The royal monastery of Surin town, a third-class royal temple of the Dhammayut order, built around the ancient image Luang Pho Phra Chi and long the seat of Luang Pu Dun Atulo.
วัดบูรพาราม · Wat Burapharam
| Official name | วัดบูรพาราม — Wat Burapharam |
|---|---|
| Where | Nai Mueang, Mueang Surin, Surin |
| Royal temple class | Third class royal temple (พระอารามหลวงชั้นตรี) National Office of Buddhism, Surin provincial office, register entry 646, which states verbatim: วัดบูรพารามได้รับพระกรุณาโปรดเกล้าฯ ให้เป็นพระอารามหลวงชั้นตรี. The entry names no sub-rank, so none is recorded here. The Thai was read verbatim rather than through a summary, following the Songkhla run's finding that a summarising fetch silently promoted a third-class grade to first class on one page and invented a rank on another. |
| Monastic order | Dhammayuttika Nikaya (คณะสงฆ์ธรรมยุต) |
| Ancient monument | Not established. |
Nai Mueang, Mueang Surin, Surin
The exact location has not been confirmed yet.
Thai temple histories mix two different kinds of statement, and this guide keeps them apart. What a register, a gazette entry, an inscription or a dated royal act shows is one thing. What the chronicles and the temple itself hold is another, and it is worth telling as what it is.
The state register that would ordinarily settle a founding date here declines to, and says in Thai that it is presuming. That is unusually candid for a register and it is repeated rather than smoothed over: no founding year for Wat Burapharam is established by any source this page consulted.
Wat Burapharam stands at 330 Chit Bamrung Road in Tambon Nai Mueang, in the middle of Surin town, and it is the one entry in this province file that is not a Khmer monument. It is a working royal monastery of the Dhammayuttika order, on land the National Office of Buddhism's Surin provincial register gives as ten rai and sixty-five square wa, and it is where most people in the province go when they go to a temple.
The register is careful about the temple's age in a way worth noticing. It does not give a founding year. It says, in Thai, that it is presumed the temple was built in the Thonburi period or the early Rattanakosin period, roughly two hundred years ago, by the man remembered as the first ruler of Surin. A state register writing สันนิษฐานว่า — it is presumed — is telling a reader something precise: that the founding is a tradition the register carries rather than a fact it holds a document for. This page repeats the presumption as a presumption.
What the register does record without hedging is the temple's standing and its principal image. Wat Burapharam was raised by royal command to be a royal monastery of the third class, and it belongs to the Dhammayut order, which in this part of Isan is closely bound up with the forest meditation tradition. Its ancient principal image is called Luang Pho Phra Chi, a Buddha in the attitude of subduing Mara, and it is the object most visitors come to pay respects to. The ordination-boundary grant is recorded as twenty metres by forty.
The other reason the temple is known far outside Surin is a person. Luang Pu Dun Atulo — Phra Ratcha Wutthachan — was among the most widely respected teachers of the northeastern forest meditation lineage, was for many years the head of the Dhammayut order in Surin province, and lived and died at this temple. His kuti is on the site and the provincial Office of Buddhism takes part in the annual observance of his death. For a great many Thai visitors, that is what Wat Burapharam is: not an antiquity but a place where someone they revere lived and taught.
Luang Pho Phra Chi (หลวงพ่อพระชีว์), the temple's ancient principal image, a Buddha in the attitude of subduing Mara, which the provincial register records as the temple's ปูชนียวัตถุ, its sacred object, and which is the focus of most visits.
The kuti of Luang Pu Dun Atulo, the forest-tradition teacher and former head of the Dhammayut order in Surin province who lived and died here, which is a place of pilgrimage in its own right.
A working Dhammayut monastery in the middle of the provincial town rather than a monument — ordinations, daily almsround and the ordinary life of a temple, on ten rai and sixty-five square wa of ground.
The ordination hall within the boundary the register records as twenty metres by forty.
This is a working place of worship for millions of people rather than an attraction, and it is treated as one at the gate. Where a figure below is blank, no source we are prepared to cite states it.
| Hours | Not established from an official source. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Not established from an official source. |
| Dress | An active monastery and a place of pilgrimage: shoulders and knees covered, shoes off before entering the buildings, and quiet around anyone at practice. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | 330 Chit Bamrung Road, Tambon Nai Mueang, Mueang Surin district, in the centre of Surin town. |
Every temple reference repeats claims nobody has checked. These are the ones we went looking for and could not stand up, listed so you know exactly where this page stops.
Royal monasteries in Thailand are graded first, second or third class, with sub-ranks below that, and the grade is recorded in the register kept by the National Office of Buddhism. Its Surin provincial office states that Wat Burapharam was raised by royal command to be a royal monastery of the third class, and names no sub-rank. The grade marks a recognised standing in the national ordering of monasteries that most temples do not have.
Not established, and unusually the state register says so itself. The National Office of Buddhism's Surin provincial entry uses the word สันนิษฐานว่า — it is presumed — of a founding in the Thonburi or early Rattanakosin period, about two hundred years ago, by the first ruler of Surin. That is a tradition the register carries, not a documented founding, and no instrument giving a year was found for this page.
One of the most widely respected teachers of the northeastern forest meditation tradition, and for many years the head of the Dhammayut order in Surin province. He lived and died at this temple, his kuti is on the site, and the provincial Office of Buddhism takes part in the yearly observance of his death. For many Thai visitors he is the reason to come.
The temple's ancient principal Buddha image, in the attitude of subduing Mara, recorded by the provincial register as the temple's sacred object. The register calls it ancient without giving it a date, and this page does not supply one.
Not necessarily, and the name is a genuine trap. The ONEP cultural-environment register carries a วัดบูรพาราม at site 1505 which is in Renu Nakhon district, Nakhon Phanom province — several hundred kilometres away and a different temple altogether. Anything sourced for this temple should be checked against Mueang Surin district before it is used.
Before you go, read the guide to Buddhism and temple etiquette in Thailand — dress, footwear, where photography is not welcome and how to behave around monks. The rest of Surin’s temples are covered here too.
Every temple here sits in a place worth reading about on its own terms. The nationwide temple guide covers the other provinces to the same documentary standard as this page, and says on each one what the record establishes and what it does not.
If you are thinking about more than a visit: work out which Thai visa route fits your situation, and see what is available to rent and buy in residences across Thailand.
Every fact on this page is drawn from the sources above. Where they disagree, this page says so rather than choosing silently. Registrations, fees, hours and access change; confirm anything you are relying on with the authority concerned. BAANLYY LLC is a Nevada company and a listing portal, does not represent any temple, and offers no legal or religious advice.