Stephen Harris, "Buddhist Ethics and the Bodhisattva Path: Santideva on Virtue and Well-Being" (Bloomsbury, 2023)
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Welcome to the new books network.
Welcome to New Books in Philosophy, a channel on the New Books Network. I'm Malcolm Keating and today we'll be talking to Stephen Harris, author of Buddhist Ethics and the Bodhisattva Path, Shanti Deva on Virtue and Well Being, published in twenty twenty four by Bloomsbury Academic Press. Welcome to New Books in Philosophy, Stephen. I'm really glad to be here. Thanks. Thanks for having me. Yeah, thanks for coming on. Uh so your book explores the Buddhist philosopher Shantideva's work, which is the, as you translated, the guide to the practices of awakening or the Buddhishary Avatara. Can you start us off by giving us your book's argument in just a nutshell?
Yeah, so um focused on the philosophical thought of the eighth century CE. Buddhist philosopher Shantideva. He's a Mahayana philosopher. So this I in a nutshell, this means he's um the dedicated to the project of universal compassion, eliminating the suffering of all beings. And then he's a majamaka philosopher. uh part of the philosophical magamagos at school, which accepts the emptiness of all phenomena. And I'm particularly as it's been more work on Shantideva's metaphysics and his epistemology, I'm particularly interested in his moral philosophy, although this is interrelated with his metaphysics in important ways. And so I frame my study as a study of his moral psychology and his account of virtue.
And what I really see as the core of the book is an in-depth study of three and a half study of four of his uh his account of the virtuous mental states, particularly generosity, patience, compassion. And then the second last chapter of the text I focus on is on Pajnero wisdom. And I do a partial study of that chapter. So in the book, I really try what I really want to do is give detailed explications of the account of these virtues as given in this text. And then particularly, I found myself really interested in this claim Shantideva repeated. Makes is made frequently in Buddhist Mahayana texts that dedication to the happiness of others also benefits oneself. In fact, he puts this very strongly. He says all happiness comes from the desire to help others, and all suffering comes from the desire to hurt others.
And then with Mahayana Buddhism, this is combined with what appears to be a radically demanding moral system. We once dedicated All of one's time, one's effort, one gives one's body, all of one's resources for the sake of others. So I was interested in. Philosophically, uh how this how this claim is intelligible. And in my study, I think there's a couple of different ways you can approach it, but I particularly approach it in terms of his moral psychology and his account of virtue by giving studies of particularly those uh those four mental states that I talked about. And I try to illustrate how each of them has a self and other benefiting structure whereby um you know generosity eliminates craving, uh which impoverishes one's own existence.
And it also enables one to give effectively to others. And then I make parallel um arguments for all three of the other virtues. So that's really what I tried to do on this.
So okay. Great. And how did you come to be interested in Shantideva?
Yeah, so for Shantideva, I mean I got interested in Buddhist philosophy. I think, um, as I think a number of your guests work at Buddhist philosophy you've interviewed. Begin by pointing out that most Western philosophy departments unfortunately primarily focus on Western philosophy. Um, as an undergraduate, I became very interested in Western philosophy. I did my undergraduate degree and I still work in Western philosophy, particularly um moral philosophy.
What is Stephen Harris’s central argument about Shantideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra?
Um, but I also found myself interested in Asian traditions. And so I think as a lot of us do, as an undergraduate, I studied that where they were at Crawford in religion department. And so then when I went back to graduate school, um I became more and more committed to the idea of looking outside just Western philosophy for philosophical inspiration and I ended up doing my two degrees, University of Hawaii and then my PhD at the University of New Mexico at places that do Indian philosophy seriously as philosophy.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:01–3:53
2
What is Stephen Harris’s central argument about Shantideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra?
3:53–15:32
3
How did Harris become interested in Shantideva and Buddhist philosophy?
15:32–25:51
4
Is the Bodhicaryāvatāra a religious text, a philosophical work, or both?
25:51–34:08
5
How does Harris distinguish Shantideva’s virtue theory from consequentialist and deontological ethics?
34:08–45:11
6
Why does Shantideva give generosity such a prominent role even without a dedicated chapter?
45:11–55:20
7
What reasons does Shantideva give for eliminating anger completely?
55:20–1:05:17
8
How are the equal‑izing and exchanging self‑other meditations used to develop compassion?
1:05:17–1:13:51
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