University of Virginia Library

5
THE INSTITUTION OF MONKHOOD
IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Buddhism has had a rich and extensive history, and its historical development
has profoundly affected it as a religion. In becoming an established
mass religion it made adaptations to the political and social environments
in which it found itself. Thus for instance in many of the areas it spread
to, it became an `established' religion: it validated and complemented
the institution of kingship and to some extent influenced the ideology
of statecraft. Buddhism and kingship had a close complementary relationship
in Ceylon, Burma and Thailand, all of them countries of Theravada
Buddhism.

Moreover, Buddhism went through both sectarian differentiation and
missionary phases outwards from India. The major split was that between
the Mahayana and Theravada schools.

Thus a single original tradition has had variant developments in different
societies. A contemporary student of Buddhism may therefore consider
the feasibility of thinking in terms of Sinhalese Buddhism, Thai Buddhism
and so on, although he has to keep in mind that there is a universal
Buddhist tradition which has become particularized in different societies.

The approach of the anthropologist studying Buddhism as a popular
religion at the village level may differ radically from that of philosophers
and theologians. While granting that one cannot fully understand the
role of a monk in village Buddhism without also understanding the place
of the monk in pristine or doctrinal Buddhism, the anthropologist will
also try to see how the institution of monkhood—the principles of recruitment,
the interaction of monks with their lay congregation, the ritual
services the monks perform—is directly integrated with village social
structure and interests. While noting that there is a core of generalized
religious concepts and idiom which derives from the grand Buddhist
tradition and which has currency in village thought and religious action,
he will concentrate on how these concepts have been transformed and
worked into the texture of village life to produce not so much a vulgarized
or distorted or debased religion but a live, ordered and meaningful entity.

Let me begin by contrasting some developments in Hinduism and
Buddhism, for, after all, Buddhism had its origin in India.

The Buddhist monk is in some respects like the Hindu sannyasin in that
he renounces the world and removes himself from society, its affiliations
and its obligations. The sannyasin is outside the social structure; his
quest in the Indian context is an extreme statement of an individual
pursuing his own salvation (Dumont 1960).

Max Muller in his Hibbert Lectures contended that the brahmanical
`ascetic' (sannyasin) was the model for the Buddhist and Jaina counterparts.
Dutt (1960) contests this viewpoint and argues that the ancient
parivrajaka (`wanderer') tradition was the seed bed which gave rise to
all the wandering sects. The resolution of this particular problem is not
of concern to us here. It is relevant to note that sannyasin means one who
renounces or casts off (the world), bhikkhu means one who is without
possessions and lives on alms. Other closely associated concepts are
nirgrantha (without ties), vairagi (free from affections). All wanderers
may be described as those who go forth from home into homelessness
(parivrajya). But in time the different wandering sects created their own
traditions of contemplation and organization, and came to terms in
different ways with the surrounding society.

In caste-bound, status-bound, purity-bound India the sannyasin is
casteless, neglectful of normal rules of social distance and pollution, and
is at the same time a revered holy man. The sannyasin by renouncing the
world and going forth into homelessness broke Vedic tradition, especially
all those rules that applied to the householder (grahastha). He did not
sacrifice, and wore no token of Vedic culture such as the sacred thread
or the symbolic tuft of hair on the head. In a sense therefore the householder
and the renouncer were polar opposites.

But in time certain important developments took place in Indian society
which produced resolutions of this dichotomy and tension. It is a common
event in India that all reforming sects are over time incorporated into the
Hindu complex and assigned a place inside it. In respect of the sannyasin
the great resolution was the incorporation of the life of the wanderer
and renouncer as the final stage in the theory of the four asramas (progression
of life through four stages). The incorporation was legitimated
in the later Upanishads which describe an initiatory ritual into the parivrajya
(going forth) condition: the initiate ceremonially disowns Vedic social
and religious practices by rejecting the sacred thread and tuft of hair, by
stretching his legs over the sacrificial utensils, by throwing the wooden
utensils into the fire, etc. He is considered, however, to take the fire, which
he no longer will tend, into himself or into his belly (Dutt 1962). Thus the
stages of indoctrination and the life of a householder proclaimed in the Vedas
were not only preserved but declared essential prior stages in the life cycle.

Equally important was the change wrought within the brahman caste
itself. The Vedic brahman and his successor of later times were different
beings. The brahman has over time come to champion some of the values
of the sannyasin: he has espoused the values of ahimsa, he and his gods
have become vegetarian. Thus paradoxically the brahmans have become
the repository and guardians of important sannyasin values while remaining
in the world within the caste system, in fact at its apex. They are the purest
and most prestigious caste(s) with monopolistic access to the auspicious
sacred, and they represent the élite moral values of Indian society which
many castes of lower status do not practise or cannot approximate in their
conduct.

It seems to me that the development of monkhood in Buddhism has
been in some respects the reverse of that undergone by the brahmans.
Buddhism in its pristine aspect was in many ways a revolutionary religion,
especially when viewed in relation to the caste system of India. Some have
argued that Buddhism was in part a kshatriya reaction (which originated
in the less brahman dominated regions of North-east India) to Brahman
supremacy and ritual formalism (Thomas 1951, p. 3). The Buddhist texts
portray certain contradictions but on the whole it is not a distortion to sum
up the situation thus.

It is not so much that Buddhism had a social ideology that fulminated
against caste but that it tended to leave caste alone. Caste status was
explained by the theory of karma, but the Buddha placed morality and
virtue above formal caste status (Rahula 1956, pp. 233-6). At best Buddhism
provided an ethical interpretation of the caste system: the virtuous outcaste
was superior to an immoral brahman, and no one is a brahman in the
moral sense by virtue of birth ascription alone.

Perhaps more important was that pristine Buddhism advocated and
practised an open recruitment to its ranks and caste was considered
irrelevant to salvation. Monkhood was not defined by caste status, and the
monks could not form a caste stratum. The rule of celibacy further meant
that the monks could not renew themselves through physical reproduction
as a social stratum or group.

A revolutionary aspect of the Buddhist bhikkhu, when compared with
brahmanical practice, was that as a mendicant he must accept without
discrimination cooked food given by any devotee. This is a dramatic
rejection of the orthodox rules of commensality. According to the teaching
of the Vinaya (disciplinary code) and the suttas, bhikkhus are prohibited
from accepting raw rice.

Moreover Buddhism brought together all strata of society on an equal
footing as a congregation at the place of worship or instruction, thereby

again taking a stand opposed to brahmanical doctrine which insisted on
participation graded by caste status and the exclusion of the lowest castes
from its temples.

In one respect the brahman and the bhikkhu are thoroughly opposed.
It is true that the rules of the Vinaya lay great stress on personal etiquette,
decorum, personal cleanliness and propriety of demeanour, but Buddhism
is dramatically anti-brahmanical in enjoining contemplation of and contact
with death as a major preoccupation of the monk. The accent is on visiting
graveyards, confrontation with death and corpses, meditation on death
to understand the transitoriness of life and body. The wearing of pamsakulina
rags gathered from graveyards is an extreme gesture of this
absorption with death. Thus Buddhism encouraged the cultivation of
equanimity in respect of that very situation which is considered to confer
the most severe form of pollution in Hindu society—death. The ritual role
of the brahman priest is by contrast eminently auspicious and pure and
concerned with the changes and progress of life itself. And when brahman
priests participate in mortuary rites, they do so not at the first impure
and malevolent stage soon after death but in the second, post-cremation
phase when the soul of the dead is transformed from the unclean pret
(ghost) to the revered pitr (ancestor).

Thus in all these respects the wandering bhikkhu was a contrast to the
brahman priest and more akin to the sannyasin. He is in the classical
tradition of one who sets forth from home into homelessness. There is
no need here to document from the texts that an eremitical life was
recommended to the bhikkhu—that his `four resources' should be mendicancy,
clothing in cast-off rags, forest life, and using urine as medicine.
The famous dictum in Mahavagga is `ma ekena dve agamittha'—`let
not two of you go one and the same way'.

But texts of the same period also relate that householders gave alms
to the Sangha (the order of monks), that monasteries and dwelling houses
for monks had been established. The four resources became optional.
And by the time The Questions of King Milinda in the second century B.C.
was composed, the resolution was that although the eremitical ideal was
upheld, monastic life was taken for granted and recognized as a fact.
Thus in his works on the history of Buddhism in India, Dutt (1960; 1962)
puts great emphasis on the change in the life of the bhikkhu from a wandering
to a settled monastic life. This transformation was accompanied by
the rules, practices and rituals of settled monastic life which I shall briefly
outline later.

I would argue therefore that when Buddhism became an institutionalized
religion, the Buddhist monk had to make a passage that was the reverse

of the one made by the brahman (who while remaining in the caste system
appropriated some sannyasin values). The monk, while standing for a way
of life set apart from that of the householder, nevertheless had to have
regular ritual and material transactions with the laity. It is this same
organized relation, which presupposes and makes possible a separate
monastic communal life distinct from and contrasted with lay life, that
also largely distinguishes the life of the bhikkhu from that of the wandering,
individualistic (and at best loosely organized) sannyasin in India.

The distinction and relation between monk and householder is a focal
point in the organization of Buddhism as a mass religion. And as might
be expected, the texts portray a tension of ideas concerning this distinction.
We can begin to explore this tension with the conception of the Buddha
himself. The founder of Buddhism, having realized the highest truth, did
not become as might have been expected the `silent one' but passed
on to the higher stage of attainment as the Samma Sambuddha, teacher
of all men, a role that was prompted by the miseries of all unenlightened
creatures and the upsurge of compassion in his heart for them. The
Buddha converted his own spiritual cognition into a message (the Dhamma)
which after him was to be preached by the Sangha (the order of monks).
The Buddha-to-come, Maitreya, is conceived in the same way.

Now, contrasted to the notion of the Supreme Buddha as sattha (teacher)
is the conception of the Pacceka Buddha who is inferior in that he is the
solitary saint (compared to a rhinoceros) who has attained perfection by
himself and for himself alone. The Pacceka Buddha is never co-existent
with a supreme Buddha, and he makes his appearance only during the
period interventing between the attainment of nirvana by one supreme
Buddha and the advent of the succeeding Buddha. He reaches nirvana
without having risen to supreme Buddhahood.

This asymmetrical evaluation of the compassionate teacher and the
lonely saint was reflected in the controversies resolved by the Sangha
in early times in Ceylon. Rahula (1956) reports some of them. In the
first century B.C. (which period is considered as the most important for
the shaping of Buddhism in Ceylon) there was a debate among several
hundred monks who assembled at a conference to decide whether the
basis of the sasana (religion) was learning or practice. It was decided that
learning was the basis of the sasana rather than practice, and the Dhammakathikas
(preachers or teachers learned in the Dhamma) succeeded in
silencing the Pamsukulikas (who wore robes made of rags). Learning was
declared necessary and sufficient for the perpetuation of the religion.
Thus out of such controversies in institutionalized Buddhism grew two
vocations which were not so distinguished in the original texts: the

vocation of books (gantha-dhura) and the vocation of meditation (vipassanadhura),
the former being considered the more important (Rahula 1956,
pp. 158-60).

The issue came up again later in slightly different terms: whether the
bhikkhu should concern himself with social service and humanitarian
activities (i.e. parish role) or only with his personal salvation. Rahula
says that opinion was divided; he cites the story of Cullapindatiya Tissa
to throw light on this issue (pp. 192-3). The gist of the story is that the
monk Cullapindatiya Tissa did not visit and sympathize with a female
upasika (devotee), who ministered to his needs, when misfortune befell
her in the form of a fire that burnt her house. He merely turned up the
next day at mealtime to receive alms.

The question raised by this story is of the greatest importance for
this book. Should the monk consider himself only concerned with his
salvation and therefore accept gifts from laymen without any corresponding
obligation (mutta-muttaka), or should he be subject to the obligations of
dhamma-dana (gift of spiritual service) which is aptly phrased in a
fourteenth-century Sinhalese exposition of the Dhamma (Saddharmalankaraya)
as follows: `Render help in return by spiritual gifts to lay people
who always support you with material gifts'?

Rahula reports that the Majjhima Commentary which cites the story
praised the attitude of the monk, but that majority opinion disagreed.

In both Ceylon and Thailand the established view was and is that the
Sangha has ritual and spiritual obligations to the laity. The recommended
ideal is for monks to be gramavasi (residing in towns and villages and
engaging themselves in educational and religious activities) rather than
vanavasi (residing in the forest and engaged in meditation with no
obligations to the laity). In the latter category are included tapassi (hermit
or ascetic monks) and pamsakulikas (monks who wear robes made of
rags) who, whenever they make their periodic appearances, face hostile
rejection by the established Sangha. Such forest dwellers also pose an
interesting problem (Obeyesekere 1968): the laity are apt to consider
them holy and to pursue them with gifts, making their escape from the
world and the adulation of the masses difficult if not impossible.

According to the monastic rules set out by the Vinaya, the bhikkhu is
advised to assist his parents when they are in need of material help and
to give them medical attention when they fall ill. Although his initiation
into monkhood and his secluded life signify his departure and separation
from his home, withdrawal does not mean that it is wrong for him to
maintain close relations with his parents.

These developments in the dialectic of ideas and practices in institutionalized

Buddhism diverge from the theory of monkhood as understood
in philosophical Buddhism, which sees monkhood as an initiation that
offers a man a way out of reciprocity, a way for a man to become entirely
himself living in but not dependent on society. Here the meditating monk
becomes the model of non-reciprocity, of spiritual enhancement through
personal effort, of the liberated and non-attached being who may receive
but need not give.

Monkhood came to have a different societal relation when its way of
life was regularized in monastic communities which had systematic
transactions with the laity. Here too the paths of the layman and the
monk were considered quite different, as in the Canonical literature. It was
recognized that the householders had a strong craving for and attachment
to their lands, wealth, wives and children, and servants, that they neither
understood nor accepted the idea of the renunciation of their possessions.
Thus Rahula, himself a bhikkhu and an historian of ancient Ceylon, states
that lay religion in ancient Ceylon was based on the fundamental conception
that the monks were expected to show the laity not `the way to
emancipation' but `the way to heaven'.

The aims of making merit on the part of the laity—from the peasant
to the King—were security and safety and prosperity in this world and
the next. The values sought were wealth, health, long life, intelligence,
power, high caste and beauty. The layman saw the monk as a mediator
and a vehicle in this quest. The Sangha was called in Ceylon punnak-khetta
(merit field) in which one sowed seeds of merit and reaped a good harvest.
But to achieve this end an unblemished Sangha and virtuous monks were
necessary, and the distinction between monk and layman must be preserved.
These are sine qua non of Buddhism.

FROM EREMITICAL TO CENOBITICAL LIFE

One last feature remains to be briefly outlined in this historical introduction.
That is the shift in the life of the majority of monks from a wandering
to a settled life and its organizational accompaniments.

This change is significant for two reasons. First, in the India of early
times there were many kinds of wandering sects, and certain particular
features in their communal life distinguished the communities of Buddhist
monks from others. Secondly, these communal practices were set out as
basic regulations that were enshrined and became the charter for future
monks. Buddhism is not indigenous to Ceylon or Burma or Thailand,
though it took root there and over time developed features specific to
each environment. But there are not only general doctrinal principles

but also rules of discipline and set communal ceremonies which are
considered an essential part of the orthodoxy, and these receive validity
precisely because of alleged unchanged transmission of Pali texts from
the time of the founding of the religion.

Most of the formal regulations pertaining to monastic life in Thai
villages today derive their basis from this heritage. They are not indigenously
contrived and nothing in village social organization will explain
the disciplinary code, or the ordination procedure, or the substance of the
Pali chants recited by monks. Yet these features, stemming from the
grand tradition, are woven into the texture of village life and have
associated features and elaborations which constitute the foci of anthropological
investigation.

A legitimate inquiry for an historian—which I am not—would be to
trace how a wandering sect became a settled order, and in the case of the
bhikkhus, how the Sangha which is unitary on conception became plural
monk-communities, which lived virtually as autonomous corporations
supported by the state and lay donors.

The Vinaya texts, as for example the Mahavagga (Rhys Davids and
Oldenberg, Part I, 1881), provide some crucial indications of the features
emphasized and elaborated in early Buddhism. The Mahavagga is
divided into the following four sections which deal with rules and
injunctions that still remain essential features of monastic life in Theravada
countries.

First Khandhaka (The Admission to the Order of bhikkhus): this contains
the rules of admission to monkhood and the upasampada (ordination)
procedure (which are followed to this day), and lists the duties of a monk
toward his upagghaya, preceptor, etc.

Second Khandhaka (The uposatha and the Patimokkha): this section
emphasizes the importance of the monks coming together half-monthly
to recite the penitentiary confession of Patimokkha (which I shall deal
with in detail in the next chapter). A vital clue as regards the decentralized
nature of monastic communities is reported in this section in these terms:
the Buddha is supposed to have ruled that the `complete fraternity' which
should recite the Patimokkha is `one residence' (i.e. a monastery), thereby
emphasizing the autonomy of the fraternities.

Third Khandhaka (Residence during the Rainy Season, Vassa): in
this section is stipulated that the retreat for three months during the rainy
season is obligatory. Great emphasis is placed on the fact that a monk
may not absent himself from his Vassa residence for more than seven
days. He may legitimately leave the residence if his parents are sick, if
his fellow monks or nuns require his attendance, or if he is needed to

officiate at merit-making activities of laymen, but he must return within
the stipulated period.

Fourth Khandaka (The Pavarana Ceremony): at the conclusion of the
Vassa residence the monks are exhorted to hold Pavarana which involves
the following: `Every Bhikkhu present invites his companions to tell him
if they believe him guilty of an offence, having seen that offence, or having
heard of it, or suspecting it' (Rhys Davids and Oldenberg 1881, p. 328).
The object of the exercise is that it would result in the monks living in
accord with each other.

Thus we see in the Mahavagga that regulated ordination, recitation
of the Patimokkha on uposatha days, the observance of Vassa residence,
marked at its conclusion by the Pavarana rite, were considered the basic
features of classical established monasticism. The story of how these
practices were developed, partly as a basis of differentiation from other
sects, and how they led to a change from eremitical to cenobitical life is
not known in detail.

The differentiation and routinization of the life of bhikkhus probably is
best seen in the rain retreat (Vassa), which was a custom among wanderers
of all sects. This general custom was apparently individuated and specialized
by the Buddhists (Dutt 1960; 1962). The rainy season became an occasion
for the bhikkhus to live together in a congregation of fellow monks. The
rule in the past—and which prevails to this day—is that Vassa residence
be taken on the day after the full moon of Asalha (or a month later) and
be concluded three months later. During this period the mobility of
monks is restricted.

Eliot (1954, pp. 245-6) describes the early practices thus: `The year
of the bhikkhus was divided into two parts. During nine months they
might wander about, live in the woods or reside in a monastery. During
the remaining three months, known as vassa or rainy season, residence
in a monastery was obligatory.' Vassa was the time when people had
most leisure so

Over time this temporary residence changed into permanent residence,
and the Vassa itself became a marked phase of retreat and intensified
religious activity in the routine life of monastic communities. The original

settlements during the retreat were of two types—the avasa situated in
the countryside and built and maintained by the monks, and the arama
located in a town or city as a private enclosure within the grounds of
a lay donor and patron. Later on established monasteries came to be
designated as arama or vihara. The critical and essential features of
monastic life—as it is lived today in a Thai village wat (the name for
the temple complex, derived from avasa)—are thus contained in the original
regularization and routinization of the rain retreat (Buddhist Lent), and
codified in the Vinaya texts. Notable among them is the fixing of boundaries
—sima—for the residence. This stating of the limits according to a set
procedure was an essential requirement for a body of bhikkhus to live
together. Today in Thailand the sima stones have to be installed, according
to set procedure and with consent from the higher authorities, to define
the boundary of the uposatha hall (bood in Thai)—which is the most
sacred component of the temple complex and in which ordination, recitation
of the Patimokkha (disciplinary rules), and other prescribed acts
take place.

The concept of sima therefore requires elucidation. In a politico-territorial
sense it defines the boundaries (the widest margin of influence)
of a political state, or smaller administrative unit. In the case of the
localized community of bhikkhus I would suggest that its significance is
somewhat different: it separates out and encloses a sacred space of a limited
extent vis-à-vis the vast secular space of the village and town inhabited
by the laity. It is fully evident in rural Thailand today how important
is the ecological separation of wat (with its widest boundary enclosing
the total complex of buildings and its inner boundary enclosing the
sacred bood) from the ban (village settlement), which parallels the separation
of monk from villager (bhikkhu from grahapati). It is the bood that best
symbolizes this distinction—for in it alone can ordination take place
(in the presence of laymen) and certain recitations be conducted (from
which layman are vigorously excluded because these spiritual exercises
relate to the vocation of the monk). Before laymen can enter the bood
they must remove their footwear, and a candidate for ordination has to
worship the sima stones to mark his entry into the sacred space and
life.

If the Vassa retreat is a critical marker in the annual cycle of activities,
then it is to be expected that its beginning and its conclusion should, as
in the past, receive special recognition. The ordination ritual (upasampada,
meaning `exceeding gain or advantage'), which we have previously noted
is a formalized ceremony of admission to monkhood, is in contemporary
Thailand (as in Ceylon) usually timed to take place in the month preceding

the rain retreat. The vast majority of ordinations take place at this time,
and this again is an old custom. The ceremony assigns certain material
obligations to lay sponsors and ritual roles to the assembled monks. The
end of the retreat is marked by the Kathina ceremony, which in its
classical sense means the distribution of robes by the lay donors to the
monks for their use in the year commencing after the retreat.

While these rituals imply a regular relation of monks with a continuing
congregation, what activities have marked off the monks as following
a vocation set apart from their congregation? For one, the recital of the
Patimokkha by the full assembly of monks living as a community semimonthly
on the sacred uposatha days (at full moon and new moon) is an
imperative act. It is said to be the outward token of the inner bond of the
Sangha. According to Dutt the Patimokkha recital was originally the
renewal of fellowship and unity as a body after a long period of dispersal
by the members of a sect. In settled monkish communities the ritual
became a recitation of the list of transgressions against the collective
Sangha life, and an expression of the unity of the monastic community
undivided by schism. Later with the elaboration of the Vinaya (the
disciplinary code of 227 rules) the Patimokkha recital became the main
item in the liturgy of the uposatha service.

The special characteristic of the decentralized and locally limited
brotherhood of bhikkhus is best represented by the concept of sanghakamma,
transactions of the Sangha. These transactions are held in `full and frequent'
assemblies according to carefully defined procedural rules. An act of
ordination, adjudicating on infringements against the disciplinary rules of
the order, settling schismatic disputes, etc., are examples of the matters
of concern to the assembly. The basic idea behind the notion of sanghakamma
is that a democratic community takes decisions on matters of
concern. Since these decisions are taken by all the members together in
assembly, members are equal and are expected to abide by the decisions
of the majority.

According to Buddhist tradition the Buddha on his last missionary tour
told his disciple Ananda that after his decease the Dhamma (doctrine) alone
should bind the bhikkhus, and that he repudiated the idea of a successor
who would be their leader or head. Thus it is said that in the early Sangha
there was no hierarchy and locus of authority; while the elders and older
monks deserved respect and privilege in etiquette, they could only advise
and instruct, not legislate or compel. The elders (theras) did not possess
episcopal authority; at best they were the chief teachers of the order.

The absence from the beginning of a firm hierarchy of positions and
consequently of authority relations is so conspicuous and intrinsic a feature

of the Buddhist Sangha that it needs to be firmly underlined.[1] In earliest
times the want of a central authority in the Sangha was shared with
brahmanism. However, in theory, the members of the Sangha were not
`priests' or `mediators'; they joined a confraternity to lead a higher life
which could not be achieved within the ordinary society. This openness
and voluntariness of the vocation was expressed in the mode of recruitment.
Subject to certain conditions, any free man was admitted; and there were
two simple ceremonies for admission—the novitiate and the higher
ordination (upasampada). The monk took no vows of obedience and
was at perfect liberty to return at any time to the world of lay life.

The tradition of sanghakamma in full assembly and the Patimokkha
confessional (and other customs), although at one level diacritical and
ideological markers of the monastic way of life, were in actual practice
fluid in interpretation and thereby somewhat `anti-structural'. The way
in which the Patimokkha confessional service was actually conducted in
the past (and is conducted today) is instructive. The Mahavagga (Rhys
Davids and Oldenberg 1881, pp. 242-5) records the procedure thus: `He
who has committed an offence, may confess it; if there is no offence you
should remain silent . . . if a Bhikkhu, after a three-fold proclamation, does
not confess an existing offence which he remembers, he commits an
intentional falsehood.' Thus the practice is that the list of offences is
read out and the brethren are asked three times after each item whether
they are pure in this matter; `only if a monk has anything to confess does
he speak. It is then in the power of the assembly to prescribe some form
of expiation. The offender may be rebuked, suspended or even expelled.
But he must admit his guilt. Otherwise disciplinary measures are forbidden'
(Eliot 1954, Vol. 1, p. 244). Eliot sums up the organizational structure
of the pristine monastic communities thus:

This ancient tradition that Buddhist monastic communities are democratic,
self-governing organizations has relevance and a large degree of
application to the contemporary Sangha in Thailand (and Ceylon), although
the historical facts are complex. A true estimation of the persisting underlying
organizational principles can only be arrived at after considering
the relationship of Buddhism and the Sangha to kingship and the state;

the administrative requirements stemming from the ownership of land
and other endowments; and the size of the monastery itself, which is
partially related to its location in urban or rural environments and to the
kind of patronage it enjoyed or enjoys.

It would take us too far from the interests of this book if we considered
these questions in detail, so I shall make only a few simplified statements.
Buddhism in the so-called `Theravada' countries came to have a recognized
relationship with the state. By and large the theory of kingship and the
rituals associated with it in Burma, Thailand and Cambodia were influenced
by Indian brahmanical ideas. But there is a striking difference in that,
unlike in India, the brahmans were confined to the court and were not
a general caste or stratum in the society. Dumont has asserted that in
India, dharma (morality), as represented by the brahmans, was superior
to artha (power), as represented by the kshatriya ruler; morality legitimated
power; dharma and artha in turn stood opposed to the inferior domain of
kama (economy). In `Theravada' countries there was no such dharma
of the brahmans acting as a check on kingship.

A conception of anacakra, royal power, as opposed to buddhacakra, the
spiritual power of the Sangha deriving from its inner discipline and the
vocation of the monks, prevailed in Theravada countries. The king was
indeed the protector, defender and patron of the Sangha, and at the
very apex of the society there was a fusion of politics and religion, spiritual
and secular power, to a degree perhaps unknown in India. Just as the
status of Chakravartin (world ruler) was equated with that of Buddha
(the idea being that a world conqueror and world renouncer are alike), so
did the kings claim the title of embryo Buddha (bodhisattva), and the
relics of the Buddha became the symbols of kingship and political autonomy.
In this capacity, the king gave patronage to Buddhism: he built monasteries
and temples, and endowed them with land. But he interfered little with
ecclesiastical matters, and wherever monasteries were endowed with
property they enjoyed autonomy in administering them, as well as judicial
and fiscal exemptions and other immunities. In the heyday of such thriving
monastic communities the differentiation of roles, the division of labour
and bureaucratization of organization was complex (e.g. see Rahula 1956 for
ancient Ceylon); but in contemporary Ceylon, the monastic bodies enjoying
landed property (the Malwatte and Asgiriya chapters of the Siyam Nikaya)
show a much looser and decentralized organization, more in line with
the classical theory of localized communities and also with anthropological
expectations of what might be expected in a society with certain types of
kinship and caste institutions (e.g. see Evers 1967). Ceylonese `sects'
which arose in the nineteenth century, and which do not enjoy such

landed property, are even more fragmented and decentralized (Ames 1963)
and have resisted any interference by political authorities in respect of
a more `rational' and country-wide organization.[2]

Thailand in some ways exemplifies this decentralizing tendency. Land
endowment to the monasteries by the king and laymen was customary,
and the monasteries apparently enjoyed immunity of control from royal
officers (Wales 1965). Today the association of royal temples with property
is by no means great or spectacular. While some monasteries enjoy
traditionally derived property, royal patronage consists of the wat having
no more than a special status, with some superior-titled monks getting
allowances from the state, and the prestige of royal presentations of
robes and other gifts at the Kathina ceremony at the end of the Lenten
season. Thus monastic communities enjoy in most matters a great autonomy.
Their internal structure is loose. The only recognized position is that of
the abbot (chao wat). In large monasteries there may be informal positions
of deputies and assistants, or even groupings of monks into divisions
(gana) with their heads. In small monasteries—especially in village wat—
there is scarcely any formal hierarchy of office below the abbot. However,
the assemblage is not altogether one of equals. The distinction between
novice and monk, the distinctions of seniority of service, the relation
between ordainer (upacha) and ordained, pupil and teacher, senior monk
and junior monk attached to him, etc., are all important for the internal
ordering of the monastic community.

What I have tried to say so far is that at the macro-level the relationship
between king (and his administrative machinery) and the Buddhist Sangha
(itself fragmented into separate communities and sects) was in the main
one of patronage and protection without interference.

But the nature of this association has to be modified in two directions,
although the essential point remains intact. There is evidence for ancient
and medieval Ceylon that the Sangha had some influence on kingship and
politics: kingship and the polity were infused with Buddhist meaning
and identity, the coronation ritual over time shifted (in part at least)
from a brahmanical to a Buddhist form, and various kings ceremonially
dedicated their kingship and their realms to the sasana or even to the
Sangha. Apart from these ideological and ceremonial features, it appears
that the Sangha even played politics in earnest: it sometimes determined
the succession to the throne, and its various sects competed for royal
favour and patronage. (See Rahula 1956, Ariyapala 1956, Geiger 1960,
Paranavitana in Ray (ed.), Vol. 1, 1959, Ch. 9.)

However, the evidence, especially in modern times, shows a more

pronounced counter-tendency for the king and the political state to
influence the Sangha.

There are known instances in Ceylon, Burma and Thailand when the
king, as defender and protector of the religion, has `purified the religion'—
such as settling schismatic disputes and rival claims of sects, or, when the
order of monks was in danger of dying out or was debased, re-establishing
it through new ordination succession (usually through the agency of
monks invited from other Buddhist countries). Not unrelated to these
reforms were moves made to ensure a Sangha loyal to the king and willing
to act in support of the regime.

The successful unification of a territory and the expansion of frontiers
by a king, with the increase of royal power through greater centralization
of control, has been paralleled in attempts to introduce some kind of
national hierarchy and unification in the Buddhist Sangha. Ceylon in
the eighteenth century under King Kirti Sri provides an example. Thailand,
which never became a colony, is an example in recent times, and its
achievement on a formal level is quite complete. There exists in Thailand
today a national ecclesiastical hierarchy which is largely the creation of
the central political government and in fact reflects the institutions and
divisions of civil and territorial jurisdiction. One should not underestimate
the importance of this official hierarchy for the organization and activities
of the Sangha as a whole. The hierarchy of officers and organs, and the
country-wide network of educational establishments are significant avenues
of social mobility and channels for the acquisition of prestige and power
in a political sense (see Appendix to this chapter).

Nevertheless, it is important to note that at the base of the system
are a multitude of local wats supported by lay congregations, headed by
abbots chosen by them (though ratified by the ecclesiastical superiors), and
in the main run as relatively autonomous monastic communities in close
integration with the villages or towns which maintain them. Important
connections between these localized wats produce regional networks which
are not the product of the official Sangha organization. This book is
concerned with the village wat, its monks, and its lay supporters in terms
of this latter perspective.

A different perspective, also important, looks at the various kinds of
links, including those in the official (formal) organization, which produce
a network of social relations, channels of mobility, levels of differentiation,
and a distribution of power at the level of the total society. This theme
is proper for a different and more ambitious work on Thai religion.

APPENDIX TO CHAPTER 5

A NOTE ON THE HIERARCHICAL STRUCTURE OF
THE `SANGHA' IN THAILAND

According to Wales (1965), in Thailand a national organization of the
Sangha directly related to the political authority of the king and his
administration only became established in the first reign of the present
dynasty (which started in 1782).

Information concerning previous centuries is uncertain and does not
indicate a national religious hierarchy. In thirteenth-century Sukhodaya,
the office of Sangharaja is mentioned; in sixteenth-century Ayudhya, the
administration of the order was for the first time divided into Northern
and Southern divisions in the reign of Maha-dharmaraja. But De la Loubère
(1693), who gives valuable information on the late seventeenth century,
makes no mention of a hierarchy, only of heads of monasteries enjoying
separate jurisdictions; there appears, though, to have been a respect
hierarchy based on the distinction between abbots of royal wat and
ordinary wat, with the head of the palace wat being the most respected
of them all. De la Loubère deserves to be quoted in full, for his remarks
throw light on the situation two centuries later.

Definite information concerning political penetration into Sangha
affairs comes to us from the reigns of Rama I (1782-1809) and the succeeding

monarchs of the Bangkok Period. A reorganization and revival
appeared necessary after the ravages of the Burmese wars which destroyed
the Ayudhya kingdom. The `purification of the religion' went hand in
hand with ensuring the loyalty and co-operation of monks. The decrees
called Kathmay Brah Sangha dealt with details of monastic discipline
and directives to lay officials to see that the disciplinary rules were
implemented.

It was in the reign of Rama IV (Mongkut) (1851-68), who was himself
previously a monk and who founded the Thammayuttika Sect, that
a complex organization of the entire Sangha was instituted (see Wales
1965 for details).

A basic distinction was that between `royal' monasteries and `ordinary'
or `commoner' monasteries. The heads of the royal monasteries (raja
gana) were appointed and installed by the king at the beginning of
every reign. Each head was assisted by two officials also royally appointed.
In contrast the heads and other officials of the ordinary monasteries were
appointed by the people or by nobles who founded and supported the
institution.

On top of this ground-level structure was erected the hierarchy. From
the heads of the royal monasteries the king appointed four ecclesiastical
officials (Cau Gana Hyai), each of whom with his assistant administered
the four great departments into which the Order was divided: the Northern
and Southern Divisions of the Mahanikaya Sect, the order of hermit
monks who were distinguished from the scholar monks (gantha dhurah)
although they belonged to the same Mahanikaya Sect, and lastly, the
newly constituted Dhammayutika Sect (founded by King Rama IV).

The question is, how did the king (or rather the relevant governmental
agency such as the Department of Religious Affairs) select monks for
appointment to the ecclesiastical offices. One device was the holding of
religious examinations under royal auspices and administered by the heads
of royal monasteries. Degrees of parian for Pali studies were granted
together with monthly payments from the treasury. (The hermit monks did
not sit examinations and were thus excluded from high ecclesiastical office.)

Combined with the examination system was the ranking of ecclesiastical
offices according to sakti na grades, as in the case of lay civil and military
officials. The sakti na, as applied to civil and military hierarchies, was an
index of the prestige of office and endowments that went with it. By
applying the same system to the religious hierarchy, the higher ecclesiastical
officers and monks who were holders of office or aspirants to it were
brought in line with national structures of power and respect.

But it is clear that one ought not to exaggerate the relevance of this

centralization and hierarchization for the multitude of small village and
other wats founded and supported by the laity. The Sangharaja's jurisdiction
over monks and monasteries was weak and ill-defined. He had
everything to do with national projects such as revision of doctrinal texts,
and little to do with the administration of individual monasteries. Thus
breaches of discipline were ordinarily judged by heads of monasteries;
some were adjudicated by the courts under the charge of the four departmental
heads. In the case of serious crime the monk was unfrocked and
handed over to a special secular court.

These administrative arrangements which took shape in the reign of
Rama IV were the basis for further changes leading to the contemporary
hierarchy in Thailand. An Act relating to the administration of the
Buddhist Sangha was passed in the reign of Rama V in 1902; subsequent
Acts of 1941 and 1963 have further modified and elaborated the system
evolved in the previous century.[5]

The formal hierarchy as it exists today copies the pattern of the civil
(territorial) administration and the high level (executive and legislative)
institutions at the political centre (see Blanchard 1958). The king is in
theory the final authority in all Sangha affairs. The Sangha is related
directly to the government through the Department of Religious Affairs
in the Ministry of Culture. This ministry disburses funds, administers
temple properties, and issues legal directives. The ecclesiastical head of
the Order is the Sangharaja (Prince or Patriarch of the Church), chosen
by the king from the executive council of the Order. This body is a Council
of Ministers chosen by the Patriarch with the consent of the Minister
of Education. They are drawn partly from the legislative body (Sangha
Sabha), also appointed by the Patriarch, and partly from the general body
of monks. The administration is divided into four departments (Administration,
Education, Propagation, and Public Works), each headed by
a member of the Council of Ministers. These heads choose their own
departmental subordinates. Quite separate from the departments are the
various levels of ecclesiastical judicial courts whose members are appointed
by the Patriarch in consultation with the Legislative Assembly.

Below these central ecclesiastical institutions are the territorial divisions.
In descending order they are: nine regions, each headed by a commissioner;
seventy-one provinces, each headed by a provincial head; districts in the
charge of district heads; communes headed by commune heads; and
finally the basic unit, the wat or monastery in charge of the abbot. Each
superior level office controls the promotions of the next inferior grade.

The abbot of the local temple is ratified in office by his superior, but is
initially chosen by his local congregation.

According to the promotion system, monks who wish to climb up this
hierarchy are partly dependent on the passing of examinations, which
are of two sorts: the Nagtham divided into three grades, and the more
prestigious Parian grades (Pali studies) made up of six grades. Monasteries
function as the educational establishments for the training of monks, and
are subject to complex differentiation in size, prestige and financial
endowment relative to their educational activities, especially in respect
to Pali studies. In Bangkok there are two universities for monks. One
could therefore speak of a national educational network which is important
for the mobility of monks academically and administratively.

There is an honorific ranking system of monks which is dependent
partly on scholarly attainments, and partly on administrative status backed
by patronage. The titles, especially the superior ones, are usually attached
to `royal' wats and range from Phraa Khruu, various grades of Phraa Raja
Gana, to the top level Somdet grades.

ADDITIONAL NOTE TO PAGE 73

Thomas (1951, pp. 22-3) succinctly describes the situation thus: `Within [the sima]
boundary each assembly was self-governing. There was no hierarchy, but seniority was
reckoned by the number of years from ordination, nor did a central authority exist to
check any tendency to change or development in new directions.'