Asanha Bucha Day: Boring, Subversive, or Subversively Boring?

Abstract

The first sermon given by the Buddha after his enlightenment is commemorated each year in Thailand with a celebration known as Asanha Bucha Day (Asalha Pūjā in Pali). Monasteries are often full on the day, but many people find the sermon unmemorable, even boring. To better understand the meaning of the sermon within the context of its reception this article presents one sermon in full given at one monastery on Asanha Bucha Day in Chiang Mai, and then through attention to the content of the spoken words and their impression on their audience offers three quite different readings of it: a conventional read, a subversive read, and a particular form of communication that emerges from the tension in between. I argue that it is through rather than antagonistic to its boring reputation that the sermon serves as a special mode of activism in Thailand, one that leverages tradition and conventionality to push for social change in a manner not yet fully appreciated in Buddhist scholarship.

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