Ditching the raft, picking up the robe and bowl

Perhaps you have already heard, but...

Andi, the author of the popular Buddhist blog Ditch the Raft, left her home country and her blog to pursue ordination at a temple in South Korea with the new name Soen Joon. She has returned to the blogosphere with another original site detailing her life as an aspiring monastic, One robe, one bowl. So if you were a fan of Ditch the Raft, or if you find the premise of an American woman in a Korean Buddhist temple interesting, check it out.

I wish Soen the best, but it calls to mind an issue I have seen cropping up from time to time--the idea that there is something "more" Buddhist or "better" for realizing Buddhanature in being a monastic. Please understand I have never read anything by Andi (Soen Joon) to suggest she feels that way or would support such a notion. But it's out there. It includes subtle presumption that we must have "effort" to "win" or "achieve" enlightenment and that nirvana is likewise a far-away place or state to be "attained". Hence the idea that monastics are "better" Buddhists or somehow "on track" to earn enlightenment sooner than the lay practioners. Obviously given my affinity for teachings such as "Affliction is Bodhi and Nirvana is Samsara" as well as the conviction that Buddha-nature/Bodhi is our inherent condition that we could appreciated if we could just stop complicating it and letting our conditioned responses get in our way, I disagree strongly with such attitudes. Here is something I wrote recently (and now modify) in response to someone wondering about how to live the right life (and seeing being a family life as somehow at odds with living a fully Buddhist life):


"True Buddha practice" isn't about form. Shaving your head, sleeping on a cot, and eating out of a begging bowl isn't "Buddhist", it's monastic. The distinction between making something a buddhist practice and not is the mindfulness brought to that activity. You can have a very Buddhist practice while changing diapers or chopping carrots, and on the other hand you can wear a saffron robe and chant dharanis without such awareness and not have a meaningful Buddhist practice. Mindfulness leads to compassion and wisdom, which are exemplified (but not confined to or summarized by) things such as the eightfold path and the precepts, which are found in every Buddhist tradition. Compassion and wisdom through mindfulness can be practiced raising children, being a good husband, being a good employee at an offfice, being a good neighbor, etc.

The monastic community exists because lay practioners do not generally have as much time to learn and teach. But spreading the Dharma is not confined to the monastic community. They are there to preserve teachings and inspire others, but if we don't live the practice, if its just some set of rituals we do at an altar or in a temple a few hours a week, what is the point of preserving and teaching it? Buddhism is about saving all sentient beings, not just those who can afford to become philosopher-priests. It is this kind of thinking that was being addressed by the revolutions of Nichiren and Shin Buddhism in feudal Japan, for example. The Dharma is not confined to sutras, and Buddha-nature isn't confined to little old men with beads and shaved heads.

If you think you would best serve others as a monk, be a monk. If you think you would be a good parent and spouse, be a parent and spouse. But don't confuse that choice with whether or not you choose a sincere Buddhist practice.