Introduction to Satsang

 

Wayism holds the satsang dear, we believe in community and we have a vinaya satsang system of monks and nuns. Wayist monks and nuns do not take lifelong vows, they renew their vows regularly.

Monks and nuns occasionally reconsider whether they should change direction and seek greater soul-growth elsewhere.

Women and men have equal access and equal rights to all aspects of Wayists life. Satsang generally try to have separate sleeping and ablution facilities for the genders. The average satsang is poor and make use of dorms and communal ablution. Some have the financial means to offer accommodation for boys and girls but the poorer satsang would start out providing for the gender in most need in its particular area. This creates a bit of an imbalance in Wayism because in many poorer countries young females are in greater need, and Wayist’s reaction is generally to provide to that need first. Adults do not share with young people. Some have facilities to accommodate adult laypersons but not all have separate ablution and sleeping facilities for different genders.

There is a propensity for spiritual pride and self-importance associated with the shorn heads and coloured robes of Theravada and Mahayana monastics. Wayist satsang have an advantage in that they do not obligate shaving of the head and eyebrows, they wear mostly white, the colour of novices in other traditions. Additionally, monks and nuns do not always wear robes but use dhoti, sampot or kurta as well. Satsang management in different areas decide on presenting a united front to the secular community (also to differentiate themselves from other monastic traditions) by choosing a practical, affordable dress code for their area. Wayists do not go on alms rounds like Buddhist monks and nuns, and do not receive gifts in their personal capacity; everything belongs to the satsang and can be shared with the community at large. Wayist monks and nuns are not regarded as altogether different from secular society; rather as an integral aspect of secular society. They share accommodation, rules and resources for the sake of practicality – not for the sake of being holier than anyone else. Wayist monks and nuns may be utilized, called upon, by their secular communities for their particular skills and knowledge about certain things, which is just the way in which the satsang forms part of the community at large.

Wayist satsang do not require, as do several other monastic traditions, that female applicants be virgins or ‘innocent’ of sexual experience. Information about a person’s sexual experiences is no more informative than information of a person’s dietary experiences and habits. It is when a person aims to perpetuate an unhealthy or potentially damaging habit (for self and others) that a sangha should take note and act accordingly.

Mari Magadha, who became enlightened and reborn as bodhisattva Tara was/is the Lord’s foremost disciple and is presently a very important aspect of the growing worldwide consciousness of women's rights, and she was a child prostitute when the Lord met her in North India in the 1st century CE.