 | Buddhism and the spirit cults in North-east Thailand |  |
THREE USES OF SACRED WORDS
Throughout this monograph I have attempted to view the various rituals
as culturally structured systems of communication which transmit messages,
and have stated that the effects sought rely on transference in
which the sender of the message, the receiver, and the supporting cast
all occupy meaningful positions in a ritual situation or context. I have
also indicated that to understand the mechanism of transference it is not
enough to decode the language of non-verbal ritual acts, but that we
must also investigate what the `sacred' words say and how they are used
in conjunction with ritual acts to effect the transference. My conclusion
is that in the three ritual complexes in which sacred words figure importantly
the words are used differently, and that their distinctive roles can be
understood fully only in terms of the total religious field.
One use of sacred words—in this case Pali chants—by monks in Buddhist
ritual has received detailed treatment. Pali chants are recited at various
occasions; they are by and large not understood by the audience; the
words, however, are viewed as charged with power and listening to them
in itself confers merit. The sacred power and authority of the words
derives from a threefold relation expressed in the Buddhist Trinity, and
the semantics of the ritual consists of a metaphorical use of words linked
with a metonymical manipulation of objects and corresponding acts. The
monks in fact at the close of chanting confer blessings of a this-worldly
kind on the laity. The mechanism involved in this transference has to be
seen in terms of the relation between monk and layman, of village monastic
institutions and their integration with village interests and life. Through
proper ritual procedures the monk, who is an ascetic, partly aggregated
to the world of death, transmutes Buddha's conquests (through nonviolence,
compassionate love, and restraint of the dangers and sufferings
inherent in human existence), expressed in sacred words, into prosperity
and mental states free of pain and transfers these blessings to the laity,
who are ethically inferior and rooted in this world. In effecting this
transference mere access to the sacred Pali words by the monk is not
enough; two crucial conditions are right conduct and discipline on the
by free gift giving on the part of the layman. The monk's mediation is
effective because he is an apt mediator.
In the case of the sukhwan ritual the words recited by the officiant in
fact comprise the major part of the ceremony. This ritual is structured as
a prophylactic and therapeutic device. The words, which significantly
are expressed in the local language rather than in a sacred and unknown
language, are meant to transmit a message that is intended to alter the
orientations of the celebrant. While the non-verbal part of the ritual shows
only small variations, the words are changed to suit particular occasions.
The ritual's effectiveness depends on the role of village elders, whose
representative the officiant is, and who act as supporting witnesses in the
initiation of youth into statuses. The ritual texts are by no means secret;
they are in theory accessible to all who can read; but the efficacy of the
words partly derives from the fact that it is a venerable elder acceptable
to the village community who, supported by village elders, plays the role
of officiant. The sukhwan ritual often resembles a teaching situation, which
becomes all the more effective inasmuch as it is dramatized as a grand
mythological event in which the chief participants are invested with
elevated attributes.
The third use of sacred words is exemplified in the exorcism ritual.
Sacred words are again important in this therapeutic ritual but play quite
a different role from either of those in the other two contexts. There are
certain formal similarities with the monk's ritual in that the exorcist's
words are thought to derive their efficacy from a three-dimensional relation
(authority of the original teacher, the power embedded in the words
themselves, and the special characteristics of the practitioner). But the
exorcism ritual is a shock therapy. The exorcist as the protagonist in the
ritual, combating the possessing spirit, shows in dramatic form the supra-human
powers of the supernatural agents whose vehicle be becomes.
Significantly the charms and spells he recites are believed to be taken from
the Buddhist sacred texts, but a vital difference is that their knowledge is
secret, and the words have been transformed into powerful spells which
are uttered esoterically. The exorcist as a mock, dionysiac monk coerces
the patient into revealing the identity of the intruding malevolent agent.
It is not the monk's ethical power that the exorcist wields, but rather the
dangerous power acquired through secret instruction by a guru and the
ability to induce and experience an abnormal state of mind.
| Buddhism and the spirit cults in North-east Thailand | |