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9
THE IDEOLOGY OF MERIT

THE LAYMAN AND THE MONK

We have already noted that the wat as an architectural complex is set
apart from the village, and that at the same time it is the centre of village
life. In the same way the distinction between monk and layman is fundamental,
though the monk is the focus of merit-making and religious
ceremonial on the part of the layman. The fact that it is the young men
of the village who are monks, and it is their elders who are benefactors,
does not stand in the way of the relationship between layman and monk
taking on a particular asymmetrical and symbiotic pattern.

The monks and novices live apart—the villagers visit them rather than
they the villagers. A monk keeps his visits to the village settlement to
a minimum; he does not socialize with villagers and he enters a home
primarily to conduct rites. When village women bring the morning and
midday meals to the monks there is very little verbal exchange. Although
a monk's home is usually in the village his visits there are also minimal;
a novice has greater freedom of contact with his family. While a monk is
separated from family and kin, the latter can and do visit him in the
wat. A monk is free to visit other wat and he often does so; nor is he
barred from going to a town where he may visit a bigger wat and transact
personal business. His freedom of movement is curtailed only during
Lent.

A layman of whatever age or either sex must show formal respect to
a monk. The fact that a monk's head is shaven and that he wears a saffron
robe automatically induces the asymmetrical etiquette. The rules of
contact with laymen are particularly stringent in the case of women—
not old women, contact with whom gives no cause for public suspicion,
but younger women, especially unmarried girls.

The concepts of formality, respect and distance are expressed in the
language of conversation between monk and layman. In fact, the linguistic
categories show a combination of two criteria of status differences. In
general, generational and relative-age distinctions are vital in village
behaviour, and kinship terms express these distinctions. Monkhood is
a specially venerated status, and it commands respect irrespective of the
age of the incumbent. In the case of a young monk vis-à-vis an elderly

layman, the two criteria are in contradiction and the language devised
expressed both nuances in a fused fashion.

Thus a man or woman who is an actual parent or of the parental
generation of the monk calls the latter hua luug (head child); hua is
a term of respect, because the head is the most sacred part of a man's
body. An older layman of grandparental or phuu thaaw status calls a monk
hua laan, the latter word meaning grandchild. A layman younger than
a monk calls him hua plus the appropriate kinship term. Thus a younger
male or female of the same generation, whether married or not, addresses
him as hua aaj (respected elder brother), and persons of the generation
below him address him in terms of the appropriate kinship term (e.g.
hua naa = respected mother's younger brother). In general, all villagers
refer to a monk as mom and a novice as juaa, both of which are terms of
respect. (Aristocrats outside the royal family have the prefix mom in their
titles.) These same terms are used as address terms towards him by a
monk's older `siblings', real and extended (of the same generation),
thereby not compromising their higher relative age position in the kinship
reckoning.

A monk in turn calls his parents and all persons of his parental generation
phau org (`father of leaving' the secular life) or mae org (`mother of
leaving' the secular life). Alternatively, he may call elders who are not
his parents by the appropriate kinship term (e.g. phau lung = father's or
mother's elder brother) and use phau org or mae org as a suffix (e.g.
phau lung phau org). The words phau/mae org refer to the concept of
sponsorship in ordination; parents, primarily, and all elders of the village
have made possible his ordination. The use of the words in respect of
all elderly persons is tantamount to saying that the monk is the son of all
the elders of the village. A monk addresses persons younger than himself
by personal name and small children as soo chaaw.

The linguistic evidence I have cited eloquently tells us how a monk,
venerated on account of his sacred status which implies removal from
village society, is nevertheless very much a part and parcel of the village
social universe categorized in terms of kinship statuses and the rights and
obligations that ensue from it. This latter point has not been sufficiently
documented and appreciated in previous ethnography. The respect accorded
to a monk and given expression in language is, of course, not unique to
monkhood but is an essential aspect of the Thai status system documented
in historical works: the use of different classifiers for nouns, of a differentiated
set of pronouns and verbs nicely graduated in terms of the relative
statuses of speaker and the person addressed (second person) or referred
to (third person). De la Loubère himself was sensitive to this Oriental

linguistic elaboration in the late seventeenth century. Thus, whereas khon
is the classifier for ordinary people, and tua for animals, ong is the classifier
for royal or revered personages, Buddha images, and monks. The general
pronouns in Central Thai for a revered third person of royal or religious
status is phraa-ong, for a respected third person than, for a familiar person
kee, an outsider khaw, and for an inferior person, child or thing man (see
Noss 1964). Similar differentiation occurs in verbs; whereas the word for
`to eat' commonly used by ordinary laymen amongst themselves is kin or
taan, it is chan when used in respect of a monk or other revered person.

A monk does not follow lay occupations—there is a strict taboo on
their practice. In theory he must also not directly handle money, but
there are in practice some neat circumventions of this rule, as, for example,
when money is included in a package which contains other, directly
acceptable items. When a monk goes to a market, however, a layman or
dekwat accompanies him and handles money on his behalf, a provision
allowed for in the Vinaya rules.

The symbiotic nature of the relationship between monks and novices
on the one hand and laymen on the other is exemplified in a two-way
reciprocity. The requirements of the monks and the local wat, including
daily food, are supplied entirely by the laity. The monks in return perform
certain ritual roles of great concern to the laity. (Hereafter when I speak
of monks, I include novices.) It is this set of double transactions that is
central to merit-making and merit-taking, in which monk and layman,
the elders phuu thaw, and the junior generation lung laan stand in opposed
and complementary relationships.

I shall first examine the layman's services to the monks and distinguish
which aspects of interaction are elaborations of doctrinally stated or
recommended rules, and which are peculiarly village and non-doctrinal
developments. I shall then devote ensuing chapters to the analysis of
Buddhist ritual and focus on the monks' services to laymen.

MERIT-MAKING (`THAMBUN')

Traditionally a basic obligation of the Buddhist layman has been that he
should materially support the wandering monks. Although today the
monks live in village monasteries, the begging bowl is still an important
symbol. In Baan Phraan Muan no food is ever cooked in the wat; it is
regularly provided by villagers. Thus feeding the monks is the most
common religious merit-making act in which a villager engages. There
is a noticeable sex distinction concerning this activity. Men never offer
food to the monks on their daily rounds, nor do they bring food to the

monks' quarters for their midday meal. On ordinary days at 11 o'clock
when the drum is beaten, old women (grandmothers) and young girls
will bring food to the wat, set it out for the monks, watch them eat, and
then carry the utensils back, having received the monks' blessings. Strict
decorum is preserved during this daily meeting with the female sex.
A monk does not express gratitude or pleasure at receiving food, because
he must show aloofness, and because it is he who confers merit by receiving
it. Technically, a monk `should not look into the face of the woman who
is giving the food', and this is observed both when a monk goes begging
and when he is served.

We have the situation, then, that women—old grandmothers past childbearing
and young unmarried girls—readily approach and minister to
the monks' daily needs.[1] The latter can do so without danger because the
monk has suppressed his male sexuality and is asexual. His relations with
them are formal; but when he gives up his robes, it is one of these same
girls that he will marry or have sexual dealings with.

Just as old women readily approach monks, so do elderly men, though
their contact on the whole is limited (except for those who serve on the
wat committee). But in comparison with young girls, young men of
the village tend to avoid the monks (who are of their own generation and
age-group). Young men keep away from the monks during wanphraa
(Buddhist Sabbath) and make their appearance only at collective calendrical
rites and festivals. In general it may be supposed that young virile men
find it uncongenial to approach their peers who have temporarily renounced
the world and whose religious preoccupation, in theory at least, is with
salvation rather than with blessed life here and now.

Daily merit-making, then, is a function of women rather than men, but
the latter also gain merit as heads and members of households. On the
whole, the more conspicuous practising Buddhists are women rather
than men. Or to put it differently, except for a few elderly male leaders, it
is women who have more contact and traffic with the monks.

The frequency of food offerings to monks was measured for a sample
of 106 village families. Only 13% said they had never offered food in
1961-2 and these were in all likelihood newly formed families whose
parental families would have acted on their behalf. While only about
17% of the families offered food daily, another 42% offered on some
days each week. There is another small segment which made merit only
on wanphraa, while the remainder offered food only during the Lent

season, when religious action was intensified. There are certain times
when individual households will intensify their food offerings for a short
period; examples are at times of illness or impending childbirth.

These facts establish that giving food to the monks is an important
and frequently indulged-in category of merit-making. A good way of
estimating the religious orientation of villagers is to compare the pattern
of food-giving with attendance at the wat for purposes of religious instruction
and edification.

Now wanphraa, the Buddhist Sabbath, occurs four times a lunar month,
and can be utilized not only for offering food to the monks, saying private
prayers, and receiving the five precepts and the blessings of the monks
but, more importantly, for engaging in religious action that is not typical
of everyday life. Sermons may be delivered by monks in the mornings
and/or evenings, and pious persons can practise the eight precepts for
a day, thereby observing a temporary asceticism and devoting time to
meditation. However, in Baan Phraan Muan wanphraa, outside of Lent,
is not characterized by such religious action. There is no sermon delivered,
and people do not observe the eight precepts. A few more people than
usual do bring food for the monks.

In comparison with behaviour on the usual wanphraa, religious orientations
during the Lent season show a different pattern, especially among
some of the older people. Since there are more monks and novices in the
wat than usual, more food has to be provided. And on wanphraa during
Lent some elderly people—more women than men—receive the eight
precepts and spend the whole day in the wat. Before breakfast and in the
evening, sermons (theed) may be preached for them.

The same sample of 106 households were asked about their attendance
at the wat on religious occasions in 1961-2. Fewer than ten people in the
sample had observed the eight precepts at one time or another. Such
persons achieve the kind of piety associated with the concepts of upasok
(male) and upasika[2] (female)—religious virtuosi in the Weberian sense.
About eight men and thirteen women in the sample reported regular
visits to the wat on wanphraa outside of Lent, and similar numbers reported
irregular visits. Thus it is clear that the ordinary villager's religious
orientation is by and large not committed to more than the ordinary
five precepts. The practice of meditation and other religious techniques
for achieving `salvation' is of very limited incidence. The old and not
the young show piety, and amongst them women are more frequent
`churchgoers' than men.

The sample results showed that 60% of the male family heads and

48% of their spouses went to the wat only on the occasion of the major
calendrical collective rites. This is to say that the majority of villagers
participate as a large congregation only when major merit-making rites
are held. On these occasions it is the making of merit through giving that
is the villagers' primary concern; sermons and chants are recited by the
monks, however, and I will deal with this aspect of religious communication
later. Here I want to establish the pattern of gift-giving behaviour. The
frequency of gift-giving at calendrical rites is as follows: about 70% of
the families reported four gifts a year per family. These gifts include
not only the usual cooked food but also other items which require a cash
outlay; only 13% reported that they had no occasion to give any gifts.

Wanphraa and the calendrical rites do not exhaust the occasion of
attendance at the wat or gift-giving to monks. Large numbers usually
attend the ordination ceremonies of monks and novices just before the
beginning of Lent; mortuary rites always conclude with merit-making at
the wat. There are other occasions (merit-making rites at the house
(thambunhuean), and for dead ancestors at the burial-place) at which
monks officiate and receive gifts. At marriages monks usually have no
role, but gifts may be sent them. On ceremonial occasions monks are
given gifts of money and of manufactured articles. As may be expected,
it is manufactured goods bought in the urban market that appear as
valued items, appropriately given to monks as special acts of merit-making
on ceremonial occasions. They are more expensive than the articles a
villager can produce or grow locally, and are hence considered more
merit-making.

RANKING OF MERIT-MAKING ACTS

We have now arrived at a point where we can make a rough estimate of
the villagers' orientation to and evaluation of various kinds of religious
action subsumed under the concept of thambun or merit-making.

A sample (seventy-nine) of family heads were requested to rank eight
types of religious acts which were presented in a random order. Table 4
presents the rank distributions. While, of course, there was no complete
agreement among villagers, it is remarkable that the distribution showed
a noticeable pattern and that the majority of respondents were by and
large agreed on the hierarchical position of each category of action in
relation to the rest.

The final hierarchy can be reduced to six positions:

1. completely financing the building of a wat—this is the act par
excellence that brings most merit;

TABLE 4. Ranking of religious acts by seventy-nine family heads

                     

	Number of persons assigning to each rank
	Highest rank							Lowest rank	Final rank
Categories of religious acts	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Financing entire building of a wat	67	5	6	1	—	—	—	—	1
Becoming a monk oneself	6	36	29	5	1	2	—	—}	2
Having a son become a monk	5	34	32	7	1	—	—	—
Contributing money to the repair of a wat	—	4	—	31	35	6	1	2}	3
Making gifts at a kathin[3] ceremony	—	—	3	29	29	6	5	7
Giving food daily to monks	1	2	7	5	2	30	14	18	4
Observing every wanphraa at the wat	—	—	—	1	10	27	22	19	5
Strict observance of the five precepts	—	—	—	—	1	9	36	33	6

2. either becoming a monk oneself or having a son become a monk;

3. contributing money to the repair of a wat or making kathin (post-Lent
ceremony) gifts;

4. giving food daily to the monks;

5. observing every wanphraa;

6. strictly observing the five precepts.

There are several implications in this pattern of evaluation. The most
conspicuous act of merit-making by a layman—building a wat—is open
only to the rich; it represents an outstanding act of financial charity.
However, an ordinary layman can either become a monk or have a son
become one, and this also rates high. Thus a lowly villager is not excluded
from making great merit—although in actual life sponsoring an ordination
ceremony requires a financial outlay, and a family should be in a position
to dispense with a son's labour so that he can temporarily withdraw
from the world. Despite these limitations, having a son ordained is
a realistic possibility for most village households.[4]

Ranking next are gift-giving or money contributions of an order that
again implies a drain on household resources. Many villagers make such
donations, although the wealthier among them make conspicuously larger
presentations.

Giving food daily to the monks is possible for almost every village
household—for it involves only the setting apart of a portion of the family's
cooked food. Since it is a daily act and relatively inexpensive, and because
almost all indulge in it, it has a low position with no scarcity value.

A remarkable aspect is that the specifically `Buddhistic way of life' is
ranked lowest. Observing wanphraa at the wat and strict observance of
the precepts—both of which connote individual ethical or moralistic
conduct—seem not to be valued highly.

On the whole then we must conclude that merit-making through gift-giving
is more valued than merit-making through the observance of
Buddhistic precepts and the pursuit of Buddhistic ethical aims. But here
certain nuances have to be introduced in order to get the picture right.

Strict observance of the five precepts (especially that exhorting avoidance
of killing) and meditation on the philosophical assertions of the Dhamma
have little positive interest for the villager, either because lay life is not
possible without breaking some of the prohibitions or because one must
renounce lay life altogether to pursue such aims. He therefore rates these
pursuits, in so far as they have relevance for his life, low on the merit-making
scale; this is not because he devalues them but because they are not
normally open to him. Moreover, these pursuits, the core of Buddhistic
striving, are thought to have pertinence primarily for the monk and
secondarily for the aged approaching death. The way of the monk is
different from that of the householder, and the monks' way of life is
accorded the more meritorious status.

This structuring of the divergent but reciprocal orientations of monk
and layman rests on two paradoxes. As Obeyesekere (1968, p. 38) has
put it, `the self-denials of the extreme ascetic may serve as models for
the good life of the ordinary man', not so much models to be imitated,
for lay life makes that impossible, but because as Durkheim (1926, p. 316)
perceived, `It is necessary that an elite put the end too high, if the crowd
is not to put it too low'.

But this very proposition itself rests on another paradox: it is because
the ordinary man labours in this world and takes on himself the burdens
of polluting activities that the religious specialist can be freed to pursue
purity freed from the world's contaminations. The monks do not kill
but must be provided with meat; they do not cook rice or make curries,
for this, too, is taking life, but rice and curries are lovingly cooked for

1a Image of the Buddha seated on and
being shielded by the seven-headed
royal Naga (snake), Muchalinda (see
Chapters 7 and 10)

1b Mortuary rites: on the third day after
cremation, the bones are collected in
a pot, and the monks are here seen
chanting and transferring merit to the
deceased before the pot is buried (see
Chapter 11)

2 The Bun Kathin procession at the end of Lent. In front are men sweeping the ground, and a man carrying the
Buddha image, followed by monks and laymen carrying money trees, gifts and flags (see Chapter 10)

them; they do not weave cloth but cloth is woven and dyed for them;
they cannot build monasteries but these are built for them by lay benefactors.
Seculars receive and pay out money on their behalf because
a monk cannot touch it without breaking a monastic rule. In the past land
was endowed to major wat, and lay trustees supervised and serfs cultivated
so that the monks might be maintained and could be free of the danger
of destroying life by digging the earth. Monks cannot replace themselves
because they are sworn to celibacy, but laymen must marry and dedicate
their sons to ascetic life.

These exemptions from pollution and the snares of the world so that
purity can be actively pursued are, after all, a major premise as well of
the Indian caste system. The Brahmin in order to be pure and to reach
upwards for greater purity requires the washerman, the barber, the farmer
and many other labourers to shield him, to provide for him, and to remove
his impurities. And, if we extend the argument, does not any aristocracy—
whether it be Roman patricians or the English gentlemen—gain its right
to creative `leisure', in the way Plato meant it, only because there are
slaves and servants to `work'?

If the villagers thus free the monks for higher pursuits, then their
labourings—even though polluting—are positively virtuous, too, and
merit is their reward.

BUILDING A `BOOD': A LONG-TERM ECONOMIC PLAN

The economy of Baan Phraan Muan is such that no man is rich enough
to engage in the conspicuous merit-making act of building a wat or any
of its component structures. Sponsoring the ordination of a son or relative
or holding mortuary rites and various merit-making rites in the home,
at which a group of monks are feasted and given gifts, is possible by an
individual or a household but usually necessitates wide-scale rendering
of mutual aid and financial donations by kinsmen, neighbours and friends.

I shall now describe a collective attempt by the village community to
plan, gather resources, and build a bood for the village. The description
reveals two features which are worth emphasizing in the context of the
doctrines of `loose structure' and `economic inefficiency', which some
writers attribute to the kind of society I am describing: one, the voluntarily
accepted and implemented obligations on the part of villagers, which
shows the propensity to co-operative effort; and two, the sense of long-term
economic planning and rational systematic marshalling of the economic
resources of the village in order to achieve something it regards as
worthwhile.

The village wat lacks a proper bood, which is the hallmark of a well-established
wat that can ordain its own monks. Some years ago the village
wat was moved to the present location, which was the site of a previous
wat that lay in ruins, and was, no doubt, `ancient' as evidenced by the
statues dug up. The remains of a bood and the presence of sima stones
(which signified that the ground was consecrated for all time) were
sufficient precedent and stimulus for the villagers to aspire to build an
imposing new bood which would give prestige to them and their village.

The wat committee consisting of the abbot and three elders met together
in late 1965 with the headman, discussed the project and the necessary
steps to be taken, and agreed to call a village meeting at the headman's
house. The traditional bamboo device (khau rau) was sounded at night
to call the villagers and some hundred of them, mostly males, assembled
(`women', it was said, `do not attend meetings'). Those assembled
agreed to accept the following recommendations of the wat committee:

1. every household was to contribute 500 bricks. Instead of making
the bricks themselves, villagers were asked to contribute the cash value
of 80 baht per household so that well-made bricks could be purchased.
This was a compulsory obligation;

2. a plea was made for two kinds of voluntary contribution: (a) donations
of paddy to the amount of 3 muen (about 36 kilograms) per household
were solicited (pae khaw pleng); (b) adults and youth, both male and
female, were requested to contribute free labour (khau laeng).

The district abbot of Amphur Pen—a previous abbot of Phraan Muan
village and still its patron and counsellor—went to Bangkok to secure
a building plan from the Department of Religious Affairs. Building
operations were commenced in February 1966 after the completion of
harvest when the granaries were stocked and the villagers were free of
agricultural work.

A set of contractors of Annamese origin undertook to build the foundations
for a fee of 4,000 baht. After digging for the foundations and installing
the bases for pillars, they pulled out, demanding a fee of 1,500 baht for
the work done. This incident is typical of diasters that plague village-based
monumental projects undertaken with insufficient money and business
knowledge. Subsequently, another group of Thai contractors, from the
town of Udorn, were employed to complete the foundations for 3,000 baht
and to build the pillars for 1,500 baht.

The collection of sufficient money for buying building materials and
for paying the builders has been a difficult task. By August 1966, village
households had freely contributed over 300 muen of paddy, which was
transported from the village by young women to the market and sold for

3,216 baht (US $120). Of the 149 households, 79 had made the cash
`brick' payments. Money collected at previous festivals, constituting the
bank balance of the wat, was also committed to the project.

By August 1966, the initial operations were successfully completed at
the cost of 20,000 baht for building materials, 1,500 baht to the Annamese
contractors, and 4,500 baht to the second group of builders. The result
of meeting these commitments was a debt of 3,700 baht which the wat
committee owed to fellow villagers, who loaned money to them on interest
in order to meet the bills.

It should be noted that the contracting workmen, about three in number,
provide only the expert services of mason and carpenter. The unskilled
manual work of transporting the building materials from the town, helping
the artisan-craftsmen by carrying sand and water to the building site,
digging the ground, etc., is provided free by village men and women,
especially those of the junior luug-laan generation. Meetings are called at
which they receive work instructions.

Thus, some seven months after the building was commenced, there
stands the incomplete shell of the bood with firm foundations and sturdy
pillars. Villagers estimate that it would take them 10-15 years and (for
them) an astronomical sum of money to complete the edifice with floor,
walls, roof, ornamentation, statues and furniture. Barring the calamities
of international politics, they will, if left in peace, accomplish their long-term
economic plan with the sweat of their brow and the denial of luxuries
for their personal comfort and enjoyment. The building itself will be
a substantive representation of their co-operative effort and sacrifice.
Have not deliverance from old age and death, and more sumptuous
treasures of the world, been promised them for such acts of charity? And
has it not always been the case that it is on the labour of the masses
that the edifice of a spiritual Sangha can arise to pursue higher things,
even if the donors are not humble peasants but magnificent kings?