Bank cards & vinaya rules for bhikkhus

[Alino]

Do they really take cow urine in todays world?

Yesterday i learned that in India cow urine is sold in stores for different purposes.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

Do they really take cow urine in todays world?

That is still part of the ordination ceremony. Did you think I was taking the piss?

The point is not to disrobe just because you cannot obtain superior medicine. The four requisites are the bare minimum, with which a bhikkhu should be content. If he can obtain a luxurious dwelling-place with central-heating, air-conditioning, and running hot water, then it is allowed. If he can obtain expensive medical treatment, silk robes, and delicious home-cooked meals, they are allowed. If not, he should be content with what he can obtain, even a dwelling in a cave or at the root of a tree, if that is all that is available.

[User019336]

*Cow* urine is commentary some 1000 years after Buddha's parinibbana. The proper course is plain rancid urine and if bit by a poisonous snake it is even mixed with feces.

It's imo stupid to expect a bhikkhu to have easy access to a cow's urine at all time.

Urine us sterile as it's produced, it's basically nitrogen dominant fertilizer and it is very nutrient dense. It becomes contaminated by microbes right away and the chemical composition changes. I don't see why a cow's urine is superior lest you want to drink cow hormones.

[DiamondNgXZ]

How can someone be forced to disrobe.. ? Its impossible and bad karma of someone forcefully removing bhikku status of others..

Some reasons:

1) Family emergency.

2) If one stays in a small western monastery and all monks leave/die and one has nowhere to go, and without cash...

3) Lay supporters unable to support the monastery. The economy is going downhill, there might be starvation next year... When you can't feed yourself, you might not be inclined to feed the monks.

4) Severe medical condition might force one to disrobe, if not worse... One bhikkhu has even committed suicide...

5) Some cataclysmic event (nuclear war, Covid-22 or Monkeypox-22 pandemic, government suddenly becoming anti-Buddhist, etc).

1. No one can force a monastic to disrobe. If parajika, it's already auto disrobed. Otherwise, only the monastic themselves can choose to disrobe or not.

2. One who's a monastic should mentally prepare themselves for all scenarios, and not just simply disrobe even due to the circumstances above. It's so hard to get into robes, why waste the chance?

3. Family stuffs, even monks can go back and take care of families, or they can come to the temple to be taken cared of.

4. So what if other monks left? So many monasteries I have seen with only a single monk there. Why cannot survive? If under 5 vassa, the monk should seek another qualified monk to be under dependence.

5. Even if there's famine back in Buddha's time, the sangha remained robed. It's totally ok to survive on very little, suffer together with the people. Ven. Kassapa had a story where he accepted food even from a leper whose finger broke off and landed on his bowl and he was contented to eat (not the finger) the food.

6. It's even better to be in robes to get medical support from supporters. Also, make sure one's monastery has health insurance to cover the monastics..

7. Monastics are very much needed in cataclysmic events, where people need the spiritual support, moral guidance etc. Covid-19 didn't stop people from ordaining, even if some delays might happen. Monastic live mostly in monasteries anyway, lockdown doesn't affect much of anything, just need some arrangement for food from lay supporters.


Just go live in a monastery, you think too much.