Baru dengar nih ada Sangha Upasaka / upasika. Ini resmi di MBI?
Selama saya belajar di Vihara Vimala Dharma, setahu saya , istilah Sangha hanya merujuk pada perkumpulan bhikkhu/bhikkhuni.
Sejak kapan ada Sangha Upasaka/upasika?
Ada beberapa sumber.
Salah satunya yang saya ingat ada di Buddhavacana - Ven. Dhammika.
Saya cari dulu ya.
terimakasih,
henrychan
Di wikipedia ada tuh :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sangha#cite_note-5
http://www.metta.lk/tipitaka/2Sutta-Pitaka/4Anguttara-Nikaya/Anguttara2/4-catukkanipata/001-bhandagamavaggo-e.html
http://books.google.co.id/books?id=ux7pnv_YCtsC&pg=PA240&dq=komunitas+sangha&hl=id&ei=_vGzTIbJPJPovQO9-LSKCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=komunitas%20sangha&f=false
dikutip dari wikipedia,
"Some[3] [4] commentators noted that Sangha is frequently(and according to them mistakenly) used in the West to refer to any sort of Buddhist community. This could be problematic in a theological sense because a collection of Buddhists does not amount to a triple gem where other Buddhists could take refuge. It is suggested by these commentators that the terms parisa or gana would be a more appropriate reference to a community of Buddhists. Parisa means "following" and it refers to the four groups of the Buddha's followers: monks, nuns, laymen and laywomen. [2] Gana is a Sanskrit term meaning "flock, troop, multitude, number, tribe, series, class" and has a more neutral meaning.[5] However this meaning of 'any sort of Buddhist community' is backed by other commentators, mainly coming from movements with a considerable section of lay people like often around Mahayana and Vajrayana schools and even Vipassana. They refer to the word sangha being traditionally also used to encompass lay followers, in sutras like Anguttara-Nikaya II.1.vii [6]. The theological problem of sangha-as-gem-to-revere they solve in two ways: firstly by stressing that the 'arya sangha' is far more of a refuge than the lower levels of sangha, and secondly by stressing that sangha stands for the 'holy spiritual dimension' of gathering as a community of Buddhists, not the more mundane dimensions. This holy dimension has some link with the concept of Kalyana mittata on peer level."
Jadi, istilah Sangha utk komunitas umat awam non-bhikkhu , muncul di negara negara Eropa dan Amerika, dan berasal dari Mahayana dan terutama Vajrayana.
Memang dlm Vajrayana ada lama yg bukan gelong (bhikkhu) sehingga sering orang keliru menganggap semua lama adalah bhikkhu. Karena lama boleh menikah, tdk heran kerancuan makin menjadi jadi.
Ditambah lagi sekte sekte kontroversial yang bisa dikategorikan "Cult", sangat murah hati memberi gelar kepada pengikutnya sebagai Acarya, Rinpoche bahkan gelar Buddha.
Apakah kita akan mengikuti yang kacau seperti itu?