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Ordination

In 1964 in the evening of the 11th day of the 8th lunar month, three
novices were ordained at the beginning of the festivities. This ordination
was sponsored by the entire village. On the previous day, called wan hoam
(the day of collecting), the ritual articles necessary for the ordination
were brought to the wat by the villagers, and the sukhwan nag ceremony
(calling the spirit essence of the ordinands) was held by the elders in the
afternoon; after ordination on the following day the resident monks chanted
suad mongkhon that night. These sequences the reader will recognize as
the usual ones connected with ordination. Hence the question arises, what
is the relation between this special ordination associated with Bunbangfai
and the annual ordination of village youth before the Lent season? The
answer is that a varying proportion of the youth, sometimes all the
candidates, ordained in a particular year are ordained on this occasion.[1]
Thus it is clear that the timing of ordination with Bunbangfai, which is
explicitly recognized as a rain-making ritual, has very important implications
for our understanding of how the institution of monkhood is
related and adapted to village interests.

How is ordination, which is strictly a Buddhist institution, related to
the propitiation of the guardian spirits of the swamp and village? As I have
already reported, villagers who are explicit that `Bunbangfai' has nothing
to do with Buddhist monks (an important `first response' to the anthropologist's
question) explain that the word bun (merit) appears in the
name of the ceremony because novices and monks are ordained in order
to make merit for and to transfer merit to the guardian spirits. Transference
of merit by the living to ancestors and by humans to deities and spirits
is, we have seen already, an important reciprocity mechanism in Buddhist
religious action.

Even more significant for the issue under discussion is the monk promotion
ceremony conducted on the same day, which, although exceptional
in occurrence, is nevertheless very telling. I refer the reader to the details
of the water-pouring ceremony, by which a monk is elevated to Somdet
(described in Chapter 7). Monks and villagers pour water into a wooden
receptacle in the form of a snake (Naga) and the water flows through the
head and throat on to the monk's head and body. When the promotion

ceremony does occur, it is often conducted together with the ordination
rites preceding the Bunbangfai festival. It is clear that in this ceremony
the Naga is seen as a friend and guardian of Buddhism; at the same time,
since he is associated with rain and fertility, the ceremony connotes the
sacred Naga enhancing and cleansing the monk who is being honoured.
Since this drama is staged at a rain-invoking festival we are justified in
asserting the equation: just as the Naga pours water on the monk to
increase his sacredness, so may rain fall on the fields and increase their
agricultural fertility. But note the paradox: in the case of the monk it is
his non-sexual sacredness that is increased; in the case of the layman their
material prosperity and fertility. The resolution of the paradox is the one
I have argued previously. The monk is a mediator and vehicle, and it is
precisely his access to sacred life-renouncing power that is transformed
and transferred into life-giving powers for the layman. What is of interest
to us in the ceremony is that it is the Naga that acts as the vehicle for
transferring sacredness.