Cambodia: Maha Ghosananda, Cambodia's 'Gandhi'

Some two million Cambodians were killed during the Khmer Rouge period, and religion was targeted for elimination. All but 3,000 of Cambodia's 62,000 Buddhist monks were murdered through forced 'disappearances', overwork, starvation, illness and outright execution.

 

Maha Ghosananda was a Buddhist monk who survived and worked tirelessly to restore peace and a sense of community in conflict-ravaged Cambodia. When the Khmer Rouge came to power in 1975 Ghosananda was in a period of secluded forest meditation and his master told him not to let current affairs disturb his concentration. He tried to obey but recalled crying for Cambodia every day. In 1978 he left the hermitage and travelled to the Thai/Cambodian border to work with refugees fleeing the carnage.

 

He established simple shack-temples in every refugee camp and taught meditation. Insisting on non-partisanship and nonviolence, these temples became neutral spaces where refugees could find moral and spiritual sustenance.

 

At the 1988 peace talks, Ghosananda announced to the leaders of the four armed factions that he was starting a fifth army, one of peace that would use 'bullets of loving-kindness and courage' as its ammunition.

 

The Army of Peace's first campaign came in 1992. Ghosananda began a four-week walk through Cambodia with a small band of monks and others, arriving in the capital Phnom Penh 1,000 strong. The marchers were a moving zone of peace for villagers who were beset by daily fighting. Expanding both tactics and objectives, they marched again and again. In 1994 to quell the civil war; in 1995 to highlight the dangers of landmines; in 1997 to show residents of former Khmer Rouge areas the power of nonviolence and in ensuing years to protest the deforestation of Cambodia.

 

Fighting for ideological reasons was now superseded by fighting to plunder Cambodia's forests for profit. Ghosananda believed peacemaking to be like breathing: if we stop, we die. And similarly so with deforestation:  keeping the environment healthy ensures healthy air to breath. Working with villagers he planted thousands of trees.

 

Ghosananda lived an itinerant life style and had no official staff. He established dozens of temples, but had no official or legal relationship with any of them. Nor did he have a school or disciples in the traditional sense. He travelled unaccompanied, arrived unannounced, and his whereabouts were often unknown even to his closest associates. It seemed he owned nothing but his robes and passport.

 

Maha Ghosananda died on 12 March 2007 in Providence, Rhode Island, USA. Read more about Ghosananda's life in this article:  Peace Wins: Maha Ghosananda, the Gandhi of Cambodia '.