Brandon Johnson

08/06/2019

RELS 2300

Section 502

The Rohingya and Religion

The Rohingya crisis has been a focus of the media over the past couple of years. They are

a group of people in a country called Myanmar who are oppressed. After reviewing who the

Rohingya are and why they are oppressed, it was interesting to look at the conflict from a

religious standpoint. The fundamental and faith-based perspective were both used to examine

this issue closer and see how it fits into the Buddhist and Muslim communities.

The Rohingya are considered the most persecuted minority in the world by both the

United Nations and the United States.1 They have continually been forced to leave their homes in

search for a safe place to live. The Rohingya are primarily located in the Rakhine state of

Myanmar. This state borders Bangladesh. They are considered stateless and they are not

recognized among the 135 ethnic groups that Myanmar officially recognizes.2

The Rohingya are predominantly Muslim and they are surrounded by Buddhist in

Myanmar. Buddhism is the primary religion in Myanmar.3 The people are oppressed by the

Buddhist majority and they are at the mercy of whatever laws the government makes. They are

not allowed to leave Myanmar without the governments permission, but they are not granted

citizenship in their own country.4 Due to oppression and suppression, the Rohingya are fleeing

Myanmar and going to Bangladesh as refugees. From Bangladesh, they desperately try to get to

Malaysia or Indonesia where there is a Muslim majority.5

 Since the 1970s there has been constant conflict between the Rohingya and the Buddhist

majority in Myanmar, but 2012 was the year that the conflict turned especially violent between

the two groups. A group of Rohingya men were accused of killing and raping a Buddhist woman

in 2012 and all hell broke loose. The Buddhist majority went around and started burning

hundreds of Rohingya homes and killing and injuring them.6 In 2017 a group of men attacked

police officers near the Bangladesh border and killed 9 of them. A Buddhist militia retaliated and

killed more than 1000 Rohingya and displaced over 300,000 people.7

The Myanmar government has sanctioned an “ethnic cleansing” and Buddhists are not

punished if they kill a Rohingya. It is rumored that the government has destroyed over 55

Rohingya villages and they have hidden the evidence so that no one can prove it. In total, 362

villages were destroyed over a years’ time.8 There starts to be a huge problem when a

government will willingly let their citizen prosecute and oppress a minority in their country.

So many Rohingya are trying to flee to Bangladesh and they are trying to keep them out

of their country. After the attack on the police officers on the border, Bangladeshi leaders have

cracked down on the number of Rohingya that they let enter the country. Try as they might, large

numbers of Rohingya people still get in to the country every year.9 For the most part, the

Bangladesh government does not let the Rohingya leave the heavily populated border refugee

areas. They even have police posts and video monitoring to make sure that they don’t move to

other parts of the country.10

This issue has come to light over the past seven years and the United Nations, United

States, and other groups have publicly rebuked the Myanmar government for how they have

treated the Rohingya people. The UN and other human rights groups have stepped up to help
with the Rohingya crisis. Pope Francis even visited Myanmar in 2017 and said that there needs

to be acceptance and respect for all ethnic groups in their country.11

Religion is the thing that hold the society together. We can’t function without and

organized social structure and religion provides that structure. Religion teaches important values

like love, compassion, justice, and self-control. These values help hold society together. Religion

also fulfills a biological purpose of bringing people together. Psychologically, religion gives us a

God who is strong enough to protect us from the awful things in live and it gives us hope that

things can get better.

The Rohingya crisis is not supported by the functional based perspective. It is said that

religion holds the community together but it seems like no community wants to help the

Rohingya. The Buddhist in Myanmar clearly don’t want the Muslim Rohingya in their country so

they are doing everything they can to eradicate them. On the other hand, the predominantly

Muslim people in Bangladesh don’t necessarily want them in their country either. If religion

really brought people together like it should, it would seem like we shouldn’t have this problem.

It seems like everyone is blaming someone else for this crisis but no one want to take

responsibility.

The faith perspective is a little more difficult to explain. This is the idea that there really

is an underlying reality that can’t be readily perceived. The process of deep questioning is one

way that people have come to the conclusion that there is an Ultimate Reality. This is done by

searching for faith through doubt and questioning. It is like peeling back the layers of an onion,

with each question or doubt you realize what you believe and move on to the next layer. Another

more intense way that people have come to the realization that there is a supreme being is

through an awakening or enlightenment. This can happen through a near-death experience or it

can be induced by meditation or fasting. Finally, it is possible that people believe and have faith

because they have accepted what others have told them or they have read about it in holy books,

such as scriptures.

Although Buddhists don’t believe in an afterlife like this perspective suggests, they still

have faith in their religion. They believe in a cause and effect type of life. If they are kind to

others, then they are closer to nirvana. Meditation is a huge part of the religion and this is a way

for them to come to a better understanding of themselves and of the world, like the faith-based

perspective suggests. One of the five basic moral precepts they believe in is to refrain from

taking another’s life. It’s interesting that this is one of the core values they believe in, however

they have killed many of the Rohingya. It seems like this is a direct counteraction of what they

believe.

I went to a Buddhist service for my site visit and after reading about how the Buddhist

citizens of Myanmar have treated the Rohingya I can honestly say that I’m shocked. I know that

it is not fair to say that all Buddhists would react that way, but it sure looks bad for the religion if

the majority of people from a predominantly Buddhist country and treating others with such

distain and hate. While I was at the Buddhist temple, it seemed like such a peaceful place and the

people seemed very peaceful and centered.

The Rohingya have been unfairly treated for years and it is time for change. It is

interested to look at this issue with both a fundamental and faith-based perspective. It is

impossible to say that one group is completely in the wrong and the other is completely in the

right. Whether or not we approach this issue as a religious or political issue, it is time to resolve

this issue.
Notes:

1. See the article “Rohingya People in Myanmar: What You Need to Know”
2. See the article “Explainer: What’s Happening to Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslims”
3. See the article “Rohingya People in Myanmar: What You Need to Know”
4. See the article “Who are the Rohingya”
5. See the article “Rohingya People in Myanmar: What You Need to Know”
6. See the article “Explainer: What’s Happening to Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslims”
7. See the article “Who are the Rohingya and What is Happening in Myanmar”
8. See the article “Who are the Rohingya”
9. See the article “Rohingya People in Myanmar: What You Need to Know”
10. See the article “Who are the Rohingya”
11. See the article “Who are the Rohingya”
 Works Cited

Deutsche, W. (n.d.). Rohingya people in Myanmar: What you need to know: DW: 12.09.2017.

Retrieved from https://www.dw.com/en/rohingya-people-in-myanmar-what-you-need-to-know/a-

40340067

Explainer: What's Happening to Myanmar's Rohingya Muslims. (2017, February 24). Retrieved

from https://asiasociety.org/blog/asia/explainer-whats-happening-myanmars-rohingya-muslims

Ratcliffe, R. (2017, September 06). Who are the Rohingya and what is happening in Myanmar?

Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/sep/06/who-are-the-

rohingya-and-what-is-happening-in-myanmar

Who are the Rohingya? (2018, April 18). Retrieved from

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/08/rohingya-muslims-170831065142812.html)