Bhaddanta Vimala Ashin Kovida (; born 14 May 1957), best known as Vasipake Sayadaw (), is a Burmese Buddhist monk,

astrologer Astrology is a range of divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of celestial objects. Di ...

and occult practitioner. He is believed to be the Senior General Min Aung Hlaing's chief astrological adviser. He is famous for his vow of silence. Vasipake played a major role in the

2021 Myanmar coup d'état A coup d'état in Myanmar began on the morning of 1 February 2021, when democratically elected members of the country's ruling party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), were deposed by the Tatmadaw—Myanmar's military—which then ve ...

Life

His origin is very unclear. Sayadaw is the

abbot Abbot is an ecclesiastical title given to the male head of a monastery in various Western religious traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not the head of a monastery. Th ...

of Thiladhamma Gonethar Tawya Monastery in Keng Tung. Senior General

Min Aung Hlaing Min Aung Hlaing ( my, မင်းအောင်လှိုင် abbreviated: MAL ; born 3 July 1956) also known as Alaungsithu is a Burmese politician and army general who has ruled Myanmar as the chairman of the State Administration C ...

has been his follower since 2006, when he was serving as the commander of the Myanmar military's Triangle Region, which oversees eastern Shan State. Some people believed that he is to be Min Aung Hlaing's spiritual cover. He has ties with Sitagu Sayadaw. In February 2020, Sayadaw was with Min Aung Hlaing and his wife Kyu Kyu Hla when they placed the " Hti" umbrella on top

Bagan Bagan (, ; formerly Pagan) is an ancient city and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Mandalay Region of Myanmar. From the 9th to 13th centuries, the city was the capital of the Bagan Kingdom, the first kingdom that unified the regions that wo ...

's most powerful ancient

Htilominlo Temple Htilominlo Temple ( my, ထီးလိုမင်းလိုဘုရား, ) is a Buddhist temple located in Bagan (formerly Pagan), in Burma/Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA con ...

. The meaning of the

temple A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called church (building), churches), Hindui ...

name is "need the royal umbrella, need the King". He was following in the footsteps of some of Myanmar's most powerful political figures including his predecessor, Senior General

Than Shwe Than Shwe ( my, သန်းရွှေ, ; born 2 February 1933 or 3 May 1935) is a Burmese strongman politician who was the head of state of Myanmar from 1992 to 2011 as Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). During thi ...

. Many people believed that the ceremony was a yadaya and seeking divine blessings for his glory. Sayadaw has been accused of providing the coup leader Min with his astrological advice for the takeover. He has been accused of advising the senior general to tell security forces to shoot protesters in the head. Most of the anti-regime protesters killed in the early days of the junta crackdown had bullet wounds to the head. Vasipake Sayadaw

He became one of the main targets of the protesters and was singled out for criticism at anti-regime protests, with some protesters attaching photos of him to htamein (women's sarongs) and hanging them in public places to express their wrath. Seeing the pictures of the

monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedica ...

he venerates attached to htamein, Min Aung Hlaing ordered his troops to take the women's garments down and publicly announced in his state-run newspapers that anyone committing the act would be charged with insulting

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

. On 18 December 2021, together with Min Aung Hlaing, he placed a new diamond orb, the highest part of Kyaik Devi Pagoda built by a Mon King centuries ago. Given the presence of his astrological adviser, Burmese people naturally conclude the aim of the ceremony, in which the general breathed new life into the ancient temple, was seek divine blessings to sustain Min Aung Hlaing's rule in the country.

Books

*''ဂုရုကျွန်းတိုင်နှင့် ကံကောင်းခြင်း'' (December 2009) *''ဆရာသခင်နှင့် ခရီးသွားခြင်း'' (2010) *''ငှက်တေလေအိုနှင့် ဂန္ထဝင်လွမ်းချင်း'' (2010) *''ဂြိုဟ်ပြာပြာ'' (2010) *''ကြံသကာထုပ်လေးများ နောက်ကွယ်မှာ…'' (2011) *''သဲရဲတိုက်'' (2011)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vasipake Sayadaw Living people Theravada Buddhist monks Burmese Theravada Buddhists Burmese Buddhist monks 1957 births