Ubiquitous and Elusive: In Quest of Theravada

Notes on Theravada Studies Conference

1. What is Theravada?

I would like to take a moment here to gather some thoughts on a conference held 12-14 August 2004 at Natuional University of Singapore. It was organized by the Asia Research Institute (ARI) and entitled, Exploring Theravada Studies: Intellectual Trends and the Future of a Field of Study (see program text pdf).

To risk being glib, though at the same time summonsing support form the conference's keynote speaker, Professor Peter Skilling, the conference was decidedly "an embarrassment of categories—theravada, hīnayana, and other old friends." In fact the The French-Canadian scholar, Peter Skilling, was just about the sole saving grace to the conference. In fact, the only other participant even coming close to the scholastic valor exhibited by Skilling was the shy and unassuming Choong Mun-keat, an Australian-based Malaysian researcher and self-described "postmodern" monk and author of The Notion of Emptiness in Early Buddhism. Still, all of the participants contributed in their own personal ways (see abstracts here (pdf).

Peter was the first to present a paper, the title of which had suddenly changed to Ubiquitous and Elusive: In Quest of Theravada. But I need be clear that I am not at all quoting Peter's actual paper, which was clearly designated a "draft" and "not for quoting." So please understand that I am merely reporting; I am only recalling Peter's impromptu spoken remarks, and not at all disclosing his written material.

"What is Theravāda?" the Bangkok-based scholar forthrightly asked the assembly of academics.

Peter Skilling's resume is impressive indeed. He is associated closely with the Lumbini International Research Institute and other interesting projects such as The Fragile Palm Leaves Project (pdf), The Electronic Buddhist Text Initiative and The Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative.

2. Thai Cultural Intricacies

Now for those with little insight into Thai cultural intricacies it may be profitable to note parenthetically at least that the religion of the Thai population is by and large Bauddha (i.e. Buddhistic, or as is generically understood, "Buddhist"), and decidedly of the so-called Southern "sectarian," Hīnayānic school of what is generically referred to as the Theravāda or "doctine of the elders." However, the system of religious observance that the Thais have pursued might more clearly be described as "Sinhalese Bauddha," due to the fact that Sri Lanka was the place where it assumed its early form. It may furthermore be helpful designate this custom as "Pali Bauddha," based on the publicly asserted strictness and adherence to the Pali Language literature that was more or less compiled by the ancient Sinhalese. Which ever way we class it, though, we need to make it clear that by "Bauddha" (generically misrendered as "Buddhism"), we intend to mean 'a religio-historical phenomenon' that is amply handled in the Sanskrit language by the word śāsana.

3. śāsana as 'Religion'

With the Sanskrit term śāsana, Buddhism offers its own definition of the concept "religion," or at least something close to it. What is more, in view of my personal interpretive analysis of the "Buddha" as a purely literary figure, i.e. as chief protagonist of the broad, diverse, and heterogeneous collection of Bauddha texts, I thus regard "Buddha" as essentially a "code word" that represents a yet undecipherable compendium of asceto-shamano-philosophic lore and that is possibly traceable as far back as Old Iranian. And so I agree whole heartedly with Richard Gombrich (1996: 79) and interpret the "Buddha" as 'shorthand for the authors of the early texts with different opinions and attitudes.'

4. Bauddhic Henotheism

In the 'theravādic' context, Bauddha is largely a henotheistic religious culture (or cult) that worships one (supreme) god without denying the existence of (lesser) others. In its developed 'mahāyānic' expressions, however, it is not so easily categorized. But in the course of my research my position has invariably shifted, especially with regard to the shifting nature of the category "Bauddha" (generically known as "Buddhism" or "Buddhist") itself, 'traditionally' perceived as comprising two large sub-categories: one older and therefore more representative, more 'faithful' perhaps to the original teachings; and the other, newer, less concerned with literality, but taking advantage of new literary developments, particularly new writing techniques, and by traveling to areas outside the old 'middle-country' of Magadha where Gautama as Buddha legendarily fasted, trod and taught for forty-five years. But for the sake of this note, "The Buddha" is a god. He is in fact the "supreme" god, the ultimate jina or "victor" precisely as the ancient Greeks conceived the process of apotheosization, or 'man-become-god,' in a context parallel to the winning athletes at Delos and Olympus whom (upon their triumphs) were drowned in the euphonic ovations of the crowd: "Die – O victor! Nothing here remains for you! You have only to ascend to the realm of the gods!" – the ascetio-athletic agon of the Buddha, his esoteric jihād of the mind.

5. The Scriptures as Forgeries

Now back to Peter Skilling and his pertinent paper on the history of the coinage and the historical construction 'theravāda.' And let us ask again:

Just what is this 'theravāda,' this 'southern' 'hīnayānic' Bauddhic school ostensibly based on its vāda ('doctrine/dogma/theory') of the theras or 'elders' (what elders?), and which stringently deems its own extensive literature as its paramount ecclesiastical authority?

Peter was of course averring to the eminent 'Pali canon,' the vast collection of literary records that the 'theravāda' alleges to transmit. Yet, one needs to be aware of the "layered" textuality of these scriptures, (which is precisely what postmodern Venerable Choong Mun-keat came to tell us about). One needs further be aware that, in terms of the explicit doctrinal claim that the Pali scriptures are "the word of the Buddha" (buddhavacana), these scriptures are certainly forgeries, not to mention bootlegs – indeed, they are grand unmitigated plagiarisms of more remote Vedic and primordial conceptions. However, let me here state that this is just my own private research view and held by no one else but me, a view, what is more, that is beyond consensus and therefore contentious [O, how much more my research notes On the Bauddhic Episteme Sati-Vipassana: metaphor for Indra and his holy weaponry (vis-à-vis Rgveda 1:103)].

"We have added nothing, we have taken away nothing" is the theravāda-canon's oft sung refrain--and declaration--that they alone are 'what the Buddha intended the sangha to be.' O mythic discourse in a globalized world.

6. More Categorical Characterizations

What is more, the so-called 'theravāda' could well be described as a highly differentiating class of Bauddhic faith with the strong propensity for conceiving itself in contradistinction to (i) all things "Hindu" and (ii) the perceived state of disciplinary and doctrinal corruption into which all other Bauddha sects have descended.

More important still, however, it needs to be broached that the so-called 'theravāda' is a historical construction. 'How to describe this historical construction?' Peter Skilling dared to ask. 'Do we describe it as a system? A system of what: thought, ethics, monasticism, asceticism, yoga, soteriology, faith? Do we describe it as some these or all of these?'

I suggest that there seems to be very little room for 'belief' in this system, as the Bauddha ultimately bases itself on the authoritative statements of an Omniscient Buddha. To this extent alone, I would furthermore assert, it would have to be considered a kind of "religious faith." The 'theravāda' is largely distinguished by the outward appearance of its monkish class. But precisely speaking the Bauddhic bhikkhu ("monk" we call it; but lit. ascetic beggar, almsman) is not so much a monk (from Greek monos, alone) as a 'cenobite' (from koinos "common" + bios "life"). Thus, he is less of a loner and more of a friar.

Indeed, theravāda is very "elusive" term. In fact as Peter pointed out, it is not a primary 'emic' term, i.e. a term of self-reference. Strange as it may seem, as a mark of identity 'theravāda' is not to be found in the pre-modern period, neither in literature nor inscription. What is more, the early European accounts of so-called 'theravādic' societies did not use the term, asserted Peter Skilling. So when was the term "theravāda Buddhism" invented? Skilling suspects the process started in the second half of the nineteenth century as a colonial or globalized construction, one of the 'religions' or 'faiths' defined to satisfy census needs, to contrast with Christianity. He further pointed out that the term 'thera' (elders) does not refer to just any 'elders' but to a specific 'historical' or foundational group, i.e. the five hundred arahats who recited and collected the teachings of the Buddha at Rājagriha within about a year of the death of Gautama. This is stated, for example, in the DīpavaMsa, a text specifically concerned with school formation and affiliation: 'the Council performed by the theras is called the theravāda,' therehi katasaMgaho theravādi 'ti vuccati (4:8, as cited by Skilling). However according to my personal and yet-unverified information, the exact term 'thera' actually appears only twice in the early Bauddha scriptures, as uttered by the canon's chief protagonist himself. And in both of these instances Gautama is made to employ the term with regard to his own two 'elder' gurus, Alāra-Kalama and Uddaka-Rāmaputra. Thus 'theravāda' could well be viewed as an antecedent entity, and thereby embued with a rarified legitimacy by no means bound by a so-called 'theravāda.'

It has nonetheless become a textbook truism that (i) 'modern Theravāda' is the only surviving school of the many early "sectarian," or pejoratively speaking 'hīnayānic' schools from the earliest times' (fifth-third century BCE), and that (ii) its Pali language canon represents the earliest body of Bauddha texts. Both of these notions are patently wrong. It cannot be not true that the so-called 'Theravāda' is the only school that has 'survived into the present day,' Skilling explained, since the clearly historical Sarvāstivāda monastic lineage continues to be followed to the present day in Tibet. Furthermore, in regard to the relative dating of the texts, we also need to take into proper consideration the extent fragmentary portions of non-Theravādin canonical works written on birch bark scrolls in the Kharosthi script and the Gandhari (Prakrit) language. These date from the first century CE or earlier, though, granted, they do not constitute a scriptural canon.

7. The Myth of Buddhavacana

Important reference needs also be made of the early Chinese translations of texts that correspond to the Pali collections of various early Hīnayānic schools. This is where the important study of Pali-Chinese comparisons comes in, along with post-modern Ven. Choong Mun-keat's valuable paper "The importance of Pali-Chinese comparison in the study of Pali suttas." Choong's thesis demonstrates two main points: (i) how a study of the Chinese collections illustrates their greater textual integrity, and (ii) that portions of some Chinese versions are probably older than certain parts of the extent Pali translations. He furthermore shows that the Pali language suttas are constructed in a 'layered manner over the centuries.' This obliquely evinces the intrepid proposal that the Bauddha canon is at least to some unmitigated extent a 'forgery' vis-à-vis the traditionally held position or 'article of faith' that the suttas are Buddhavacana, "the (verbatim) word of Gautama," when of course this is rather more 'an extended allegory,' i.e. myth.

8. An Ahistorical Designation

And indeed, we admit, the impertinent disclosure of this textual myth throws rudely into question the future validity of employing 'theravāda' as an analytical marker for the socio-political phenomena known as "Bauddha." For as applied by academics and 'new adherents to the faith,' particularly beginning from the mid-twentieth century, what else can we do but dismiss 'theravāda' as an essentially ahistorical designation whose usage clearly 'chooses to ignore the complexity and relative lateness of the tradition' (Skilling).

Having thus said, we may now begin to see how so-called "Theravāda Buddhism" is fraught with presumptions (Skilling), a major one being that it does not represent the perspectives of those who traditionally adhere to the 'religion' (sāsna), i.e. the largely illiterate agrarian-based South and Southeast Asian peasants from whom 'theravāda' would implicitly have gained its "authorizing practice" (McCutcheon 2001). In the starkest of contrasts, the modern Theravāda would rather more be seen as a mark, or even as a label in the globalizing process of "social formation," i.e. a reflection of the utopian imaginaire and nostalgia spawned in the minds of western educated urbanites by global publishers avid to sustain such emerging market dreams and aspirations.

As a final word I would only surmise from the wonderfully hosted conference proceedings, that the increasingly apparent picture we are gaining of a so-called "theravāda Buddhism" is a picture more defined by its cultural inconsistencies than by the strained incomprehensibility of its meta-narrative and internal cult dogmatics.

References

Choong Mun-keat. 2005. The importance of Pali-Chinese comparison in the study of Pali suttas in Khthónios: A Journal for the Study of Religion, University of Queensland, vol. II, no. 2, June 2005: 19-26.

Desai, Santosh, N. 1980. Hinduism in Thai Life. Bombay: Popular Prakashan Pri­vate Ltd.

Gombrich, Richard. 1996. How Buddhism Began: The Con­di­tioned Genesis of the Early Teachings.

McCutcheon, Russell T. 2001. Critics Not Caretakers: Redescribing the Public Study of Religion. Albany: State University of New York Press.

Rhys Davids, C.A.F. 1920. sāsana. In Encyclopaedia of Re­lig­ion and Ethics, vol. 11. Edited by John Hastings. Edin­burg.

Skilling, Peter. 2004. Ubiquitous and Elusive: In Quest of Theravada. Paper delivered at the conference Exploring Theravada Studies: Intellectual Trends and the Future of a Field of Study, organized by the Asia Research Institute, on 12-14 August 2004, at the National University of Singapore.

Sritantra. 2005. On the Bauddhic Episteme Sati-Vipassana.

Thompson, George. 2002, Adhrigu and Drigu: on the Semantics of an Old Indo-Iranian Word, Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 122, no.2 Apr-Jun.