The Buddhists have also nunneries for women.  It is related that Sakya-muni consented to establish them at the earnest request of his aunt and nurse, and of his favorite disciple, Ananda.  These nuns take the same vows as the monks.  Their rules require them to show reverence even to the youngest monk, and to use no angry or harsh words to a priest.  The nun must be willing to be taught; she must go once a fortnight for this purpose to some virtuous teacher; she must not devote more than two weeks at a time to spiritual retirement; she must not go out merely for amusement; after two years’ preparation she can be initiated, and she is bound to attend the closing ceremonies of the rainy season.

Sec. 7.  Karma and Nirvana.

One of the principal metaphysical doctrines of this system is that which it called Karma.  This means the law of consequences, by which every act committed in one life entails results in another.  This law operates until one reaches Nirvana.  Mr. Hardy goes so far as to suppose that Karma causes the merits or demerits of each soul to result at death in the production of another consciousness, and in fact to result in a new person.  But this must be an error.  Karma is the law of consequences, by which every act receives its exact recompense in the next world, where the soul is born again.  But unless the same soul passes on, such a recompense is impossible.

“Karma” said Buddha, “is the most essential property of all beings; it is inherited from previous births, it is the cause of all good and evil, and the reason why some are mean and some exalted when they come into the world.  It is like the shadow which always accompanies the body.”  Buddha himself obtained all his elevation by means of the Karma obtained in previous states.  No one can obtain Karma or merit, but those who hear the discourses of Buddha.

There has been much discussion among scholars concerning the true meaning of Nirvana, the end of all Buddhist expectation.  Is it annihilation?  Or is it absorption in God?  The weight of authority, no doubt, is in favor of the first view.  Burnouf’s conclusion is:  “For Buddhist theists, it is the absorption of the individual life in God; for atheists, absorption of this individual life in the nothing.  But for both, it is deliverance from all evil, it is supreme affranchisement.”  In the opinion that it is annihilation agree Max Muller, Tumour, Schmidt, and Hardy.  And M. Saint-Hilaire, while calling it “a hideous faith,” nevertheless assigns it to a third part of the human race.

But, on the other hand, scholars of the highest rank deny this view.  In particular, Bunsen (Gott in der Geschichte) calls attention to the fact that, in the oldest monuments of this religion, the earliest Sutras, Nirvana is spoken of as a condition attained in the present life.  How then can it mean annihilation?  It is a state in which all desires cease, all passions die.  Bunsen believes that the Buddha never denied or questioned God or immortality.