Vinaya

Vinaya , “discipline” in Faded and Sanskrit (CH: jièlǜ 戒律; ja: kairitsu 戒律; Ti: dulwa or `dul Ba), indicates the corpus of Buddhist texts having milked with the practices of the monastic community or sangha noble. It constitutes, with the Dharma, corpus more centered on the theory and primarily made up of Sutra S, the essence of teaching that the Bouddha states to leave with its disciple in his “will”, the Mahaparinibbana Sutta .

The vinaya was first of all transmitted during a few centuries by oral way, diversifying according to the places and the schools, although one in general regards the differences as minor. Its principal part is made up of the unit of the many rules which govern the monastic life, called Patimokkha in faded and pratimoksha in Sanskrit. One also finds in the vinaya additional rules, the sanctions in the event of infringement, the methods of resolution of the conflicts, the texts explaining the origin of the articles of the patimokkha, of the precise details on their application. Are added to it some will sutras and of the biographies of large disciples.

Vinayas current

Three vinayas are still of use nowadays:

Vinaya Pitaka of the theravadin (Myanmar, Kampuchea, Laos, Sri Lanka, Thailand); the patimokkha includes/understands 227 rules for the monks and 311 for rare the moniales (less than 300 all confused countries).
Dharmaguptaka Vinaya or Dharmagupta Vinaya , in Chinese sìfēnlǜ 四分律 (China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam); the patomokkha envisages 250 rules for the monks and 348 for the moniales.
Mūlasarvāstivāda Vinaya , (Himalayan area and Mongolia); the patimokkha imposes 253 rules to the monks and 364 with the moniales, limited to some Western recently ordered.

The monasteries belong in general to a given current and prefer to receive people having received the ordination of their line. Nevertheless, they are not inevitably exclusive and can accept monks or nuns according to another vinaya. This type of cohabitation was frequent in certain areas formerly. The monasteries theravada are in theory exclusive; this restriction constitutes an obstacle for the suction-nuns. Indeed, the beginners must pronounce their wishes of nuns near moniales confirmed, but the female order theravada disappeared at the 11th century, preventing all new ordination theoretically. A certain number of women were made order by Taiwanese and Korean moniales mahayana according to the Dharmagupta Vinaya , being based on the fact that the founders of the Chinese female orders were in fact of the nuns theravada from Sri Lanka. Nevertheless, the legitimacy of their ordination is not accepted by the whole of the clergy, in general unfavorable to the entry of the women in the orders.

The currents vajrayana missed also traditionally experienced nuns, the women entering the monasteries remaining at the stage of beginner. However, ordination according to the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya is sometimes accepted there and the confirmed first moniales appeared there is little.

Birth of the vinaya according to the tradition

The tradition claims that no vinaya was necessary to the beginning of the activities of sermon of Gautama, when the monks were still very few; it proved to be essential vis-a-vis the general fall of the quality of the disciples according to the expansion of the monastic community. It would be right after the death of the Buddha, by intending the Subhadra monk to be delighted to be able to live from now on more freely, than Mahâkâshyapa would have decided to convene the first council to make recite by Upali the rules of the Vinaya Pitaka . The Buddhas of last the would not have left all of vinaya, but the teaching of those which had left one of them would have lasted longer. The patimokkha must have had at the beginning a certain flexibility because the Mahaparinibbana Sutta mentions that the minor rules can be abandoned. Nevertheless, Ananda, principal agent of the words of Gautama, would have neglected to be made specify of which it acted, also all the rules were preserved and Ananda was reprimand.

See too

Sangha | Tipitaka | Bhikkhu | Bhikkhuni

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