Pandaka

Not to be confused with Pandaka (fish), a kind of fish.

Pandaka is a Sanskrit and Pali sexuality term which does not have precise English translation, but incorporates (or perhaps confuses) multiple concepts associated with homosexuality, immaturity, voyeurism, impotence and infertility. It has been studied under the auspices of Theravada Buddhist thought.

Historic context

In the Vinaya Pali Canon, 4 gender types are defined: male, female, ubhatobyanjanaka and pandaka. ubhatobyanjanaka refers to intersex or literally a person with the signs of both sexes/genders. (Historic references to hermaphroditism have been superseded by the understanding that true hermaphroditism has never been observed in humans.) Pandaka is a less clear cut case, all references have a central theme: some form of deficiency in male sexual reproductive capacity or reproductive desire. In traditional Hindu pre-scientific thought, all reproductive capacity (or burden) has been assigned to the sperm and lingam with no credit to the female or egg.

There are 5 pandakas compiled by Bunmi from Pali Cannons:

• asittakapandaka - A man who gains satisfaction from performing oral sex on another man and from ingesting his semen, or who only becomes sexually aroused after ingesting another man's semen.
• ussuyapandaka - A voyeur, a man who gains sexual satisfaction from watching a man and a woman having sex.
• opakkamikapandaka -
  • A Eunuch
  • a man who "attains ejaculation through some special effort or artifice".
  • literally by-assault, Sperm that are annihilated by assault or violence.
• pakkhapandaka - People who become sexually aroused in parallel with the phases of the moon.
• napumsakapandaka - A person with no clearly defined genitals, whether male or female, having only a urinary tract, one who is congenitally impotent.

Modern context

In the crackdowns on crime in post-coup Thailand, there is draft legislation to clean out crime and sociopaths from the Sangha, and in this drive, a motion to criminalise sexual deviant behaviours within it, yet the very definitions of sexual deviancy or paraphilia are being challenged and revisited by scholars.

See also

• Kathoey
• Religion and homosexuality