When we went to our nearest temple, Wat Phra Lao, to invite the abbot to the family tam boun which is coming up on Saturday, he surprised us considerably. He ordained when he was 20 years old and has been a monk for 39 years now. The first time I met him as far as I can recall was in 1994. He was very friendly and was keen to talk with me about football, particularly the World Cup which had just been played. His hero, if monk's can have a hero, was Roberto Baggio. At the time I thought that just a little odd since I hadn't expected monks to be following the World Cup and also Baggio's missed penalty had meant that Brazil beat Italy in the final.. Later I learned that Baggio was normally an outstanding goal-scorer and also a Buddhist.
Now this monk, a local man with many relatives in Phana, has spent all his time as a monk at Wat Phra Lao. He has been acting-abbot on two occasions, the first lasting many years while the abbot was incapacitated by long-term illness. Most people assumed that he would become abbot when the time came to appoint a new one, but he did not. And that experience looked like being repeated last year. It seems that the Sangha hierarchy felt that a famous temple as Wat Phra Lao is should have as abbot someone 'learned' and with 'vision'. 'Vision' is usually a synonym for development in the form of new buildings but this monk was known to not wish to change the character of the wat. A monk favoured by the hierarchy visited in anticipation of becoming the abbot but local people rebelled. I have heard that some said they would refuse to feed him. So a victory for local power, I think.
So when we got to Wat Phra Lao to formally deliver our invitation, we were surprised to find this abbot, not known for his learning, sitting outside his kuti (the one he has occupied for many years, not the official abbot's kuti) doing some writing on small strips of green bamboo. He was writing in the ancient aksorn khom, a Khmer script that is considered to have sacred and magical properties.
Here are the implements he had on his work table:
and the preparations he had made earlier:
The finished product looked like these:
These strips of bamboo will one day be regarded as having magical properties of some sort, probably only after they have been 'sacrilized' through a somphot ceremony. Writing such as this is often found on small pieces of metal and is highly prized if it is either very old or associated with a famous monk. Wat Phra Lao will be holding such a ceremony on the eve of the annual temple festival in February as they have done for the last few years. You can read something about last year's ceremony HERE .
The abbot also did some writing on his white board, to show the difference and some similarity between the aksorn khom and the Thai script.
It seems that the abbot has taught himself to read and write the script, and also aksorn tham, the script used for religious purposes in Lanna and Laos in years gone by. This script is thought of here as being of more religious significance because it was what was used in the temples, and what the monks learned. But the Khmer script is thought to have more magical potency. Here is a photo of a few pages of the aksorn tham that are in a palm-leaf book that Pensri inherited from her father:
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