On the illegality of Bhik(kh/s)uni Ordination

That’s so true! Here in Germany there are lots of exceptions for the churches—not for other religious organizations, though; and Buddhism doesn’t even count as a religion … :upside_down_face:

I recently came to know that the Catholic and Protestant churches in Germany are even exempted from GDPR, the European law for data protection! They have their own regulations that they follow, the details of which I don’t know.

8 Likes

America is similar. Churches get all kinds of tax breaks and exemptions. I don’t know if other religious groups are also entitled to those, though.

5 Likes

There is the “division between Church and State” but Buddhism will not be recognized as a religion but as a “life philosophy”, not as a “church” so this would most likely not apply. I discussed this with the relevant authorities of the Institute of Gender Equality and they agreed that this does not apply, also because the recognition is not complete yet. But I have recently also posed the question to the Buddhist Union to make sure. This is also why it is important to look into this before the recognition is completed.

7 Likes

…us Westerners…

—> the majority of the world’s bhikkhunis live in Asia
—> the groundwork of the bhikkhuni revival from the late 80s onwards was a collaboration between Asians living in the West, Asian trained Asians living in Asia, and Asian trained Westerners.
—> many bhikkhuni networks are in Asia, connecting women in countries including Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand Sri Lanka, etc…as well as the US Australia and beyond
—> some branches of SL Siam and Amarapura Nikayas in SL supported the revival officially since the 90s already, by 1997, one quarter of SL mahanayakas supported
—> there have been significant recent improvements for bhikkhunis in SL, including official government funding of bhikkhuni college
—> sri lankan bhikkhunis have recently received high level recognition through appointment to education director roles e.g. bhikkhuni Ven. Supeshala
—>bhikkhuni Ven Vijithananda of the Sakyadhita Centre was recently awarded prestigious rajakiya pundit award within SL Amarapura nikaya

There are some areas which still need attention like SL id card and Thai visa issues though (to let monks into Thailand to ordain bhikkhunis). And obviously the material standard is not as good in some parts of Asia as in some parts of the West. Reports of property issues are concerning but these affect sila matas too. Without going into details, monks taking over nuns’ places has happened in the West too, it’s not just an Asian thing.

I have an upcoming book which includes a very detailed study of the bhikkhuni revival, including previously unpublished info, and the thing that is very clear to me is its transnational character as not an Asian or a Western thing. Without Asian bhikkhunis, I wouldn’t even have nun teachers at all. While the West has many things to offer, personally, I cannot think of a future without the ties of love and support I have with Asian bhikkhunis.

22 Likes

I think It depends on what vinaya you ordain to in theravada and Tibetan tradition you can’t ordain as nun because there are no enough nuns to ordain you and this is the reason why the mahasanghika tradition vanished from India because new monk/nun could not ordain due to lack of existing monks if I am not mistaken you need 4 monks or 4 nuns for ordination process

While in Chinese/dharmaguptaka tradition you can still ordain as nun

You mention gender equality but this is a Westerner concept, in theravada for example there are more precepts for nun than for monk and furthermore there’s no female buddha for example

Furthermore I don’t think buddhism needs to surrender to any western value I mean what’s your goal to ordain in the first place ? You need to surrender to buddha not some western values

Of course I can be wrong here I think someone can convince me that I am wrong if I am wrong

1 Like

Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu! I guess the event mentioned in this is an outlier. That’s great news.

I think you misunderstood my post. I wasn’t criticizing Asian bhikkhunis or saying we don’t need them. I was criticizing this:

and saying that we can’t rely on those (usually) sexist institutions, or the monks who are in thrall to them, to further the bhikkhuni cause. As much as we owe the various (male) Ajahns, Bhantes, and Sayadaws for transmitting Dhamma to the West, and despite how inspiring or dear they are to us, most of them are totally useless when it comes to helping with this.

The fact that Buddhism has always had to recognize and follow the laws of the country in which it exists, coupled with the fact that Buddhism isn’t even recognized as a religion in some Western countries, might in fact be a blessing in disguise. As Ven. Vimala pointed out, some of the more progressive Western countries have laws that help enshrine the right of a woman to a bhikkhuni ordination, albeit rather indirectly. Since we don’t have any centralized monastic institutions whose judgments on monastic matters are backed by the law of the land, bhikkhunis (Asian or Western) will never have to fear having their nunnery taken away or being jailed for going on alms round. Although I didn’t express it, what I was thinking was that Asian bhikkhunis would be better off in the West than in Asia.

You could ask Asian bhikkhunis what they think on that one.

6 Likes

Just to come back to this, I was wrong. The “Separation of State and Church” will come into effect upon the recognition of Buddhism in Belgium. But failing an organization like the Church has, the Buddhist Union will take that role, and only for it’s members. Buddhist organizations that are not members of the Buddhist Union will still fall under the regular law. As @Sabbamitta said, in Germany Buddhism is not recognized and the last I heard from it it won’t be, so all organizations will fall under the regular law. I don’t quite know what that is in Germany but most likely it will affect the ordinations of women there. In Germany at least some ordinations happen.

The Buddhist Union here represents most Buddhist organizations, also non-monastic organizations, of all traditions and has a very flat, non-hierarchical structure where all the members have an equal vote. The few meetings I have attended had a very diverse group of people of all genders. Like I said, they are very keen to make sure that we do not fall into the same pitfalls as the Catholic Church and allow for equal representation, an ethical charter and a safety net where people can report abuse. This also includes having equal opportunities for all genders to ordain.

The above will have implications also for monastic organizations here that do not ordain women at all. For instance the Dhammakaya openly does not accept gay or transgender men. They will be unable to keep up such discrimanatory rules under the law and under the Union’s membership.

I recently contacted all nuns in this country. I found exactly 3. So that makes the ratio nuns : monks around 3 : 50 or so! While from my own experience the ratio of women : men in lay meditation centers is 6 : 4. Quite a difference.

The fact that certain groups of people are now unable to obtain monastic ordination or are discouraged from doing so creates a barrier for all women and transgender people who come to Buddhism seeking refuge from suffering. What we need is a Sangha that is more balanced if we want to spread the Dhamma in these countries.

14 Likes

Yes, they do; but I don’t know if anybody already raised the question of these being legal under the country’s law … :thinking:

Congratulations to the Belgians to lead the way in this matter! :pray:

3 Likes

Gender equality is compassion and wisdom in action. Compassion to allow equal opportunity for half of the human beings. Wisdom in recognising that to suppress half of humanity is to cripple the potential spread, practise of the Dhamma by so much more than half.

It’s good to keep abreast of the development of morality in the world and to respond in a compassionate manner, not to dogmatically be attached to the old values. Part of what I hope not to see is the last bastion of meat eaters are Buddhists who hides behind Buddha saying: “Buddha ate meat”.

14 Likes

I think that so far with Bhikkhuni ordinations, everybody was mostly concerned to hold the ordinations in a way that make them unquestionable from the point of view of Vinaya, and rather would make things overly strict than even a little to free. And probably questions of local law have not been taken into consideration at all. But they are in fact an important aspect.

3 Likes

Just to pop by and say, this is a really important area of inquiry.

When we did the bhikkhuni ordination in Oz, the question of abiding by local anti-discrimination laws came up, but it was not very germane, largely because Australia has few human rights laws and many religious exemptions. But the principle—that Vinaya must adapt to local laws—was certainly relevant and so far as I know, accepted on all sides.

Also relevant, tho lost in history, is the Thai Senate select committee finding on bhikkhuni ordination (of I think 2003) which, so far as I know, the highest-level legal statement in Thailand on the matter (unless there has been anything more recent.) They found that the opposition to bhikkhuni ordination contravened the Thai constitution on two grounds: it discriminated against women, and violated the right to religious freedom. They therefore recommended that the Sangha Council ruling against bhikkhuni ordination be revoked. The Sangha Council rejected this, and it has not so far as I know been tested in court, but it remains, I believe, the highest-level precedent in Thai law on this question.

Sadly, in Australia, our current government is bent on undermining human rights through its religious discrimination laws. So this is not likely to be much help here.

15 Likes

I think, the Bhikkhuni (and Bhikkhu) ordination is entirely the right and duty of the religious group, i.e. the Buddhist Sangha. It has nothing to do with the idea of “discriminating against women, and violating the right to religious freedom”.

Currently, only Chinese Bhikkhuni ordination (based on the tradition of Chinese Mahayana Buddhism) is officially and historically recognised and presented.

But, I really think women do not have to be recognised by men for the ordination. In fact, it already has become a reality, which most of them are in the form or structure of Theravada or Tibetan style.

2 Likes

Legal or Illegal, it does not matter. Legal or Illegal, its in the heart.
A Bhikkhu or A Bhikkuni, its in the heart not the gender.
A Monastic does not mean he or she can or try to control his or her mind for a layman can be better.
It is not the robe. A Robe is just a Robe. It is just a fashion. A Robe can be a mean of building ego.

3 Likes

Interesting about Thailand; thanks for sharing that.

For those unaware of the situation in Australia, what is happening is that the right wing Aust government is sympathetic to passing laws that give religious bodies/organisations exemptions from the general Human Rights Laws passed earlier by more liberal dispensations. Sadly, I’m ignorant of what qualifies a group to be regarded as ‘religious’ in Australian laws or of the legal status of Buddhism or Buddhist organisations.

Recognised and presented by whom, do you mean?

2 Likes

The Chinese nuns are recognised by and presented in the tradition of Chinese Mahayana Buddhism. They are Bhikkhunis in the Chinese tradition.

2 Likes

I had no idea. Has the Sangha Council ever rejected any other rulings from the Thai government?

2 Likes

As a layperson and an Ameircan, I’m somewhat confused and was wondering if those more knowledgeable could help explain. In some parts of explaining my confusion, I may use examples that are more extreme than the central topic of this thread. I want to be clear up front that I am not trying to compare anything people are actually doing to these more extreme situations, just trying to use corner cases to illuminate the whole boundaries.

First, I’d like to understand how far these antidiscrimination laws in other countries reach. In the US freedom of association and freedom of religion are enshrined much more highly in our constitution. Generally, it is only private secular corporations (for-profit or not) with more than 15 employees who are subject to these laws (additionally government entities are held to higher standards). Even a very large formal club is free to discriminate on the basis of gender, like the Daughters of the American Revolution, whose membership is restricted to women (I don’t know their stance on Trans identity), and further restricted on the basis of lineage (one ancestor who contributed to independence). It is also 100% legal for, for example, a small restaurant with 10 employees to only hire people from the proprietor’s family or home country. Finally, the government just has nothing to say about groups that do not engage with either the formal legal system, commercial enterprise, or certain forms of criminal conspiracy. So, for example, there could be a 20-member exclusively straight cis white male Anglican group who just meet up to have little parties together, and it wouldn’t just be legal, but would basically be invisible to the government. How many of those things would be illegal in Belgium or Australia?

The second thing I’d like to understand is how the Vinaya is supposed to interact with local laws. First off, aside from the rules that directly relate to local law (like the rule against a monk helping to smuggle goods through a customs checkpoint to assist a layperson to avoid paying taxes), are there any direct statements from the Buddha on the topic of how Vinaya and law are meant to interact?

Do most ordained sangha communities actually have a legal existence, with ordination entailing formal membership? My understanding had been that it was more nuanced, particularly in the west, with the legally incorporated entity being a fundamentally lay organization, pooling lay resources together to be used at lay discretion, interacting with the monastic community only in that the organization gives things to them and listens to them (perhaps appointing either an Abbot or someone chosen by an Abbot to an office like “Spiritual Director”, but that being a sort of “coincidence” without the organization determining who the abbot is). I did not think that there was anything visible to the government that was an incorporated entity with exclusively ordained membership rolls that grow every time someone was ordained and shrink every time someone is defrocked. Thus it was my understanding that in western countries governments had no visibility into or stance on who was or was not ordained.

Regarding kutis it was my understanding that most of the Vinaya restrictions only applied to kutis without a sponsor and the work around was that most monastics live in sponsored housing. Is this incorrect?

Further, I’m curious how this is thought to interact with rules of more moral consequence. One thing I know is somewhat regular, but have never thought about from this angle, is exterminations to comply with health codes. I know that these happen from time to time, and always sort of figured that it was viewed similarly to, say, a monastic trainee killing a mosquito that was biting him, but scaled up. Is it instead the general view that health codes supersede the 61st confession rule?

Sincere thanks to anyone who can clarify an illuminate.

3 Likes

13 posts were split to a new topic: Should the Vinaya be kept secret from the laity?

Good question! I really don’t know, but I suspect not.

Indeed. Ven Akaliko and myself have been somewhat involved in this, and the Buddhist community opposes these changes.

What has happened in Australia is that the same-sex marriage debate revealed that some minority communities in Australia can be wooed by pushing legislation whose purpose is to harm the LQBTQI+ community, or to erode rights for women.

When I was at such a meeting in the NSW Parliament, I saw that all the religions were represented by 100% men, except for Buddhism. I proposed that we all try to invite more women to be present, given that we were discussing such questions as the legality of abortion. The Liberal MP laughed it off, saying that even his own party had a long way to go to achieve equality. He wasn’t wrong.

I think that’s a complicated legal question, and probably varies a lot from place to place.

In Thailand, for example, the Sangha is administered under an official Sangha Act, with leaders appointed by the King, so their relationship with the law is different from Australia.

Yes, the Vinaya states that “kings should be obeyed”, i.e. that the Sangha should follow whatever local laws there are. This principle is applied in several cases in the Vinaya itself, for example, we should not ordain someone who is wanted by the authorities.

Not as such, no.

It varies, but yes, this is often the case.

That’s correct. In Australia they will sometimes refer to the Buddhist Councils or ASA in questionable cases, eg. deciding on a visa, etc. The biggest direct concern that the Aust gov has had with monks is when they come on religious visas then disrobe.

More or less, yes. Monastics usually don’t own the kutis we live in, so many of the Vinaya rules are treated as loose guidelines.

Tough one! What we do first of all is try our very best to build so that bugs don’t come. At Santi, for example, we made no enclosed cupboards in the kitchen, as that helps minimize cockroaches. For buildings, if making from scratch it is possible to termite-proof them pretty well.

In cases where there are pests that either cause a genuine threat or are in violation of health codes, monastics have been known to turn a blind eye as lay people take care of it. I don’t think there’s a good answer to this problem; some things are not black and white.

9 Likes