Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) by Charles Eliot

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Though the Buddha seems to condemn by anticipation the form of the
Vedanta known as the Advaita, this philosophy illustrates the difficulty
of making any statement about the saint after his death. For it teaches
that the saint knows that there is but one reality, namely Brahman, and
that all individual existences are illusion: he is aware that he is
Brahman and that he is not differentiated from the world around him. And
when he dies, what happens? Metaphors about drops and rivers are not
really to the point. It would be more correct to say that nothing at all
has happened. His physical life, an illusion which did not exist for
himself, has ceased to exist for others.

Perhaps he will be nearest to the Buddha's train of thought who attempts
to consider, by reflection rather than by discussion in words, what is
meant by annihilation. By thinking of the mystery of existence and
realizing how difficult it is to explain how and why anything exists, we
are apt to slip into thinking that it would be quite natural and
intelligible if nothing existed or if existing things became nothing.
Yet as a matter of fact our minds have no experience of this nothing of
which we talk and it is inconceivable. When we try to think of
nothingness we really think of space from which we try to remove all
content, yet could we create an absolute vacuum within a vessel, the
interior of the vessel would not be annihilated. The man who has
attained nirvana cannot be adequately defined or grasped even in this
life: what binds him to being is cut[524] but it is inappropriate and
inadequate to say that he has become nothing[525].

CHAPTER XI

MONKS AND LAYMEN

1

The great practical achievement of the Buddha was to found a religious
order which has lasted to the present day. It is known as the Sangha and
its members are called Bhikkhus[526]. It is chiefly to this institution
that the permanence of his religion is due.

Corporations or confraternities formed for the purpose of leading a
particular form of life are among the most widespread manifestations, if
not of primitive worship, at any rate of that stage in which it passes
into something which can be called personal religion and at least three
causes contribute to their formation. First, early institutions were
narrower and more personal than those of to-day. In politics as well as
religion such relatively broad designations as Englishman or Frenchman,
Buddhist or Christian, imply a slowly widening horizon gained by
centuries of cooperation and thought. In the time of the Buddha such
national and religious names did not exist. People belonged to a clan or
served some local prince. Similarly in religious matters they followed
some teacher or worshipped some god, and in either case if they were in
earnest they tended to become members of a society. Societies such as
the Pythagorean and Orphic brotherhoods were also common in Greece from
the sixth century B.C. onwards but the result was small, for the genius
of the Greeks turned towards politics and philosophy. But in India,
where politics had strangely little attraction for the cultured classes,
energy and intelligence found an outlet in the religious life and
created a multitude of religious societies. Even to-day Hinduism has no
one creed or code and those who take a serious interest in religion are
not merely Hindus but follow some sect which, without damning what it
does not adopt, selects its own dogmas and observances. This is not
sectarianism in the sense of schism. It is merely the desire to have for
oneself some personal, intimate religious life. Even in so
uncompromising and levelling a creed as Islam the devout often follow
special _tariqs_, that is, roads or methods of the devotional life, and
these _tariqs_, though differing more than the various orders of the
Roman Catholic Church, are not regarded as sects distinct from ordinary
orthodoxy. When Christ died, Christianity was not much more than such a
_tariq_. It was an incipient religious order which had not yet broken
with Judaism.

This idea of the private, even secret religious body is closely allied
to another, namely, that family life and worldly business are
incompatible with the quest for higher things. In early ages only
priests and consecrated persons are expected to fast and practise
chastity but when once the impression prevails that such observances not
only achieve particular ends but produce wiser, happier, or more
powerful lives, then they are likely to be followed by considerable
numbers of the more intelligent, emotional and credulous sections of the
population. The early Christian Church was influenced by the idea that
the world is given over to Satan and that he who would save himself must
disown it. The gentler Hindus were actuated by two motives. First, more
than other races, they felt the worry and futility of worldly life.
Secondly, they had a deep-rooted belief that miraculous powers could be
acquired by self-mortification and the sensations experienced by those
who practised fasting and trances confirmed this belief.

The third cause for the foundation and increase of religious orders is a
perception of the influence which they can exercise. The disciples of a
master or the priests of a god, if numerous and organized, clearly
possess a power analogous to that of an army. To use such institutions
for the service and protection of the true faith is an obvious expedient
of the zealot: ecclesiastical statecraft and ambition soon make their
appearance in most orders founded for the assistance of the Church
militant. But of this spirit Buddhism has little to show; except in
Tibet and Japan it is almost absent. The ideal of the Buddha lay within
his order and was to be realized in the life of the members. They had no
need to strive after any extraneous goal.

The Sangha, as this order was called, arose naturally out of the social
conditions of India in the time of Gotama. It was considered proper that
an earnest-minded man should renounce the world and become a wanderer.
In doing this and in collecting round him a band of disciples who had a
common mode of life Gotama created nothing new. He merely did with
conspicuous success what every contemporary teacher was doing. The
confraternity which he founded differed from others chiefly in being
broader and more human, less prone to extravagances and better
organized. As we read the accounts in the Pitakas, its growth seems so
simple and spontaneous that no explanation is necessary. Disciples
gather round the master and as their numbers increase he makes a few
salutary regulations. It is almost with surprise that we find the result
to be an organization which became one of the great forces of the world.

The Buddha said that he taught a middle path equally distant from luxury
and from self-mortification, but Europeans are apt to be struck by his
condemnation of pleasure and to be repelled by a system which suppresses
so many harmless activities. But contemporary opinion in India
criticized his discipline as easy-going and lax. We frequently hear in
the Vinaya that the people murmured and said his disciples behaved like
those who still enjoy the good things of the world. Some, we are told,
tried to enter the order merely to secure a comfortable existence[527].
It is clear that he went to the extreme limits which public opinion
allowed in dispensing with the rigours considered necessary to the
religious life, and we shall best understand his spirit if we fix our
attention not so much on the regime, to our way of thinking austere,
which he prescribed--the single meal a day and so on--as on his insistence
that what is necessary is emancipation of heart and mind and the
cultivation of love and knowledge, all else being a matter of
indifference. Thus he says to the ascetic Kassapa[528] that though a man
perform all manner of penances, yet if he has not attained the bliss
which comes of good conduct, a good heart and good mind, he is far from
being a true monk. But when he has the heart of love that knows no anger
nor ill-will, when he has destroyed lust and become emancipated even
before death, then he deserves the name of monk. It is a common thing to
say, he goes on, that it is hard to lead the life of a monk. But
asceticism is comparatively easy; what is really hard is the conversion
and emancipation of the heart.

In India, where the proclivity to asceticism and self-torture is
endemic, it was only natural that penance should in very truth seem
easier and more satisfactory than this spiritual discipline. It won more
respect and doubtless seemed more tangible and definite, more like what
the world expected from a holy man. Accordingly we find that efforts
were made by Devadatta and others to induce the Buddha to increase the
severity of his discipline. But he refused[529]. The more ascetic form
of life, which he declined to make obligatory, is described in the rules
known as Dhutangas, of which twelve or thirteen are enumerated. They are
partly a stricter form of the ordinary rules about food and dress and
partly refer to the life of a hermit who lives in the woods or in a
cemetery.

In the Pitakas[530] Kassapa's disciples are described as _dhutavada_ and
the advantages arising from the observance of the Dhutangas are
enumerated in the Questions of Milinda. It is probable that the Buddha
himself had little sympathy with them. He was at any rate anxious that
they should not degenerate into excesses. Thus he forbade[531] his
disciples to spend the season of the rains in a hollow tree, or in a
place where dead bodies are kept, or to use an alms bowl made out of a
skull. Now Kassapa had been a Brahman ascetic and it is probable that in
tolerating the Dhutangas the Buddha merely intended to allow him and his
followers to continue the practices to which they were accustomed. They
were an influential body and he doubtless desired their adhesion, for he
was sensitive to public opinion[532] and anxious to conform to it when
conformity involved no sacrifice of principle. We hear repeatedly that
the laity complained of some practice of his Bhikkhus and that when the
complaint was brought to his ears he ordered the objectionable practice
to cease. Once the king of Magadha asked the congregation to postpone
the period of retreat during the rains until the next full moon day.
They referred the matter to the Buddha: "I prescribe that you obey
kings," was his reply.

One obvious distinction between the Buddha's disciples and other
confraternities was that they were completely clad, whereas the
Ajivikas, Jains and others went about naked. The motive for this rule
was no doubt decency and a similar thought made Gotama insist on the use
of a begging bowl, whereas some sectaries collected scraps of food in
their hands. Such extravagances led to abuses resembling the degradation
of some modern fakirs. Even the Jain scriptures admit that pious
householders were disgusted by the ascetics who asked for a lodging in
their houses--naked, unwashed men, foul to smell and loathsome to
behold[533]. This was the sort of life which the Buddha called anariyam,
ignoble or barbaric. With such degradation of humanity he would have
nothing to do. He forbade nakedness, as well as garments of hair and
other uncomfortable costumes. The raiment which he prescribed consisted
of three pieces of cloth of the colour called kasava. This was probably
dull orange, selected as being unornamental. It would appear that in
mediaeval India the colour in use was reddish: at present a rather bright
and not unpleasing yellow is worn in Burma, Ceylon, Siam and Camboja.
Originally the robes were made of rags collected and sewed together but
it soon became the practice for pious laymen to supply the Order with
raiment.

2

In the Maha and Culla-vaggas of the Vinaya Pitaka we possess a large
collection of regulations purporting to be issued by the Buddha for the
guidance of the Order on such subjects as ceremonial, discipline,
clothes, food, furniture and medicine. The arrangement is roughly
chronological. Gotama starts as a new teacher, without either followers
or a code. As disciples multiply the need for regulations and uniformity
of life is felt. Each incident and difficulty that arises is reported to
him and he defines the correct practice. One may suspect that many
usages represented as originating in the injunctions of the master
really grew up gradually. But the documents are ancient; they date from
the generations immediately following the Buddha's death, and their
account of his activity as an organizer is probably correct in
substance. One of the first reasons which rendered regulations necessary
was the popularity of the order and the respect which it enjoyed. King
Bimbisara of Magadha is represented as proclaiming that "It is not
permitted to do anything to those who join the order of the
Sakyaputtiya[534]." Hence robbers[535], debtors, slaves, soldiers
anxious to escape service and others who wished for protection against
the law or merely to lead an idle life, desired to avail themselves of
these immunities. This resulted in the gradual elaboration of a code of
discipline which did much to secure that only those actuated by proper
motives could enter the order and only those who conducted themselves
properly could stay within it.

We find traces of a distinction between those Bhikkhus who were hermits
and lived solitary lives in the woods and those who moved about in
bands, frequenting rest houses. In the time of the Buddha the wandering
life was a reality but later most monks became residents in monasteries.
Already in the Vinaya we seem to breathe the atmosphere of large
conventual establishments where busy superintendents see to the lodging
and discipline of crowds of monks, and to the distribution of the gifts
made by pious laymen. But the Buddha himself knew the value of forests
and plant life for calming and quickening the mind. "Here are trees," he
would say to his disciples at the end of a lecture, "go and think it
out[536]."

In the poetical books of the Tripitaka, especially the collections known
as the Songs of the Monks and Nuns, this feeling is still stronger: we
are among anchorites who pass their time in solitary meditation in the
depths of forests or on mountain tops and have a sense of freedom and a
joy in the life of wild things not found in cloisters. These old monkish
poems are somewhat wearisome as continuous reading, but their monotonous
enthusiasm about the conquest of desire is leavened by a sincere and
observant love of nature. They sing of the scenes in which meditation is
pleasant, the flowery banks of streams that flow through reeds and
grasses of many colours as well as the mysterious midnight forest when
the dew falls and wild beasts howl; they note the plumage of the blue
peacock, the flight of the yellow crane and the gliding movements of the
water snake. It does not appear that these amiable hermits arrogated any
superiority to themselves or that there was any opposition between them
and the rest of the brethren. They preferred a form of the religious
life which the Buddha would not make compulsory, but it is older than
Buddhism and not yet dead in India. The Sangha exercised no hierarchical
authority over them and they accepted such simple symbols of union as
the observance of Uposatha days.

The character of the Sangha has not materially changed since its
constitution took definite shape towards the end of the master's life.
It was and is simply a body of people who believe that the higher life
cannot be lived in any existing form of society and therefore combine to
form a confraternity where they are relieved of care for food and
raiment, where they can really take no thought for the morrow and turn
the cheek to the smiter. They were not a corporation of priests and they
had no political aims. Any free man, unless his parents or the state had
a claim on him and unless he suffered from certain diseases, was
admitted; he took no vows of obedience and was at any time at liberty to
return to the world.

Though the Sangha as founded by the Buddha did not claim, still less
exact, anything from the laity, yet it was their duty, their most
obvious and easy method of acquiring merit, to honour and support monks,
to provide them with food, clothes and lodging and with everything which
they might lawfully possess. Strictly speaking a monk does not beg for
food nor thank for what he receives. He gives the layman a chance of
doing a good deed and the donor, not the recipient, should be thankful.

At first the Buddha admitted converts to the order himself, but he
subsequently prescribed two simple ceremonies for admission to the
novitiate and to full privileges respectively. They are often described
as ordinations but are rather applications from postulants which are
granted by a Chapter consisting of at least ten members. The first,
called pabbajja or going forth--that is leaving the world--is effected
when the would-be novice, duly shorn and robed in yellow, recites the
three refuges and the ten precepts[537]. Full membership is obtained by
the further ceremony called upasampada. The postulant, who must be at
least twenty years old, is examined in order to ascertain that he is
_sui juris_ and has no disqualifying disease or other impediment. Then
he is introduced to the Chapter by "a learned and competent monk" who
asks those who are in favour of his admission to signify the same by
their silence and those who are not, to speak. If this formula is
repeated three times without calling forth objection, the upasampada is
complete. The newly admitted Bhikkhu must have an Upajjhaya or preceptor
on whom he waits as a servant, seeing to his clothes, bath, bed, etc. In
return the preceptor gives him spiritual instruction, supervises his
conduct and tends him when sick.

The Chapter which had power to accept new monks and regulate discipline
consisted of the monks inhabiting a parish or district, whose extent was
fixed by the Sangha itself. Its reality as a corporate body was secured
by stringent regulations that under no excuse must the Bhikkhus resident
in a parish omit to assemble on Uposatha days[538]. The Vinaya[539]
represents the initiative for these simple observances as coming not
from the Buddha but from King Bimbisara, who pointed out that the
adherents of other schools met on fixed days and that it would be well
if his disciples did the same. He assented and ordered that when they
met they should recite a formula called Patimokkha which is still in
use. It is a confessional service, in which a list of offences is read
out and the brethren are asked three times after each item "Are you pure
in this matter?" Silence indicates a good conscience. 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.

What has been said above[540] about the daily life of the Buddha applies
equally to the life of his disciples. Like him they rose early,
journeyed or went to beg their only meal until about half-past eleven
and spent the heat of the day in retirement and meditation. In the
evening followed discussion and instruction. It was forbidden to accept
gold and silver but the order might possess parks and monasteries and
receive offerings of food and clothes. The personal possessions allowed
to a monk were only the three robes, a girdle, an alms bowl, a razor, a
needle and a water strainer[541]. Everything else which might be given
to an individual had to be handed over to the confraternity and held in
common and the Vinaya shows clearly how a band of wandering monks
following their teacher from place to place speedily grew into an
influential corporation possessing parks and monasteries near the
principal cities. The life in these establishments attained a high level
of comfort according to the standard of the times and the number of
restrictive precepts suggests a tendency towards luxury. This was
natural, for the laity were taught that their duty was to give and the
Order had to decide how much it could properly receive from those pious
souls who were only too happy to acquire merit. In the larger Viharas,
for instance at Savatthi, there were halls for exercise (that is walking
up and down), halls with fires in them, warm baths and store rooms.

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[542] or rainy season,
residence in a monastery was obligatory. This custom, as mentioned,
existed in India before the Buddha's time and the Pitakas represent him
as adopting it, chiefly out of deference to public opinion. He did not
prescribe any special observances for the period of Vassa, but this was
the time when people had most leisure, since it was hard to move about,
and also when the monks were brought into continual contact with the
inhabitants of a special locality. So it naturally became regarded as
the appropriate season for giving instruction to the laity. The end of
the rainy season was marked by a ceremony called Pavarana, at which the
monks asked one another to pardon any offences that might have been
committed, and immediately after it came the Kathina ceremony or
distribution of robes. Kathina signifies the store of raw cotton cloth
presented by the laity and held as common property until distributed to
individuals.

It would be tedious to give even an abstract of the regulations
contained in the Vinaya. They are almost exclusively concerned with
matters of daily life, dwellings, furniture, medicine and so forth, and
if we compare them with the statutes of other religious orders, we are
struck by the fact that the Buddha makes no provision for work,
obedience or worship. In the western branches of the Christian
Church--and to some extent, though less markedly, in the eastern--the
theory prevails that "Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to
do" and manual labour is a recognized part of the monastic life. But in
India conditions and ideals were different. The resident monk grew out
of the wandering teacher or disputant, who was not likely to practise
any trade; it was a maxim that religious persons lived on alms, and
occupations which we consider harmless, such as agriculture, were held
to be unsuitable because such acts as ploughing may destroy animal life.
Probably the Buddha would not have admitted the value of manual labour
as a distraction and defence against evil thoughts. No one was more
earnestly bent on the conquest of such thoughts, but he wished to
extirpate them, not merely to crowd them out. Energy and activity are
insisted on again and again, and there is no attempt to discourage
mental activity. Reading formed no part of the culture of the time, but
a life of travel and new impressions, continual discussion and the war
of wits, must have given the Bhikkhus a more stimulating training than
was to be had in the contemporary Brahmanic schools.

The Buddha's regulations contain no vow of obedience or recognition of
rank other than simple seniority or the relation of teacher to pupil. As
time went on various hierarchical expedients were invented in different
countries, since the management of large bodies of men necessitates
authority in some form, but except in Lamaism this authority has rarely
taken the form familiar to us in the Roman and Oriental Churches, where
the Bishops and higher clergy assume the right to direct both the belief
and conduct of others. In the Sangha, no monk could give orders to
another: he who disobeyed the precepts of the order ceased to be a
member of it either _ipso facto_, or if he refused to comply with the
expiation prescribed. Also there was no compulsion, no suppression of
discussion, no delegated power to explain or supplement the truth. Hence
differences of opinion in the Buddhist Church have largely taken the
shape of schools of thought rather than of separate and polemical sects.
Dissension indeed has not been absent but of persecution, such as stains
the annals of the Christian Church, there is hardly any record. The fact
that the Sangha, though nearly five hundred years older than any
Christian institution, is still vigorous shows that this noble freedom
is not unsuccessful as a practical policy.

The absence of anything that can be called worship or cultus in Gotama's
regulations is remarkable. He not merely sets aside the older religious
rites, such as prayer and sacrifice; he does not prescribe anything
whatever which is in ordinary language a religious act. For the
Patimokkha, Pavarana, etc., are not religious ceremonies, but chapters
of the order held with an ethical object, and the procedure (the
proposal of a resolution and the request for an expression of opinion)
is that adopted in modern public meetings, except that assent is
signified by silence. It is true that the ceremonial of a religion is
not likely to develop during the life of the founder, for pious
recollection and recitation of his utterances in the form of scripture
are as yet impossible. Still, if the Buddha had had any belief whatever
in the edifying effect of ritual, he would not have failed to institute
some ceremony, appealing if not to supernatural beings at least to human
emotions. Even the few observances which he did prescribe seem to be the
result of suggestion from others and the only inference to be drawn is
that he regarded every form of religious observance as entirely
superfluous.