Presidential swearing in at Ruwanveli Maha Saeya, Anuradhapura: Lest its symbolism is misread by rabid antinationalist racists
Posted on November 27th, 2019
By Rohana R. Wasala
I
love my country. I am proud of my country. I have a vision concerning my
country. I appeal to all Sri Lankans to join together in building a prosperous
land for posterity” declared Gotabhaya Rajapaksa on being sworn in as the
seventh executive president of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka
near the Ruwanveli Mahasaeya at Anuradhapura on November 18, 2019. After
assuming duties at the presidential secretariat in Colombo on the following day,
he made this FB entry: ‘I
am now the President of all Sri Lankans, whether they voted for me or not and
irrespective of their ethnicity or religious beliefs. Elections are now over and
I need the support of all Sri Lankans to build a prosperous and harmonious
nation where all can live with respect and dignity’.
Gotabhaya
is a man of few words, he means what he says; he is a near perfect exemplar of
the Buddhist ideal of acting according to what one preaches. As president he
will not renege on his election promises. This is something that his past
performance, both as a military officer for two decades (1971-1992), a
lieutenant colonel by the time he voluntarily left the army, and as a civilian
government functionary – defence secretary – for ten years under war winning
former president Mahinda Rajapaksa, his older brother (2005-14), has already
borne out. He doesn’t mince his words when he speaks out about important but
unpalatable truths. During his campaigning, he urgently called upon the Tamil
and Muslim minorities to trust him, vote for him, and be partners to the certain
historic victory that he was going to score on behalf of all Sri Lankans. The
election results made it clear that his appeal had largely fallen on deaf ears.
Gotabhaya said that the level of compliance with his request fell short of what
was expected. He referred to this fact on the occasion of his taking oaths, and
remarked that although he knew he could win by relying on Sinhalese votes alone
he requested the minorities to participate in the victory by voting for him. And
he repeated his appeal for cooperation from the two minority communities in the
future for nation building.
The
new executive president was sworn in at the historic Ruwanveli Maha Saeya in
Anuradhapura under the gaze of a statue of king Dutugaemunu (161-137 BCE), the
builder of that edifice. The symbolic significance of this event cannot be lost
on the fair-minded and patriotic Sri Lankans who are aware of the 2500 year long
recorded history of the majority community, the indegenous Sinhalese of the
island nation. Sinhalay (Ceylon), now called Sri Lanka, is the homeland of the
Sinhalese; there is no other land or country that they can call their homeland
(The word ‘homeland’ here means a particular people’s or nation’s native land).
But in the context of widely prevailing distortions of the history of the
Sinhalese in their island home, introduced by racially biased fake historians,
this swearing in ceremony is bound to be misinterpreted to the disadvantage of
all Sri Lankans, particularly the majority Sinhalese. Such misreadings of the
historic proceeding, the taking of oaths by Gotabhaya before the Maha Stupa and
the statue of the king Dutugaemunu, are likely to be attempted by strategically
‘concerned’ outsiders having various designs on the island, which is located on
a geopolitically most sensitive point in the region.
Chapter
XXV (25) of the Mahavamsa or the Great Chronicle of the 5th century CE records
the main purpose of Dutugaemunu’s military campaign against the Chola invader
king Elara of Anuradhapura (205-161 BCE). (The source text used here is the 1889
English version of the Pali original compiled in two parts by Mudliyar L.C.
Wijesingha as an imperial government commission; the first part of the work
where Chapter 25 occurs was translated by George Turnour in 1836, and was
annotated and emended by Wijesingha in 1889.) Before beginning his campaign,
king Duttha Gamani (Dutugaemunu) went to Tissa Vihara at Mahagama (cf. modern
Tissamaharama viharaya, Magampura international airport, etc., in the Hambantota
district in southern Sri Lanka), reverentially bowed down to the monks, and
said, I am about to cross the river for the restoration of our religion” and
asked for some monks to be allotted for our spiritual protection. Their
accompanying us will afford both protection and the presence of ministers of
religion (which will be) equivalent to the observance of the services of our
religion”. So, five hundred monks were assigned, and the king left, accompanied
by them.
The
five hundred ‘ministers of the faith’ (i.e., monks or bhikkhus) were to attend
the king in the campaign ‘as a self-imposed penance’, which Wijesingha
elucidates as ‘punishment for breaches of discipline’. It is important to
understand the term ‘penance’ in this Buddhist, non-Christian, context. The
author of the Mahavamsa was a Buddhist monk, and he didn’t actually want to
glorify war as it involved violence and killing. He depicts Dutugaemunu as being
contrite when he has committed such acts, though these are unavoidable in war.
The presence of the monks kept him reminded of the justness of his cause and
helped him take part in religious practices and rituals to keep his conscience
clear. At one point in his march from Mahagama to Anuradhapura, Dutugaemunu had
occasion to remark: This enterprise of mine is not for the purpose of acquiring
the pomp and advantage of royalty. This undertaking has always had for its
object the re-establishment of the religion of the supreme
Buddha”.
Eleven
chapters of the Mahavamsa (Chapters XXII to XXXII) are devoted to Duttha
Gamani,the victor over invaders and re-unifier of the divided country, and the
builder of the Maha Stupa/Maha Chetiya or the Ruwanveli Maha Saeya (completed by
his successor king Saddha Tissa, Gamani’s younger brother, two or three years
after his death in 137 BCE) . In the long narrative covered in these chapters,
we are treated to balanced accounts of friend and foe alike. Usurper king Elara
receives just praise for his righteous rule. However, perhaps in his desire to
emphasize the heroic stature of prince Dutugaemunu, the Mahavamsa author
represents his father king Kavantissa as a pacifist who constantly dissuaded his
sons Gamani and Tissa, particularly, the first, the more rebellious elder of the
two, from challenging the foreign usurper Elara at Anuradhapura, allegedly
fearing for their physical safety. But now we know that the father king was
actually preparing for war against Elara, but did not like the adolescent
brashness of Gamani. He had assigned the responsibility of looking after the
food security of the people to Tissa, and went about amassing the necessary
forces. Gamani ran away from his father and remained in hiding in the Malaya
country for a time. He returned home to Mahagama on his father’s unexpected
death, and after a brief armed encounter with his younger brother over
succession, which was settled by the intervention of the monks, and before
setting off on his campaign march to Anuradhapura, ‘sent back Tissa (to
Digavapi) to superintend the agricultural works in progress. He similarly
employed himself also, calling out the people by the beat of
drums’.
On
this (that is, on the two brothers being thus reconciled through the mediation
of the monks), Mahanama Thera reflects philosophically: ‘Thus good men being
sensible that violent resentment, engendered hastily by many and various means,
is pernicious; what wise man would fail to entertain amicable sentiments towards
others?’
The
Mahavamsa author Mahanama Thera was an erudite Buddhist monk. In fact, he was a
royal in robes, for he was king Dhatusena of Anuradhapura (c. 460-478 CE)’s
maternal uncle and teacher. Dhatusena spent his childhood as a novice monk
living and learning under the care of Thera Mahanama, who obviously groomed him
for assuming kingship at the opportune time, for at that time, the island was
under foreign invasion. Dhatusena turned warrior, made war on and defeated the
south Indian Damila usurpers Parinda, Khudda Parinda (sons of Pandu who had died
after five years on the throne), Dathiya, and Pithiya, and ‘entirely extirpated
the damilas who had been the devastators of the island by their various
stratagems – by having erected twenty-one forts, and incessantly waged war in
the land; and re-established peace in the country, and happiness among its
inhabitants. He restored the religion also, which had been set aside by the
foreigners, to its former ascendency’. So, king Dhatusena repeated the heroic
deed that king Dutugaemunu had done six hundred years before. He also did a lot
for the economic wellbeing of the nation through his massive Kalawewa reservoir
project and numerous other enterprises. But he did something more: he had his
uncle Mahanama Thera compose the Mahavamsa in order to charter the course of
history since the arrival of legendary prince Vijaya from the Vanga (modern
Bengal region) country in India and the later introduction of Buddhism as
recorded in earlier works and as transmitted in oral tradition and preserve it
for posterity.
Again,
about six hundred years after Dhatusena, as described in Chapters 57-60
contained in Part II of the Mahavamsa (continued as Culavamsa), prince Kirti
(born around 1039 CE), son of ‘the Great Lord’ Moggallana and princess Lokita of
Rohana, who became sub-king in that southern part of the kingdom of Lanka, as a
tender teenager, having subdued his enemies there, fought many battles against
powerful south Indian Chola invaders ruling at Pulatthi (Polonnaruwa) and
finally became king over the whole country as Vijaya Bahu (the First) in 1055
and ruled till his death in 1110 CE. As usual since the time of king
Devanampiyatissa (307-297 BCE) when Buddhism was introduced to the country under
royal patronage, at this time too ‘the princes of Lanka……. .continued to defend
the country and the religion of the land’ through the counsel of the Order
(i.e., the Maha Sanga). ‘Thus did Vijaya Bahu, the ruler of men, hold the reins
of government without any fear in his hands for fifty and five years more; and
when he had had improved the religion of the land and the country…….sore
distressed by the wicked …..(Chola invaders), he ascended up to heaven as if to
behold the great reward arising from his good deeds on earth’.
From
the hallowed precincts of our magnificent past as recorded in the Mahavamsa
(continued down the ages to date as a royal/state enterprise) let’s return to
the present.
With
the decisive electoral victory of Gotabhaya Rajapaksa Sri Lanka has just emerged
from the worst, the strongest, recent threats to its existence as a sovereign
nation with a glorious history that none in the world can surpass in spite of
its tiny geographical size or its political, economic and military
insignificance. But Sri Lanka’s pivotal importance as the repository of pristine
Buddhism, which, whether it is explicitly acknowledged or not, has already
automatically become (perhaps) the single indispensable non-religious
ethico-philosophical refuge for the human species, who
appear to be lost
…. on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night”
as Maththew Arnold, the 19th century visionary English poet put it.
We,
the Sinhalese, have from time immemorial been patriots, lovers or supporters of
the country, or nationalists, but never racists (those who love or support their
own race to the exclusion or disadvantage of other races) or, as followers of
the Buddha dhamma, we have never been religious fanatics (those who believe
that, as only their religion is true, all other religions are false, and that
all those who profess other faiths are inferior to themselves, and are in need
of being converted, or deserve harassment and even physical elimination). We
have been passionately patriotic; throughout our long history, we have fought
victoriously, shedding much blood defending our country from various foreign
invaders attracted by its strategically important location and its natural
resources. Today, however, we are being represented to the outside world by
inimical forces in various manifestations as rabid Sinhalese racists and violent
Buddhist fanatics, whereas the truth is the exact opposite: We are actually
victims of others’ essentially politically motivated racism and religious
intolerance. Over the past seven decades of independence, we have been intensely
persecuted by Tamil racism, and since recently, by Islamic extremism. But this
statement must be immediate qualified with the following: it cannot be believed
that this religious fanaticism and racial discrimination against the Sinhalese,
particularly against the Buddhist majority among them, is shared by the majority
of the Tamil and Muslim minority communities. But such passions are aroused
among innocent Tamils and Muslims by a handful political opportunists among them
to win their votes at elections. Externally, our cry for justice is not heard,
because our voice is drowned out by the bullying noises of the enemies who
outnumber us a hundredfold.
We
may breathe a sigh of relief now that Sri Lanka is being placed in safe hands
with Gotabhaya at the helm. He will look after the security of the unitary Sri
Lankan state in all its aspects (economy, law and order, civil administration,
and all other conceivable departments) in the face of threats from separatist
zombies and Islamic terrorists still lurking in the shadows, neither of whom has
any legitimate issue to settle with the Sinhalese Buddhist majority community.
Gotabhaya has pledged to complete implementing all the development proposals
contained in his meticulously drafted election manifesto within his five year
term. It is the citizens’ responsibility to extend their full cooperation to him
without being distracted by the machinations of political, moral, and physical
decrepits who have agreed to sell out the land and resources of the country,
and to divide and destroy the nation in order to savour power at least in their
dying years.
Beginning
with the immediate ending of the state of anarchy that has been prevalent for
the past five years, the change envisaged by patriots on this occasion will
involve, not only regaining the postwar momentum of growth reached during the
2009-2014 period and restoring the safe and secure background that made such
development possible, but also, even more vitally, eliminating threats to the
continued existence of the unitary state that our ancient and modern heroes
guided by the Guardians of the Nation, the Maha Sangha, have delivered to
us.
Swearing in at the sacred Ruwanveli Maha Saeya that is so deeply steeped in history shows the seriousness with which Gotabhaya views his epoch-making mission of saving the country of which all fair-minded and patriotic Sri Lankans must be justly proud.
A point of view offered for critical reception.