The Robe and the Sword - by Sonia Faleiro (Paperback)

About the Book

"Journalist Sonia Faleiro investigates the rise and consequences of Buddhist extremism, focusing on the three countries where nationalist Buddhists are the most active, powerful, and violent-Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand"--

Book Synopsis

When the robe becomes a weapon, who can stop the violence?

We think of Buddhism as a faith of peace--rooted in compassion, patience, and nonviolence. But across South and Southeast Asia today, the robe is being turned into a weapon as radical monks and nationalist movements unleash hatred and war.

In The Robe and the Sword, acclaimed journalist Sonia Faleiro travels from Sri Lanka's riot-scarred towns to the homes of refugees along the Myanmar border to Thailand's fortified temples, uncovering how militant monks have transformed a tradition of nonviolence into a tool of terror. She reveals how Sri Lanka's Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara incited mobs against Muslims, how Myanmar's Ashin Wirathu helped ignite a genocide, and how elements of Thailand's clergy have entrenched military rule.

Through vivid portraits of zealots, survivors, and dissident monks fighting to reclaim their faith, Faleiro delivers an unflinching investigation into the colonial trauma, economic grievances, and political forces fueling a dangerous new extremism. The Robe and the Sword is a searing and indispensable work of narrative nonfiction, urgently needed to understand how sacred traditions are being weaponized--and what is at stake for the future of our interconnected world.

Review Quotes

"The Robe and the Sword is an uncomfortable book, and that is its virtue.Faleiro brings moral clarity to terrain that is usually tiptoed around.... Faleiro delivers a bracing wake-up call, exposing the West's kitschification of Asian faiths and the East's enthralment to charismatic, ultraviolent clerics." --The Times

"The Robe and the Sword weaves personal experience, historical analysis, and on-the-ground reporting from India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and the border with Myanmar. Faleiro pinpoints the unhealed trauma of colonialism as the source of much of the religious violence, and highlights its implications for Buddhists around the world." --Tricycle: The Buddhist Review

"Sonia Faleiro is a master of narrative reportage, illuminating every topic she touches. This book that connects colonial fault lines, broken economies, the scourge of Islamophobia, and extremism is one that only Faleiro can write. Pay heed: it is the story of our broken world." --Fatima Bhutto, author of The Hour of the Wolf and co-editor of Gaza: The Story of a Genocide

"With sharp insight and deep humanity, Sonia Faleiro's The Robe and the Sword traces the long and uneasy bond between Buddhism and political power, offering a vital portrait of how faith, identity, and resistance are being redefined across the region." --Thant Myint-U, author of Peacemaker: U Thant and the Forgotten Quest for a Just World and The Hidden History of Burma: Race, Capitalism, and the Crisis of Democracy in the 21st Century

"With intellectual resourcefulness and rigor, Sonia Faleiro describes one of nationalism's most insidious and least-noticed mutations. Briskly and accessibly, The Robe and the Sword charts the complex social-economic shifts that make even an ancient spiritual tradition devoted to renunciation hospitable to modern fanaticism." --Pankaj Mishra, author of The World After Gaza

"Sonia Faleiro's The Robe and the Sword is a must-read piece of the puzzle of rising religious and ethnonationalism worldwide. This meticulous reporting and analysis offers a sorely needed broad take on Buddhist extremism's impact on some of the world's most vulnerable people. Faleiro is one of our best journalists and thinkers. Unflinching in pursuing narratives that disrupt our established ways of seeing, she insists that we enlarge our field of vision to see the critical historical and contemporary connections beyond national borders." --V.V. Ganeshananthan, author of Brotherless Night