Offering a feminist analysis of foundational Buddhist texts, along with a Buddhist approach to social issues in a globalized world, Hsiao-Lan Hu revitalizes Buddhist social ethics for contemporary times. Hus feminist exegesis references the Nikaya-s from the Discourse Basket of the Pali Canon. These texts, among the earliest in the Buddhist canon, are considered to contain the sayings of the Buddha and his disciples and are recognized by all Buddhist schools. At the heart of the ethics that emerges is the Buddhist notion of interdependent co-arising, which addresses the sexism, classism, and frequent overemphasis on individual liberation, as opposed to communal well-being, for which Buddhism has been criticized. Hu notes the Buddhas challenge to social hierarchies during his life and compares the notion of non-Self to the poststructuralist feminist rejection of the autonomous subject, maintaining that neither dissolves moral responsibility or agency. Notions of kamma, nibbana, and dukkha (suffering) are discussed within the communal context offered by insights from interdependent co-arising and the Noble Eightfold Path. This work uniquely bridges the worlds of Buddhism, feminism, social ethics, and activism and will be of interest to scholars, students, and readers in all of these areas.

This Worldly Nibbana: A Buddhist-Feminist Social Ethic for Peacemaking in the Global Community, Hsiao-Lan Hu, SUNY Press, Hardcover, 250 pages, $75.00

Hsiao-Lan Hu is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies and of Women's and Gender Studies at the University of Detroit Mercy.

CONTENTS: This Worldly Nibbana
Acknowledgments				ix
1.	Introduction
		Foundational Texts and Basic Teachings: Nikaya-s in the Pali Canon		8
		Dhammic Exegesis: Interdependent Co-Arising and the Cessation of Dukkha		17
		Constructing Non-Adversarial Engaged Feminist-Buddhist Social Ethics		24
2.	Socio-Ethical Dimensions of Early Buddhism			31
		The Liberative Is Ethical: This-Worldly Wholesomeness		32
		Good Friends: The Entire Holy Life		42
		Four Assemblies of the Sangha: De-Essentializing Social Hierarchies		47
			Renunciates and Laity	48
			Class and Gender	55
3.	A Feminist Exegesis of Non-Self: Constitution of Personhood and Identity			63
		Five Aggregates: The Constitution of Individual "Self"		64
		Seeing "Non-Self" in the Making of Gender Identity		72
		Subject Formation and Cultural Delimitation		82
4.	Person-in- Kammic-Network: Moral Agency and Social Responsibility			91
		Kamma as Taught by the Buddha: Volitional Actions Here and Now		93
		Global Co-Arising of Dukkha		110
5.	Buddhist Self-Reconditioning and Community-Building			127
		The Three Learnings: Socially Conscionable Self-Reconditioning		129
		Person-in-Community: Buddhist Community-Building Ideals		144
6.	Conclusion: This-Worldly Nibbana and Participatory Peacemaking			159
		Boundary-Crossing Interconnections		162
		Peace at Every Step		170
Notes				179
Bibliography				215
Index				233