J. B. Callicot and J.

McRae (ed), Environmental Philosophy in Asian

Traditions of Thought (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2014)

Chapter 4

Acting with Compassion:

Buddhism, Feminism, and the
Environmental Crisis
Stephanie Kaza

O n my altar at home stands a small bronze casting of Kuan Yin

(also known as Kannon Kanzeon in Japan), who serves to bless my
meditation space and daily activity. Her robes are flowing and gracious,
and in her hand she holds a vase of healing water. She stands ready to
receive the suffering of the world with compassion and equanimity.
Above the kitchen sink I have a picture of a carved jade Kuan Yin from
China. She holds a rabbit on her arm, manifesting the spirit of harmony
with life and all living beings. On my desk, covering the books and
papers of my current work, is a prayer cloth of the Green Tara. She sits
on a lotus dais; her aura and soft face radiate gentle and penetrating
power.
I begin with Kuan Yin because she represents a feminine gender
form of a realized Bodhisattva, known to many people for thousands
of years as the embodiment of compassion for all beings in the vast
interdependent mutually causal web. Sometimes depicted with a
thousand arms, Kuan Yin reaches out to offer a thousand tools of
compassion—a shovel, a flute, a blanket, a kind word. Kuan Yin is ‘the
Mahayana archetype of mutual support, giving life and fulfillment to
the Sangha . . . of stones and clouds, of wild creatures and forests, of
people . . . in the slums and prisons of our cities, not to mention our own
families and friends’.1 In the Tibetan tradition, the feminine form of the
Green Tara serves as a reminder of the one who heals by her presence,

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 72 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

serving countless beings. Her green color symbolizes the capacity

to take action; her right hand forms the mudra, or gesture of calling
forth awakening, and her left the gesture of refuge.2
As realized beings, Kuan Yin and Tara listen to all the cries of the
world, not just those of people. This means they are also concerned
with plants and animals, mountains and valleys, small creatures
and large. The feminine compassionate presence has long been
addressed by Buddhists of many cultures to relieve human sickness,
grief, and poverty of spirit. In the current sweep of environmental
destruction, it is Kanzeon and Tara who see and experience with us
the pain and suffering of deserts, forests, soils, groundwater, oceans,
and skies. They offer a model of radical presence in the world, of no
separation between the one who suffers and the one who responds.
The calls for action and healing arise spontaneously and naturally
out of the cries of death and despair.
In this introductory work, I draw on the courage and inspiration
of these Bodhisattvas to investigate the role of Buddhist practice
and philosophy informed by feminist principles in support of work
for the environment. As Buddhism and feminism gain strength and
momentum in the Western world, the environmental crisis looms
large on the horizon of our survival. I believe those trained in the
self-discipline, analysis, and reflective processes of Buddhism and
feminism have a powerful contribution to make in addressing the
enormous challenges of environmental work. I encourage many
more women and men to develop these tools for effective, grounded,
­sensitive, and nonviolent action on behalf of the earth.
I speak from my own perspective as a Buddhist, feminist, and envi-
ronmentalist. I have been studying Zen Buddhism for sixteen years
with Kobun Chino Roshi, practicing at Green Gulch and Jikogi Zen
Centers in California, and serving as chair of the national Buddhist
Peace Fellowship board. I have evolved as a feminist through my
mother’s example as a lawyer for the poor, through my experience
of power relations in patriarchal workplaces and religious centers,
and through examination of feminist discourse in theory, philosophy
and morality. I am an environmentalist by profession, with academic
training in both biology and social ethics. I have been working in
the field of environmental education and conservation for twenty
years and currently teach Environmental Ethics at the University of
Vermont in Burlington.
I begin with principles held in common by Buddhism and
feminism that are relevant to the environmental crisis. I then offer

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 Acting with Compassion 73

examples of these principles in action, of feminist women engaged

in environmental work as Buddhist practice. This exploration is an
introduction to a field of integrated perspectives which is just devel-
oping. I draw primarily on American Buddhism; the paper should
not be construed to be internationally inclusive.

Introduction
When Buddhism arrived in the West, it encountered curious and
bright minds of both sexes, eager for teachings and spiritual practices
relevant to their lives. The search for spiritual foundation escalated in
the 1960s and 1970s as sensitive men and women suffered through the
paralyzing national pain of the civil rights movement and the Vietnam
War. College students and activists scrutinized social values in depth
and rejected much of the status quo parochialism that characterized
American thinking. Spurred by their interest and, in the case of Tibet,
cultural destruction, the most extensive wave of Buddhist teachers
arrived in America from Tibet, Japan, Korea, Thailand, Sri Lanka,
and Burma.3
At the same time, feminism was blossoming and gaining strength
as a social movement. Women were waking up to the repressed and
hidden cruelties of male domination in individual relationships as
well as social institutions. In consciousness-raising groups across
the United States, women examined issues of reproduction and
health, power and sexual abuse, and outright misogyny. Feminist
intellectuals took on the challenge of deconstructing gender-biased
assumptions that underlay the foundations of Western language, poli-
tics, psychology, medicine, law, and philosophy. Feminist Buddhists
questioned patriarchal Asian forms and inappropriate teacher-student
conduct. 4
Earth Day 1970 marked a watershed point in public concern for
the environment. Widespread exposure to extensive environmental
problems generated a wave of citizen action groups and environ-
mental education programs. Activists pointed to the cumulative
excesses of postwar industrialization and commercialization, along
with skyrocketing human populations, as pressing the limits of the
planet’s carrying capacity. Doomsday predictions forecast large-scale
environmental catastrophes long before Chernobyl, Love Canal, or
the loss of the Black Forest. Antinuclear activism was a relatively
new movement struggling against the enormous odds of a fearful
Cold War nation.

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 74 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

In the two decades between Earth Day 1970 and Earth Day 1990,
Buddhism, feminism, and concern for the environment in America
grew and changed tremendously, ref lecting a period of serious
questioning of values and social structures. The maturation of under-
standing and insight over these two decades provides a significant
setting for reviewing the role of Buddhism teachers of the 1960s and
1970s. Twenty years later, there were over 300 Buddhist centers across
the country and a dozen major Buddhist publications.5 In this period
of growth, over twenty women gained recognition as formal Buddhist
teachers.6 In the 1960s, feminism was a little-known word, but by
1990, feminists had established hundreds of nonprofit organizations to
support women’s issues, from rape hotlines to women’s history weeks.
Retreats and conferences for women Buddhists were regular features
on Western meditation calendars.
By Earth Day 1990, the proliferation of books, graduate programs,
environmental careers, and by now well-established environmental
lobbying groups was an indicator of the all-encompassing scale of
the ecological situation. The environmental crisis had grown beyond
local, state, national, and international capacity to handle it. Amidst
the world context of North-South tension, over 1500 women from
84 countries stood in solidarity for women’s environmental needs at
the 1991 Women’s World Congress for a Healthy Planet. One after
another presented moving testimonies of economic injustice, forest
degradation, loss of soil and farms, and frustration with political
systems that systematically destroyed environmental resources.7
I believe there is a powerful conf luence of thought, practice,
commitment, and community in the lives of feminist Buddhists
working for the environment who have lived through this history of
startling change. In these two decades, leadership and participation of
women in Buddhist practice have paralleled the rise in feminist theory
research and explorations in conservation biology and restoration
biology. A whole new generation of young people has been raised in
families with feminist and/or Buddhist parents concerned about the
environment. Feminists, Buddhist women practitioners, and environ-
mental advocates are no longer isolated from one another.
The growth and maturation of these social and religious move-
ments have come at a time when people are hungry for ethical
response to the environmental problems they see around them. Yet
most Americans lack the patience and moral reasoning skills to work
through the complexities of environmental dilemmas. The discipline
of Buddhist practice and the social analysis of feminism now bring a

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 Acting with Compassion 75

mature perspective to the endless suffering of the environment and

a capacity to live with the tension of unresolved issues that will take
more than several generations to correct.

Environmentally Relevant Principles

of Buddhism and Feminism
The philosophical principles of Buddhism and feminism overlap and
complement each other in a number of areas, mutually supporting
an interdependent, systems-oriented view of the environment. There
are also several areas in which one of these is under-developed in its
traditions, practices, or teachings and is enhanced or influenced by
exposure to the other. I outline here six areas of confluence, with some
comments on differences that are not yet fully addressed.

Experiential Knowing
In contrast to much of Western philosophy and theology, Buddhism
begins with the truth of personal experience. Experiential knowing in
relationship to spiritual development is valued over textual, abstract,
or other sources of knowing, which are distant from the individual. 8
The early canons of Buddha’s teachings repeatedly urged the prac-
titioner to thoroughly study his or her own experience and mental
conditioning in order to break through the limitations of the falsely
constructed self. The Buddha insisted his followers not take his
authority as a final say on any matter, but rather sincerely investigate
the teachings for themselves. Meditation practices aim to quiet and
stabilize the mind so that it is capable of observing thoughts, sensa-
tions, and actions in great detail. One’s own mind and experience are
the places in which one learns to recognize the universal nature of
suffering (the first of the Four Noble Truths in Buddhism).
Experiential knowing is based on embodied mindfulness practices
that develop awareness of need and greed, the suffering of pleasure
and pain, and the impermanent nature of things. The content for
this learning is always one’s own life. One’s spiritual challenge is to
investigate in depth the accumulated patterns of response to physical,
social, mental, and psychological stimuli in order to liberate the
practitioner from the suffering of unconsciousness. By shining the
light of awareness on the nature of one’s own conditioned reality,
one finds the freedom to act effectively and skillfully, grounded
in thorough self-knowledge. This experiential knowing or study
of self in body, speech, and mind lies at the heart of all traditions

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 76 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

of Buddhist ­teachings. Dogen Zenji, ninth-century Japanese Zen

Master, expressed this:

To study the buddha way is to study the self,

To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things.9

Feminism is equally clear on the importance of experiential

knowing as a foundation for social action and personal insight. The
feminist movement in the United States, as well as in other countries,
has consistently emphasized that women speak their own truths with
their own voices. Feminists have encouraged women to reclaim the
stories of their lives and speak what they know from direct experi-
ence. The personal is recognized as the political, for it is a genuine
place of truth telling. This has meant speaking out about the painful
suffering of sexual and environmental abuse, articulating the power
of women’s emotions, and hearing the realities of women’s bodies
and environmental health concerns. In feminist religious studies in
Buddhist and other traditions, women struggle with the discontinuity
between personal experience and patriarchal tradition, looking for
new language, forms, and community that match women’s religious
experience.10
Feminists have validated the important realm of subjective
knowing, acknowledging the inner experience of self that places the
knower in an interior as well as exterior context.11 Subjective knowing
in women has been consistently denigrated by Western patriarchal
cultures as self-centered, romantic, and distorted by emotionality.
The scientific inquiry method, which insists on the necessity of an
objective perspective, is the extreme opposite of subjective or inte-
rior knowing. It depends completely on the assumption that the actor
can be separate from the object of one’s actions. 12 This overlooks
the critical discipline of subjective knowing that reveals the inner
structure and conditioning of the individual mind. It is this built-in
conditioning that limits accuracy and objectivity in perception. Inte-
grated, experiential knowing, which includes both object of knowing
and the knower herself, is necessary for understanding the complexi-
ties of the environmental crisis.
For many women, the experience of knowing in relation to the
natural world develops the mind-body’s response to other beings and
to lunar and seasonal cycles, informed by kinesthetic and sensory
awareness. Body rhythms and responses to the earth have long been
celebrated in earth-based spiritual traditions such as the Goddess

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 Acting with Compassion 77

culture, not necessarily only by women. Among Buddhist cultures,

the Japanese and others have cultivated an emotional and aesthetic
attitude toward the natural world that represents intimate and prere-
flective encounter with the environment. In the Japanese view, nature
is seen as the realm of ‘spontaneous becoming’—a meeting ground
for the dynamic unfolding of person, tree, rock and bird.13
The embodied knowing of child and mother can be a model for
intimate relations with the earth.14 The child in the womb knows only
mother as earth; it is surrounded by, sustained by, and conditioned
by the mother as context. Likewise, the earth is body to the woman,
completely informing, conditioning, and nourishing her life. This
metaphor does not imply that women have preferred access to these
truths (the ‘essentialist’ position in feminist philosophy). Rather,
embodied knowing for any person is a direct link to experience of
relationship with the earth. The earth itself can be seen as Buddha’s
body, supporting all lives, being the Great Life.
Embodied knowing is a source of confidence for embodied spiritu-
ality and environmental political action. The Buddhist and feminist
emphasis on direct experience of the environment is informed by
the body as mind, rather than body and mind as separate. Through
knowing based on experience, one becomes grounded in actual reality
rather than in one’s ideas of reality. Through this grounding, the prac-
titioner gains a legitimate voice with which to speak personally and
specifically of environmental relationships and how they are ignored,
sabotaged, or otherwise denied.

Examining the Conditioned Mind

Central to Buddhist philosophy and meditation method is the practice
of discriminating wisdom. This is the detailed study of how things
work—both in external and internal realities and in the interaction
and co-creation of the two. The purpose is to break through delusions
that generate and perpetuate a sense of an independent and separately
existing self. The discriminating mind can expose rationalized actions
and mental-cultural-emotional habits that perceive beings as separate
objects rather than as members of a web of relationships.
In the context of the environment, there are at least three prevalent
patterns of thought that block relational perception.15 One common
thought habit is stereotyping of animals and ecosystems by describing
them in oversimplified terms. People tend to lump the few character-
istics they know of an organism or plant community into a generic
representative that does not accurately reflect reality. For example, the

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 78 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

generic whale is playful, altruistic, intelligent, large, and gentle—

each characteristic fitting one species or another, but not existing
anywhere in this combination in a real whale. Emotional responses
to plant communities also lead to undifferentiated labeling. Deserts
are viewed as wastelands, and all forests are seen as cool, dark places,
despite the many differences in topography, climate, plant and animal
inhabitants, and human history.
A second form of objectification is projection, in which the mind
projects internalized ideas onto favored and unfavored elements of the
environment. By reducing the reality of a forest to someone’s idea of
a forest, the community becomes objectified—seen as object with a
convenient name and simplified description. ‘Cute’ or ‘nice’ animals,
such as deer, rabbits, and songbirds, elicit more sympathetic responses
than ‘mean’ animals, such as coyotes, spiders, and bats.16 Likewise,
good land is land that can be farmed or developed; bad land is what
is too steep, dry, or impenetrable to be subdued.
A third prevalent thought habit is dualistic thinking, in which
one object or idea is placed in opposition to another, often with
the implication that one has power or superiority over the other.
Self-other opposition forms the mental basis for anthropocentric
relationships with plants and animals, as well as prejudice and
racism. We-they conflicts, expressed in view of the environment as
enemy, share the same mental polarizing structure as mind-body,
creator-created, nature-culture dualisms.17 The mind separates and
distances one side of the polarity from the other, rather than seeing
the opposites as complementary and inclusive, each arising in the
context of the other.
Feminism has exposed a particular aspect of conditioned thinking
generally overlooked in Buddhism: the influence of gender iden-
tity and cultural habits of objectifying women. Many writers have
described in depth the suffering that has resulted from oppressive
dualistic thinking, projection, and stereotyping of women. Ecofemi-
nist philosopher Karen Warren suggests three features of oppressive
conceptual frameworks that apply both to treatment of women and
the environment. 18 The first, value-hierarchical thinking refers to
placing value or giving preference to what is seen as being of higher
status, as opposed to considering all things equally. The second,
value dualisms, points to the typically Western pattern of viewing
opposites as disjunct and exclusive, and then assigning moral superi-
ority to one-half of the dualism, for example male-female, day-night,
temperate-tropical, vertebrate-invertebrate.

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 Acting with Compassion 79

The third feature is the logic of domination, the argument that

justifies subordination of one opposite by the other. To uphold this
logic requires considerable mental and social cooperation with
oppressive cultural conditioning. One can see this logic at work in
rationalizing intolerable conditions for laboratory and factory-farm
animals.19 The same dominating, objectifying mind that uses women
for sex objects also justifies the use of land for strip-mining and
forests for clear-cutting. Those with international power promote
development projects for less industrialized nations that contribute
not only to environmental degradation, but also to the oppression and
further impoverishment of women.20 In highly industrialized nations,
women are subjected to aggressive domination by powerful market
advertising that manipulates their desires for consumer products.
Both Buddhism and feminism provide critical tools for examining
deeply the roots of antirelational thinking that support environmental
destruction. Both insist on a thorough review of all aspects of the
conditioned mind that perpetuate mental and physical patterns of
domination. However, because Buddhism has been transmitted almost
entirely through patriarchal cultures, its investigation of gender
conditioning is underdeveloped. This weakens the Buddhist argu-
ment for ecological interdependence, because it misses the critical
link between patterns of oppression of women and the environment.
The feminist Buddhist position includes the connection, observing
the nature of mind in women and men that sustains a separate self,
capable of dominating humans and environment.

The Truth of Interrelatedness

The fundamental law in Buddhism is the Law of Dependent
Co-Arising: that all events and beings are interdependent and
interrelated. The universe is described as a mutually causal web of
relationship, each action and individual contributing to the nature
of many others.21 The Pali word for this law, Paticca-samuppada,
explains the truth in its literal meaning. Patticca means ‘grounded on
or on account of’, sam is ‘together’, and uppada means ‘arising’. Thus
the whole phrase can be translated ‘the being-on-account-of-arising-
together’. Or in the text,

This being, that becomes:

from the arising of this, that arises;
this not being, that becomes not;
from the ceasing of this, that ceases.22

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 80 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

An image for this cosmology is the Jewel Net of Indra, from the
Mahayana Buddhist tradition.23 The multidimensional net stretches
through all space and time, connecting an infinite number of jewels
in the universe. Each jewel is infinitely multifaceted and reflects
every other jewel in the net. There is nothing outside the Net and
nothing which does not reverberate its presence throughout the web
of relationships.
This law is one of the most obvious connections between Buddhism
and the environment. As ecologists point out in example after
example, ecological systems are connected through water, air, and
soil pathways. Impacts of chemical pesticides on agricultural lands
carry to adjacent wetlands; industrial carbon emissions affect global
atmospheric climate patterns. Interdependence and interrelation-
ship are central starting points for ecological research of food webs,
nutrient cycles, and forest succession. Indra’s Net, however, contains
more than the ecological sum of biosphere, atmosphere, and litho-
sphere. The Buddhist principle of interdependence includes human
thought, perception, and values, and their impacts on the ecological-
evolutionary conversation. This critical difference is what makes it
possible and necessary for people in the Net to act ethically out of
regard for the other beings in the Net.
In the context of human relationship, feminist ethicist Mary Grey
describes the metaphysic of connectedness as ‘revelatory para-
digm’ and ‘moral imperative’. She suggests that the ethics of care
and responsibility develop from a person’s experience ‘trying to be
faithful to relation or connection’.24 A number of feminist ethicists and
writers point to mutuality and solidarity as key values for the feminist
movement.25 These values spring from the need for sister bonding
as a source of strength in facing the internalized pain of the victim
of sexism and in organizing for institutional and social change. Full
mutuality or interdependence is not possible for one dominated by the
absolutizing, individualist ‘I’. Thus to experience the richness of full
mutuality, one must transcend or break through the limitations of the
thought habit of individualism reinforced as the dominant ideology
in the Western world.
For the woman who has suffered physical, economic, psychological,
or spiritual oppression, freedom from the rigidity of the fixed ‘I’ / self
and release into the web of relationships means the choice of many
more nourishing options for growth and development. Because this
maturation occurs in a shared context with others also suffering isola-
tion, the feminist experience of interrelatedness is a process of mutual

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 Acting with Compassion 81

becoming, born out of mutual vulnerability. The joy and satisfaction

of this experience may then be a foundation for ‘passionate caring for
the entirety of the relational nexus’.26 A woman who uncovers her own
capacity for mutuality can then (and often does) extend her efforts and
empathy to the many other women in different cultures and places
who also suffer from lack of freedom of choice.
For both Buddhism and feminism, the core truth of interrelation-
ship or mutual becoming is central to individual liberation or freedom
from false reification of an independent ‘I’. Feminist Buddhists
who understand this path of liberation can be extremely effective
and compassionate participants in the struggle for environmental
consciousness. Acting from deep-rooted experience in the freedom
to choose options other than oppression, they can work creatively
and skillfully to open up environmental conversations that have been
frozen by loss of relationality.

Emotional Energy as Source of Healing

The Buddhist practice of investigating conditioned body, speech, and
mind includes detailed observation of the nature of emotions. In the
Sutra on the Four Establishments of Mindfulness, for example, the
meditator is instructed to practice awareness of pleasant, painful,
and neutral feelings as they arise in the mind and body. In Thich
Nhat Hanh’s modern-day commentary on this Sutra, he suggests
exercises for identifying and acknowledging feelings and seeing the
physical, physiological, or psychological roots of particular feel-
ings.27 By becoming fully familiar with the nature of anger, grief,
fear, desire, denial, or the blocking of these feelings, a practitioner
gains confidence in living through the sweep of emotional responses
that naturally arise from moment to moment.
The first step of healing from the suffering of difficult emotions
is to recognize and fully claim the rich information and energy
response of the body/mind. In the investigation and mindfulness
practice itself, energy is released and becomes available for healing
through attention and understanding. Rather than suppressing deep
emotions, Buddhist practice can help a person develop the capacity to
consciously use this energy to relieve suffering. Much of the response
to the current environmental crisis is an emotional response, filled
with grief, fear, and anger at the loss and destruction of plants,
animals, forests, and watersheds. The depth of response may be
so overwhelming that people become immobilized and unable to

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 82 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

act. Buddhist practices to validate and move through these waves

of emotion can be extremely helpful in freeing up energy to take
action on behalf of the environment.28
Western feminists also recognize the importance of emotional
response in the process of awakening to oppression. Most Western
white women have been conditioned not to express anger overtly.
Strong displays of empassioned emotion have been marginalized and
viewed as unacceptable by the ruling patriarchy and its male model
of ‘cool’ and reserved emotions. Anger at sexual and environmental
abuse qualifies as an ‘outlaw emotion’, invalidated by those who wish
to avoid hearing other experiences.29 Feminists, however, are well
aware that social and gender conditioning can only be overthrown by
a strong surge of energy and desire for change. Anger is very effective
in marshaling the energy necessary to dismantle the structure that
perpetrates violence against women and the environment.
If one begins with the fundamental truth of one’s own experience,
recognizing that perception and conception are intimately related,
it becomes necessary to know how we feel in order to act morally.
As feminist theologian Beverly Harrison asserts, ‘The failure to live
deeply in “our bodies, ourselves” destroys the possibility for moral
relations between us.’30 For Harrison, anger is a ‘feeling-signal that
all is not well in our relation to others or the world around us.’31
Powerful emotion is a sign of resistance to the unsatisfactory moral
quality of our social and environmental relationships. This signal
is the wake-up call to look more deeply into the situation at hand.
Harrison argues that the power to respond is the power to create a
world of moral relations. This is the work of spiritual and religious
practice, the transformative work that can serve to slow environmental
destruction and heal the wounded biosphere.
The combination of Buddhist mindfulness practice and feminist
moral response is a powerful antidote to widespread despair and
depression over the possibility of nuclear annihilation, environmental
catastrophe, or out-of-control corporate greed. This practice does
not remove the threats or mitigate the devastating consequences of
irresponsible actions, but it does help to generate the tremendous
energy needed to address the complexities of the global environ-
mental situation.32 Anger, despair or other strong emotions alone
are not enough to stop environmental tragedy, because they cause
polarization and defensive reactions that block communication.
Environmental activists already have a history and bad name in
some circles for misusing emotions in the service of battle strategy.

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 Acting with Compassion 83

Habitual unexamined anger can harden into ideology that further

erodes opportunities for working together. By cultivating a deeper,
more fully informed emotional response, one cultivates greater
possibilities for a healing transformation of relationships between
human beings and the environment.

Relational Ethics
Buddhist ethics are grounded firmly in the truth and experience of the
Law of Dependent Co-Arising. Sila, or guidelines for moral action, are
central to Buddhist practice in all traditions. The Three Pure Precepts
are vows to refrain from actions that ignore interdependence, to
make an effort to act out of understanding of interrelationship, and
to serve all beings in the interdepending web.33 The five (Theravada)
prescriptive precepts to not kill, not lie, not steal, not abuse sexuality
or intoxicants spring from a fundamental recognition of relationships.
One aims to act as respectfully and inclusively as possible toward
plant, animal, and human companions.
In the Mahayana traditions, the model of enlightenment is the
Bodhisattva who gains awakening in order to serve all beings. This
is in contrast to the Theravadan goal of achieving liberation to be
freed from the cycle of endless suffering and rebirths in a human
body. Buddhist or other religious beliefs that place emphasis on
Otherworldliness, or some version of escaping from the drudgery of
this world, are not helpful for responding to the escalating deteriora-
tion of the environment. Forests can only be replanted here on this
earth by those who live here, not those who have transcended the
world. The Bodhisattva model encourages the practices of compas-
sion for all others as a means of accomplishing a profound sense of
interrelatedness. One can specifically cultivate ‘eco-bodhicitta’ or the
mind of enlightenment that serves all relations of the environment.34
The experience of compassion for others’ suffering is what allows
us to feel the connections with disturbed ecosystems and threat-
ened species, distressing as they may be.35 Sensitivity and moral
concern for the health of human relationships can extend as well to
plants, animals, forests, clouds, stone, and sacred places. Buddhist
relational ethics are based on knowing that one cannot act without
affecting other living beings, that it is impossible to live outside
the web of interconnectedness. The beautiful Jewel Net of Indra
is sustained and enhanced by the quality of moral intention and
commitment to the many facets of the Net. To act from this sense

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 84 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

of relatedness is deeply empowering, setting an ethical example for

others to consider.
Compassion in Western culture, in contrast, is frequently asso-
ciated with pity and powerlessness and relegated to the domain of
women’s nurturing.36 In examining Western psychological values,
feminist researchers have challenged the traditional stages of moral
and psychological development based on male socialization, as
described by Kohlberg.37 In this model, moral maturity develops
through increasing allegiance to universal rules or principles of justice
and individual rights. Carol Gilligan’s work, in contrast, suggests
that women’s moral development in the West is based on maturing
responsiveness to relationships and consideration of others in moral
choices.38 Kohlberg’s male model reinforces an environmental ethic
oriented to rights and justice; Gilligan’s alternative model supports
an environmental ethic of care and responsibility.
Relational ethics as described by both Buddhist teachings and
feminist writers might also be called contextual ethics. A contextual
ethic, as I use the term, reflects both the diversity of human voices in
a given place and time39 and the specific environmental relationships
in which the human dilemma is embedded.40 Built into this approach
to ethics is the rejection of any single authoritative ethical voice or
posited human nature that exists independent of historical context.
Abstract individualism is seen as ungrounded and relatively unhelpful
in addressing the tensions of a specific environmental conflict.
Environmental moral dilemmas occur in a web of relationships.
Each situation has a unique history, based on very particular causes
and conditions. A contextual ethic represents a shift from emphasis
on rights, rules, and predetermined principles to a conception of
ethics grounded in specific relationships. Environmental actions
based entirely on rules as moral guidelines inevitably leave out some
aspect of the situation that is not included in the legal framework.
Rules generalize; relationships are infinite and complex. A relational
ethic calls for compassion for all the relationships involved in the
­situation—parent-child, tree-animal, bird-human, soil-rock. Relation-
ships are not something outside of who we are; they, in fact, define
who we are to a large extent as moral agents in a social and historical
context. As Warren argues, ‘Relationships of humans to the nonhuman
environment are, in part, constitutive of what it is to be human’. 41
Relational morality is not simple; it is extremely difficult to make
sound environmental decisions when relatively little is known about
ecological relationships. The stakes are often very high when the

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 Acting with Compassion 85

consequences of human actions mean the loss of millions of plant

and animal lives. Trade-offs in tropical environments, for example,
are almost a matter of triage today. The practices of compassion and
contextual reflection generate a deep appreciation of biological and
cultural complexity and of the long-standing ties between humans
and all other members of the biotic community. I believe this is an
essential foundation for critically needed re-evaluation of what we are
doing on the planet and what is ethically acceptable and life-sustaining.

The Role of Community

All Buddhist traditions venerate the three Jewels—the Buddha,
Dharma, and Sangha. In environmental terms, the Buddha can be
interpreted as all beings who teach, or the teacher within, or the
Buddha as environmental teacher. To see all beings as teachers means
one can learn from wolf, redwood, buffalo, river, and mountain. 42
To see the Buddha as teacher within means one learns from one’s
own experience with the environment. The Buddha as environmental
teacher is the one who points to the truth of interdependence and
co-dependent arising of all life forms.
Dharma is the truth of the teachings in their many forms, percep-
tions, and experiences. Each plant and animal, as well as human, is
an embodiment of evolutionary truth, a testimony to thousands of
years of living more or less successfully in conversation with the
environment. Each experience of connection with members of the
environmental web is a taste of the deep truth of the nature of reality
as mutually causal and interdependent.
The Third Jewel, the Sangha, is traditionally described in Buddhist
literature as the monastic community, or those who practice within a
retreat setting. Rules for Sangha behavior are extensive, numbering
over 300 in some traditions, with specific rules for nuns, often in
subordinate relationship to monks. For most American Buddhists,
some of these rules are inappropriate because of cultural differ-
ences,  but even more, they are not specific to lay or non-monastic
practice, which is the prevalent form of practice in the United States.
Deep ecologist Bill Devall proposes the concept of ‘eco-sangha’,
in which people practice with all the members of their bioregion or
watershed area and consciously identify with and include the environ-
ment as community.43 One then sits in meditation not only with others
in the human community, but also with the surrounding oaks, maples,
jays, warblers, and wildflowers.

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 86 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

Feminist Buddhist Rita Gross suggests that Sangha is the

‘indispensable matrix of spiritual existence’ necessary for human
liberation. 44 She critiques the historical tendency in Buddhism to
emphasize the lonely path to freedom, suggesting that too much
aloneness is not a good thing, for it is not, in itself, instructive in
how to get along with others. Her feminist reconceptualization of
Sangha rests on the values of community, nurturing, communication,
and relationships, traditionally cared for by women in many cultures.
With no theistic Ultimate Other in Buddhism to provide guaranteed
relationship to the person experiencing isolation, there is no alterna-
tive but to provide relationship for one another. She suggests, ‘It is
necessary to create the social, communal, and compassionate matrix
of a society in which friendship and relationship are taken as catego-
ries of utmost spiritual importance’. 45
A feminist interpretation of Sangha validates and deepens the key
feminist political and psychological values of solidarity and mutuality.
Companionship and shared activities, including dialogue on environ-
mental ethics, are then central to spiritual development and need to
be cultivated as primary virtues. Women’s friendships and love for
each other and the mutual growth process may be threatening and
confusing to some, because they challenge traditional ethics based in
individualism. I believe that the friendship-Sangha model is a helpful
and appropriate basis for refinding and redefining our human relation-
ships with plants, animals, and ecological communities. It is both
enjoyable and sustainable, and can serve as a significant counterpoint
to the recent history of industrialized attack and plunder.

A Few Possible Limitations

These six areas of philosophical similarity or complementarity between
Buddhism and feminism offer a solid foundation for a Buddhist femi-
nist approach to environmental issues. I believe that the environmental
ethics generated from such a position recommend restraint in human
activities that cause destruction and loss of habitats, species, and
ecosystems, with the aim of reducing suffering for many forms of life.
However, for effective evaluation of these two approaches, it is neces-
sary to keep in mind the historical traditions and limitations of each
source philosophy. There are several potential weaknesses of tradi-
tional Buddhism that may serve either to limit Buddhist involvement
with the environment or, through dialog and activity, may actually help
define the evolutionary edge of American Buddhism.

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 Acting with Compassion 87

Egocentrism as Central Concept

Buddhist philosophy and religious practice emphasize breaking
through the limited perspective and conditioning of the small self or
human ego, in order to experience the boundless interrelated nature
of reality. The route to liberation assumes an overvaluation of self
or ego, which distorts perception and perpetuates self-centeredness.
This fundamental approach may not be as applicable for marginal-
ized groups of people, including women. Teachings that point to the
falsely constructed separate ego may be received as disconnected
from the actual lived experience of oppression, or as a paternalistic
strategy for pacification or assimilation. 46 For women and others
experiencing social messages that continually devalue the self,
the Buddhist emphasis on egolessness may only serve to further
erode the not yet fully formed and validated person. Practices that
suppress the ego may be misinterpreted as a denial of personhood
which can be used as a method of subjugation and denigration of
marginalized groups.
Feminism has taken a strong position on self-advocacy as a key
principle in fighting abusive patterns of social conditioning, whether
in marriage, work, or health matters. Self-advocacy is critical to
women speaking up for their rights, their existence, and more human
standards of behavior. The marginalized or oppressed woman is
encouraged to find her voice, her dreams, her capabilities, her inner
strength. This is essential spiritual work, the challenge of distin-
guishing the true self from the many layers of social and gender
patterns that deny the self.
This critique of Buddhism is relevant to environmental work in
at least two respects. One, in the realm of ecofeminist spirituality,
there may be a tendency to overemphasize the subjective experience
of environment as universal, in the enthusiasm for a women’s nature-
based religious practice. However, this may more accurately reflect
the need to simply establish the existence and validity of women’s
personhood, long overlooked by many religions, including Buddhism.
I suggest that Buddhist feminists seeking ecological spirituality
examine the teachings in depth to recognize healthy aspects of self-
development as well as the blocks to egolessness.
Secondly, recognition of the full ‘personhood’ or intrinsic exis-
tence of plants, animals, mountains, and rivers depends on one’s
capacity to fully recognize one’s own personhood. For the Buddhist
woman student, personhood may be displaced by the brilliant experi-
ence of boundarylessness before the self is fully developed. This

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 88 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

then diminishes the person’s capacity to deeply reflect and stand in

solidarity with the full existence of any particular environmental
other. Calling up the image of Indra’s Net, this suggests that the
reflective power of each jewel within the Net directly enhances the
beauty and perception of all the other jewels. It is the quality of this
reflection and existence that then guides our choice of environmental
actions; an ethic of restraint expressing respect and appreciation for
the beauty of the other members of the web is not possible if one does
not first fully and deeply appreciate the self.

Power Relations Analysis

The social conditions of power, status, and privilege critically
affect environmental decisions, law and treaty making, and natural
resource negotiation. Social aspects of Buddhist religions are
riddled with power, relations, as much as any other organized
religion. The social glue of power roles determines the nature of
attitudes and actions of those in power and those not in power.
While Buddhist philosophy clearly includes the relevant tools for
examining the nature of power relations and the abuse of power, this
area of inquiry is not a central emphasis in American practice today.
Gender power relations, in particular, are not generally addressed,
most likely because Buddhist philosophy and practice forms have
come through patriarchal cultures with primarily male teachers and
leaders. In many schools of Buddhism, there is a strong emphasis
on practice relationships with an authoritative teacher. This can be
a relationship of respect, but it can also be a relationship of abuse,
where power and status are used to gain sexual access to women
students.47
Issues of power relations have been raised by American femi-
nist Buddhists trying to correct for Asian cultural influence in the
historical development of Buddhism. 48 This enquiry into gender
conditioning is not widespread and not necessarily well received by
American Buddhist centers or teachers. By broadening the field of
inquiry to areas of hidden gender assumptions, feminists challenge
the status of many of the governance and religious forms transferred
to America from Asian patriarchal cultures. Those who hold reli-
gious or administrative power reinforced by Western male favoritism
are generally not inclined to examine the language, behavior, and
psychology of gender conditioning, despite feminist research showing
the powerful capacity of gender conditioning to influence all other
forms of conditioning.

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 Acting with Compassion 89

This weakness in Buddhist philosophy as it has arrived in the

Western world could have significant detrimental effects on the
evolution of a Buddhist environmental ethic. The trust of interde-
pendence, acknowledging the intrinsic value of each member of the
web, is just a starting point for investigating the nature of specific
relationships. The environmental crisis is driven by the complexities
of power distribution, giving preference and status to some govern-
ments, some corporate ventures, some ecosystems, some species,
some cultures over others. An effective Buddhist environmental ethic
is strengthened by the dimension of power analysis presented by femi-
nist theorists. Political, economic, and personal power can serve the
environment, if illuminated by awareness and social consciousness
of the logic of domination. Without this awareness, the critical role
of power can be overlooked by the Buddhist practitioner focusing on
the beauty and miracle of interdependence.

Social Ethics and Engaged Practice

Buddhist ethics traditionally emphasize behavior guidelines and
liberation for the individual, rather than structural change of social
systems. The current literature on Buddhism and social change is
somewhat limited in covering the history of commitment to social
issues. 49 In contrast, Christian social ethics trace their origin to
the earliest stories of Jesus’ suffering and compassion, developing
principles of social justice as central to Christian religious practice.
In some cases, Asian Buddhist cultures reinforce the acceptance of
reality to the extreme of passivity. This can make it very difficult for
Buddhist religious or social leaders to advocate social change. 50
Feminism is fundamentally based in a need, desire, and strong
motivation for social change. This drive for change might be seen
as incompatible with Buddhism, presenting possible difficulty in
merging these two approaches. The urgency and passion behind the
feminist agenda may seem unmeditative to practicing Buddhists; the
passive acceptance of Buddhist religious culture may seem unmoti-
vated or apathetic to committed feminists. Yet each has something
to gain from the other, particularly in developing a strong movement
for environmental justice and a new code of environmental ethics.
Social environmental ethics are more than the sum of individual
ethical practices regarding the environment. They are the ethics neces-
sary for dealing with the whole systemic pattern of environmental
destruction, which has a force and momentum of its own. A religious
practice that only advocates individual improvement in environmental

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 90 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

actions (such as recycling, vegetarianism, or birth control) does not

go far enough in investigating the roots of socialized environmental
destruction. The development of a social ethic to address the scale
of environmental systemic disorder requires a motivation to work
with the system as a whole and to uphold standards for the system as
well as for the individual.51 In this task, the commitment of feminism
may be a useful catalyst for inspiring Buddhist dialogue and activity
necessary to affect the environmental situation at any long-term
meaningful level.

Examples of Buddhist Feminist Environmental Work

Buddhist feminist activity on behalf of the environment is not yet
very extensive, primarily because the number of people self-identified
as Buddhist, feminist, and environmentalist is not large. However,
examples of their environmental work are significant and are serving
to inspire others around the world. These examples reflect primarily
American Buddhist concern for the environment, though certainly
there are women in other countries expressing their feminist and
environmental concerns through Buddhist practice.

Research and Theory

Two examples of research carried out by Buddhist feminists concerned
with the environment are the Perception of Nature Project undertaken
by Chatsumarn Kabilsingh of Thailand and the comparative analysis
of Buddhist philosophy and Western systems theory by Joanna Macy
of the United States. Kabilsingh has reviewed the early Buddhist
teachings of the Pali Canon to catalog specific references to the
environment. Under the sponsorship of the World Wildlife Fund, a
number of these teaching stories have been compiled and distributed
throughout Southeast Asia.52 Many of these early discourses cover
the central points of Buddhist philosophy with specific references to
refraining from harming others in the environment and specifically
protecting trees, rivers, and animals of the forest.
Macy’s work interprets the primary teaching of interrelationship
in an environmental context, developing her ideas of ‘the ecological
self’ based on analysis of the co-arising of knower and known, body
and mind, doer and deed, and self and society.53 Her careful review
of the nature of causality lays an important foundation for a Buddhist
analysis of environmental power relations. She bases her definition of
mutual morality in the dialectics of personal and social transformation,

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 Acting with Compassion 91

laying out a Buddhist construction of an environmental philosophy

that is appropriate for today’s interdependently created ecological
crisis. This work builds on her earlier theoretical writing, in which
she develops the image/essence of the Perfection of Wisdom as a
feminine form, as the pregnant point of potential action, light, space,
and emptiness, calling this the author of the Tathagatas.54 Macy’s work
is a major theoretical contribution to the evolution of an environmental
ethic informed by Buddhist and feminist philosophy.

Environmental Activism
A second arena of Buddhist environmental activity lies in green
politics and activism. The Buddhist Peace Fellowship (BPF) was
founded in 1978 to bring a Buddhist perspective to the peace and
environmental movements and to raise issues of social concern among
Buddhist practitioners. In 1990, Doug Codiga, Margaret Howe, and I
initiated a BPF campaign for environmental awareness by distributing
to Buddhist centers and individuals over three hundred packets of
materials and posters featuring the Buddha sitting in peaceful harmony
surrounded by tigers, monkeys, tropical birds, and forest vines. The
packets included suggested educational activities, a bibliography of
readings, chants, and prayers, and ideas for environmentalizing local
Buddhist centers.
The Berkeley BPF chapter has been actively engaged in Buddhist
antinuclear environmental activism at the local Concord Naval
Weapons base.55 For the past five years they have led a half-day sitting
meditation on the railroad tracks, blocking the passage of weapons out
from the base. The protest is nonviolent and nonaggressive; it is meant
as a statement of witness and solidarity, both with other non-Buddhist
activists and with those who suffer from the threat or presence of
nuclear weapons in their countries. Feminist and ordained Zen priest
Maylie Scott has consistently promoted these sittings, serving as an
inspiration to others by the strength of her practice and commitment
to social change.
Another antinuclear effort, the Nuclear Guardianship project,
protests the storage of nuclear waste underground, where problems are
out of sight and difficult to manage. Joanna Macy, Charlotte Cooke,
and others propose instead that waste be stored above ground, to
be watched over by ‘nuclear guardians’ in monastery-like settings.56
This radical solution draws on the Buddhist model of monastic life,
where mindfulness is the central practice, developing consideration
and consciousness for all beings in the nuclear-affected web of life.

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 92 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

The guiding ethic for the project reflects a deep sense of relationship
with beings of the future who will inherit decaying nuclear isotopes
in massive quantities.
Charlene Spretnak’s work in green politics and spirituality reflects
her belief that a spiritual infrastructure is essential for the successful
transformation to a postmodern green society.57 Spretnak draws on her
Vipassana Buddhist practice to remain grounded and centered in the
middle of inevitable political tension and strategizing. She has worked
to incorporate principles of feminism and nonviolence in Green Party
platforms in California. For Spretnak, environmental activism is a
direct expression of Buddhist practice, an embodiment of her spiritual
commitment to serve all beings.
Buddhists Concerned for Animals (BCA), founded in 1981, is
an example of green Buddhist politics. This group is committed
to stopping cruelty to animals, especially in the use of animals for
scientific experimentation.58 They were instrumental in pressuring the
University of California at Berkeley to improve their animal research
practices. As Buddhists, they urge vegetarian eating to protest the
inhumane conditions of factory-farmed animals. BCA raises issues of
domination by promoting cruelty-free cosmetics that do not depend
on animal testing for safety checks.

Environmental Education
Among Buddhist feminists concerned with the environment, a
number of women are professional teachers or writers associated
with academic institutions or spiritual retreat centers. As a faculty
in diverse departments or schools, they are building bridges between
traditional subject areas and current environmental concerns.
Buddhist feminists Lisa Faithhorn and Elizabeth Roberts teach
Deep Ecology at California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) and
Naropa Institute, respectively; Joanna Macy teaches systems theory,
cross-cultural social activism, and spiritual practice in an environ-
mental context at the Berkeley Graduate Theological Union, as
well as at CIIS. I teach environmental ethics in the Environmental
Studies program at the University of Vermont. For these educa-
tors, course design and content, as well as teaching style, reflect
a grounding in Buddhist practice and philosophy and a feminist
perspective on power and domination. Macy has led the way in
working with the blocked energy of despair, grief, fear, and anger
to enable people to transform and free this energy for the healing of

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 Acting with Compassion 93

the world. Her teaching content and style rest solidly on a feminist
analysis of power and a Buddhist practice of compassion. 59
Another group of Buddhist feminist teachers addresses envi-
ronmental issues in retreat or workshop settings, where spiritual
practice is the context for environmental understanding. For example,
Wendy Johnson, head gardener at Green Gulch Zen Center since
1980, teaches classes in gardening and tree planting as mindfulness
practice. Green Gulch, a well-established retreat center in central
coastal C ­ alifornia, supports both a garden and an organic farm, with
over twenty acres in lettuce, potatoes, squash, and other kitchen
vegetables.
Wendy sees tree planting as part of a long-term plan for restoration
of the once forested hillside slopes. Joan Halifax combines Buddhist
mindfulness practice with modern forms of shamanism, to evoke
connection with the natural world.60 Drawing on her background in
anthropology, she leads workshops and trips to sacred sites to inspire
spiritual grounding in the power of the earth itself.
Several writers also contribute to the educational literature, offering
a Buddhist feminist perspective on the environment. Susan Griffin’s
book Woman and Nature is an American ecofeminist classic.61 Griffin’s
Buddhist Vipassana practice informs her poetry and creative writing,
allowing her to express in detail the illusory distinction between
mind and body, mind and nature. She writes as a committed feminist,
pointing directly and vividly to parallel examples of oppression of
nature and woman. China Galland’s work on women in wilderness
settings, as well as her investigation of Tara and the Black Madonna,
also reflect a serious commitment to Tibetan Buddhism and the impor-
tance of women’s voices in reconnecting with the environment.62
Some Buddhist environmental education takes place through
devotional practices or ceremonies. At Green Gulch Zen Center,
Wendy Johnson and I designed a Buddhist Earth Day ceremony that
included a morning lecture on the environment, animal memorial
service, and taking of the precepts in the presence of the central oak
tree.63 Wendy and others have also organized a number of family prac-
tice days, in which children participate in harvesting vegetables and
planting trees. Earth prayers and dedications have been collected by
­Elizabeth Roberts and Elias Amidon, subtly and skillfully reflecting
an orientation to Buddhist mindfulness and a sense of the ecological
self.64 Mayumi Ada, Japanese Zen student, educates by painting large
banners and silk screens of earth bodhisattvas surrounded by garden
vegetables. She transforms traditional male figures such as Manjusri

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 94 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

into female forms, cutting through delusion with spirited feminine

energy.65 Her feminist art has graced several conferences on Women
and Buddhism held in the San Francisco Bay area; her drawings
frequently appear in United States Buddhist publications.
This is only a sampling of examples of women engaged in envi-
ronmental work based in Buddhist practice and feminist awareness.
Certainly there are other examples from the wider international
community. In contrast to so much feminist and environmental polit-
ical work, which is combative in the desperate struggle for women’s
rights and environmental sustainability, a Buddhist nondualist and
nonviolent viewpoint can make a very valuable contribution to the
healing of the world. Women who are strong in their practice and
understanding of Buddhism can bring a powerful intention to the
difficult and sometimes overwhelming work of taking care of one
another and the place where we are.

Conclusion
I believe these two streams of thought and activity-Buddhism and
feminism-benefit from the insights and knowledge of each other in
a way that can nourish and sustain the environment. The conflu-
ence of Buddhist and feminist thought, practice, commitment, and
community in the 1990s offers a strong contribution to the healing of
environmental loss and degradation. I opened this discussion in the
context of the spiritual lineage of the feminine compassionate presence
and the potential for healing she represents. By acknowledging Kuan
Yin and Tara, I acknowledge all those who have drawn courage and
inspiration from this aspect of their own Buddha natures in responding
to the seemingly insurmountable suffering of the environment. Now,
perhaps, these realized beings can be an inspiration and a source of
guidance in taking care of the planet and each relationship in the
complex biological and geophysical web of Indra’s stunning Jewel net.

Notes
1. R. Aitken, ‘Kanzeon’, in Not Mixing up Buddhism: Essays on Women
and Buddhist Practice (Fredonia, NY: White Pine Press, 1986), pp.
24–29.
2. J. Blofeld, Boddhisattva of Compassion: The Mystical Tradition of Kwan
Yin (Boulder, CO: Shambhala Books, 1978), and M. Wilson, In Praise
af Tara (London: Wisdom Publications, 1986).
3. R. Fields, How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of
Buddhism (Boulder, Colorado: Shambhala Books, 1981).

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 Acting with Compassion 95

4. S. Boucher, Turning the Wheel: American Women Creating the New

Buddhism (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1985).
5. D. Morreale, Buddhist America (Santa Fe: John Muir Publications, 1988).
6. L. Friedman, Meetings with Remarkable Women (Boston: Shambhala
Books, 1987).
7. For further information on the Congress, or to obtain a copy of
the Women’s Action Agenda, contact Women’s Environment and
Development Organization, 845 Third Avenue, 15th Floor, New York,
NY 10022.
8. D.T. Suzuki, Practical Methods of Zen Instruction, in Essays in Zen
Buddhism (New York: Grove Press, 1949).
9. K. Tanahashi (ed.), Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dogen
(San Francisco: North Point Press, 1985), p. 70.
10. J. Plaskow and C.P. Christ (eds.), Weaving the Visions (San Francisco:
Harper & Row, 1989).
11. M.F. Belenky et al., Women’s Ways of Knowing: The Development of
Self, Voice and Mind (New York: Basic Books, 1986).
12. S. Harding. The Science Question in Feminism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell
University Press, 1986).
13. H. Tellenbach and B. Kimura, ‘The Japanese Concept of Nature’, in
J.B. Callicott and R.T. Ames (eds.), Nature in Asian Traditions of
Thought (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989).
14. P. Levitt, ‘An Intimate View’, in A. Hunt-Badiner (ed.), Dharma Gaia
(Berkeley: Parallax Press, 1990).
15. S. Kaza, ‘Systems Thinking: Tools for Buddhist Restoration Ecology’
(paper presented at the Society for Ecological Restoration and Manage-
ment Annual Meeting, Oakland, California, 1989).
16. S. Kellert, ‘Perceptions of Animals in America’, in R.J. Hoage (ed.),
Perceptions of Animals in American Culture (Washington, DC:
­Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989).
17. S. Keen, Faces of the Enemy: Reflections of the Hostile Imagination
(San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1986).
18. K.J. Warren and J. Cheney, Ecological Feminism: A Philosophical
Perspective on What it Is and Why it Matters (Boulder, CO: Westview
Press, forthcoming).
19. M. Kheel, ‘From Healing Herbs to Deadly Drugs’, in J.Plant (ed.),
Healing the Wounds: The Promise of Ecofeminism (Philadelphia: New
Society Publishers, 1989).
20. V. Shiva, Staying Alive: Women, Ecology, and Development (London:
Zed Press; New Delhi: Kali for Women, 1988).
21. D.J. Kalupahana, The Principles of Buddhist Psychology (Albany, NY:
State University of New York Press, 1987), p. 26.
22. From the Pall Canon, Samyutta Nikaya II, 28,65, quoted and interpreted
in S. Kaza, ‘Towards a “Buddhist Environmental Ethic”’, Buddhism at
the Crossroads 1.1 (1985), pp. 22–25.

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 96 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

23. F.H. Cook, ‘The Jewel Net of Indra’, in Callicott and Ames (eds.),
Nature.
24. M. Grey, ‘Claiming Power in Relation: Exploring the Ethics of Connec-
tion’, JFSR 7 (1991), pp. 7–18, p. 13.
25. M.A. Farley, Personal Commitments (San Francisco: Harper & Row,
1986). M. Daly, ‘Be-Friending’, in Plaskow and Christ (eds.), Weaving
the Visions, pp. 199–207.
26. Grey, ‘Claiming Power’, 1991, p. 13.
27. T.N. Hanh, Transformation and Healing (Berkeley: Parallax Press,
1990).
28. Hanh, Present Moment, and J. Macy, Despair and Personal Power
in the Nuclear Age (Philadelphia: New Society Publishers, 1983), pp.
158–61.
29. A.M. Jaggar and S. Bordo (eds.), Love and Knowledge: Emotion in
Feminist Epistemology, Gender/Body/Knowledge (New Brunswick, NJ:
Rutgers University Press, 1985).
30. B.W. Harrison, Our Right to Choose: Toward a New Ethic of Abortion
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1983), p. 13.
31. B.W. Harrison, ‘The Power of Anger in the Work of Love’, in C.S. Robb
(ed.), Making the Connections (Boston: Beacon Press, 1985), p. 14.
32. Macy, Despair, pp. 158–61.
33. I wrote this version of the Three Pure Precepts for the 1990 Earth Day
ceremony at Green Gulch Zen Center. Much of the text is reprinted in
the Buddhist Peace Fellowship Newsletter (Summer 1990), pp. 32–33.
34. A. Ross, Strange Weather: Culture, Science and Technology in the Age
of Limits (New York: Verso, 1991).
35. J. Macy and J. Seed have developed a ritual Council of All Beings,
designed to draw out these responses. Councils have been conducted
all over the world, in a wide diversity of settings. The form is described
in Seed et al., Thinking Like a Mountain (Philadelphia: New Society
Publishers, 1988).
36. A. Klein, ‘Compassion: Gain or Drain? Buddhist and Feminist Views
on Compassion’, Spring Wind 6.1, 2, 3 (1986), pp. 105–16.
37. L. Kohlberg, The Philosophy of Moral Development (San Francisco:
Harper & Row, 1981).
38. C. Gilligan, In a Different Voice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1982).
39. K.J. Warren, ‘The Power and the Promise of Ecological Feminism in
Environmental Ethics’, 12.3 (1990), p. 139.
40. J. Cheney, ‘Eco-Feminism and Deep Ecology’, Environmental Ethics
9.2 (Summer 1987), pp. 115–46.
41. Warren, 1990, op. cit., p. 143.
42. D. Zenji, ‘Mountains and Waters Sutra’, in K. Tanahashi (ed.), Moon in
a Dewdrop (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1985), pp. 97–127.

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 Acting with Compassion 97

43. B. Devall and G. Sessions, Deep Ecology: Living as if Nature Mattered

(Salt Lake City: Peregrine Smith Books, 1990).
44. R. Gross, ‘Buddhism after Patriarchy’, in P.M. Cooey, W.R. Eakin and
J.B. McDaniel (eds.), After Patriarchy (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books,
1991), p. 78.
45. Gross, ‘Buddhism’, p. 78.
46. For an introduction to these ideas, see K. McCarthy, ‘A Critique of
Emptiness from the Margins’ (paper presented at the Western Regional
Meeting of the American Academy of Religion, March 1990, with addi-
tional comments from panel member Y. Vowels).
47. See Turning Wheel: Journal of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship (Summer
1991), pp. 22–29, with articles by J. Komfield and others and the formal
statement of ethical guidelines by Second Generation Zen Teachers. See
also Boucher, Turning the Wheel.
48. See Boucher, Turning the Wheel; R. Gross, ‘Buddhism and Femi-
nism: A Personal Synthesis’, in Not Mixing Up Buddhism: Essays
on Women and Buddhist Practice (Freedonia, NY: White Pine Press,
1986); and A. ­Karabinus, ‘Women in North American Zen Buddhism’
­(unpublished, MA thesis).
49. S. Sivaksa, Seeds of Peace (Berkeley: Parallax Press, 1991), and K. Jones,
The Social Face of Buddhism (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1989).
50. This was a key topic at a social action training for Asian monks and
other Buddhist activists I conducted with Paula Green in conjunction
with the International Network of Engaged Buddhists meeting in
Bangkok, February 1991.
51. G. Fourez, Liberation Ethics (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1982).
52. C. Kabilsingh, ‘Early Buddhist Views on Nature’, in A. Hunt-Badiner
(ed.), Dharma Gaia (Berkeley: Parallax Press, 1990); and K. Davies,
Tree of Life: Buddhism and Protection of Nature (Hong Kong: Buddhist
Perception of Nature Project, 1987).
53. J. Macy, ‘The Greening of the Self’, Common Boundary July-August
1990), pp. 22–25; idem, Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General
Systems Theory: The Dharam of Natural Systems (Albany, NY: State
University of New York Press, 1991); idem, World as Lover, World as
Self (San Francisco: Parallax Press, 1991).
54. J. Macy, ‘Perfection Wisdom: Mother of All Buddhas’, in R. Gross (ed.),
Beyond Androcentrism (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1977), pp. 315–17.
55. Regular updates of Berkeley chapter activities regarding the weapons
base sitings are available through the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, PO
Box 4650, Berkeley, CA, 94704
56. J. Macy, ‘Guardians of the Future’, Context 28 (Spring 1991), pp. 20–25.
57. C. Spretnak, The Spiritual Dimensions of Green Politics (Sante Fe: Bear
& Company, 1986); and F. Capra and C. Spretnak, Green Politics: The
Global Promise (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1984).

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 98 Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought

58. Boucher, Turning the Wheel, pp. 288–93.

59. See, for example, interviews of J. Macy in Inquiring Mind 5.2, pp. 1–3
and C. Ingram, In the Footsteps of Gandhi (Berkeley: Parallax Press,
1990), pp. 141–68.
60. J. Halifax, ‘The Third Body: Buddhism, Shamanism, and Deep
Ecology’, in A. Hunt-Gadiner (ed.), Dharma Gaia (Berkeley: Parallax
Press, 1990).
61. S. Griffin, Woman and Nature: The Roaring inside Her (San Francisco:
Harper & Row, 1978).
62. C. Galland, Longing for a Darkness: Tara and the Black Madonna
(New York: Viking, 1990).
63. Wendy Johnson’s Earth Day talk, ‘Sitting on Our Garbage’, is reprinted
in the Buddhist Peace Fellowship Newsletter (Summer 1990), along with
the text of the Earth Day ceremonies.
64. E. Roberts and E. Amidon (eds.), Earth Prayers from around the World
(San Francisco: Harper-Collins, 1991).
65. M. Oda, Goddesses (Volcano, CA: Volcano Press/Kazan Books, 1988).

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