156 CHAPTER SEVENwat, and the central ritual arena of the village as a whole. It is here that vil-
lagers gather to participate in communal merit-making ceremonies, such as
making donations, taking the precepts, and listening to the Dharma.
Because monks play a crucial role in these communal merit-making cere-
monies, the Sanghavasa is a necessary adjunct to the Buddhavasa. The moral
purity the monks gain by observing the monastic code makes them the ideal
recipients of the gifts of the laity. Their celibate lifestyle frees them to devote
their time to studying the Dharma and other subjects that the laity have little
time to pursue on their own. Thus the monks function both as the repository
of merit that the laity can tap into by giving the monks support, and as the
custodians of the knowledge valued in the smooth functioning of the com-
munity. In this respect, the monks form a ritual and, relatively speaking, liter-
ate elite, although it should be remembered that monkhood is open to males
regardless of social background, and most of the monks in a given village
monastery are close relatives of the villagers. As noted previously, the past cen-
tury has seen the monks' role as the custodians of knowledge limited to a cer-
tain extent, but they are still the prime repository of many forms of traditional
knowledge not taught in the government schools. They are also the primary
counselors for problems on the personal, family, and communal levels.
Despite its avowed purpose, the Sanghavasa of a village wat is not the ideal
place for a monk to practice the teaching. The wat functions as the social cen-
ter of the village, and thus there is plenty of activity to distract the monks from
their meditation. Also, the observance of the Vinaya rules may not be espe-
cially strict (Strong EB, sec. 6.8.1). This laxness naturally affects the strength
of the merit that the monks are developing and into which the villagers hope
to tap. Still, except for,major lapses, villagers rarely take issue with the monks
over the level of their practice, both because the monks are their own relatives
and because they fear the demerit that is said to come from criticizing monks.
Those villagers who are dissatisfied with the amount of merit their monks are
producing will simply go to another nearby village wat or to a forest wat where
the level of practice is stronger and offers better returns on their investment.
This last statement, although it may sound crass, accurately reflects how the
Thais themselves describe their motivation.
A third element in the wat-which, in legal terms, makes it a wat-is the
sima (sacred boundary) containing the ordination hall. The sima is considered
so sacred that no political authority, not even the king, has jurisdiction over it.
If a criminal takes refuge in the sima, the police have to ask permission of the
wat's abbot before they can enter the area to catch him. In wats that make a
clear delineation between the Buddhavasa and Sanghavasa, there is some dis-
agreement over which area the sima belongs to, but actually it belongs to both.
Being the most sacred spot in the wat, it is where their functions merge on
the highest level. The ordination hall is where the monks meet to conduct
their communal business, such as the fortnightly recitation of the Patimokkha,
yet it is also where very important merit-making rituals are held, such as Bud-
dha-image consecrations and-the most important merit-making ritual, in
which the dual functions of the entire wat as ritual center and monastic