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Venerable Ajahn Jayasaro -
The Early Years of Venerable Ajahn Chah
The Life and Teachings of
Venerable Ajahn Chah
Adapted from Uppalamani
It
was in Bahn Gor, a small village a few hours walk to
the south of Ubon town in the Isahn region of Thailand, that one of the greatest
monks of the modern era was born, and close to which he would later establish a
forest monastery that was to attain a world-wide reputation. His full monastic
title came to be Tan Chao Khun Phra Bodhinyana Thera, but he is known familiarly
as Luang Por (Venerable Father) Chah and to his disciples as simply "Luang
Por."
Luang Por Chah was born on the
seventh waning day of the seventh moon of the Year of the Horse, 1918. He was
the fifth child of eleven born to Mah and Pim Chooangchote, who, like the vast
majority of their generation, were subsistence rice farmers. The name Chah means
clever, capable, resourceful. In accordance with custom, Luang Por's mother gave
birth to him kneeling, her arms above her head grasping a rope suspended from
the rafters of the house. Afterwards she endured fifteen days of confinement,
lying with her stomach as close as possible to a charcoal brazier to "dry
out" her womb -- an ancient custom that still survived in the countryside
despite, some seventy years previously, King Mongkut railing against it as
"this senseless and monstrous crime of having women smoked and
roasted." In the first months after his weaning, Luang Por's mother would
have fed him by chewing and masticating sticky rice in her own mouth first and
then gently spooning it into his.
Luang
Por was born into an affectionate and respected household, one of the wealthier
families in a closely-knit community. The Isahn villages of those days, isolated
by forests and vulnerable to the vagaries of the weather and the caprice of
spirits, put great store on sharing, generosity, and harmony. The model was of
an extended family, and over the years marriages between inhabitants of a
village tended to make it one in fact. Houses were made of wood, roofed with
grass thatch, and raised on stilts as protection from floods and wild animals.
They were placed close together with no fixed boundaries between them. Life was
conducted on a large open space upstairs, with rooms used only for sleeping.
People not only heard their neighbours' family dramas, they could see them as
well. There was no concept of privacy, much less a desire for it. The villagers
subscribed to respect for monks, elders, and spirits; consideration for the
feelings of others; and a sense of shame. They relished laughter and
conversation. Luang Por grew up with a strong sense of community and place and
"the gift of the gab".
He was both a talker and a doer, the natural leader of his group of
friends, the one whom everyone wanted to be close to and without whom all games
and adventures seemed dull.
The adjective often used to describe Luang Por in his old
age -- ebullient -- is the one that comes most readily to mind when picturing
him as a child. He was a chunky, exuberant young lad and yet, at the same time,
keen and perceptive -- nobody's fool. He was full of fun and vigor, with the
sunny, buoyant disposition so common to his people; but even then he showed a
glint of steel in his ways. He was both a talker and a doer, the natural leader
of his group of friends, the one whom everyone wanted to be close to and without
whom all games and adventures seemed dull. Luang Por bore the round face and
flat "lion's nose" common to his race. More distinctively, his mouth
was unusually wide and compelling -- surely destined one day to have memorable
things to say -- while in charming contrast to the powerful symmetry of his
face, his right ear was larger than the left. His childhood friends remember
Luang Por's mildness. They say he never enforced his dominance with bullying or
coercion; no one can recall him in a fight. He was a mediator in his companions'
disputes and, from an early age, drawn by the yellow robe. He relates a
childhood memory of playing the role of a monk. He would sit sternly on an old
bamboo bed with pahkaoumah draped over his left shoulder like a robe,
and his friends would be the laity. The meal time is probably the only event in
the monks' daily life that is interesting enough to lend itself to drama, and it
was that which the children would enact. Luang Por would ring a bell, and his
friends would bring a tray of fruit and cool water. After bowing three times
they would offer it to him meekly. He in return would give them the five
precepts of the Buddhist layperson and a blessing.
* * *
School was not as yet a major intrusion on children's
right to fun. By the 1920s, some thirty years after its inception, a State
education system had still forged few inroads into rural Isahn. During Luang
Por's childhood, three years of primary education were available, but they were
not compulsory and few parents saw their worth. Luang Por, by the age of nine,
had completed a single year.
Education of the young had
traditionally been one of the major functions of the village wat
(monastery). Apart from the fact that fifty percent of children -- the girls --
were excluded, results were impressive. Foreign observers had often expressed
surprise at the high standard of literacy among Thai men (at the same time,
interestingly enough, praising what they saw as the superior shrewdness and
industry of the women). The boys would help out with the monastery chores and,
through daily personal contact with the monks and participating in the life of
the wat, received an education with a strong moral and spiritual foundation. It
was a system that forged strong links between the monastery and the village, and
it has been argued that the loss of this educational role to the State was a
body blow to the rural Sangha's sense of purpose from which it has never fully
recovered. It was at the age of nine that Luang Por asked permission from his
parents to move out of the family home and into the local monastery. It was a
common practice for parents to entrust sons to the monks but rare for a boy to
volunteer. Many years later Luang Por spoke of his decision in the following
way:
"As a boy I had a fear of
committing evil actions. I was always a straightforward lad. I was honest, and I
didn't tell lies. When there were things to be shared out, I was considerate; I
would take less than my due. That basic nature just kept maturing until one day
I said to myself, 'Go to the monastery.' I asked my friends if they had ever
thought of doing the same thing, and none of them had. The idea just arose
naturally. I'd say it was the result of past actions -- as time went on,
wholesome qualities steadily grew inside me until one day they led me to decide
and do as I did."
On another occasion, in a more
humorous vein, Luang Por told some lay disciples that he had become a dekwat
(monastery child) because he was tired of watering the family tobacco fields and
because the humdrum daily round of chores was so tedious and repetitive. As one
of Luang Por's s remembers it, a small accident brought things to a head:
"His going to live in the monastery wasn't arranged by our parents; it was
his own idea. One day he was helping his brothers and s pounding rice, but
he wasn't putting much heart into it. He [accidentally] got hit by the wood we
were using as a mallet. It must have hurt him because he got angry and shouted
out, 'That's it! I'm going to go and ordain!'"
A few days after the mallet
blow, Luang Por's parents took him to the village monastery. Wat Bahn Gor was
situated in a large sandy enclosure shaded by coconut palms, mango trees, and
tamarinds and consisted of a sala (main meeting and sermon hall), a vihàra
(monks residence), and a samànam (water-ringed ceremonial hall). Por
Mah and Maa Pim entrusted their son to the abbot with a predictable mixture of
sadness and pride - and Luang Por was now a dekwat. But this was not the
beginning of a long and painful separation from his parents; Luang Por had by no
means withdrawn into a pinched and cloistered realm. The boundaries between the
monastery and the surrounding world were marked not by imposing walls but a
rather half-hearted bamboo fence. Indeed, the monastery was the central focus of
the communal life of the village rather than a symbol of its rejection. In a
sense, he had entered the world rather than left it.
Few of the images that the word
"monastery" is likely to evoke in a secular Western mind would agree
with the reality of a village wat in rural Thailand. Wat Bahn Gor, where Luang
Por had gone to live, might be the abode of monks, but it was considered the
property of all. The path in front of the main hall was a public thoroughfare,
and the monastery well was used by all the nearby houses. Important public
meetings took place in the monastery hall, which also acted as a hostel for
passing travellers and was thus the centre for the reception and dissemination
of news about other areas. The monastery played a central role in the social
life of the village. It was the site for the important festivals that punctuated
the hard struggles of the year. With daily entertainment almost nonexistent,
every one looked to the lively ngahn wat (monastery fairs) for
excitement and fun. Some of the fairs were of specifically Buddhist
significance; others were of a more earthy animist character, presided over by
the monks and sandwiched by offerings of alms to them.
As for the monks, they were not
an hereditary elite. In Thai Buddhism, temporary ordination has long been the
norm and constitutes a rite of passage for young men. Indeed, a man who has
never been a monk would have difficulty finding a wife. Young women would shy
away from him as a kon dip, literally an "unripe" person.
Customarily, the young men in a village would ordain after finishing their
military service, mostly for the three-month Rains Retreat but sometimes for as
long as two or three years.
Apart from their standing as members of the Buddhist Sangha, the monks
also had the extra prestige of being the most educated and knowledgeable people
in the community.
The result was a fluid monastic community in which serious and dedicated
students rubbed shoulders with restless time-servers. One of the great merits of
the system was that with every family having members who were or had been monks,
the close bond between village and monastery was constantly renewed. The
long-term monks would be few in number. They would almost all have been born and
raised in the local village and would thus empathize deeply with the daily
problems of the local people. They would take participation in village affairs
seriously, sometimes as leaders in public works projects such as building
bridges, or frequently as the impartial adviser and referee in lay disagreements
and disputes. Historically, the wat was the center of learning. Apart from their
standing as members of the Buddhist Sangha, the monks also had the extra
prestige of being the most educated and knowledgeable people in the community.
They would learn and transmit many skills such as carpentry, painting,
decorative arts, and tile, brick and cement making. Some monks would be herbal
doctors and many, notwithstanding the prohibition in the Monks' Discipline, were
astrologers. But of course it was the monastery's religious role that was,
ideally, paramount. Primarily the monks were expected to be, as far as possible,
the embodiment of the Buddha's teachings and to inspire by word and deed moral
and spiritual values. They were also called upon to perform traditional rituals
and ceremonies. They would be invited to local houses to chant blessings and
sprinkle lustral water during marriages, house-warming parties, times of
sickness or ill luck. At the death of a villager they would chant the rather
abstract and philosophical Matika verses, traditionally believed to be
the teachings the Buddha gave to his mother in Tusita heaven following her
death.
Luang Por spent four years as a
dekwat. During that time, he learned to read and write, helped with the sweeping
and cleaning of the monastery, served the monks, and gradually absorbed, if not
their intellectual nutrition, then at least the ambience and flavour of the
basic Buddhist teachings. His duties were not onerous, and there was plenty of
time for play with his fellow dekwat, of whom there was a constant supply. It
was the custom for rough lads to be sent to the monastery by their weary parents
for urgent moral reform; orphans, if no relation could take them, could always
find a refuge with the monks. Apart from accepting boys for religious reasons,
the monastery was also the local social welfare centre. In the Monks' Discipline
it is laid down that an aspirant must be twenty years of age before he can
become a monk but that a boy old enough "to scare crows" can become a
novice. Luang Por took the novice "Going Forth" vows in March 1931. He
was thirteen and could have driven off a raiding hawk. Luang Por's sturdy frame
and bulging belly together with his resonant voice earned him the nickname Eung,
or Bullfrog. Life carried on in almost the same relaxed fashion, although
wearing the robe conferred a higher status and increased expectations; at least
in front of the laity, a restrained demeanor was de rigeur. Luang Por would
spend time everyday walking up and down in the shade, memorizing the various
Pali chants: the daily service, meal blessings, auspicious verses chanted at
house-warming parties and marriages, and the more somber funeral chants: Adhuvam
jivitam, dhuvam maranam, avassam me maritabbam -- Life is uncertain; death
is certain; I too will die.
He also completed the first of
the three levels in the curriculum of monastic studies. It included sections on
the Buddha's life and teachings, the code of Discipline and the history of
Buddhism, and provided a sound foundation in the core teachings. At other times,
gardening and building projects served to work off teenage steam.
* * *
During his novice years, Luang Por's teacher and mentor was a monk called
Ajahn Lung. In accordance with the reciprocal relationship laid down in the
ancient texts, Ajahn Lung oversaw Luang Por's studies, and Luang Por in return
acted as his personal attendant. Every now and then in the evenings, Ajahn Lung
would kindly accompany Luang Por on visits to his family -- it would have been
forbidden for a novice to go alone -- and indeed seemed to enjoy these
excursions even more than Luang Por, exuding a confidence and charm among Luang
Por's family that the young novice found a little eccentric. At Ajahn Lung's
instigation, the visits became steadily more frequent and protracted, and
sometimes it would be late at night before the two of them walked back to the
monastery, accompanied by the barks of the village dogs their footsteps
disturbed.
One day Ajahn Lung confided in
Luang Por that he had decided to disrobe and suggested that his protégé might
do likewise. A confused Luang Por agreed. He had been living in the wat for
seven years and, at the dangerous and wobbly age of sixteen, a small push was
enough. Some days after the joint disrobing, Luang Por's parents were visited by
elder relatives of ex-Ajahn Lung to discuss a marriage proposal. The ardent
admirer of Luang Por's Sah, assured of her affections, was free at last
to declare his love.
Luang Por went to work in the
family fields. Inevitably, the novelty of mud and sweat soon wore off, and
though he applied himself to the regular round of the rice farmer with a gusto
that drew much praise, he bore quietly within himself a sense of something lost
and unfulfilled. It was not an overpowering emotion -- he was a buoyant,
vigorous young man -- but a constant, unobtrusive shadow that he could only try
to ignore. For the moment Luang Por was content to divert himself in the usual
ways. Together with his best friend Puut he would walk to neighboring villages
to flirt with young ladies at monastery fairs.
When Luang Por finally fell in
love it was with a girl from his own village. Her name was Jyy, the step-
of his companion Puut. The girl's parents were pleased with the prospective
match; Luang Por was a friend of the family, good-natured, hard-working, and
honest. In those days it was taboo for young lovers to be alone together; custom
dictated that they would meet at the girl's house, upstairs on the porch in the
evening, where she would be sitting demurely, spinning wool. Luang Por began to
spend more and more of his evenings at Puut's house. Relations between young men
and women were strictly overseen by elders. Lovers, forbidden to touch, were
quick to learn the nuances of the verbal caress. In Isahn village life, banter
between them was inventive and the ability to extemporize much admired. The men
would swagger and flatter and ardently woo in the
"I-can't-live-without-you" style, while the girls would play shy and
hard to get or else wittily insult their suitor's manhood -- "the
loud-mouthed swain is holding a limp kite in a windless sky" was just one
of the well-known jibes gleefully repeated.
But witty repartee soon loses
its charm when genuine feelings are engaged, and late at night Luang Por and Jyy
would like to sit out in the starry coolness talking quietly. The plan hatched
on one such night was that they would marry as soon as Luang Por had completed
his National Service and spent a rains retreat as a monk to make merit for his
parents in the time-honoured way. At that time Luang Por was nineteen years old
and Jyy seventeen. It would be another four years before they could expect even
to hold hands.
One day that year as the rainy
season approached and every household was busy preparing ploughs, rakes, hoes,
yokes, fish traps, and machetes for the upcoming work in the paddy fields, Luang
Por had just taken out a load of tools to the family's small hut raised on
stilts in the middle of their fields. As he related himself many years later:
"When I was eighteen I liked a girl. She liked me too, and, as these things
go, after some time of liking her I fell deeply in love. I wanted to marry her.
I daydreamed about having her by my side helping me out in the fields, making a
living together. Then one day on my way home from work I met my best friend,
Puut, on the road. He said, 'Chah, I'm taking the girl.' When I heard those
words I went completely numb. I was in a state of shock for hours
afterwards."
Simply, and with the
unquestioned prerogative that parents of his age and culture possessed, Puut's
father and his wife had decided that their two stepchildren should marry; there
was no more to be said. The reasons were pragmatic and economic. If Puut married
Jyy, the family would be saved a bride price they could ill afford. They had
just acquired land some distance from the village that should not be left
fallow. The young couple could move out there and farm it together.
Luang Por, despite the coming
of the rains, must have felt his life suddenly beached in a dry and desolate
land. But other than trying to reconcile himself to the situation, what could he
do? It made no sense to be angry with Puut. His friend had not plotted behind
his back and was painfully embarrassed by the whole affair. But this
disappointment was a profound one, a sharp and hurtful lesson in the
uncertainties that bedevil human affairs. Where should you, where could you,
place your trust? Luang Por maintained his friendship with Puut, and indeed it
was to last for the rest of Luang Por's life. But with Jyy he had to be more
circumspect; his feelings could not be denied by an act of will. Even after
becoming a monk, if Luang Por saw her in the monastery, he would have to do his
utmost to avoid a meeting that might stir up painful emotions. Luang Por
admitted that for the first seven years of his monkhood it was impossible to
completely let go of his thoughts of Jyy. Perhaps after all, by some miracle,
she would become free. The same tantalizing scenarios periodically recurred in
his mind, the same facile, happy endings. Could he then in such a case remain in
the robes? He didn't know. It was only when he finally left his familiar
surroundings and through meditation practice gained a method of stilling his
thoughts and seeing them in perspective, that the fantasies faded. In later
years as abbot of Wat Nong Pah Pong, describing to the monks the drawbacks of
sensual desire, he would often talk of the debt of gratitude he owed to Puut:
"If he hadn't married Maa Jyy, then I probably wouldn't be here
today," he would say.
When Luang Por's name was
missing from the list of young men from Ubon called up for National Service, he
was free to ask for ordination. But by this time his ideas about becoming a monk
had changed. He no longer considered it simply in terms of making merit for his
parents, an expression of the gratitude he felt towards them. These were
certainly noble aims, but he desired something more, something that could
resolve the dis-ease in his heart. Lay life seemed hollow, tedious, and full of
vicissitudes; perhaps the monastic life could lead him to meaning and peace. He
would ordain for an indefinite period. His mother and father were pleased. They
had enough children to help with the farm work, and it was auspicious to have a
son in robes. The ordination ceremony took place on the April 26, 1939, at Wat
Gor Ny, the local monastery, on a hot, shimmering afternoon. Phra Kroo
Intarasarakun was Luang Por's preceptor and conferred on him the monk's name of
Subhaddo (well-developed).
You're on your own now, I said to myself, and pulled out my copy of the
Pàtimokkha and started to memorize it.
Luang Por spent the first two years of his monastic life at Wat Bahn Gor:
"At the end of the rains retreat, the monks and novices who joined the
Sangha at the same time as me all disrobed. Sometimes before disrobing they'd
try on their lay clothes and parade up and down. I thought they were completely
insane. But they thought they looked good, that their clothes were smart, and
they talked about the things they were going to do after they disrobed. I didn't
dare to tell them that they'd got it all wrong because I didn't know how durable
my own faith was. After my friends disrobed, I became resigned. You're on your
own now, I said to myself, and pulled out my copy of the Pàtimokkha (the monks'
rules of discipline) and started to memorize it. It was easier than before with
nobody teasing me or fooling around. I was able to concentrate on it fully. I
didn't say anything, but I made a resolution that from that day onwards until
the end of my life, whether it be at the age of seventy or eighty or whatever, I
would try to practice with a constant appreciation, not allow my efforts to
slacken or my faith to weaken. To be consistent. That is an extremely difficult
task, and I didn't dare to tell anyone else."
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