ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to examine the multi-layered pluralism in the roles of a Buddhist bhik and to bring out the tension between the social and spiritual roles of a Buddhist practitioner, experienced by virtue of being a woman. Liberty, liberation and free womanhood are ideas that are frequently dealt with in different contexts within the Therigth. The use of the terms liberty, free womanhood and the like are quite subjective and wide-ranging in the Therigth, and take into account freedom from household/domestic chores, and looking after ailing relatives, to more abstract, spiritual and philosophical interpretations of nibbnna and the like. A woman entering the Buddhist Samgha was required to take oath, I go forth to a homeless life, following the Lord Skyamun I abandon the superficial characteristics of a householder. The Princess Jtaka shows a woman creating her own opportunities and directing her own future on the Bodhisattva path.
