Bhante, for those of us who live in areas that have never had a Buddhist monastic presence, what is important to know when meeting, greeting, interacting with a bhikkhu or bhikkhuni?
Also, what is meant when people say sadhu, sadhu, sadhu?
See, easy question.
Okay.
How to deal with bhikkhus, bhikkhunis?
Don't call them bhikkhu.
I've had people call me bhikkhu.
You can call them what you like, but
It's like saying monk.
Excuse me, monk?
Don't say that.
Well, it's just etiquette.
It's not that they'll be necessarily offended, but there's etiquette for you.
Just as you wouldn't say, hey monk, don't say, hey bhikkhu.
You can call them bante or ayye,
āye you would be the correct, I think, which is the female.
Bhadde, actually Bhadde would be more proper, but they don't seem to use that.
Or they do actually, but nowadays they don't.
But in the texts it seems like Bhante and Bhadde.
Bhadde was the female.
But the bhikkhunis seem to prefer āye or āye.
I would say āye is probably more common.
So find out venerable also work, you know, just like you would call a priest father, right?
Even if you're not particularly religious, out of respect and deference, you call a doctor doctor, you call a priest father, you call a monk venerable or something like that.
Even if you don't respect them, it's a courtesy, it's etiquette.
So that's something.
Don't try to get too close or friendly to them.
The reason we've ordained is to get away, is to be in solitude, to have the time to ourselves.
So trying to be buddy-buddy with a monk and thinking of yourself as buddies or something like that.
If you're not a monk,
It's like an ordinary person and a soldier.
The soldier has to remain aloof and has to have some seclusion.
There is a difference.
People don't realize that because they haven't experienced the life, but we have a very strict life with lots of rules.
and so it can be harmful for the monk and it can be a source of misunderstanding for the layperson when the monk is, as a result of their interaction they might break rules and as a result of them refusing to break rules the layperson might become upset and it's a cause for misunderstanding when it seems like the monk is acting
a bit standoffish or whatever it actually it's usually just trying to keep the rules and concerned that that's very difficult to keep the rules with these people so so close to me so so buddy buddy um so yeah that's about it men men shouldn't touch bhikkhunis women shouldn't touch bhikkhus right
And you shouldn't really touch them in general.
Touching is not a good thing.
We're not touchy-feely sort of people.
The monks, give them some space.
Give them their own space.
Don't be afraid of them and don't be afraid to ask.
If you're not sure about something, ask, is this appropriate, is this inappropriate?
Most bhikkhus and bhikkhunis like to be asked, like to have people ask questions.
It's not really a greed thing, it's just they're bursting with knowledge and practice.
And, you know, quite willing to answer people's questions.
So ask them lots of questions.
It's a good thing.
It's a good way to disfigure if they're a real monk or a real bhikkhu or bhikkhuni.
Because if they get angry at you, then you know what they're like.
If they brush you off, if they give you silly answers, if a monk is very buddy-buddy with you, then you should know that they are not really dedicated to their practice.
If they just want to tell jokes and so on, this kind of thing, engage in useless things.
What does sadhu?
Sadhu means it's good.
So it's an expression of appreciation.
When you appreciate something someone has done, when you appreciate something someone has said, or when you appreciate a good deed, this is what we say.
We say sadhu.
We say it three times.
It's just a tradition.