Should Buddhists(lay) be virgins till marriage?

[Shaswata_Panja]

Did the Buddha ever say anything about premarital sex? Did he recommend virginity till marriage? Did he discourage virginity till marriage? Did he have nothing to say on this?

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

Did the Buddha ever say anything about premarital sex?

Yes; he said having sex with the betrothed of another, is unskilful and unwholesome behaviour.

Did he recommend virginity till marriage?

Not that I know of...

Did he discourage virginity till marriage?

Not that I know of...

Did he have nothing to say on this?

Yes; he said that there are unwholesome sexual practises:
Having sex with the betrothed of another;
Having sex with those still in the care of their parents/guardians;
Having sex with an imprisoned person;
Having sex with an ordained person
Having sex with those married to others.

See here.

[pilgrim]

Did the Buddha ever say anything about premarital sex?

Yes; he said having sex with the betrothed of another, is unskilful and unwholesome behaviour.

Just want to add that
1. if you are betrothed or even going steady, sex with another person would also be unskilful
2. only a small number of those who are not married would be betrothed.

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

Indeed. That would be a form of lying; "lying" is not only a verbally-committed behaviour. A person can be deceitful and dishonest in their physical behaviour also.
So cheating is a form of physical misleading.

Besides which, a cheater knows they are cheating; therefore they know it is wrong behaviour from the outset.
This is different to being attracted to the betrothed of another, acting upon that attraction, and only discovering after a while, that they have withheld the information from you.

That said, unskilful sexual behaviour - or any unskilful behaviour - has to be volitional to be truly unwholesome.

Acting unknowingly, without prior knowledge may be misguided, naive and gullible; but it is not as bad, kammically, as knowingly acting on such notions.

[DNS]

Did the Buddha ever say anything about premarital sex? Did he recommend virginity till marriage? Did he discourage virginity till marriage? Did he have nothing to say on this?

It wasn't much of an issue in ancient India. The Buddha and other males and females of the time married around the age of 16 or earlier. There wasn't much time before that (age) to do dating or anything. Even until fairly recently, this may have been the case in India. My tour guide in India was a 65 year old Hindu man. He and his wife were married at the age of 15.

As that article linked above suggests, I think there can be some middle way. I am kind of conservative in this area so I especially like the admonition against:

Having sex with those still in the care of their parents/guardians;

If a person wants to engage in adult actions, then they should take on adult responsibilities, that is pay their own rent some place, mortgage, bills, etc. It is not about age or marriage (in my view) and more to do with taking on responsibilities and showing maturity. Today many people do not get married until age 25, 30 or even later so expecting complete abstinence until then is not realistic, however, expecting them to take responsibilities seriously is, in my opinion.

[Shaswata_Panja]

thank you NoBSBuddhist...its great to have such knowledge in hand

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

Hope it is useful to you.
Does it help any situation?

[Shaswata_Panja]

Yes since in the age I am in its very good to have the Buddha's view on sexual ethics

[waterchan]

I suspect that the people at the time of the Buddha had very different attitudes towards sexuality, some of which may come as a shock to our modern sensibilities.

I remember seeing what was probably an ancient Sri Lankan portrait of one of the Buddha's female disciples approaching an assembly with a breast hanging out. It's fuzzy and I could very well be wrong. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

[thepea]

Acting unknowingly.

This is the behavior to come out of.

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

Acting unknowingly.

This is the behavior to come out of.

Only if you know you don't know.
If you don't know you don't know, then it's kind of hard to come out of it, isn't it?
Particularly if the other person lies to you about it.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

Acting unknowingly, without prior knowledge may be misguided, naive and gullible; but it is not as bad, kammically, as knowingly acting on such notions.

That depends on what you mean by “Unknowingly.” If you mean that you have sex with someone who is married or engaged, without knowing that they are, then yes, though one should make a proper inquiry before taking such a significant step. However, if you mean, “Not knowing that sexual misconduct is unwholesome,” then no — kammically it is more serious than if done knowing that it is unwholesome.

The Milindapañha gives the following explanation:

8. “Which is the greater demerit, conscious or unconscious wrong-doing?”
“Unconscious wrong-doing, O king.”²
“Then we should doubly punish those who do wrong unconsciously.”
“What do you think, O king, would a man be more seriously burned if he seized a red-hot iron ball not knowing it was hot than he would be if he knew.”
“He would be burned more severely if he didn’t know it was hot.”
---
² All wrong-doing is rooted in ignorance, so one who does wrong knowingly will feel remorse and correct himself sooner than one who is deluded.

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

Thank you Bhante; I indeed meant the former.

[LXNDR]

Abandoning sensual misconduct, he abstains from sensual misconduct. He does not get sexually involved with those who are protected by their mothers, their fathers, their brothers, their sisters, their relatives, or their Dhamma; those with husbands, those who entail punishments, or even those crowned with flowers by another man.

He engages in sensual misconduct. He gets sexually involved with those who are [1] protected by their mothers, [2] their fathers, [3] their brothers, [4] their sisters, [5] their relatives, or [6] their Dhamma; [7] those with husbands, [8] those who entail punishments, or even [9] those crowned with flowers by another man.

as it appears, premarital sex of a non-betrothed adult person with another free, non-betrothed, mentally competent adult person will not constitute sexual misconduct

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

I think, by a process of elimination, that, happily, is probably obvious to the OP, now....