Customer Reviews

Thai Law: Buddhist Law

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This book is a collection of conference papers about Thai law scholarship. Although the introduction suggests that it is accessible to non-experts, in reality I found it to to be far too detailed and esoteric for anybody who hadn't at least read a primer on Thai or Buddhist law (I'm not a complete novice - I've read books on Thai history and am a lawyer - but even I was confused). The first three chapters focus on recent discoveries of manuscripts. Obviously, knowing the scholarship of Buddhist law would help in appreciating the significance of those finds. The other articles interpret Thai law manuscripts and their legal significance. With the exception of Andrew Huxley's article, they presume much knowledge of Thailand and refer to kings, terms, and places without any context. In fact, at times the authors cite Thai manuscripts without providing an English translation.

This book obviously represents a significant amount of work and intellectual scholarship. If you can borrow it from a library, the introduction and Huxley's article are worth reading and will give you a decent sense of the type of scholarship that occurs in this field. However, I'd really only recommend this book if you have some background in the field first.