History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c91.344

v7.c91.344

The Pātimokkha for monks contains 227 articles which were to be recited twice a month in an assembly of at least four monks and confessions of breaches of the rules had to be made. If one reads the Cullavagga (SBE XX pp 330-340), one may understand how the gatherings of legions of monks and nuns in immense monasteries led in some cases to sapping the ordinary observances of decency and morality. At first the Pātimokkha could be recited to nuns by monks and the nuns could confess their lapses to monks but this had to be changed later and it was laid down that only bhikkhunīs could do these things for them. P 333 of the same shows how nuns quarrelled among themselves and came to blows and p 335 narrates how some monks threw dirty water on nuns and how they uncovered their bodies and thighs before nuns.