Buddhism is a minority religion inSwitzerland. According to the 2000 census, 21,305 Swiss residents (0.29% of the total population) self-identified as Buddhists. About a third of them were born inThailand.
Interest in Buddhism in Switzerland emerged at the beginning of the 20th century, sparked by allusions to the religion byTheosophy and some philosophical schools.[1] An early Buddhist center was established inLausanne, around 1910, by the German monkNyanatiloka.[1] In the 1920s and 1930s, a number of groups were formed in the regions aroundZurich and Lausanne.[1] A Buddhist group in Zurich, founded in 1942, published for many years the Buddhist journalDie Einsicht.[1] In the 1970s, a group inFrench-speaking Switzerland was formed in Lausanne by Georges Bex, who had been ordained a monk in Thailand.[1] During the same period, variousBuddhist schools were established in Switzerland, notablyPure Land Buddhism, inGeneva andYverdon, and in 1978 the Swiss Buddhist Union (Schweizerische Buddhistische Union /Union bouddhiste suisse /Unione Buddhista Svizzera) was founded.[1]
Immigration from Asian countries, mostly fromCambodia,Thailand,Tibet andVietnam resulted in the multiplication of Buddhist centers in Switzerland.[1] TibetanGeshe Rabten founded in 1977, inMont Pèlerin, a Buddhist monastery and study centre for European monks, nuns and lay people as well. Switzerland also has Tibetan-Buddhist and Zen monasteries, among them theTibet Institute Rikon located in Zell-Rikon im Tösstal in theTöss Valley in the canton of Zürich.[2]
In 2003 theTheravada templeWat Srinagarindravararam inGretzenbach was dedicated by PrincessGalyani Vadhana, the daughter of the Princess MotherSrinagarindra, after whom the temple was named.
In earlier censuses, Buddhism figured together with other non-Abrahamic traditions (mainlyHinduism) as "other churches and communities". These accounted for 0.12% in 1970, 0.19% in 1980, 0.42% in 1990 and 0.78% in 2000 (0.38% Hinduism, 0.29% Buddhism, 0.11% other).
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