Muslim boy, aged 7, made monk revolts the Buddha’s vinaya tenet
Dimbulagala chief incumbent hails it a historic event but will it be flashpoint to spark bigotry’s fires again?
Perhaps it is his karmic destiny to enter the Noble Order of the Sangha and follow the path of the Buddha at so young an age. Or perhaps it is his father’s good fortune to have found a convenient 24/7 care centre free of charge to relieve himself of his paternalistic duty of having to fend for the boy whilst the mother’s working abroad in the Middle East as a house maid.
Seven-year-old Ismail Aslama was recently ordained as a monk at the Dimbulagala Forest Monastery and given the new name Rathnapure Siri Sudarshanalankaram, the chief priest of the monastery, the Ven. Millane Siriyalankara Thera announced this week. He said that a certain Hameed Ismail, the father of the boy, whose wife was employed abroad had brought the child to the monastery and offered him to the Sangha. The chief monk hailed the ordination of the Muslim boy as a historic event and proudly declared: “This is the first time in the long history of the Dimbulagala Aranya Senasanaya that a Muslim has been ordained as a Buddhist monk.”
All very well. Except for one thing. Given the boy’s tender age and his mother’s absence from the country, does it revolt the Buddha’s Code of Vinaya tenets? Consider this.
Rahula was the only child, the only son of Prince Siddhartha. On the day of his son’s birth, Siddhartha realised another fetter, another barrier had risen to bar him renouncing the world to find the cause of universal woe. The more he lin- gered, the more he dilly dallied, the more would the tentacles of attachment grow to bind him to the world’s materialistic life and make it impossible for him to break free and leave his father Suddhodana’s Kapilavatthu kingdom.
That night he left. Under cover of darkness though lit by a pale yellow moon he embarked on an unknown path, on an unknown journey, in an unknown quest to find an unknown treasure.
Seven years later – one year after attaining the ultimate bliss of Enlightenment – he returned as Gautama the Buddha to his father’s Kapilavatthu kingdom. Yasodhara, his wife, who he had left behind in his search for the elusive Truth that would free mankind from accursed sorrow, was eagerly awaiting his arrival. She dressed the young prince, the Prince Rahula, in the best of clothes, and pointing the Buddha out to the young boy said thus:
“There is your father, the Prince Siddhartha, now known as Gautama the Buddha. Behold him son, behold that golden coloured ascetic resembling Brahma on earth. He is your father. And he has great treasures. Go, go to him, and ask for your inheritance. Say to him: I am Prince Rahula, your only child, the son and heir to your fortune. After my consecration as King of Kapilavatthu, I intend to become the Chakravartin, universal monarch. To become one I need wealth. Give me your great wealth: for the son is the owner of what belongs to the father.”
When young Rahula, aged 7, had walked up to his father, the Buddha, and said what his mother had bade him say, the Buddha remained silent. The boy persisted in repeating his request but still the Buddha gave no answer. When the Buddha finally left the palace after finishing his mid day meal as the guest of his father Suddhodana, young Rahula trailed behind, repeating again and again the refrain: “Give me my inheritance.”
No one stopped the young boy and neither did the Buddha prevent him from following him. When the Buddha reached the park with Rahula’s shadow still falling on his robe, the Buddha contemplated thus: “He desires his father’s wealth but it goes with the world and the world is full of woe. What I can give him is not the wealth of worldly riches, which I stood to inherit from my sire had I not renounced it all and taken the path I took; but instead I shall give him the infinite wealth of the Dhamma which I discovered all alone. I shall give him the noble wealth I received at the