Episode 35: Jeffery D. Long on Hinduism, religious nonviolence

Jainism, birthed out of the rich religions of India, asks practitioners to be as careful as they can in not hurting a single thing. They step carefully on the ground and wear masks to avoid inhaling and accidentally killing the little things we thoughtlessly murder. Now, that, but writ large: Gandhi, and the nonviolent movement that sought Indian independence from British rule. 

Well, we don’t talk about any of that, because as a fellow religious convert, I much more wanted to discuss Jeffery D. Long’s switch from small-town Missouri Catholicism to Hinduism over the decades. It turns out, the tale started when he was very young, but then culminated when he was much older: a seeking that finally a home in a newly embraced religion, but also an over-arching belief in the ability of man and man’s systems to change to embrace more peace, less war and violence. 

Dive a lot into Long the main, some into his newly co-edited (and contributed) book, Nonviolence in the World’s Religions: A Concise Introduction (Routledge, 2022), and some more into his wanting to highlight the peace at the heart of some of the world’s religions at a time when the world is increasingly critical of the violence that bubbles up from religion’s adherents. 

And, bonus, listeners! Long recommended books at the end of our recording session for beginners curious about Hinduism or other strands of Eastern religion he’s explored through the years. This is not an exhaustive list. Email him and I bet he’ll pony up with one. 

• A Survey of Hinduism, 3rd edition by Klaus K. Klostermaier (from SUNY Press, from Half Price Books online)   
• Vedanta: A Simple Introduction by Pravrajika Vrajaprana (from Vedanta Press) 
• Jainism: An Introduction by Jeffery D. Long (from I.B. Tauris)  
• Buddhism: A Very Short Introduction by Michael Carrithers (one of a long, lovely series on everything from Oxford)   
• What the Buddha Taught by Walpola Rahula (a marvelous one I read a year or so ago, from Grove Press in its most recent edition, with many older editions everywhere in the used-book market)  
• What the Buddha Thought by Richard Gombrich (from Equinox Publishing) 
• Empty, Empty. Happy, Happy. by Tyler Lewke (Redwood Publishing, 2019, on Amazon) 
• Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda (from the Self-Realization Fellowship, whose wide publishing has made this book a mainstay in used bookstores for decades) 

Editor’s note: This interview is the second of a three-part series on Nation-Building, War and, right here, Peace. (Also in the works is a series on Birth, Adolescence and Old Age.)