Burma: Census of India 1901 Vol. I - Khamkoo

.
uc<
:
:
32 REPORT ON THE CENSUS OF BURMA.
found its way in by sea from Ceylon rather than to that which traces its passage
down the valleys of the Irrawaddy and Chindwin from India. It appears that
neither of these views is inconsistent with the actual facts as indicated (possibly
with some fanciful imagery) in the ancient Burmese chronicles. The following
note, which Mr. Taw Sein Kho has kindly written for me, not only brings out
clearly the dual origin of Burmese Buddhism (a point to which, perhaps, sufficient
prominence has not been given in the past) but also shows incidentally that the
two component parts of the faith as professed in the province crossed its borders
for the first time at different periods and from different points of the compass
" There are two schools of Buddhism, the Northern and Southern. Sanskrit is the vehicle
of the former and Pali of the latter. In the Northern school, which is still professed by
Nepal, Bhutan, Thibet, Mongolia, Corea, China and Japan, the existence of a Supreme
Being, the Creator of the Universe, called Adhi-Buddha, is recognized, while in the Southern
school, which is now professed by Ceylon, Burma and Siam, the central tenet is that
man, without any extraneous aid from any Superior Being, is capable of attaining Salvation,
and that Buddha is the highest type of humanity. The adherents of the Northern school
immigrated to Burma and settled down at Prome at the beginning of the Christian era.
Some of the settlers came by sea, because Prome was then a sea-port, while others came
possibly by land by way of Chittagong and Arakan or via Assam and Manipur. The
Chindwin valley is full of ancient historic sites, and is redolent of traditions about Brahmanic
kings similar to those prevailing at Prome. There were also Indian settlements at
Yazagyo, Male, Tagaung and Legaing. Later on, in the 8th and 9th centuries A.D-, there
was an upheaval of races in Central Asia and China, and ethnic pressure, due to the displace-'
ment of race by race, profoundly affected the destinies of both India and Burma. Further,
the advent of Muhammadan rule into the valley of the Ganges destroyed Buddhism in Northern
India, and the Northern school gradually lost its hold over Burma, because its life-blood
had been cut off at its source. Meanwhile, the Buddhists of the Irrawaddy Valley had entered
„ T , , „ . . into relations with the
R
bonzis* of Thibet and the Lamas of
U
undoubtedly drived from tlTfrhi- China, and the theistic character of the Northern school
betan "Bonzi." became tinged with Shamanistic beliefs and corrupt practices,
of which the unchastity of the Aris of Pagan was the
most prominent. When Nawrata became king of Pagan in the 1 ith century A.D., the
prevailing religion had, indeed, reached a very low depth in its stages of decline and corruption.
" That6n was the stronghold of the Southern school in Burma. Thither the monks of
Ceylon repaired for the propagation of their faith. It is said that the Theras, Sona and
Uttara, were sent as Buddhist Missionaries to That6n after the Third Council held by
Asoka in 244 B.C. The truth of this statement rests on the correct identification of the
term "Suvannabhumi," the Aurea Regio of Ptolemy, with the ancient Talaing kingdom of
Thaton. Be that as it may, Pagan is the place where the two schools of Buddhism coalesced
under the auspices of Nawrata and his successors, and where the stronger vitality of the
Southern school completely absorbed, assimilated and obliterated the Northern school."
45. An account is given in the 1891 Report of what may be called the High
and
Burmese '
Low Church parties in the Burmese Buddhist
uirr,e.j( Buddhist ms Sects acs.
Church, the Sulagandis and the Mahagandis, to give
them two of their many names. Mr. Taw Sein Kho says of them
" The Buddhist sects remain as they were 10 years ago. The attitude of each sect towards
the other is not conciliatory ;
at the same time it is not aggressive. A new sect has
arisen called the (Kamatan, cogcp §?)• Its members believe that beatitude can be attained
even in this life by means of austerity, self-control and ecstatic meditation."
Another sect not adverted to in the 1891 Report is that of the Mans. These
are to be found in small numbers in portions of the Pegu and Tenasserim divisions,
the scattered remnant of a body whose anti-clericalism appears to have created some
sensation in Upper Burma rather less than half a century ago. Their tenets
(which seem to be somewhat similar to those of the Sawti sect, referred to in
the article on Nam Hkam in the Upper Burma Gazetteer) are described in the
following note, for which I am again indebted to Mr. Taw Sein Kho :
" The sect was founded by Maung Po, a physician of King Mindon, in 1856. All Buddhists
must revere the "Three Gems," Buddha, Dhamma (Law) and Sangha (Assembly of
Monks). Maung Po taught that the third " Gem " was a mere excrescence, and he repudiated
the obligation of the laity to supply the monks with the four necessaries, namely, shelter,
raiment, food and medicine. His principal doctrine is that man's salvation lies in his own
hands, and that salvation can be attained if one has overcome the Mdras (pronounced man
in Burmese) as Gotama Buddha did.