The Body in the Theragatha and the Therigatha Essay Example

of seduction, whose only goal is life, is to distract men from the more important values of life and bhikkhus from the goal of liberation. The portrayal of this general misogynist view of Buddhism, however, becomes problematic in the Therīgāthā, as women themselves are writing it. It is their own bodies which are accused of being contaminated and contaminating. The theras recorded their experiences of transcending the bonds of the contaminating woman. The therīs, however, did not view men as a distractions and thus, could not record this experience. Instead, they talk of overcoming the material bonds of their own bodies by means of which, they can cease to become objects of distraction for men.

A central theme in the Theragāthā and Therīgāthā is realizing the transience of the physical body. The body is essentially composite. Its attractiveness detracts one from the true path of life – it is an illusion preventing one from focusing on the important goals of life, by means of desire and seduction. The transient nature of the body is emphasized by looking at the body as a combination of bones, flesh, membranes and fluids. Desire for the body is thwarted by means of corpse meditation. Decomposed bodies in cemeteries are observed to realize the actual components of the body which remain after death and mingle into the earth. Desire is overcome by perceiving what the body turns to, eventually, and understanding its worthlessness.

Both the Theragāthā and the Therīgāthā employ imagery which is repulsive, to combat desire for sexual pleasures. Both contain descriptions of the “evil-smelling”, “full of worms”, “oozing” and “rotten” body. For the theras, however, the

“rotting” body is not just any body at the cemetery; it is the body of another, mostly that of a woman’s. Echoing the first Pārājika offence, women’s bodies are seen as the primary enemy and equated with snake imagery such as when Sabbakāma says in Th.457:

“But he who avoids them as one avoids a snake’s head with one’s foot, he being mindful overcomes this attachment to the world.” To succumb to the attractions of a woman is a grave offence and the theras predict death for such an offence as does Sabbakāma in Th. “Those ordinary individuals who with impassioned minds pursue them (i.e. women), fill up the terrible cemetery. They heap up renewed existence.”

The woman’s body is compared to a “hook”, “snare” or “pitch” where deluded fools are trapped till death and thus remain entrapped in the circle of birth and death. Those who are attracted to the woman’s body commit two errors: mistaking pleasure for pain, and purity for impurity.6 Attraction to a woman’s body only causes pain as Pārāpariya illustrates in Th. 738: “Passionately attracted to the form of woman, the sound of woman, to the touch of a woman too, (and) the scents of woman, one finds all sorts of pain"7

The theras present themselves as the ones who have realized the transient nature of the body and can overcome the desires of the woman’s body. The body is of another as is the fool who is deluded by it. The Therīgāthā, on the other hand internalizes the lesson of the transient nature of the body. The body that is “evil-smelling”, “rotten” and “full of worms” belongs to the speaker

of the poem. Very often, it is someone else who imposes this realization upon the therī; as says Abhaya to his mother in Thi.33. “Upward from the sole of foot, O mother dear, Downward from crown of hair his body see. Is’t not impure, the evil-smelling thing?”8

The snake imagery in the verses of the theras in replaced by images of the cemetery; and the bodies which end up in the cemetery belong to the therīs themselves. The verses of the therīs illustrate the transient nature of their own bodies by drawing attention to its disgusting nature and the fact that it will end up at the cemetery like all decomposing corpses. Their lesson involves detracting others from their own bodies which will eventually end up in a cemetery as opposed to the theras detracting others, who will otherwise end up in a cemetery, from another’s i.e. a woman’s body.

“In the Buddhist worldview, beauty is not an inherent property of a given object, but rather, is the product of human artifice.”9 Women, by means of artifice, enhance their beauty to “trap fools” and detract men from their goals of liberation. Both the Theragāthā and the Therīgāthā, acknowledge the role that artificial beauty plays in distracting men. therīs relate the experiences of their previous life in which they ornamented their own body to attract men and theras relate how women decorate their bodies to delude other ordinary men. Both use hunter and hunting imagery to describe artificial beauty and its effects.

However, Karen Lang has pointed out in her study of this imagery that the descriptions of the hunter, trap and prey are

used differently in the two texts.10 In the Theragāthā, Mara is the hunter, women’s bodies are the baited snare and ordinary men the prey; whereas, in the Therīgāthā, women themselves are the hunters, their bodies are the baited snare and men are the prey. The therīs identify themselves with Mara and replace him whereas the theras underplay the importance of women even in this negative context and represent her as an object of no importance - used and discarded later. As found in the imagery of decomposed bodies and deluded fools, therīs again, internalize the image of artificial beauty whereas the theras project it onto others. The theras themselves play the role of perceivers from a distance.

In both the Theragāthā and the Therīgāthā, the attractive body belongs to a woman except in one verse attributed to Sumedha. In Thi. 462 11, Sumedha’s parents tell her that she has been promised to the “handsome” King Anikaratta. She, however, wearies of the ordinary life and wishes to lead the life of an ascetic and devotee of Buddha. King Anikaratta “in brave array of gems and gold” tries to dissuade Sumedha but to no avail. Thus, the king is not seen as a distraction for Sumedha, in fact, she hardly notices him. She has already decided to denounce worldly life and the king is the last resort her parents employ to restrain her. She, however, is beyond worldly ties and uses this opportunity to try to enlighten her parents and her suitor on the transience of the body and the worthlessness of worldly life.

As with other matters of the body, the process of ageing

is also more internalized in the Therīgāthā than in the Theragāthā. However, since ageing is experienced both by men and women, both theras and therīs exhibit a degree of personalization on the subject. The theras however, are mostly abstract and not as vividly descriptive as the therīs. It is my perception that since, the beauty of women was given so much negative importance in Buddhism and women identified so strongly with their own bodies, its eventual decay due to old age or renounce by joining the order becomes a theme of importance in the verses of the therīs. Ambapali describes in great detail, every aspect of her youthful beauty and juxtaposes it with what has become of that beauty due to old age, to emphasize the impermanence of Beauty.12

Lang tells us that the objective of the theras and the therīs is the same. Both seek to dismember worldly ties and follow the path of Buddha to nibbāna. However, their gender differences bring about changes in the way they talk about the process of transcending life. “A monk celebrates his release from the sickle, the plough, and the spade (Thag., 43), while a nun celebrates her release from the mortar, the pestle, and her hunchbacked husband (Thig., 11).” This difference in gender also influences their choice over images – the theras employ images of war and warfare such as of swords, chariots, archers etc whereas the therīs employ more domesticated imagery.

The Theragāthā and the Therīgāthā are different in the methods they employ to achieve liberation. The liberation for the therīs, comes by observing their own bodies and though their own experiences. The

theras, on the other hand, achieve liberation by perceiving another i.e. the desirous woman and recalling to mind the images of putrefaction and the decay of decomposing corpses so as to establish “disgust with the world.” It is a phenomenon catalyzed by external forces.

“The therīs struggle against a false conception of self is much more immediate and personal than the theras struggle against a false conception of other.”13 This is what is the essential difference between the verses of the therīs and the theras – that of the personal in the Therīgāthā and the external in the Theragāthā and brings about the differences in the ways of projecting similar subjects in them.