Holy Things and the Spectre of Syncretism in Thai Religion

Edited by Aaron Michael Ullrey.

This Research Reflection by guest contributor Nathan McGovern is part of an ongoing series spotlighting the academic study of religions.

If syncretism is so wrong, then why does it feel so right? My new book, Holy Things: The Genealogy of the Sacred in Thai Religion, is a study of the practice in Thailand of asking “holy things” (sing saksit) for boons. The phrase sing saksit in Thai refers to specific objects, generally statues and shrines, that are understood to have the power to grant practitioners mundane boons—such as help in one’s love life, getting a better job, making more money, and so forth—but cannot help in the Buddhist path to nirvana. 

The procedure for asking one of these holy things for a boon is essentially cash-on-delivery: you promise an offering when asking the holy thing for something, but you only give the offering if the boon is received. Any number of holy things in Thailand have a reputation for granting boons, but the majority fall into one of three categories: shrines to local spirits, shrines to gods, and Buddha images. Placing holy things into these three categories, however, raises one of the oldest questions in the modern study of religion: Is this syncretism—a mixture of different religions? 

A key methodological insight in the discipline of History of Religions is that we understand religion better if we avoid normative statements and instead focus on a purely descriptive approach to religious phenomena. Prominent scholars, including J. Z. Smith, argue that syncretism is not useful for understanding religious practice because calling something syncretistic is inherently normative. 

To call something “syncretistic” presumes that there are discrete religions that supposedly “mix.” But deciding what a religion is in its allegedly pure form before mixing is itself a normative enterprise. This way of thinking is rooted in normative polemics against popular practices religious elites considered improper.

Earlier studies, especially in anthropology, regarded Southeast Asian Buddhism as syncretistic, with a common paradigm delineating three components: Buddhism, Hinduism (or Brahmanism), and local spirit religion (or animism). But this paradigm misunderstands Buddhism, even from a normative standpoint. Buddhists worship gods and spirits because gods and spirits are an essential part of Buddhist cosmology. They are supernatural beings trapped in samsara, just as you and I are, and it is possible to be reborn as a god or spirit according to one’s karma. 

These supernatural beings cannot help you attain nirvana because they have not attained nirvana themselves. They do, however, have extraordinary powers, so they can potentially grant mundane boons. The Buddhist worship of gods and spirits does not, therefore, deviate from an original, pure, or normative Buddhism.

Nevertheless, there are aspects of the worship of holy things in Thailand that stubbornly seem syncretistic. The identity and iconography of the gods sometimes reflect influences from Hindu mythology and iconography not found in the Pali Buddhist scriptures. Thai Buddhists worship Buddha images for boons in the same way and under the same general category, namely holy things, as they do gods and spirits. Finally, Thai Buddhists themselves are increasingly adopting the language of syncretism to explain their own religious practices.

A genealogical study of the word saksit—the “holy” in holy things—allows me to answer these questions. The word saksit did not mean “holy” in the Thai language until it was used by Christian missionaries in the nineteenth century to translate the Western concept of the holy. Prior to that time, saksit referred to a power not attributed to Buddha images but possessed by gods and spirits and accessible to Brahmans. The knowledge of Brahmans, in turn, was acknowledged in Thai discourse to be valid in the mundane realm, while only Buddhism provided the correct path to liberation from rebirth. This acknowledgment, even in precolonial times, of the limited validity of Brahmans’ knowledge explains why seemingly Hindu iconography for the gods is found in Thailand. Buddhism says the gods are real, and Brahmans tell us who they are and what they look like. 

The subsequent colonial-era effort to make an equivalence between the Western category “holy” and the Thai term saksit made very old, traditional practices appear in a whole new light. Buddha images could now be considered saksit, just like gods and spirits, because they too are “holy.” For centuries, Thai Buddhists have been asking Buddha images for boons, but the slight shift in a word’s meaning has created a bridge between this and the similar practice of asking gods and spirits for boons, making a traditional Buddhist practice seem like an intrusion from another religion. 

Religions did not mix, but categories did, and those categories mixing gave not only Western scholars but also Thai Buddhists eyes to see their own practices as mixed up and, for those of a reformist bent, to criticize them as such.