elitist in nature. This aspect of the pattern of Buddhist expansion was not adopted in Ceylon. Part of the appeal of Buddhism to the Sinhalese (people of Ceylon) appears to have been that it was not as rigidly caste-determined as Hinduism; this accounts for its popularity. Indeed, Gombrich says, "Buddhist values have modified so Indian a feature as caste. . . . The fact that the bearers of Sinhalese cultural values are not brahmins . . . but monks, who in theory represent the value of castelessness, so lightens the emphasis on purity that the Sinhalese lead lives of an utterly different quality . . . from their Hindu neighbors" (p. 144). One may infer from this that in India, Theravada Buddhist missions had what amounted to a royal charter. As the missions diffused into new territories, however, the sangha themselves would have had a distinctive presence. This would appear to have been the case even though royal protection were sought by missionaries. For it would have been the monks in their role as monks that would have been objects of emulation, not m
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