Your Ad Here

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Significance of Vap Full Moon Poya

Significance of Vap Full Moon Poya

The rainy season commenced three months ago with Esala – ‘Vassana Kalo’. It comes to an end with the Vap Poya. The ‘Katina’ season ushers in the Buddhist calendar with Vap, which is popularly known as ‘Cheevara Masaya’.

This year, Vap Full Moon Poya falls on Saturday, October 3 (today).

Vap Poya marks the offering of the ‘Katina Cheevara’ or new robes to Buddhist monks, who observed ‘Vas’ – Rainy Retreat, beginning from Esala to Vap.

‘Katina’ – ‘Cheevara Pooja’, the noble meritorious deed is considered the most sacred wholesome act a Buddhist can perform. It is known as the Great Eight Merits or ‘Ata Kusal’. The word ‘Katina’ means unbreakable. It is believed that those who participate in ‘Katina’ religious activities obtain much merit and they live a happy life in this world as well as in the other world once they depart.

It was on Vap Full Moon Poya Day that the Buddha visited the heavenly abode of Tavatimsa. In this heavenly abode, He preached ‘Abidhamma’ to the Devas of that celestial plane, which resulted in the elevation of ‘Matru Deva’ (Mother Diety) to attain ‘Sotapanna’ and 80 crores of Devas to various stages of Sainthood. Eventually, He terminated his retreat in order to descend to the city gate of Sankassapura. He informed Arahat Moggallana about his arrival. Moggallana had paid him a visit seven days before.

Vap Poya is of great significance for yet another reason. Throughout our cherished history, Buddhists have celebrated Vap on a grand scale. Temples in Sri Lanka will be filled to capacity. They will be involved in ‘Dana’, ‘Seela’, ‘Bhavana’ and thereby they accumulate merit.

Buddhist history reveals another important landmark which is connected to Vap Full Moon Poya Day; for it was on such a day that the future Buddha, Maitriya Bodhisatva, entered the order with a retinue of 500 followers.

Furthermore, Vap Poya paved the way for the arrival of Sangamitta Theri. The advent of Buddhism took place with the advent of ‘Dhammarajassa Savaka’ Arahat Mahinda Thera. King Devanampiyatissa’s sister-in-law Anula, was very keen to enter the Order of Bhikkunis. Therefore, the King made a request to Emperor Asoka to send Sanghamitta Theri.

It is clear as crystal that Sri Lanka and India had a very cordial diplomatic relationship, even at that time. It was on Vap Poya Full Moon Day that Devanampiyatissa sent Minister Maha Aritta, a close relation of Devanampiyatissa to India, for this mission. This resulted in the arrival of Sangamitta during Unduvap Poya, which is in the month of December. It records the establishment of a ‘Bhikkuni Sasanaya’ in Sri Lanka. Sangamitta brought a Bo–Sapling from the Jayasri Maha Bodhiya to Sri Lanka.

The Great King Devanapiyatissa, who propagated Buddhism, questioned Arahat Mahinda whether Buddhism was firmly rooted in Sri Lanka. Arahat Mahinda stated; "Dear King, until such time a person born and bred in Sri Lanka enters the order, holds a ‘Dhamma Sangayanawa’ and after a complete and thorough study of ‘Vinaya’ rules relating to Dhamma, then only will Buddhism be firmly established throughout Sri Lanka."

According to chronicles, this was fulfilled by Minister Aritta, who entered the order. Therefore, the establishment of Buddhism on a firm footing took place on Vap Full Moon Poya Day.

On this Vap Poya Day, Let us follow firmly the five precepts (Pancha Seela), abstain from destroying living beings, abstain from taking things not given, abstain from sexual misconduct, abstain from false speech and abstain from taking anything that causes intoxication.

May the blessings of the Noble Triple Gem and the protection of the devas be with you!

Island.lk

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Bonjorno, thetriplegem.blogspot.com!
[url=http://viagraenat.pun.pl/ ]Compra viagra online[/url] [url=http://cialisdkee.pun.pl/ ]Comprare cialis in Italia[/url] [url=http://viagraycla.pun.pl/ ]Acquistare viagra in Italia[/url] [url=http://cialisonya.pun.pl/ ]Acquisto cialis in Italia[/url] [url=http://viagrareta.pun.pl/ ]Acquistare viagra in Italia[/url] [url=http://cialisybea.pun.pl/ ]Compra cialis [/url]

I want to be you. said...

my grandparents framed me 2 days ago and are trying to have me put in prison for the rest of my life with the three strikes law
my grandfather hit me in the head with a cordless phone and I took it from him while grabbing his arms to stop him from hitting me which then because he is old and feeble he lost his balance while flailing and trying to hit me more and because I had a hold of his arms while trying to stop him from hitting me anymore I greatly cushioned his fall anyway then my grandmother started trying to hit me with her cordless phone and I had to let go of one of his arms to take the phone from her and she sat down in a chair... perhaps he has dementia and the local mental health which i have been telling them about the verbal and mental abuse from him for the last 12 months ... whatever I need help dealing with this idiot government and society... remember when I told you people need to live in the real world and develop community skills not play games that don't build community skills... and now the only advocate i have seen for the reality which internet communications can enable is being framed because this bastard will get away with having murderd all life on earth and blame me and the kids for not being smart enough to fix it when they controlled the education system to create stupid factory workers for the last 200 years...
The Wheel o Buddhist Terms Poster GTD The Art 0 War flashcards/ immersive ethics holographic augmented reality semantic search AI learn tool

http://globalcide.livejournal.com
Matthew Lane Tripp EXTINCTCULTURE

Brainwash yourself; ubiquitous immersive ethics logistics of permaculture sustainability augmented reality education infrastructure fair trade technology transfer there is no intelligence if the measurement is always changing the genius sperm + egg * 4000 surrogate mothers with 2 fertilized embryo's each, U ,,  am here to pollute your mind with information that is not relevant to your personal ability to adapt to the conditions which are available for you to have the prosperity you can share with the life around you without suffering projectvisitor. I want to mix the wheel of buddhist terms poster art of war flashcard deck (game?) MS onenote, there.com, nature.com, sociology, situational awareness wikipedia article the 48 laws of power, all academic databases, + smartphone application, augmented reality, + GTD flowchart with permaculture logistics of sustainability, take TWoBT poster to have it scanned into a file + blow it up into a wall mural by blockposters.com yesmagazine.org /planet/a-living-built-environment software engineers of permaculture logistics, which has nothing to do with the flowchart wall mural, that she doesn't know how to write the projector display software try looking through the lists created by the people i follow (you will need an account to look) http://twitter.com/Globalcide/following

http://TradeSkillsLLC.blogspot.com

posted to current.tv 
http://bit.ly/ARTOFWAR48
If the 3000 minutes that were spent watching this video were used to apply the GTD flowchart http://bit.ly/GTDflowchart2 and http://bit.ly/TWoBTP2 for permaculture logistics sustainabilty fair trade technology transfer immersive augmented reality ethics education working on the project so that none of the peices being put together in the tasks of the project were not repeated... teams of fifth graders could work out the free plan B 4.0 book online. http://T4BP.com/Globalcide and http://TradeSkillsLLC.blogspot.com Matthew Lane Tripp at 1572 East Blackstock Rd. Moore SC 29369. The livejournal globalcide is a flyer you can set the maximum margins and grey font and size 9 font for a one page flyer. There is more but it cut me off at 4000 text.

About Buddhism

Today's Visitors