Respect for life: can Zen Buddhism help in forming an environmental ethic?

Abstract

Zen Buddhism has an enviable respect for life. Buddhism promises to chasten human desires and thirsts, to fit humans into their sources, their surrounding world. But there is a series of challenges to Zen Buddhism. Compassion to wild animals? Buddha nature in a lotus flower? Saving endangered species and ecosystems? A challenge to Zen is to use its insights to help form an environmental ethic--East and West.