Thailand: Little Hope For Nuns In New Draft Bill

[sabaijai]

Thailand: Little hope for nuns in new draft bill

by SANITSUDA EKACHAI, May 8, 2008

Source: Buddhist Channel

Bangkok, Thailand -- Any mae chee or white-robed nun who believes she will get legal status as a monastic member under new legislation pushed by the elders will be in for a big disappointment.

No, the nuns will not get any legal status as clerics. That is crystal clear in the Support and Protection for Buddhism draft bill. Worse, any freedom they enjoy now will be clipped.

Don't blame the nuns if they feel betrayed.

It is a well-known fact that our home-grown mae chee have long suffered lack of support for their spiritual pursuits, being primarily treated as temple hands.

They must have welcomed the change when the Office of National Buddhism announced that it was sponsoring a bill that would recognise nuns as clerics and support their dharma work.

Who can blame their optimism? Amnart Buasiri from the Ecclesiastical Council Secretariat himself said the bill would make the nuns nak buat or clerics.

But truth be told, the draft bill does not define the nuns as clerics. The mae chee, it says, are practising Buddhist laywomen or upasika who wear white robes, shave their heads, observe eight precepts and live a homeless life.

And although the draft bill will not recognise the mae chee as monastic members, it orders mae chee to be under the clergy's control.

When it comes to financial support for the mae chee's work, however, the clergy wants nothing of it. The draft bill clearly stipulates that this is the government's duty, not the clergy's.

Wonder why many women seek the path of Bhikkhuni? Or why many prefer to engage in dharma work independently?

Before the setting up of the Nuns Institute, a self-regulated body, the nuns were under the clergy's paralysing control which chained them to temple kitchens, said senior mae chee Arun Pet-urai.

Her call for clarification of mae chee's rights in the new structure does not only echo her peers' concerns, it also shows they have not been consulted at all.

Talk about lack of respect.

Interestingly, the elders' draft bill does not mention the Nuns Institute at all. The nuns, it says, must be under direct control of the clergy.

Get the picture?

If the nuns get a poor deal in the Support and Protection for Buddhism draft bill, it is because the clergy's principal goal is not about justice but power.

Out of 43 articles, only one is about the mae chee. The full control of mae chee, to be exact.

The rest is about getting the government to pay for the clergy's propagation work and to protect them from perceived threats - particularly the mass media.

It is a watered-down version of the same draft bill which was rejected by the National Legislative Assembly last year. Remember its controversial clause on monks' sexual misconduct which punished only women, not the monks?

This clause has been removed. But the rest is more of the same, although legal punishment has been reduced.

For example, the punishment for the mass media for portraying the clergy in a bad light is a maximum five years' jail term and/or 100,000 baht fine, down from 10 years and 500,000 baht.

Still, this is much higher than legal punishment in the defamation law.

The same severe punishment is meted out for those perceived to "imitate" and "distort" the teachings - a stern message for new religious groups, particularly the emerging Bhikkhuni movement.

And although religious sites, icons and rituals are cultural matters that change over time and vary from place to place, the clergy prohibits any changes without its approval.

Those who do so face heavy punishment.

The message is clear. The clergy owns the teachings, the rituals, the icons, the sites. They alone can reap the benefits.

For accuracy, this draft bill should be called the Support and Protection of the Clergy, not Buddhism.

For clearly this is but a case of abusing Buddhism for clique power.

[rockyysdt]

Thailand: Little hope for nuns in new draft bill

by SANITSUDA EKACHAI, May 8, 2008

Source: Buddhist Channel

Bangkok, Thailand -- Any mae chee or white-robed nun who believes she will get legal status as a monastic member under new legislation pushed by the elders will be in for a big disappointment.

No, the nuns will not get any legal status as clerics. That is crystal clear in the Support and Protection for Buddhism draft bill. Worse, any freedom they enjoy now will be clipped.

For accuracy, this draft bill should be called the Support and Protection of the Clergy, not Buddhism.

For clearly this is but a case of abusing Buddhism for clique power.

Who actually controls what is decided in such bills?

[sabaijai]

Digging around, I came across this 4 Sep 1996 article about a similar bill back then, by the same author.

Crusading for nun's rights

What does a feminist lawyer do when she becomes a nun? One would expect her to use her commitment to gender equality to push for legal change to improve the low social status of the sisterhood.

This is exactly what Khunying Kanittha Wichiencharoen is doing. The 76-year-old former feminist, lawyer, and social worker who took up the sisterhood in 1992 is lobbying for a bill which will give nuns legal status and entitle them to financial assistance from the government.

For the nun community, this is bad news. As in exchange for this legal status, they must sacrifice the present equality of their sisterhood and their work flexibility and be governed by an autocratic bureaucracy. And under the proposed bill, punishment for dissents is severe — disrobement.

Are nuns blind to women's rights? They say they are not. It is only that they believe this official recognition comes at too high a price.

"Such laws will hurt, not help us," said Arun Pet-urai, 63, secretary of the Thai Nuns Institute, echoing other nuns' sentiments. More importantly, however, the proposed bill violates the Dhammavinaya: the code of conduct set by Buddha which determines the self governing status and democratic participation of monks and nuns in their communities.

"We cannot allow secular laws to distort Buddha's teachings," agrees Sansanee Sthirasuta, 43, a nun leader.

The Nuns Institute believes there are between 4,000 and 5,000 nuns nationwide but other estimates put the number as high as 20,000. Whatever the figure, the head-shaven, white-robed mae chi as they are called are looked down upon and suffer discrimination wherever they go.

Monks oppose the ordination of women on the grounds that, as ruled by Buddha, women can only be ordained by senior bhikshuni, the female equivalent of monks in Theravada Buddhism, Thailand's dominant sect.

But since this lineage of female priests died out long ago, there is no one who can now ordain them properly. And it is absolutely unthinkable that bhikshuni could simply be reintroduced.

Therefore, Thai women who want to lead a religious life have to settle for the status of mae chi who subscribe to only eight precepts compared to the 227 monks follow, giving them an inferior status.

Outside religious circles, it is widely believed that young nuns have entered the sisterhood because they are broken-hearted while old nuns living at monasteries are perceived as mere temple hands. And beggars posing as nuns only worsen their already lowly image.

Unlike monks, nuns get very little social support and must work, usually in menial jobs, to support themselves. Many nunneries grow their own food to cut expenses. Despite their religious commitment, nuns have an ambiguous legal status and state policies towards them are inconsistent.

For example, the Interior Ministry bars them from voting because they are categorised as clerics. But other state agencies legally regard them as lay women.

Finally, due to its low status, the sisterhood rarely attracts urban, educated women, leaving its ranks to be filled by chao ban — villagers who have long been a voiceless group.

Despite discrimination, many nuns excel in dhamma practice and in social work, especially in rural areas.

Nuns' Bill — Wrong Model

It is against this background of discrimination that Khunying Kanittha is lobbying for better recognition for nuns.

"Can you imagine? There is not even a single word in Thai law that recognises the existence of mae chi. This needs to be changed," said the outspoken nun, who has already enlisted the legislative support of Deputy Education Minister Chaowarin

Latthasaksiri who is in charge of religious affairs.

"I'm sure the female MPs will also help lobby for the passage of the bill," added the pioneer of women's rights.

In a bid to head off any opposition, Khunying Kanittha chose the 1962 Monks' Bill as her blueprint — a strategy that may backfire.

The notorious bill was imposed on the monk community by the late military strongman Marshal Sarit Thanarat. It centralized the clergy's hierarchical and feudal administration, and entrusted absolute power to the Ecclesiastic Council. But according to the Dhammavinaya, any group of five or more monks can operate as an independent monk community, or sangha.

Apart from self government, Buddha also ruled that sangha decisions must be democratic and participatory with the Dhammavinaya as the sole code of conduct and seniority determined by years in the monkhood, not position.

Although the authoritarian Monks' Bill violates these democratic principles, no monk dared to challenge the all-powerful Ecclesiastic Council whose rigidity and inefficiency is often blamed for the current weakness of the clergy which is obsessed with materialism and ruled by favouritism.

But Khunying Kanittha argues that she only kept the positive parts of the Monks' Bill, adapted and adding to it as necessary.

After discussions with other leading nuns, it was agreed that the nun community should not be ruled as monks are under a feudal system with an aristocratic council and a royalty-like figure head.

And aware of possible opposition from monks who may see nuns as rivals, the proposed bill also states that mae chi are not the same as bhikshuni which were equal to monks.

But, this is about where the main differences end.

Criticisms

Like the Monks' Bill, the nun's legislation would make the nun's governing body all powerful with the absolute authority to appoint and disrobe members, and to allocate budgets.

"What will happen if this power is in the wrong hands," asked mae chi Sansanee Sthirasuta, a nun of 15 years.

"Any laws concerning nuns or monks should aim to provide a favourable environment for dhamma practice," she continued.

"These laws must help each member to learn from the others and to constantly improve their minds through self discipline, meditation and the development of insight into the laws of nature.

"But the draft Nuns' Bill is control-oriented, thus stimulating rather than thinning greed, anger, and delusions," she added.

While most opposition to the bill from nuns is on religious grounds, renowned Buddhist thinker and reformist Professor Prawase Wasi, attacks it from an organisational point of view.

Power-centred bureaucracies, he claims, be it a government or a clergy, cannot cope with the complex and rapid changes of the modern world.

And as even novices subscribe to at least 10 precepts, nuns, who only practise eight, can never be considered clerics. Santisuk explained.

The Nuns' Bill's rationale that it will prevent imposters is also weak, he went on, for there are other laws which can be used to arrest these people.

Alternative secular laws for nuns invite too many problems, Santisuk says adding that he believes a first move is for nuns to increase the number of precepts they practise to at least 10.

In Sri Lanka, which also practises Theravada Buddhism, women can live a strict religious life as female novices. Although they cannot become bhikshuni, upon reaching the age of 20, they can continue being a cleric and are called 10-precept nuns.

"Thai nuns can do the same," he said. Mae chi Arun and mae chi Sansanee agreed that it is the nuns' own purity of dhamma practice which will eventually win them public faith and respect. "It is true that we nuns want recognition of our existence," said mae chi Arun. "But this proposed bill goes too far"!

"We have been working for our own spirituality and society without legal status. If it limits our ability to work, then we certainly don't need it."

[Richard W]

From a quoted article: Monks oppose the ordination of women on the grounds that, as ruled by Buddha, women can only be ordained by senior bhikshuni, the female equivalent of monks in Theravada Buddhism, Thailand's dominant sect.

But since this lineage of female priests died out long ago, there is no one who can now ordain them properly. And it is absolutely unthinkable that bhikshuni could simply be reintroduced.

Is this accurate? I thought Thailand had, in the past few years, acquired a few bhikkhunis from a Mahayana (Korean?) lineage. Can monks and nuns switch sect without losing their individual status?

[sabaijai]

Yes there are bhikkhunis in Thailand who have been ordained by Mahayana monks or nuns. They are not recognised as fully ordained by the Theravada establishment.

[bankei]

There are now around 20 Bhikkhuni in Thailand. Have a look at www.thaibhikkhuni.com for the latest.

Most are now being ordained in Sri Lanka, although I think some have been ordained in Chiangmai by Thai monks.

[Nampeung]

Where is Ajhan Chatsuman ?

[Nampeung]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhammananda_Bhikkhuni

[sabaijai]

The first wave of current Sri Lankan bhikkunis were also ordained in the Mahayana tradition and hence this lineage is likewise not recognised by the Thai Sangha. For those who may have missed them, there are a couple of extensive threads here on the topic, including info on Dhammananda:

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Mae-Chee-Bik...mp;hl=bhikkhuni

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Future-Bhikk...mp;hl=bhikkhuni

And a general search here:

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/search.html&...te=%2Bbhikkhuni

Strictly speaking there is no Theravada bhikkhuni lineage with the same vinaya-sanctioned validity as the various bhikkhu lineages. In the Thai orthodox view these bhikkhunis fall in the same category as Santi Asoke, in other words they have no clerical status in Thailand. Perhaps one day, as the female leadership clearly harbour ambitions of this nature. It's tricky because it begs the question, what constitutes an legitimately ordained monk? I get the feeling many male leaders in the Sangha would like to ordain women but they can't find a way for it not to conflict with the Vinaya.