Greeting a Monk

0:00You're starting. Peter asked, what is the formal way to greet a monk in Sri Lanka? And is it different from other countries? Is high Bhante acceptable? I think high Bhante you can say when you're familiar I would possibly call, say, hi, Bante, if I meet Bante Yutadamu somewhere here in the monastery. If it's an official occasion, or a monk you don't know, don't say hi, Bante, I would say. Rather... Say, namasa kaan bante. That's Thai, you know. No, isn't it?

1:05Is it? Okay, then don't say that. Thai corruption of the word. Namaskara. It would be namaste, no? Namaste bante. But namaste is also no good because that's Sanskrit. I mean, sorry to jump in, but... Yeah, that's fine. Would you say, Hi, Father, to a priest? Or, Hi, Brother, to a Christian monk? I don't think people normally would, if they have respect for the person. I would think at least, say, Hello, Father, or something like that. Because, I mean, Bhante is not a nickname.

1:44It's a title of respect. It's like, Hi, Venerable. I guess you could say it. But it's, you know, I mean, it gets ridiculous when you like say, hi, your majesty or something like that. You don't really, for a king or something, but it's not on that level. But because of the fact that Bhante is a title of respect, I think hi Bhante is a little bit too informal. It differs from country to country. As we experienced just now, in Thailand you would say, Namaskarn Ajaan or Namaskarn Prajaan.

2:33You would, in most countries I think, put your hands together and don't look straight into the face in the beginning, later in the conversation, yes, but in the beginning have the head a little bit lowered or even a little bit bent or so. If it's an important monk, the more important the monk, the deeper the bow, and things like that. Yeah, I mean, here in Sri Lanka, they touch their hands to your feet. People do that when they respect you. And we do that when we respect a senior monk.

3:16We touch our head, actually, to the feet of the elder. And people do that for their parents. Or I learned here in Sri Lanka from the bhikkhunis who have stayed in Sri Lanka before me that we do... Like people do to the Queen of England. I don't know how that is called. Yeah, probably. And with the palms together. That would be the appropriate greeting for a bhikkhuni to greet a higher monk. We were talking about the word bante because I'm still pretty adamant that it's masculine, but that's really a grammatical question.

4:07They'll often say ayye or you could say bade, I think, but no one uses it. But I think you could. Because it is used, there's two angels talking together, and one calls the other Bhante, the female calls the male Bhante, and the male turns around and calls the female Bhante, which they're actually pretty much the same word, just one's masculine, one's feminine. It's not so clear. They are not asking for... Okay?