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Venerable Ajahn Sucitto -
Aspects of Training: A Universal Order
In this extract from the Vinaya instructions to the
bhikkhus at Amaravati in 1988, Ajahn Sucitto points out the developments
in attitude that the Buddha brought about among the sect of "Wanderers"
of India to transform it into the Bhikkhu-Sangha.
There has been a tradition in India for millennia, certainly from before
the time of the Buddha, of paribbajakas, spiritual seekers who were
homeless ones, wanderers. Some of these Wanderers became the Buddha's
first disciples, and fundamental features of their attitude towards
spirituality form the basis of the Sangha's training. There were also
the Brahmins, those in the priestly caste, who followed the Vedas and
performed the Vedic rituals to ensure prosperity, fecundity, etc. But
the paribbajakas were those who renounced caste and worldly aims and
values. This renunciation was called the pabbajja, the going forth, and
it was a complete renunciation of any status or role in the caste
system. And this, in the Indian culture, was a very significant step
since most people belonged completely to one particular niche in the
caste structure. To renounce that was a considerable renunciation.
This is important to consider because in our life here we can begin to
develop ideas of status or role or position. Nowadays in Buddhist
countries, there is an ecclesiastical hierarchy in the Sangha, but this
is purely an administrative structure, often brought about through
secular powers. In the Holy Life itself, there is no status. Such roles
and responsibilities as are allocated by the Sangha to individual
members of the Order are not considered to be very important, nor
regarded as a measure of one's spiritual development.
The paribbajakas had thrown away a lot of the outward regulations of the
religious life and it seems that the Buddha found this helpful because
it meant that the regulations became much more internalised. A pure one
was thought to have purity of heart rather than just being one who could
perform rituals. Paribbajakas adopted a common standard of harmlessness,
renunciation and celibacy. The sincere ones were not interested in
acquiring things, not fascinated by the sensory world, not looking for
winning power or gain or support. It is from this the attitude of
going-forth, which defined the fundamental 'status' of the homeless one,
that the bhikkhu training conventions evolved.
In that way of life, a paribbajaka would seek the going forth under a
teacher, a sattha. When Wanderers met each other, they would ask, 'Whose
Dhamma and discipline are you following, friend?' There were teachers
like Sanjaya, the original teacher of Venerables Sariputta and
Maha-Mogallana, and each had their own Dhamma and discipline. The
training disciplines of other paribbajakas consisted mainly of ascetic
practices like eating out of the hands, going naked, not lying down, or
drinking water out of puddles rather than out of vessels. This was their
training for renunciation. However, the Buddha's emphasis was upon a
more refined wisdom training, and his whole teaching was of a reflective
nature. So, though he lived a wanderer's life, the Lord Buddha felt that
his disciples should try to open up beyond the limitations of both the
paribbajaka ethic and that of the Brahmins. His approach was more
universal than that of his contemporaries.
Lord Buddha offered a Dhamma and discipline that weren't just a set of
rules to be kept by a particular sect or a group for the purpose of
ritual or asceticism or out of blind obedience to a teacher's whim, but
were that which led to universal truth, to universal standards of wisdom
and morality, and to skilful conduct for all human beings. As the
Buddhist Sangha evolved out of this amorphous band of wanderers, the
definition of what the bhikkhu was became more and more narrow. And yet
the increasing degree of this regulation was never considered to be an
obstacle to liberation. The disciples undertook these further
restrictions upon what they could do and what was suitable and so forth
because they considered them to be not limitations on the Holy Life but
rules which strengthened it and gave it a broader significance.
So one should look at the particular training rules that the Buddha
established for his bhikkhu disciples in this way. They were intended to
develop a life that led to harmlessness, renunciation, contentment with
little, and freedom from passion in ways that were not mortifying or
extreme. And they led to behaviour which exemplifies and illustrates
those goals in order to establish and sustain faith in lay people.
Becoming a bhikkhu, an ordained disciple of the Buddha, was, at first,
very much as it would have been for any other paribbajaka: one would
have faith in the sattha, the Lord Buddha, and ask for the going forth
in his Dhamma and discipline. And the Buddha would say, 'Come, bhikkhu,
live the Holy Life.' At first, that was all that ordination, as we now
call it, meant - just an affirmation of faith in that particular teacher
and a reciprocal acceptance.
Throughout his life the Buddha continually distinguished between faith
and belief. He said that one would realise truth through one's own
knowledge rather than just through belief. He insisted on many occasions
that disciples not just blindly believe but follow him out of faith.
This attitude, which is in line with the sentiments expressed in the
Kalama Sutta, emphasises personally experienced realisation, which was a
goal fundamental to the Wanderers. And in his last years, the Buddha
made the point over and over again that the Dhamma-Vinaya was the
teacher, not him - he was the Awakened One, the one who pointed out the
Way. He was adopting the role of teacher not in the old sense of someone
who expected belief but rather as someone who demonstrated a universal
law. However, a disciple should certainly follow his teacher in faith,
backed up by his reflective reasoning.
How does this kind of faith differ from belief? It's a matter of
humility, of being prepared to test out the teacher's advice in the
spirit of free inquiry. There is an example in the Kitagiri Sutta, sutta
70 of the Majjhima Nikaya, where the Lord Buddha says to a group of
monks: 'I, monks, enjoy good health, vitality and freedom from physical
discomfort by eating one meal a day, so you too should do this, monks.'
And they said, 'Yes, Lord', and they tried it and they kept that rule.
Then they went to two of the monks of the notorious 'group of six'.
These two, Assaji and Punabbasuka, were monks renowned for their
shamelessness. The good monks said to them, 'We eat one meal a day and
we enjoy good health.' And Assaji and Punabbasuka said, 'Well, we eat
three meals a day - we eat in the mornings, we eat in the evenings, we
eat whenever we feel like it - and we enjoy good health and feel good
too. So we're going to do it this way.' The good monks then told this to
the Lord Buddha and he summoned these two monks and said: 'There is a
difference between doing that which is pleasant and skilful and doing
that which is is pleasant and unskilful. It's not that your actions
produce physical displeasure, but they go no further - and there are
ways in my training which lead towards the goal of the Holy Life,
towards renunciation, contentment with little, and so forth.'
He was, in fact, pointing to the very ethos of the parabbajaka, the
mendicant, the one content with little and not particularly interested
in the sensory world. And he was asking them to reasonably investigate
their actions in terms of the tenets of the 'going-forth', the act of
faith. He also reminded them that the fundamental step in the graduated
course of training was having faith in the teacher. You may not always
agree with what he says or have experienced what he's talking about, but
you have faith in the teacher. And from that faith you become interested
in Dhamma, you draw near, you listen to Dhamma, you practise it, you
struggle with the conflict that your defilements bring up, and then you
penetrate to truth and experience the results. But the first step is to
have faith. If there's no faith, then you don't begin or continue. And
what these monks had done wrong, where their foolishness lay, was in
acting out of a lack of faith. There was no willingness to commit
themselves to following the teacher; and without that the course of
training does not even get off the ground.
Moreover, the Buddha said that, as far as he was concerned, it was of no
importance at all whether people kept the rules or not. Rather than
concerning himself with that, he wanted to compassionately point out
that if they wished to progress, then this was the correct course of
action.
Since the Buddha's Parinibbana, it's up to the Sangha to be that source
of faith and to practise in faith. Many times, we take on training rules
that we may not feel are especially relevant or that don't agree with
our personalities. Even as a community we may think, 'I don't see the
point in that.' These particular views often arise in the mind. One has
to tackle them skilfully, to see that it's more important to sustain
practice that brings up faith in one's own mind - a kind of going forth
and a willingness to try - and that creates a situation that supports
the faith of others. Many of our minor rules and conventions are
arbitrary, but they have been decided upon, and if we keep them, then
there is a sense of unity and concord, a composed and well-ordered sense
in the community that is inspiring and gives rise to a fruitful field
for the practice of other people.
There are many rules on harmonious conduct in community life: rules
about sustaining and proclaiming gross wrong views; rules that deal with
showing respect towards the Vinaya (the discipline), the Dhamma, the
Order, the Buddha, the elders, and so forth. These attempt not to create
orthodoxy but to create standards of orthopraxy. The Buddha's emphasis
was on unanimity of practice so that the good field of the Dhamma-Vinaya
and the field of the Sangha were kept in good order for the welfare of
others and for future generations.
The other universal aspect of the Lord Buddha's approach was the attempt
to keep Dhamma-Vinaya available to the lay people. There was
encouragement for bhikkhus to teach. There was a time when the bhikkhus
just used to sit and meditate and be quiet and the lay people complained
the monks just sat there all night long, 'dumb like hogs'. And the
Buddha said, 'Bhikkhus, I allow you to talk on the Dhamma.' So they
started talking on Dhamma. In other words, the concept of social
responsibility was introduced - which wasn't a concept in the Wanderers'
vocabulary. Note: the bhikkhus were to act out of a sense of
responsibility rather than a desire to win favour or support.
Many training rules that sustain a life of mendicancy grew out of a need
to develop a relationship with lay people, to keep Dhamma-Vinaya
accessible to them and in their minds. A bhikkhu's life is one of having
little personal storage of items. Even when we have established
monasteries, we use communal stores; we renounce personal ownership and
go to a storeman to ask for permission for this or for that. This is a
good training because one doesn't start taking requisites for granted.
Lay people can 'make invitation' (pavarana - the invitation to ask them
for any requisites the monk or nun may need), but there are rules to
make sure that one does not take advantage of such offers by asking or
constantly badgering people for things.
Also, there are observances that conform to the social customs of that
time, designed to present an appearance that was polite, graceful, and
pleasing to the lay people. Many of the sekhiya rules work on this
level. When we understand this principle, we see the need to investigate
what is suitable and what is offensive to the social customs of the age.
If we do what's appropriate, we can feel that we are working in harmony
with what the Lord Buddha taught and what the Dhamma is about.
So you see how this non-sectarian and universalist approach of the
Buddha makes it very important for the Bhikkhu-Sangha to try to sustain
an appearance that is inspiring, to live in harmony and concord, to
avoid activities that give rise to bad reputation or to people's not
being inspired by the Holy Life, and to agree to abide within rules and
regulations. So it was that, from the basis of the Wanderers' rejection
of conventions and spirit of independent inquiry, there arose a very
distinctive order, whose conventions are for its own welfare and for the
welfare of the many.
Forest Sangha Newsletter: July 1992, Number 21
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