BUDDHIST MONASTIC CODE I

The Valuable Chapter Chapter 8.987. When a bhikkhu is having a new bed or bench made, it is tohave legs (at most) eight fingerbreadths long — using sugatafingerbreadths — not counting the lower edge of the frame. In excessof that it is to be cut down and confessed.The purpose of this rule is to prevent bhikkhus from making and using furnishingsthat are high and imposing.The factors for the offense here are three.1) Object: a bed or bench whose legs, measuring from the lower side of theframe to the floor, are longer than eight sugata fingerbreadths (16.7 cm.)2) Effort: One acquires it after making it or having it made3) Intention: for one's own use.Object. The Canon contains many rules dealing with furnishings, especially in theKhandhakas, and because furnishings in the time of the Buddha were somewhatdifferent from what they are now, it is often a matter of guesswork as to what,precisely, the rules are referring to. The bed (mañca) here almost certainly refers towhat we mean by a bed. The bench (pīṭha), according to the K/Commentary, isshorter than a bed, but not so short that it is square. This last stipulation comesfrom Cv.VI.2.4, which allows bhikkhus to use an āsandika — apparently a squarestool, large enough to sit on but not to lie on — even if the legs are long. Anotherpiece of furniture with long legs allowed in the same passage is the sattaṅga, achair or sofa with a back and arms. The Vinaya-mukha includes a pañcaṅga — achair or sofa with a back but no arms — under this allowance as well. The Canonand commentaries make no mention of this point, but it seems valid: Armless chairsand sofas are less imposing than those with arms.The sugata measures are a matter of controversy, discussed in Appendix II. For thepurposes of this book, we are taking the sugata span to be 25 cm. Because thereare twelve sugata fingerbreadths in a sugata span, eight sugata fingerbreadthswould be equal to 16.7 cm.Effort. The permutations under this factor are as follows: the act of making thebed/bench or having it made — a dukkaṭa; acquiring the finished article — apācittiya. This last penalty applies regardless of whether the bed/bench was madeentirely by oneself, entirely by others either partly or entirely at one's instigation, orwhether one finished what others began or got others to finish what one beganoneself. In any event, one must cut the bed/bench down to the proper size beforeconfessing the offense.If one obtains a tall bed/bench made by another — not at one's instigation — thenusing it entails a dukkaṭa (§). Cv.VI.8 allows that if furnishings of the sortunallowable for bhikkhus to own themselves are in a lay person's house (and belongto the lay person, says the Sub-commentary) bhikkhus may sit on them but not liedown on them. There are three exceptions to this allowance, the one piece objected419