{"id":923,"date":"2009-11-16T10:53:15","date_gmt":"2009-11-16T10:53:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/onecity\/2009\/11\/women-in-buddhism-the-thai-nun-controversy.html"},"modified":"2009-11-16T10:53:15","modified_gmt":"2009-11-16T10:53:15","slug":"women-in-buddhism-the-thai-nun-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2009\/11\/women-in-buddhism-the-thai-nun-controversy.html","title":{"rendered":"Women In Buddhism: The Thai Nun Controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Rafi Santo<\/b><\/i>, Director of the Interdependence Project<\/a>‘s Integral Activism Program<\/p>\n

\"Women_In_Buddhism.jpg\"<\/a><\/span>In an unprecedented historical act, Ajahn Brahm<\/a> (full name: Ajahn Brahmavamso), a senior monk in the Thai Forest Tradition<\/a> of Theravadin Buddhism<\/a>, conducted a full ordination at his Australian monastery for a
\ngroup of four nuns to make them Bhikkunis, the highest level of
\nBuddhist monastics that women can attain. The ordination is undoubtedly
\na huge move towards re-establishing the extinguished lineage of full
\nfemale monastics in the oldest of the Buddhist traditions, but at the
\nsame time the controversy that it has sparked has served to illuminate
\nhow much work remains to be done within the fight for gender equity in
\nTheravadin monastic communities.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n


\n
The ordination, planned without consultation with the governing
\nbody of the Thai Forest tradition who were only given notice a couple
\nof weeks before it took place, resulted in the Ajahn being given a
\nchoice: state that the ordination was null and void, or have his
\nmonastery revoked of its status as a branch monastery of the Thai
\nForest Tradition.  He bravely chose the latter, and the resulting
\nexpulsion of his monastery has made clear the position of the
\nestablishment: the revival of the Bhikkuni order and granting of full
\nrights to women in the tradition is of less value than preserving the
\nprotocols and “harmony” of a monastic institution that while producing
\nsome of the most awakened teachers and practitioners of the dhamma that
\nthe West has known, has also been dominated by oppressive patriarchal
\npractices for many hundreds of years.<\/p>\n

As I’ve looked into the happenings surrounding the ordination,
\nthere’s no doubt that there are many complexities.  The canonical and
\ncontemporary laws regarding female ordination are debated<\/a>.  The sovereignty the central
\nauthority of the Thai Forest tradition’s governing body over
\nmonasteries outside of Thailand<\/a> is<\/a> unclear<\/a>.  The process by which Ajahn Brahm and his colleagues at Bodinyana undertook the ordination<\/a> is not fully supported<\/a> even by those in the Western
\nmonastic community that have voiced that they wish to see the Bhikkuni
\norder re-established.<\/p>\n

 
But one thing is clear: these are all formalities. Laws, even
\ncanonical ones if need be, can be changed. Indeed, it’s a core tenet of
\nBuddhism that all things are impermanent, nothing is immutable. Ajahn
\nBrahm made a choice, to make the institutions of the dhamma fall more
\nin line with the core values of the dhamma, and now many of his
\nmonastic and lay counterparts that are Buddhist leaders both here in
\nthe West and in Thailand have that same choice.  Some have
\nunfortunately already made the wrong one<\/a>.  If the others stand idly
\nby as this happens, it’s clear where they stand.  If you support what
\nAjahn Brahm is doing, make your voice heard on this petition<\/a>, and let dharma teachers you
\nhave relationships with know that you believe that they should put in
\ntheir two cents in on the issue.  May all beings have the same
\nopportunity for practice and awakening, no matter their gender or
\nanything else.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Rafi Santo, Director of the Interdependence Project‘s Integral Activism Program In an unprecedented historical act, Ajahn Brahm (full name: Ajahn Brahmavamso), a senior monk in the Thai Forest Tradition of Theravadin Buddhism, conducted a full ordination at his Australian monastery for a group of four nuns to make them Bhikkunis, the highest level of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":74,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-buddhism","category-interdependent-activism-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nWomen In Buddhism: The Thai Nun Controversy - One City<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2009\/11\/women-in-buddhism-the-thai-nun-controversy.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Women In Buddhism: The Thai Nun Controversy - 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His writing has been featured in numerous print and online publications. He is the founding director of the Interdependence Project and the host of the I.D. Project\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s popular weekly podcast (available on iTunes). He is currently on the part-time faculty of Eugene Lang College at New School University in NYC, where he teaches Buddhism. Ethan lectures regularly at universities and venues around the country on Buddhism, meditation, contemporary culture, and activism.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/author\/enichtern"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/74"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}