Buddhist disciples strive to escape suffering and achieve enlightenment. However, they need the help of lay people in different aspects of daily life. “Proper bondmen” (淨人) is a common type recorded in the Buddhist Vinaya texts, and attracts the attention of various academics. Previous research has mostly focused on their assistance in handling money and property. This article examines the records related to proper bondmen in the Chinese translation of Buddhist Vinaya texts comprehensively and the corresponding passages in the Pāli Vinaya are also used as references. Based on the research of this paper, proper bondmen come from donation, borrowing, paying off debts, or they are originally monks or slaves. Proper bondmen includes men and women, in large quantities, they live inside the monasteries or nearby settlements. With the assistant of proper bondmen, monks and nuns can avoid killing sentient beings, using violence, having ambiguous connection with opposite sex or violation of various monastic rules, so that monks and nuns can live their daily life more convenient. However, some proper bondmen steal monastery property, disturb monk or nun‟s meditation, and even occupy monasteries. Finally, this article also points out that in the Buddhist circle, there are obvious differences in the records of proper bondmen and “monastery attendants” (yuanmin 園民) in the Chinese and Theravāda Buddhist literatures, which is worthy for further discussion. It is hoped that this article contributes to a deeper and broader understanding of proper bondmen.
