisation in Myanmar and Sri Lanka involving myself and three other
researchers.
2
My interviews in both countries adopted an informal approach that helped
build trust with the informants. Usually, the interviews started with general questions about
topics such as current affairs, the role of monks in Buddhist lay life and the political
participation of the monks, and then proceeded to more focussed questions on tensions
and episodes of violence, the history of conflicts, responsibility for violence, new radical
groups, threats and fears. I transcribed the interviews and analysed them through NVIVO
using a grounded-theory approach.
3
An important original contribution of this article to academic scholarship on Buddhist–
Muslim conflicts is its novel methodological approach. I have developed an empathetic
vantage point for generating insights into the views of ordinary monks regarding the tensions
and conflicts between Buddhists and Muslims in Sri Lanka and Myanmar. This approach is
based on a normal ethnographic toolkit but it does so in an atypical way. Instead of looking at
the overt behaviour of monks, I have endeavoured to listen to their inner feelings and
emotions rather than treating them as a distant and objective reality. In fact, I try to arrive
at an inter-subjective understanding in which an element of subjectivity can creep into the
analysis. Religious conflicts demand some level of inter-subjective understanding of actors’
feelings and emotions without, nevertheless, ceasing to be critical. My own positionality of
being a Buddhist and living in a Theravada Buddhist country is important in this whole
exercise. Having been to a Buddhist school and also to Dhamma schools from an early age,
philosophically, I use my cultural affinity to feel the grievances the monks express, however
rational or irrational those grievances may be. Thus, an empathetic approach is instrumental
in making sense of how monks feel and in illuminating the factors that influence monks’
perceptions towards historical memory and, of course, Muslims. This empathetic approach
generates a more balanced picture of Buddhist–Muslim conflicts without demonising some
violent actors over others.
4D. HERATH
Conflict Histories and Consciousness in Sri Lanka
The discursive construction of Buddhists in Sri Lanka as a persecuted majority has a long
history and is associated with a long-held discourse of fear. The Sinhala ethno-identity was
establishedaroundthefifth century CE (Dharmadasa, 1992), and the Sinhalese have histori-
cally grappled with the “spectra of South Indian invasions”, which contributed to the collective
worldview of Buddhists as a “beleaguered majority with a minority complex”(Tambiah, 1986,
p. 58). Gunawardana (1976), meanwhile, traces the Sinhala ethno-identity to the 13
th
century
(CE) and argues that the South Indian Chola invasions and their negative impact on Buddhist
institutions and culture were formidable seeds of Buddhist nationalism. The colonial conquest
and advent of Christianity by the Portuguese, the Dutch and the British had a deleterious
impact on Buddhist institutions, culture and the life of Buddhists in general, and consolidated
Buddhist nationalism. The colonial period provided the strongest platform for the develop-
ment of both Sinhala and Tamil nationalism. Dharmapala, who rose to prominence in the 18
th
century as a lay Buddhist leader, propagated a strong Sinhala Buddhist ideology in which he
identified the Sinhalas as being under threat from Muslims and Christians (DeVotta, 2004;
Spencer, 1990).Inthelate19
th
century, a major conflict arose between Buddhists and Muslims
over “tom tom beating”(drumming) as part of Buddhist rituals. By
[o]bdurately demanding processional silence before their churches and mosques at all times,
localised bodies of catholic Christians and Muslims were imposing their world views on the
Buddhists in whose midst they lived. As such, their demands were political assertions and
a delimitation of symbolic space (Roberts, 1990, p. 260).
This engendered strong antipathy towards Muslims and Christians and prepared the
ground for riots against Muslims in the early 1900s, which reached their worst point in
1915. Buddhist revivalists in Sri Lanka in the 19
th
and 20
th
centuries felt that, although
Buddhism was the religion of the majority, colonial treatment had relegated it to a place
of social and political marginalisation relative to the religions of minorities (Kannangara,
1984). These scholars point out that the external incursions and the colonial treatment of
majority–minority relations contributed to the Sinhala Buddhist perception of victim-
hood vis-à-vis Christians and Muslims.
Inthelate19
th
and early 20
th
centuries, economic grievances were amalgamated with an
existing discourse of Sinhala Buddhist victimhood. The pan-Islamic revivalism in the late
1890s coincided with an emergence of an affluent class of Coast Moors (Muslim migrants
from South India) who occupied a dominant position in trade in Colombo (Jayawardena,
1970; Kannangara, 1984). This was also a time of global economic turmoil punctuated by price
fluctuations, high unemployment and poverty. In this context, Sinhala Buddhists developed
a sense that Moors benefitted by “profiteering”and accused them of economic exploitation.
Since the riots of 1915, sporadic violence against Muslims has occurred in different periods.
During 1975 and 1976 riots were reported in some parts of Sri Lanka, including in Puttalam
(De Silva, 2005). The clashes in Mawanella in 2001 attracted significant attention. Since 2012,
radical Buddhists have engineered several attacks on Muslim-owned businesses, mosques and
houses in Dambulla (2012), Aluthgama (2014), Ginthota (2017) and Kandy (2018). These
incidents spanning over 100 years varied in terms of causes, motivations and magnitude. The
involvement of organised radical movements has been a notable feature in incidents since
2012 (Herath & Rambukwella, 2015).
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 5
Discursive constructions and imagining of Muslims
The Buddhist monks and the laity interviewed in this study construct Buddhists as
ahistorically victimised community that faces an existential threat in the form of
Muslims. According to one informant,
Muslim people have a history of destroying what belongs to others. In India, they destroyed
two Buddhist universities. One of them was Nalanda. Legends say flames in the library lasted
for six months . . . In the year 2001 they destroyed the Bamiyan statues in Afghanistan
(Academic and monk, Anuradhapura).
The monk was referring to Nalanda, which was a Mahavihara (large monastery) in
ancient India. Nalanda is considered to have been a centre of Buddhist teaching and
learning from around the seventh century BCE. The monk referred to the destruction of
this ancient Mahavihara by Bakhtiyar Khilji of the Mamluk Dynasty. In a completely
different context, a monk in Mandalay, Myanmar also referred to the alleged destruction
of Nalanda. It is interesting how an incident which possibly occurred in ancient Magadha
(modern day Bihar) in 1200 CE keeps resurfacing in the Buddhist nationalist discourse in
Sri Lanka as well as in Myanmar. Narratives of invasions, which supposedly occurred
thousands of years ago, inform the present-day discourse of fear and colour current
perceptions towards Muslims. However, this discourse misses some important nuances
in the destruction of Nalanda, which was destroyed twice by non-Muslims in 455–467 CE
and 606–648 CE. Furthermore, it is interesting how this narrative, irrespective of the
ethnic diversity among worshippers of Islam, imagines a homogenous category of
“Muslims”in pre-modern history when the concepts of “ethnicity”and “nation”did
not have their modernist connotations (see Anderson, 1996; Gellner, 1983).
Constructing “the Muslim”and “the Buddhist”in Sri Lanka
When the monks interviewed in this study engaged in the discursive construction of the
Buddhist, they did so in relation to an existing discourse of fear that is intrinsically tied to the
construction of “the Muslim”as “the other”. The Muslim is seen as a person who tries to
exploit others by making maximum use of the slightest opportunity. The image of a generous
and benevolent Buddhist is juxtaposed with a rapacious Muslim. The Buddhist monks and
laity I interviewed said that Buddhists have historically been generous towards people of other
faiths. A scholar–monk I interviewed in Anuradhapura, for instance, mentioned that the kings
of Kandy had provided Muslims with shelter when the Dutch (in the 18
th
CE) persecuted
Muslims in the Southern littoral, while Christianity also found fertile ground to establish and
grow. He added that Muslims as well as Christians have always exploited this generosity to
make inroads into Buddhist society. Some of the monks in Anuradhapura described the
“rapacious”quality of Muslims through an account of a clandestine attempt to establish
a mosque in the Mahamewna Gardens, where the sacred Bodhi Tree is located:
In the Mahamewna Gardens, Muslims tried to erect a mosque in the guise of building
a house. Monks had allowed a poor Muslim family to live in this most sacred Buddhist
Garden with 2,500 years of history. That is who we are. That is also our weakness that others
exploit. We never say “do not build mosques or churches or (Hindu) Kovils”. Every religion
has a right to build their shrines. But is it ethical to build a mosque on sacred land donated
by monks? (University student and monk, Anuradhapura, emphasis in original).
6D. HERATH
When I interviewed monks in Anuradhapura, including students and academics at
a local university, most of them referred to this incident. According to their narrative,
long ago, the chief prelate in Anuradhapura had allowed not only Muslims but also
Hindus to build houses and shops in the buffer zone surrounding Mahamewna. Monks
alleged that in this particular case, a Muslim family had surreptitiously tried to convert
their house into a prayer-centre and described the incident as a crystallisation of Muslim
“expansionism”. Monks are not averse to the presence of other religions and their
religious performance, but two simultaneous imaginary constructions were evident
here: monks construct their own image as a benevolent community, which is hurt by
the alleged misuse by a Muslim family. They extrapolate from an isolated event to
caricature the immanent nature of Muslims. This discursive construction of a Muslim
threat is closely tied to the historical memory of victimhood at the hands of other
religious groups and colonial conquest. It is poignantly clear that there is deeply
entrenched mistrust towards Muslims, which can be comprehended only through an
empathetic understanding of the Buddhist sense of historical injury. Arguably, it is not so
much hatred that needs to be addressed as mistrust and the tendency to homogenise the
Muslim community, which includes people belonging to various ethnic groups such as
Malays, Javanese, Coast Moors and Persians (see Faslan & Nadine, 2015).
It is important to stress that some monks attempt to avoid the tendency to homogenise the
heterogeneous Muslim community. For instance, one interviewee noted that it is the ordinary
people who often suffer from conflicts while the instigators of violence are usually safe. He
went on to reject the often-quoted expansionist thesis in respect to Muslims: “Ordinary
Muslim people are not extremists. They do not need to expand their religion. The ordinary
Tamil man does not need a separate state. But when a conflict occurs, ordinary people die, not
the most powerful in our society”(Young monk and scholar, Rathnapura, Sri Lanka).
Many of the monks I interviewed generally believed that Muslims assert extraordinary
visibility through the construction of new mosques even in scarcely populated places. They do
not see the construction of new mosques as an essential part of ordinary Islamic worship but as
evidence of extreme religiosity. Yet, these monks fail to question the ubiquitous construction
and presence of Buddhist structures in every nook and corner of cities and villages. There is
little recognition that both Buddhists and Muslims have given more weight to material–
outward expressions of piety. Other monks I interviewed in Sri Lanka also spoke about the use
of loudspeakers by mosques for early-morning and late-evening prayers, and mentioned that
it disturbed their sleep and peace of mind. Monks saw this as an expression of Islamic
dominance and the imposition of Islamic culture on Buddhist communities. One wonders
whether this is a repetition of history albeit involving different parties. The British colonial
rulers and affluent Muslims thought in the 1930s that “tom-tom beating”(the use of drums in
Buddhist rituals) disturbed the “repose of the sleep”and a Police Ordinance of 1865 imposed
restrictions on drumming (Roberts, 1990). Buddhists felt aggrieved and victimised by “the
encroachments of minorities working within the shadow of the colonial power”(Roberts,
1990, p. 241). In present-day Sri Lanka, monks have felt aggrieved by the loud noise of Muslim
prayers in the early morning and evening. In some Buddhist temples, monks also play pre-
recorded Pirith (religious stanzas) in the mornings and evenings on loudspeakers, in the belief
that Pirith chanting will extend blessings to devotees. This has become a way of reasserting the
Buddhist presence, and has led to a “noise war”between temples and mosques, and actually
disturbed the “repose of the sleep”.
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 7
Discourse of population growth
A powerful weapon in the armoury of radical actors is the explosive discourse of
population growth. The monks I interviewed in Sri Lanka believe that the higher
population growth among Muslims will one day metamorphose into the subjugation of
the Sinhala majority. According to one interviewee, “This is not a programme with
weapons but Muslims can capture the country by increasing their size. We can only
create awareness among Sinhalese to increase the number of children among Sinhalese”
(Young monk, Kandy).
A close examination of the fertility rates of different ethnic groups in the 2012 census
is a good starting point to disaggregate the discourse of population growth. Census data,
in fact, show that there was higher fertility among Muslims: the fertility rates of Sinhala
and Muslim women were 2.3 and 3.3 respectively. Yet, one must not be oblivious to
significant nuances in long-term trends. The fertility rates of Sinhala and Muslim women
within the age cohort of 15–49 years were 1.9 and 2.4 respectively, but for women aged 50
or above, the rates were 3.5 and 4.5 respectively. Thus, long-term trends demonstrate
declining fertility among the younger generation in both ethnic groups. It is also
insightful to compare the fertility rates of women across Sri Lanka’s major ethnic groups,
which for the Sinhala, Sri Lankan Tamils, Indian Tamils and Muslims (aged 15–49) were
1.9, 2.3, 2.4 and 2.4 respectively. This shows that Indian Tamils and Muslims, in fact, had
the same fertility rates, although the population discourse has singled out the growth of
Muslims (Department of Census and Statistics, 2014).
Some monks reject the whole argument about the population growth of Muslims,
however, arguing that it is really education and health that matter for the birth rate. One
monk, for instance, pointed out that even among poor and uneducated Sinhala commu-
nities, there is higher population growth:
Between population growth and religion there is no connection. This is a lack of education
and lack of reproductive health . . . family planning . . . Maha Oya is an area which is
a hundred per cent Sinhala Buddhist. The population growth there is very high since they
are very poor, with low education (Senior monk, activist, Colombo).
This monk’s comments also show that there are counter-voices to the dominant dis-
course of fear. These counter-voices are discussed later in the article.
Cultural transformations
New dress codes such as the black Saudi-style abaya and hijab have been adopted in Sri
Lanka since the 1970s (Nuhman, 2004). Pan-Islamic movements and reformist religious
ideologies of the 20
th
century encouraged a shift towards stronger outward expression of
Muslim religious identity and concomitant social and cultural changes, which dimin-
ished the traditional links between Buddhists and Muslims (McGilvray, 2008; McGilvray,
2011). Sri Lankan Muslims have become more conspicuous due to the adoption of
purdah and hijab attire, the wearing of Arab-style thobes, jubba garments and Tablighi
Jamaat missionary campaigns, and the boom in mosque construction. Non-Muslims,
meanwhile, have increasingly seen Muslims as culturally different, leading to a further
“othering”of Muslims in Sri Lanka (McGilvray, 2016). I observed a sense of anxiety and
8D. HERATH
antagonism among the monks I interviewed with regard to these socio-cultural changes
among Muslims:
Last month I went to Pakistan for a private visit. I thought, Pakistan being a Muslim state,
people would have covered their bodies in full. I did not find 10 people who covered their
face in this Muslim state. That’s why I say that people here are more Muslim than Allah
(Scholar and young monk, Rathnapura, Sri Lanka).
This monk was of the view that Muslims have adopted Arab-style dress, and that this has
caused a social disconnect between Muslims and Buddhists. He uses his experience from
a visit to Pakistan to justify his claims. While he may represent a general perception prevalent
in Sri Lanka, he based his claims on his incomplete and ad hoc experience in Pakistan.
Monks I met considered Wahhabism as an extreme and strict version of Islamic
worship. Reformist Islamic movements such as Thawheed Jamaath and Thablighi
Jamaath have attracted social and political attention in Sri Lanka, although the former
is treated more as a movement towards piety and does not necessarily also entail
“political Islam”(Haniffa, 2016). Nonetheless, followers of Thawheed Jamaath have
had intra-community conflicts with other Islamic groups (Faslan & Nadine, 2015). The
stress that newer groups have laid on dress codes and their spiritual endeavour to
“purify”Islam have inadvertently drawn Muslims out of culturally embedded traditions
such as wearing Indian-style dresses, saint worship, and visiting multi-religious places of
worship.
4
This cultural and behavioural shift seems to have weakened Muslims’tradi-
tionally intimate social connectedness with Buddhists. In April 2019, Thawheed Jamaath
carried out a series of suicide bombings on Easter Sunday. The Sri Lankan government
claimed that the group had links with Islamic State. The deaths of hundreds of Catholics
and tourists, as well as the massive damage to the economy through this attack, exacer-
bated fears about Muslims and raised suspicions about the entire Muslim community.
Discourses on economic dominance and expansion
Buddhist perceptions of insecurity in relation to Muslims are strongly linked to the
discourse of the dominance of Muslims in trade, and there is a long history of calls to
boycott Muslim businesses (Jayawardena, 1970). In fact, by the late 19
th
century,
Anagarika Dharmapala compared Muslims to Jews, who had become prosperous by
“Shylockian”methods (DeVotta, 2007, p. 16). It is possible that the European anti-
Semitism prevalent at the time informed the kind of Islamophobia that Dharmapala
engendered. The European conception of the Jews as “greedy and prosperous”was
applied to describe local Muslims (Frydenlund, 2017; Frydenlund, 2018a). Perceptions
of Muslim economic dominance were also linked to the success of Muslim political
parties in obtaining a strategic political and economic edge from the Sri Lankan govern-
ment. When I visited Ampara on the east coast, a senior government official mentioned
having to allocate a disproportionate amount of state resources to the Muslim commu-
nity there due to pressure from a Muslim Minister. He believed that this had caused
a sense of marginalisation among the Hindu and Christian Tamil communities.
A disproportionate concentration of business in the hands of ethnic minorities has
caused a sense of resentment in majority communities in some East Asian countries (Chua,
2004). In many cities in Sri Lanka, Muslim businessmen usually occupy a dominant
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 9
position relative to other religious communities. Monks I interviewed felt that this has
caused a sense of resentment and perceptions of unfair trade among Buddhists. One monk
I interviewed, however, was critical of Sinhala Buddhist traders and had a sense of
appreciation for the skills of Muslim traders: “Muslims are not fair in their trade. But
they are very clever in trade. They treat the customer as their ‘God’. They are very polite to
customers, unlike the Sinhala traders”(Young monk, Balangoda).
Views about the economic dominance of Muslims present an analytical challenge to
scholarly engagement on this issue. The success of Muslim businesses, as argued by the
informants too, comes from hard work and their generationally transmitted skills, and is
not offensive to another community. In many countries disproportionate ownership of
business by individuals belonging to minorities, nevertheless, leads to subjective grievances,
which are manipulated to mobilise antagonism in majority communities (Chua, 2004).
Popular support for radical Buddhists
The discursive construction of Buddhists as a historically victimised majority and
imagining of Muslims as a strong threat has motivated some monks to treat BBS as an
important voice for the “beleaguered”Sinhala. Many Buddhists, however, expressed
strong reservations about the conduct of BBS monks and their use of violence and
virulence. After years of silence, the Asgiriya chapter, one of Sri Lanka’s most influential
Buddhist Nikayas (chapters), issued a media communiqué that succinctly captures the
Buddhist polemic:
Although we do not approve the aggressive behaviour and the style of expressions of the
Galabodaatte Gnanasara thero [of BBS], we do not reject the concerns he has raised. . . The
non-Buddhists must keep in mind that the Buddhists of this country have always respected
and sustained other faiths (Chief Prelate of Asgiriya chapter, cited in Daily Mirror,2017).
The Sangha community appears to be heterogeneous in its attitudes towards BBS. I met
some monks who appreciated both the message and the conduct of Gnanasara, the
general secretary and de facto leader of BBS. These monks saw him as an iconic Bikku,
who has emerged in a historic epoch. They saw his rough behaviour, including vociferous
and virulent language, as pivotal to efficacious communication with the ordinary masses.
In a way they are expecting the re-incarnation of a Dharmapala, who led Buddhists in an
anti-colonial and anti-proselytisation campaign during the 19
th
century.
The article now moves on to look at these issues in Myanmar.
Conflict Histories and Consciousness in Myanmar
The historical memory of conflicts between Buddhists on the one hand, and British
colonial rulers and Muslims on the other, influences the discursive construction of
Buddhists and Muslims in Myanmar. The British colonial administration brought
a significant number of labourers from India (Smith, 1965). Moneylenders of Indian
origin caused indebtedness among local farmers and the former bought a significant
portion of rice lands. This caused some grievances, which were used to mobilise anti-
foreign/anti-Muslim sentiments in local communities. So colonial intervention had
a significant impact in engendering Buddhist nationalism and xenophobic tendencies
10 D. HERATH
against Indians. The Bamars –the majority ethnic group in Myanmar –have historically
suffered through colonial conquest (Leach, 1973). Colonial rule had a direct deleterious
impact on Buddhism as it caused a “disestablishment”of traditional ties between the state
and the Sangha, leading to the neglect of Buddhist institutions (Bechert, 1973). This
“colonial trauma”has been fostered and abused by political and military leaders since
independence (Frydenlund, 2018a).
Myanmar’s nationalist elites during the colonial period built a discourse of fear
focussing on intermarriage between Buddhists and non-Buddhists, and demanded
separation of Myanmar from India (Kyaw, 2016). The British colonial administration
excluded ethnic Bamars from the armed forces and privileged other ethnic groups such as
the Chin, Kachin and Karen, and Indian migrants. This had highly negative conse-
quences for ethnic integration and created antagonism between the Bamars and other
minorities (Walton, 2008). The first half of the 20
th
century saw intense ethnic polarisa-
tion in Myanmar between the Japanese and British colonisers. While the Japanese
recruited Buddhists, the British recruited Indian Muslims. The colonisers trained and
armed these groups, setting them against each other (Schonthal, 2016; Schonthal &
Walton, 2016). A history of external interventions thus created schisms between the
majority and the minorities. This history informs current Buddhist perceptions and
discourses of fear towards Muslims.
There is a long history to the episodes of conflict and tension between various
Buddhist and Muslim communities belonging to different ethnicities in Myanmar.
There were riots in the 1930s, mainly targeting Indian migrants, while the riots in 1938
specifically targeted Muslims. Monks from the All Burma Council of Young Monks are
believed to have played a role in these riots. Ever since, there have been episodes of
conflict and violence between Buddhists and Muslims in various parts of Myanmar,
including the hotspot of Rakhine state (Crouch, 2016; International Crisis Group, 2017;
Kipgen, 2012; Rogers, 2008; Schober, 2011; Smith, 1965; Walton & Hayward, 2014). Both
969 and Mabatha have played a pivotal role in propagating anti-Muslim sentiment since
2012. Mabatha, for instance, pushed the quasi-military government to adopt laws that
restrict interreligious marriages and conversion (Frydenlund, 2017; Frydenlund, 2018a).
In August 2017, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) staged an attack on 30
police posts, leading to the deaths of 79 militants and security personnel and sparking
a major counter-offensive by security forces. Consequently, a humanitarian crisis erupted
in Rakhine state with more than half a million Rohingyas fleeing to Bangladesh in the face
of attacks by the military or vigilante groups. Myanmar does not recognise Rohingyas as
citizens, and they are therefore in a much more precarious situation than ordinary
Muslims.
Constructing “Buddhists”and “Muslims”in Myanmar
Like their counterparts in Sri Lanka, monks interviewed in Myanmar for this study engage
in a discursive construction of Buddhists as a historically victimised community and
Muslims as an existential threat to Buddhists and the Buddhist identity. Although there is
vast heterogeneity among Muslims in Myanmar in terms of ethnicity, language and region,
the discourse of fear constructs a homogeneous category of “Muslims”as the “other”.
Relative to Sri Lanka, interviews in Myanmar illuminate stronger and harder anti-Muslim
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 11
prejudices. As I was told by one informant, “Most Buddhists can kill a man only when they
are very angry. But Muslims are cold blooded, and they can kill even when they are not
angry. So, they can kill easily and mercilessly”(Young female teacher at a monastery,
Mandalay).
This young woman saw “the Muslim”as an aggressor who is inherently violent and
capable of killing others without provocation. She agreed that Buddhists also commit
violence, but only when they are provoked. There is a persistent narrative in Myanmar
that constructs Muslims as a “fearsome other”(Schissler, Walton, & Thi, 2017). This can
represent a situation in which a minority of extremist actors assume that a whole
community, not just certain individual members, are fearsome and deserve violence
simply by virtue of their existence.
Population growth and interreligious marriage
969 and Mabatha have propagated the view that Muslims threaten Buddhism and
Buddhists through their higher population growth. These movements see Muslims not
only as an internal threat but also as a regional and global threat that conspires to Islamise
the whole world (Crouch, 2016; Kyaw, 2016; McGilvray, 2016; Schonthal, 2016;
Schonthal & Walton, 2016). Conforming to the same arguments, many of the monks
I met in Mandalay and Yangon expressed fear about the population growth among
Muslims. According to one informant:
In the mountain region you see the Bayan tree. It starts very small. But the nature of the
Bayan tree is that it swallows the whole building. The Muslims are like that. They are
growing more and more in our country (Senior monk, Yangon).
This monk, an abbot of a monastery in Yangon, believed that such high growth rates by
Muslims may pose a threat to Myanmar’s Buddhist identity. Monks I interviewed
believed that the high population growth rate among Muslims would achieve what
invasions had done in the past. The discourse of population growth reveals the
Buddhist perception of victimhood and beleaguered mentality, but this perception did
not go unchallenged. Some monks believe in a non-aggressive and non-violent response
to alleged intrusions from other religions:
The problem is not the growing number of Muslims or Christians or those from any other
faith. Buddhism is like a branch of a tree. If you cut the roots it cannot survive. So, we must
maintain Buddhism (in its proper quality) (Senior monk, Mandalay).
This interviewee argued that the response to fears about incursions from other faiths or
the threat of the population growth of Muslims lies within the Buddhist community,
which should strive to uphold Buddhist values. Hence, he looked inward, specifically
towards the moral integrity of religion rather than at counter-actions towards purported
threats. Unlike in Sri Lanka, there was a strong discourse of fear with respect to inter-
religious marriages in Myanmar:
At first Muslims do not force Bamar girls to convert. But when they have children, if the
mother is not Muslim, children do not have a right to inheritance. So, because of love for
their children mothers convert to Islam (Young monk, Mandalay).
12 D. HERATH
It was not so much the marriage of Buddhist women to Muslim men that worried this
monk but their subsequent conversion to Islam through Islamic marriage. He went on to
argue that even if these women by chance managed to avoid conversion, their offspring
would still be converted to Islam. Some of the monks I met said that, unlike other
religions, Islam does not permit children of a mixed marriage to choose their religion;
they therefore considered Islam to be intolerant. Monks asserted that Buddhists never
converted Muslim women to Buddhism. In this respect, some of my informants endorsed
Mabatha’s campaign to ban or restrict interreligious marriages. The majority of infor-
mants I interviewed in Myanmar believed that conversion of Buddhist women did occur
in the past and had placed Buddhists in a position of insecurity.
The Buddhist obsession with conversion is puzzling, especially from a Western-inspired
human rights perspective, which upholds proselytisation and conversion as aspects of
religious freedom. An empathetic vantage point contributes to understanding religious
conflict because it reveals that this notion of religious freedom does not resonate well with
the cultural context of Myanmar: monks maintain a perception of historical victimhood
associated with proselytisation and conversion to Christianity during the colonial era. This
collective memory is evoked in the ongoing debate about proselytisation and conversion to
Islam. Mabatha and 969 have used it to create fear and to push through the parliament
certain controversial pieces of legislation such as restrictions on interreligious marriages.
The Buddhist sense of insecurity and the interest in the political exclusion of certain ethno-
religious minorities have been conflated at the level of Mabatha (Frydenlund, 2018b), but it
is difficult to generalise this tendency to ordinary monks.
Nevertheless, I found monks who challenge this perpetual concern with conversion.
A chief abbot I interviewed in Mandalay stated that Buddha himself created Buddhism by
preaching Dhamma and convincing people to espouse Buddhism:
Even Buddha did his duty (of preaching) and other people converted themselves to
Buddhism (voluntarily). This way is the Buddha way. It is different from the Mabatha
way. We must do our duty. You see . . . most monks do not do their duty in our country.
I think we should blame them (Abbot, former Saffron Revolution leader, Mandalay).
This abbot pointed to a counter-narrative to the phobia about conversion and believed
that monks had failed to perform their duty of preaching and practising Buddhism;
hence, monks are at fault for the conversion of Buddhists to Islam. This monk did not see
a threat in conversion, and mentioned that radicals had exaggerated the problem.
As an extension of the discourses of population growth and religious conversion, the
conflict in Rakhine state and the issue of Rohingyas were key points of reference in shaping
the current perceptions of victimhood among the monks I interviewed.They expressed fear
that migrants from Bangladesh might enter Myanmar illegally and threaten Myanmar’s
Buddhist identity. Most of my informants stated that they did not oppose granting citizen-
ship to Rohingyas but believed that migration from Bangladesh should stop.
Interestingly, unlike in Sri Lanka, the monks I met in Myanmar did not make
a distinction between traditional and reformist Islam, possibly indicating a greater
tendency to homogenise Muslims as one coherent group. It was enlightening to listen
to a civil society activist in Yangon, who was Islamic by faith. This activist spoke about
the influence of Thablighi Jamaath in Myanmar and how it was linked to the social
distancing of Muslims:
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 13
While there has been radicalisation among Buddhists, there has also been radicalisation
among Muslims. In particular, Thablighi influence has been strong. Muslim Maulavis
[religious leaders responsible for mosques] go to India or Pakistan for training. They return
with extreme ideological views. They want Muslim men to wear the beard and women to
cover their hair. In the past Muslim women dressed like Burmese and behaved like Burmese.
So, Burmese Buddhists now find that Muslims are so different (Muslim activist, Yangon).
This activist presented a critique of the Islamic reformist influence on ordinary Myanmar
Muslims. He was of the view that the changes in outward appearance in Muslim men and
women have created social distancing between Buddhists and Muslims, and that such
social distance was often translated into fear and hatred when the media projected
Muslims as fundamentalists and terrorists in a globalised world.
Economic dominance and expansion
I interviewed a Buddhist nun who lived in an ordinary monastery in Sagaing and was not
connected with any political or religious movement, although she mentioned that
Mabatha had once visited the area for an awareness campaign. She observed: “Suppose
we do not buy from their shops . .. that would be one way to stop their energy. We never
buy from their shops. We do not go in their automobiles or motorbikes”. She indicated
the extent to which the discourse of economic “grievances”informs the desire to boycott
businesses run by Muslims and the belief that such boycotts can counter Islamic
expansionism.
One could easily observe in Mandalay and Yangon that if any minority had economic
significance, it was not the Muslims. There was a conspicuous presence of highly
successful Chinese merchants in both Mandalay and Yangon. These relatively recent
migrants had become generous patrons of the monasteries in urban areas and had
managed to integrate with the local community through their real or cultivated cultural
affinity. One of my interpreters, whose home town was Mandalay, told me that “We have
no problem with the Chinese. They are Buddhist. When a Chinese marries a Buddhist
woman, it is monogamy”(Elderly male Buddhist laity, Yangon).
My interpreter was well aware that Chinese merchants had monopolised certain parts
of the local economy, but for him the Chinese were not an economic or cultural threat as
the latter were Buddhist and practised monogamy.
5
The overwhelming presence of
wealthy Chinese merchants seemed to initiate a process of gentrification and crowded
the poor Burmese out of Mandalay and Yangon. With few exceptions, however, my
informants did not express economic grievances in relation to Chinese merchants,
evidently because these merchants were seen as culturally congruent. Arguably, the
Buddhist sense of historical victimhood associated with colonial rule must be taken
into account in order to understand this attitude. Beneath the discourse of economic
grievances lies the Buddhist sense of fear and insecurity vis-à-vis other religious com-
munities with a history of proselytisation/conversion.
The legitimacy of radical actors
It is important to examine whether 969 and Mabatha had legitimacy in the eyes of
Buddhist monks before the government banned them. By campaigning against Aung San
14 D. HERATH
Suu Kyi, Mabatha tried to create the impression that Suu Kyi was favourably disposed
towards Muslims and anti-Buddhist. Most of the monks I interviewed were critical of
Mabatha’s role in defending and promoting the former military regime in the 2015
elections.
Some of the monks further presented a moral critique against Wirathu. One inter-
viewee in Mandalay opined that Wirathu represents “extremism”and strong attachment,
which is against the Buddhist principles of Middle Path and Detachment:
I dislike Rev Wirathu. He seems to have an (undue) attachment to Buddhism. It is
extremism. With attachment we distance from the right path.
Mabatha’s way is not the Buddha way. That is why I criticised it. The Buddha way is the
Metta way. We must love all beings as a mother loves her only child. You see, Metta Sutta
...Mātāyathāniyam puttam āyusāekaputta-manurakkhe
6
. . . it is very clear . . . very clear.
Buddha is not for Buddhists only (Abbot, former leader of Saffron Revolution, Mandalay).
This abbot had been an activist in the Saffron Revolution. He saw Wirathu from a deeply
normative perspective and stressed that Wirathu contradicted the Buddhist norms of
“Middle Path”and “Detachment”. In this view, Buddhist loving kindness was not
reserved for Buddhists but extended to all living beings. This monk promoted a counter-
narrative that disagreed with radicals and opened up the possibility of deconstructing
Islamophobia.
However, the Sangha community is heterogeneously positioned vis-à-vis Mabatha and
969 (Gravers, 2015; Schober, 2006). For instance, some of the monks I interviewed
vehemently stated that they appreciated the role of 969 and Mabatha, and maintained
that these organisations were necessary to defend Buddhism because the state, including
the military regime, had failed to do so. It was puzzling to witness this besieged mentality
in a country where Buddhists are the predominant majority, and where the military,
almost exclusively Buddhist, is in control while the perceived threat is only a minor
fraction of the population. An important empirical contribution of this article is to show
that the historical sense of being a victimised majority leads them to appreciate radical
actors, who have been adept at cultivating a discourse of fear through the use of global
prejudices against Muslims and global Islamophobia. Until the victory of the National
League for Democracy in the 2015 elections, this ideology had the institutional infra-
structure and support to grow and flourish.
Irrespective of the religious rhetoric of 969 and Mabatha about external threats, the
Buddhist monks I interviewed in Myanmar (and Sri Lanka) likewise identified internal
threats and a decline of Buddhism manifested by moral degradation. I asked an abbot in
Mandalay: “If you were to advise the government on how to protect Buddhism, what
actions would you recommend?”The abbot responded by saying, “teaching and learning
Buddhism and practising meditation”. Many monks were of the view that Buddhism
could only be defended through the moral exaltation of Buddhists. So monks are
confronted with the reality that their society is in a state of flux and they no longer
have the same social status that they once enjoyed. Some monks explicitly stated that the
military, which saw itself as the defender of Buddhism, was the main source of this
internal transformation, and hence, an internal threat to Buddhism: “The main threat in
Burma is the government and the people who are using Buddhism to attack other people
in the name of religion”(Scholar and abbot, Yangon).
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 15
This informant revealed a duality that monks confront within the current political
landscape: the discursive construction of Buddhists as a historically victimised majority
forces them to focus on external threats, but changes within the Buddhist society and
Sangha compel them to reflect on who they really are. This monk, who had participated
in the Saffron Revolution and the “88 Uprising”, revealed another political reality: the
bitter experience of Buddhism being manipulated for political advantage by actors such
as the former military regime.
Conclusions
I have developed an empathetic vantage point for generating insights into the views of
ordinary monks regarding the tensions and conflicts between Buddhists and Muslims in Sri
Lanka and Myanmar. This article has tried to make sense of how monks feel and examined
their perceptions towards the tensions and conflicts between Buddhists and Muslims
within a broader context of historical memory as well as contemporary transformations.
Empirically, the most important contribution of this article is to elucidate the discursive
construction of Buddhists as a historically victimised community and to demonstrate that
historical experiences and memory are critical to understanding the feelings and behaviour
of Buddhist monks vis-à-vis Muslims. The Buddhists I interviewed viewed the current
conflicts between Buddhists and Muslims from a historically grounded viewpoint, which
considers the Buddhist community as onethat has suffered injury throughout history at the
hands of external forces. Monks and laity claimed that in both Myanmar and Sri Lanka,
Buddhists have historically accommodated people of other faiths and given them space to
grow and flourish. Yet, they felt that other religious communities, historically, have
encroached on the Buddhist sphere by imposing limits on Buddhist rituals, conversion of
Buddhists to other faiths, and destruction of Buddhist heritage sites. This sense of past
“injury”informs the perceptions of the present: informants saw the current concerns about
conversion, construction of religious structures, population growth, migration, marriage
and even economic competition through the historical lens of past injury.
The discourse of fear, which this study has highlighted, did not evidence an apocalyptic
mentality by Buddhists. Rather, the fears emanated from a substantive basis of history. The
pre-colonial and colonial experiences, neglect of local economic systems, invasions, and
incursions into the Buddhist community left them with permanent scars, which constitute
acollectivememory.Idonotarguethatthisisinevitableorthatitisrationalonthepartof
Buddhists to invoke collective memory to justify their present feelings or any form of violence,
but this is how my informants construct their “reality”. This article has endeavoured to
demonstrate this reality in order to enrich our understanding of tensions between these
religious communities. There is another reality: that of radical Buddhist actors, who cater to
the Buddhist sense of fear and, in fact, manipulate such fears to generate hatred and
antagonism towards Muslim communities. These actors use existing local and global pre-
judices against Muslims and Islamophobia to mobilise Buddhists and, in some cases, to incite
violence. The vast heterogeneity among Muslims in terms of language, ethnicity, origin,
customs and economic standing remains shrouded within the Buddhist imaginary of the
“Muslim other”. This has enabled radical actors to paint Muslims as a single and unified force
that threatens Buddhism and Buddhists. There are also political actors who wilfully use these
fears for religious “outbidding”and subverting democracy. Efforts to counter these racist
16 D. HERATH
campaigns should nevertheless be sensitive tothesubstantivebasisofhistory,whichthe
radical and political actors exploit.
Furthermore, the dynamics and transformations within the Islamic community and
worship have also been significant for Buddhist–Muslim tensions and mistrust. For
instance, the discourse of “purification”, pursued in particular by the relatively new and
more reformist Islamic groups, has drawn Muslims out of the local culture and traditions in
which they were embedded for hundreds of years. Islamic reformism, cultural transforma-
tions and pragmatic manifestations have contributed to the social othering of Muslims. The
suicide bombings in April 2019, which were carried out by terrorists who belonged to
a reformist Islamic organisation, not only killed hundreds of innocent Catholics but also
damaged relations between Muslims and other communities in Sri Lanka.
Nevertheless, one should not be oblivious to the fact that there are counter-discourses
that challenge the discourse of fear and external threat. The monks I interviewed in
Myanmar and Sri Lanka share a notion of moral decline within the Buddhist Sangha and
lay communities, and consider this a significant internal threat to Buddhism. Further, some
monks challenged the existing discourse of fear and thus promoted a counter-narrative to
extremism and religious “othering”. Nevertheless, these voicesare weak or remainrelatively
less visible. The radicals on both sides of the spectrum continue to command the public
imagination and dominate the collective memory. Playing on religious sensitivities still
generates massive political gains for parties that choose to mobilise discourses of fear, while
terrorist attacks such as those at Easter 2019 in Sri Lanka are likely to consolidate fear for
time immemorial.
Notes
1. Throughout this article “Sinhalas”and “Sinhalese”are used interchangeably.
Throughout this article “Sinhalas”and “Sinhalese”are used interchangeably.
2. Camilla Orjuela, Gustaaf Houtman and Carolina Ivarsson. The researchers in this project
focussed on different aspects and dynamics of Buddhist–Muslim relations in Sri Lanka and
Myanmar, including youth and social media, the role of civil society and monks in counter-
ing violence, rights of passage traditions, and so on. The data and literature collected by each
researcher were shared within the group.
Camilla Orjuela, Gustaaf Houtman and Carolina Ivarsson. The researchers in this project
focussed on different aspects and dynamics of Buddhist–Muslim relations in Sri Lanka and
Myanmar, including youth and social media, the role of civil society and monks in counter-
ing violence, rights of passage traditions, and so on. The data and literature collected by each
researcher were shared within the group.
3. Grounded theory allows researchers to code interview transcripts methodically and system-
atically. Codes are then used to generate themes, which form the basis of analysis and
formation of a theory by logically linking the themes. NVIVO is software that facilitates
coding and generating themes.
Grounded theory allows researchers to code interview transcripts methodically and
systematically. Codes are then used to generate themes, which form the basis of analysis
and formation of a theory by logically linking the themes. NVIVO is software that facilitates
coding and generating themes.
4. In Sri Lanka there are many religious places, such as Adam’sPeak, visited and worshipped
by Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Christians for centuries.
In Sri Lanka there are many religious places, such as Adam’s Peak, visited and worshipped
by Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Christians for centuries.
ASIAN STUDIES REVIEW 17
5. Monks and laity I interviewed in Mandalay and Yangon never expressed any fear towards
Karen or Shan Buddhists. Monasteries in these cities have hundreds of young novices of
many ethnicities, which have armed conflicts with the Myanmar military.
Monks and laity I interviewed in Mandalay and Yangon never expressed any fear towards
Karen or Shan Buddhists. Monasteries in these cities have hundreds of young novices of
many ethnicities, which have armed conflicts with the Myanmar military.
6. Excerpt from Metta sutta, which is about extending loving kindness to all beings.
Excerpt from Metta sutta, which is about extending loving kindness to all beings.
Acknowledgments
I would like to express my gratitude to Ven. Kudawawe Somananda Thero, Camilla Orjuela,
Harshana Rambukwella, Gustaaf Houtman, the anonymous reviewers and the journal’s editors for
their invaluable and constructive comments, which have contributed immensely to this article.
Funding
This work was supported by the Swedish Research Council under grant number 348-2014-5962.
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