Early Monastic Buddhism v1.c19.15

v1.c19.15

The Buddhists adopted more or less the general directions scattered in the brāhmanic and non-brāhmanic literatures for the brahmacārins and sannyāsins and it was after some years had passed when the number of followers had grown fairly large that Buddha thought of framing a code of disciplinary rules in keeping with the teaching promulgated by him i.e., the *majjhimā-paṭipadā* which kept clear of the two extreme forms of life, viz., that of a rigorous non-brāhmanic ascetic and that of an ease-loving householder. He laid more emphasis on the control of mind (*citta*) than on body (*kāya*) and speech (*vācā*),³ and so he formulated a code of rules which answered to his ideal. The life of a monk living in a monastery but practising meditation in a forest or cemetery was Buddha’s ideal and so he directed that the monasteries should be located at a lonely spot outside but not very far from the limits of a town or a village so that the monks