Chantig

 4. THE REFUGES AND PRECEPTS  

Going for Refuge gives a continual perspective on life by referring one's conduct and understanding to the qualities of Buddha (wisdom), Dhamma (truth) and Sangha (virtue). The Precepts are also for reflection and to define one's actions as a responsible human being.

There is a formal means of requesting the Refuges and Precepts from a bhikkhu, which is as follows:

After bowing three times, with hands joined in A~njali, recite the following:

Tatiyampi maya"m bhante, ti-sara.nena saha pa~nca siilaani yaacaama

For the third time, we, Venerable Sir, request the three Refuges and the Five Precepts.

4.1 GOING TO THE THREE REFUGES

Repeat after the leader:

To the Buddha I go for refuge.
To the Dhamma I go for refuge.
To the Sangha I go for refuge.

For the second time, to the Buddha I go for refuge.
For the second time, to the Dhamma I go for refuge.
For the second time, to the Sangha I go for refuge.

For the third time, to the Buddha I go for refuge.
For the third time, to the Dhamma 1 go for refuge.
For the third time, to the Sangha I go for refuge.

Response:
-- Yes, Venerable Sir.

4.2 THE FIVE PRECEPTS

                           To undertake the precepts, repeat each precept after the leader:

In this transcription, Pali diacritical marks are represented using plain ASCII characters according to a convention widely used on the Internet by Pali students and scholars. Long vowels (those usually typeset with a bar above them) are doubled: aa ii uu . For consonants, the diacritic mark precedes the letter it affects. Thus, the retroflex (cerebral) consonants (usually typeset with a dot underneath) are: .r .t .th .d .dh .n .m .s .l . The guttural nasals (m or n with a dot above) are represented by "m and "n The palatal nasal is represented here as ~n .

Pronunciation

Paali is the original language of the Theravadin Buddhist scriptures, the closest we have to the dialect spoken by the Buddha himself. It has no written script of its own, and so every country that has adopted Theravada Buddhism has used its own script to transcribe it. In Thailand this has meant that Paali has picked up some of the tones of the Thai language, as each consonant and consonant cluster in the Thai alphabet has a built-in tone -- high, medium, low, rising, or falling. This accounts for the characteristic melody of Thai Paali chanting.

Vowels

Paali has two sorts of vowels, long -- aa, e, ii, o, uu, and ay; and short -- a, i, and u. Unlike long and shorts vowels in English, the length here refers to the actual amount of time used to pronounce the vowel, and not to its quality. Thus aa and a are both pronounced like the a in father, simply that the sound aa is held for approximately twice as long as the sound a. The same principle holds for ii and i, and for uu and u. Thus, when chanting Paali, the vowels are pronounced as follows:

a as in father
o as in go
e as in they
u as in glue
i as in machine
ay as in Aye!

Consonants

Consonants are generally pronounced as they are in English, with a few unexpected twists:

c as in ancient
p unaspirated, as in spot
k unaspirated, as in skin
ph as in upholstery
kh as in backhand
t unaspirated, as in stop
"m and "n as ng
th as in Thomas
~n as in canyon
v as w

Certain two-lettered notations -- bh, dh, .dh, gh, jh -- denote an aspirated sound, somewhat in the throat, that we do not have in English and that the Thais do not have in their language, either. The Thai solution to this problem is to pronounce bh as a throaty ph, dh as a throaty th, and gh as a throaty kh.

Paali also contains retroflex consonants, indicated with a dot under the letter: .d, .dh, .l, .n, .t, .th. These have no English equivalent. They are sounded by curling the tip of the tongue back against the palate, producing a distinct nasal tone.

The meters of Paali poetry consists of various patterns of full-length syllables alternating with half-length syllables.

Full-length syllables:

contain a long vowel (aa, e, ii, o, uu, ay); or
end with "m; or
end with a consonant followed by a syllable beginning with a consonant (e.g., Bud-dho, Dham-mo, Sa"n-gho).

In this last case, the consonant clusters mentioned above -- bh, dh, .dh, gh, jh, kh, ph, th, .th -- count as single consonants, while other combinations containing h -- such as lh and mh  count as double.)