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In a lecture entitled, “Buddhism in an Islamic State: Religious Tolerance and Harmony” delivered at the Soka Gakkai Malaysia (SGM) Culture Centre on August 17, 2008, Prof Dr Yusoff Ismail, a professor of anthropology and Dean of the Faculty of Applied Social Sciences, Open University Malaysia, described the society in Kelantan, with a thriving Theravada Buddhist community, as a testament of religious tolerance in Malaysia. For two years, he had lived there among the Buddhist Siamese to complete his anthropological research.
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Delivered to an audience of 160 people, including Prof Tan Sri Anuwar Ali, President & Vice Chancellor of Open University Malaysia, and Puan Sri Eveline Anuwar, Prof Yusoff Ismail also said that his investigation had shown that Buddhism and Islam can be practised within the same social and cultural sphere without generating much inter-ethnic and religious tension. The Buddhists in Kelantan are mainly from the Thai community. There are twenty Theravada temples in the state, with some of the largest Buddha statues in Malaysia.
The talk also covered some aspects of Theravada religious life in the state, particularly on how Buddhism adapts itself – mainly by adopting a non-confrontational stand - to the local social and cultural conditions and demands of the larger Malay society.
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