Gender Equality of Buddhist Thought in the Age of Buddha

Toshie Kurihara

Introduction

I

N different historical eras and geographic regions, the teachings of
Buddhism, including those regarding women, have taken various
forms. In recent decades, the development of feminist theory has
encouraged a revisiting of the world’s religious traditions, including
Buddhism, from a women’s perspective. Buddhism has been criticizedas having functioned as an instrument of oppression, often lending
support to discrimination against women.
In the twenty-first century, as the value of gender equity gains wider
acceptance, there is an increasing need for such criticism to be coupledwith efforts to reconsider the relation between Buddhism and womenand the potential for the deep egalitarian currents of Buddhist thought tobe deployed in a manner that is emancipatory for women.					This paper looks at the portrayals of women in the early sutras, said
to describe the Buddha’s lifetime, as a means of clarifying Buddhism’sview of women. These early scriptural sources contain many references
to women. This presentation will look at the question of women in theearly Buddhist community and the Buddha’s own views of women.

1. Women as a Source of Temptation
According to tradition, the Buddha, having attained enlightenment undera Bodhi (pipal) tree, began his teaching career by preaching to acetic
practitioners in Sarnath. This is referred to as the First Turning of the
Wheel of Dharma and the resulting converts became the Buddha’s first
disciplines, forming the initial Sangha, or community of practitioners.
The Sangha continued to grow as more and more people were drawn to
the Buddha and sought to engage in Buddhist practice.
For monk practitioners, women were seen as the greatest single
impediment to their practice. Among the precepts to be upheld bymonks, those against sexual misconduct were especially strict. These37

38… gender equality of buddhist thoughtmonks were expected to engage in the purification practices known as
Brahmacharya in order to control the sexual impulses that were regarded
as especially powerful among all human desires. Monks who violated
this precept and had sexual relations with women were banished fromthe Sangha for having committed the grave crime of transgressing therules of conduct known as Påråjika.
The Buddha, for his part, is recorded as having been very harsh in his
condemnations of the deleterious effects of contact with women and of
carnal desire. Denunciations of sexual desire can be found throughout
the Buddhist scriptures. For example: “Full of lust for the sight of awoman, for the voice and the smells of a woman, for a woman’s touch,you experience many kinds of suffering.”1 And: “People followed bythirst crawl around like a captured hare. Therefore you should remove
thirst and wish for being free of passions. / Beset by craving, people run
about like an entrapped hare. Therefore one who yearns to be passionfree should destroy his own craving.”2
Monk practitioners were admonished that they must be careful of all
such temptations, and that by avoiding the lures of women and resisting
sexual desire, the world of enlightenment would be open to them. The
Buddha urges abnegation of a variety of desires but none more thansexual desire. There is reason to believe that there were specific conditions within the community of believers that impelled the Buddha todenounce carnal desire so emphatically. There are recorded reports, forexample, of a monk who had been seduced by his wife from whom hehad separated in order to take up Buddhist practice.
The original community of believers was composed solely of men,thus reducing the exposure to the temptations of women and sexuality.
The members of this community lived in forests and caves, under trees,in cemeteries and exposed areas. They practiced a simple way of life
satisfying only the bare minimum of needs. Living away from population centers, they could avoid contact with the temptations presented by
women and were thus relatively less likely to violate the precept against
sexual misconduct.
After a time, however, women appeared who expressed their wish tojoin and be part of this community. These would become female monks,
and the Buddha’s initial response is worth noting.

2. The Ordination of Women
As noted, for some time, the Sangha was composed only of men. But
eventually women, whose presence had been abjured as a hindrance togender equality of buddhist thought

39

practice, were admitted into the community of practitioners. It is easy to
imagine the various problems that arose from this. There are number ofdifferent narratives depicting the process by which women came to beordained into the community of believers.
The first group of nuns to be ordained is said to have been 20 women
led by the Buddha’s stepmother, Mahapajapati Gotami. Mahapajapati
nursed and raised the Buddha after his mother, Måyå, died just one
week after giving birth to him. Her son Nanda also entered the religious
life and when her husband King Suddhodana died, she went to the
Buddha who was then residing in the outskirts of Kapilavastu, thecapital of Shakya Kingdon, and expressed her desire to join him. The
Buddha rejected her request three times, saying that this was something
she must not do or even consider.
Having had her request refused by the Buddha, Mahapajapati
followed him, making the arduous journey to Vaishali, some 200
kilometers distant. She again requested permission to join the Sangha as
an ordained nun and was again refused. This time it was Ananda, one of
the Buddha’s ten major disciples said to be first in hearing the Dharma,
who took pity on her and asked, “Lord Buddha! Are not men andwomen the same and their ability to reach the state of Arhat (enlightenment)?” The Buddha responded by acknowledging that they were.
Ananda followed up by suggesting that there should then be no reason
to deny women admittance into the Sangha. At this point, the Buddha
had no reason not to grant the women’s request.
There were, however, eight conditions (the eight Garudhammas or
heavy rules) attached to the ordination of women. Most of these monks.
Further, whereas there were 250 precepts for monks, the lives of nuns
were to be guided by 348 precepts.3
Here however, I think it is important to reaffirm the core thread ofhuman equality and nondiscrimination that runs through Buddhism andBuddhist teaching, which asserts a fundamental equality, unaffected bysuch factors as birth, class, sex or class. This can be gleaned from thefollowing words of Sutta Nipata:“Not by birth is one an outcast; not by birth is one a brahman. By
deed one becomes an outcast, by deed one becomes a brahman.”4This is a truly dramatic assertion in a society that at the time wasstructured around a caste system in which Brahmin occupied thepreeminent place. This egalitarian philosophy, transcending all distinctions of class and caste, exerted a strong appeal among the non-elite
majority of the populace. The Buddhist Sangha was likewise governedby an egalitarian ethos, in which the most important factor determining40… gender equality of buddhist thought
respect was the number of years that had passed since a person’s full
ordination. Whatever their respective social backgrounds, a junior infaith was expected to rise and bow in reverent greeting to a senior.
The equality of men’s and women’s capacity to realize religious
enlightenment can be confirmed in the discussion cited above regarding
the ordination of women. It is also apparent in these words of the
Buddha. “If any woman or man goes in this direction, he or she
approaches nirvana in this vehicle.”5
In the India of the time, women were subjected to the control of theirfamilies and husbands; their existence as individuals was accorded only
scant recognition. Against this background, the opportunity afforded by
Buddhism to leave their families and seek personal salvation was truly
revolutionary. This is not to say that all forms of actual discrimination
were eliminated, but we can see the aspiration toward equality within
early Buddhism, despite the constraints of the era.

3. The Enlightenment of Buddhist Nuns seen in the
Therigatha
Despite the strict conditions placed on ordination and the many precepts
they were required to follow, many women became nuns. The
Therigatha (Verses of the Elder Nuns) is an early collection of poems by
71 elder nuns: 23 of royal background, 13 from the commercial class,
18 Brahmins and 4 courtesans. This suggests the large number ofwomen who had been ordained in the Buddhist order.
These women’s motivations for becoming nuns were varied. Theirstories are marked by individual drama: the deaths of children, escapefrom a violent husband, being left without support following the deathof a spouse, fleeing from incest, etc. They tell the noteworthy stories ofwomen who had struggled to survive in a society that afforded them norespect, but were able to practice Buddhism and gain enlightenment on
an equal footing with men. Although the precepts they had to follow
were strict, they were able to experience their own existence, not having
to submit to anyone else. As one scholar has put it, Buddhism offeredthem a refuge from the violent abuse of their families and the discrimination of society.6
This collection of verses is imbued with the powerful confidence
these nuns embraced regarding their enlightenment. The verses of thenun Soma, the daughter of a Brahmin family, merit our attention as a
critique of gender-based discrimination. The following is her response
to a demon claiming that the teachings are difficult to grasp except by

gender equality of buddhist thought

41

those with withdrawn as hermits, and impossible for woman tounderstand.
“What does womanhood mather at all / When the mind is concentrated well, / When knowledge flows on steadily / As one sees correctly
into Dharma.”7
After having lost her husband, child and family members, the nun
Kisa-gotami encountered the Buddha and attained enlightenment. To
quote her verse:
Going along, about to give birth, I saw my husband dead. Giving birthin the road, I hadn’t reached my own home. Two children deceased, myhusband dead in the road—miserable me! My mother, father, & brotherwere burning on a single pyre. . . . With family killed, despised by all,my husband dead, I reached the Deathless. I’ve developed this path,
noble, eightfold, going to the Deathless. Having realized Unbinding, I’
ve gazed in the mirror of Dharma. I’ve cut out the arrow, put down theburden, done the task.8

Likewise, the Buddha welcomed former courtesans into the Sangha. The
nun Vimala was among them:Intoxicated with my complexion, figure, beauty, & fame; haughty withyouth, I despised other women. Adorning this body embellished todelude foolish men, I stood at the door to the brothel: . . . Today,
wrapped in a double cloak, my head shaven, having wandered for alms,
I sit at the foot of a tree and attain the state of no-thought. All ties—
human & divine—have been cut.9

The experience of enlightenment described by these nuns is in no way
inferior to that described by male monks in the Theragatha, another,parallel collection of verses. The nuns’ verses are filled with the joyful
confidence that those who follow the Buddhist teachings and engage inpractice can reach enlightenment. The existence of these writings is in
itself evidence of the presumption of gender equality in terms ofenlightenment. This is all the more remarkable when considered against
the lack of social of women at the time.

4. The Buddha’s View of Women
Here I have looked briefly at the Buddha’s view of women. Admonitions
to avoid women are premised on recognition of the power of their

42… gender equality of buddhist thought
sexuality. The Buddha does not assert that women’s capacity to attainenlightenment is inferior to that of men’s. Even the more vigorous rejections of femininity are best understood as warnings to men to avoid such
distractions in their own pursuit of enlightenment.
Carnal desire, one of the fonts of life itself, is shunned. It is easy to
imagine the difficulty this view had gaining acceptance in India with its
rich tradition of thinking about sexual love. Some scholars havesuggested that Buddhism’s strict teachings on this front was one factor
hindering its widespread acceptance within Indian society.10
But religious practices requiring sexual abstinence are possible only
to those living in communities of the ordained. This would be difficult if
not impossible for lay women believers in the midst of family life andits complex emotional realities. Early Buddhism was a religion focusedon clerics. While the nuns of the Therigatha collection express theirreligious confidence and joy, most women lived lives dominated by men
amidst the sexual and emotional entanglements of secular life. The
Buddhist teaching of equality of enlightenment pertained only to life
within the community of the ordained. It did not change the prevalent
perceptions a society as a whole.
Following the Buddha’s passing, there were changes in attitudes
toward Buddhist nuns. The Buddha is recording as saying to his disciple
Ananda that if women had not been ordained, his teachings would havegained acceptance in society for thousand years, but because women
were ordained these teachings would only spread for 500 years. A homewith many women is more vulnerable to the predations of Burglars orrobbers; in the same way, in a Sangha with nuns the difficult practices
will not long be upheld.
But there is reason to doubt the veracity of this record. It is possiblethat male monks who did not welcome the presence of nuns presented
their own views as the Buddhist words. Seeing a community of women
believers only as an impediment, they sought to present the ordinationof women as something other than the Buddha’s true intent.
During the Buddha’s lifetime an ideal of gender equality was taught,
and within the confines of an ordained community women were able toattain enlightenment. But men were the protagonists of the community,
and it was they who compiled the sutras, at times incorporating into
them their own views, in the wake of the Buddha’s passing. Over time,
the Buddha’s original spirit was diluted and the ideas of these malemonks were recorded as sutras, generating a philosophy of discriminatory and degrading views of women that runs counter to this original
spirit.

gender equality of buddhist thought

43

Conclusion
Despite the gender equality of the Buddha’s own views, in later eras, theBuddhist view of women changed under the influence of societal norms
and systems prejudicial to women’s interests. This resulted in suchteachings as that women could not become Buddhas, that they wereburdened by 5 obstacles to enlightenment, that they must first be reborn
as men to attain enlightenment and that they must be excluded fromholy sites. From within the darkness of history, against assertions of the
deep karma and unsalvageable nature of women, we can hear theiranguished cries in quest of enlightenment.
The founder of the IOP, SGI President Ikeda, as written the following
on this point:
To cause that Law to spread and take root in society, however, theBuddha had to consider how to explain it in terms people would accept.
Under certain circumstances, Shakyamuni, while fundamentally
determined to teach the Law “according with the Buddha’s own mind,”
had to employ wisdom and adapt his teaching to the capacities of his
listeners simply to get a hearing; he had to draw others gradually toward
his own enlightened state of life...When explanations are tailored to thebiases of society in this fashion, however, there is a danger that evenpeople of sincere faith will become attached to those biases, leading to a
distorted interpretation of the teaching. The effect often is that when adistorted teaching gets handed down it does nothing but exacerbate andharden the discriminatory attitudes of society. If we were to trace thehistorical view of women in Buddhism, we would probably find manysuch instances.11

The question of philosophic accommodation to social norms isimportant one, an unavoidable problem when considering thetransformation of an original system of thought.
At the same time, such Mahayana teachings as the Lotus Sutra, which
describes the enlightenment of the dragon King’s daughter, or the vow
to save suffering people by Lady Srimala in the sutra of the same name,as well as Nichiren’s own teachings on the enlightenment of women, allthese offer a clear lineage of emancipatory ideas within the Buddhist
tradition. This is a lineage to which the SGI lays claim.
To dedicate oneself to Buddhism means more than simply studying
the words of the sacred texts. It means to interpret and reinterpret
Buddhism as a philosophy against the context of the present era in44… gender equality of buddhist thought
which we live, in order to revive its original spirit and give it new andrelevant meaning. This is the work that SGI President Ikeda has been
engaged in and called for. This holds an important key for thinking
about women and Buddhism in the present.
Notes
1
Theragåthå Verses of the Senior Monks. Chapter of the Twenties. “16.2 Påråpariya.”
http://suttacentral.net/en/thag16.2
2
Buddharakkhita Acharya, trans. “Craving.” In The Dhammapada: The Buddha’s
Path of Wisdom, 104. Buddhist Publication Society, 1998.
3
For a detailed discussion of the precepts to be observed by Buddhist nuns, see
Iwamoto Yutaka Bukkyo to Josei (Buddhism and Women), Sato Mitsuo Genshi Bukkyo
Kyoudan no Kenkyu (Research in the Early Buddhist Sangha) Sankibo Busshorin, 1963.
4“Vasala Sutta: Discourse on Outcasts” (Sutta Nipata 1.7), translated from the Pali by
Piyadassi Thera. Access to Insight (Legacy Edition).
5
Samyutta-Nikaya 1.5.6
6
Tagami Taishu, Bukkyo to Sei Sabetsu: Indo Genten ga kataru (Buddhism andSexual Discrimination: As Recounted in the Original Indian Texts), Tokyoshoseki, 1992,
pp. 8–16.
7“Soma Sutta: Soma” (Samyutta Nikaya 5.2), translated from the Pali by Bhikkhu
Bodhi. Access to Insight (Legacy Edition)
8“Kisagotami Theri” (Therigatha 10), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro
Bhikkhu. Access to Insight (Legacy Edition)
9“Vimala: The Former Courtesan” (Therigatha 5.2), translated from the Pali by
Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight (Legacy Edition)
10
Minamoto Junko “Nihon Bukkyo no Sei Sabetsu” (Sexual Discrimination in
Japanese Buddhism) in Ogoshi Aiko, et al. Sei Sabetu suru Bukkyo (Sexual Discrimination in Buddhism), Hozokan, 1990, p. 92.
11
Ikeda Daisaku, et al. The Wisdom of the Lotus Sutra: A Discussion. Vol. 3. World
Tribune Press, 2000, pp. 104–105.

Author Biography
Toshie Kurihara is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Oriental Philosophy.
Her fields of research are Sociology of Religion, Women’s Studies, and History ofSocial Thought. She is a member of The Japan Sociological Society, Japanese Association for Religious Studies, and The Japanese Association for the Study of Religion andSociety. She is the author of To Live Wisely: Seminar of Humanity for Women 2 (1999),
Guidance to Happiness of Women (2003), The Challenges of Women: Past, Present andFuture (2014), “Women in Japanese Buddhist History: Focusing on the Theory of
Enlightenment of Women in Nichiren’s Teachings,” in The Challenge of Mahayana
Buddhism, ed. The Institute of Oriental Philosophy (2006), and many more articles. She
has also translated multiple books.

The Language of Lotus Sutra’s Parable of Medicinal Herbs

Faridah Noor Mohd Noor
Abstract
The Lotus Sutra as a text has been translated into different
languages. In the English language several versions of the Lotus
Sutra exist today. As a Buddhist text, its English translations have awider outreach reaching the Occidental beyond its Oriental origin.
Based on Kumarajiva’s translation of the Lotus Sutra, the English
translations are reputed to have kept to its appeal and richness of its
language. This paper looks at the discourse of the Parable of theMedicinal Herbs from the 2009 translation by Burton Watson. The
corpus consists of the 216 lines of the verse format of the parable. A
discourse analysis of the text revealed the extensive use of literary
devices and binomials to deliver its teachings and the message ofimpartiality. It is through these language features that makes it
linguistically appealing to its readers. I wish to caveat that thisattempt to examine this rich and classical text is with the humble
understanding that it will not lend itself to any single interpretation.

Introduction
The Lotus Sutra is one of the most important and influential of all thesutras or sacred scriptures of Mahayana Buddhism, revered by almost
all branches of the Mahayana teachings, and over many centuries theobject of intense veneration among Buddhist believers throughout
China, Korea, Japan, and other regions of eastern Asia.
Burton Watson (1993, p. ix)

T

HE Kumarajiva translation of the Lotus Sutra is highly reputed andremains the version sorted out in both China and Japan. Based on
this translation, the Lotus Sutra was translated many times over into theEnglish language and each attempt is a work to produce the finest
interpretation of its message and meaning. Two versions of Watson’stranslation were published in 1993 and 2009. This paper has chosen the45

46

the language of lotus sutra’s parable

2009 publication as it is the latest. Watson’s translation is also theworking version selected by The Institute of Oriental Philosophy (IOP)
of Japan and the Soka Gakkai Malaysia (SGM). The selected chapter,
The Parable of the Medicinal Herbs, is one of the seven parables in thecollection of the Lotus Sutra.
The Lotus Sutra consists of 28 chapters and it is unique that eachchapter is presented in two formats—prose and verse. Each chapter
begins with a prose that introduces the main thrust of the chapter and thecontent is then presented in a verse form. This unique dual format ofpresentation places the Lotus Sutra in a genre of its own.
Methodology
The source of this exploratory paper is the translation by Burton Watson(2009) entitled The Lotus Sutra and Its Opening and Closing Sutras.
The focus of analysis will be the verses from Chapter Five (pp. 137 to
143). The stanzas have in total 216 lines. Each of the verses arenumbered for ease of reference.
Analysis of the language features will look at the use of language
features, namely, literary devices and binomials. The findings will bepresented as the language used in:
A. The Didactic Overtones of the Parable of Medicinal Herbs
B. The Language of Impartiality in the Parable of Medicinal Herbs

Examples will be taken from the corpus to facilitate the illustration anddiscussion of the language features found.

Language Features—A Brief Introduction
This section provides an introduction to the main features found in thistext. To begin with, the Parable is didactic in nature as it can be
categorised as texts that offer instructional information with guidance inmoral, religious, and ethical matters. The language features in the
Parable can be divided into two groups: Literary devices and binomials.
A. Literary Devices
Imagery refers to the use of literary devices such as anaphora, epithets,
hyperboles, similes, metaphors and descriptive words to give a dramaticeffect so that readers can visualize through the mental picture created intheir minds.