Amavatura

Amavatura (lit: Ambrosial Water) is a devotional biography of the Buddha composed by Gurulugomi, a commentator and philosopher who lived in the 12th century in Sri Lanka (Reynolds et al., 1994; Wikramasinghe, 1900). It is considered the first prose narrative among extant Sinhalese literary works (Suriyahetti, 1975).

Amavatura is called the life story of the Buddha by its author Gurulugomi (Suriyahetti, 1975). He has compiled it by emphasizing one of the nine virtues of the Buddha namely Purisadhammasarathi which means "guide of tamable beings" (Suriyahetti, 1975). The work has been divided into 18 chapters under the following headings;

1) Durdanta-damana               2) Svasantana-damana               3) Parasantana-damana

4) Grihapati-damana               5) Brahmana-damana                 6) Raja-damana

7) Angulmal-damana              8) Parivarjaka-damana                9) Manavaka-damana

10) Digambara-damana        11) Jatila-damana                       12) Tapasa-damana

13) Bhikkhu-damana             14) Naga-damana                        15) Yaksha-damana

16) Asura-damana                 17) Deva-damana                        18) Brahma-damana

1) Reynolds, F., Tracy, D. and Greeley, A.T. eds., 1994. Religion and practical reason: New essays in the comparative philosophy of religions. SUNY Press. p.124.
2) Suriyahetti, P., 1975. A syntactical study of the Amavatura. University of London, School of Oriental and African Studies (United Kingdom). pp.1-7.
3) Wikramasinghe, D. M. D. Z., 1900. Catalogue of the Sinhalese Manuscripts in the British Museum: London. pp.29-31.

This page was last updated on 28 February 2022