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The Legal Authority of the Buddha Over the Buddhist Order of Monks
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 April 2015
Extract
Soon after Gotama the Buddha Sakyamuni obtained his Enlightenment in 531 B.C. he established the basis of a self-governing Religious Order (Sangha). The rules of this community (Vinaya) were framed and promulgated by the Buddha himself.
It is the general belief that the Buddha was concerned solely with establishing a moral and spiritual teaching and that he was not law-minded. For instance, T. W. Rhys Davids maintains that:
“… in the strict sense of the word there is no Buddhist law; there is only an influence exercised by Buddhist ethics on changes that have taken place in customs. No Buddhist authority, whether local or central, whether lay or clerical, has ever enacted or promulgated any law.”
Contrary to this view, I have argued that the Vinaya was a monastic code which in its entirety amounted to a legal system. In this article, I wish to consider the Buddha's relationship to law and law-making by examining the nature of his authority and how his recommendations were elevated into precepts. I shall argue that the Buddha legislated by way of precepts, that he was not a judge, as some scholars contend, and that his precepts rarely took the form of a dialogue in which a question of conduct is posed and a precept is uttered in response (Responsa).
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90. Mahavira, the leader of the Jaina.
91. Vinaya Pitaka 1.238, Book of Discipline 4.325 (trans. I. B. Horner).
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93. Vinaya Pitaka, supra note 2, at 2.196; Book of Discipline, supra note 2, at 5.27578.
94. Jivakasutta, Majjhima Nikaya 1.368.
95. Digha Nikaya 1.5.
96. For the Jaina community's attitude towards meat see the Purusartha-Siddhyapaya 163 which demands that those who desire to avoid violence should renounce wine, flesh, honey and figs. See Tahtinen, U., Ahimsa Non Violence in Indian Tradition 158 (1976)Google Scholar.
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