Mahādvāra Nikāya

Dhammānudhamma Mahādvāra Nikāya Gaing (Burmese: ဓမ္မာနုဓမ္မမဟာဒွါရနိကာယဂိုဏ်း, also known as Mahā Dwāya Gaing or Mahādvāra Nikāya, is a monastic order of monks in Myanmar (Burma), primarily in Lower Myanmar.[1] This order is very conservative with respect to Vinaya regulations.[2] It is one of the nine legally sanctioned monastic orders in the country, under the 1990 Law Concerning Sangha Organizations.[3]

Dhammānudhamma Mahādvāra Nikāya Sect
ဓမ္မာနုဓမ္မမဟာဒွါရနိကာယဂိုဏ်း
Abbreviationမဟာဒွါရဂိုဏ်း (Mahādvāra Sect)
Formation
  • 1852 (Dvāra Sect, original)
  • 1918 (Mahādvāra Sect)
TypeBuddhist monastic order
HeadquartersMyanmar
Members6,066 (2016)
LeaderH.H. Latpadan Sayadaw Bhaddanta Varasāmi, 16th Thathanabaing of Mahādvāra Sect

Statistics

Ordained Buddhist monks by monastic order in Myanmar (2016).[4]
  1. Thudhamma 467,025 (87.3%)
  2. Shwegyin 50,692 (9.47%)
  3. Mahādvāra 6,066 (1.13%)
  4. Mūladvāra 3,872 (0.72%)
  5. Veḷuvan 3,732 (0.70%)
  6. Hngettwin 1,445 (0.27%)
  7. Kudo 927 (0.17%)
  8. Mahāyin 823 (0.15%)
  9. Anaukchaung 645 (0.12%)

According to 2016 statistics published by the State Samgha Maha Nayaka Committee, 6,166 monks belonged to this monastic order, representing 1.15% of all monks in the country, making it the third largest order after Thudhamma and Shwegyin Nikaya.[4] With respect to geographic representation, the majority are based in Lower Burma, with a sizable plurality of Mahādvāra monks living in Ayeyarwady Region (40.69%), followed by Yangon Region (20.65%), Bago Region (20.61%), and Mon State (9.97%).[4]

In 2016, the order had 805 monasteries, representing 1% of the country's monasteries.[5]

Origins

Dvāra Gaing

In 1214 of the Burmese Era (around 1852 CE), during British rule in the Ayeyarwady Region, Sayadaw Ashin Ukkamsa Vimala from the town of Okpho (now Ingapu township) had a dispute with the Sayadaws of the Sudhammā order (Thudhamma Gaing) who were under British jurisdiction.[1][2][6]

This dispute was triggered by the issue of ordination (upasampadā) in a water sīmā (ye sim).[1][2][6] Furthermore, Okpho Sayadaw ruled that when paying homage to The Buddha, one should not do so by reciting kāyakamma, vacīkamma, and manokamma (bodily action/karma, verbal action, mental action).[7] According to him, the correct way was to pay homage with the concept of dvāra (door), by reciting kāyadvāra, vacīdvāra, and manodvāra (bodily door, verbal door, mental door).[7][note 1] He also argued that the Sangha could self-regulate without a Dhammarāja if the monks strictly followed the Vinaya (monastic discipline), emphasizing moral intention and challenging royal authority in ordinations.[6]

Kyìthè Layhtat Sayadaw (of the Thudhamma order), author of the Jinattha-pakāsanī, refuted this view on homage, arguing that homage with the concept of kamma (action), rather than dvāra (door), was the correct one. Therefore, in Lower Myanmar, the order formed by Okpho Sayadaw was called the Dvāra Gaing ("Door Order"), while the Thudhamma order was called the Kamma Gaing ("Karma Order"). Later on, however, the name Kamma Gaing fell out of use, and it was again referred to as the Thudhamma Gaing.[2]

These Dvāra orders later split further into 3 types, namely:

Mahādvāra Gaing

For 13 years after the death of Okpho Sayadaw, no one had been elected as a new Mahānāyaka of Dvāra sāsanā. In the year 1280 M.E. (1918-1919 C.E.), the Dvāra Sect held a Sangha meeting which elected the Yangon Monastery Sayadaw from Hinthada as the second Mahānāyaka of Dvāra Sāsanā, and gave the title of "Dhammānudhamma Mahādva Nikāya" to their Dvāra Sect.[8]: 25  The majority of Dvāra monks reverted to perform rites on full moon days and new moon days in the Burmese calendar, citing a teaching of Lord Buddha that full moon days and new moon days be determined by the king or the government (rāja padhāna).[9]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Currently, this method of paying homage [using dvāra] is no longer found. Almost the entire country pays homage only with kāyakamma, vacīkamma, manokamma.

References

  1. ^ a b c "Dwara Nikaya". Archived from the original on 2006-10-06. Retrieved 2010-08-27.
  2. ^ a b c d Carbine, Jason A (2011). Sons of the Buddha: Continuities and Ruptures in a Burmese Monastic Tradition. Vol. 50. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 978-3-11-025409-9.
  3. ^ Gutter, Peter (2001). "Law and Religion in Burma" (PDF). Legal Issues on Burma Journal (8). Burma Legal Council: 10. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-03-14.
  4. ^ a b c "The Account of Wazo Samgha of All Sect, M.E 1377 (2016)". The State Samgha Maha Nayaka Committee. Retrieved 2025-10-19.
  5. ^ "The Account Monasteries of All-Sect in 1377 (2016)". The State Samgha Maha Nayaka Committee. 2016. Retrieved 2025-05-06.
  6. ^ a b c Schober, Juliane (2010-11-30), Schober, Juliane (ed.), "Theravada Cultural Hegemony in Precolonial Burma", Modern Buddhist Conjunctures in Myanmar: Cultural Narratives, Colonial Legacies, and Civil Society, University of Hawai'i Press: 0, doi:10.21313/hawaii/9780824833824.003.0002, ISBN 978-0-8248-3382-4, retrieved 2025-05-11{{citation}}: CS1 maint: work parameter with ISBN (link)
  7. ^ a b Jyotisar Shraman (2017). An Application of Kāyagatāsati in Theravāda Buddhism to the Modern Society (PDF) (Thesis).
  8. ^ ဓမ္မဃောသကဦးမောင်မောင် (March 1989). နိုင်ငံတော်အသိအမှတ်ပြုသံဃာ့ဂိုဏ်းကြီးကိုးဂိုဏ်းအကြောင်း [About The State Recognized Nine Major Sects of Saṃghā] (in Burmese). Rangoon: စိန်ပန်းမြိုင်စာပေတိုက်. Retrieved 29 October 2025.
  9. ^ "သံဃာ့ဂိုဏ်းကြီး(၉)ဂိုဏ်း" [The Nine Major Sects of Monks]. Department of Religious Affairs (in Burmese). Retrieved 29 October 2025.
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