Cambodian Buddhism: History and Practice

2. The Middle Period and the Emergence of the Theravada

2 The Middle Period and the Emergence of the Theravada The Problem of Sources 9ràvakayàna Buddhism had been present in Cambodia well before the fall of Angkor, but the precise nature of its occurrence remains elusive and it is di‹cult to divine any social influence the movement might have exercised. Whether the 9ràvakayàna was represented by one school or by many is impossible to say. It is also hard to get a clear perspective on the movement’s oscillating fortunes over the lengthy period stretching from Funan to the opening of the fifteenth century. The occurrence of scattered fragments of Pali inscriptional evidence, with isolated examples from as far back as the seventh century ce, has inclined some to believe that the Theravada was active in the region at a relatively early point, but this can hardly pass muster as convincing evidence. As noted in the previous chapter, we are on firmer ground from the opening of the fourteenth century. In an influential essay Benda (1962) has argued that Theravada Buddhism gained the power to replace a Mahayano-Brahmanical ancien régime that had become “either deficient or declining, if not both” toward the end of the Angkorian period. The strength of the Theravada in these changed circumstances was considerable. Benda asserts that it made possible the creation of “a quasi-egalitarian religious community of which even the monarchs themselves became, albeit for short times and mainly symbolically, members.” This new community in turn acted as an eªective mechanism for the restraint of excessive kingly authority, particularly since those committed to this new form of religious life “practiced the principles of other-worldly simplicity and fru26 gality, in sharp contrast to the Mahàyàna monks of the classical age” (Benda 1962, 120–121).1 Other scholars have taken a similar line, with Kulke, for instance , attributing the decline to Jayavarman VII’s “frenzy of [Mahàyàna] missionary zeal” combined with a heady Buddhist-inspired apotheosis of kingship . The people, exhausted by the economic consequences of the experiment, then wearily “turned to the Ceylonese Theravada Buddhism which from the twelfth century began to spread across Burma to the rest of mainland Southeast Asia” (Kulke 1993, 375–376). The Jinakalamali, a Southeast Asian Pali chronicle, certainly mentions eight Khmer in a larger party of Thai monks who received higher ordination in Sri Lanka in 1426,2 but we should be a little careful about reading this as evidence of a fundamental shift in emphasis for Cambodian Buddhism as a whole. Benda characterizes the Cambodian Theravada of the late and immediately post-Angkorian periods as a grassroots movement, its populist and antiaristocratic message supporting its spread through a previously neglected rural environment . Under its benign influence the peasantry gained a new sense of solidarity and were able to break free from the confines of “the world of local spirits and traditions” to a wider understanding of their place in the historical process. In this, Benda perhaps unconsciously endorses the presuppositions of earlier French scholarship. Leclère (1899, 497), for example, believed that Buddhism had been responsible for the destruction of the Angkorian caste system, although it must be said that contemporary inscriptions do provide some evidence of interethnic and interclass marriages with good levels of interaction between social groupings.3 Benda’s analysis of this major change in direction for Cambodian society has wide currency but suªers from a thin evidential base and too romantic a reading of Theravada history and metaphysics. Theravada karma theory, for instance, links social rank with merit accrued in previous lives. This means that it oªers limited opportunities for advancement to those from the lower strata of society. Indeed, its innate conservatism is a key feature of attack by its opponents , most notably the communists of the modern period. If we look elsewhere , it is not at all clear that Buddhism in Sri Lanka around the same period successfully operated beyond aristocratic control, and the same holds good for Thailand, although admittedly somewhat later. It is probable that Cambodian Buddhism operated in much the same pattern. Another problem relates to the unanswered question, if the 9ràvakayàna had been present in the region for many centuries, what caused it to break through at this specific point? Furthermore, the velvet revolution through which the Theravada is supposed to have risen to prominence does not fit the estabThe Medieval Period 27 [3.144...