Early Buddhism and Antinatalism

I think the problem lies in the fact that we are taught morality as a branch of philosophy, and we inevitably approach Buddhist morality with the same mindset. The training in Sila belongs to the fourth noble truth, which makes it more of a function than a position. I do not think of the precepts as philosophical or moral positions.

Everything else being equal, morality is primarily eternalist. Most of moral debates happen when the primacy of eternialism is disputed, such as in suicide, abortion, gay marriage …etc. Antinatalism is no exception, another futile attempt to dispute the eternal eternalism (viewing nature as a continuum).

Saying all that, my worthless personal view tells me that giving birth is one of the most foolish acts a human can perform, climate change or otherwise.

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Well, I would say that for the Buddha, what is skillful depends on the circumstances and receptivity of the audience as well as whether it leads to the ending of suffering or not. So the skillfulness of a teaching or statement is not a one-sided calculation. This is why the Buddha taught different teachings to different people, including laypersons. If the Buddha did not think that this was the case, he would have always told all laypersons that he taught that they needed to take up celibacy then and there. But he did not do this. So, while I agree that from a certain perspective, celibacy is the most skillful option if one is looking for a way out of dukkha, it is not always the most skillful thing to teach (if one’s audience is lay) and not always the best course of action for everyone at all times.

Furthermore, what I meant by harmless is that it is not directly hurting anyone. A married person having sex with their spouse is a non-violent act which does not break any of the five precepts (even if, of course, from a spiritual perspective, it is reinforcing craving, so it is not absolutely harmless). The Buddha often spoke to laypersons who engaged in this life, and he did not always tell all of them they were living wrongly or not practicing well. So, the way I see it, there is a sliding scale of how Buddhists take up certain trainings, and the Buddha did not expect nor direct everyone to immediately jump to the celibate stage if they were not ready. Sometimes, he told people they should buy jewelry for their wives!

Perhaps, even though sexuality and babies are pretty closely connected, which is how this discussion got started in the first place. Your initial post seemed to suggest that since the Buddha taught that sensual pleasure should be avoided, perhaps birthing children is similarly against the Dhamma. But if that’s not what you meant, feel free to correct.

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I think Buddhism in general is neither natalism nor anti-natalism. Buddhism consists of both laypersons and monks, male and female.

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Hi Javier,

It seems even the forum bot might be tiring of me:

A great discussion includes many voices and perspectives. Can you get anybody else involved?

but if it is OK with the human mods and other users for me to continue the conversation here, then alright :slight_smile:

Rereading our discussion, it seems to me we are approaching the question from different angles. You mentioned the fact that the 5 training-steps don’t proscribe sex, therefore married lay persons are ‘allowed to indulge’.

I think there is an important distinction to be made though, between following precepts and practicing the Dhamma. For example, I know very sincere Christians and Muslims whose actions are in alignment with the 5 lay precepts, but they would be the first to tell you they are not Dhamma practitioners.

As AN 6.63 famously says: Cetanāhaṃ, bhikkhave, kammaṃ vadāmi ‘Bhikkhus, it is intention I call deeds’.

I understand this to be saying that what is important is not so much the outward act, but whether our motivation is rooted in greed, ill will or delusion. In other words, the wholesome or unwholesome nature of an action is not determined by whether it is ‘allowed’ under a set of training-steps that one has voluntarily taken on.

Contrasting the 5 and 8 lay precepts, when it comes to sex I see the 5 version as promoting harm reduction and the 8 version as promoting harm avoidance. It reminds me of my friend’s mum who would tell us as teenagers when we were going out “be good, but if you can’t be good, be safe!”
:joy:

In the same way as it is better to avoid killing altogether, but if you are going to commit murder, it is less serious if you don’t kill an arhant, so too it is better to practice celibacy, but if you are going to have sex, it is probably less serious if you avoid sleeping with other people’s partners etc. That doesn’t mean Buddhism gives a positive spin on killing or sex. When done intentionally, they are unequivocally harmful.

This loops back then to my original statement, that the Buddha did not praise sex and sensuality.

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Hi Leon, I don’t think we are saying very different things. However, I think what I wanted to communicate was that the Buddha did not expect everyone to give up the married life right away, and he did not always teach complete renunciation to laypersons. This does not mean I deny that sexuality leads to suffering, but that there is a kind of sliding scale of practices recommended by the Buddha, and he did not always recommend everyone jump at the deep end at once. With that being said, this also ties into the antinatalism discussion. If he thought that everyone needed to abandon sexuality right away, without delay, and that giving birth to children also needed to be abandoned by everyone immediately, he would have said so every time he taught laypersons. At least this is how I see it.

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I suppose, philosophically, it could be said that Buddhism is personally antinatalist within the framework of rebirth. That is, a practitioner shouldn’t want to be reborn again because life has its inevitable downside of old age, illness, and death even when we live full and happy lives. But, early Buddhism really has nothing that I can see to say about having children in the present life. They didn’t think about such ideas. People and animals and other beings are born and die. That’s the way it is. You can go with the flow or against it by attaining nirvana.

In fact, if we really want to talk about the Buddhist attitudes about parenthood and family, the Buddha’s unconditional compassion for beings is sometimes likened to a parent’s love for their offspring. I’ve seen Buddhist writers take that outside of human relationships and describe how a mother cow will tend to its calf or fish guarding their roe. Sounds like a positive thing to me.

This is one of the times when I really just don’t understand western thinking, and it’s hard to put my finger on exactly what it is, but it’s just unnatural in some way. The abstractions, the use of morality as a kind of philosophical weapon, setting groups of people against each other, etc. It just makes little sense to me, personally. I consider it far more of a problem to climate change, though, because it’s why we can’t get our act together regarding problems like climate change.

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Also in MN 117, the Buddha defined mundane right view:

“And what, bhikkhus, is right view that is affected by the taints, partaking of merit, ripening in the acquisitions? ‘There is what is given and what is offered and what is sacrificed; there is fruit and result of good and bad actions; there is this world and the other world; there is mother and father; there are beings who are reborn spontaneously; there are in the world good and virtuous recluses and brahmins who have realised for themselves by direct knowledge and declare this world and the other world.’ This is right view affected by taints, partaking of merit, ripening in the acquisitions.

From the Karaniya Metta Sutta:

Even as a mother protects with her life
Her child, her only child,
So with a boundless heart
Should one cherish all living beings;

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Regarding parents’ love for their children (and grandchildren), I would note the Buddha’s take when speaking to Visākhā at Ud. 8.8:

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The smilies the Buddha used are helpful for people because they point to feelings and experiences that are hard to simply describe with words.

However, it does not seem to me that the Buddha is suggesting that people should reproduce.

Instead he’s saying take that same energy of loving (Metta) and protecting (karuna) a child or sweet/vulnerable being and apply it to yourself and to “all beings everywhere…above and below, around and everywhere…” (Divine abodes Sutta/chant)

But agree with you it does not at all seem he’s telling anyone they are wrong for having kids, either! He himself had Rāhula who he guided to awakening. (Rāhula has quite a few Suttas to his name…one of my favorites is the detailed meditation instructions in The Longer Advice to Rāhula MN62).

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Hi Javier,

I completely agree with you here:

Indeed, he was clear when teaching what was necessary to achieve a certain result. E.g. if you want a heavenly rebirth, then do as suggested in Snp.2 (quoted above). But if you want arahantship sooner rather than later, you’ll need to practice differently.

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Imagine no more children are born into this world. What happens to all of us leaving this world unenlightened? If we are not born into this world, how can we reach enlightenment?
Is experiencing suffering not a precondition to be able to end suffering?

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Compassion and attachment are two different issues. Compassion at it’s heart rests in our instinct to care for offspring and members of a social group, in my humble opinion, and the Buddhists noticed this and used it in many parables about compassion. These things are not so easily separated from each other, and it’s true that the ordinary person suffers a great deal because of impermanence.

Something I’ve discovered through some broader history studies is that it was a common belief in many religions in India and the Near East during ancient times that this world was a trap to escape and be done with. Early Christians had a very similar view as Buddhists and other Indian ascetics. Why did they have such a negative view of the world? Well, it really was a terrible existence for most people, and the belief in rebirth made it seem even worse.

Today’s world is orders of magnitude less terrible than it was in ancient times, and I think that’s probably why these religions can’t get much traction in modern times. Not that many people are suffering that much. It’s still there, impermanence and attachment, but the suffering is more subtle. Warfare is muted, disease is largely gone, slavery is abolished, etc. On the other hand, it seems as though suffering is a relative thing: What would have been minor problems in the ancient world loom large in the modern person’s mind.

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@Leon, @Javier

Given Test tube babies (say we only allow one egg to prevent killing the others), procreation is a different issue compared to having sex with one’s spouse.

Apologies for the scenario below.

Theorectically, say, even if there’s a hypothetical scenario where there’s a planet with only females and one monk, there’s a strong philosophical need to have procreation for humanity there, then the females can just wait until the monk have a wet dream and get the semen from his robes. The monk doesn’t have to break precepts or disrobe, although it would be very hard to practise, unless the monk live in seclusion.

So the philosophical grounds for natalism or anti natalism can be considered from other viewpoints as well, not just abstaining from sexual activity.

My take on antinatalism is that we are not advocating for all humans to stop procreating. The sex drive is strong, the cultural, economical reasons are strong, some people will eventually want to or accidentally have some kids. From Buddhist point of view, if we wishes for the Buddha’s dispensation to last at least until it dies out and not due to humanity go extinct, we should also play some part in helping to preserve and propagate humanity. This includes going vegan to help reduce global warming.

From the perspective of growth of religion prediction (Google it), Buddhism is estimated to have less percentage of adherence compared to total humanity because Buddhists don’t procreate as much as the other religions. Or that Buddhist parents don’t play a good enough role to indoctrinate/ teach/ brainwash their kids into the Dhamma.

So from the perspective of the Buddhist religion itself, the advice and strategy to give to Buddhists for the sake of getting more to come into contact with the Dhamma is to promote Buddhists having more kids. For the sake of global warming, overpopulation, we would prefer if people of other religions don’t procreate as much, or that antinatalism succeed in being the philosophy for them. This strategy if adopted by all religions, would actually contribute a lot more to overpopulation as a strategy for “war” of attrition to get the most good for oneself at the expense of others.

However, I think the Buddhists are in general too kind, good and nice to adopt those strategies. By seeing just so many people here who commented not to have kids (ok, let’s make it a poll below), we can see that Buddhists are more towards willing to take a hit for the general wellbeing of everyone.

Do you plan to have kids?
  • No
  • Yes/ already had them

0 voters

So in conclusion, the antinatalism movement has its uses in reducing overpopulation, since people’s actions are determined by views/philosophy. Yet, there’s also reason from Buddhist point of view to have more kids who can become Buddhists (rarity of human life and Buddha arising in the world). It’s really up to individual families to choose which philosophy they wish to hold as their circumstances stands.

In economic terms, as the cost of kids goes up in developed countries, people will tend to have lesser kids/ no kids. So the motion of urbanization, globalization, more donation to poorer countries to help distribute wealth of nations can help in reducing global birthrates. This is actually possibly the stronger determinant in human procreation than mere philosophy.

I never wanted children, and managed to make to it to 45 years old without having had any. Looking back, I’m glad I never had any children. Having said that, I agree with others that it’s a personal decision, and is one that is influenced by many factors (culture, religion, social pressures, etc.). The pressures on a man to have children are quite different than those women face, to be sure, but a lot of the pressure women get subjected to are simply redirected to the men in their lives. It ain’t easy trying to stay committed to being child-free as a man, let me tell you, while also trying to form a meaningful, intimate relationship. Even if you can find a woman who doesn’t want children (in my experience women like that are a very small minority), you’d better hope that once the relationship gets serious she doesn’t change her mind. If she does, that’s either the end of the relationship or you have to abandon your commitment to staying child-free. Now that I’m well into middle age, I can breath a bit easier know that so long as I date women my age, there probably won’t be the same pressure to have children. The problem right now is that so many women have children from past relationships. Anyway, all of this equally applies to women, too, of course. I’m just speaking from my perspective as a man.

Birth control was quite revolutionary in regards to allowing people some control over the reproductive process. I’ve heard that the number of monks in Myanmar is dwindling, and that there are monasteries sitting around empty in the countryside, because people are now able to chose when and how many children they have. One of the many purposes monasteries have served over time in Buddhist countries was a place where parents could deposit children they didn’t have the means to support. That use case for monasteries is disappearing, I think. In old Tibet, it was common for the second son to become a monk because the first son inherited all the family’s wealth and lands. So, there wasn’t much point in a second son remaining a layman. Having a sizeable population of celibate monks and nuns was itself a form of national birth/population control, too.

Hi NgXinZhao,

To what kind of female are you referring?
To female kangaroos or female rock snakes?

I presume you mean a woman.
Please be more kindful when referring to women.
Women are not their reproductive parts and abilities.
Let’s not objectify women - or/and men.

Also, not all women are biologically female and the conflation of female to woman
erases gender-nonconforming people and members of the trans community.

In short, insinuating that women would be after the semen of a sleeping monk
and a last man on earth, is disrespectful to women and to any monk
who does not see women that way. It’s 2021 - let’s move forward.

Dear Teresia,

Sorry, thanks for wanting to educate. Indeed, I am not familiar with the woke terminologies and subtle issues here.

I am referring to female humans.

What’s the difference between females and women? I use females from the point of view of a scientist (having a physics degree). I had the impression that females are more respectful than women cause it doesn’t include social issues like age referred to, etc. It seems to be the other way around.

In this case, indeed, I am in need to refer to the reproductive functionality. I am sorry if that’s considered objectification, can you inform me how can a person refer to this functionality of women without objectifying?

So I take it to mean that it’s better to let the humanity go exinct in this case? Sorry, I have Sheldon Cooper’s (from Big Bang theory) sense of social non-sensitiveness. Thank you for teaching.

I’m sure you never meant to imply anything sexist in your thought experiment, Venerable, and were simply viewing things in terms of clinical biological processes - the human drive to reproduce, and how that might unfold in one extreme, wildly hypothetical situation. However, not everyone can think about such things in the same detached way as you. Gender and sexuality are very emotionally charged ideas for many. So I think it’s better to drop this. The potential value of the outcome of this thought experiment doesn’t outweigh its potential to cause hurt and misunderstandings.

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I find the argument to rationalize reproduction on the basis of opening a window for possible enlightenment in the human realm to be strange. Who copulates with this underlying intention?

If such an argument proves anything, it proves that humans are quite skillful in fabricating BS.

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