Phra Dhammajayo: The Most Loved As Equally As Controversial Monk
Author: Eleanor Choke-jaya
Posted on: 1st September 2019
Keywords: #Buddhism, #controversial, #meditation, #monk,
Length: 1563 words
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| The Abbot Dhammajayo |
His name has been mentioned countless times with compliments as well as criticism injected with serrated details. The worst case went as far as seeing him as an opportunistic dynamic figure adept at exploiting Thai Buddhism and its institutions for his own benefit. Well, to be fair, he is not the only target in the on-going digital times, but any person who are well-known and successful and are on social media. He is a bigger target because he perhaps is more successful in what he has achieved than others.
From the viewpoint of an emic, here perhaps is another side of the story which is rarely found in any cyber platform. Basically, what I can say is, taking up a career as an abbot is a very hard thing to do, not only the hard work itself but also a lot of scrutiny. Taking an example, for the group of people living inside the temple, he is seen as the combination of a spiritual father, a professional mentor and a charismatic boss. So it is hard to imagine how he has managed himself to fulfill their expectation and upholding the faith of the whole congregation having on him throughout the years laden with situations, scandals, and crisis surrounding himself and his organization.
Starting by delving into his spiritual father’s role, the temple female Upasikas said he is humane, funny, having a great sense of humour. For them, he is very accessible and very available as opposed to his notorious reputation of being hard to be met. They said he could not do any better on his role as their spiritual father. Most importantly, the temple people believe that they are loved by him, why? Because not only providing the necessities for them, they said he has also never allowed them to question that they are not his top priority in regard of their community’s well-being; which is not necessary mean that he is always with them physically because they understand that he is working very hard; he has a lot of issues to prove by himself.
When being asked about his role as a mentor to them, the consistent piece of advice he has given is to not be heedless in working on the self-development; literally he wants them to take Dhammakaya meditation in the daily basis. Being in the meditation mentor role, he is always ready to provide them with transcendent explanations to their meditation experiences; it is truly an encouragement for them to strive for the progress.
However, when it comes to his role as a boss, they said there is no nonsense. . He has an expectation of excellence. He always sets the high bar for them to achieve because he knows that they have the potential to accomplish. He saw the potential in them, often before they saw in themselves. And this really motivates them to pursue the vision and they will definitely support whatever project under his initiation and be his great advocate, of course. He also encourages to have a sense of pride of what they do and what they are.
The temple’s people know as they experience that what they are doing on the day to day basis is understood by him. Practically, they by the time he was healthy, saw him walking through places inside the temple to inspect the works, he was not just walking through but stop and talk to people doing the works and he would get the feedback and their perspective. He is a good listener; he takes questions and feedback in and process them and ultimately he arises with his own conclusion. They found that it was very interesting to see how he formulated the opinion because he was so interested in what the temple’s people were doing. He is himself, very authentic; he listens to people around him but finally he makes the ultimate decision. And this is one of the elements makes people see him as a charismatic boss.
His followers think he throughout the years has dedicated himself for something really big and important for the better future of the country including the world at large. So everyone under his abbotship wants to do a good job for him. They can’t help to believe that it is amazingly and very interesting to be able to be part and to take care of the missions he has put so much energy, effort and passion into building them up and they make sure to keep them healthy, vibrant and strong. They know all the missions are going to be historic.
When talking about numbers of legal charges filed against him, particularly about money laundering case, the temple’s people strongly speak it clear that money launderer has no place to stand in the temple as it is totally unacceptable and inexcusable in any sense and any setting; in general if it transpires, it needs to be reported and dealt with. In the organizational level, they ensure that there is a strong team who is equipped to deal with this issue if they arise. They hope they will never arise; they hope they have a strong culture they will not arise. If they were, it needs to be dealt with quickly.
The temple believes that they would never be able to support or speak up for someone who is money launder, who is corrupted in any way or form; they just simply would not and could not be OK with these but they all know how the Abbot is and they know all those accusations are not true.
They said they know the real side of him which is almost totally opposite of what the main stream media portrays him. They in the temple see that because they have been working alongside of him for a long time. The temple followers also see that side of him. The general public does not see it because it does not portray to the Thai society.
His Inner Dreams program on the DMC television channel was a valuable tool allow him to by-pass some red-tape to get directly to the temple’s constituency with his message in the unfiltered unedited way and without having been controlled by the media or any other people. It is tremendously valuable and very effective. People can see the authenticity of him from there.
When coming to the topic of how it was like during the period of being surrounded by the government armed force, it is quite amazing to hear from the temple that with such a viciousness of the attack, the Abbot was very strong. On the day to day basis during the situation, observers witnessed the excitement the whole congregation was waiting to listen to his message he was going to have for them each afternoon, it was so hopeful. And it was a beauty. A kind of beauty that cannot be communicated in words of how so powerful and overwhelming it was.
Furthermore, he was exceptionally a great source reassurance to the temple’s congregation when like sometimes they got upset by what they heard. It was challenging; they thought they actually could accept differences in opinion but the harder was the labelings and the fault accusations. They had to hear things that they all knew that they were fault. The comfort they took was they knew well their leader how he is. Most of all, they were confident in the strength he had through the situation.
Further to the most important question most people want to know is: where is the Abbot Dhammajayo now? And how he is? The answer received from the temple’s people is, obviously, over the years, they still stay in contact quite closely with him. Working on the day to day basis, they think it really is the work that keeps him going, the work that he strongly believes in; he can see the great effect from the work that he has been doing and that really keeps him strong.
Talking about the reason behind all the protection effort from Dhammakaya followers in keeping Phra Dhammajayo out of the government legal agency’s hand, they said there are a few reasons: one: general ethical point, when someone has done something so devotional, he should be supported. They think it is important for the world that anyone has done incredible morally good to the society, he should not be ended up imprison. There are people who will support him. There are people who will take risk for him as he has done so much self-sacrifice. It is important for the government agency to understand that there is public’s desire for truth and justice.
After all, seeing from the sociological implications of what the Abbot Dhammajayo did were enormous especially returning the possibility of mental liberation to lay people. At a time when most meditation techniques in Thai society were taught to monastics only, Phra Mongkolthepmuni, the founder of the meditation technique called Dhammakayapa meditation instructed thousands upon thousands of lay people to practice meditation. When coming to the present Dhammakaya Temple, his successor: Phra Dhammajayo has really brought Dhammakaya meditation practice to a level of awareness and intellectual engagement among Thai Buddhists and non-Buddhists that did not exist before him.
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