เอกสารการประชุมวิชาการและเสนอผลงานวิจัย มหาวิทยาลัยทักษิณ ครั้งที่ 19 2552 - page 19

การประชุมวิ ชาการและเสนอผลงานวิจัย มหาวิ ทยาลัยทักษิ ณ ครั้งที่ 19 ประจำป 2552
That statement is essentially the same as what Imam Ghazali apparently said within
a different cultural context:
Beneficial knowledge is that which increases your fear of God Most High, improves your
ability to discern the faults of your ego, makes you more cognizant of how to worship your
Lord, reduces your desire for this world, increases your longing for the next world, and
opens your spiritual insight to the disastrous defects of your actions so you can avoid them.
It discloses to you the plots and delusions of the Devil and how he misleads the scholars who
have gone astray until he exposes them to the hatred and anger of GodMost High, for they have
used religion to purchase this world, taken knowledge as a means to gain the wealth of sultans,
to consume the wealth of religious endowments, the poor, and the needy, and turned their
energies throughout the day to the acquisition of prestige and high standing in the hearts
of people, which forces them to show off their good deeds, to argue, and to be quarrelsome
and ostentatious when they speak.20
Of course, both of these cultural statements have regional relevance to university research for
the South. Both are concerned about the role of universities in the modern world. Both have good
reason to be concerned. The responsibilities of the modern university are clearly in the transmission
of morally useful knowledge and its adaptation and in the case of research, its creation for the
beneficial use onbehalf of the populace. Such ‘beneficial use’might otherwise be called ‘development’,
but in factwe have somisused thisword that it can sometimesmean the veryopposite to ‘beneficial use’.
The English word ‘development’ derives from a description of a process of unrolling or
unfolding, such as events. It originally had none of connotations of human control or influence
that it does today. In the Thai language context การพัฒนา (karn phatana) apparently retained
its original meaning of personal spiritual development until the introduction of the Western
economic development era into Thailand. These changes in the two languages considered here
are more than mere curiosities of usage, they indicate a fundamental shift in worldview – a
shift from a focus on living within nature to one of controlling nature. Those who understand
such changes are relatively unsurprised by the social and other problems that we live amongst
in the region today. Imparting understanding is part the role of a university – a role that has
no association with selfishness, parochialism or technical skill divorced from understanding.
19Buddhadasa Bhikkhu (1991) AgriDhamma: The Duty of Professional Agriculturists. A Lecture by
Buddhadasa Bhikkhu to Agricultural Teachers and Officials on 25 March 1991 at Suan Mokkhapharam,
Chaiya, Surat Thani Province, Thailand. Translated by Lindsay Falvey transcribed by Lerchat
Boonek. Institute for International Development <http://www.iid.org/publications/buddhadasa.pdf>
พุทธทาสภิกขุ ธรรมนาทเกษตร. ธรรมบรรยายแกคณะครูบาอาจารย
20Bidayat al-Hidaya, 50