Buddha Bathing Festival

The main rite of the Buddha’s birthday is the bathing of the Buddha. Water is poured over the Buddha’s statue, which is usually a small statue of a top-naked prince assuming a position of “one hand touching the earth and one hand pointing towards the heaven”. According to Buddhist sutras, when Prince Siddh?rtha Gautama of the ancient Indian nation of Kapilavast was born 2,600 years ago, one of his hand touched the earth and another pointed towards the heaven. He walked 7 steps in four directions with one lotus flower blooming in each step he treaded, and intoned, “"Supreme am I in the world, Greatest am I in the world”. Prince Siddh?rtha later became the Buddha (meaning the enlightened one), and was given the revered title of “Sakyamuni”, meaning the saint of the Sakyas. As the prince was born the king of dragons gave him a bath with a shower of water, and this is the origin of the Buddha Bathing Festival.

The date of Buddha’s Birthday

When was the Buddha born? Different factions tell different stories. In 1950, a group of Buddhist leaders from Europe, America, and Asia gathered in Colombo, the capital of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) to found The World Fellowship of Buddhists. They discussed the mission and responsibilities of the Buddhists and agreed upon the date of Buddha’s birthday. According to the results of their discussion, the Buddha was born in 623 B.C.E., achieved enlightenment in 588 B.C.E., lived for 80 years in our world and arrived at nirvana in 543 B.C.E. The Buddhist calendar began from when the Buddha arrived at nirvana, with the addition of one year upon each Buddha’s Birthday. 2010 was year 2554 of the Buddhist Calendar.

However, Buddhists remain divided over the birthday of the Buddha. Chinese Buddhism (including China, Taiwan and Macau) took the 8th of the 4th lunar month as the Buddha’s Birthday, and Korea followed suit. South Asian nations including Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, Bhutan, Singapore, Malaysia, Nepal, Bangladesh and some regions of India adopted the day of the full-moon in the 5th Lunar Month as the Vesak – the Buddha veneration festival. They also celebrate celebrates the birth, enlightenment and nirvana of the Buddha on this day.

The significance of the bathing

Buddhist monasteries of larger scales in Hong Kong held public Buddha bathing ceremonies on 8th of the 4th Lunar Month. The Ten Thousand Buddhas Monastery in Shatin, for example, received large crowds of believers through the day. In the morning, the monks conduct an assembly and chant sutras at the Main Temple Building. Later, led by a senior monk, believers queue outside Pagoda to bath the Buddha statue using a water scoop. Buddhists believe that besides commemorating the birth of the Buddha, the bathing ceremony also cleanses the filth in a person’s heart, i.e. greed, anger and delusion. Through cleansing and reflecting on one’s ails, one achieves the purpose of eliminating vexations.

The celebration of Buddha’s Birthday in Hong Kong also carries folk colour. The volunteers of the Ten Thousand Buddhas Monastery distribute white rice donated by charitable individuals on Buddha’s Birthday in front of the Main Temple Building. They place white rice and peanuts (the fruit of longevity) in red packets which are distributed to all who come to worship the Buddha. The packet is called the “rice of wellbeing”.