My previous two articles discussed Thích Nhất Hạnh’s reinterpretation of mindfulness and his teaching of interbeing. These form the foundation for exploring his Engaged Buddhism, which connects spiritual practice with social action. In this article, we will examine how his Engaged Buddhism was formed and shaped through his life experiences.
Thích Nhất Hạnh (1926–2022) lived through a time of continuous conflict in Vietnam, including Japanese occupation during World War II (1939–1945), the anti-colonial First Indochina War (1946–1954), and the Vietnam War (1955–1975), which drew in global powers. These successive wars profoundly influenced his understanding of suffering, mindfulness, and the need for engaged spiritual practice.
He developed his engaged teachings and practices primarily in response to the suffering caused by the political and social conditions during the wars in Vietnam, his homeland. (Chapman 2007; Hunt-Perry & Fine 2000) Given that the environment in wartime Vietnam differed greatly from that of France, where he later lived in exile, this discussion will be divided into two periods: during the wars in Vietnam and after the war, once he had settled in France. This structure will help to illustrate how he adapted his teachings and practices to meet the specific needs of people in different contexts.
Let us begin with his monastic training and early experiences as a young monk, which played a crucial role in developing his understanding of the deep connection between personal transformation and social change.
Thích Nhất Hạnh’s monastic training
Thích Nhất Hạnh became a novice monk in 1942 at age 16. He was ordained at Từ Hiếu Temple near Huế, a city in central Vietnam. This was during World War II, a time of great uncertainty and hardship. The suffering he witnessed during this period, as we will see, strongly influenced how his Engaged Buddhism later took form.
• Mindfulness practice
According to Thích Nhất Hạnh: “The fundamental training of a novice in Vietnam is essentially to practice being present in every moment and to do whatever one is doing with full awareness.” (Thích Nhất Hạnh 2016) In other words, mindfulness is the core of monastic training in Vietnam. It means learning to be fully present and aware in everyday activities. This way of living mindfully would later become the basis for Thích Nhất Hạnh’s socially engaged approach to Buddhism.
• Manual labor
At the temple, in addition to meditation and studying the Buddhist teachings, manual labor was an essential part of monastic training. Thích Nhất Hạnh recalled spending long hours each day doing physically demanding tasks such as polishing rice and carrying heavy buckets of water, which would leave his shoulders red and swollen. (Powers 2016)
This emphasis on physical work continues today. The importance of manual labor is still seen in the daily lives of monks and nuns at Plum Village, and even retreatants take part in daily work as part of their mindfulness practice. (Drawing on data from my PhD fieldwork at Plum Village, I will explore this aspect of practice in more detail in future articles.)
• Gāthās
Another important aspect of Thích Nhất Hạnh’s monastic training was the practice of gāthās. These are simple verses recited during ordinary daily actions to help bring us back to mindfulness. (Thích Nhất Hạnh 1997) He explained:
As novices, we were handed it [a small book called Gāthās for Daily Life] when we entered the monastery and instructed to keep it close at hand at all times, even to use it as a pillow at night. The verses in it taught us how to stay present with our own minds in order to observe ourselves throughout the ordinary actions of daily life: eating, drinking, walking, standing, lying down, and working. . . . The mind is like a monkey swinging from branch to branch. It is not easy to catch a monkey. You have to be quick and smart, able to guess which branch the monkey will swing to next. It would be easy to shoot it, but the object here is not to kill, threaten, or coerce the monkey. The object is to know where it will go next in order to be with it. That thin book of daily verses provided us with strategies. The verses were simple, yet remarkably effective. They taught us how to observe and master all the actions of body, speech, and mind. (Thích Nhất Hạnh 2000)
This small book of gāthās, originally written in classical Chinese, was compiled by a Chan master from China. Thích Nhất Hạnh later translated it into Vietnamese to make the practice more accessible. Today, these gāthās have been translated into many languages, making them available to anyone who wishes to use them in their practice. (Thích Nhất Hạnh 2016)
Thích Nhất Hạnh wrote many gāthās to support and deepen mindfulness practice. At Plum Village, these short verses are posted in various places, such as the toilets and dining room. They serve as gentle reminders to return to the present moment and become more aware of our actions.
Following a long-standing Zen tradition, Thích Nhất Hạnh encouraged people to write their own gāthās. Since these verses are such an important part of his teachings, future articles will explore whether the retreatants I interviewed during my PhD fieldwork actually used his gāthās, and whether they found them helpful in their daily practice. We will also look at whether they created their own, and how they went about it.
• Studying secular subjects at university
Thích Nhất Hạnh was fully ordained as a monk in 1949 at age 23, during the First Indochina War. The ongoing conflict and violence in the country continued to shape his views, laying the groundwork for the later development of his Engaged Buddhism.
After his ordination, Thích Nhất Hạnh joined the Báo Quốc Buddhist Academy, which focused mainly on traditional Buddhist studies. However, he believed that monks in the modern world should also study non-Buddhist subjects, such as Western science, literature, philosophy, and foreign languages.
When the academy refused to update its curriculum, Thích Nhất Hạnh and several fellow students left in 1950. They moved to Ấn Quang Temple in Saigon and enrolled at Saigon University to study Western science and philosophy. During this time, he also wrote poetry and novels to support himself. (Chapman 2007) Notably, he was among the first monks in Saigon to pursue secular subjects at university and one of the initial six to ride a bicycle. (Plum Village n.d.)
The birth and meaning of Thích Nhất Hạnh’s Engaged Buddhism
Thích Nhất Hạnh’s desire to renew Vietnamese Buddhism is evident in his many achievements as a young monk in the 1950s. These included creating his own monastery, the Fragrant Palm Leaves (Phương Bối) Hermitage, becoming the chief editor of the leading Buddhist magazine Vietnamese Buddhism, and publishing books and articles in newspapers. (Thích Nhất Hạnh 1996, 2017) Thích Nhất Hạnh explained how his social involvement took shape and what it truly means:
When I was a novice in Vietnam, we young monks witnessed the suffering caused by the war. So we were very eager to practice Buddhism in such a way that we could bring it into society. That was not easy because the tradition does not directly offer Engaged Buddhism. So we had to do it by ourselves. That was the birth of Engaged Buddhism.
Buddhism has to do with your daily life, with your suffering and with the suffering of the people around you. You have to learn how to help a wounded child while still practicing mindful breathing. You should not allow yourself to get lost in action. Action should be meditation at the same time. (Malkin 2003)
His engaged approach emerged in 1954 when a newspaper invited him to write about Buddhism. He recalled:
I wrote a series of ten articles titled “A Fresh Look at Buddhism.” It is in this series of ten articles that I proposed the idea of Engaged Buddhism—Buddhism in the realm of education, economics, politics, and so on. So Engaged Buddhism dates from 1954. (Thích Nhất Hạnh 2008)
Conclusion
Thích Nhất Hạnh’s early monastic training emphasized mindfulness in daily life, manual labor as meditation, and the use of gāthās to anchor awareness in the present moment. These practices laid the foundation for his Engaged Buddhism, which bridges spiritual practice with social action.
Engaged Buddhism, as he developed it, grew from two key sources: a desire to renew Vietnamese Buddhism and a deep response to the suffering caused by war. As a young monk, he worked to reform monastic education and explored secular subjects such as science and literature. These early experiences reflected his bold vision and willingness to challenge convention.
However, his socially engaged approach to Buddhism upset many traditional-minded Buddhist leaders, who felt that monastics should avoid social or political involvement. The next article will examine the obstacles he faced and how he dealt with them through his mindfulness practice. These experiences continued to shape and deepen his engaged approach to Buddhism.
References
Chapman, John. 2007. “The 2005 pilgrimage and return to Vietnam of exiled Zen Master Thích Nhất Hạnh.” In P. Taylor (Ed.), Modernity and Re-enchantment: Religion in Post-revolutionary Vietnam (pp. 297–341). Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Hunt-Perry, Patricia., & Fine, Lyn. 2000. “All Buddhism is Engaged: Thích Nhất Hạnh and the Order of Interbeing.” In C. S. Queen (Ed.), Engaged Buddhism in the West (pp. 35–66). Boston: Wisdom Publications.
Malkin, John. 2003. In Engaged Buddhism, peace begins with you. Retrieved from http://www.lionsroar.com/in-engaged-buddhism-peace-begins-with-you/#
Plum Village. n.d. The life story of Thích Nhất Hạnh. Retrieved from https://plumvillage.org/about/thich-nhat-hanh/biography/
Powers, John. 2016. “Thích Nhất Hạnh.” In J. Powers (Ed.), The Buddhist World (pp. 606–16). New York: Routledge.
Thích Nhất Hạnh. 1996. “The sun my heart.” In A. Kotler (Ed.), Engaged Buddhist Reader: Ten Years of Engaged Buddhist Publishing (pp. 162–170). Berkeley, California: Parallax Press.
Thích Nhất Hạnh. 1997. Stepping into Freedom: An Introduction to Buddhist Monastic Training. Berkeley, California: Parallax Press.
Thích Nhất Hạnh. 2000. Fragrant Palm Leaves: Journals 1962–1966. London: Rider.
Thích Nhất Hạnh. 2008. “History of Engaged Buddhism.” In The Mindfulness Bell, 4–9.
Thích Nhất Hạnh. 2016. At Home in the World: Stories and Essential Teachings from a Monk’s Life. London: Penguin Random House.
Thích Nhất Hạnh. 2017. The Other Shore: A New Translation of the Heart Sutra with Commentaries. Berkeley, California: Palm Leave Press.
Related features from BDG
Buddhist Mindfulness Versus Secular Mindfulness, Part 1
Buddhist Mindfulness Versus Secular Mindfulness, Part 2
Buddhist Mindfulness Versus Secular Mindfulness, Part 3
Buddhist Mindfulness Versus Secular Mindfulness, Part 4
