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Buddhism: Dialogue with Ethics

Buddhist Views on Human Life and Death

  • 3 things to know
  • Component 2

Overview

Buddhist responses to the prescribed issues of human life and death, including abortion, euthanasia and assisted suicide, embryo research, cloning and designer babies, and capital punishment, drawing on the first precept, intention, the Vinaya, Keown, the Dalai Lama and Nagarjuna.

What you need to know

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Process

What advice did Nagarjuna give a king about murderers in the Ratnavali?

Process

Why do many Buddhists oppose capital punishment?

Process

Why do many Buddhists support hospice and palliative care rather than euthanasia?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    How does intention affect the karmic weight of an abortion in Buddhist teaching?

    Model answer

    An abortion chosen out of hatred or convenience carries heavier unwholesome karma than one chosen reluctantly and with compassion, although both still involve harm to a living being.

  2. 2

    What exceptions did the 14th Dalai Lama allow in his view of abortion?

    Model answer

    He called abortion an act of killing and generally negative, but said it could be an exception where the child would be severely disabled or the birth would cause serious problems for the parents, so each case should be judged on its circumstances.

  3. 3

    What is mizuko kuyo?

    Model answer

    A Japanese Buddhist memorial ritual for a child lost through miscarriage, stillbirth or abortion, in which offerings are made to the bodhisattva Jizo, who is believed to protect children.

  4. 4

    How does Thai law on abortion compare with traditional Thai Buddhist teaching?

    Model answer

    Thailand has allowed abortion on request up to 12 weeks since 2021, and up to 20 weeks after counselling since 2022, even though many Thai monks and lay Buddhists still teach that abortion breaks the first precept.

  5. 5

    Why do many Buddhists oppose voluntary euthanasia?

    Model answer

    Deliberately ending a human life breaks the first precept, and a death chosen out of aversion to suffering may carry an unwholesome state of mind into the next rebirth.

  6. 6

    Which rule of the Vinaya is cited against euthanasia and assisted suicide?

    Model answer

    The third parajika rule, under which a monk is expelled for intentionally killing a human being, providing someone to kill them, or praising death so that a person dies.

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