Here we clearly see that the secular/spiritual dichotomy that Jones had earlier constructed forces him to adopt the strong stance that members of contemporary culture will “inevitably” engage in reductive modernism.

Now if, as we saw in Jones’s definition just above, an esoteric religion such as Buddhism must concern itself with individual, spiritual soteriology (a “training whereby individuals can realize their True Nature”), then Jones’s project will have to be: to determine how such a religion could develop a socially engaged element without succumbing to secular reductive modernism. Jones raises this methodological issue when discussing the subject of the validation for Buddhist activism, which raises the question: “On what basis, on what foundation, is Buddhist social analysis, and the activism derived from it, to be grounded?” Jones contrasts his method with “the other method” (that of the reductive modernists, of course):

My method of validation can be characterized by terms such as primary, existential, perennial, epistemological. It contrasts with the other method of validating Buddhist social analysis and justifying social activism, which is secondary, exegetical, culture-bound and contingent in character, relying on specific scriptural evidence and historic Buddhist practice to give direct and prescriptive guidance. (1989: 196-197)

The way in which Jones uses the labels “primary” and “secondary” here is very revealing. Most postmodern, critical thinkers, ever insistent on highlighting the contextuality of everything, would certainly insist on reversing these labels (as would I). “Specific scriptural evidence and historic Buddhist practice” should be considered the primary source (the raw data, so to speak) on the basis of which various secondary “existential” or “epistemological” interpretations can be formulated. For Jones to think that his methodology is “perennial” and not “exegetical” is naïve in the extreme, as even any premodern Buddhist hermeneutist would attest. But of course, his adoption of the label “primary” is necessary if he is to appropriate the authority to speak for the Buddhist tradition, and his adoption of labels such as “existential,” “epistemological,” and “perennial” are necessary if he is to construct an historically disengaged Buddhism from which he can distance (exalt) his own, innovative engaged hybrid.

When discussing Lopez and Gómez above, we saw how the Orientalists of the colonial and post-colonial period created a philosophy/ritual split in order to appropriate Buddhism as a pure philosophy. Jones makes a similar observation when he notes that post-colonial Buddhist intellectuals created a religion/politics split, this time in order to appropriate a politically engaged legacy for Buddhism:

[As illustrated by H. Bechert and Demieville,] Western cultural colonialism was challenged by those [Asian Buddhists] who had already unbeknowingly succumbed to it, but who professed to find in the Buddhist scriptures and traditions such secular Western ideals as scientific rationalism and state socialism. These could then be claimed as having been all along a part of the Eastern cultural heritage. (1989: 273)

Certainly such examples of false consciousness(25) or inappropriate “reading back” did occur, and were perhaps even rampant. And certainly the following also occurred:

In the heady post-colonial period, Buddhist intellectuals were concerned to present the Dharma as a national, humanistic, democratic, and even socialist ideology for today. … Buddhism was … claimed to be no less rational, scientific[,] and ‘modern’ (and therefore relevant) than either the technological capitalism or the Marxian scientific socialism which challenged it. (1989: 235)

However, I should not want to assume that all such claims were necessarily examples of naïve appropriation fostered by false consciousness. Many legitimate, sober comparisons were no doubt drawn as well. But Jones will not be so generous; he states a little further on:

This kind of reductive modernism in my view overemphasizes and misinterprets the significance of the social teachings of the Pali canon. … Concerned to make Buddhism manifestly relevant to the social and political requirements of the post-colonial era, these [reductive] modernists tend to read the scriptures in terms of certain dominant contemporary ideas, as if they were originally a programme for social reform; their over-arching spiritual and existential context and significance is lost beneath a burgeoning humanistic rationalism. Meanings are read into them which are at best arguable and at worst extravagant and tendentious. (1989: 237)

Jones here confidently criticizes these Buddhists for reading their own scriptures “as if they were originally a programme for social reform,” as if he, Jones, can authoritatively say that they were not. Furthermore, he proceeds to tell them what the true significance of their scriptures is, a significance that is to be recovered from what Jones discerns to be their “over-arching spiritual and existential context”—a significance and context that he says the Buddhists have “lost.” It seems that, in the heady postmodern period (obsessed with revealing ever more context and eschewing dubious comparisons), Orientalism is alive and well.