[Buddha-l] Rice & Dragons

[Jo]

Sent: Sunday, April 15, 2012 3:53 PM

Richard Hayes wrote:

> Of the monks mentioned in the Pali canon who caste can be determined,
> more than 50% are brahmin.

This is based upon information from the commentaries and certainly 
grossly inflates the number of brahmins for status reasons. And probably 
because they didn't recognize the use of brahmin gotra names by brahmins.

  Most of the Sanskrit-using thinkers who
> shaped Buddhist thought in India—that is, most Mahāyānins, were
> brahmins.

Is there reliable evidence of this ? Or is it based upon legends of 
doubtful reliability ?

  In Sri Lanka there are nikāyas within the bhikkhu-sangha
> that are closed to all non-brahmins.

There are probably no Sinhalese brahmins and certainly no such Nikāyas. 
The Siam Nikāya is closed to non-members of the Goigama class, but they 
are not brahmins. This rule was supposedly imposed by a Hindu king.

  Of course, it can be said that
> when people become Buddhist monks, they theoretically no long retain
> their caste, but the same was also true of all sannyāsins in India.
> In Buddhist texts one finds repeated references to people being being
> born into good families because of their good karma in previous lives
> and bad families because of their bad karma. I'm sorry to say that
> the claim that Buddhism is today and always opposed to caste as a
> function of karma is a modern urban legend.

There is no doubt that both Buddhists and Jains tend to downplay the 
significance of caste and reject its divine origins.

Lance Cousins
_______________________________________________

Thanks for these corrections and suggestions, Lance.

What I had in mind were the Buddha's sermon(s) on whether or not Brahmins are "born instead of made", so to speak. This is in the Pali suttas. His point during the discussion with a Brahmin interlocutor was that only by observing sila and the other virtues can one claim to be a Brahmin. Being born one does not endow the owner of the caste title with virtue or automatic social precedence.  Right now I can't find the sutta--sorry.