Documents That Establish the Rules: The Genre of Chayik

Chapter 1 contextualizes the primary sources that form the backbone of this book and focuses on the genre of the monastic guidelines as a whole. In this chapter, I demonstrate that the monastic guidelines were often written in reaction to issues that were seen to be in need of attention, such as corruption, bribery, nepotism, the maltreatment of lay-servants, and political scheming. The texts furthermore give us insight into the internal hierarchy and organization of the monastery, its judicial role, monastic economics, and the social stratification within the monastery. For this reason, I argue in this chapter that these works are rich sources for monastic social history and, despite the fact that they do not overtly deal with matters of social justice, a great deal of insight can be gained from close reading of the chayik. This chapter also explores the parallels of the genre with other Buddhist traditions.