Magha Puja
| Makha Bucha Day | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Also called | Makha Bucha Day Tabaung Full Moon Day Navam Poya Meak Bochea |
| Observed by | Cambodian, Lao, Burmese, Nepalese Sri Lankan and Thai Theravada Buddhists |
| Type | Buddhist |
| Date | Full moon day of the 11th lunar month |
| 2016 date | 22 February |
| 2017 date | 11 February 10 February (Sri Lanka) |
| 2018 date | March 1 |
Māgha Pūjā (Burmese: တပို့တွဲလပြည့်နေ့ ; Khmer: មាឃបូជា, ; Lao: ມະຄະບູຊາ; Thai: มาฆบูชา; Sinhalese: නවම් පොහොය) is an important Buddhist festival celebrated on the full moon day of Māgha in Cambodia, Laos, Nepal, Thailand and on the full moon day of Tabodwe in Myanmar. The spiritual aims of the day are not to commit any kind of sins; do only good; purify one's mind. Māgha Pūjā is a public holiday in Cambodia, Laos, Nepal, Myanmar and Thailand and is an occasion when Buddhists tend to go to the temple to perform merit-making activities. In Sri Lanka this full moon day is called Navam Poya. Although it is a public holiday in Sri Lanka, it is celebrated just as any full moon day is and there are no special festivals, unlike in Southeast Asia.
The third lunar month is known in the Thai language as Makha (Pali: Māgha); Bucha is also a Thai word (Pali: Pūjā), meaning "to venerate" or "to honor". As such, Makha Bucha Day is for the veneration of Buddha and his teachings on the full moon day of the third lunar month.
Māgha Pūjā day marks the four auspicious occasions occurring at the Veḷuvana bamboo grove, near Rājagaha in northern India ten months after the enlightenment of the Buddha. On that occasion, as recorded in the commentary to the Mahāsamayasutta (DN 20) four marvellous events occurred:
On this occasion the Buddha gave those Arahants the principles of Buddhism, called "The ovadapatimokha". Those principles are: To cease from all evil; To do what is good; To cleanse one's mind. In Thailand, this teaching has been dubbed the "heart of Buddhism".
In Burma, Magha Puja, called the "Full Moon of Tabaung" or "Tabodwe Full Moon Day" (တပို့တွဲလပြည့်နေ့), is a traditional merit-making day for Buddhists. Tabottwal is the month before last month of the year in the traditional Burmese calendar. The country's largest pagoda festival, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival, begins during the new moon of the month of Tabodwe in the traditional Burmese calendar and continues until the full moon. The festival begins with a nakyake shitsu ceremony for offerings to the 28 Buddhas (from Taṇhaṅkara to Gotama), followed by a 10-day, nonstop recital of the Patthana, Buddhist scriptures on the 24 causes of worldly phenomena.
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