When chanted

Chanted when a building or a lodging is offered to the Sangha, and at ceremonies marking such a gift.

Historical background

A short chant for one occasion: the giving of a dwelling, whether a single hut, a hall, or a whole monastery. The book prints its own reference for it.

Its subject is unusually concrete. Most of the chants around it concern virtue, merit or truth in general; this one is about a roof, and about what a roof makes possible.

Meaning and purpose

The first verses are entirely practical and do not hurry to a moral. A dwelling keeps off cold and heat, beasts of prey, creeping things, mosquitoes and the cold-season rains, and the fierce wind and heat once they have arisen. Only after all that comes the purpose clause — for shelter and for ease, and in order to meditate and to see clearly. The physical facts are named first and what they are for is named last.

The middle draws the practical conclusion: a wise man seeing his own good should have pleasant dwellings built, settle the deeply learned in them, and give them food, drink, robes and lodging. Nothing here is presented as sacrifice. It is presented as sense.

The closing verses complete the exchange, and the direction of the return is worth noticing. They teach him the Dhamma that dispels all suffering, and having understood that Dhamma he attains final Nibbāna. What comes back to the donor is not merit in the abstract but teaching — which is the one thing the people he housed have to give.

The chant

As the book prints it: page 29 →