Despite unrest, monks in Myanmar carry on.Byline: Choe Sang-Hun The New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Times MANDALAY, Myanmar - As the lunchtime gong chimed through a tree-shaded monastery, several hundred monks in burgundy robes lined up on a mid-October day, all holding alms bowls. It is a common scene in Myanmar, formerly Burma, where one out of every 100 people, many of them still children, are monks. But the lunch line at the Mahagandhayon Monastery, the country's largest, used to be much longer. "We usually have 1,400 monks here," a senior monk said. "Because of the situation, parents took 1,000 of them home." For decades, two powerful institutions have shaped Burmese life: the 500,000-member Buddhist clergy, which commands a moral authority over the population, and Senior Gen. Than Shwe's junta, whose 450,000-strong military keeps the population in check with intimidation. Their uneasy coexistence has shattered. After scattered demonstrations erupted against sharp increases in fuel prices in August, thousands of monks took to the streets to protest the junta's economic mismanagement mis·man·age tr.v. mis·man·aged, mis·man·ag·ing, mis·man·ag·es To manage badly or carelessly. mis·man  age·ment n. and political repression. The military responded
with force.
The guns have prevailed over mantras, at least for now. As of Oct. 6, the government said it had detained 533 monks, of whom 398 were released after sorting out what it called "real monks" from "bogus ones." "They took away truckloads of monks and laypeople lay·peo·ple or lay people pl.n. Laymen and laywomen. ," said the deputy leader of a monastery in Yangon. "They had the monks kneel down, with their hands on the back of their heads. Anyone who raised his head was beaten." He said that at Ngwe Kyayan, the largest monastery in Yangon, soldiers took food and donation boxes, beat the abbot and vandalized images of Buddha, as some of its 300 monks fought back. When it was over, The New Light of Myanmar, a government-run English-language newspaper, said, "monks had been defrocked during interrogation interrogation In criminal law, process of formally and systematically questioning a suspect in order to elicit incriminating responses. The process is largely outside the governance of law, though in the U.S. ," so that they could be questioned as laypeople, then ordained or·dain tr.v. or·dained, or·dain·ing, or·dains 1. a. To invest with ministerial or priestly authority; confer holy orders on. b. To authorize as a rabbi. 2. and sent "back to their monasteries." In interviews, monks denounced the process, saying the military had no authority to defrock de·frock tr.v. de·frocked, de·frock·ing, de·frocks 1. To strip of priestly privileges and functions. 2. To deprive of the right to practice a profession. 3. To deprive of an honorary position. or ordain ORDAIN. To ordain is to make an ordinance, to enact a law. 2. In the constitution of the United States, the preamble. declares that the people "do ordain and establish this constitution for the United States of America. monks. The junta also employed divide-and-rule tactics, by persuading the state-sanctioned Sangha sangha: see Buddhism. sangha Buddhist monastic order, traditionally composed of four groups: monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen. Established by the Buddha, it is the world's oldest body of celibate clerics. Maha Nayaka Committee, which oversees the Buddhist clergy, to accept its donations and to order monks to stop protesting or face punishment. At the Mahagandhayon Monastery in Mandalay, soldiers had pulled back by mid-October after cordoning off this temple for weeks. But their trucks continued to lurk in back alleys near the compound. |
|
||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion