KL 24 May 1st Tisarana

Dhamma Retreat at Samādhi Vihara
Day 1 : Tisarana
Sylvia Bay
May 2024
Retreat schedule
Time Activity
9.30 – 10.00 Puja & guided meditation
10.00 – 12.00 Dhamma learning
12.00 – 1.30 Lunch and recharging
1.30 – 2.00 Self-paced meditation
2.00 – 4.00 Dhamma learning & reflection
4.00 – 5.00 Guided thematic meditation
5.00 – 6.00 Q & A, puja & merit sharing
20-minute
guided
meditation
Right understanding of Ti-sarana (Three-refuges)
• What is Refuge?
• When do you seek Refuge?
• Whom do you go to for refuge?
• We go for refuge when we need help. But whom do we trust?
➢ Our own brain, logic and reasoning skills
➢ People we trust (parents, mentors, friends...);
➢ Social media, Youtube, books, professionals...
➢ Do we really go to Buddha, Dhamma, sangha for refuge?
Right understanding of Ti-sarana
• What does it mean by going “to the Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha”
for refuge?
➢ This is not about Buddha granting your wishes or delivering
an outcome you want.
➢ ‘Go’ or turn to the refuges when akusala mental states arise
(fear, worry, anger and agitation, grief, and so on).
➢ Recalling the Gems will help us calm down, ease our mind,
restore mental balance.
• How do the refuges do that?
Right understanding of Ti-sarana
• How do the refuges help us regain mental balance and find
peace? How do they work?
• It’s a self-help programme. We must recall the qualities of the
Buddha, Dhamma and Sangha.
• Know the qualities by heart and frequently (daily) recall them.
• At one level – know and be inspired by Buddha’s life story,
correct and deep understanding and experience of the
Dhamma, guided and be inspired by sangha.
• Deeper level – internalise the qualities of the Gems.
Qualities of the Buddha
Iti pi so Bhagavâ-Araham Sammâ-sambuddho.
Vijjâ-carana sampanno Sugato Lokavidû Anuttarro
Purisa-damma-sârathi Satthâ deva-manussânam
Buddho Bhagavâti
Such indeed is the Blessed One, worthy (noble), fully self-enlightened,

endowed with knowledge and conduct, well-gone (well-journeyed),
knower of the worlds, the incomparable tamer of trainable men,
teacher of gods and men, enlightened, and blessed.
• ‘Faith’ in Buddha’s enlightenment and that his teaching will help us
experience cessation of dukkha.
Qualities of the Dhamma
Svâkkhato Bhagavatâ Dhammo Sanditthiko Akâliko Ehi-passiko
Opanâyiko Paccattam veditabbo viññuhiti.
The Dhamma is well expounded by the Blessed One,

Apparent here and now. Timeless.
Encouraging investigation. Leading inwards.
To be experienced individually by the wise.
• ‘Seeing is believing.’
• Well expounded means all that is needed for enlightenment
is there.
• Dhamma needs to be understood and experienced.
Qualities of the Sangha
Pali English
Supatipanno Bhagavato sâvaka They are the Blessed One’s disciples, who
sangho have practised well
Ujupatipanno ‘straight’ (honestly, sincerely)
Ñâyapatipanno to transcend suffering (for nibbāna)
Sâmicipatipanno correctly (as laid down by Buddha)
• Yadidam cattâri purisa yugâni attha-purisa-puggalâ

• In our Dhamma practice, we should be conscientious, honest and sincere, done
with right understanding for realisation of nibbāna.
• Embodiment of the Dhamma
Mindfully stretch
Saddha (faith, confidence, conviction, trust)
• 'Faith’ is under-rated in the Age of Science.
• It is a crucial and essential mental state for enlightenment.
• Note:
➢ One of only two factors to appear as a key mental state for cultivation
for both happiness in lay life and spiritual success for practitioner.
➢ Specially mentioned twice in 37 FOE (as part of 5 indriya and 5 bala) and
both times cited as the first factor on the list.
➢ Key factor associated with stream-entry (stream-enterer will drop the
fetter doubt) and enlightenment (only arahant has absolute faith).
➢ Prelude to stream-entry – Dhamma follower (emphasis on wisdom) vs
Faith follower.
Saddha must sit on knowledge and understanding
Three levels/types of saddha
1. ‘Blind’ faith i.e., obedience – fear of doing wrong (and offending). Fixated
with dos and don’ts of rites and rituals.
2. Faith with right knowledge and understanding.
➢ Come, sit, listen, hear, internalise...
➢ Reflect. Probe, ask questions, challenge assumptions. Exercise critical
thinking.
3. Faith that comes with cultivation and practice in accordance with the
Eightfold Path. Degree of awakening to true meaning (vijja) of the
Dhamma.
Enlightenment knowledge and faith
Live in the Dhamma daily. What does this mean?
1. Paññā (wisdom) – Correlate teaching to observations on working of
the mind. E.g., seeing impermanence in the aggregates. Deep insight
of 4 NT, 8FP, conditionality of reality, workings of kamma, etc.
2. Sīla – Deep awareness of kusala-akusala dichotomy and mind leans
towards taming lobha, dosa and moha.
3. Samādhi – As your understanding of the Dhamma deepens, you will
experience more periods of peace in your waking moments.
Grow in confidence that you know how to shape the mind because you
understand how it works. You feel empowered. No longer feel helpless in
the face of changing external or internal conditions.
Lunch
Self-paced
meditation
Why is saddha so critical?
Critical foundation for the arising of samādhi and paññā.
1. Enough to keep one open-minded, receptive, attentive so that one
can hear, absorb and recall much.
2. Enables us to overwrite our view/perspective (diṭṭhi); our
perception sits on ignorance.
3. Necessary ‘upstream’ condition for morality and other mental
cultivations follow-up.
4. Perseverance in the practice.
5. Condition for arising of joy and so aid in samādhi practice.
Why is saddha so critical?
6. Will lead to beneficial association. “When (noble sangha) show
compassion, they show compassion to the person with faith, not so to
the person without faith… When they approach anyone, they first
approach the person with faith. When they receive alms, they first
receive alms from the person with faith… and when they teach the
Dhamma, they first teach it to the person with faith.” (AN 5:38 Faith)
7. Conduit to heaven – “With the breakup of the body, after death, a
person with faith is reborn in a good destination, in the heavenly
world.” (AN 5:38 Faith)
How to cultivate saddha?
• Saddha is a mental state and thus like all mental states, can be
cultivated.
• Will take time to blossom
• Must have right condition to grow, namely, knowledge and
understanding.
• Gain confidence through constant exposure, reflection, correlation, as
teaching proves to be effective in diminishing dukkha. (Analogy –
medicine works and you gain confidence in the doctor)
How to cultivate saddha?
Activity: discuss in a small group, how you will go about
cultivating saddha.
1. Accumulate knowledge of Buddha, Dhamma and sangha.
2. Have a Dhamma learning routine.
3. Find good kalyanamitta. (SN 45:2 Half the Holy Life)
4. Associate with practitioner-sangha
5. Adopt thoughtful ritual – bowing before Buddha rupa, chanting
with understanding, sharing merits.
6. Visit holy sites
7. More?
Break?
Sutta
appreciation
Ratana sutta (Khp 6)
1. Whatever beings are here assembled, whether terrestrial or
celestial. May all these beings be happy. And listen closely to
my words.
2. Pay attention, all you beings, show kindness to the humans.
Day and night they bring you offerings. Therefore guard them
diligently.
3. Whatever treasure is here or beyond, or precious jewel in the
heavens— None is equal to the Perfect One.
In the Buddha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there
be well-being.
4. The calm Sakyan sage found cessation, dispassion, the
deathless, the sublime: there is nothing equal to that state.
In the Dhamma is this precious jewel. By this truth may there
be well-being.
5. That purity praised by the supreme Buddha, called
concentration (samādhi) with immediate result. That
concentration has no equal.
In the Dhamma is this precious jewel. By this truth may there
be well-being.
6. The eight persons, praised by the good: these four pairs are the gift-
worthy Disciples of the Well-Gone One. Gifts to them yield abundant fruit.
In the Sangha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be well-being.
7. With mind well established, free from sense pleasures, firm in Gotama’s
teaching. On attaining their goal they plunge into the deathless, freely
enjoying the perfect peace they’ve gained.
In the Sangha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be well-being.
8. As a post firmly grounded in the earth cannot be shaken by the four winds,
so is the superior person, I say, who definitely sees the Noble Truths. In the
Sangha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be well-being.
9. Those who comprehend the Noble Truths well taught by him of deep
wisdom, even if they were slightly negligent, would not take an eighth
existence. In the Sangha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be
well-being.
10. For one who has attained to vision, three states are at once abandoned:
view of self, doubt, and clinging to needless rules and rituals. Freed from
the four states of misery, he cannot do six kinds of evil deeds. In the Sangha
is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be well-being.
11. Though one might do some evil deed by body, speech, or mind,
he cannot hide it, such is impossible for one who has seen the path. In the
Sangha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be well-being.
12. Like woodland groves in blossom, in the first heat of summer.
So is the most excellent Dhamma that He taught, leading to
Nibbāna, the highest good. In the Buddha is this precious jewel.
By this truth may there be well-being.
13. He, the best one, beyond compare, knower, giver and bringer of
the best, taught the most excellent Dhamma. In the Buddha is this
precious jewel. By this truth may there be well-being.
14. Their past is extinct with no new arising. Their minds not drawn to
future birth. Their old seeds destroyed, their desires no more
growing. The wise go out just like this lamp.
In the Sangha is this precious jewel. By this truth may there be
well-being.
15. Whatever beings are here assembled,
Whether terrestrial or celestial,
Gods and humans revere the Perfect One.
Let us bow to the Buddha—may there be well-being.
16. *** Let us bow to the Dhamma—may there be well-being.

17. *** Let us bow to the Sangha—may there be well-being.
18. By the power of this truth, may suffering cease for me.* By the
power of this truth, may fear cease for me.*
By the power of this truth, may illness cease for me.*
Guided sitting
on saddha
Questions

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Dhamma Retreat at Samādhi Vihara

Such indeed is the Blessed One, worthy (noble), fully self-enlightened,

The Dhamma is well expounded by the Blessed One,

Sâmicipatipanno correctly (as laid down by Buddha)

• Yadidam cattâri purisa yugâni attha-purisa-puggalâ

16. *** Let us bow to the Dhamma—may there be well-being.

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