Buddhism and Nationalism as Sources of Identity in in Asia of the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries

Abstract

The article examines the influence of Buddhism and nationalism on identification processes in Asian countries in the context of political transformations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Significant revitalization of Buddhism (sometimes called “Buddhist Modernism”) in a number of countries coincided with the growth of nationalism (especially in Russia, Mongolia, Tibet, China, and Japan), as well as the growing perception of Buddhist transnational unity. Nationalism and religion collaborated in their reactions to a number of important phenomena: the anti-colonial movement, the resistance against western cultural expansion (India, China, Japan), the aspiration of independence (Tibet, Mongolia), the renovation processes (in particular, among the Russian Buddhists). These phenomena were caused by objective factors, the changes in worldviews, as well as with activity of some individuals (Tagore, Tai-su, Uchida Ryohei, Dalai Lama, Agvan Dorjiev). The high level of civilizational depth allowed Buddhists of various traditions to assert their basic principles as important to identity resources.