Satha Wetha Maha Meth Lyrics by Sunil Santha

He who showed great compassion to all beings
and opened the great road to nibbana

The foremost of the three worlds, the teacher of nibbana, the pure sage, lord of the world,
the day he was born in this world, the day he attained Buddhahood, the day he entered parinibbana,
nurturing devout hearts, in remembrance, these white flowers are offered
and with those flowers, our pure hearts too are offered to the Buddha

There rises the full moon, soft and heavy, in Vesak splendour
ah! its beams spread out just like pillars of pure silver
jasmine garlands bloom in triumph, and the fragrance of sil comes drifting
everything living and lifeless alike is adorned for the Buddha-festival

Driving far, far, far away the roots of unwholesome craving,
making the mind pure like a spotless devotee’s cloth, let us sing the Buddha’s virtues today
having reached the shore of dreadful samsara, on the road shown to deathless nibbana,
praising the virtues of the Perfectly Enlightened One, we offer flowers

Today is a thrice-great festival for the whole world, the Buddha’s own,
casting off sins, drawing forth merit, swimming in the ocean of sil,
crossing from endless samsara to that far shore, in the nibbana that gives deathless bliss,
we wish for calm and beautiful peace. Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu!

This is a Vesak devotional, and it opens by naming what the Buddha did for the world: he “showed great compassion to all beings and opened the great road to nibbana.” That is the whole reason for the celebration, gratitude to the one who found and shared the path out of suffering. Like other Vesak songs it remembers the three great events on this one full-moon day, his birth, his enlightenment, and his parinibbana, and offers “white flowers, and with them our pure hearts too.”

The second verse is pure Vesak atmosphere. The full moon rises “soft and heavy” in festival splendour, its beams spreading “like pillars of pure silver,” jasmine garlands bloom, and the “fragrance of sil,” the scent of people keeping the precepts, drifts through the air. In a lovely touch, “everything living and lifeless alike is adorned for the Buddha-festival,” the whole world, animate and inanimate, dressing up for the day.

The last verses turn worship into inner work. The singer calls to drive “far, far away the roots of unwholesome craving” and to make the mind “pure like a spotless devotee’s cloth,” so that praising the Buddha is joined to actually cleansing the heart. The goal is stated plainly, to cross “from endless samsara to that far shore,” to the “nibbana that gives deathless bliss,” and the song ends the way Buddhist devotion always does, with the threefold blessing, “Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu.” What the listener is left with is the serene, aspiring spirit of Vesak: beauty, moonlight and flowers on the outside, and a quiet reaching for purity and release within.