The Guideline for Conservation of Buddhist Local Traditions of the Mon Community, Sam Khok District, Pathum Thani Province

Abstract

This article aimed to study 1) the guidelines for Buddhist local tradition preservation of the Mon community in Sam Khok district, Pathum Thani province, 2) the Buddhist teachings related to the local traditions of the Mon community, and 3) analyze the guidelines for Buddhist local tradition preservation of Mon community in Sam Khok district, Pathum Thani province. It was qualitative research with fieldwork by in-depth interviews with 5 groups of key informants: 1) village scholars, 2) elders in the community, 3) subdistrict chiefs, 4) village headmen, and 5) municipal officials. The research results were found as follows;

1) The preservation of local traditions of the Mon community, Sam Khok district, Pathum Thani province was handed on by raising awareness among youth to realize the values and importance of cultural traditions and local wisdom, supportive promoting various traditional and cultural activities, encouraging the awareness of cherishing the local people, recovering the local traditions in daily living.

2) Buddhist teachings related to the local traditions of the Mon community, Sam Khok district, Pathum Thani province, found that the important traditions were spirit belief, play traditions, and festivals, in each tradition, there found hidden Buddhist teachings such as gratitude, 6 respects and 6 states of conciliation and unity. there were 6 ways of preserving the Buddhist local traditions; 1) Training members of families for tradition recognition, 2) Handing on the performance from one generation to the next generation, 3) Promoting local scholars, 4) Raising awareness of the cultural traditions’ value, 5) Constant promotion of cultural traditions and local wisdom activities, 6) Dissemination and exchange.

3) The guidelines for preserving the traditions of the Mon community at Sam Khok district, Pathum Thani province were; organizing the projects and activities for the youth by inviting the community scholars to teach and guide the Mon traditions and cultures, joint hand for preserving the local cultural traditions, the youth would learn a simple and happy way of living and the preservation of local folk, plays, games related to valuable cultural traditions by using lifestyles and cultural traditions, recognizing cultural value and love their homeland more.