Lưu ảnh kỷ niệm về Thầy Tế Độ, Ngài Đại Trưởng Lão Thiền Sư Ovādācariya Sayādaw Ū Paṇḍitābhivaṁsa
ABOUT SAYĀDAW U PAṆḌITĀBHIVAṂSA
Sayādaw U Paṇḍitā (July 29, 1921; also known as Ovādacariya Sayādaw U Paṇḍitābhivaṃsa) is one of the foremost living masters of Vipassanā meditation in the Burmese Theravāda Buddhist tradition. A successor to the late Mahāsī Sayādaw, he has taught many of the Western teachers and students the Mahāsī style of Vipassanā meditation. He is the abbot of Paṇḍitārāma Meditation Center in Yangon, Burma.
Sayādaw U Paṇḍitā was born in 1921 in the greater Yangon area in Burma. He became a novice at age twelve and was ordained at age twenty. After decades of study, he passed the rigorous series of government examinations in the Theravada Buddhist texts, gaining the Dhammācariya (Dhamma teacher) degree in 1952.
Sayādaw U Paṇḍitā began practicing Vipassanā under the guidance of the Mahāsī Sayādaw starting in 1950. In 1955, he left his position as a teacher of scriptural studies to become a meditation teacher at the Mahāsī Meditation Center.
Soon after the Mahāsī Sayādaw died in 1982, Sayādaw U Paṇḍitā became the guiding teacher (Ovādacariya) of the Mahāsī Meditation Center. In 1991, he left that position, founding Paṇḍitārāma Meditation Center in Yangon. There are now Paṇḍitārāma branch centers in Burma, Nepal, Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Sayādaw U Paṇḍitā became well–known in the West after conducting a retreat in the spring of 1984 at the Insight Meditation Society (IMS) in Barre, Massachusetts in the United States. Many of the senior Western meditation teachers in the Mahāsī tradition practiced with U Paṇḍitā at that and subsequent retreats. The talks he gave in 1984 at IMS were compiled as the book “In This Very Life.”
As of 2005, he continues to lead retreats and give Dhamma talks but rarely conducts interviews himself.
A complete biography by Thāmanaykyaw Sayādaw is available at “One Life’s Journey”.
Sayādaw U Paṇḍitā is known for teaching a rigorous and precise method of self–examination. He teaches Satipaṭṭhāna or Vipassanā meditation, emphasizing sīla or moral discipline as a requisite foundation. He is also an erudite scholar of the Pāli Tipiṭaka or Theravāda Buddhist canon.
(Cre on pic: Panditarama Shwe Taung Gon)