Modern Buddhist Conjunctures in Myanmar: Cultural Narratives, Colonial Legacies, and Civil Society

1. Theravada Cultural Hegemony in Precolonial Burma

Theravada Cultural Hegemony in Precolonial Burma 1 This chapter delineates Theravada Buddhist paradigms that shaped precolonial polities in the region that became modern Burma. These empires modeled themselves after classical states of Southeast Asia in which royal patronage of Buddhist institutions helped consolidate the regional power of the court. Periodic reforms of the Buddhist sangha and the ritual mobilization of ethnic communities upheld this Buddhist hegemony. The intrusion of colonial trade networks and concurrent monetarization in Lower Burma undermined this economy of merit. As the British gained control over the regions of Lower and Upper Burma, colonialism became the cultural harbinger of modernity. In response to the European encroachment along the coastal regions along the Bay of Bengal, King Thalon relocated the royal palace of the Restored Taungoo dynasty (1597–1752) from Pegu in Lower Burma to Ava in Upper Burma in 1635. The move occurred at a moment in early colonial history when European explorers of the Southeast Asian archipelago expanded their trade networks along the coastline of Lower Burma. Some historians characterized this shift inland of the Burmese political center as “motivated by the intransigence and xenophobia which radiated from the Court of Ava” and interpreted the relocation of the capital to Upper Burma as a defeatist retreat from encroaching European maritime trade networks.1 More recently, Victor Lieberman has challenged this assertion of a Burmese xenophobic withdrawal.2 He argues that the move of the center of power from Pegu to Ava was a strategic choice of the Restored Taungoo dynasty in response to the famine, war, and depopulation that had destabilized its earlier rule in the lower delta region. With this move King Thalon also shifted the kingdom’s political focus away from maritime CHAPTER 1 16 trade and renewed inland trade with other Buddhist polities. Ava, the new capital in the northern Irrawaddy river basin, consolidated a geopolitical location for subsequent Burmese kingdoms and offered new economic opportunities through lucrative land trade with Yunnan. By implementing this strategy, the Restored Taungoo dynasty realized, once again, the political hegemony of a Theravada polity and brought neighboring Buddhist groups, like the Shan, under the control of the Ava court. When an intermittent Mon rebellion eclipsed the Taungoo era in 1752, King Alaungpaya (1752–1760) founded the new Konbaun dynasty (1752–1885) and reconstituted the Burmese empire by moving the capital still further upcountry to Shwebo. Subsequent Konbaun kings moved the capital back to the banks of the Irrawaddy River, initially to Ava and later to Amarapura and Mandalay. The dhammarāja model of kingship was a central principal for organizing early modern kingship during the Restored Taungoo and Konbaun dynasties. In his discussion of the Burmese polity from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries, Lieberman underscores the role of Theravada Buddhism as the prism through which the court promoted political and cultural integration. He writes that “the rise of an overarching culture that was simultaneously more orthodox Theravadin, more self-consciously Burman, and more sympathetic to central regulation became apparent.”3 The master narrative of court culture in precolonial Burma was articulated in its construction of Theravada orthodoxy. To an unprecedented degree, the court defined Theravada orthodoxy as Burman and established the dominance of the Burmese over neighboring ethnic groups. The empire of the Konbaun dynasty incorporated diverse ethnic groups, such as the Shan, Arakanese, Mon, Lao, and Tai, who practiced local versions of Theravada Buddhism along with the veneration of ancestors. Konbaun kings nonetheless succeeded in integrating these groups into the center’s Buddhist culture and ritual system. Several factors reinforced the Burmese Theravada hegemony over other Buddhist ethnicities. Ethnic vassals were mobilized through the ritual theater of the court and through the construction of religious monuments and works of royal merit. Provincial officers were obliged to participate in annual kandaw rituals to demonstrate their loyalty to the court, which helped reproduce court ritual, culture, speech, aesthetics, and art at the provincial courts.4 Participants in the provinces and ethnically different groups would be encouraged to emulate the culture of the court even if they did so only in select contexts or followed other traditions on other occasions. An extensive system of intermarriage between the court and provincial nobility further reinforced selective participation in Konbaun culture and hegemonic orthodoxy. During Bodawpaya’s reign (1782–1819), the court even maintained a list of royal supporters who followed the religious practices of the king.5 Map...