[Buddha-l] Orders and Ordinations (was women & , er, religion)

[Alex Wilding]

> May Mañjuśrī save us from Buddhist Hybrid English, and narrow definitions of broad words.
And from the journalistic smudging of straightforward words.

Your definition of "ordination" would include anybody who has been through taking refuge formally. This would run roughshod over the distinctions that have been made amongst Buddhists for many, many centuries. Do you count the hundreds of thousands of Westerners who have taken refuge vows, bodhisattva vows and so on as "ordained"? Presumably you must, but I feel I should ask, as I find your position incomprehensible.

Further, it raises a question: if you want to abuse the English language by using "ordination" in such a loose way (an abuse you are, of course, free to commit), what do you suggest as a word to use in your own linguistic circles to distinguish between, on the one hand, the people who are ordained in the sense that I (and I suspect the majority of English-speaking Buddhists) use the word to refer to those who hold the full traditional set of monastic vows and those who, on the other hand, like you and me, have not, even though we may have taken other sets of vows?
Perhaps you would call them "fully ordained"? Or "fully ordained in the traditional sense"? Or "really" ordained? "Truly" ordained? None of these sound at all appropriate, but I presume that, as a Buddhist, you are likely to see the distinction to which I refer as of enormous significance.
                                    
All the best
Alex Wilding
Blog: http://chagchen.org/


> -----Original Message-----
> From: buddha-l-bounces at mailman.swcp.com [mailto:buddha-l-
> bounces at mailman.swcp.com] On Behalf Of Jayarava
> Sent: Wednesday, 22 July 2009 10:13 PM
> To: Buddhist discussion forum
> Subject: [Buddha-l] Orders and Ordinations (was women & , er, religion)
> 
> Hi Alex
> 
> I'm not ashamed to be a pedant, and as an antipodean I sometimes use terms of
> abuse affectionately with friends like Dayamati - who can be a pedant, though
> usually only for comic effect or to win an argument!
> 
> We speak English, yes? In English an order is simply a "body of persons living under
> a religious discipline". The WBO is straightforwardly included in this definition, and
> my entry into the WBO was clearly an ordination. Specifically I took on the religious
> discipline of the Order - a set of principial precepts and vows  - for life. There were
> other ritual aspects to the ceremony as well, but that's by the by. It so happens that
> the order I joined is an order of practising Buddhists. So I am quite unambiguously
> an ordained member of a Buddhist order - much like my pal who is "an ordained Zen
> priest", although I didn't get a certificate and cool robes like him. (I've already
> confessed my jealousy, and risen above it)
> 
> May Mañjuśrī save us from Buddhist Hybrid English, and narrow definitions of broad
> words.
> 
> Jayarava
>