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The Kammaṭṭhāna Forest Tradition of Thailand (from Thai: พระกรรมฐาน – ''Phra Kammatthaan'' , see ''#Etymology'' for details), commonly known in the West as the Thai Forest Tradition, is a lineage of Theravada Buddhist monasticism, as well as the lineage's associated heritage of Buddhist praxis. In the tradition, practitioners take on one or more objective supports (Pali: ''kammaṭṭhāna'') — meditation subjects which are held in mind during meditation practice. These supports are used both to get the mind into samadhi (states of ''concentration'' or ''absorption'') and for investigation which cultivates paññā (''wisdom'' or ''discernment'': a major division of the Noble Eightfold Path that represents the insight which arises from Buddhist practice). Additionally, monks in the tradition usually adopt a certain number of optional ascetic practices, known in Pali as dhutanga (Thai: ธุดงค์ – ''thudong''). Orthopraxy with regard to the earliest extant Buddhist texts is emphasized in the tradition, and the tradition has a reputation for strict adherence to the Buddhist monastic code, known as the Vinaya. The tradition teaches that the goal of Buddhist practice is an awakening to the deathless dimension of the mind, which is related to what the Forest Ajahns refer to as the ''Original Mind'' (Thai: จิตเดิม – ''Cit Deim''; see also: Luminous mind). According to Ajahn Maha Bua, the deathless can be realized by reaching and examining the Original Mind, which Maha Bua says is a feature of the minds of ordinary beings. This deathless awareness is described as one which transcends the Buddhist characterization of the mind's functions of sentience, known as the five aggregates, and is also distinct from mental stillness, emptiness, or notions of an annihilation of awareness. Kammaṭṭhāna teachers assert that awareness of the deathless can be realized not simply through contentment or letting go, but rather through intense mental exertion (sometimes described as a "battle" or "struggle") to "cut" or "clear the path" through the defilements of an ordinary person's mind, known as kilesas. The Kammaṭṭhāna tradition began circa 1900, as a grassroots movement led by Ajahns Mun Bhuridatta and Sao Kantasīlo — two Thai monks from the predominantly Lao–speaking cultural region of Thailand known as Isan. They were ordained in a 19th-century reform movement known as Dhammayut (Pali: ''Dhammayutika'', meaning ''In accordance with the dhamma''), the eponymous reform movement for which the modern monastic order is named, founded by Mongkut (Rama IV of Siam) while he was ordained as a Theravada monk. Disillusioned with an increasingly scholastic culture beginning to be imposed on the Thai clergy by state religious authorities under Mongkut's son Chulalongkorn (Rama V of Siam) in the late 19th Century, Ajahn Mun and Ajahn Sao both took to the rural frontier of Northeast Thailand, with Ajahn Mun traveling abroad to neighboring regions for a time. According to Mun, the primary motivation for their departure from the clerical mainstream was a rejection of the popular notion held by their contemporaries that the path to nibbana was lost to mankind. They eventually attracted their own following, and began their own tradition from within the newly formed modern Dhammayut order at the beginning of the 20th Century, in spite of a second wave of clerical reform measures in Thailand being implemented from Bangkok by the Dhammayut monk–prince and half-brother to Chulalongkorn named Vajirañāṇa (Thai: ''Wachirayan''), which were intended to thwart western imperialism. In the early 20th century the tradition struggled to maintain its niche in Thailand among attempts to domesticate its following. Beginning in the 1950s though, the tradition would gain respect among the urbanities in Bangkok, and receive widespread acceptance among the Thai Sangha. Many of the Ajahns were nationally venerated by Thai Buddhists, who regarded them as ''arahants'' — living Buddhist saints in Theravada Buddhism. Because of their reputations, the Ajahns have become the subject of a cultural fixation on sacralized objects believed among lay followers to offer supernatural protection. This cultural fixation was referred to by social anthropologist Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah as a ''cult of amulets'', which he described during a field study in the 1970s as "a traditional preoccupation now reaching the pitch of fetishistic obsession". During this time, the tradition found a significant following in the West; particularly among the students of Ajahn Chah Subhatto, a forest teacher who studied among a group of monks in the Mahanikai (Pali: ''Mahanikaya'', meaning ''Great Collection'') — the other of Thailand's two monastic orders alongside the Dhammayut — many of whom remained loyal to their Mahanikai pedigree in spite of their interest in Ajahn Mun's teachings. However, in the final decades of the 20th century the tradition experienced a crisis when the majority of Thailand's rainforests were clear cut. In spite of this deforestation in Thailand, the Kammaṭṭhāna tradition continues presently in sparsely populated areas on the outskirts of cities, in Thailand and around the World. ==Etymology== The Thai word ''kammatthaan'' originates from the Pali kammatthana. This reflects a tendency of Thai words to have Pali and Sanskrit roots. The Pali ''kammatthana'' is a compound word which is constructed from the bases ''kamma'' (Sanskrit: karma), meaning "action" or "work"; and thana, meaning a "place" or "abode". The monks are interchangeably referred to as Dhutanga Kammatthana monks, due to their tendency for practicing the dhutanga ascetic practices. The word ''kammatthana'' began to be attributed to Ajahn Mun's lineage because of the tradition's custom of handing down rudimentary meditation instructions from preceptor to ordinand during a new monk's full ordination, known as ''upasampada''. The practice came to be known as the ''kammatthana'', or the ''basic occupation'' of a monk (also translated as the ''place of work''), and the monks were referred to as ''kammatthana'' monks to distinguish them from forest-dwelling monks who belonged to other meditation lineages. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Thai Forest Tradition」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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