What is the Buddhist attitude to women? First and foremost, women are viewed as human beings subject to birth, old age, sickness and death: beings prone to suffering and with the ability and opportunity to transcend it. The Buddha made it very clear that the capacity for enlightenment is not gender-based. It is present by virtue of a human birth and women are viewed as having the same spiritual potential as men. In light of this view of their spiritual capacity, the Buddha gave women who wished to devote themselves wholeheartedly to his training the opportunity to become monastics. He […]