This article has developed in response to a series of observations made over a decade ago by Wilfred Cantwell Smith in his The Meaning and End of Religion . In that work, Smith made the point that the concepts ‘religion’, ‘religions’, ‘Hinduism’ and ‘Buddhism’ are rather recent, of Western origin, and, in an attempt to understand mankind's religiousness, inadequate. In developing his argument, Smith considered the Buddhist case with penetrating insight but, because his thesis was of such comprehensive scope, chose (...) not to go into a detailed consideration of relevant matters in the Theravāda Buddhist tradition. (shrink)

The Buddhist cumulative tradition is enormously complex and variegated, having been a part of the human record for over two thousand years, and having contributed massively to the shaping of a variety of cultures in South, South‐East, sand East Asia. More recently many in Europe and the Americas are responding to the teachings offered by one or another of the continuing strands of this cumulative tradition. Attempting both to communicate and to interpret in any degree of detail the positions this (...) great tradition has developed about what constitutes the ideal in human relationships and polity, in an ever changing process over these many centuries and in the remarkable variety of these many contexts, would border on the bewildering. But the attempt might be instructive, since it could creatively place in juxtaposition an awareness that we human beings begin at different starting points in constructing our views of ourselves and the contexts in which we live out our lives. (shrink)