Forest Recollections

[camerata]

This is a fascinating book by Dr Kamala Tiyavanich about the Thai Forest Tradition and its place in Thai Buddhism as a whole. Apparently the book started out as a dissertation, and traces the regional traditions of Thai Buddhism and how they were forcibly absorbed into modern state Buddhism.

In particular, it follows the lives of Ajarn Man and nine of his disciples in the thudong tradition, how they practised and how that wandering life came to an end. The first half of the book is pretty exciting, describing the rich variety of regional Buddhist traditions upcountry and the trials and tribulations of thudong monks who had to face hardship, disease, wild animals, ghosts, spirits, demons and their own fear in the jungle and charnel grounds.

There is also an interesting chapter on "sexual desire," in which we read about village women seducing monks, wanting to marry them, flashing their bodies at them (What is it with Thai women and monks?), and the early 20th century custom in some villages of girls going naked from the waist up. There is even a scene where Aj Cha has to do walking meditation deep in the jungle naked from the waist down because his robes were stimulating him too much as he walked. His reaction to the complaints this episode received when his biography was published in the 60s was, "Let them complain..."

But worse than sex was the danger of an unworldly monk falling in love (at first sight) with a village girl.

The second half of the book is a bit more dissertation-like as it describes developments in the second half of the 20th century. Bangkok-based Sangha officials (who generally advocated "polite" behaviour - living in a temple - and Pali study for monks) looked down on the wandering, meditating monks who they thought of as country bumpkins, but enlisted their help in bringing Dhamma to villagers so that more Thammayut monasteries could be built upcountry. Thudong monks were happy to teach Dhamma to villagers and wean them off animism and spirit worship. Ironically, though, as villagers lost their fear of fierce forest guardian spirits they began to cut down the trees and cultivate the land, and this was the beginning of the end for Thailand's forests and the original thudong practice.

It was followed by Sarit and his development policies of building roads and destroying forests that could hide communist insurgents. Wandering thudong monks became suspects and eventually had to settle in monasteries for their own safety. The final absurdity was that some of these meditation monks then became fashionable and famous, and had various titles conferred on them.

All in all, it's an inspiring book but a sad one. British and French colonialism forced Thailand to rapidly centralize control over the country and religion, and to force a standardized, "rational" Buddhism on the whole country so as not to be seen as backward/primitive by foreign governments and Christian missionaries.

Perhaps the only good thing to come out of this was that with these meditation monks forced to stay in one place, more people - including Westerners - had the opportunity to learn from them.

This is a must-read for anyone interested in Theravada Buddhism or Thai culture, as far as I'm concerned. Dr Kamala is at Cornell University. Her ajarn is David Wyatt, author of Thailand: A Short History.

Edited March 20, 2005 by camerata

[Abandon]

Thanks for the heads up - will look out for it. I read the Ajahn Man biography by Ajahn Maha Bua which gave a great insight into that period and the way things worked with the forest monks. Bit of a stodgy read, but well worth it.