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The significance of Uduwap poya
In the yearly cycle of full moons, two are of special significance to Sri Lankan Buddhists. They are the full moon days of the months of Poson (June) and Uduwap (December). Poson full moon day marks the arrival of Mahinda Thera and King Devanampiya Tissa's conversion to Buddhism. It was a turning point in our history, as it was. Buddhism became the State religion
It was, the chronicles say, on the Uduwap fullmoon day that same year, that Sanghamitta Therani brought the branch of the Bodhi Tree to Sri Lanka. Today is the 2238th anniversary of that land-mark event.
The main purpose of the Therani coming to Lanka was to start the Bhikkhuni Sasana or Order of Buddhist nuns. The bringing of the Bodhi sapling was incidental.
The King's sister-in-law Anula Devi, after listening to three or four of Mahinda Thera's expositions of the Dhamma expressed a desire to renounce the lay life and become a bhikkhuni.
As the Vinaya rules did not permit a man to confer 'pabbajja' (ordination) on a woman, the Thera asked the King to send an envoy to Paataliputra, (modern Patna) the capital of Emperor Asoka to invite Sanghamitta Therani, the Emperor's daughter and his sister herself an erudite Bhikkhuni, to Lanka. The Thera also told the King to request Emperor Asoka to send a branch of the Maha Bodhi, under which the Buddha had sat at the time of his Enlightenment.
The Bhikkhuni Sasana which Sanghamitta Therani inaugurated with the ordination of Anula Devi, grew in strength, of numbers and of erudition. Such was the recognition abroad that in the 5th century AD, two groups of Bhikkhuni's went to China and established a Bhikkhuni Sasana in Nanking, the capital of the Sung dynasty.
But with the fall of Anuradhapura in 1017 AD the Bhikkhuni Sasana disappeared, leaving no trace of its existence anywhere in the island or any clue to its demise.
However, the Bo sapling which the Therani brought from India and which was planted in the Maha Megha Garden in Anuradhapura, has survived 2238 years of droughts and disasters, some natural, some man-made.
Dr. Senarat Paranavithana has stated that after intensive research even after Anuradhapura was abandoned and the city went under the jungle tide, pilgrims trickled through to make their offerings and supplications and invoke the blessings of the Jaya Siri Maha Bodhi the 'Victorious Illustrious Bodhi' ' truly a worthy appellation for a tree that has withstood so many calamities. Paul E. Pieris puts this very eloquently.
"The axe of the ruthless invaders who for so many centuries to come, were destined to spread ruin through out the country, was reverently withheld from its base." Twenty three centuries after its planting the LTTE who massacred pilgrims within its sacred precincts did not touch or torch the Tree.
Sir James Tennent, a British officer who travelled the length and breadth of the island, after seeing the once grand city of A'pura 'Shrunk to a few scattered huts' wrote in 1859. "That which renders the fallen city illustrious, even in ruins, is the possession of the Jaya Sri Maha Bodin Wahanse, the 'Victorious Illustrious Supreme Lord, the sacred Bo Tree,' the planting of which forms the grandest episode in the sacred annals of Ceylon'.
Commenting on the antiquity of the Tree, Tennent wrote: The tree of Anarajapoora is in all probability the oldest historical tree in the world. Ages varying from one to five thousand years have been assigned to the baobabs of Senegal the eucalyptus of Tasmania, the Wellingtonia of California and the Chestnut of Mount Etna. But all these estimates are matters of conjecture whereas the age of the Bo-tree is a matter of record.
"Compared with it, the Oak of Elerslie is but a sapling, the olives in the Garden of Gethsamane were full-grown when the Saracens were expelled from Jerusalem and the cypress of Soma in Lombardy is said to have been a tree in the time of Julius Caesar, yet the Bo-tree is older than the oldest of these by a century."
In the fifth century, Fa Hien found the Bo-tree in good condition and noted that it was inclined to one side and that pillars had been erected to support its branches.
Successive sovereigns have built walls around the parent tree, stone steps leading to the sacred enclosure, paved the enclosure with marble slabs, repaired and added to the building around and all these are recorded in the annals. They have held festivals in honour of the tree, A special festival for watering the tree had been held every 12th year since its planting.
About 30 years ago a monk offered a gilded fence - Ran Veta to the Jaya Siri Maha Bodhi, and last year or the year before a second ran veta, its cost of construction paid for by public donations, was fixed round the tree.
More books have been written on the Bodhi tree, in Sinhala and Pali than on the Dalada, the sacred Tooth Relic, and a host of beliefs and customs have grown round the tree. Let me quote Paul E. Pieris again.
"It is doubtful if any other single incident in the long story of their race has seized upon the imagination of the Sinhalese with such tenacity as this of the planting of the aged tree.
Like its plaint roots which find sustenance in the face of the bare rock and cleave their way through the stoutest fabric, the influence of what it represents has penetrated into the innermost being of the people till the tree itself has become almost human.
"Till the tree itself has become almost human".
Not this tree alone but all the trees that grew from its seeds, and even seeds dispersed by birds. Some trees are said to have more 'anuhas' (Power?) than others. Hence the popularity of Bodhi Pooja - the supplications and invocations of blessings on the sick, on the armed forces, on special occasions like anniversaries.
The latest was a notice in a newspaper announcing a Bodhi Pooja at a well known temple to invoke blessings on students sitting the exam.
The Pali stanzas recited at these pooja are those recited in veneration of the Buddha but the belief behind this ritual is that the Tree will grant the wishes and bless the devotee or devotees.
The current wave of Bodhi Pooja goes back to the sixties started by Panadura Ariyadhamma Thera. Its popularity has spawned a host of booklets giving the rites to be performed and the stanzas to be sung. They became so prolific by the eighties and the Ven. Walpola Rahula Thera's comment, (in an article published in the Daily News) 'There are no Buddha Pooja now only Bodhi Pooja, is almost an indictment.
Rituals are essential and have over the centuries been part of popular Buddhism, but has the current trend of Bodhi Pooja not gone too far?
Sri Pada season
The Sri Pada season started on December Uduwap Poya day. It will terminate on the Vesak Poya day this year. Sri Pada Mountain is also known by names like Samanala Kanda, (Samanala Mountain) and Adam's Peak.
Every year millions of pilgrims, irrespective of their religion, join processions to climb the Samanala Mountain to worship the footprint of the Buddha. If it is not for worshipping, no one will climb the hill particularly in the night. Even if one climbs the hill for personal requirements he never spends the night hours on top of the hill.
For this reason, the pilgrims have a series of beliefs, expectations and myths about their experience and sights of many events which are not common in their day to day life. Even though all of them are natural events, pilgrims understand them as events that occur only in the Adam's Peak environment and many believe that such events have close relationship to the footprint and the God Saman (Saman Deviyo).
The Ira Sevaya, (fluctuation of sun's images a few minutes before sunrise) is one of the most beautiful and colourful visual observations one can see in the world. When one observes the sky in the early morning from the Adam's Peak, the eastern sky over the horizon changes its colours very fast. So pilgrims can observe beautiful designs in the sky and changes of colours just like the observations when he is in front of an expert painter.
Mixed with all this colouring effect, the sun (apparently images of the sun) can be seen above the horizon. It is not a single image, but plenty of them. The images are seen in different locations before you see the actual sun above the horizon a little later. One who does not know what is really happening in the eastern sky, may believe that the sun moves up and down several times to worship the footprint of the Buddha as it is mentioned so in myths about Sri Pada. As it is not an easy thing to count the number of visible images of the sun and most of the pilgrims including some veteran Buddhist monks and learned professors use to say that Sun worships three times the Buddha's foot step before it rises. As the event could not be explained with believable words not only the lay-pilgrims, but also religious pilgrims including Buddhist monks still have belief of the God sun (Hiru Deviyo) worshipping the footprint of the Buddha before it starts provision of energy to the world.
It is pathetic to see that some media personnel, Buddhist monks and learned professors taking part in television programs broadcast from the Sri Pada still explaining this event to listeners without considering the science behind these natural events.
Pilgrims at the sacred mountain
This so called Ira Sevaya or the apparent movement of the sun before sunrise is not a sight special to Sri Pada or Sri Lanka but it can be seen from any hill top and also from airplanes, provided the clear sky environment is available over the eastern sky and the observer is at a significantly high altitude. I have heard that special locations on top of hills in some parts of India have been reserved for tourists for them to observe this beautiful scenery.
A light ray encounters a number of effects when it travels in a media or passes a sharp edge, or travels through a common surface between two transparent media like water and glass or air and glass or even air-layer and another air-layer if two layers have different characteristics. Such behaviours are explained under the terminology like Reflection, Refraction, Diffraction, Scattering, Diffusion and Total Internal Reflection which have meanings different from each other.
If one has studied these phenomena in Physics (Advanced Level or higher levels), he can explain the science of the natural events like rainbow, mirage, fluctuation of sun before sun rise, eclipses, halo event and colourful pattern seen in the sky particularly in North Pole and South Pole skies.
The apparent movement or shift of the sun a few minutes before sunrise seen at the top of a hill is caused both by Total Internal Reflection (TIR) and diffraction of sun's light beams by the lower atmosphere.
Light rays go through Total Internal Reflection (TIR) when they meet a common boundary between two media one denser than the other (like glass and water, water and air or glass and air). Requirement for a beam to undergo TIR is the incident rays should travel through the dense medium before meeting the common boundary. When the incident angle exceeds a particular value (called critical angle), rays are reflected just like they are reflected by a plain mirror.
Light rays from the un-risen sun are incident through the dense air which is at very low level, close to the earth surface, of the atmosphere towards rare (low dense) layers which are above surface layers. Under these circumstances, light rays get reflected towards the dense layer at boundaries separating dense/rare air layers. Even though the actual position of the sun at this time is covered by the solid earth for an observer/pilgrim at the top of a hill like Sri Pada, he can see the sun through the reflected light rays. The apparent positions of the sun which are seen through reflected rays are images of sun and are seen above the horizon (see the diagram).
As all of these happen while the sun and the earth are relatively moving, an observer sees a large number of images of the sun when the time passes and the apparent positions of images are not the same. The observers may understand these changing of positions of suns images as movement of sun up and down.
A few minutes later, the sun rises above the horizon and this is the real sun. As the Total Internal Reflection does not occur now one can see only one figure which is the real sun just above the horizon. This position of the real sun is usually below the positions of the images he saw a little early.
This phenomenon TIR is shown in the diagram. Please note that the diagram is not drawn to a scale and is a little exaggerated to show you the phenomenon clearly.
Ira Sevaya may be partly a result of the diffraction of solar light beams at the tip of the earth in the early morning.
A light ray finds the body of the earth as a tiny sharp edge and therefore it undergoes through the phenomenon diffraction at the earth surface and breaks the ray into a number of branches which are transmitted in different directions. Similar in TIR, a number of images are formed by diffraction too and an observer on a high location can see fluctuation of images of the sun again before sunrise. Both of these phenomena, Total Internal Reflection and diffraction, may cause the so called Ira Sevaya which is a natural event happening all over the world every day. Both sun and earth are moving and rotating bodies. Sun is common to the whole world and it provides energy to the whole world positioning billions of kilometers away from us not close to Adam's peak. Before it rises over the horizon seen from Sri Pada hill, it spends hours in the sky in other parts of the world!.
Present day children should be directed in the correct way to understand the real facts of our universe and other matters related to it. Myths and beliefs will mislead the educating children and it is the rights of all responsible personnel including lecturers, teachers and also media personnel to highlight the truth about the natural events not the myths. Otherwise the next generation will be never armed with scientific understanding to face the present and future world.
බුදු සරණයි!!!
Add rep+ if u like this post
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The significance of Uduwap poya
In the yearly cycle of full moons, two are of special significance to Sri Lankan Buddhists. They are the full moon days of the months of Poson (June) and Uduwap (December). Poson full moon day marks the arrival of Mahinda Thera and King Devanampiya Tissa's conversion to Buddhism. It was a turning point in our history, as it was. Buddhism became the State religion
It was, the chronicles say, on the Uduwap fullmoon day that same year, that Sanghamitta Therani brought the branch of the Bodhi Tree to Sri Lanka. Today is the 2238th anniversary of that land-mark event.
The main purpose of the Therani coming to Lanka was to start the Bhikkhuni Sasana or Order of Buddhist nuns. The bringing of the Bodhi sapling was incidental.
The King's sister-in-law Anula Devi, after listening to three or four of Mahinda Thera's expositions of the Dhamma expressed a desire to renounce the lay life and become a bhikkhuni.
As the Vinaya rules did not permit a man to confer 'pabbajja' (ordination) on a woman, the Thera asked the King to send an envoy to Paataliputra, (modern Patna) the capital of Emperor Asoka to invite Sanghamitta Therani, the Emperor's daughter and his sister herself an erudite Bhikkhuni, to Lanka. The Thera also told the King to request Emperor Asoka to send a branch of the Maha Bodhi, under which the Buddha had sat at the time of his Enlightenment.
The Bhikkhuni Sasana which Sanghamitta Therani inaugurated with the ordination of Anula Devi, grew in strength, of numbers and of erudition. Such was the recognition abroad that in the 5th century AD, two groups of Bhikkhuni's went to China and established a Bhikkhuni Sasana in Nanking, the capital of the Sung dynasty.
But with the fall of Anuradhapura in 1017 AD the Bhikkhuni Sasana disappeared, leaving no trace of its existence anywhere in the island or any clue to its demise.
However, the Bo sapling which the Therani brought from India and which was planted in the Maha Megha Garden in Anuradhapura, has survived 2238 years of droughts and disasters, some natural, some man-made.
Dr. Senarat Paranavithana has stated that after intensive research even after Anuradhapura was abandoned and the city went under the jungle tide, pilgrims trickled through to make their offerings and supplications and invoke the blessings of the Jaya Siri Maha Bodhi the 'Victorious Illustrious Bodhi' ' truly a worthy appellation for a tree that has withstood so many calamities. Paul E. Pieris puts this very eloquently.
"The axe of the ruthless invaders who for so many centuries to come, were destined to spread ruin through out the country, was reverently withheld from its base." Twenty three centuries after its planting the LTTE who massacred pilgrims within its sacred precincts did not touch or torch the Tree.
Sir James Tennent, a British officer who travelled the length and breadth of the island, after seeing the once grand city of A'pura 'Shrunk to a few scattered huts' wrote in 1859. "That which renders the fallen city illustrious, even in ruins, is the possession of the Jaya Sri Maha Bodin Wahanse, the 'Victorious Illustrious Supreme Lord, the sacred Bo Tree,' the planting of which forms the grandest episode in the sacred annals of Ceylon'.
Commenting on the antiquity of the Tree, Tennent wrote: The tree of Anarajapoora is in all probability the oldest historical tree in the world. Ages varying from one to five thousand years have been assigned to the baobabs of Senegal the eucalyptus of Tasmania, the Wellingtonia of California and the Chestnut of Mount Etna. But all these estimates are matters of conjecture whereas the age of the Bo-tree is a matter of record.
"Compared with it, the Oak of Elerslie is but a sapling, the olives in the Garden of Gethsamane were full-grown when the Saracens were expelled from Jerusalem and the cypress of Soma in Lombardy is said to have been a tree in the time of Julius Caesar, yet the Bo-tree is older than the oldest of these by a century."
In the fifth century, Fa Hien found the Bo-tree in good condition and noted that it was inclined to one side and that pillars had been erected to support its branches.
Successive sovereigns have built walls around the parent tree, stone steps leading to the sacred enclosure, paved the enclosure with marble slabs, repaired and added to the building around and all these are recorded in the annals. They have held festivals in honour of the tree, A special festival for watering the tree had been held every 12th year since its planting.
About 30 years ago a monk offered a gilded fence - Ran Veta to the Jaya Siri Maha Bodhi, and last year or the year before a second ran veta, its cost of construction paid for by public donations, was fixed round the tree.
More books have been written on the Bodhi tree, in Sinhala and Pali than on the Dalada, the sacred Tooth Relic, and a host of beliefs and customs have grown round the tree. Let me quote Paul E. Pieris again.
"It is doubtful if any other single incident in the long story of their race has seized upon the imagination of the Sinhalese with such tenacity as this of the planting of the aged tree.
Like its plaint roots which find sustenance in the face of the bare rock and cleave their way through the stoutest fabric, the influence of what it represents has penetrated into the innermost being of the people till the tree itself has become almost human.
"Till the tree itself has become almost human".
Not this tree alone but all the trees that grew from its seeds, and even seeds dispersed by birds. Some trees are said to have more 'anuhas' (Power?) than others. Hence the popularity of Bodhi Pooja - the supplications and invocations of blessings on the sick, on the armed forces, on special occasions like anniversaries.
The latest was a notice in a newspaper announcing a Bodhi Pooja at a well known temple to invoke blessings on students sitting the exam.
The Pali stanzas recited at these pooja are those recited in veneration of the Buddha but the belief behind this ritual is that the Tree will grant the wishes and bless the devotee or devotees.
The current wave of Bodhi Pooja goes back to the sixties started by Panadura Ariyadhamma Thera. Its popularity has spawned a host of booklets giving the rites to be performed and the stanzas to be sung. They became so prolific by the eighties and the Ven. Walpola Rahula Thera's comment, (in an article published in the Daily News) 'There are no Buddha Pooja now only Bodhi Pooja, is almost an indictment.
Rituals are essential and have over the centuries been part of popular Buddhism, but has the current trend of Bodhi Pooja not gone too far?
Sri Pada season
The Sri Pada season started on December Uduwap Poya day. It will terminate on the Vesak Poya day this year. Sri Pada Mountain is also known by names like Samanala Kanda, (Samanala Mountain) and Adam's Peak.
Every year millions of pilgrims, irrespective of their religion, join processions to climb the Samanala Mountain to worship the footprint of the Buddha. If it is not for worshipping, no one will climb the hill particularly in the night. Even if one climbs the hill for personal requirements he never spends the night hours on top of the hill.
For this reason, the pilgrims have a series of beliefs, expectations and myths about their experience and sights of many events which are not common in their day to day life. Even though all of them are natural events, pilgrims understand them as events that occur only in the Adam's Peak environment and many believe that such events have close relationship to the footprint and the God Saman (Saman Deviyo).
The Ira Sevaya, (fluctuation of sun's images a few minutes before sunrise) is one of the most beautiful and colourful visual observations one can see in the world. When one observes the sky in the early morning from the Adam's Peak, the eastern sky over the horizon changes its colours very fast. So pilgrims can observe beautiful designs in the sky and changes of colours just like the observations when he is in front of an expert painter.
Mixed with all this colouring effect, the sun (apparently images of the sun) can be seen above the horizon. It is not a single image, but plenty of them. The images are seen in different locations before you see the actual sun above the horizon a little later. One who does not know what is really happening in the eastern sky, may believe that the sun moves up and down several times to worship the footprint of the Buddha as it is mentioned so in myths about Sri Pada. As it is not an easy thing to count the number of visible images of the sun and most of the pilgrims including some veteran Buddhist monks and learned professors use to say that Sun worships three times the Buddha's foot step before it rises. As the event could not be explained with believable words not only the lay-pilgrims, but also religious pilgrims including Buddhist monks still have belief of the God sun (Hiru Deviyo) worshipping the footprint of the Buddha before it starts provision of energy to the world.
It is pathetic to see that some media personnel, Buddhist monks and learned professors taking part in television programs broadcast from the Sri Pada still explaining this event to listeners without considering the science behind these natural events.
Pilgrims at the sacred mountain
This so called Ira Sevaya or the apparent movement of the sun before sunrise is not a sight special to Sri Pada or Sri Lanka but it can be seen from any hill top and also from airplanes, provided the clear sky environment is available over the eastern sky and the observer is at a significantly high altitude. I have heard that special locations on top of hills in some parts of India have been reserved for tourists for them to observe this beautiful scenery.
A light ray encounters a number of effects when it travels in a media or passes a sharp edge, or travels through a common surface between two transparent media like water and glass or air and glass or even air-layer and another air-layer if two layers have different characteristics. Such behaviours are explained under the terminology like Reflection, Refraction, Diffraction, Scattering, Diffusion and Total Internal Reflection which have meanings different from each other.
If one has studied these phenomena in Physics (Advanced Level or higher levels), he can explain the science of the natural events like rainbow, mirage, fluctuation of sun before sun rise, eclipses, halo event and colourful pattern seen in the sky particularly in North Pole and South Pole skies.
The apparent movement or shift of the sun a few minutes before sunrise seen at the top of a hill is caused both by Total Internal Reflection (TIR) and diffraction of sun's light beams by the lower atmosphere.
Light rays go through Total Internal Reflection (TIR) when they meet a common boundary between two media one denser than the other (like glass and water, water and air or glass and air). Requirement for a beam to undergo TIR is the incident rays should travel through the dense medium before meeting the common boundary. When the incident angle exceeds a particular value (called critical angle), rays are reflected just like they are reflected by a plain mirror.
Light rays from the un-risen sun are incident through the dense air which is at very low level, close to the earth surface, of the atmosphere towards rare (low dense) layers which are above surface layers. Under these circumstances, light rays get reflected towards the dense layer at boundaries separating dense/rare air layers. Even though the actual position of the sun at this time is covered by the solid earth for an observer/pilgrim at the top of a hill like Sri Pada, he can see the sun through the reflected light rays. The apparent positions of the sun which are seen through reflected rays are images of sun and are seen above the horizon (see the diagram).
As all of these happen while the sun and the earth are relatively moving, an observer sees a large number of images of the sun when the time passes and the apparent positions of images are not the same. The observers may understand these changing of positions of suns images as movement of sun up and down.
A few minutes later, the sun rises above the horizon and this is the real sun. As the Total Internal Reflection does not occur now one can see only one figure which is the real sun just above the horizon. This position of the real sun is usually below the positions of the images he saw a little early.
This phenomenon TIR is shown in the diagram. Please note that the diagram is not drawn to a scale and is a little exaggerated to show you the phenomenon clearly.
Ira Sevaya may be partly a result of the diffraction of solar light beams at the tip of the earth in the early morning.
A light ray finds the body of the earth as a tiny sharp edge and therefore it undergoes through the phenomenon diffraction at the earth surface and breaks the ray into a number of branches which are transmitted in different directions. Similar in TIR, a number of images are formed by diffraction too and an observer on a high location can see fluctuation of images of the sun again before sunrise. Both of these phenomena, Total Internal Reflection and diffraction, may cause the so called Ira Sevaya which is a natural event happening all over the world every day. Both sun and earth are moving and rotating bodies. Sun is common to the whole world and it provides energy to the whole world positioning billions of kilometers away from us not close to Adam's peak. Before it rises over the horizon seen from Sri Pada hill, it spends hours in the sky in other parts of the world!.
Present day children should be directed in the correct way to understand the real facts of our universe and other matters related to it. Myths and beliefs will mislead the educating children and it is the rights of all responsible personnel including lecturers, teachers and also media personnel to highlight the truth about the natural events not the myths. Otherwise the next generation will be never armed with scientific understanding to face the present and future world.
බුදු සරණයි!!!
Add rep+ if u like this post
උපුටා ගෙන ඒම internet එකෙනි.
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