Bi Pc 5555. Being stingy with families
Pāli / Sanskrit:Kulamaccharinī
A nun who tries to keep her supporters from supporting others must confess the offense.
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Theravāda Collection on Monastic Law The Nuns’ Analysis
The chapter on offenses entailing confession The subchapter on monasteries 55. Being stingy with families
Origin story
At one time when the Buddha was staying at Sāvatthī in Anāthapiṇḍika’s Monastery, a certain nun there was walking for almsfood along a street. She then went to a certain family where she sat down on the prepared seat. The people there gave her a meal and said, “Venerable, other nuns may come too.” Then that nun thought, “What can I do so that other nuns don’t come?” And she went up to other nuns and said, “Venerables, in such-and-such a place there are malicious dogs, a fierce ox, and it’s muddy. Don’t go there.”
Another nun, too, went to that family while walking for almsfood along that street. She sat down on the prepared seat and the people there gave her a meal. They then asked her, “Venerable, why don’t the nuns come here?”
And she told them what had happened.
People complained and criticized her, “How can a nun keep a family to herself?” … “Is it true, monks, that a nun acted like this?”
“It’s true, sir.”
The Buddha rebuked her … “How could a nun act like this? This will affect people’s confidence …” … “And, monks, the nuns should recite this training rule like this:
Final ruling
‘If a nun keeps a family to herself, she commits an offense entailing confession.’”
Definitions
A: whoever … Nun: … The nun who has been given the full ordination in unanimity by both Sanghas through a legal procedure consisting of one motion and three announcements that is irreversible and fit to stand—this sort of nun is meant in this case. A family: there are four kinds of families: the aristocratic family, the brahmin family, the merchant family, the worker family. Keeps for herself: if she thinks, “What can I do so that other nuns don’t come?” and she then speaks disparagingly about that family to the nuns, she commits an offense entailing confession. If she speaks disparagingly about that family to the nuns, she commits an offense entailing confession.
Non-offenses
There is no offense: if she is not keeping a family to herself, but describes the drawbacks as they are; if she is insane; if she is the first offender.
The fifth training rule is finished.
The “…” is an abbreviation carried over from the Pāli original itself, called peyyāla. The early canon was memorized and recited, so passages repeated verbatim from a preceding discourse were commonly contracted to an elision mark rather than written out in full. Venerable Thích Minh Châu's translation preserves this convention. Some texts therefore look short — but that is the canonical form, not missing content or a truncated translation. The elided passages can be read in full in the preceding discourses of the same chapter.
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