A Comprehensive Analysis of Buddhist Judgment in Modern Asia

Abstract

Buddhist judging is a cognitive practice of drawing on Buddhist values to adjudicate disputes. It is not just an internal, cognitive practice, but a procedurally robust judicial system. This paper examines Buddhist judicial systems as a way to give scholars a more complete view of the multiplex structures and concepts of judging in contemporary Asia. I show that, for at least some Buddhists in modern Asia, proper judging requires much more than just pious motivations. The complexity of the Rmaa Nikya fraternity in Sri Lanka, as well as the complexity and complexity of its judicial infrastructure, is also analyzed. It demonstrates that the so-called “hybridities” for which these symmetries seem to provide evidence are not an unnatural agglomeration of transplanted legal concepts that give rise to some unintended cyborg (part state law, part religious law).