MILADAKALAB
BUDDHISM AND EMOTIONAL SUPPORT FOR ELDERLY PEOPLE
ABSTRACT. This paper discusses the important religious role of elderly people in traditional Khmer society and traces the construction of new lives by refugees to Western countries in the past decade, showing the important place of monasteries as a focus for the old. The data derive from fieldwork in Cambodia in 1965-66 and from several shorter periods of fieldwork in the mid-1980s among Cambodian refugees in France, Thailand, Australia, Germany and the United States. Key Words: Buddhism, Cambodia, Khmer, refugees, religious observance, women,
migration
In Cambodia, Buddhism is an aspect of Khmer ethnicity, and thus it pervades the lives of all people, yet it is especially important to the older generation. It is usual in all Theravada 1 Buddhist countries that among the lay people only old persons are meticulous in their religious observances. This conduct gives them not only psychological satisfaction but also useful occupation as they are experienced and skilled at organizing ceremonies. It also brings them in touch with non-related persons of the same age group, provides them the respect of the whole community, and for the abler among them, often also considerable influence. This traditional pattern is continued with a few modifications among Cambodian refugees in the West. Several writers on Theravada Buddhist societies have noted that it is mostly the old people who attend temple services on holy days. Gombrich (1981) writes about Sri Lanka "... on a full moon p o y a 2 the average temple in the area probably has forty or fifty people taking the Eight Precepts (listed below) and about half that number on the m d s a p o y a . 3 Most of these are old people, especially women, who outnumber men taking ata sil 4 by at least four to one; there are also a few schoolchildren, which I believe to be a modem development. Very few people indeed take the Eight Precepts between the ages of twenty and fifty, except perhaps at Wesak." Similarly, for Thailand, Kingshill (1976) observes that "many of the older villagers stay in the w i h a - n 5 the entire precept day". Tambiah (1970) states that "the old and not the young show piety, and among them the women are more frequent 'churchgoers' than men". Moerman (1968) thinks that Buddhism, which focuses on the next life, is in many ways the religion of the old. Participation in its services is expected to increase with age and actual attendance does, in fact, reflect age and sex. Only a few ancient villagers who have retired from secular affairs spend the eve of the holy day in the temple. The same was true of Cambodia. Ebihara (1966) writes: "Religious piety reaches its peak in old age when individuals come to possess more physical and Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology 5: 7-19, 1990. © 1990 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
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psychological leisure than is ordinary... The woman past menopause cuts off her hair or shaves her head to signify renunciation of worldly vanities; some old people stay for extended periods of time in small shelters on temple grounds to pray and meditate: both men and women become much more observant of holy days and are seen at all religious ceremonies, large and small, staying through all the prayers and sermons, which the younger adults often do not bother or cannot afford to attend . . . . Merit is accumulated ... and it also earns a great deal of respect for the old people while they are still in this world." In Lovea village described by Martel (1975) old people also had all the important functions connected with the monastery, as was the case in my village Prek Por (Kalab 1976). Vickery (1984) criticises the idea that all Khmers lived in a typical village with a Buddhist monastery and mentions a village in Siem Reap which he briefly visited, which had a lifestyle of its own. No doubt there existed isolated ancient villages with mainly pre-Buddhist culture, but there are no statistics available to prove their prevalence and importance. Cambodia extends over 181,000 Km 2 and in 1970 had about 7,000,000 inhabitants according to Migozzi (1973), giving average density of 40 persons per Km 2, but 6,000,000 inhabitants lived in the central area of about 60,000 Km 2 where the density was over 90. Though this zone included the most fertile areas, according to Delvert (1961) this distribution depended more on history than on fertility of the soil. Among the population there were some 400,000 foreign nationals in 1962, of these 160,000 Chinese who were deemed to be Buddhists, and 210,000 Vietnamese who were mostly Catholics; there were also 150,000 people professing Islam, divided between Cham and Malay. Tribal people inhabited mostly the mountainous border areas. But the majority population of Cambodia are ethnic Khmers. Perhaps half a million or more Khmers live also in neighbouring countries, in the Mekong delta in Vietnam, and in Thailand mainly in the adjacent provinces of Surin, Buriram and Srisaket. Khmers lived in the area probably for several millenia but we have first historical records from the first centuries of our era. Chinese immigrants were settled in Cambodia certainly in the 12th century, and probably much earlier, but they are progressively merging into the Khmer population through intermarriage, hence the group of Sino-Khmers who are not yet completely absorbed. But the Khmers virtually never married any Vietnamese who continued penetrating into the country and occupying parts of Cambodia over several centuries, and later were brought into the capital in large numbers by the French to man their civil service. I shall be concerned only with the Khmers and SinoKhmers, and the line between these two is not always clear in Khmer villages. What unites the Khmers is their Mon-Khmer language and their religion. The Khmers were under Indian cultural influence from the beginning of the Christian era, though we have best information about their ancient history and customs from Chinese travelers. The Khmers write their language in an alphabet of Indian origin, their ritual language was Sanskrit and later Pali, their ancient architectural style derived from India, and ceremonies at the royal court were performed by Brahmans of
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Indian origin. The ancient kings belonged to various Hindu sects, or were Mahayana Buddhists. Later kings became Theravada Buddhists. Each period left its imprint on the popular culture, though it would be often difficult to decide which traits predate Indian influence, which ones are leftovers of the Brahmanic period, and which ones arrived with Buddhism of either school, which itself contains Brahmanic elements. For instance, in Vedic religion the souls of the dead were transformed permanently into ancestors through a series of ceremonies which included the offering of riceballs to ancestors. This offering is still part of the most important Khmer annual feast. Yet already in Buddha's time several Indian philosophical schools preached that sentient beings are reborn after each death in another form, the quality of which depended on their previous moral conduct, until at last the perfected soul merged with the absolute never to be born again. Buddhism also believes in rebirth dependent on conduct in past lives. The Buddha was a wise man who found the Four Noble Truths: life is unsatisfactory, and the reason for this is our craving. This craving for sense gratification, for existence or for non-existence is the cause of rebirths into successive lives with all their continuing ills; if we wish to end suffering we must eliminate this craving and attachment to things. The way to this attainment is the Eightfold Path, which consists of right ethical conduct, mental culture and wisdom. The ultimate aim is the attainment of Nirvana, a transcendent state of emancipation which is undescribable in human language. Whoever attains Nirvana is never reborn again. Mahayana Buddhists do not stop here. They claim that anybody attaining such wisdom would be so compassionate that he would voluntarily continue being reborn so he could help beings on their way to liberation. In either case man's progress depends on his own effort. In Buddhism there is no God Creator. The universe follows natural laws, periodically disintegrating, and then recreating itself anew. Buddhists may believe in various spirits and Brahmanic gods, if they are so inclined, and these beings are also part of nature. Gods live longer and in more pleasant abodes than man, they are powerful and may help us in ordinary human affairs, but they are not immortal, and they cannot influence our ultimate liberation. They have nothing to do with true Buddhist aims. As Buddhism is not concerned with any personal god, the texts recited in the temple are not prayers in the Christian sense. They are either praises of the Buddha, his teaching, and the community of monks, or they are statements about the basic tenets of the philosophy, or they are undertakings to follow the moral code. As Rahula (1959) writes, according to the age old tradition in Buddhist countries, one is considered a Buddhist if one takes the Buddha, the teaching, and the order of monks - generally called The Triple Gem - as one's refuges, and undertakes to observe the Five Precepts - the minimal moral obligation of a lay Buddhist - not to destroy life, not to steal, not to commit adultery, not to tell lies, and not to take intoxicating drinks - reciting the formulas given in the ancient texts. The devout layman, usually the elderly, undertake on holy days to
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observe the Eight Precepts. Terwiel (1975) contains a detailed discussion of all the precepts. The Eight Precepts differ from the Five in that the persons undertake to observe complete chastity, not to take any food between noon and dawn, to abstain from dances, music, spectacles, not to use perfumes, garlands, make-up or personal adornment, and not to sleep on high or luxurious beds. These precepts are usually observed only for a specified period of time, in Cambodia most commonly on the Days of Precepts, that is, the full moon day, the new moon day, and the eighth day after the full moon and new moon days. According to Dhammarama (1962) extremely devout lay people may choose to observe the Ten Precepts, which are also observed by all novices. The only addition to the Eight Precepts here is the abstinence from accepting gold and silver, in practice the use of money. Such devotees then live in monasteries. The fact that devout persons are mostly old people may have several reasons but nothing is found in the Buddhist doctrine that would encourage people to postpone religious practices till their old age. Boys may become novices when they are strong enough to chase a crow from a field. At the time of ordination a candidate must be able and healthy. The Buddha exhorted people to start their religious practices early. The Dhammapada (Dhammarama 1963) devotes a whole section to old age; there "a man without much knowledge grows old like a bull, his muscles develop, but not his wisdom." And "Men who have not lived the holy life and have not attained riches in their youth, suffer like old herons in a lake without fish". The idea seems to be that people should start studying and practising religion as early as possible so they can realize certain aims. In the past when ordination was a rite of passage in Cambodia and Thailand, every boy received religious education before marriage. This was never the privilege of women; girls became white-clad 'nuns' only very exceptionally. With modern secular schooling monkhood started going out of fashion, so that most people begin taking religion seriously only in old age. This practice fits the Hindu theory of four stages of life, when young men become first students, then householders, and only in old age hermits and renouncers. This principle was actually legalized in ancient India by several orthodox Hindu kings, who did not like losing ablebodied tax payers to monasteries, and an identical situation prevails under Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia at present, when only men over 50 may ask for permission to become monks. Although there are few obstacles to lay religious observances, especially in democratic countries, younger Cambodians nevertheless mostly shun the monastery except during great festivals. One of the reasons is probably the difficulty in truly observing the precepts in everyday lay life. The rule against taking life is most difficult because most peasants have to kill pests eating their rice; they kill malariacarrying mosquitoes, and they supplement their diet with fishing. In the east it is customary to bribe officials and tell them lies. White lies are often essential for smooth social intercourse. And most men like alcoholic drinks. Teenagers have their own interests like pop music, and young parents have little spare time; they are usually satisfied to gain merit by materially supporting the monastery and leaving the organization of religious life to the old.
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Old age is not easily defined in Cambodia, because the concept of age is relative rather than absolute. For the Khmers, age is the most important classification of people, but though they have the concept of generation, what really matters is whether a person is older or younger than ego. The kinship terms for ego's generation and younger people do not even differentiate between sexes though gender may be specified by adding 'male' or 'female' - and they have no word for 'sibling', but only one term for 'older sibling' and another for 'younger sibling'. Husband is also addressed as 'older sibling' and wife as 'younger sibling', therefore husband should be always older than wife. And Khmers take special care to remember which twin was born first, because both conduct and form of address depend on relative ages. Once I was spending a night at Kompong Cham Ville guest house in the company of a lady from the Education Department, and it so happened that the place was crowded at lunch time with important government officials because Prince Sihanouk was to inaugurate a development project nearby in the afternoon. In the dining room my companion went on pointing out to me various people she knew, always mentioning their name, their age, and the ministry they worked in. And during introductions one was always asked one's age. Actual age might be at times more important than generation, as my friend addressed one of her aunts as 'older cousin', because she was only a couple of years older than her niece. An older person is never addressed just by name, and this may be the reason why people rarely remember the names of their deceased grandparents and it is next to impossible to collect genealogies of any depth in the rural area. Yet the Khmers have several named generations - according to the publication La vie du paysan khmer (Commission des moeurs et coutumes du Cambodge 1969) they have names for seven generations up and seven generations down, though most of these terms are used only in invocations where ancestors are worshipped. According to Martel (1975), Cambodians can name seven generations in all, five ascending and two descending, but most of these terms are used only in ceremonies. However important age may be in interpersonal relations and whatever the number of generations recognized, there is no particular age at which a person joins the group of senior citizens. Persons all of whose children are married may be inclined to join this group though they need not do so. Buddhism always encouraged the contemplation of the unsatisfactoriness of life, of old age, sickness and death. As people grow older, their eyesight deteriorates and other faculties start declining, their thoughts turn more often to the idea of impermanence and of rebirth. It is at this stage in life when people have fewer responsibilities and more leisure that they start thinking seriously of accumulating more merit. It is now also easier to adjust lifestyle to harmonize with religious observances. They have now time for study and meditation, and most of them have gained considerable experience over the past decades during various festivals and ceremonies and may now help with their organization. This is a function which somebody has to fulfil and only the old people have both the time and knowledge.
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Those who are especially skilled will be called also to organize domestic ceremonies and usually be rewarded for their trouble. They have also the simple satisfaction that their services are wanted and they are gaining a position of authority in this sphere. The group of religious old people is visually differentiated from other adults because they shave their hair or cut it very short, and they dress mostly in black and white. The prevalence of women within this group has probably several reasons. For Thailand, according to Terwiel (1975), firstly there are slightly more women than men in the older strata of the community. Secondly, the number of available older men has been somewhat depleted because older men have the opportunity to become monks. According to Ebihara (1975) "This necessity to earn merit weighs especially heavily on women. Buddhism considers women to be inferior to males and to be born a woman indicates that one had accumulated only a limited amount of merit in the previous incarnation. W o m e n are not permitted to become monks, the means whereby males can earn tremendous amount of merit at one blow, and there is no comparable order of nuns." While women in Tibet o r Japan can become fully fledged nuns, the Theravada line of ordination died out some centuries ago, or so it is generally believed. According to personal communication from Russell Webb, a Thai woman discovered a valid Theravada line somewhere further east, became ordained there and later returned to Thailand, where she is recognized as a true nun by the monks, but she is the only one. In the hamlet Prathnol in Prek Pot, which I studied in 1966, the pattern was the same as described by Ebihara and others. Only old people observed the Eight Precepts on the four holy days each month. All the seven achars - the committee of laymen representing the supporters of the monastery - were men past 50. The monastery Vatt Prakal had fifty little huts at the quietest end of its area, and these were reserved for lay meditators. The meditation teacher was a layman about 60 years old who lived permanently in the monastery. During the rainy season, which is sometimes called the Buddhist Lent, lay people would come there for a retreat for a week or for a number of weeks. There was a special initiation ceremony for newcomers, which included a sermon by a senior monk. However, the fifty huts were probably never all occupied; some weeks only a few people entered, in others a dozen persons, mostly women. I saw only one youngish person there, a woman who was about 40 years old; most were in their sixties. For people attending the retreat for the first time there was a kind of rite of passage during which their hair was shaved never to grow long again. From then on they belonged to an in-group, a club, where people had special interests in common. The ceremony is called chol samathi (entry into meditation), and I have not seen it described anywhere. The ritual takes place always in the early afternoon at about two o'clock on a Thursday, the day of the planet Jupiter, and it is performed within the temple building on consecrated ground where all formal acts of the order of monks take place, but not ordinary weekly services, which are held in the community hall. The participants first pay respect to the
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Buddha image, then go one by one behind the altar, where there is on the pedestal of the Buddha statue a bas relief of Nieng Kunhing, a deity said to correspond to the Brahmanic goddess of earth DharanL Here every meditator presented a lighted incense stick to Nieng Kunhing and prostrated before her. The old people already in retreat for a week or longer were all present seated in the centre opposite the main Buddha image. Three newcomers were seated in front of them, in the first row, when I attended the ceremony. The meditation teacher was present from the start. The three women to be initiated arrived each with two trays of symbolic objects. On each tray there were five candles, five sticks of incense, five bowls of sand, and five lotus buds, also lotus buds with a pair of betel leaves, a packet of candles and a few packets of incense sticks as well as a tin of sand into which the smouldering incense sticks could be placed. One pair of trays contained a pair of kerosene oil lamps in place of the packets of candles. The newcomers were accompanied by some family members and friends who were seated at the sides. Altogether 41 persons were present on that occasion. When the monk arrived, the people started to recite the usual praises of the Triple Gem, then received the refuges and eight precepts, after which followed a sermon which the monk read from a palmleaf manuscript in a monotonous voice and rather fast. The usual collection took place as during any sermon. People normally contributed one riel per person, and the gift was presented to the preacher in an envelope at the conclusion of the service, after which he left. After that the candidates handed over one tray each to the meditation master, and they kept the other tray which they carried to their little huts. Though the huts were separated by only about two meters of space, some of the women were quite frightened to spend the night there alone. Normally there is very little privacy in Cambodian homes, which a European may find frustrating, but for the Khmer the good life means to be surrounded by his family at all times. One woman who had been in retreat two years earlier described to me what happened there. The candidates have to learn certain texts by heart, and then sit alone and repeat them concentrating on them, until they see a vision. If this happens, they go quickly to the meditation teacher and describe to him what they have seen. He explains the meaning to them. She said she once saw a dead body; the teacher asked her, what was inside. She didn't know, so she returned to continue her meditation, and then she saw a heart and other organs inside the body; the teacher said that that was a good sign. People usually stay until they have a vision, some succeed quickly, others take a long time. Of course meditation is a very individual thing and the technique depends more on a particular teacher than on textbooks. The students of the same teacher tend to form into a group with some common interest and a fair understanding of each other. Not the whole time is spent in meditation. The morning is passed usually in chores and eating, family members normally bring food to their grandmother or grandfather. There are daily interviews with the master, and in between the people sit together in groups in the shade of trees and talk. After a few weeks in retreat they will probably make new friends among the other meditators whom
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they knew only superficially before. And these friends then meet regularly every week during their religious observances. Younger people in the village respect this group of elders and are influenced by them. While government officials were distrusted and avoided and the headman had an ambiguous position as a go-between with his loyalty split between the villagers and the government, the monks were trusted and their advice would be normally accepted. The monks themselves would usually discuss every problem with the achars who had thus considerable influence. Though the old women kept more in the background, they had their own network of informants and friends, and the wife of the chief achar was an extremely efficient organizer of the women during festivals; she had her importance recognized even by the mandarins, so that the wife of the district officer would bring gifts to her when returning from Phnom Penh. The political relevance of the monastery and those associated with it became obvious during the general election campaign in 1966, when the candidates addressed no public meetings, only distributed some posters and leaflets, but each of them visited every abbot in the electoral district. On the face of it this was an irrational procedure, because monks are not supposed to be interested in politics, they have no right to vote or be elected. Yet every politician knew that the monks were the trusted advisors of villagers and their opinion was of the greatest value. And the old people associated with the monastery, who were in regular contact with the monks, played a vital part in the formation of their counsel. On the day of the election all the white-clad meditation students left their retreat in a single file, led by the meditation master, and went to cast their vote. Kaufman (1960) states that the monastery is also a "home for the aged: the elderly male members who are no longer capable o f carrying on the arduous task of farming may join the monkhood during their waning years in order to acquire merit, purge themselves of their sins, and at the same time be assured of a daily supply of food." Though this is tree, the motivation is usually more complex, and in any case a monastery is not a geriatric ward. There was only one monk out of twenty in Vatt Prakal who became ordained late in life, when he became a widower. He was quite able to take part in the daily activities of the monastery, though on the whole he was given more time for meditation and fewer chores. Yet at the time of ordination a candidate must be healthy and must not have any obligations to anybody. If he becomes disabled later, the community of monks will of course look after him, but very frail or sick men cannot be ordained. I attended once a ceremony in Battambang in honour of an abbot who just attained 100 years of age. He had to be carried to the ritual and probably could not take in much any more, yet great respect was shown to him. Long life and good health are signs of much merit. In this sense religious observances are a kind of preventive medicine. Yet when people do fall sick they seek first the help of a medical specialist. Some monks practise traditional medicine, but most experts are lay people. The sick may also approach spirit media to ask advice from their ancestors. An animistic ritual, which is used primarily to strengthen a persons health during a dangerous period like pregnancy, may be also used for
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sick people. But when all else fails, especially in case o f chronically sick old people, the family may arrange a Buddhist ceremony in their home. The person thus gains merit by listening to a sermon and by presenting offerings to the monks. Some Buddhist texts are specially recommended as sermons for sick people. The accumulated merit will take effect either in this life with the recovery of the patient or in the next life. W h e n the time of death approached - unless it was sudden and unexpected - a monk would be invited to read the relevant scriptures for the dying person, to keep his or her mind on the right thoughts, which could influence his or her rebirth. For the Buddhist death is only the beginning o f a new life, they try to be always aware o f its unavoidability and the necessity to strive for a good rebirth and ultimately Nirvana. Death is not a taboo subject, it is not hidden away. Though there are some crematoria in Cambodia, most dead were cremated on open funeral pyres, with relatives lighting the pyre, waiting nearby till the ashes cooled sufficiently so the relations could handle them and collect unbumt pieces o f bones, wash them ritually and put them in a receptable to keep at home or in a stupa. Children were not excluded from these occasions. Most cremations took place within the monastic compound and meditation on death was always one o f the favourite topics in the retreats. Preparation for rebirth was one o f the functions of the monastery, but care for the frail and sick was the task for relatives within the home and within the lay community; only sick monks were cared for within the monastery. As candidates for ordination had to be healthy and without obligations, the monastery could not be a refuge for all old men. Very severely disabled people would not enter the retreat if they needed constant care and could not stay alone in a hut. The monastery was not a hospital, but it was a community centre for the whole village and a very respectable club for the elderly who were able to make use of it. The numbers of the elderly are unlikely to be excessive in developing countries. In m y hamlet o f 278 inhabitants there were 45 persons over 40 o f whom 31 were in their 50s, and 16 over 60. A m o n g the over-sixties there were seven men and nine women. Since the monastery served six other hamlets as well, over the year between 120 and 200 elderly persons might have been interested in entering retreat for a period o f time. In practice the numbers taking Eight Precepts on holy days were below fifty even during the rainy season. Some people had other interests, and in some cases the reason might have been financial. Though nobody is asked to pay anything, it is expected that supporters will be generous to their monastery and though in those days nobody went hungry in Cambodia, some people had no cash. Political events did not allow the traditional situation to continue for long. Prince Sihanouk was deposed in 1970 and Lon Nol intended to stop the Vietnamese communists from using Cambodian territory. Instead the war spread to the countryside, Phnom Penh was filled with refugees and those who could started leaving the country. W h e n Pol Pot established his Democratic Kampuchea, it was possible in the beginning to escape from the border areas and
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according to Haines (1985), some 35,000 to 40,000 people fled to Thailand, another 150,000 went in the opposite direction to Vietnam. Almost all of this wave of refugees in Thailand are now resettled in third countries. The second influx into Thailand occurred during the unsettled conditions generated during and after the Vietnamese invasion of Kampuchea in December 1978. Over two to three years some 600,000 refugees entered Thailand, fleeing starvation and fighting. Some were settled in holding camps operated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees; most stayed in border villages on no man's land. Later the boundary became fortified and mined and escape became as difficult as across the Berlin Wall. In the meantime the traditional organization of Cambodian society was destroyed. Monarchy ended with Lon Nol's Khmer Republic in 1970, but Lon Nol still supported Buddhism and even tried to justify the abolition of monarchy by following Buddha's preference for the republican constitution of Vesali, which is still the basis of the organization of the monastic community. Then Pol Pot arrived in 1975, emptied Phnom Penh and started disrobing monks. According to Son Sann (1986) there were about 80,000 monks in pre-1975 Cambodia, of whom about 500 survived the regime. Everybody had to work in the fields, food was scarce, and young people were sometimes put in charge of groups of elders. Not only was the whole life collectivised and families split, but an effort was made to change attitudes by changing language use. According to the new constitution, for instance, everybody was to be addressed by the term 'mit' (friend) to eliminate any discrimination on the basis of rank or age (Chandler 1976). In practice it seems not to have worked. Both Picq (1984) and Kiernan (1982) describe cases where Khmer Rouge cadres liked to be called by the more respectful term 'elder brother'. Nevertheless, even if some of the old language remained, the pattern of conduct changed. The elders were no more respected; if they could not work hard, they mostly starved to death. Under Heng Samrin, the regimentation slightly lessened. People could travel within the country looking for relatives, albeit with special permits, and some old men were allowed to be ordained monks, but they are being politically educated and supervised. For the meantime, it seems that traditional Khmer lifestyle can be preserved best outside Cambodia, but every country has different problems. The Khmer minority living in rural Thailand still follows the traditions, but these are purely oral traditions. Because everybody must attend a Thai school, they cannot read or write in Khmer. Refugees face even greater problems. On the whole the different waves of refugees have different backgrounds, different experiences and different expectations. Their treatment on arrival in Thailand is often unpleasant and if they succeed in reaching the camps, life there is often monotonous without hope or future. Those lucky enough to emigrate into a third country have also to cope with a new language and a new culture. They find it difficult to adjust to competitive environments where aggressive face-to-face confrontation between individuals is common. The chain of traumatic experiences over the past two
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decades has affected the mental and physical health of many Cambodians. According to Ebihara (1985), one survey in California indicated that 84% of Cambodian households reported a member under a physician's care, as compared with 45% of Vietnamese, 24% of Hmong and 24% of Lao households. While children who grew up after 1975 are not very familiar with traditional Khmer culture, they are usually better able to adjust to their new surroundings. The aged face special difficulties, as they are mostly unable to get a job, to learn a new language, to make new friends. They need to meet each other, and according to custom they find it more congenial to meet while sharing some task in a monastery, than meeting in other people's homes. There exist Theravada monasteries in most large Western cities but most of them are Sinhalese or Thai institutions and elderly Cambodians naturally prefer Khmer speaking monks. To found a monastery is an expensive venture and so only large communities can afford one. The first Cambodian monastery abroad was probably Vatt Khemararama in Paris (Ang Choul6an 1981) which was started soon after Pol Pot's arrival in Phnom Penh. At present there are three monasteries in Paris, others are in Bordeaux, Rennes, Lyon, Brussels and Zurich, and possibly in other places in Europe, in Australia in Sydney and Adelaide, and at least a dozen in the United States which have the largest number of Cambodian immigrants, around 100,000 persons. The monasteries organize major calendric festivals and perform domestic ceremonies, and depending on space, there is usually accommodation for lay meditators and most of them have resident white-clad ladies, though these facilities are much limited in comparison with traditional Cambodia. It is difficult to know the position of old people inside Cambodia today. Not many of them survived. The minority of refugees who traced their families inside Cambodia and keep in touch do not have reliable news, because letters are censored, but they all seem to concentrate on sending parcels of medicaments to their relatives; some of them reach the addressees, others do not. Medicines seem to be in short supply, so much so that they are probably in part used as currency in much the same way as American cigarettes were used in post-war Europe. If medical care is limited, the elderly might at least find solace in religion, but it seems that only few monasteries are open. Candidates for ordination are selected at least partly on political grounds and it is difficult to guess how many of them become expert meditation teachers. The elderly can gain merit by attending services on holy days and taking the Eight Precepts. But the new monks are in part selected and supervised by the state and it is unlikely that many of them can have the same confidence of the villagers as those in the sixties. And not all monasteries are probably places where people can talk freely. CONCLUSION In traditional Cambodia the old people had a special role to play. They were always looked after by their families and respected for their age, but if they
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devoted the last years of their life to religion, they gained additional esteem, useful occupation, and often considerable influence. In the West we hear of retired men who lose all purpose in life once they are separated from their workplace; many old people tend to look more backwards to the memories of their past than to the future. The Cambodian role for the old seems to prevent this. They start learning new skills in their fifties and sixties. The meditation retreats teach relaxation techniques which are becoming fashionable in the West. They are also suitable for the very frail who are no more fit for much physical activity. Most elderly Khmers keep active in one way or another, planning for the future, whether they are organizing the next ritual, or making merit for their next life. The religious life brings them peace and hope and inner satisfaction, but also the respect of the community at large. They not only avoid being under their children's feet, but they have a useful role to play looking after monks' welfare and they spend much time with other devout people of the same age which brings them companionship. Though they are united by the basic requirements of moral observances, there are many ways in which the religious life can be led to suit all manner of men. The contemplative type may spend the whole day in meditation, the energetic ones may organize fundraising functions, the restless ones will get involved in monastic politics. All these aims are in pursuit of the traditional role of the elderly. These roles however depended on the existence of monasteries which were materially supported by all members of the community. With the destruction of the old social system of Cambodia this role of the elderly has disappeared. The loss of this tradition is felt even more painfully among the elderly refugees uprooted in a strange world of alien culture. Both groups are now attempting to recreate the old tradition. For the refugees the problem will last probably just one generation, the young ones are already learning other ways. Whether this tradition will be fully revived inside Cambodia will depend on any political settlement that may or may not be reached in the future. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This paper is based on research for which support has been received from the Royal Geographical Society and the International Federation of University Women (1965-66) and the University of Durham (1984-88). I am grateful to these bodies for their help. NOTES Theravada - 'doctrine of the elders' - a form of Buddhism followed today in Burma, Cambodia, Laos, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Chittagong District of Bangladesh. Mahayana Buddhism is active in China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Nepal and Tibet. 2 Terms used in quotations and text differ according to the language of the society being described. In addition, every author spells them differently in English. P o y a (Sinhalese) means quarter day of the lunar calendar; holy day; day of precepts. 3 m d s a p o y a (Sinhalese) - no moon day 4 a ta sil (Sinhalese) eight precepts 5 w i h a - n (Thai) - main assembly hall in the Buddhist temple compound.
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19
REFERENCES CITED Ang, Choul6an 1981 Sahakum khmae neu srok barang neng preah putthsasna (Khmer community in France and Buddhism) (in Khmer). Culture khm~re. Paris: Cedoreck, pp. 116-26. Chandler, D.P. 1976 The Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea: The Semantcis of Revolutionary Change. Pacific Affairs, Vol. 49, No. 3, pp. 506-515. Commission des Moeurs et Coutumes du Cambodge 1969 La vie du paysan khmer. Phnom Penh. Delvert, J. 1961 Le paysan cambodgien. Paris: Mouton. Dhammarama, P.S. 1962 Initiation pratique au buddhisme. Phnom Perth. Dhammarama, P.S. 1963 Dhammapada (Pali text with French translation). Bulletin de l'6cole frangaise d'Extr~me-Orient. Vol. LI. Ebihara, M. 1966 Interrelations between Buddhism and social systems in Cambodian peasant culture. In Anthropological studies in Theravada Buddhism. M. Nash, ed. Pp. 175-196. New Haven: Yale University Press. Ebihara, M. 1974 Khmer village women in Cambodia. A happy balance. In Many sisters. C.J. Matthiasson, ed. Pp. 305-36. New York: The Free Press. Ebihara, M. 1985 Khmer Refugees. In Refugees in The United States. W. Haines, ed. Pp. 127-147. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. Gombrich, R.F. 1981. Precept and practice. Oxford. Haines, D.W. ed. 1985 Refugees in the United States. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. Kalab, M. 1976 Monastic education, social mobility, and village structure in Cambodia. In The Anthropological Study of Education. C.J. Calhoun and F.A.J. Ianni, eds. Pp. 61-74, The Hague: Mouton. Kaufman, H.K. 1960 Bangkhuad, a community study in Thailand. Rutland, Vermont. Kieman, B. and C. Boua 1982 Peasants and politics in Kampuchea 1942-1981. London: Zed Press. Kingshill, K. 1976 Ku-Daeng The Red Tomb. Bangkok: Suriyaban Publishers. Martel, G. 1975 Lovea, village des environs d'Angkor. Paris: Ecole fran~aise d'Extr~meOrient. Migozzi, J. 1973 Cambodge, faits et probl~mes de population. Paris: Centre National de la Recherche. Scientifique. Moerman, M. 1968 Agricultural change and peasant choice in a Thai village. Berkeley: University of California Press. Picq, Laurence. 1984 De la reforme linguistique et de l'usage des mots chez les Khmers Rouges. In Cambodge II, Asie du sud-est et Monde Insulindien. Vol. XV, 1-4, M.A. Martin, ed., Pp. 351-57. Paris. Rahula, W. 1959 What the Buddha Taught. Bedford: Gordon Frazer. Son Sann 1986 Buddhism and the future of Cambodia. In Buddhism and the Future of Cambodia. Pp. 157-63, Rithisen: Khmer Buddhist Research Center. Tambiah, S.J. 1970 Buddhism and the spirit cults in Northeast Thailand. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Terwiel, B.J. 1975 Monks and Magic. London: Curzon Press. Vickery, M. 1984 Cambodia 1975-1982. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.
Department of Anthropology University of Durham United Kingdom
BUDDHISM AND EMOTIONAL SUPPORT FOR ELDERLY PEOPLE
ABSTRACT. This paper discusses the important religious role of elderly people in traditional Khmer society and traces the construction of new lives by refugees to Western countries in the past decade, showing the important place of monasteries as a focus for the old. The data derive from fieldwork in Cambodia in 1965-66 and from several shorter periods of fieldwork in the mid-1980s among Cambodian refugees in France, Thailand, Australia, Germany and the United States. Key Words: Buddhism, Cambodia, Khmer, refugees, religious observance, women,
migration
In Cambodia, Buddhism is an aspect of Khmer ethnicity, and thus it pervades the lives of all people, yet it is especially important to the older generation. It is usual in all Theravada 1 Buddhist countries that among the lay people only old persons are meticulous in their religious observances. This conduct gives them not only psychological satisfaction but also useful occupation as they are experienced and skilled at organizing ceremonies. It also brings them in touch with non-related persons of the same age group, provides them the respect of the whole community, and for the abler among them, often also considerable influence. This traditional pattern is continued with a few modifications among Cambodian refugees in the West. Several writers on Theravada Buddhist societies have noted that it is mostly the old people who attend temple services on holy days. Gombrich (1981) writes about Sri Lanka "... on a full moon p o y a 2 the average temple in the area probably has forty or fifty people taking the Eight Precepts (listed below) and about half that number on the m d s a p o y a . 3 Most of these are old people, especially women, who outnumber men taking ata sil 4 by at least four to one; there are also a few schoolchildren, which I believe to be a modem development. Very few people indeed take the Eight Precepts between the ages of twenty and fifty, except perhaps at Wesak." Similarly, for Thailand, Kingshill (1976) observes that "many of the older villagers stay in the w i h a - n 5 the entire precept day". Tambiah (1970) states that "the old and not the young show piety, and among them the women are more frequent 'churchgoers' than men". Moerman (1968) thinks that Buddhism, which focuses on the next life, is in many ways the religion of the old. Participation in its services is expected to increase with age and actual attendance does, in fact, reflect age and sex. Only a few ancient villagers who have retired from secular affairs spend the eve of the holy day in the temple. The same was true of Cambodia. Ebihara (1966) writes: "Religious piety reaches its peak in old age when individuals come to possess more physical and Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology 5: 7-19, 1990. © 1990 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
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psychological leisure than is ordinary... The woman past menopause cuts off her hair or shaves her head to signify renunciation of worldly vanities; some old people stay for extended periods of time in small shelters on temple grounds to pray and meditate: both men and women become much more observant of holy days and are seen at all religious ceremonies, large and small, staying through all the prayers and sermons, which the younger adults often do not bother or cannot afford to attend . . . . Merit is accumulated ... and it also earns a great deal of respect for the old people while they are still in this world." In Lovea village described by Martel (1975) old people also had all the important functions connected with the monastery, as was the case in my village Prek Por (Kalab 1976). Vickery (1984) criticises the idea that all Khmers lived in a typical village with a Buddhist monastery and mentions a village in Siem Reap which he briefly visited, which had a lifestyle of its own. No doubt there existed isolated ancient villages with mainly pre-Buddhist culture, but there are no statistics available to prove their prevalence and importance. Cambodia extends over 181,000 Km 2 and in 1970 had about 7,000,000 inhabitants according to Migozzi (1973), giving average density of 40 persons per Km 2, but 6,000,000 inhabitants lived in the central area of about 60,000 Km 2 where the density was over 90. Though this zone included the most fertile areas, according to Delvert (1961) this distribution depended more on history than on fertility of the soil. Among the population there were some 400,000 foreign nationals in 1962, of these 160,000 Chinese who were deemed to be Buddhists, and 210,000 Vietnamese who were mostly Catholics; there were also 150,000 people professing Islam, divided between Cham and Malay. Tribal people inhabited mostly the mountainous border areas. But the majority population of Cambodia are ethnic Khmers. Perhaps half a million or more Khmers live also in neighbouring countries, in the Mekong delta in Vietnam, and in Thailand mainly in the adjacent provinces of Surin, Buriram and Srisaket. Khmers lived in the area probably for several millenia but we have first historical records from the first centuries of our era. Chinese immigrants were settled in Cambodia certainly in the 12th century, and probably much earlier, but they are progressively merging into the Khmer population through intermarriage, hence the group of Sino-Khmers who are not yet completely absorbed. But the Khmers virtually never married any Vietnamese who continued penetrating into the country and occupying parts of Cambodia over several centuries, and later were brought into the capital in large numbers by the French to man their civil service. I shall be concerned only with the Khmers and SinoKhmers, and the line between these two is not always clear in Khmer villages. What unites the Khmers is their Mon-Khmer language and their religion. The Khmers were under Indian cultural influence from the beginning of the Christian era, though we have best information about their ancient history and customs from Chinese travelers. The Khmers write their language in an alphabet of Indian origin, their ritual language was Sanskrit and later Pali, their ancient architectural style derived from India, and ceremonies at the royal court were performed by Brahmans of
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Indian origin. The ancient kings belonged to various Hindu sects, or were Mahayana Buddhists. Later kings became Theravada Buddhists. Each period left its imprint on the popular culture, though it would be often difficult to decide which traits predate Indian influence, which ones are leftovers of the Brahmanic period, and which ones arrived with Buddhism of either school, which itself contains Brahmanic elements. For instance, in Vedic religion the souls of the dead were transformed permanently into ancestors through a series of ceremonies which included the offering of riceballs to ancestors. This offering is still part of the most important Khmer annual feast. Yet already in Buddha's time several Indian philosophical schools preached that sentient beings are reborn after each death in another form, the quality of which depended on their previous moral conduct, until at last the perfected soul merged with the absolute never to be born again. Buddhism also believes in rebirth dependent on conduct in past lives. The Buddha was a wise man who found the Four Noble Truths: life is unsatisfactory, and the reason for this is our craving. This craving for sense gratification, for existence or for non-existence is the cause of rebirths into successive lives with all their continuing ills; if we wish to end suffering we must eliminate this craving and attachment to things. The way to this attainment is the Eightfold Path, which consists of right ethical conduct, mental culture and wisdom. The ultimate aim is the attainment of Nirvana, a transcendent state of emancipation which is undescribable in human language. Whoever attains Nirvana is never reborn again. Mahayana Buddhists do not stop here. They claim that anybody attaining such wisdom would be so compassionate that he would voluntarily continue being reborn so he could help beings on their way to liberation. In either case man's progress depends on his own effort. In Buddhism there is no God Creator. The universe follows natural laws, periodically disintegrating, and then recreating itself anew. Buddhists may believe in various spirits and Brahmanic gods, if they are so inclined, and these beings are also part of nature. Gods live longer and in more pleasant abodes than man, they are powerful and may help us in ordinary human affairs, but they are not immortal, and they cannot influence our ultimate liberation. They have nothing to do with true Buddhist aims. As Buddhism is not concerned with any personal god, the texts recited in the temple are not prayers in the Christian sense. They are either praises of the Buddha, his teaching, and the community of monks, or they are statements about the basic tenets of the philosophy, or they are undertakings to follow the moral code. As Rahula (1959) writes, according to the age old tradition in Buddhist countries, one is considered a Buddhist if one takes the Buddha, the teaching, and the order of monks - generally called The Triple Gem - as one's refuges, and undertakes to observe the Five Precepts - the minimal moral obligation of a lay Buddhist - not to destroy life, not to steal, not to commit adultery, not to tell lies, and not to take intoxicating drinks - reciting the formulas given in the ancient texts. The devout layman, usually the elderly, undertake on holy days to
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observe the Eight Precepts. Terwiel (1975) contains a detailed discussion of all the precepts. The Eight Precepts differ from the Five in that the persons undertake to observe complete chastity, not to take any food between noon and dawn, to abstain from dances, music, spectacles, not to use perfumes, garlands, make-up or personal adornment, and not to sleep on high or luxurious beds. These precepts are usually observed only for a specified period of time, in Cambodia most commonly on the Days of Precepts, that is, the full moon day, the new moon day, and the eighth day after the full moon and new moon days. According to Dhammarama (1962) extremely devout lay people may choose to observe the Ten Precepts, which are also observed by all novices. The only addition to the Eight Precepts here is the abstinence from accepting gold and silver, in practice the use of money. Such devotees then live in monasteries. The fact that devout persons are mostly old people may have several reasons but nothing is found in the Buddhist doctrine that would encourage people to postpone religious practices till their old age. Boys may become novices when they are strong enough to chase a crow from a field. At the time of ordination a candidate must be able and healthy. The Buddha exhorted people to start their religious practices early. The Dhammapada (Dhammarama 1963) devotes a whole section to old age; there "a man without much knowledge grows old like a bull, his muscles develop, but not his wisdom." And "Men who have not lived the holy life and have not attained riches in their youth, suffer like old herons in a lake without fish". The idea seems to be that people should start studying and practising religion as early as possible so they can realize certain aims. In the past when ordination was a rite of passage in Cambodia and Thailand, every boy received religious education before marriage. This was never the privilege of women; girls became white-clad 'nuns' only very exceptionally. With modern secular schooling monkhood started going out of fashion, so that most people begin taking religion seriously only in old age. This practice fits the Hindu theory of four stages of life, when young men become first students, then householders, and only in old age hermits and renouncers. This principle was actually legalized in ancient India by several orthodox Hindu kings, who did not like losing ablebodied tax payers to monasteries, and an identical situation prevails under Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia at present, when only men over 50 may ask for permission to become monks. Although there are few obstacles to lay religious observances, especially in democratic countries, younger Cambodians nevertheless mostly shun the monastery except during great festivals. One of the reasons is probably the difficulty in truly observing the precepts in everyday lay life. The rule against taking life is most difficult because most peasants have to kill pests eating their rice; they kill malariacarrying mosquitoes, and they supplement their diet with fishing. In the east it is customary to bribe officials and tell them lies. White lies are often essential for smooth social intercourse. And most men like alcoholic drinks. Teenagers have their own interests like pop music, and young parents have little spare time; they are usually satisfied to gain merit by materially supporting the monastery and leaving the organization of religious life to the old.
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Old age is not easily defined in Cambodia, because the concept of age is relative rather than absolute. For the Khmers, age is the most important classification of people, but though they have the concept of generation, what really matters is whether a person is older or younger than ego. The kinship terms for ego's generation and younger people do not even differentiate between sexes though gender may be specified by adding 'male' or 'female' - and they have no word for 'sibling', but only one term for 'older sibling' and another for 'younger sibling'. Husband is also addressed as 'older sibling' and wife as 'younger sibling', therefore husband should be always older than wife. And Khmers take special care to remember which twin was born first, because both conduct and form of address depend on relative ages. Once I was spending a night at Kompong Cham Ville guest house in the company of a lady from the Education Department, and it so happened that the place was crowded at lunch time with important government officials because Prince Sihanouk was to inaugurate a development project nearby in the afternoon. In the dining room my companion went on pointing out to me various people she knew, always mentioning their name, their age, and the ministry they worked in. And during introductions one was always asked one's age. Actual age might be at times more important than generation, as my friend addressed one of her aunts as 'older cousin', because she was only a couple of years older than her niece. An older person is never addressed just by name, and this may be the reason why people rarely remember the names of their deceased grandparents and it is next to impossible to collect genealogies of any depth in the rural area. Yet the Khmers have several named generations - according to the publication La vie du paysan khmer (Commission des moeurs et coutumes du Cambodge 1969) they have names for seven generations up and seven generations down, though most of these terms are used only in invocations where ancestors are worshipped. According to Martel (1975), Cambodians can name seven generations in all, five ascending and two descending, but most of these terms are used only in ceremonies. However important age may be in interpersonal relations and whatever the number of generations recognized, there is no particular age at which a person joins the group of senior citizens. Persons all of whose children are married may be inclined to join this group though they need not do so. Buddhism always encouraged the contemplation of the unsatisfactoriness of life, of old age, sickness and death. As people grow older, their eyesight deteriorates and other faculties start declining, their thoughts turn more often to the idea of impermanence and of rebirth. It is at this stage in life when people have fewer responsibilities and more leisure that they start thinking seriously of accumulating more merit. It is now also easier to adjust lifestyle to harmonize with religious observances. They have now time for study and meditation, and most of them have gained considerable experience over the past decades during various festivals and ceremonies and may now help with their organization. This is a function which somebody has to fulfil and only the old people have both the time and knowledge.
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Those who are especially skilled will be called also to organize domestic ceremonies and usually be rewarded for their trouble. They have also the simple satisfaction that their services are wanted and they are gaining a position of authority in this sphere. The group of religious old people is visually differentiated from other adults because they shave their hair or cut it very short, and they dress mostly in black and white. The prevalence of women within this group has probably several reasons. For Thailand, according to Terwiel (1975), firstly there are slightly more women than men in the older strata of the community. Secondly, the number of available older men has been somewhat depleted because older men have the opportunity to become monks. According to Ebihara (1975) "This necessity to earn merit weighs especially heavily on women. Buddhism considers women to be inferior to males and to be born a woman indicates that one had accumulated only a limited amount of merit in the previous incarnation. W o m e n are not permitted to become monks, the means whereby males can earn tremendous amount of merit at one blow, and there is no comparable order of nuns." While women in Tibet o r Japan can become fully fledged nuns, the Theravada line of ordination died out some centuries ago, or so it is generally believed. According to personal communication from Russell Webb, a Thai woman discovered a valid Theravada line somewhere further east, became ordained there and later returned to Thailand, where she is recognized as a true nun by the monks, but she is the only one. In the hamlet Prathnol in Prek Pot, which I studied in 1966, the pattern was the same as described by Ebihara and others. Only old people observed the Eight Precepts on the four holy days each month. All the seven achars - the committee of laymen representing the supporters of the monastery - were men past 50. The monastery Vatt Prakal had fifty little huts at the quietest end of its area, and these were reserved for lay meditators. The meditation teacher was a layman about 60 years old who lived permanently in the monastery. During the rainy season, which is sometimes called the Buddhist Lent, lay people would come there for a retreat for a week or for a number of weeks. There was a special initiation ceremony for newcomers, which included a sermon by a senior monk. However, the fifty huts were probably never all occupied; some weeks only a few people entered, in others a dozen persons, mostly women. I saw only one youngish person there, a woman who was about 40 years old; most were in their sixties. For people attending the retreat for the first time there was a kind of rite of passage during which their hair was shaved never to grow long again. From then on they belonged to an in-group, a club, where people had special interests in common. The ceremony is called chol samathi (entry into meditation), and I have not seen it described anywhere. The ritual takes place always in the early afternoon at about two o'clock on a Thursday, the day of the planet Jupiter, and it is performed within the temple building on consecrated ground where all formal acts of the order of monks take place, but not ordinary weekly services, which are held in the community hall. The participants first pay respect to the
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Buddha image, then go one by one behind the altar, where there is on the pedestal of the Buddha statue a bas relief of Nieng Kunhing, a deity said to correspond to the Brahmanic goddess of earth DharanL Here every meditator presented a lighted incense stick to Nieng Kunhing and prostrated before her. The old people already in retreat for a week or longer were all present seated in the centre opposite the main Buddha image. Three newcomers were seated in front of them, in the first row, when I attended the ceremony. The meditation teacher was present from the start. The three women to be initiated arrived each with two trays of symbolic objects. On each tray there were five candles, five sticks of incense, five bowls of sand, and five lotus buds, also lotus buds with a pair of betel leaves, a packet of candles and a few packets of incense sticks as well as a tin of sand into which the smouldering incense sticks could be placed. One pair of trays contained a pair of kerosene oil lamps in place of the packets of candles. The newcomers were accompanied by some family members and friends who were seated at the sides. Altogether 41 persons were present on that occasion. When the monk arrived, the people started to recite the usual praises of the Triple Gem, then received the refuges and eight precepts, after which followed a sermon which the monk read from a palmleaf manuscript in a monotonous voice and rather fast. The usual collection took place as during any sermon. People normally contributed one riel per person, and the gift was presented to the preacher in an envelope at the conclusion of the service, after which he left. After that the candidates handed over one tray each to the meditation master, and they kept the other tray which they carried to their little huts. Though the huts were separated by only about two meters of space, some of the women were quite frightened to spend the night there alone. Normally there is very little privacy in Cambodian homes, which a European may find frustrating, but for the Khmer the good life means to be surrounded by his family at all times. One woman who had been in retreat two years earlier described to me what happened there. The candidates have to learn certain texts by heart, and then sit alone and repeat them concentrating on them, until they see a vision. If this happens, they go quickly to the meditation teacher and describe to him what they have seen. He explains the meaning to them. She said she once saw a dead body; the teacher asked her, what was inside. She didn't know, so she returned to continue her meditation, and then she saw a heart and other organs inside the body; the teacher said that that was a good sign. People usually stay until they have a vision, some succeed quickly, others take a long time. Of course meditation is a very individual thing and the technique depends more on a particular teacher than on textbooks. The students of the same teacher tend to form into a group with some common interest and a fair understanding of each other. Not the whole time is spent in meditation. The morning is passed usually in chores and eating, family members normally bring food to their grandmother or grandfather. There are daily interviews with the master, and in between the people sit together in groups in the shade of trees and talk. After a few weeks in retreat they will probably make new friends among the other meditators whom
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they knew only superficially before. And these friends then meet regularly every week during their religious observances. Younger people in the village respect this group of elders and are influenced by them. While government officials were distrusted and avoided and the headman had an ambiguous position as a go-between with his loyalty split between the villagers and the government, the monks were trusted and their advice would be normally accepted. The monks themselves would usually discuss every problem with the achars who had thus considerable influence. Though the old women kept more in the background, they had their own network of informants and friends, and the wife of the chief achar was an extremely efficient organizer of the women during festivals; she had her importance recognized even by the mandarins, so that the wife of the district officer would bring gifts to her when returning from Phnom Penh. The political relevance of the monastery and those associated with it became obvious during the general election campaign in 1966, when the candidates addressed no public meetings, only distributed some posters and leaflets, but each of them visited every abbot in the electoral district. On the face of it this was an irrational procedure, because monks are not supposed to be interested in politics, they have no right to vote or be elected. Yet every politician knew that the monks were the trusted advisors of villagers and their opinion was of the greatest value. And the old people associated with the monastery, who were in regular contact with the monks, played a vital part in the formation of their counsel. On the day of the election all the white-clad meditation students left their retreat in a single file, led by the meditation master, and went to cast their vote. Kaufman (1960) states that the monastery is also a "home for the aged: the elderly male members who are no longer capable o f carrying on the arduous task of farming may join the monkhood during their waning years in order to acquire merit, purge themselves of their sins, and at the same time be assured of a daily supply of food." Though this is tree, the motivation is usually more complex, and in any case a monastery is not a geriatric ward. There was only one monk out of twenty in Vatt Prakal who became ordained late in life, when he became a widower. He was quite able to take part in the daily activities of the monastery, though on the whole he was given more time for meditation and fewer chores. Yet at the time of ordination a candidate must be healthy and must not have any obligations to anybody. If he becomes disabled later, the community of monks will of course look after him, but very frail or sick men cannot be ordained. I attended once a ceremony in Battambang in honour of an abbot who just attained 100 years of age. He had to be carried to the ritual and probably could not take in much any more, yet great respect was shown to him. Long life and good health are signs of much merit. In this sense religious observances are a kind of preventive medicine. Yet when people do fall sick they seek first the help of a medical specialist. Some monks practise traditional medicine, but most experts are lay people. The sick may also approach spirit media to ask advice from their ancestors. An animistic ritual, which is used primarily to strengthen a persons health during a dangerous period like pregnancy, may be also used for
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sick people. But when all else fails, especially in case o f chronically sick old people, the family may arrange a Buddhist ceremony in their home. The person thus gains merit by listening to a sermon and by presenting offerings to the monks. Some Buddhist texts are specially recommended as sermons for sick people. The accumulated merit will take effect either in this life with the recovery of the patient or in the next life. W h e n the time of death approached - unless it was sudden and unexpected - a monk would be invited to read the relevant scriptures for the dying person, to keep his or her mind on the right thoughts, which could influence his or her rebirth. For the Buddhist death is only the beginning o f a new life, they try to be always aware o f its unavoidability and the necessity to strive for a good rebirth and ultimately Nirvana. Death is not a taboo subject, it is not hidden away. Though there are some crematoria in Cambodia, most dead were cremated on open funeral pyres, with relatives lighting the pyre, waiting nearby till the ashes cooled sufficiently so the relations could handle them and collect unbumt pieces o f bones, wash them ritually and put them in a receptable to keep at home or in a stupa. Children were not excluded from these occasions. Most cremations took place within the monastic compound and meditation on death was always one o f the favourite topics in the retreats. Preparation for rebirth was one o f the functions of the monastery, but care for the frail and sick was the task for relatives within the home and within the lay community; only sick monks were cared for within the monastery. As candidates for ordination had to be healthy and without obligations, the monastery could not be a refuge for all old men. Very severely disabled people would not enter the retreat if they needed constant care and could not stay alone in a hut. The monastery was not a hospital, but it was a community centre for the whole village and a very respectable club for the elderly who were able to make use of it. The numbers of the elderly are unlikely to be excessive in developing countries. In m y hamlet o f 278 inhabitants there were 45 persons over 40 o f whom 31 were in their 50s, and 16 over 60. A m o n g the over-sixties there were seven men and nine women. Since the monastery served six other hamlets as well, over the year between 120 and 200 elderly persons might have been interested in entering retreat for a period o f time. In practice the numbers taking Eight Precepts on holy days were below fifty even during the rainy season. Some people had other interests, and in some cases the reason might have been financial. Though nobody is asked to pay anything, it is expected that supporters will be generous to their monastery and though in those days nobody went hungry in Cambodia, some people had no cash. Political events did not allow the traditional situation to continue for long. Prince Sihanouk was deposed in 1970 and Lon Nol intended to stop the Vietnamese communists from using Cambodian territory. Instead the war spread to the countryside, Phnom Penh was filled with refugees and those who could started leaving the country. W h e n Pol Pot established his Democratic Kampuchea, it was possible in the beginning to escape from the border areas and
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according to Haines (1985), some 35,000 to 40,000 people fled to Thailand, another 150,000 went in the opposite direction to Vietnam. Almost all of this wave of refugees in Thailand are now resettled in third countries. The second influx into Thailand occurred during the unsettled conditions generated during and after the Vietnamese invasion of Kampuchea in December 1978. Over two to three years some 600,000 refugees entered Thailand, fleeing starvation and fighting. Some were settled in holding camps operated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees; most stayed in border villages on no man's land. Later the boundary became fortified and mined and escape became as difficult as across the Berlin Wall. In the meantime the traditional organization of Cambodian society was destroyed. Monarchy ended with Lon Nol's Khmer Republic in 1970, but Lon Nol still supported Buddhism and even tried to justify the abolition of monarchy by following Buddha's preference for the republican constitution of Vesali, which is still the basis of the organization of the monastic community. Then Pol Pot arrived in 1975, emptied Phnom Penh and started disrobing monks. According to Son Sann (1986) there were about 80,000 monks in pre-1975 Cambodia, of whom about 500 survived the regime. Everybody had to work in the fields, food was scarce, and young people were sometimes put in charge of groups of elders. Not only was the whole life collectivised and families split, but an effort was made to change attitudes by changing language use. According to the new constitution, for instance, everybody was to be addressed by the term 'mit' (friend) to eliminate any discrimination on the basis of rank or age (Chandler 1976). In practice it seems not to have worked. Both Picq (1984) and Kiernan (1982) describe cases where Khmer Rouge cadres liked to be called by the more respectful term 'elder brother'. Nevertheless, even if some of the old language remained, the pattern of conduct changed. The elders were no more respected; if they could not work hard, they mostly starved to death. Under Heng Samrin, the regimentation slightly lessened. People could travel within the country looking for relatives, albeit with special permits, and some old men were allowed to be ordained monks, but they are being politically educated and supervised. For the meantime, it seems that traditional Khmer lifestyle can be preserved best outside Cambodia, but every country has different problems. The Khmer minority living in rural Thailand still follows the traditions, but these are purely oral traditions. Because everybody must attend a Thai school, they cannot read or write in Khmer. Refugees face even greater problems. On the whole the different waves of refugees have different backgrounds, different experiences and different expectations. Their treatment on arrival in Thailand is often unpleasant and if they succeed in reaching the camps, life there is often monotonous without hope or future. Those lucky enough to emigrate into a third country have also to cope with a new language and a new culture. They find it difficult to adjust to competitive environments where aggressive face-to-face confrontation between individuals is common. The chain of traumatic experiences over the past two
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decades has affected the mental and physical health of many Cambodians. According to Ebihara (1985), one survey in California indicated that 84% of Cambodian households reported a member under a physician's care, as compared with 45% of Vietnamese, 24% of Hmong and 24% of Lao households. While children who grew up after 1975 are not very familiar with traditional Khmer culture, they are usually better able to adjust to their new surroundings. The aged face special difficulties, as they are mostly unable to get a job, to learn a new language, to make new friends. They need to meet each other, and according to custom they find it more congenial to meet while sharing some task in a monastery, than meeting in other people's homes. There exist Theravada monasteries in most large Western cities but most of them are Sinhalese or Thai institutions and elderly Cambodians naturally prefer Khmer speaking monks. To found a monastery is an expensive venture and so only large communities can afford one. The first Cambodian monastery abroad was probably Vatt Khemararama in Paris (Ang Choul6an 1981) which was started soon after Pol Pot's arrival in Phnom Penh. At present there are three monasteries in Paris, others are in Bordeaux, Rennes, Lyon, Brussels and Zurich, and possibly in other places in Europe, in Australia in Sydney and Adelaide, and at least a dozen in the United States which have the largest number of Cambodian immigrants, around 100,000 persons. The monasteries organize major calendric festivals and perform domestic ceremonies, and depending on space, there is usually accommodation for lay meditators and most of them have resident white-clad ladies, though these facilities are much limited in comparison with traditional Cambodia. It is difficult to know the position of old people inside Cambodia today. Not many of them survived. The minority of refugees who traced their families inside Cambodia and keep in touch do not have reliable news, because letters are censored, but they all seem to concentrate on sending parcels of medicaments to their relatives; some of them reach the addressees, others do not. Medicines seem to be in short supply, so much so that they are probably in part used as currency in much the same way as American cigarettes were used in post-war Europe. If medical care is limited, the elderly might at least find solace in religion, but it seems that only few monasteries are open. Candidates for ordination are selected at least partly on political grounds and it is difficult to guess how many of them become expert meditation teachers. The elderly can gain merit by attending services on holy days and taking the Eight Precepts. But the new monks are in part selected and supervised by the state and it is unlikely that many of them can have the same confidence of the villagers as those in the sixties. And not all monasteries are probably places where people can talk freely. CONCLUSION In traditional Cambodia the old people had a special role to play. They were always looked after by their families and respected for their age, but if they
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devoted the last years of their life to religion, they gained additional esteem, useful occupation, and often considerable influence. In the West we hear of retired men who lose all purpose in life once they are separated from their workplace; many old people tend to look more backwards to the memories of their past than to the future. The Cambodian role for the old seems to prevent this. They start learning new skills in their fifties and sixties. The meditation retreats teach relaxation techniques which are becoming fashionable in the West. They are also suitable for the very frail who are no more fit for much physical activity. Most elderly Khmers keep active in one way or another, planning for the future, whether they are organizing the next ritual, or making merit for their next life. The religious life brings them peace and hope and inner satisfaction, but also the respect of the community at large. They not only avoid being under their children's feet, but they have a useful role to play looking after monks' welfare and they spend much time with other devout people of the same age which brings them companionship. Though they are united by the basic requirements of moral observances, there are many ways in which the religious life can be led to suit all manner of men. The contemplative type may spend the whole day in meditation, the energetic ones may organize fundraising functions, the restless ones will get involved in monastic politics. All these aims are in pursuit of the traditional role of the elderly. These roles however depended on the existence of monasteries which were materially supported by all members of the community. With the destruction of the old social system of Cambodia this role of the elderly has disappeared. The loss of this tradition is felt even more painfully among the elderly refugees uprooted in a strange world of alien culture. Both groups are now attempting to recreate the old tradition. For the refugees the problem will last probably just one generation, the young ones are already learning other ways. Whether this tradition will be fully revived inside Cambodia will depend on any political settlement that may or may not be reached in the future. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This paper is based on research for which support has been received from the Royal Geographical Society and the International Federation of University Women (1965-66) and the University of Durham (1984-88). I am grateful to these bodies for their help. NOTES Theravada - 'doctrine of the elders' - a form of Buddhism followed today in Burma, Cambodia, Laos, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Chittagong District of Bangladesh. Mahayana Buddhism is active in China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Nepal and Tibet. 2 Terms used in quotations and text differ according to the language of the society being described. In addition, every author spells them differently in English. P o y a (Sinhalese) means quarter day of the lunar calendar; holy day; day of precepts. 3 m d s a p o y a (Sinhalese) - no moon day 4 a ta sil (Sinhalese) eight precepts 5 w i h a - n (Thai) - main assembly hall in the Buddhist temple compound.
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REFERENCES CITED Ang, Choul6an 1981 Sahakum khmae neu srok barang neng preah putthsasna (Khmer community in France and Buddhism) (in Khmer). Culture khm~re. Paris: Cedoreck, pp. 116-26. Chandler, D.P. 1976 The Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea: The Semantcis of Revolutionary Change. Pacific Affairs, Vol. 49, No. 3, pp. 506-515. Commission des Moeurs et Coutumes du Cambodge 1969 La vie du paysan khmer. Phnom Penh. Delvert, J. 1961 Le paysan cambodgien. Paris: Mouton. Dhammarama, P.S. 1962 Initiation pratique au buddhisme. Phnom Perth. Dhammarama, P.S. 1963 Dhammapada (Pali text with French translation). Bulletin de l'6cole frangaise d'Extr~me-Orient. Vol. LI. Ebihara, M. 1966 Interrelations between Buddhism and social systems in Cambodian peasant culture. In Anthropological studies in Theravada Buddhism. M. Nash, ed. Pp. 175-196. New Haven: Yale University Press. Ebihara, M. 1974 Khmer village women in Cambodia. A happy balance. In Many sisters. C.J. Matthiasson, ed. Pp. 305-36. New York: The Free Press. Ebihara, M. 1985 Khmer Refugees. In Refugees in The United States. W. Haines, ed. Pp. 127-147. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. Gombrich, R.F. 1981. Precept and practice. Oxford. Haines, D.W. ed. 1985 Refugees in the United States. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. Kalab, M. 1976 Monastic education, social mobility, and village structure in Cambodia. In The Anthropological Study of Education. C.J. Calhoun and F.A.J. Ianni, eds. Pp. 61-74, The Hague: Mouton. Kaufman, H.K. 1960 Bangkhuad, a community study in Thailand. Rutland, Vermont. Kieman, B. and C. Boua 1982 Peasants and politics in Kampuchea 1942-1981. London: Zed Press. Kingshill, K. 1976 Ku-Daeng The Red Tomb. Bangkok: Suriyaban Publishers. Martel, G. 1975 Lovea, village des environs d'Angkor. Paris: Ecole fran~aise d'Extr~meOrient. Migozzi, J. 1973 Cambodge, faits et probl~mes de population. Paris: Centre National de la Recherche. Scientifique. Moerman, M. 1968 Agricultural change and peasant choice in a Thai village. Berkeley: University of California Press. Picq, Laurence. 1984 De la reforme linguistique et de l'usage des mots chez les Khmers Rouges. In Cambodge II, Asie du sud-est et Monde Insulindien. Vol. XV, 1-4, M.A. Martin, ed., Pp. 351-57. Paris. Rahula, W. 1959 What the Buddha Taught. Bedford: Gordon Frazer. Son Sann 1986 Buddhism and the future of Cambodia. In Buddhism and the Future of Cambodia. Pp. 157-63, Rithisen: Khmer Buddhist Research Center. Tambiah, S.J. 1970 Buddhism and the spirit cults in Northeast Thailand. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Terwiel, B.J. 1975 Monks and Magic. London: Curzon Press. Vickery, M. 1984 Cambodia 1975-1982. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.
Department of Anthropology University of Durham United Kingdom
