Mediaeval Sinhalese Art c6.67

Language: English

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Into the details of a century of British rule we need not enter. At the beginning of the Kandyan Sinhalese were still an independent and self-contained community, with a culture and art which had for all an equal appeal, and a state religion which was also the religion of the people. Now however, the old spirit has departed, and though the unspoilt villager is still a man worth knowing well, the ‘educated’ classes are sadly degenerate and de-nationalised. Impoverished by the change from a society based on personal relations to one based on the exchange of coin and free trade in land, the aristocracy are unable, even if willing, to support the old traditions; nor, breaking with these, have they in any adequate way acquired the culture of the west. By many, the old life and old culture are despised, and all interest in the country and its past is dead. The priesthood suffers also from lack of the vigorous support of the kings;

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temples are allowed to fall into decay, and valuable and beautiful memorials of the past allowed to disappear, or to be cheaply restored away by those who do not understand or care for them.* As an example of the disintegration of society and of the general disorganisation of manners and morals resulting, I give one quotation from the Report of the Temple Lands Commissioners for 1871: “The Dambulla vihāra is, as is well known, a shrine held in great reverence by the Buddhists, and it is a place of great interest, worthy of being maintained as a historical monument, being the only rock temple of any importance in Ceylon, and possessing a painted roof, which is the best example of Buddhist art in the Island. To this vihāra belong large and valuable forests, which should be preserved for supplying the necessary timber for the maintenance of the buildings belonging to the vihāra, and also for the benefit of the vihāra tenants, to whom the wild honey, jungle ropes, and pasture for cattle, to be found in these forests, are of considerable value. The incumbent of the vihāra, without regard to the interests of which he was the guardian, sold to a low-country carpenter all the valuable timber in one of the large forests, and omitted to pay the money into the vihāra chest. Complaint was made to the Commissioners, but they had no power to act.

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They however called the attention of the ecclesiastical authorities to the matter, and the incumbent has been called upon to pay in to the credit of the vihāra upwards of £170, probably less than a third of the amount he has received. It is doubtful whether he will pay even this. Certainly he will go unpunished. The people know that their priest has committed the greatest crime a Buddhist can commit, for in their language, ‘he has robbed Buddha.’ They know also that he has committed a great offence against our laws, in having appropriated to himself the property of which he was the trustee. The Buddhist authorities will not seek to remove him, because they cannot act without the aid of our Courts. The tenants will not act, because they are afraid to take steps against a man of influence with money at command. Others will not act because the expenses would come out of their own pockets. This is only one example out of many; and nothing can be more injurious, nothing more demoralising, than for the people to see frauds of this kind, committed by trustees of temple property, go unpunished.

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It is not easy to suggest a remedy for fear of the out-cry, ‘The Government is supporting Buddhism’: better let lying, fraud, and robbery go unpunished, than do anything which would have any appearance of protecting from ruin, and from loss to the public, those lands which have been set apart for the maintenance of a religion which is not ours’—even though that religion is the pure and simple creed which is held by one-third of the human race, and has been the faith of the Sinhalese people for 2000 years. It would be well if this question could be dealt with merely as a matter of good government, untrammelled by the odium theologicum. It is simply the question of preserving for the public those public lands at present set apart for religious purposes, which, unless closely looked after, will gradually become lost to the public altogether.”