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20 BOOK REVIEW
Hindu Bioethics for the Twenty-first Century, by S. Cromwell Crawford (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003)
ISBN 0-7914-5779-6
Cromwell Crawford is Professor and Chair of Religion at the University of Hawaii. He has known India well from earliest childhood and has written extensively on Indian philosophy
and ethics. Principally, he has drawn from the Hindu canon. This is for the obvious reason that the Vedic dharma is the majority tradition in India and among the Indian Diaspora. There is also another, subtler reason, namely the inclusive nature of Hinduism, its ability both to adapt to and influence social and economic changes, local traditions and cultures, and other spiritual traditions including those more ancient than Hinduism itself.
Hindu Bioethics
FOR THE
Twenty-first Century
CHONWELL CRAWFORD
It is this inherent flexibility of Hinduism that attracts Professor Crawford and to which his scholarship is dedicated. However, he is often profoundly critical of Hindus, individually or collectively, who he feels do not live up to this tradition of tolerance and inclusion. In his latest book, he condemns the 'evils' of the jati or caste system in its corrupted form. He points to Hindu sects such as the Saivas and Vaisnavas, as well as reformers such as Ram Mohan Roy, Swami Dayananda and Mahatma Gandhi, who opposed the caste system and 'untouchability'. He also cites nonVedic traditions, such as Buddhism and Jainism, which have adopted a more clearly egalitarian approach, making spiritual development open to all.
Professor Crawford is also profoundly interested in Jain teachings in their own right. He has been a
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staunch friend and ally of Jainism in the West, as well as an advisor and contributor to Jain Spirit. In Hindu Bioethics, he refers to the freedom that Jain scholars enjoyed in exploring medical science, unhampered by brahmanic taboos. Their conclusions influenced the development of Ayurveda. Professor Crawford also draws our attention to the interaction between Jain and Hindu thought. In the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, for instance, "ahimsa provides the ethical framework for all other virtues classified under Yama (restraint). Ahimsa is more than non-violence, it is non-hatred (vairatyagah). Its scope is universal, and it cannot be relativised by a series of 'ifs', 'ands' or 'buts'."
Ayurveda, we are reminded, means 'the science of living to a ripe old age'. It is the basis of Indian medicine, health care and scientific inquiry in a wider sense. As such, it would seem to have strong pre-Vedic influences, as does Jainism, being the continuation of an earlier Indian tradition. Ayurveda is about far more than diagnosis, treatment and prevention, more even than research. It is as much concerned with health as with disease, with the mind and spirit as the body. Ayurveda is concerned with integration of the different aspects of the self, but it also emphasises the interconnectedness of all living systems and the need to preserve both balance and diversity in nature.
There are strong areas of overlap between the ancient insights of Ayurveda and the most recent insights of psychology and neuroscience, as well as physics and ecology. These point us towards a more holistic vision of the self and the universe than has hitherto been prevalent in the West. Many Westerners are rethinking their attitudes towards spirituality, material progress and what constitutes health,
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and they are turning for guidance to ancient systems from the East, including Ayurveda. Professor Crawford's book is therefore highly timely. In a rigorous but accessible way it addresses from a Hindu perspective concerns such as surrogate motherhood, animal-tohuman transplants, preventative and complementary medicine and birth control. Yet Hindu Bioethics has a far larger purpose than this. The aim of the book is clearly to encourage those tendencies within modern Hinduism that are most flexible and liberal in their outlook. This Hinduism, he makes clear, is not a 'Hinduism Lite' for New Age enthusiasts in the West. On the contrary, it represents a return to the roots of Vedic culture, drawing upon pre-Vedic influences such as Jainism.
In this way, Professor Crawford places himself in a distinguished and honourable tradition of Hindu reform. There are, nonetheless, moments when Western ideological preoccupations intrude and break the rhythm of his argument. For example, he rightly emphasises those aspects of Hindu culture which empower women, and condemns those spiritually baseless customs that have held them back. However, in doing so he sometimes resorts to the divisive and outdated rhetoric of left-wing feminism. That ideology, as we have seen in the West, creates conflict rather than well-being and so is merely the reverse of the prejudice it opposes. Vedic culture, by direct contrast, offers an holistic view of the female and male principles. Shakti and Shiva are not at war, but equal, balanced and interdependent.
This small criticism aside, Hindu Bioethics is an exhilarating achievement as well as an important work of scholarship.
Aidan Rankin
www.jainelibrary.org
