Dan's Interview Transcript 2

In this section of the interview Dan explored the monk's analysis of Buddhist soldiers' psychology. The monk referenced the story of Elara during this portion of the interview. The story of Elara and Dutugemunu is useful not only for understanding the monk's comments, but also to understand the historical roots of the overall ethnic conflict. The Wikipedia entry describes Elara as a Tamil king who ruled a large area of northern Sri Lanka from 205 to 161 BCE. Elara is recorded in the 6th century CE Mahvamsa, or "Great Chronicle" of Sri Lankan history as a very just king. He is credited as treating the Sinhala with the same respect he gave his fellow Tamils during his 44 year reign. Despite his status as an excellent ruler, an upstart young Buddhist prince from the south, Dutugemunu, defeated Elara in a duel couched in a larger battle at the gate of the northern capital. Dutugemunu is revered today as a Sinhala hero for routing the Tamil king. His struggle is often cited by Sinhala nationalists as an ancient example of the Sinhala dispelling Tamil invaders and re-asserting Buddhist cultural identity. During his 25 year reign, Dutugemunu built numerous Buddhist sites of worship while patronizing and strengthening the monastic community. Despite the fact that the Mahvamsa specifically states in chapter XXV that the tanks of water ran with the blood of the slain on that day of battle, the monk tells Dan in the interview that Elara and Dutugemunu engage in a mano e mano duel in order to preserve the lives of their respective soldiers. This is a colloquial interpretation of the story I have also run across in some of the popular Sri Lankan press. I was surprised to see the story misrepresented by a well educated monk and questioned Dan about it. "If I derailed an interview every time a monk misquoted or misrepresented doctrine to me then I would never get anywhere. I am interested in the point he is trying to make about soldiers and the war, not accuracy," he told me.

D: What sorts of people do you think Sri Lankan soldiers are?

S: If they have learned army discipline well, they are good soldiers. They are respectful of laws, fair and respectful of their duty. They are people like that. Most Sri Lankan soldiers are Buddhists. As Buddhists, they are influenced by the Buddhist teachings which have been passed down through the generations. No matter how skilled a soldier is, that Buddhist teaching influences him.

D: Is there a difference between the sermons that you give to soldiers and those that you give to normal lay people?

S: Yes. I give courage to soldiers. “ārabhata nikkhamata ninjata Buddhasāsane” That is what the Buddha preached to the monks. Begin, go forth and act!” He gave the monks that sermon in accordance with the Buddha Dhamma. We can tell the army to be active and do duty, have courage and go forward. Do your duty perfectly. We can say such things. We can bless them so that they have mental and physical strength.

D: What sort of advice would you give to a soldier who has shot and killed someone on the battlefield and is feeling regret.

S: At that time we have to direct them towards religion. Religiously speaking, regret is a mistake. Religiously we must tell them that this regret is no good. If a soldier regrets what he has done on the one hand he will be a bad soldier. That is because if he feels regret it means that he hasn’t learned his discipline well. A perfect soldier cannot feel regret. It is not related to religion. It is connected to army discipline. He might say, “I thought that I couldn’t shoot. I felt bad. I felt this, I felt that. I felt bad. I felt compassion for the one I shot.” He could say that. Religiously we can give him advice.

D: Does a sin occur when a soldier shoots the enemy?

S: As for that, that is a problem found everywhere in history (laughing), whether it is a sin or not, it is a sin. One cannot prevent that. However, for a sin one must fulfill several conditions. Without that there is no sin. Army soldiers are ordered to go to war and shoot. This happens according to the rules of the army unit. That is their rule. Now. The executioner hangs people. There is a problem there also as to whether sin occurs or not. That is his duty. There is the problem of carrying out the law. In the same way, the army carries out the law. So they have to shoot people. A fierce thought and a sinful thought arises from this. This cannot be prevented. There a sin occurs by his hand. One cannot say that that does not happen (laughing). One cannot shoot with compassion and loving-kindness. That is a mental problem.

D: What kinds of qualities does one need to be a good soldier?

S: They need to respect the laws. They need to be disciplined. They must be well-trained. They must have fairness. If you look at the Sinhala method, the Sri Lankan conflict is a duel. The battle between Duttugamunu and Elara was like that too. They decided to fight a duel between each other in order to halt the loss of life of others. That is a special kind of battle in the Sinhala method. Imagine, for example, Elara’s sword or shield fell to the ground. The other person would never strike at such a time. If the sword were to fall he wouldn’t strike. He would tell him to pick up his sword and fight. That is the highest attribute of our system of war. A sword may be dropped accidentally, but it would do no good to strike at that time. That would not be skill. That would not be skill. One needs to fight fairly and face victory or defeat. If a soldier is skilled like that, they would not shoot when their enemy’s weapon has fallen to the ground. That is weakness of character not bravery. That is why soldiers are full of bravery, fairness, and duty. They need to have honesty, discipline and obedience. They also need to obey the laws. That is the perfect soldier. That is the perfect soldier. This has nothing to do with whether they are Sinhala or Buddhist; such a soldier could be sent to any army in the world. However, our young men are a little different when they go to the army because they are Buddhist. One cannot remove that foundation. They were brought up in a Buddhist environment with their parents until they were 18 or 20. One cannot change that foundation. I think that that nature is common to all armies.

D: What do you think the difference is between an American soldier and a Sri Lankan soldier?

S: Right. When a boy is brought up in the Buddhist tradition, they do not lose their identity as Buddhist even after military training. They do not forget the Maitri prayer, “May all beings be free from suffering.” They cannot condone the harming of any beings. Not even an army officer can suppress this. Even a leader of the army can see that Buddhist identity when they are amongst the soldiers. Even though they join the army, Buddhist boys can’t get rid of that. I don’t know how it is with other religions.

D: What is the biggest challenge to soldiers? That is to say, what is the biggest obstacle for soldiers trying to act in a Buddhist way?

S: I don’t think that there is anything. There are no obstacles in our country for those in the army. There is even a temple at the army headquarters. There is a temple inside the headquarters. That is a strange thing. I don’t know of anything like that in other countries.

D: They are there.…

S: Oh. There is a temple there. People take the precepts there. Monks preach there. There is a lot of room for soldiers to become inclined towards religion. They can spend their free time working at the temple. So there is nothing preventing Buddhists from being good soldiers and nothing preventing soldiers from being good Buddhists. Being a soldier doesn’t hinder being Buddhism. Being a Buddhist doesn’t hinder being a soldier. Neither of them gets in the way of the other. They can protect their Buddhist identity and their identity as soldiers. There is no challenge. It is not a challenge to say that a Buddhist has joined the army and gone to war. One can be a better soldier with the Buddhist thoughts of compassion and Maitri. One can be a better soldier.

D: What do you think a soldier thinks as he shoots someone else? What does the soldier think?

S: He shoots according to rules and discipline. He can’t refrain from shooting there. If at that time they were to think, “Oh No!” They wouldn’t be able to shoot. As he prepared to shoot, he would become shaky. He might shoot as a soldier, but afterwards he would have regret. He would think, “How many people have I killed with my hand?” and feel regret. On the other hand, he might not feel that way. He might just think, “I have fulfilled my duty.” In order to fix his mind he would tell himself that he just did his duty.

D: So what would happen to a soldier if he died on the battle ground? What do you think?

S: Even if the soldier next to you eats a bullet and falls dead, a soldier wouldn’t feel regret because of the training and discipline received as a soldier. What becomes foremost then is the discipline received from the army. At that time, army rules and discipline take over. Sometimes other things come to mind, but he suppresses them. War is something that we completely reject. We must not condone war as Buddhists. However, all countries have armies to protect the country. In our country too, even though there are Buddhists in the army, they will protect the country if they need to.

D: Yes, I am looking into the mental states of soldiers.

S: Yes, that is something that should be looked into and discussed.

D: What happens to the soldier who dies on the battlefield?

S: I can’t say. We can’t say that the same thing will happen to each person because we don’t know what their mental state was at that moment. According to Buddhist teachings, the last determines the next life: whether it is good or bad. According to that one is reincarnated. We don’t know what the mental state of a soldier is at that moment. We don’t know what kind of form it takes. Some may be angry. Some may not. We can’t say. It is determined by each person’s thoughts.

D: Can you remember a sermon that you recently gave to the army?

S: Yes. I preached a sermon last poya [full moon day] at the army base.

D: Could you tell us about it? What did you say?

S: I talked about the current situation. That is to say, now there is a war. We have started fighting with the Dravidian LTTE in the North and East again. We can’t go there and reduce their morale. If we were to do that there would be serious criticism from society. We can tell them to perform their duties properly and we can talk about the country and the unity of the country. We can tell them that their responsibility is this and that they need to fulfill it in a legal and fair manner. They could go to war and kill innocent Tamil people. We don’t want this at all. On the battlefield there is a war between two groups and people from both sides die. However if innocent Tamils, Muslims, or Sinhala are killed, we can’t condone that. We tell them to never do such things. We tell them not to harm a single animal whether it is a goat or a cow. There is no need to harm animals like that. They are innocent animals. Next are innocent people. There is no need to harm them. However, a war is between two groups of people and people from each of these groups die. We can’t prevent that.

D: You said before that you had gone to the north to give sermons.

S: Yes.

D: Could you tell us about going north?

S: I went to Jaffna right after it was captured to chant paritta [protection sutras]. I chanted paritta right after Jaffna was captured. They put up a lion flag and we chanted paritta that night. At that time we were invited to preach paritta. They were so happy. No one can be satisfied with the destruction of war. Lives, buildings, temples, churches, all are destroyed. That day we saw, we were taken around the area that had been taken, we saw that everything was destroyed. There wasn’t a building or a church left, all were destroyed. The destruction was huge. I can’t even describe it. Lives were destroyed and buildings were destroyed. I understood what a battlefield was like on that day. We saw the ferocity of war with our own two eyes. We asked them why they had attacked churches and Hindu temples. They told us “The LTTE had gone inside the church and attacked. We shot back at them. It was the same with Hindu temples. They would go inside and attack and we would attack them back. There was nothing to be done about that.” That is the ferocity of war. I went to Hiroshima and saw it. I saw the destruction of a nuclear bomb. In the same way, the attack of Jaffna was also a terrible thing. There is no way that we can condone such things. We cannot condone this kind of damage and destruction.