Today I want to discuss who makes decisions in the Jogye Order and how. Whose will caused the recent national monks’ rally to be held? This is a crucial question. Outsiders cannot know the majority view inside the Order or how sharply the leadership’s wishes differ from those of ordinary monks. They inevitably receive conduct performed publicly in its name as the conduct of the entire Jogye Order.
I have criticized the rally repeatedly. It was difficult to justify from the standpoint of awakening, compassion, generosity, patience, reason, or the Korean public. Yet after holding it, the Order announced that it would stage another pan-Buddhist rally. Did anyone even investigate what ordinary Buddhists wanted? Presenting the leadership’s will as that of every Buddhist invites ridicule.
Do those leading the Order possess awakening and compassion?
I ask whether this rally truly expressed the majority opinion of Jogye monks. Should Buddhism not be led by people who are awakened, discerning, wise, and compassionate? Is somebody else now leading it? Or are there no people in the Order with awakening, compassion, and insight? I am sorry if these questions sound painful, but the institution’s public conduct makes them unavoidable.
When something is done in the Order’s name, it represents the whole institution. If someone forced the rally through despite widespread opposition, that person must be held responsible. This is precisely why the present moment is the best time to reform the Jogye Order.
Turn this failure into an opportunity for accountability and reform
Those who planned and forced through the national rally should be identified, held accountable, and removed. The monks have been given an exceptional chance to replace an old leadership and let a new Jogye Order be born. This is the best moment for younger, aware, and awakened monks to gather, decide, and raise a current of reform.
Because the Order staged such an indefensible event against the public, the case for reform has become unmistakable. Neither the event imposed as institutional policy nor the language sent into society displayed the bearing of an awakened person, compassion, generosity, or patience. Nor is the problem limited to this rally. The same structure appeared in earlier walking events and the One-Million Vows Buddhist Project.
A Buddhist project in the twenty-first century is not larger construction
A Buddhist project should mean the work of the Buddha. Yet what first comes to mind when Jogye monks hear the term? Building a larger temple, raising a huge statue and covering it in gold, laying out a garden, and erecting a pagoda. This is the current state of institutional Buddhist projects.
A genuine project should spread the Buddha’s Dharma or relieve the public’s suffering. In the twenty-first century, the Order must stop enlarging temples, gilding statues, and multiplying gardens and pagodas. Monks do not lack this knowledge. Most already know it. The question is why their knowledge is not reflected in institutional action.
The reason is that unsuitable people control decision-making. Decisions are made by those pursuing money and power rather than by people who embody monastic life. Partial repairs will not suffice. Thorough reform is required, and younger monks, a new current within the Order, must become its center.
During an election season, the Order became an instrument of political pressure
This is the twenty-first century, yet what occurred before a presidential election was political intervention, pressure, intimidation, and fear. The name of the Buddhist community was suddenly thrown into an electoral struggle. Leaders attacked the government, demanded that a particular lawmaker leave his party, and threatened a pan-Buddhist rally if he was not expelled. The political intention was plainly visible.
Monks linked to political power dominate the Jogye Order, and only their speech and will prevail. What conclusion did abbots reach after gathering? Because a lawmaker called the collection of money from hikers who did not even enter the temple a “Bong-i Kim Seon-dal” scheme, they demanded that he lose his parliamentary seat. If such abbots are the Order’s face, the institution’s continued existence loses its value.
Abbots and the supreme patriarch should be chosen for awakening, not money
Should an abbot, the highest authority in a temple, be someone with money, or someone with awakening, insight, virtue, and compassion? In reality, people say that gaining an important abbacy requires a huge sum. The candidate’s wealth then matters more than whether the candidate has awakened.
The same applies to the supreme patriarch. If an influential patriarch had possessed sound judgment and wisdom, this crisis would not have developed as it did. If the qualities of awakening, compassion, and insight were absent, the patriarch cannot evade responsibility. When even that office is reached through costly electoral structures, a person who lives without possessions and practices in purity can never become either abbot or patriarch.
Thus the more monastic a person is—the closer to the Buddha, the more dedicated to pure practice and non-possession—the more that person is excluded from institutional events and the will expressed to society. How can such a structure represent the Jogye Order?
Surgery at the roots is required
Reform must be urgent, painful, and thorough. The decayed structure must be removed from its roots. Many monks will agree. Yet earlier generations failed to call wrong conduct wrong and left a gray zone around their seniors. Through history and changing times, Buddhism’s spirit scattered little by little until the institution began to rot.
The time for another major operation has arrived. Decision-making must include not only orders imposed from the top but opinions rising from below. Institutions must prevent impure actors from gaining a foothold in power. Younger and awakened Jogye monks should put their heads together, determine how to overcome the crisis, and speak publicly. An opportunity this strong may not return.
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