Buddhist Perspective on Punishment

 

Buddhism gives the priority to the man as it is considered as a man-centered philosophy. To illustrate, Buddhism expect the welfare of the society and its’ virtuousness can be established by making each and every individual a virtuous person. Even the punishment is used as a method for making a moral being. However, there arise several questions as, what is meant by punishment? Why one should be punished? For whom it should be punished? To the wrong deed or to the person who has done that wrong deed? 

The importance of Buddhism in the context of punishment is it rejects punishment that , but at the same time it presents the ways that can be used in order to make the wrong deeds and to rehabilitate the person who has done that particular wrong deed. Thus, physical, mental or vocal deeds (kāika, mānasika and vācasika) could be result in committing wrong deeds. when a person has self-destructive feelings that person either tries to be alone or to commit suicide. For that, Buddhism tries to rehabilitate people, help them to overcome their problems and ive another chance to live a better life. As such, the foundation of punishment in Buddhism is non-violence.

Buddhism is opposed with killing as stated in the five precepts. It has mentioned that not to kill anyone. According to Buddhist teachings one should take themselves as examples (attānaṃ upamaṃ katvā) and should not harm or kill others as everyone fear for the death and harm. ‘Sabbe tasanti daṅdassa’ means that every person is fear for punishments. ‘Sabbe bhāyanti maccuno’ illustrates that everyone fear for being killed by someone. ‘na haneyya- na ghātaye’ means one should not engage himself in killing or hurting others and also one should not encourage anyone to kill or harm others. Everyone want to live their life until it come to its end naturally because everyone love their lives (sabbe jīvitaṃ piyaṃ).

If someone destroy others’ lives for the sake of their happiness or future expectations, then they would never gain that happiness as it has mentioned in Buddhism that ‘pecca so na labhate sukhaṃ’. When deers were hunting by the king Devānaṃpiyatissa, Ven. Rev. Mihindu thero asked him not to kill animals as they are belong to the nature and Mihindu thero mentioned that the king is just a guardian of the earth not the owner of the earth.

There are Buddhist jātaka stories which indicate several people who committed crimes, but received the Buddha’s karunā (compassion) such as the story of Aṅgulimāla. Aṅgulimāla was a person who killed 999 people. But he had the ability understand that evil deed and he had the ability to rehabilitate by attaining Arahanthood. Buddhists believe in karma theory which is the results of the actions that we perform.

However, if someone give punishments to those who are virtuous and do not perform evil deeds that are harmful for others, then those people would suffer from punishments. Dhammapada has mentioned ten results that can be occurred for the people who perform that type of immoral an invalid wrong deeds. They can be listed as following. 

Parusaṅ vedanaṃ

Jāniṅ

Sarīrassaṃ bhedhanaṃ

Garukaṅ ābhādaṅ

cittakekhapaṅ

Rājato Upasaggaṅ

Dārunaṅ abbhakanaṅ

ñātīnaṃ parikkhayaṅ

Bhogānaṃ pabhaṅgaraṃ

Agārāni Aggi dahati

Above-mentioned punishments are come to those who punish to the virtuous people who do not commit any sin. Then they would suffer from those punishments either in this life or in another life. This shows that there is a metaphysical nature in the Buddhist theory of punishment. 

When a person did a wrong deed, he is consider as an offender under the law and punish them regardless of ethical and religious values. Nevertheless, Buddhist laws reject punishment though punishment is a characteristic of civil law or the common law of a country. That is the deviation point between common law and Buddhist law. Even punishment in Buddhism itself is based on non-violence. It directs people to measure meritorious and evil acts by analyzing its consequences.