The Buddhist Religion: A Historical Introduction

42 CHAPTER TWO

criterion that even a streamwinner would not intentionally transgress the prin-
ciples of right speech, right action, or right livelihood. Once the Buddha's
Awakening is granted, as it is when one professes faith in him, it is helpful to
have his or another arhant's certification that so-and-so is an Awakened One of
such-and-such a degree. This is a teacher's common method ofletting his stu-
dents know which among them is a person whose discernment can be trusted
and who is competent to carry the teachings to others. This point became in-
creasingly important as the Buddha gained more disciples and could send them
to proclaim the teaching in his place. As noted previously, the nature of his
message required that the listener hold the teacher in esteem in order to bene-
fit from hearing it. By giving his disciples what amounted to a certificate of
health, the Buddha aided them in their work of conveying to others in an ef-
fective way the message that his diagnosis for their suffering was correct, the
cure efficacious, and the resulting state of health well worth the effort.

2.4 FOUNDING THE BUDDHIST

COMMUNITY

After the second sermon, on the not-self characteristic, there were six arhants

in the world, counting the Buddha himself. Soon Yasa, son of a rich merchant

ofBenares, waking up during the night in a state of anxiety, went out to Sar-

nath, where the Buddha comforted him and taught him a graduated Dharma

suitable for lay people, namely, the merits of generosity and virtue, the re-

wards of generosity and virtue to be enjoyed in heaven, the drawbacks of even

heavenly sensual pleasures, and the blessings of renunciation. Then he

preached the higher Dharma, the Four Noble Truths, to the young man, who

soon afterward attained arhantship and took full ordination as a monk. Mean-

while, Yasa's father came looking for his son, happened to find the Buddha,

listened to his teaching, attained the Dharma-eye, and took the Three

Refuges, committing himself to the preeminence of the Buddha, Dharma,

and Sangha. Thus he became the fmt upasaka (lay devotee) in the strict sense,

inasmuch as the two merchants who had brought offerings to the Buddha at

Bodhgaya had not been able to take refuge in the Sangha prior to its exis-

tence. Eventually, Yasa's mother and sisters took the Three Refuges and be-

came the first upasika (female lay devotees) (Strong EB, sec. 3.5.1).

The Buddhist Sangha, in its arya (ideal) sense, consists of all people, lay or

ordained, who have acquired the pure Dharma-eye, gaining at least a glimpse

of the Deathless. In a samvrti (conventional) sense, Sangha denotes the com-

munities of ordained monks and nuns. The two meanings overlap but are not

necessarily identical. Some members of the ideal Sangha are not ordained;

some monks and nuns have yet to acquire the Dharma-eye. When Yasa's fam-

ily took refuge in the Sangha, all of the bhik~us in the conventional Sangha

were also members of the Sangha in the ideal sense. Thus they took refuge in

the Bhik~u Sangha, intending the word Sangha in both senses of the term.