Changing Buddhist Practice in Burma - Online Burma Library

Purification and dependency between king and monk
The relation between the leading monk, who would normally have been the
king's teacher, and the king created the 'balance of power': "The stronger the
king, the more likely he would be to impose his choice; the stronger the
Sangha, the more likely they would be to impose theirs on the king"
(Mendelson 1975: 53-4). Nevertheless, it cannot readily be assumed that
thathanabaing 26 was a single voice representing all the sects in Sangha. There
were complex relations within the monk organization; Mendelson thus
summed up: "The monastic lineages...cut across other factional divisions in
the Sangha, just as the holders of the office of thathanabaing represented
different points of view either promoted by the royalty or supported by the
monkhood at large" (Mendelson 1975: 57).
Mendelson, who has studied the history of Sangha from medieval times to the
present, observes that over time two important factors determined change in
Sangha (1975: 25). First, there was the "splitting off of sectarian groups from
the main body of the Sangha" when "these new groups justify the split...in
terms of a redressal of laxity which creeps into the Sangha at large". The
splitting group usually cited 'reassertion of Vinaya' (i.e. for a purer or cleaner
monastic rule of conduct) as the main reason for the breakaway. Second,
depending on the 'strong' or 'weak' lay authority, the lay would usually react
in one of two distinct patterns: a weak lay authority [weak king] might "try to
manipulate the sectarian break to its own advantage...favouring and even
creating a sect out of incipient dissatisfactions", while a strong lay authority
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