Religion, Equality And Discrimination Flashcards
What is the Buddhist text that details the first ordination of a nun and the requirements attached to it?
The Cullavagga contains the story of how the Buddha ordained the first nun, Mahapajapati-Gotami (his aunt and foster mother), and the rules he stipulated for nuns, the Eight Garudhammas.
Who asked the Buddha to ordain women?
Mahapajapati-Gotami, the Buddha’s aunt and foster mother, requested that she be ordained as a bhikkhuni (nun). She was later joined by his disciple Ananda. The Buddha eventually relented after some resistance to the idea.
What are the Eight Garudhammas?
The Buddha stated that women could be ordained as Bhikkhunis only if they accepted the Eight Garudhammas. They are as follows:
- A bhikkhuni must bow down and give salutations to a bhikkhu, no matter how senior the bhikkhuni is or how recently the bhikkhu was initiated.
- A bhikkhuni must not spend a Vassa (the rainy season) in a district where there is no bhikkhu.
- Every two weeks a bhikkhuni should ask the bhikkhu sangha for the date of a particular ceremony and the time where a bhikkhu will give a talk.
- At the end of Vassa, all bhikkhu is should come before a sangha of both bhikkhus and bhikkhunis for an admission of faults.
- A Bhikkhuni that has admitted a daily must have this considered by a sangha of both bhikkhus and bhikkhunis.
- After two years as a novice, a bhikkhuni is to ask for higher ordination from a sangha of both bhikkhus and bhikkhunis.
- A bhikkhuni must never ‘revile or abuse’ a bhikkhu.
- An official warning or reprimand cannot be issued by a bhikkhuni to a bhikkhu, but the opposite ‘is not forbidden’.
(1, 6 and 8 are the most important toy remember)
What did the Buddha say the ordination of women would do to the longevity of the Dharma?
He stated that the Dhamma would go from lasting 1000 years to 500 years.
More specifically, the Buddha stated that ‘If, Ananda, women had not received permission to go out from the household life and enter the homeless state, under the doctrine and discipline proclaimed by the Tathagata, then would the pure religion, Ananda, have lasted long, the good law would have stood for a thousand years, but since, Ananda, women have now received that permission, the pure religion, Ananda, will not now last so long, the good law will stand fast for only five hundred years.’
What does the Buddha compare the ordination of women to?
The Buddha compares it to a blight falling upon a field of sugar-cane.
What has complicated the ordination of bhikkhunis in Theravada Buddhism?
The Theravada bhikkhuni sangha died out in the 11th century. As a result, no new bhikkhunis can be ordained due to the requirement for a dual bhikkhu and bhikkhuni sangha for ordination.
What are some of the interpretations of the Cullavagga used to justify ordaining women.
Some take a non-literal view of the text, stating that the Buddha was a product of his social milieu (the ordination of women itself was quite controversial for the time), or that the patriarchal elements in the Cullavagga were later additions; in both cases the statements made about women can be discarded. However, these views are criticized for degrading the authority of the Buddha and the Vinaya Pitaka respectively.
It has also been argued that the Buddha’s imposition of the Garudhammas and his hesitation to ordain women came out of a desire to keep the women safe and the sangha safe from accusations of sexual misconduct; therefore in the spirit of the Buddha’s teachings, women should be ordained. However, it can be argued that the spirit of the Buddha’s teachings cannot be separated from his explicit command.
Some have attempted to ordain women through the bhikkhu sangha alone, or through an extant Chinese bhikkhuni sangha. These attempts have been rejected by some, including the Central Sangha Council in Thailand, due to the former not being permitted by the Garudhammas, and the latter because it involves a ‘cross-sangha’ with Mahayana and Theravada influences.
It has also been argued that the Buddha does not address bhikkhunis or women in general as inferior to their male counterparts in other texts and statements. Both can attain enlightenment, therefore people should not be restricted by their gender from following the bhikkhuni path. It can, however, be argued that what the Buddha states elsewhere does not negate what he said in the Cullavagga.
What chapter of the Lotus Sutra is linked with whether women can be enlightened?
Chapter 12 of the Lotus Sutra, titled Devadatta, is often cited in discussions surrounding whether women can become enlightened in Buddhism.
What does the Buddha say about Devadatta in chapter 12 of the Lotus Sutra?
The Buddha states that Devadatta will one day become a buddha named Devaraja who will ‘enlighten innumerable sentient beings’.
That Devadatta, often the antagonist in stories about the Buddha and considered to be an embodiment of evil within the religion, can become enlightened is evidence that all can obtain Buddhahood.
What is the relationship between the chapter Devadatta and women.
In the chapter, the Boddhisattva Manjushri praises the eight year old daughter of the Dragon King, saying that she ‘instantly produced the thought of enlightenment and has attained the stage of non-retrogression’ and that ‘she has a harmonious mind and has attained enlightenment’. She then suddenly appears before the host of Bodhisattvas.
Sariputra, representative of Theravada Buddhism challenges Majushri and the dragon king’s daughter on this claim, arguing that ‘because the body of a woman is filthy and impure, not a vessel for the Dharma’, she could not not attain ‘unexcelled awakening’.
Seeing this, the Dragon King’s daughter gives the Buddha a precious jewel, which the Buddha states was ‘done extremely quickly’. She then claims that she can become a Buddha even more quickly. Those assembled then saw her ‘instantly transformed into a male, take up the bodhisattva practice, and immediately go to a world named Spotless, in the southern region, where, sitting upon a lotus blossom, she attained impartial, proper awakening. With the thirty two characteristics and eighty different attractive features she proclaimed the wonderful Dharma to all living beings everywhere in the universe’.
How has the story of the Dragon King’s Daughter been interpreted by Buddhists?
It has been argued that the story demonstrates that ‘male’ and ‘female’ are only designations of the transient form of a human being, and that in reality gender is not an inherent attribute of a person, but a relative and conditioned label.
Adjectives such as ‘male’ and ‘female’, then, can be seen as conventional truth describing a person’s gender, rather than ultimate truth, which is that there is no ‘male’ or ‘female’.
Rita Gross, a prominent Buddhist feminist, explores the story with reference to the concept of sunyata (emptiness). To her, the story demonstrates that conventional signs do not determine a person’s identity, for ‘neither the Naga [dragon] princess nor the bodhisattva, nor the Buddha has fixed existence’.
One could also trace back to the initial story of Devadatta’s eventual enlightenment as evidence that anyone can become enlightened.
What is the significance of the Therigatha in the debate about whether women can be enlightened?
The Therigatha, a text included in the Khuddaka Nikaya of the Sutta Pitaka, was written by elder nuns, written in the first century BCE by a group of nuns.
The central theme of the book is enlightenment. Within it, one of the bhikkhunis is confronted by Mara, who declares that ‘Whatever was reached by the sages, a state hard to originate; women with two-fingered wisdom, cannot reach it’.
The bhikkhuni replies ‘what matters womanhood, when the mind is well-restrained; with the precede of knowledge, seeing phenomena rightly with insight. Pleasure is fully destroyed everywhere, the aggregate of darkness shattered. Know thus, O Evil One, I have defeated you.’
The Therigatha is therefore critical, though often overlooked, as it establishes women as equals to men in attaining enlightenment.
What has Rita Gross called for in her book Buddhism After Patriarchy?
In Buddhism After Patriarchy, Rita Gross calls for a ‘revalorisation’ of Buddhism revealing the ‘massive undercurrents of sexism and prejudice against women’ and ‘repairing the tradition, often bringing it much more in line with its fundamental values’.
What are the four levels of androcentrism described by Rita Gross? What did they do to the religion?
Rita Gross has described four levels of androcentrism within Buddhism that have resulted in a religion where women rarely make up the leadership structures of the faith, despite being a core part of the lay following. The four levels are as follows:
- Texts and stories made by men and about men were far more likely to be recorded and preserved than stories and texts for and about women.
- Texts and stories about women are given second place to their male counterparts, such as the Therigatha.
- Western Buddhist scholarship follows these trends within Buddhism while presenting its own version of Buddhism.
- Buddhism in the west and in the east becomes ‘unrelenting in its androcentrism’.
What does Rita Gross say about the relationship between Buddhism and feminism?
Rita Gross states that there is ‘profound sympathy between Mahayana ethics and some of the most important insights of feminism’ due to the Bodhisattva’s goal of ending suffering for all sentient beings; this goal fits in with those of feminism.
She also states that when Buddhism is being true to itself and its fundamental values ‘it manifests the same vision as does feminism’.
