A Doubtful Fate of Laotian and Cambodian Buddhism
LAOTIAN BUDDHISM TAKES A NEW TURN
Though a small country with a small population, Laos was strong religiously. Before the Communist takeover in 2518/1975, Buddhism was the state religion under royal patronage and the Sangha was unified, with no division into sects or denominations, under the leadership of the Supreme Patriarch. In spite of the absence of current statistics, it can be said that in 1975 nearly 100 percent of the 3 million Laotians were Buddhists. Not only were they unified in their faith, they were also strong in their faith.
Laotians were devoted Buddhists of the Theravada School. They adhered to the traditional Buddhist culture that they had shared with the traditional Thais. Laos stood at an earlier stage of modernization than Thailand and the monkhood had not been isolated from, or lost its place in, any sector of Laotian society. The monks had their rightful share in the process of development. Leadership of the 1monkhood was still maintained and the monks still played significant roles in public education. Ecclesiastical education was a basic part of the national system of education and enjoyed full responsibility of the secular government. In 2507/1964 the Institute of Buddhist Studies was established as an ecclesiastical institution under the charge of the Ministry of Education.1 Large numbers of Laotian monks went to further their studies in Thailand and India every year and were a direct concern of the Laotian government. On graduation, they had significant places in national affairs. Ostensibly, monks in Laos were thus in a good position to find a suitable place for Buddhism in modernized society and to help the people achieve a desirable development, if they should not fall into negligence and lose the opportunity, and if political events should not interfere and put them out of action or dislocate the whole process.
However, the above promising picture of Laotian Buddhism can be compared only to the visible part of an iceberg seen above water. While the country had a very backward economy and was often spoken of as the least developed of the Indochina states, the Laotian monkhood, on the whole, did more for the persistence of the status quo than for the solution of the problem. The majority of the monks and novices were, like the populace, undereducated, both in the modern sense and in the sense of monastic training. They lived in idleness and in ignorance of the real conditions of the changing society. Superstitious beliefs and practices were prevalent. Generally speaking, the Laotian monks led the masses in this deluding way rather than preach the real teachings. of the Buddha to enlighten them. Undoubtedly, this state of affairs contributed to the progress of Communist ideologies among the modern younger generations and, eventually, to the final collapse of the old royal regime.
After a long civil war between the Laotian royal government forces aided by the United States and the pro-Communist Pathet Lao (The Lao People's Revolutionary Party) supported by the North Vietnamese and a long period of political instability, Laos fell completely into the hands of the Communists in 2518/1975. The 600-year-old monarchy was abolished on July 2, 1975 and the kingdom was turned into the Lao People's Democratic Republic. In 2520/1977, Vietnam and Laos signed a 25-year agreement for military and economic cooperation. The 2522/1979 Vietnam-Cambodia pact even says that the three countries "must unite with one another in political, military, diplomatic and other affairs."1 A large number of refugees have fled Vietnamese-dominated Laos, draining the country of most of its elite. Laotian monk-refugees can be found taking shelter in Thailand and living with Laotian communities in the United States and some European countries. The last patriarch of Laos, a respectable very old senior monk, has been hospitalized in Bangkok. Because of the lack of communication, Buddhism in Laos becomes hidden away as if behind a kind of curtain. Hearsays and rumours develop abroad, including the ones that no new monks have entered the monasteries as people are not allowed to ordain while the pre-existing monks are encouraged or indirectly forced to leave the monkhood and that the rhonks have been utilized by the current regime as political instruments for indoctrinating the people in the new ideology.
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