Prolife, Prochoice: Buddhism and Reproductive Ethics.

Introduction

Among the many modern ethical issues of concern to women, those surrounding reproductive choice are arguably the most urgent. My purpose here is to explore these issues from Buddhist points of view, traditional and contemporary, to open the discussion on how contemporary American Buddhists may resolve tensions between Buddhist ideals and modern realities, and explore how Buddhist thinking on these issues may contribute to contemporary dialogue on reproductive ethics. To begin, I present a brief overview of Buddhist ethical theory. Second, I investigate Buddhist tenets relevant to reproductive choice and how these tenets are variously interpreted in ...