assembly three times to confer ordination on him. As
a member of the san ̇gha in full standing, the officiant
then restates this entreaty as a formal resolution to the
community. Following this, the same questions placed
privately are now posed to the candidate before the en-
tire group, and upon his successful responses the offi-
ciant formally moves that the assembly ordain him.
The time of this event is measured (using pegs of spec-
ified size) on a sundial, so as to determine the new
monk’s exact seniority.
The ordinand is then made to affirm that he can
maintain his asceticism for the rest of his life, includ-
ing the four supports (nis ́raya) of clothing, food, hous-
ing, and medicine. He also confirms that he can
maintain celibacy in both mind and body, and avoid
stealing, killing, and lying. In the text of the Mulasar-
vastivada ordination, the injunctions against such
errors are lengthy and emphatic, with particular at-
tention on the transgression of claiming false knowl-
edge or attainment of spiritual truths, cosmic realities,
meditative states or yogic powers, or achievement of
arhatship. The ordinand affirms that he will not revile,
offend, chastise, or deride others, even when others do
so to him.
After all this, the officiant finally declares that the
ordinand has now been properly entered into the re-
ligious life by a preceptor, two teachers, the agreement
of the san ̇gha, and a formal action (the ceremony) in-
volving three inviolable motions. The ceremony does
not immediately end with this declaration, but con-
tinues with injunctions to the new monk to maintain
his training, to treat his preceptor as his father just as
the preceptor will treat the monk as son, to respect
those senior to him, to strive for the direct realization
of Buddhist truths, to learn the monastic rules not cov-
ered yet in the bimonthly san ̇gha meeting, and to
maintain attentiveness with all aspects of the dharma.
Historical variations in Buddhist ordination
Ordination was used in the early years of Buddhism
to define the membership of the san ̇gha and induce
members to adhere to a uniform religious lifestyle,
both differentiating the Buddhist order from other re-
ligious groups and inspiring its members with a
shared sense of identity as formally accepted descen-
dents of the Buddha. As the Buddhist movement
diversified, there developed multiple ordination lin-
eages, called nikayas(literally, segment or division),
each with slightly different interpretations of the
vinaya regulations. Since these nikayasalso predom-
inated in different geographical areas and developed
sometimes very different sets of ABHIDHARMAphilo-
sophical texts, they functioned as separate MAIN-
STREAMBUDDHIST SCHOOLS.There is no evidence for any variant approach to or-
dination in the early MAHAYANAvocation, but with the
emergence of master–student initiation lineages in the
Kashmiri meditation tradition (fourth century C.E. and
thereafter) and the Indian tradition of TANTRA (ca.
sixth century C.E. and thereafter), the relative signifi-
cance of ordination declined somewhat. The Tibetan
san ̇gha maintains the use of ordination as an impor-
tant threshold of entry into the practice of Buddhism,
but greater emphasis is placed on tantric initiation lin-
eages and the identification of tulkus(reincarnated
sages). In an analagous fashion, local monastery rela-
tionships and both CHAN SCHOOLand esoteric (tan-
tric) initiation lineages changed the religious salience
of ordination in East Asia. More drastic changes oc-
curred in modern Japan, where the Buddhist clergy
have redefined ordination as a more lofty but less de-
manding dedication to Mahayana ideals not requiring
maintenance of the rules of celibacy.In the early years of Buddhism in each of the cul-
tural realms of East Asia (China, Korea, Japan, and
Vietnam), there was great emphasis on proper train-
ing in Buddhist vinaya (monastic regulations) and the
correct ordination of monks and nuns. DAO’AN(312–
385) devised a set of monastic rules himself, but was
happy that it could be displaced by portions of the Sar-
vastivada-vinayaintroduced toward the end of his life.
The entire Four Part Vinaya(Sifen lü) of the Dhar-
maguptaka school, which was to become the most
widely used version in China, was translated in 414 by
Buddhayas ́as and Zhu Fonian; complete vinayas of
four other mainstream Buddhist schools were trans-
lated during the next decade or so. The insights of the
pilgrim and translator XUANZANG(ca. 600–664) on
contemporary Indian practices upon his return to
China in 649, as well as his suggestion that all Chinese
monks needed to be ordained anew, caused substan-
tial uneasiness among his peers. This was one of the
motivations behind an ordination platform movement
initiated by the great historian and vinaya specialist
DAOXUAN(596–667), who in the very last year of his
life had visions of the Buddha’s ordination platform at
Jetavana. Although entirely contrary to Indian histor-
ical realities, the slmaboundary of the Indian ordina-
tion was reinterpreted as a Chinese-style raised
platform. Daoxuan’s example inspired other ChineseORDINATION