Thudhamma Gaing

The Thudhamma Gaing, officially the Sudhamma sect, is the largest monastic order of monks in Myanmar, one of nine monastic orders legally recognized under the country's 1990 Law Concerning Sangha Organizations. It emerged from reforms undertaken by King Bodawpaya, who convened the Thudhamma Council at Amarapura in 1782 to settle a doctrinal dispute over whether monks should cover one or both shoulders, with the faction favoring the two-shoulder rule based on Pali Vinaya texts and their commentaries prevailing and giving the order its name. According to 2016 statistics it comprised 467,025 monks, 87 percent of all monks in the country, and operated 56,492 monasteries, 90 percent of Myanmar's total, concentrated mainly in the Mandalay Region, Shan State and Yangon Region. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/