For those who are interested to sponsor these titles, please contact Mr. Lim Hock Eng, contact number: 012-4302893, email address: sunandahelim@gmail.com
SADHU, SADHU, SADHU!!
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Dhamma books to be released for the coming Vesak Day 2010
For those who are interested to sponsor these titles, please contact Mr. Lim Hock Eng, contact number: 012-4302893, email address: sunandahelim@gmail.com
SADHU, SADHU, SADHU!!
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
INTERNATIONAL PETITION TO PROTECT LUMBINI'S ENVIRONMENT
Dear Friends of Lumbini:
The Lumbini Environmental Protection Alliance (LEPA) is writing to ask for your help in protecting Lumbini's environment and the health of its local population. As you may know, Lumbini is the birthplace of the Buddha and is situated in Nepal. It is one of the four holy sites of Buddhism, the other three being Bodh Gaya, Sarnath and Kusinagar, all located in India. In recognition of its religious significance, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated Lumbini as a World Heritage Site in 1997. LEPA is an international alliance that includes the Lumbini Development Trust (established by the government of Nepal to oversee this World Heritage Site), Lumbini Institutions (all the Buddhist monasteries in Lumbini), and the Lumbini Stakeholder Committee, comprising numerous Buddhist and non-Buddhist organizations as well as individual supporters from around the world. LEPA was established for the purpose of protecting Lumbini's sacred environment and the health of its community.
Shortly before his great passing away (maha parinibbana), the Buddha spoke to his disciple Ananda as follows:
There are four places the sight of which should arouse a sense of urgency in the faithful.
1) Here the Tathagata was born (Lumbini)
2) Here the Tathagata attained supreme enlightenment (Bodh Gaya)
3) Here the Tathagata set in motion the Wheel of Dhamma (Sarnath)
4) Here the Tathagata entered maha parinibbana (Kusinagar)
And, Ananda, the faithful monks and nuns, male and female lay-followers will visit those places. And any who dies while making the pilgrimage to these shrines with a devout heart will, at the breaking-up of the body after death, be reborn in a heavenly world.
(Digha Nikaya 16, adapted translation by M. Walshe)
Today, environmental pollution from heavy industry (cement and steel plants) that have located in the Lumbini region of Nepal is degrading air and ground water quality and local agriculture. It is likely impacting human health as well. A campaign has been underway for some years now to stop this desecration of Lumbini's sacred space. As the collective voice of Lumbini's friends around the world, LEPA is writing to humbly request your support in an international effort to protect and safeguard Nepal's Lumbini from the growing impacts of environmental pollution.
The full petition prepared by LEPA with complete background information is viewable at. This petition is an appeal to Nepal's Ministry of Industry’s Industrial Promotion Board (IPB) to:
(1) create an industry-free zone around Lumbini,
(2) freeze the establishment of new industries outside of this industry-free area, and
(3) strictly monitor existing industrial firms.
The document requests that the Ministry of Environment of the Government of Nepal undertake a continuous, professional industrial pollution monitoring and assessment program of the industries and environment in the Lumbini Road Industrial Corridor, with certain provisions as noted therein.
As the voice of concern for Lumbini, we urge you to sign this petition by adding your name and country of residence to the form embedded below (and by answering the optional questions as well if you wish); and clicking the 'Submit' button. You will be adding your voice thereby to that of other individuals and organizations around the world who understand the importance of cherishing and preserving this world treasure.
The Lumbini Environmental Protection Alliance wishes to express its maha-gratitude for your anticipated support of its effort on behalf of current and future generations of beings everywhere!
With much metta!
Lumbini Environment Protection Alliance
Please follow the link below
spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dF8xYzkteHFmNi1jTFA2R3J4a28zRWc6MA
The Lumbini Environmental Protection Alliance (LEPA) is writing to ask for your help in protecting Lumbini's environment and the health of its local population. As you may know, Lumbini is the birthplace of the Buddha and is situated in Nepal. It is one of the four holy sites of Buddhism, the other three being Bodh Gaya, Sarnath and Kusinagar, all located in India. In recognition of its religious significance, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated Lumbini as a World Heritage Site in 1997. LEPA is an international alliance that includes the Lumbini Development Trust (established by the government of Nepal to oversee this World Heritage Site), Lumbini Institutions (all the Buddhist monasteries in Lumbini), and the Lumbini Stakeholder Committee, comprising numerous Buddhist and non-Buddhist organizations as well as individual supporters from around the world. LEPA was established for the purpose of protecting Lumbini's sacred environment and the health of its community.
Shortly before his great passing away (maha parinibbana), the Buddha spoke to his disciple Ananda as follows:
There are four places the sight of which should arouse a sense of urgency in the faithful.
1) Here the Tathagata was born (Lumbini)
2) Here the Tathagata attained supreme enlightenment (Bodh Gaya)
3) Here the Tathagata set in motion the Wheel of Dhamma (Sarnath)
4) Here the Tathagata entered maha parinibbana (Kusinagar)
And, Ananda, the faithful monks and nuns, male and female lay-followers will visit those places. And any who dies while making the pilgrimage to these shrines with a devout heart will, at the breaking-up of the body after death, be reborn in a heavenly world.
(Digha Nikaya 16, adapted translation by M. Walshe)
Today, environmental pollution from heavy industry (cement and steel plants) that have located in the Lumbini region of Nepal is degrading air and ground water quality and local agriculture. It is likely impacting human health as well. A campaign has been underway for some years now to stop this desecration of Lumbini's sacred space. As the collective voice of Lumbini's friends around the world, LEPA is writing to humbly request your support in an international effort to protect and safeguard Nepal's Lumbini from the growing impacts of environmental pollution.
The full petition prepared by LEPA with complete background information is viewable at
(1) create an industry-free zone around Lumbini,
(2) freeze the establishment of new industries outside of this industry-free area, and
(3) strictly monitor existing industrial firms.
The document requests that the Ministry of Environment of the Government of Nepal undertake a continuous, professional industrial pollution monitoring and assessment program of the industries and environment in the Lumbini Road Industrial Corridor, with certain provisions as noted therein.
As the voice of concern for Lumbini, we urge you to sign this petition by adding your name and country of residence to the form embedded below (and by answering the optional questions as well if you wish); and clicking the 'Submit' button. You will be adding your voice thereby to that of other individuals and organizations around the world who understand the importance of cherishing and preserving this world treasure.
The Lumbini Environmental Protection Alliance wishes to express its maha-gratitude for your anticipated support of its effort on behalf of current and future generations of beings everywhere!
With much metta!
Lumbini Environment Protection Alliance
Please follow the link below
spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dF8xYzkteHFmNi1jTFA2R3J4a28zRWc6MA
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Annoucement on the Resume of Meditation session
This is to inform/remind that our regular
Metta Meditation Session at
Inward Path, 52 Rangoon Road
will resume on
However,
we having our
Vipassana session on
Thursday April 29.
Instead we will, after April 27, have our
Metta Session
every M O N D A Y
beginning from
the Monday of May 3
and
Vipassana Session
every T U E S D A Y
beginning from
the Tuesday of May 4.
We are unable to have our session on Thursday as
the Charismatic Church on the first floor is now
having activity every Thursday and
their loud drumming and music
will disrupt our meditation.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
ANNOUNCEMENT
Please be informed that
there will not be any
meditation sessions from
March 30, 2010.
The session will
resume on
April 22, 2010
(Tuesday).
Thursday, March 18, 2010
THE JHANAS & THE LAY DISCIPLE
According to the Pali Suttas
by VENERABLE BHIKKHU BODHI
ISBN 978-983-3512-70-6
IJ175/10
Size: 5.5” x 8.25”
Pages: 48 pages
In Theravada Buddhist circles during the past few decades a debate has repeatedly erupted over the question whether or not jhāna is necessary to attain the “paths and fruits,” that is, the four graded stages of enlightenment. The debate has been sparked off by the rise to prominence of the various systems of insight meditation that have become popular both in Asia and the West, especially among lay Buddhists.
Those who advocate such systems of meditation contend that the paths and fruits can be attained by developing insight (vipassanā) without a foundation of jhāna. This method is called the vehicle of bare insight (suddhavipassanā), and those who practise in this mode are known as “dry insighters” (sukkha-vipassaka) because their practice of insight has not been “moistened” by prior attainment of the jhānas. Apparently, this system finds support from the Visuddhimagga and the Pāli Commentaries, though it is not given a very prominent place in the commentarial treatment of the path, which usually follows the canonical model in placing the jhānas before the development of insight.
The booklet helped to answer these three specific questions:
- Do the texts indicate that a worldling must attain jhāna before entering upon the "fixed course of rightness" (sammatta-niyāma), the irreversible path to stream-entry?
- Do the texts typically ascribe the jhānas to lay disciples who have attained stream-entry?
- If the texts do not normally attribute the jhānas to the stream-enterer, is there any stage in the maturation of the path where their attainment becomes essential?
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
DRUG DETOXIFICATION CENTRE IN THAILAND
Report by Jennifer Marostica, Reuters
Wat Tham Krabok (Thai: วัดถ้ำกระบอก, literally Temple of the Bamboo Cave) is a Buddhist temple (wat) in Thailand, located in the Phra Phutthabat district of Saraburi Province.
The temple was first established as a monastery in 1958 by the Buddhist nun Mae Chee Boonruen. It was upgraded to temple status 17 years later, in 1975. The temple is majestic in its appearance, with gold pagodas marking its entrance. The temple also features a major permanent work exploring the life of Buddha, seen as a series of disjunctions and dialogues, by contemporary British artist Gareth Lloyd.
Office website: http://www.thamkrabok-monastery.org/
THAM KRABOK, Thailand, May 23 (Reuters) — An obscure Buddhist monastery in central Thailand that advocates a secret herbal potion and ritual vomiting for drug addicts has become a final source of hope for thousands of Thais and Westerners. Since its foundation in 1959, Wat Tham Krabok, 140 km (85 miles) north of Bangkok, has put nearly 100,000 addicts through its "cold turkey" detox programme and given them a grounding in meditation to help them keep on the straight and narrow. The treatment — a far cry from the picture postcard beaches, jungle trekking and wild nightlife that draw millions of visitors to Thailand each year — is not for the faint-hearted.
Dressed in red hospital-style overalls, patients have to stay for a minimum of 10 days, during which they are subject to a strict regimen of leaf-sweeping, steam baths, herbal medication and group vomiting.
"Invariably, the people who end up here come as a last resort," said Phra Hans, a Swiss psychologist who became a Buddhist monk — with the title "Phra" — after visiting Tham Krabok seven years ago.
"Everybody who comes here must come as a warrior, ready to fight for their life."
MAGIC POTION
Sitting in the shadow of an imposing limestone crag, the monastery was founded in the late 1950s by a group of monks who decided to renounce all earthly pleasures and live out the rest of their days in a cave.
However, the military rulers of the day, keen to rid the capital of its opium dens, encouraged them to accept a large plot of land in return for taking care of the drug addicts the army was booting out of Bangkok.
Using a complex herbal medicine whose ingredients were revealed to the aunt of one of the monks in a dream, the monastery started treating its first opium addicts in 1959.
To this day, the 100-odd ingredients of the thick, dark potion that lies at the centre of the detox programme remain a secret known only to Tham Krabok's abbot and medicine monk.
"I've no idea what's in it. There must be some sort of active ingredient, but the only thing I know for sure is it's disgusting," said Patrick, a British health worker who has spent three months at the wat overcoming alcohol and cocaine addiction.
According to Phra Hans, the potion draws toxins out of the patient's body and into the stomach. The quickest way to get the toxins out of the stomach is for the patient to drink large quantities of water and then vomit.
In what is now a well-choreographed ceremony, patients sit cross legged and side-by-side in front of a long open drain. Accompanied by drums and chanting they then try to drink a bucket of water before sticking their fingers down their throats.
SACRED VOWS
Along with the myths surrounding its foundation and herbal cocktail are varying accounts of the long-term success rates of the treatment.
However, Prah Hans said reports of relapse rates as lows as 30 percent -- levels unheard of in Western drug addiction therapy -- are unverifiable.
"We really can't say. Full recovery takes five years or more, and we just don't have the resources to keep track of patients. We can't follow them," he said. "Cleaning out the body is only five percent; the other 95 percent is in the mind."
Regardless of their religious or ethnic backgrounds -- 80 percent of patients are Thai Buddhists, the rest foreigners of all denominations from across the globe -- are given a Buddhist "sacca", or vow, in which they swear never to touch drugs or alcohol again.
For some former addicts, the six-word Thai phrase does work in warding off temptation.
"Every time I get that little voice in my head and think I'm getting into trouble, I just close my eyes and say the words in Thai, and I'm OK," said Adam, a Londoner who turned to Tham Krabok after 17 years of trying and failing to beat heroin and crack addiction in Western rehab clinics.
"My mind used to race at 1,000 mph and I couldn't slow down. I couldn't work, couldn't read books. But then I tried the meditation and felt really calm," he said. "It's very different to Western rehab."
The wat has its detractors, not least British rock star and celebrity junkie Pete Doherty, whose departure after only three days led to tabloid newspapers depicting the wat as a prison camp in which patients were beaten with bamboo poles.
Phra Hans denied any such claims.
"Pete Doherty ran away because he wasn't ready. It was a dreadful episode. We can't lock people away or hold them against their will because that is a violation of human rights," he said.
"We only want people who are ready and who are serious about getting clean."
An I.b.m.c. Guide to Buddhist Meditation Retreats in Thailand
Wat Tham Krabok (Thai: วัดถ้ำกระบอก, literally Temple of the Bamboo Cave) is a Buddhist temple (wat) in Thailand, located in the Phra Phutthabat district of Saraburi Province.
The temple was first established as a monastery in 1958 by the Buddhist nun Mae Chee Boonruen. It was upgraded to temple status 17 years later, in 1975. The temple is majestic in its appearance, with gold pagodas marking its entrance. The temple also features a major permanent work exploring the life of Buddha, seen as a series of disjunctions and dialogues, by contemporary British artist Gareth Lloyd.
Office website: http://www.thamkrabok-monastery.org/
* * *
Drug addicts vomit out their ills in Thai Monastery
by Ed Cropley, ReutersTHAM KRABOK, Thailand, May 23 (Reuters) — An obscure Buddhist monastery in central Thailand that advocates a secret herbal potion and ritual vomiting for drug addicts has become a final source of hope for thousands of Thais and Westerners. Since its foundation in 1959, Wat Tham Krabok, 140 km (85 miles) north of Bangkok, has put nearly 100,000 addicts through its "cold turkey" detox programme and given them a grounding in meditation to help them keep on the straight and narrow. The treatment — a far cry from the picture postcard beaches, jungle trekking and wild nightlife that draw millions of visitors to Thailand each year — is not for the faint-hearted.
Dressed in red hospital-style overalls, patients have to stay for a minimum of 10 days, during which they are subject to a strict regimen of leaf-sweeping, steam baths, herbal medication and group vomiting.
"Invariably, the people who end up here come as a last resort," said Phra Hans, a Swiss psychologist who became a Buddhist monk — with the title "Phra" — after visiting Tham Krabok seven years ago.
"Everybody who comes here must come as a warrior, ready to fight for their life."
MAGIC POTION
Sitting in the shadow of an imposing limestone crag, the monastery was founded in the late 1950s by a group of monks who decided to renounce all earthly pleasures and live out the rest of their days in a cave.
However, the military rulers of the day, keen to rid the capital of its opium dens, encouraged them to accept a large plot of land in return for taking care of the drug addicts the army was booting out of Bangkok.
Using a complex herbal medicine whose ingredients were revealed to the aunt of one of the monks in a dream, the monastery started treating its first opium addicts in 1959.
To this day, the 100-odd ingredients of the thick, dark potion that lies at the centre of the detox programme remain a secret known only to Tham Krabok's abbot and medicine monk.
"I've no idea what's in it. There must be some sort of active ingredient, but the only thing I know for sure is it's disgusting," said Patrick, a British health worker who has spent three months at the wat overcoming alcohol and cocaine addiction.
According to Phra Hans, the potion draws toxins out of the patient's body and into the stomach. The quickest way to get the toxins out of the stomach is for the patient to drink large quantities of water and then vomit.
In what is now a well-choreographed ceremony, patients sit cross legged and side-by-side in front of a long open drain. Accompanied by drums and chanting they then try to drink a bucket of water before sticking their fingers down their throats.
SACRED VOWS
Along with the myths surrounding its foundation and herbal cocktail are varying accounts of the long-term success rates of the treatment.
However, Prah Hans said reports of relapse rates as lows as 30 percent -- levels unheard of in Western drug addiction therapy -- are unverifiable.
"We really can't say. Full recovery takes five years or more, and we just don't have the resources to keep track of patients. We can't follow them," he said. "Cleaning out the body is only five percent; the other 95 percent is in the mind."
Regardless of their religious or ethnic backgrounds -- 80 percent of patients are Thai Buddhists, the rest foreigners of all denominations from across the globe -- are given a Buddhist "sacca", or vow, in which they swear never to touch drugs or alcohol again.
For some former addicts, the six-word Thai phrase does work in warding off temptation.
"Every time I get that little voice in my head and think I'm getting into trouble, I just close my eyes and say the words in Thai, and I'm OK," said Adam, a Londoner who turned to Tham Krabok after 17 years of trying and failing to beat heroin and crack addiction in Western rehab clinics.
"My mind used to race at 1,000 mph and I couldn't slow down. I couldn't work, couldn't read books. But then I tried the meditation and felt really calm," he said. "It's very different to Western rehab."
The wat has its detractors, not least British rock star and celebrity junkie Pete Doherty, whose departure after only three days led to tabloid newspapers depicting the wat as a prison camp in which patients were beaten with bamboo poles.
Phra Hans denied any such claims.
"Pete Doherty ran away because he wasn't ready. It was a dreadful episode. We can't lock people away or hold them against their will because that is a violation of human rights," he said.
"We only want people who are ready and who are serious about getting clean."
* * *
An I.b.m.c. Guide to Buddhist Meditation Retreats in Thailand
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