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Monk allowed back into homeland

The South Vietnamese government exiled him. Its communist successor wouldn't let him return. So for 39 years, Vietnam's best-known Buddhist monk has traveled the world and built a huge and faithful audience for his message of peace and forgiveness.

Now Thich Nhat Hanh has come full circle, back to his native soil.

That the 79-year-old Zen master is being allowed to visit for three months is testimony to the transformation Vietnam has undergone in recent years. On the streets, the clatter of traffic and mobile phones reveal the modern consumer society that has eclipsed the old communist ways. And a regime deeply suspicious of religion has allowed Nhat Hanh to meet with its prime minister and preach to 9,000 people at the famed Thien Mu Pagoda in central Hue.

"In a country that has gone through many decades of war, there must be a lot of suspicion and fear and hate and violence in their way of thinking, so the purpose of my visit is to decrease that level of fear and suspicion ... the seeds that you plant will sprout in the future," the slender, brown-robed monk said in an interview at the Hanoi temple where he is staying.

In the 1960s, Nhat Hanh became an early opponent of the Vietnam War. He is credited with inspiring Martin Luther King Jr. to speak out against it, and was nominated by King for the Nobel Peace Prize.

He was abroad in 1966 when the US-backed South Vietnam government banned his return. Nine years later, when the communist government seized the south, it kept the ban in force.

Today, Thich Nhat Hanh ranks second only to the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, among Buddhist voices to the Western world. He lives in France and teaches in the US, and has won a worldwide following with his doctrine of "engaged Buddhism," which emphasizes peace, meditation, and -- in a crisis -- nonviolent civil disobedience. His books have sold more than a million copies.

His return has meant navigating a diplomatic mine field. It took a year to negotiate the government invitation to him and 200 followers to make the visit in January. Vietnam has agreed to publish some of his books here, and allow him to travel throughout the country.
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