Myanmar

POPULATION 42,238,224
BUDDHIST 87.2 percent
CHRISTIAN 5.6 percent
MUSLIM 3.6 percent
HINDU 1.0 percent
OTHER 2.6 percent

Country Overview

INTRODUCTION

The Union of Myanmar, also called Burma, situated along the southeastern rim of continental Asia, is bordered by five countries: India and Bangladesh to the west, China to the north and east, and Laos and Thailand to the east. To the south of Myanmar and the west of peninsular Myanmar lies the Bay of Bengal. Myanmar is an economically undeveloped, semitropical, and mountainous country whose people have relied on rivers as the major travel routes. Buddhist monks accompanied Indian traders sailing to Myanmar's ports along the Bay of Bengal. Buddhist monks, however, also crossed mountains and used river routes to enter the country from the north.

Theravada Buddhism, the dominant religion in Myanmar, appeared about 2,000 years ago. Hinduism also dates back to this time. Christianity was encouraged during British colonial rule in the nineteenth century and has drawn the most converts from Myanmar's tribal animist populations. The ancestors of many of Myanmar's Muslims arrived during the British colonial period.

The impact of British colonial rule on the Buddhist sangha (community of monks) led monks to identify the precolonial past as a time when "pure" Buddhism flourished in Burma. The military coup in 1962 effectively sealed off the country from the rest of the world for about 20 years, which contributed to a perception of the purity of Burmese Buddhism. The current military regime, which chose the name Myanmar in 1989 to replace Burma as the official national designation, has identified its agenda as the fostering of Myanmar cultural heritage, which is effectively Buddhist culture. The government has invoked this agenda to rationalize its persecution of ethnic minorities.

As in other Southeast Asian countries, Buddhism has been used to legitimate historical and contemporary rulers. The current situation in Myanmar pits the ruling military regime, which has identified itself as a champion of Buddhism, against the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and leader of the political opposition, Aung San Suu Kyi, whom her followers view as a bodhisattva (future Buddha).

RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE

Since the 1960s the military regime has been persecuting ethnic minority groups, which include the country's Muslim, Christian, and animist populations. The United Nations estimates that between 1 and 2 million displaced persons live in Myanmar, about 600,000 in camps and the rest in hiding. More than 600,000 refugees have fled Myanmar for Thailand, Laos, Bangladesh, and Malaysia since the late 1980s. Many have fled to escape conscription into forced labor projects, which the military regime defines as voluntary contributions to earn Buddhist merit. The military regime has recruited youths by portraying the army as defending pagodas and monasteries against attack by religious minorities.

Major Religion

THERAVADA BUDDHISM

DATE OF ORIGIN Second century c.e.
NUMBER OF FOLLOWERS 38.3 million

HISTORY

Although Theravada Buddhism was introduced, along with Hinduism, to Burma by Indian traders who reached its shores during the first century c.e., Mahayana Buddhist missionaries from the Indian King Ashoka's court were the first Buddhist missionaries to influence mainland Southeast Asia. The first Buddhist kingdoms (100 b.c.e.–900 c.e.) established in Burma, however, were those of the Pyu, who had migrated from Tibet and incorporated Vajrayana, Mahayana, and Theravada Buddhism into their religious beliefs. The Mon, the Pyu's southern neighbors, who had migrated from the east, prospered from trade with Indian merchants, adopted Theravada Buddhism, and sent their own missionaries to propagate Buddhism throughout the region. By the ninth century the Pyu kingdoms were in decline, and a new wave of immigrants, the Burmans, settled in the north, establishing their own kingdom centered around the city of Pagan in 849.

By the eleventh century the Pagan kingdom succeeded in unifying Burma. The Pagan king Anawrahta defeated the Mon in 1057 and strove to legitimize his action by declaring himself to be a dharmaraja, a bodhisattva whose task as a monarch was to promote Buddhism. The Burmans, who learned the Pali language and Buddhist scriptures from Mon monks and Buddhist arts from Mon craftsmen, established Pagan as the new center of Theravada Buddhism.

After the fall of the Pagan kingdom to the Mongols in 1287, no unified kingdom existed in northern Burma until the emergence of Ava in 1364. In the south the Mon forged another kingdom at Pegu (now Bago), which lasted until 1531 and became the chief center of Theravada Buddhism in Burma. Succeeding dynasties endeavored to unify Burma and wage war on the Ayutthaya kingdom of Thailand. The Ava kingdom was reestablished toward the end of the sixteenth century, and Ava kings attempted to re-create their state in the image of Pagan's former glory as a Buddhist kingdom. After Ava fell in 1752 the rulers of the succeeding Konbaung dynasty set themselves to conquering their neighbors. Their incursions into Assam resulted in the first of what would be three wars with the British in the nineteenth century, British colonization in 1885, and the transformation of Burma into a province of India until 1937.

The British rule in Burma severed the traditional relationship between the sangha and the state, revoking state patronage of the sangha and precipitating a series of rebellions led by Buddhist monks (1885–97, 1932–34). The sangha lost some of its traditional prestige, Christian missions were encouraged, and children were sent to secular schools, where their Christian teachers criticized Buddhism. The Young Monk's Association, which was effectively a political organization directed to national liberation, was founded in 1906. Burma became independent in 1948, and its first prime minister, U Nu, dedicated himself to strengthening Buddhism and ensured the passage of a constitutional amendment instituting Buddhism as the state religion. He convened the Sixth Buddhist Council in 1954.

In 1962 General Ne Win overthrew the government. Ne Win did not promote Buddhism and initially tried to transform Burma into an isolated, socialist state. The country's dismal economy, however, compelled him to put forward a new constitution, which would open the country to foreign aid. He resigned in 1988 after intensive protests (involving Buddhist monks) brought Burma close to revolution. The military took control, killed many demonstrators, and imposed martial law. The military regime promised a new constitution and called for elections in 1990. The overwhelming victor was Aung San Suu Kyi, daughter of General Aung San (1915–47), former hero of Burma's independence movement. She did not enjoy the fruits of her victory because she was placed under house arrest in 1989 and remained so until 1995. Nevertheless she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. Unlike the government of Ne Win, the current military regime publicly professes its support for Buddhism, as does Aung San Suu Kyi, who defines her political position in terms of the pursuit of Buddhist goals. She has argued that democracy and human rights are consistent with the Burmese Buddhist system and accused the military regime of violating the Buddhist precepts against lying and killing.

EARLY AND MODERN LEADERS

Major historical leaders of Buddhism in Burma were often kings. Anawrahta (reigned 1044–77), who unified and expanded the Pagan empire, converted to Theravada Buddhism and maintained close relations with the Sri Lankan King Vijayabahu. Anawrahta sent monks to revive the sangha in Sri Lanka and, in return, obtained relics and a copy of the Pali canon, which he regarded as more correct than the copy he had obtained from his conquest of the Mon. Kyanzittha (reigned 1084–1113), Anawrahta's successor, built many of the most important Burmese temples. King Dhammazedi (reigned 1472–92) of the Pegu kingdom in Ava was a former monk who undertook a major reformation of the monastic order. In the first half of the seventeenth century, Manirathana Thera, a monk, translated numerous texts into the Myanmar language. These were subsequently introduced into school curriculums.

Most modern leaders of Buddhism in Myanmar have professed vipassana meditation (insight meditation). Sayagyi U Ba Khin (1899–1971), a layman, achieved such exceptional mastery of the techniques developed by Ledi Sayadaw that he was encouraged by a renowned Buddhist teacher, Webu Sayadaw, to offer instruction in this practice to laypeople. Among Sayagyi's students was Satya Narayan Goenka (born in 1924), whose Vipassana Research Institute was responsible for making the entire Pali canon available on the Internet and in various systems of writing.

MAJOR THEOLOGIANS AND AUTHORS

Among the country's most influential theologians was Ledi Sayadaw (1846–1923), a prolific Buddhist scholar and influential teacher of meditation and scripture, who demonstrated particular ability in both the theory and practice of dharma (in the Pali language, dhamma). He departed from the scholarly traditions of his peers by writing many works in colloquial Burmese in order to make them accessible to laypeople. Another important theologian was Mahasi Sayadaw (1904–82), author of 67 Buddhist works and teacher of satipathana vipassana meditation (concentration meditation).

HOUSES OF WORSHIP AND HOLY PLACES

Houses of worship are mainly temples and pagodas. Pagodas, which are relic chambers or stupas, are more plentiful in Myanmar than in other Buddhist countries. Particularly important pagodas include the Shwezigon Pagoda near Pagan, which houses a replica of the Buddha's tooth obtained by Anawrahta; Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon (Rangoon), the largest gold-plated temple in the world, said to house eight hairs of the Buddha; Kuthodaw Pagoda in Mandalay, featuring the inscription of the Pali canon onto 729 white marble tablets; Mahazedi Pagoda in Bago (Pegu), enshrining a replica of the tooth relic and, purportedly, the Buddha's begging bowl; Arakan Pagoda in Mandalay, containing a sacred image of the Buddha; and Kyaiktiyo Pagoda in Kyaiktiyo, perched atop a golden rock that is balanced on the edge of a cliff.

WHAT IS SACRED?

Buddhist relics worshiped in Myanmar include eight hairs that, according to some legends, the Buddha purportedly gave to two Burmese merchants who had offered him refreshments; several replicas of the Buddha's tooth relic from Sri Lanka; and a replica of the tooth relic from the People's Republic of China. Consecrated images of the Buddha are objects of worship and may be attributed with special powers. For example, several images of a serpent-hooded Buddha are believed to protect victims of snake bites, and carved fish representing an incarnation of the Buddha are believed to have the power to bring rain. A symbol of the Buddha's renunciation of the world, the monk's yellow robe, is regarded as a sacred object with the power to protect the wearer from attacks by spirits or witches. The bo, or bodhi, tree (pipal tree) is particularly venerated and is ritually watered on the day commemorating the Buddha's enlightenment.

HOLIDAYS AND FESTIVALS

The day of the Buddha's enlightenment is celebrated in Myanmar by such meritorious activities as catching fish in drying ponds in order to release them in fresh water. The onset of Buddhist Lent unites Myanmar villagers in collective efforts to honor monks about to enter retreat for three months. A lottery determines which layman shall have the privilege to present the collective offering to the monks in the communally owned gilded begging bowl. Another lottery decides how the collective offerings will be distributed among the monks. The First Festival of Lights, held at the end of Buddhist Lent, honors one's elder relatives with gifts of food or clothes. During the following month lay people accrue special merit by making collective public offerings of yellow robes to monks. This month also provides an occasion for the public offering of other items needed by monks. These items are conspicuously displayed with their donor's names on or under a wooden structure known as a wishing tree and taken in procession to the monastery. The Second Festival of Lights marks the end of the robe-offering season by commemorating the robe given to the Buddha by his mother. Villagers earn particular merit by collectively sewing a robe within one night to present to a monk or to cover a Buddha image.

MODE OF DRESS

Six different types of robes are offered to monks or to the Buddha. The robe worn by a monk during his initiation, consisting of stitched-together patches of yellow cloth, is known as the great robe. Other robes include the two types that monks might receive during the Festivals of Lights, a robe adorned with a water-lily pattern that is offered to the Buddha, a "golden robe" made from white cloth covered by painted gilded flowers, and the "ownerless robe," which is left on the path frequented by a monk who vows not to accept a robe offering. Nuns wear pink robes, orange skirts, and brown stoles.

DIETARY PRACTICES

Although Buddhism does not proscribe the eating of meat, some monks and renowned teachers in Myanmar have advocated vegetarianism.

RITUALS

In Myanmar the daily practice of merit-making involves taking refuge in the Triple Gem (through which one relies on the Buddha, the dharma, and the sangha for help and guidance), reciting mantras, observing the pancha sila (Buddhist precepts), and offering cooked food to monks. Often it is not the monks themselves who beg from households but young novices who do so on their monastery's behalf. The food so collected is usually eaten by the novices and monastic visitors, not by the monks, who instead dine in the monasteries on ordered meals prepared by devout villagers. The daily food offering is an important expression of the relationship between the sangha and the laity. In village chapels, which are typically simple structures, laypeople may attend services led by a lay elder every evening.

Funerals offer the laity an opportunity to make merit and monks the opportunity to guide the soul to its future rebirth. In the event of an accidental death, the body is buried as quickly as possible and without ceremony, to discourage the dead person's ghost from returning to the former community of the deceased. When a nonaccidental death occurs in villages, people believe that the entire community is contaminated by the death and must work together to restore purity. Vigils following nonaccidental deaths provide community members with the opportunity to earn merit, because their presence reassures the departed spirit and drives off opportunistic ghosts. Just before the body is taken from a village house, laypeople place a mirror before its mouth to determine whether the soul has left the body, and they rock the body in a final obeisance to the Buddha. Relatives of the deceased usually do a meritorious act and then sponsor a ritual to transfer the merit to the deceased.

Although laypeople may be either buried or cremated, monastic funerals entail cremation and often separate final rites. During the latter, hired mourners weep and chant over the deceased monk's bones, which are laid in a kind of flower cradle. As the cradle is rocked, attending monks pray that the deceased will reach an auspicious destiny. The bones are then either interred or ground into a powder that is molded into a Buddha image to be placed in the monastery.

RITES OF PASSAGE

Males who do not devote their lives to the sangha nonetheless typically participate in two monastic initiations. The first occurs around the age of eight or nine, when a boy undergoes the shinbyu ritual inducting him as a novice in the monastery. The initiate's parents might hire a band, offer guests a rich feast, and invoke the theme of Prince Siddhartha's departure from his secular, courtly life by dressing their son in the costume of a royal prince and building an imitation palace of cardboard and wood to house the festivities. Although a novice probably will not remain long in the monastery, his initiation is viewed as an essential basis for his ordination into monkhood when he is at least 20 years old. An ordination ceremony takes place in a temple chamber forbidden to laypersons. The candidate kneels before an assembly of at least four monks while one monk recites the ordination ritual. Following this recitation the presiding monk questions the candidate, the candidate formally requests admission to the sangha, and, barring objections from the assembly, the presiding monk then admits the candidate to the sangha, bestowing on him a new name.

MEMBERSHIP

Burma began to attract Western converts to Theravada Buddhism around the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1908 Allan Bennet, the second Englishman to be ordained in Burma as a Theravada monk (Gordon Douglas was the first, in 1899), left Burma for England, where he founded a mission. Because members of the military government had been influenced by vipassana meditation, vipassana masters were permitted to leave Burma as missionaries from 1962 to 1988, when the country was closed (when foreigners were generally barred from entering the country and few citizens were permitted to leave). Since 1988 the Maha Bodhi meditation center and other traditions have attracted foreign disciples.

The Myanmar government has actively promoted missionary projects of its own. The most substantial of these is the International Theravada Buddhist Missionary University, which opened in 1998. Burmese monks living outside of the country convened in Malaysia in 1985 to establish the International Burmese Buddhist Sangha as a missionary organization. The Internet is an important tool for these various centers and organizations.

SOCIAL JUSTICE

The country's military regime has generally tried to eliminate monks who might be active in the field of social justice. Under UNICEF auspices, however, monks and nuns have been training at Thailand's Sangha Metta Project (formed in 1998) to become educators in the prevention and social management of AIDS.

SOCIAL ASPECTS

Myanmar Buddhists believe in a type of religious essence known as pon, which constitutes the power and glory of an individual and is mainly an attribute of men. Because men possess pon and women generally do not, women are expected to treat men with respect and defer to them in public. It is the wife's responsibility to guard and enhance her husband's pon. Although women enjoy parity with men in terms of inheritance rights, many choices of occupation, the ability to initiate divorce, and voicing their opinions, the view that pon is a male principle and associated with the capacity to attain nibbana (nirvana) influences relations between men and women.

POLITICAL IMPACT

Buddhist monks periodically protested against British colonial rulers and the military regime that has controlled Myanmar since 1962. In 1990 monasteries organized an unprecedented boycott against the government. In response the government chose to avoid its earlier mistake of opposing Buddhism by declaring its program to support Buddhism by such actions as removing "vice" (meaning subversive monks) from the monasteries. Moreover, the government publicly associated the protests waged by monks in 1988 with the defilement of revered Buddhist shrines and argued that party politics should never be combined with religion.

Contemporary Myanmar politics reveals opposing interpretations of what constitutes meritorious activity. The military government, which has been censured internationally for its persecution of ethnic minorities and suppression of democracy, describes the forced labor it exacts from ethnic minorities to build temples and other state projects as voluntary labor given to gain Buddhist merit. The military government's chief opponent, Aung San Suu Kyi, has asserted that the struggle for democracy aids the Buddhist realm and, therefore, constitutes merit-making.

CONTROVERSIAL ISSUES

Abortion, which is illegal in Myanmar, is considered to violate Buddhist ethics, but Buddhism does not oppose contraception. Buddhist nuns do not enjoy a high position in Myanmar society. They do not have the opportunity to pursue Buddhist studies, nor are they requested to perform religious functions.

CULTURAL IMPACT

Buddhist literary genres in fifteenth-century Burma included verses based on stories of the Buddha's life but placed in a Burmese context, devotional poetry, and advisory epistles written by monks to kings. During the first millennium the Pyu devised a distinctive style of stupa known as a cetiya, which was continued in succeeding periods. In the eleventh century Buddhist architects began to build cetiyas with open bases and with domes that arose from the floor rather than the roof of these bases. This style transformed the base of the cetiya into a temple with internal halls that were decorated with Buddha images and paintings. These internal halls encompassed the lower part of the dome of the cetiya, which featured Buddha icons facing the four directions. The Ananda temple of Pagan is a noted example of this style. The Mandalay style of Buddha image depicts a standing Buddha with arms slightly spread at the base.

Other Religions

The propitiation of nats (designated as 37 anthropomorphic spirits associated with territories, villages, families, and activities) addresses worldly concerns, such as illness, bad luck, and prosperity. The Buddhist householder's worship of nats is oriented toward maximizing the potential of the present life, but maximizing the potential of one's present life ideally enables one to generate the merit that secures a better rebirth. Because the Buddhist householder in practice pursues the goal of a good rebirth rather than spiritual salvation, Buddhism and nat cults can be understood as reflecting complementary ethical notions and approaches to the supernatural. In Myanmar a nat shrine adorns each Buddhist village and many Christian villages. Nat cult leaders are mostly women, who serve as oracles, mediums, or diviners and consider themselves to be either married to or the lovers of nats. Several pagodas are dedicated exclusively to nat worship. Buddhists propitiate nats during the observance of rites of passage. The house nat must be honored when a child is born, and village nats receive offerings prior to a boy's initiation as a Buddhist novice, at weddings, and at funerals. Nats also receive offerings during the phases of the agricultural cycle and to prevent and cure illness. Significant parallels can be drawn between the hierarchy of nats and the political structure of historic Burmese kingdoms.

Hindu practitioners may participate in common Buddhist rituals in Myanmar. Brahman priests are occasionally hired to offer auspicious chants during shinbyu rituals, because the Buddhist sponsors believe that the Brahman priests are particularly adept at praising the ritual participants and guests and appeasing envious nats.

Because the ancestors of the majority of Myanmar's Muslim population arrived from India during the British rule, Myanmar Muslims cannot prove that their ancestors were residents of Burma before 1823 and thus meet the requirement for Myanmar citizenship and a national identity card. This, in turn, denies Muslims access to travel, education, and jobs. The construction of new mosques is prohibited, and, where anti-Muslim riots have occurred, Muslims are forbidden to assemble in groups of more than five. During 1991–92 about 250,000 Muslims fled to Bangladesh.

Like Muslims, Christians in Myanmar are prohibited from constructing or repairing churches; they are also prohibited from publishing or distributing religious literature. Bibles translated into local languages are forbidden. Many Christian churches have been closed or destroyed. Christian worship is only permitted in buildings more than 100 years old that display no external symbols of the cross. Christian ethnic minorities are being forced to convert to Buddhism. One group of Christian Karen tribal guerrilla fighters viewed the twin boys (born in 1988) leading them in their struggle (against the Myanmar army and the Myanmar regime's persecution of Christian tribal people) as messiahs.

Marcia Calkowski

See Also Vol. 1: Buddhism, Theravada Buddhism

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