Debating a monk is dukkha

Have you ever tried to point out to a monk that he just might be full of shit? It’s not an easy thing to do, because let me tell you, some monks are very adept at turning the tables and making you out to be the problem, that it’s your delusion operating here, not theirs.

I stumbled into such a debate after seeing a post on the Heartland Singapore Facebook page. It was referring to a post at buddhavacana.net, which appears to be a message board. There are other, blog-like pages on this site, but it doesn’t appear to be very active. Anyway, you can read my heresy by following the link I provided.

The gist of this began with a question emailed to the monk administering the page: “Can a gay person be ordained as a monk/nun?”

Bhante Shi Chuanguan replied with this: “Heterosexual men and women have to transcend their heterosexual desires if they are going to be ordained. Similarly, gay person can be ordained as a monk/nun, as long as this person can transcend this inclination.”

Me thinks I detect a double standard here.

As an aside, the Venerable Ashin Sopaka had a very pithy comment on the Heartland Facebook page, to which I will return later. But my response on the forum was to say I thought the answer provided, as well as an answer provided by another presumed monastic, was drawing a distinction between straight people seeking ordination and gays seeking ordination, that each was to be treated differently.

The Bhante said that straights had to “transcend their heterosexual desires,” while a gay person had to “transcend this inclination.”

This inclination? So the straight person need only renounce his or her sexual desires, while the gay has to renounce being gay? In other words, renounce his or her sexuality. What’s up with that?

You can read my entire reply on the message board, as I waxed very eloquent and pontificated like a true queen in heat. Perhaps that was a bit rash, because Bhante replied and suggested that, “Your inference that there is such a prejudicial idea is what is prejudicial.”

Moi? OK, OK, you can read my reply to that bit of obfuscation, because clearly this Bhante wanted to paint me the ignorant dualistic thinking bitter fag and a poor victim of all that nasty hate in the world, which, I would point out, often begins with narrow-minded and atavistic interpretations of religious doctrine by Paleolithic thinkers such as him. But I digress.

What I want to do is now return to Ashin Sopaka’s comment on the Heartland Facebook page. Ashin Sopaka succinctly points out that apparently the requirement to enter the monastery and seek ordination is to already be an enlightened being. Doesn’t the requirement that a gay first “transcend this inclination” mean that one must have renounced all notion of self, which can only be achieved upon enlightenment?

Seems to me that all the monastic code requires is that the monk or nun abstains from any form of sexual activity. That living in a monastery is the venue through which a monk or nun practices the doctrine to eventually transcend all fabricated notions of identity, whether they are sexual or otherwise. What “inclinations” remain in the unenlightened mind is irrelevant to anyone else in the monastery, as it is the duty of the monk or nun to peel back the layers of delusion and clinging within his or her own mind to ultimately attain freedom.

I’m sure Bhante Shi Chuanguan is a very wise man and knows his Dhamma pretty well. But his understanding of gay people, in my opinion, is no better than your average homophobe.

Update: I am pleased to say that Shi Chuanguan replied to my comments in a manner suggesting that we are coming together to a closer understanding.

Chicago temple gets some unwelcomed attention

Well drat, I missed an opportunity this weekend to join a group of protesters rallying outside of a Chicago-area Theravada temple, bringing attention to allegations that a monk at the temple had sexually assault a girl there. I only found out about it via Barbara O’Brien’s blog the day after the demonstration. Had I known about this event, I would certainly have gone.

There was also a related demonstration in Long Beach, Calif. I love the quote from the Orange County Chapter of SNAP, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, which organized the two demonstrations: “It’s a different religion, but it’s the same story.”

I wrote about this situation not too long ago, and my conclusion then remains the same: There needs to be some type of oversight of these temples, regardless of whether they be Theravada, Zen, Tibetan – whatever. But the reality of the situation remains true as well, because these organizations do have members, and these members are the ones who should be raising hell about this.

As mentioned in my earlier post, I had contacted some monks I know for their thoughts. Two replied to my queries with the same message: While the monk’s action is deplorable, these “ethnically oriented” temples are not interested in outside pressure to police monks and we “outsiders” should just leave them alone and let them figure out how to deal with this on their own.

Now this is where my reaction could easily be taken out of context to portray me as a reactionary anti-immigration xenophobe, because to that notion of just “let them deal with it themselves” I say a loud and forceful, “Fuck that!”

We are in America, not Thailand or Cambodia, or anywhere else where the locals might sheepishly avoid confrontation with their religious leaders. And while I have no problem with immigrants bringing with them their homeland culture to add richness and diversity to our American culture, when that culture is one of silence and fear, then fuck that. You can send that attitude back on the boat.

Regardless of what this monk told his Sangha, regardless of what the Vinaya says about this, there is the Third Precept, which in numerous places throughout the Tipitika identifies inappropriate sexual contact with a child as constituting sexual misconduct.

This monk doesn’t need to go back to Thailand. He needs to go to jail.

BTW, the photo with this post is from Bali and has nothing to do with the temple in Chicago. It's just a nice photo of some cute boys with slingshots. Yes, they had slingshots. Hunting for rats maybe?

Who will watch the watchers?

A recent story in the Chicago Tribune has rightly outraged many. The specter of clergy sexually abusing minors has revealed itself in the Sangha, as well as the pernicious practice of enabling the monk perpetrators through “sending them away” to places where they wind up re-offending. The sad thing, in my mind, is that you could substitute “priest” wherever you see “monk” and “Catholic Church” for the temple’s cited. It’s the same enabling behavior: rather than directly dealing with the offender, he is shuffled off to re-offend.

But don’t get carried away with that analogy.

Our reactions to this story, which by the way is not “new” because even this specific event has been developing for more than a decade, reflect both our bewilderment and our anger. But while for many of us our initial reaction is to “rage against the machine,” where does it get us? Is that our best response?

It is easy to see parallels in this situation, which I repeat is nothing new, with what’s happened in the Catholic Church. Both have traditions in which the clergy take vows of celibacy and both are dealing inappropriately with violations of that vow through secrecy and shuffling clergy around. But the similarity ends there.

The Catholic Church is a world-wide organization with a central authority. Its entire administrative structure is based upon this authority, and while the Vatican moves agonizingly slow, it is an authority to which congregants can turn to petition or seek to influence. There is a dearth of similar administrative structures or hierarchies for Buddhism in America, and with Theravada, there are none.

This is not a “Theravada” problem as it is not an institutional problem. Theravada, or the way of the elders, is not broken. Theravada is no more broken than Zen is broken, the latter of which has also seen its share of sexual misconduct among its clergy. To say that there is a problem within Theravada that needs to be addressed is no different from the one made by the editors of “Buddhist Warfare,” that Buddhism has a problem with violence.

There is a problem, yes, but not with Theravada per se.

With the Catholic Church, it is an institutional problem because the failure of appropriate response lies within the institutional hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church. But there is no “institution” of Theravada. All the individual congregations have their own boards that answer to no higher authority. Proclamations of “Theravada, fix yourself” are specious and meaningless.

Whose problem is it then? Because clearly this is a problem that requires our attention. While I knew how I felt, I didn’t know how to respond. So I asked four monks who reside both in the U.S. and Southeast Asia. What can a layperson do? Are there oversight organizations that can be pressured? Reasoned with?

While I have not heard back from all of them, the responses I did receive were simultaneously unsurprising and vexing. It goes back to the culture issue: many of these congregations are based upon an ethnic community that doesn’t have the same tradition of openness and confrontation that we have in America in particular and in the West in general. And the other issue is what ecumenical or administrative organization is there that exists to exert pressure on? When you’re angry, who do you shout at? Who has authority over these sanghas?

Shravasti Dhammika replied, in part, to my query with the following: "I have long been an advocate of the idea that ultimately, to move ahead, Western Buddhists will have to gently and politely ‘part company’ from traditional Asian Buddhism. The values, assumptions and attitudes of the two are just too different...We Westerners have enough problems of our own, getting involved in ethnic Buddhists’ wastes energy, leads to resentment and changes nothing. Let’s walk our own path."

While I do not subscribe to the notion of Hinayana – the Lesser Vehicle – when describing Theravada or the Thai Forest Tradition, the way it is manifested, the practices that it adheres too, certainly make it come off as a teeny-weeny wagon mired in twisted and misogynistic doctrine.

And after viewing the vibrant and at times acrimonious discussion at Sujato’s blog regarding secular Buddhism versus traditional practices, I am increasingly of the mind that Buddhism in America needs a Reformation of its own.

This is an important question for American and other Western Buddhists as more and more Westerners adopt Buddhism while at the same time its various iterations are increasingly co-existing literally closer to each other: Thai and Cambodian Theravada temples within blocks of Tibetan meditation centers that are close to Zen groups operating in store fronts and SGI groups meeting informally in homes in many neighborhoods. No longer are the various schools and vehicles physically separated by countries or other much larger geographic divisions. For crying out loud, I bet 90 percent of the non-Buddhist world thinks that the Dalai Lama is the leader of all Buddhists!

Many of us may rebel against the idea of a “centralized” Buddhist structure that oversees congregations and establishes parameters, and there is merit in their worry. But if Buddhism is allowed to gradually erode into a populist practice in which anyone who writes anything and gets it published is suddenly a guru who doesn’t know or care a whit about Dhamma, then we all might was well start dropping acid right now and walk the road of hedonism and nihilism, because that’s where such a road leads.

Conversely, Buddhism cannot be and never really was a fixed doctrine. Frankly, most of the Vinaya the Buddha made up as he went along, reacting to certain situations that arose at the time. Now that the Buddha’s gone, however, the Vinaya and Tipitika are treated like some sacrosanct text that cannot be changed and even contemplating a review of it would be considered heresy.

Yet it is this blind allegiance to doctrine that gives us a Thai Forest Tradition that can’t come to grips with ordaining women, a Zen culture in which the teacher is considered infallible, a Mahayana sentiment filled with bodhisattvas that can’t pay their own bills but they’re gonna save every sentient being, and a Tibetan culture that deifies superstition.

Things have changed in the monastic community and many of us may not be aware of that. Arun from Angry Asian Buddhist reminded me of an excellent point. In the past, families in Asia sent their children to the Sangha for education, but nowadays, education has been largely secularized. Trips to the Sangha are less frequent. In fact, it is losing support in some regions. Add to this the growing desire and pressure to succeed in life, to get a professional degree; in the past those motivated to learn, think abstractedly and were of high intelligence were attracted to the monastic tradition, but has that attraction disappeared? And if so, how is that affecting the quality of those who do enter the Sangha to seek ordination? If all the smart and ambitious ones are going to graduate school, what does that leave for the Sagha in terms of new recruits?

Granted, the Sangha has done great things for young men who made poor decisions, drank excessively, gambled, used drugs, etc. But some of these men are also being ordained and sent off to the U.S. to guide their own community of immigrants and do so on their own without guidance or support. These young men are placed in positions of authority to watch over a devout and, most likely, naïve congregation.

Who is watching the watchers?

In the meantime, young women and boys are preyed upon by those whom they thought they could trust.

Perhaps it is time that Buddhism in America takes a look at how physicians are managed. Medical doctors who received their degree overseas, but who desire to practice in the U.S., are treated just like residency students and required to go through a residency program before being licensed here. I know two medical doctors, one who received his degree in the Philippines and the other who received his degree in Taiwan. Both are licensed physicians in their home country, but for them to practice in the U.S. they must go through a residency program here just like someone fresh out of an American medical school.

But someone trained to be a Buddhist cleric and ordained in Thailand, Nepal, Japan, or anywhere else can come here and start a congregation with virtually no oversight.

Maybe that needs to change.

Making a chai tae out of a kathoey, or real man out of a fag

Got a sissy-boy child? Send him to a reparative therapist who attests he or she can “straighten” your boy out. Even if it kills him. Literally.

These types of “clinics” and “therapists” were fairly common in the not-too-distant past in the United States, but for the most part have been professionally ridiculed as not only ineffective, but as psychological quackery and mental torture. There remain a few who still push this dangerous fake therapy, the most infamous being the laughable George Rekers.

More recently, similar clinics have turned up in Malaysia, which is led by a homophobic Islamic (is that redundant?) government that has for years been trying to convict a dissident of sodomy. These clinics were for “sissy boys” and asserted they could turn your sissy boy into a real man. Unsurprisingly, many reparative therapists took up the torch – oh, how ironic – to practice this voodoo psychology in Malaysia where they found a willing client: The Malaysian government, which allegedly forced boys into the treatment centers. Despite international condemnation, the Malaysian government essentially replied with a hearty “fuck you.”

A side note: To really understand Malaysia’s antipathy toward gays, you need to know the history behind the government’s attempt to denounce and prosecute dissident Anwar Ibrahim. The government wants to get rid of him so badly, but the only thing they can come up with is an accusation of sodomy.

But I digress. Because that’s not the end of it. While it may not surprise you that conservative Christian groups and Islamic groups continue to support efforts to change one’s sexuality, it may surprise you to learn that Buddhist organizations, teachers and even various Sanghas have been involved in reparative therapy as well. And a recent news report of a particular Thai Sangha’s involvement in treating so-called “ladyboys” infuriates me no end, as this strikes me as a complete corruption of the Dhamma as well as some of the worst kind of homophobia I’ve seen.

To get a good grasp about how this issue operates in Thailand and most of Southeast Asia, one needs to understand both how the Sangha fits into Thai culture, as well as understand the history of the kathoey, or ladyboy, both in Thai culture and Buddhist history. For this explanation, I’m going to rely heavily on a work by Peter A. Jackson called “Male Homosexuality and Transgenderism in the Thai Buddhist Tradition.” Granted, this work dates back to 1993, but it nonetheless presents excellent background on this issue.

There remains a very strong link between the Sangha and lay community in SE Asia, where families in Thailand, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia send their boys to the Sangha for short periods where they learn Dhamma and live as a novice monk. Some decide to stay. Most return to their families and lay life. This is such a strong tradition that a recent survey revealing that many Thais no longer support the Sangha like they had in the past has made headlines in the local press.

Many may have a perspective that Thais are generally very tolerant and accepting of homosexuality. After all, sex clubs have been ubiquitous in Bangkok and Pataya (not as much so in Phuket), and if you type the search terms “ladyboy” and “Thailand” into Google, you’ll get a plethora of results for various websites offering a variety of services performed by such ladyboys.

True, there are no laws against homosexual activity in Thailand as there are in Malaysia to the south, but to conclude that homosexuality is widely accepted in Thailand would be very unskillful. It’s not uncommon for Thai police to raid gay bars just for the hell of it, much like police did in the U.S. during the 1950s and 1960s. What made the attitude different in Thailand from that in the West, Jackson points out, was the Thai attitude toward homosexuality was largely diffused: it lacked a specific target. The AIDS epidemic in Thailand changed all that; it gave people who initially harbored vague feelings of antipathy toward homosexuals an opportunity to target aggressive hatred.

But where did this seed of homophobia come from? Believe it or not, it came from several Thai Buddhist teachers from the past whose homophobic interpretations of the Tipitika have been carried forward by more recent members of the Thai Sangha. As was largely the case with Christianity and Biblical texts, the Buddhist canon contains sections referring to certain, specific sexual activity and attitudes. But given the fact that there was no Western concept of homosexuality 2,500 years ago in Asia, modern Buddhist “interpreters” have tended to force the concept of homosexuality onto Pali terms and descriptions of activity that appear similar to what the Western mind labels as “homosexual.”

Another thing to keep in mind is the Pali canon, and Thai Buddhism in particular, contains a very strong anti-sex message directed specifically toward monks.

“That which is called methunadhamma is explained as: the dhamma of an unrighteous man (asattapurisa), the conduct of the common people, the manners of the low, dhamma which is evil and crude, dhamma whose end is but water, an activity which should be hidden, the dhamma which couples should perform together.” (Vinaya, Vol. 1, p.49)

While the message was strident, it did not differentiate between forms. All types of sex were covered: it didn’t matter what a monk stuck his penis into, such activity always carried the same result – the monk had failed and was usually expelled from the Sangha. But a distaste for all forms of sex, even among the laity, found its way into the commentaries of many Thai Buddhist writers. Jackson writes:

“Significantly, contemporary Thai Buddhist views on laypersons' sexual behaviour are often more proscriptive and extreme than attitudes reflect in the Pali canon or in traditional or popular Thai accounts of Buddhist doctrine and ethics. Phra Buddhadasa's work has been especially influential among educated and middle class Thai Buddhists. However, his views on sexuality are at variance with Thai Buddhism's traditional distinction between lay and clerical ethical conduct. The ethical extremism of Phra Buddhadasa and other contemporary Buddhist reformists in Thailand such as Phra Phothirak results from a clericalising trend whereby ethical demands traditionally made only of monks are now increasingly also being required of laypersons.”

This anti-sex attitude remains to this day not only in the Thai Sangha, but to a large extent within general Thai society among the laity in the form of homophobia.

The term "kathoey" in Thai loosely translates as "ladyboy" and has a somewhat interesting history in Buddhist literature. The term has been translated to include everything from hermaphrodites to being a descriptive term for a weakling or eunuch. The Pali term pandaka has been used to describe virtually any sexual deviant, but was most frequently used to describe homosexual activity. Jackson writes:

“But whether or not Buddhism has been instrumental in influencing the development of the popular Thai notion, a very similar mixing of physical and psychological sex, gender behaviours and sexuality occurs both in the Pali terms pandaka and in the Thai term kathoey. Both terms are parts of conceptual schemes in which people regarded as exhibiting physiological or culturally ascribed features of the opposite sex are categorised together. If Buddhism was not the source of the popular Thai conception of kathoey then at the very least it has reinforced a markedly similar pre-existing Thai cultural concept.”

Jackson further states that the term kathoey has largely transformed in general Thai vernacular to be used to describe any gay man, whether a cross-dresser or straight-acting, so nowadays it essentially translates as "fag."

It is unfortunate that so many Thai commentators and their subsequent followers developed and promoted such anti-gay sentiments as there are some very interesting references in the Pali canon to the Buddha showing great tolerance toward those whose sexual identity did not follow the norm.

There was Ananda, the Buddha’s cousin and personal attendant, who allegedly was born a kathoey in many previous lives and who became an arahant shortly after the Buddha became enlightened. And there is the story of Vakkali, who was enamored with the Buddha. The Buddha rebuked Vakkali for constantly staring lustfully at the Buddha, but his rebuke was not a “stop looking at me that way gay boy,” but rather, stop falling into the trap of sensual attachment. Nonetheless, the Buddha told Vakkali to go away. Jackson writes:

"Vakkali was so shattered by this command that he attempted to kill himself by jumping off a mountain. But deva or spiritual beings informed the Buddha of Vakkali's dejection and he quickly went to the monk's aid in time to save him from committing suicide. With an extremely brief exposition of the dhamma, 'The eyes see dhamma,' the Buddha gave Vakkali the insight he needed in order to attain enlightenment and he immediately attained arahantship."

Nonetheless, there is a proscription against ordaining a pandaka that is attributed to the Buddha based on a tale in the Vinaya about a monk who was running around the Sangha asking the young monks to “fuck me, fuck me.” When they didn’t oblige, the pandaka went to the elephant stables and again pleaded with the men there to “fuck me, fuck me.” When the Buddha heard about this, he expelled the pandaka because he was concerned what the lay community might think about the Sangha. This has created considerable controversy today over whether openly gay men should be allowed to be ordained.

Now we arrive to the year 2011 when effeminate boys are being sent to Sanghas where monks are attempting to transform them from being pandaka or kathoey into real men, or chai tae. At work here is probably centuries of indoctrinated homophobia.

The renunciation of sexual desire, whether same-sex or opposite-sex, is for the monastic community and has everything to do with renouncing sensual pleasure of all types. For the monks to teach these “ladyboys” to become "real men" would mean guiding these boys in the ways of hetero sex. The fact that monks would even venture into that territory at all with young novices strikes me as a serious corruption of Dhamma, as well as a particularly virulent form of homophobia sustained by reactionary abbots who don't know what to do with the ordained ladyboys in their midst.

And again we come back to the psychological trauma such reparative therapy can create in young minds. This isn’t the ending of suffering, this constitutes the nurturing and encouragement of suffering. Many of these boys will simply reject the efforts and return to their previous ways after they leave the Sangha. But others may likely be so traumatized that they commit suicide or develop seriously self-destructive behaviors. From being happy, these boys are “transformed” into miserable waifs.

Shameful. Shameful. Where is Rahula when you need him? Where is the water dipper?

A Teenie Weenie Theravada Wagon Wheelie

I am really riled about how atavistic the Thai Forest tradition is being about the whole bikkhuni ordination situation. They are literally behaving like misogynistic cretins about this. Read John’s post over at Sweep the Dust Push the Dirt as well as Sujato’s posts on what has been happening in Australia, particularly this post.

I know that this is not how I should behave or feel if I am practicing Dhamma correctly, but dag gummit! I don’t have the authority to tell the fellows at Wat Pa Pong they’re behaving like a bunch of junior high school boys. But their efforts to control and quash Western sanghas and their efforts to allow women into the Theravada monastic community is so outlandish, so completely corrupt, and so utterly bold and brazen that it is just like the Soviets sending nuclear missiles to Cuba – it is that provocative.

They have drawn a line in the sand. I say we kick the sand in their face. They must be shamed into retracting their position. And every Buddhist blogger, I urge you to post as much about this so that our thoughts and words get picked up by Google in searches and more people realize just how insane it is that the most peace loving and compassionate world view that there is can’t even find room to allow women to share in its supreme bliss.

And so I have written a song to commemorate this moment. Well, sort of. If you know how to sing “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini,” then you can sing this song too.

Budho doh doh dohohohohohoho

She had a calling for that monastic life
A zillion precepts were no concern
She had a calling for that monastic life
Contemplation is what she yearned

Two three four tell the people what’s the score

It’s that Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Theravada wagon wheelie
Seems it has no room for the gals
An Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Theravada wagon wheelie
The rules were changed by misogynistic pals

Two three four stick around we’ll tell you more

Budho doh doh dohohohohohoho

All the fellows it seemed had achieved their dream
Wearing stylish robes while they set the tone
All the fellows it seemed had achieved their dream
And they wanted to keep it all monochrome

Two three four tell the bikkhus they’re a bore

Budho doh doh dohohohohohoho

Cuz it’s a Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Theravada wagon wheelie
Barely room for fat-assed monastic snobs
An Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Theravada wagon wheelie
They’re really not against the stream but boorish slobs

Two three four let us open up the door

The Buddha said contemplation is supreme
What’s the deal? Just go by what is said?
The Buddha said contemplation is supreme
Even Buddha deigned that thinking dead

Two three four it’s time to see the teaching’s core

Budho doh doh dohohohohohoho

And scrub that Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Theravada wagon wheelie
Let’s open up our minds and breathe the air
Expand that Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Theravada wagon wheelie
And understand that we can make things fair

“Thank you, thank you, thank you, I’m accepting donations at the back of the hall.”

Failing a test or provoking failure: Which is worse?

It’s a lovely Saturday morning and I’m feeling very relaxed, in part knowing that I have completed my personal challenge of blogging every day about a chapter in the Dhammapada. As I finished with that yesterday, I’m feeling like I can take it easy, maybe enjoy the day, go for a hike, and perhaps later catch up with my Frank Zappa blog, which I’ve been neglecting due to the Dhammapada blog posts.

So as I’m enjoying my morning coffee, I read the Kakacupama Sutta: The Simile of the Saw (MN 21, note this link is to only an except of this sutta, not the entire sutta, but it is the excerpt I’m concerned with), I’m getting what the Buddha is teaching here, particularly the similes being used to describe how to control one’s anger. But then I read the example about this woman Lady Vedehika who had a well-known reputation of being calm and gentle. Lady Vedehika also had a slave girl named Kali who is aware of this reputation, so she gets this big idea of “why don’t I test her?” Kali wants to know if Lady Vedehika is truly without anger, or whether Vedehika has anger that just hasn’t been provoked. And that’s what Kali does: she deliberately sets out to provoke anger out of Lady Vedehika and she is so successful that Vedehika goes into a rage and clobbers the slave girl on the head with a rolling pin. So what does that little bitch Kali do? She runs out and tells people that Lady Vedehika’s reputation of being calm and gentle is false, because look here! Our calm and gentle lady clobbered me on the head just because I didn’t get my lazy ass out of bed early enough like I normally do!

Of course, because of this, Lady Vedehika’s reputation gets trashed, all because of that conniving bitch slave girl Kali. And this is used as a lesson to show monks how important it is to abandon anger and not reacted with hatred toward those who might provoke it.

OK, I get that. It is a noble state of affairs to strive for, to develop the calm and serenity so that I completely abandon anger and not react to provocation with anger. But what’s this deal with Kali? In fact, the summary of this sutta provided by Access to Insight describes the story as being about “a wise slave who deliberately tests her mistress's patience.” Wise slave? To me Kali is a conniving little bitch! She deliberately went out of her way to engage in behavior she knew would likely provoke a response, just to satisfy her curiosity as to whether it was really true Lady Vedehika was calm and gentle, or just a bitch waiting to be provoked.

What’s worse here? Lady Vedehika failing a test of her anger? Or Kali deliberately setting out to provoke such a failure?

I could see a couple monks getting together to deliberately test the patience of another monk, because if the tested monk fails, he has the Sangha to help him overcome his hindrance and eventually abandon the unskillful quality. That would have been a much better simile, I think, to present such an example. But that’s not the case in the simile used by the Buddha. In some ways, this sutta is like a Buddhist version of the Book of Job.

It is as if I had a boyfriend, and together as a couple, we enjoyed a reputation of being trusting and loving. And that I also enjoyed a reputation of being trusting and loving because I showed no feelings of being threatened by how my boyfriend hangs out with other friends occasionally, other men who I do not associate with. I exhibit no jealousy because I have no reason to believe that my boyfriend would sleep with any of his friends, despite how good looking they might be. And my boyfriend becomes aware of the reputation of how trusting and loving I am by hearing others comment on it. Maybe they even say to him how lucky he is to have found a partner like me.

But rather than being content with the knowledge, “my boyfriend Richard is such a kind and trusting partner, so trusting he does not worry about me when I go out with other friends. He does not need to worry because I do not, in fact, sleep with any of my other friends. And people tell me how lucky I am because they have jealous boyfriends. What if I test Richard to see if he really is trusting and loving, or if he also can become jealous if he discovers that I flirt shamelessly with other men, and then have a sexual encounter with another man?”

Well gosh, how do you think I’m going to react? I’m not the bloody Buddha. I’m not even a flipping monk. I’m just a guy here, trying to do the best I can, and if you go out and deliberately behave like that, I am going to be mad as hell and I’ll kick your sorry ass out.

Funny, just thinking about this fictitious scenario really has me riled! I guess I should follow the Buddha’s guidance and abandon these unwholesome thoughts and focus on something positive. Like it’s a really freaking beautiful day out, perfect for a hike in the woods!

Bhikkhuvagga: Monks

There’s been a lot of discussion recently about monks, the sangha and finding teachers. We’ve had the ordination of bikkhunis in Australia bunching up some panties in Thailand; others perplexed that their teachers seem to be less than perfect; and many discussions about the nature and direction of the Western sangha. And so I come to chapter 25 in the Dhammapada (only one more to go after this!), and with this background in mind, I look at the Bhikkhuvagga – or Monks – with an eye toward what it can tell me about Buddhism and the Sangha in the here and now.

And my conclusion is that it tells me nothing and everything.

On the one hand, the Bhikkhuvagga presents these idyllic descriptions of monks and a monk’s life.

“Hands restrained,
feet restrained
speech restrained,
supremely restrained —
delighting in what is inward,
content, centered, alone:
he’s what they call
a monk.

A monk restrained in his speaking,
giving counsel unruffled,
declaring the message & meaning:
sweet is his speech.

Dhamma his dwelling,
Dhamma his delight,
a monk pondering Dhamma,
calling Dhamma to mind,
does not fall away
from true Dhamma.”

Verses like these portray some serene individual that doesn’t get angry or even mildly perturbed, so when we encounter a monk who is a human being – and most are I think – the picture doesn’t quite fit. I can remember when I first observed my teacher smoking. I have to admit, I was disappointed! This guy’s a monk and he smokes Winstons! But where is the real problem here? It’s not with him, it’s with me, with my expectations about what a monk is and how a monk should behave. Of course, this doesn’t mean that a monk is not dwelling in the delight of Dhamma just because I perceive the monk is not living up to my own expectations. But because I have these preconceived ideas, I suddenly turn into the Sangha police and start issuing Dhamma tickets!

It’s the last verse, however, that portrays for me everything about monks.

“A young monk who strives
in the Awakened One’s teaching,
brightens the world
like the moon set free from a cloud.”

That image, of a moon set free from a could, is common in the Tipitika. And what I really like about this verse is that what it portrays, someone who lives the Dhamma and brings light to the world, is something that any of us can achieve. Whether we take vows or simply live good lives, we can bring joy to others. We can blow away the clouds over someone’s life, as well as our own. And that’s the beauty of Buddhism for me.

It sort of reminds me of the old story about the man and the starfish. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. A man is walking along the beach and he observes ahead of him someone stooping occasionally and throwing something out to the sea. As he gets closer, he realizes that the man is picking up starfish exposed on the beach from the receding tide and he’s throwing them back to the sea. The man witnessing this asks the other, “Why are you doing this? There are hundreds of starfish on this beach, you can’t possibly save them all. How can this matter?”

The other man just smiled, stooped down to pluck another starfish from the beach and toss it back to the ocean. He then said, “It mattered to that one.”

Just by being positive and striving to live the Dhamma in as much of what I do, I can be like that young monk and brighten a little part of the world.