• Corpus ID: 170795852

Going against the grain:A historical and comparative analysis of renunciationand celibacy in Indian Buddhist monasticisms

@inproceedings{Hemthep2014GoingAT,
  title={Going against the grain:A historical and comparative analysis of renunciationand celibacy in Indian Buddhist monasticisms},
  author={Phramaha Sakda Hemthep},
  year={2014}
}

• Phramaha Sakda Hemthep
• Published 1 August 2014
• Political Science

This research is concerned with the concept of renunciation and celibacy
in Buddhist traditions, and how it has evolved with respect to
institutional, social and cultural aspects. The goal of this study is to trace
the history of renunciation to Indian contexts and show how the practice
of celibacy has evolved in Buddhist Monasticisms.
I hypothesise that the practice of celibacy is the most significant concept
in maintaining Buddhist communal institutions. It can be used as the
moral standard and ethical norm for both Buddhist monks and lay people.
It has always existed alongside the growth and ramification of Buddhist
sects and sectarian schools. Buddhism arose as one of the reformist
śramaṇa traditions that opposed the Vedic sacrificial rituals of
Brahmanism. The success of the śramaṇa movements made celibacy a
central virtue within the broad spectrum of Indian religions, even that of
the Brahmaṇism. The value placed on celibacy resulted in Brahmanism
having to adapt and reinterpret celibate and renunciatory values.
Although the early Mahāyāna shows new forms of religious practice
oriented around devotion to bodhisattvas, there is no evidence that
Mahāyāna attempted to denigrate the monastic life. However, as
Mahāyāna evolved fully, it became strongly critical of the arhat ideal of
the Śrāvakayāna. With the development of the new teaching of upāya
‘skill in means’, Mahāyāna undertook the greatest degree of doctrinal
adaptation, which may be seen as to deviate considerably from earlier
Nikāya Buddhism. Consequently, the bodhisattvas are permitted to
violate the monastic vow of celibacy. The root of monasticism was thus
threatened. This was connected with the emergence of married monks in
Kāśmir followed by Nepal. In Japan, although Buddhism was faced with
the same phenomenon, clerical marriage obviously lies in the ideology of
mappō, a belief in the decline of the Buddhist doctrine.