Luang Pho Ruay Pasathiko and the legacy of Wat Tako
Phra Mongkhon Sitthachan, widely known as Luang Pho Ruay Pasathiko, was the abbot of Wat Tako in Phachi District, Ayutthaya. Late in life he became widely associated with the auspicious meaning of ruay, “rich,” and with portrait medals, metal wrist plaques and series named as blessings for prosperity. His seventy-two years as abbot also encompassed scriptural education, Sangha administration, temple construction and sustained work for the surrounding community.
Childhood and ordination
His secular name was Samruai Sonrit (สำรวย ศรฤทธิ์). He was born on Friday, 9 December B.E. 2464, the Year of the Rooster, corresponding to 9 December 1921, at Ban Tako, Village No. 2, Don Ya Nang Subdistrict, Phachi District. His father was Mi and his mother Sinla Sonrit. There were eight children—three sons and five daughters—and Samruai was the sixth. Ruay was a familiar shortening of Samruai and later became associated with hopes for prosperity; his monastic name was Pasathiko.
Local oral history describes Ruay’s paternal ancestors as Lao and records that he could speak Lao.
The temple’s health-tourism report records Ruay completing Prathom 4 at Wat Tako School in B.E. 2472, while a local cultural interview places his arrival to study at the temple at age twelve. Novice ordination is recorded separately: the temple chronology gives 12 April B.E. 2484 under Phra Athikan Bunchuai at Wat Tako, while another interview gives age sixteen. These dates and ages are not fully consistent. Temple schooling and formal ordination represent different stages; the exact sequence remains unresolved without the original register.
He received full ordination at Wat Tako in the same year, B.E. 2484, and was given the Pali name Pasathiko. The publicly readable temple text prints 12 April specifically under the novice heading but gives only the year under full ordination, leaving the exact day of full ordination uncertain. His preceptor was Phra Khru Sunthon Thammaniwit, Luang Pho Chuen Sirivanno of Wat Phachi. Phra Samut Choi of Wat Wimon Sunthon served as kammavacacariya, and Phra Samut Bunchuai of Wat Tako as anusavanacariya. Later accounts sometimes call Choi Phra Palat, possibly a later office; the sequence of his titles still requires the appointment records.
Scripture and teachers
Ruay studied in the Wat Tako monastic school and passed Nak Tham Ek, the highest Nak Tham level, in B.E. 2487. Temple tradition says that, in his fourth rain after completing this scriptural stage, he considered the foundation sufficient to teach lay visitors and turned more fully to meditation, ritual, yantra letters and forms of protective knowledge transmitted among Central Thai monastic teachers of the period. He studied with his preceptor Chuen, whose line is associated with Luang Pho Klan of Wat Phra Yat, and with Phra Khru Praphat Thammakhun, Luang Pho Chaem Dhammapalo of Wat Wang Daeng Nuea. His education thus encompassed scripture, meditation and traditional ritual and yantra knowledge.
Temple administration education and community work
In B.E. 2488 he became abbot of Wat Tako and remained in office until his death in B.E. 2560, approximately seventy-two years. The temple's list of appointments shows responsibility accumulating over time. He became a kammavacacariya in B.E. 2494; subdistrict ecclesiastical head for Nong Nam Sai and a monastic teacher in B.E. 2496; supervisor of the national Dhamma examination in Phachi and an education committee member at the Wat Tako public school in B.E. 2498; head of the Don Ya Nang ecclesiastical subdistrict in B.E. 2499; a preceptor in B.E. 2501; and chair of the local public training unit in B.E. 2526. Teaching in the monastery, supporting the village school and overseeing local Sangha affairs became intertwined parts of his work.
His ecclesiastical titles also require a chronology. The temple account says that he once held the office Phra Baidika and prints B.E. 2483 for his appointment as a Phra Samut in the Don Ya Nang–Nong Nam Sai division. Because that date precedes the same source's B.E. 2484 full ordination, it must be checked against the original record rather than silently repeated as consistent. In B.E. 2499 he became Phra Palat in Chuen's establishment. In B.E. 2511 he received the third-class abbatial title Phra Khru Sunthon Thammaniwit, rising to second class in B.E. 2521 and first class in B.E. 2541. In B.E. 2558 he was appointed a samanya-class royal prelate with the title Phra Mongkhon Sitthachan. Objects celebrating this advancement in B.E. 2559 may bear the celebration year, but the appointment itself belongs to B.E. 2558.
In B.E. 2556 (2013), Mahachulalongkornrajavidyalaya University awarded Ruay an honorary doctorate in ethical education. Its historical list names him under his title at the time, Phra Khru Sunthon Thammaniwit, alongside Ruay Pasathiko and Wat Tako, agreeing with the temple chronology.
When Ruay took responsibility for Wat Tako, it was still a small field monastery with limited hall, residence and ordination-hall space on low land that the villagers had helped raise against flooding. He replaced the old preaching hall with a larger one, added residences, expanded and enclosed the grounds, dug a pond for dry-season use and repaired monastic buildings as resources permitted. Temple memory gives a more revealing detail than any list of structures: he supervised construction personally and kept written income and expenditure accounts. Before starting a project he would ask whether the money was available. Work should proceed only if it did not distress people or leave debt. The monastery expanded gradually within those means.
A qualitative study published in B.E. 2567 reviewed documents and interviewed twenty-one monks, scholars and community participants. It grouped his approach into four connected areas: religious buildings and objects as an initial focus for faith; social welfare that encouraged self-reliance, education and vocational development; public works such as roads, shelters and shared spaces; and Dhamma that moved faith toward conduct in daily life. In the study’s account, this progression led from faith toward ethical conduct, meditation and wisdom in everyday life.
Those close to him remembered a modest monk who spoke little—sometimes answering only what was asked—but showed compassion through practical work. The line most often preserved is tham arai dai yang nan, “what one does brings the corresponding result.” With it, he reminded listeners to attend to their actions and responsibilities. The temple report also preserves local memories of his knowledge of old remedies and distillation, and says that monks and villagers consulted him about lung and skin complaints. He enjoyed trees and sometimes brought disciples to transplant tako trees, caring for them himself. These local healing memories are not clinical evidence of effectiveness; illness still calls for medical care.
Sacred objects and the great stupa
Both the temple account and recent scholarship divide his object production into two periods: an early period from B.E. 2498 to 2512, and a later period from B.E. 2513 until his death. Some issues were organised by Wat Tako; others were made by disciples or outside committees and presented to him. Recorded purposes include construction and restoration of monastic facilities and public-benefit work. Temple issues, disciples’ offerings, invitations to ceremonies elsewhere and posthumous memorials have different histories. Even objects carrying the same name can differ in organiser, place of manufacture, purpose, ceremony and the part Ruay played.
Collector classifications commonly begin the early period with B.E. 2498 powder images or Somdet-type amulets, including forms described as a bodhi-leaf mould. Later material includes portrait medals, powder tablets, rings and numerous talismans. Competition catalogues show that many of these names have become established collecting categories, but a competition list is not a temple production ledger and does not authenticate every item submitted under a category. “First issue” requires comparison of mould, material, dimensions, marks, packaging, old photographs and provenance. A low-resolution frontal image and a dealer's caption cannot establish the canon.
The object most immediately associated with Ruay is the let khomue, a metal wrist plaque or bracelet adapted from contemporary jewellery. Wat Tako's account places its origin around B.E. 2534. Disciples proposed placing Ruay's portrait on a fashionable bracelet with the heart formulas of the four elements and a verse praising the Buddha, while raising funds for a celebration of his ecclesiastical rank. The plan called for 999 pieces, but shortage of capital limited production to 208. The recorded cost was 240 baht and the offering price 500 baht per bracelet. Gold and silver sema medals, silver medals with gold masks, enamelled silver rings and brass rings were made for the same occasion. A solo consecration was held in the old ordination hall, with meditative determination continuing through the rains retreat. Another version places the first bracelet in B.E. 2537, rather than the temple account’s B.E. 2534. Dates and quantities help establish an issue’s background, but individual bracelets still require comparison of their forms and provenance.
Series using ruay or chana chon, “defeat poverty,” reflect both his name and a Thai custom of giving sacred objects aspirational names. Market accounts often link prominent B.E. 2556 Chana Chon items with fundraising for the Pasathiko great stupa. Yet a name may cover multiple materials and moulds, different organising committees, or posthumous reuse. Each must be checked against temple documentation.
The foundation stone of Phra Mahathat Chedi Pasathiko was laid on 13 May B.E. 2557. The Ayutthaya Provincial Office of Buddhism names Governor Witthaya Pheophong as the lay chair and Ruay as the monastic chair. The design team included National Artist Wannida Phuengsunthon, Bancha Chumkasorn, Ong-at Hudakorn, Tawan Weerakun and specialists associated with Silpakorn University. The two-storey building later became a central architectural, devotional and commemorative space at Wat Tako. The stupa brought temple development, worship and later commemorative gatherings into a shared setting.
Final years and death
For his final illness, a temple-local report says that he regularly smoked hand-rolled tobacco in keeping with the habit of his generation and attributes his chronic lung condition to it. From B.E. 2559 he required hospital care repeatedly. He was admitted to Vichaiyut Hospital in Bangkok on 22 March B.E. 2560, deteriorated and entered intensive care on 12 June, and died at 9 p.m. on Wednesday, 19 July B.E. 2560. Contemporary reporting gives his elapsed age as ninety-five years, seven months and ten days; Thai commemorative sources often use the traditional inclusive age of ninety-six. These are different counting conventions, not competing birth years. The temple chronology gives seventy-six rains.
After public mourning, the coffin was opened during the hundred-day observances on 30 October B.E. 2560. Temple steward สมนึก จันทร์ศรีทอง described an undecayed body with a face resembling sleep; it was then placed in a glass coffin in the stupa. A later provincial Buddhism office account dates the opening to B.E. 2561, conflicting with this contemporary testimony. The original temple announcement is still needed to clarify the discrepancy.
Succession and continuing welfare
Ruay’s disciple พระมหาธรรมทส ขนฺติพโล returned to lead Wat Tako after his teacher’s death. A Phachi native, he had served Ruay as a novice, whom Ruay called Nen Kaeo. He later studied at Bangkok’s Wat Sam Phraya and became its assistant abbot. Wat Tako celebrated his appointment on 15 February B.E. 2561. He pledged to continue Ruay’s approach, particularly its public welfare work.
The appointment and its celebration fell on different days. The temple history records Ayutthaya’s provincial ecclesiastical head appointing Phra Maha Thammathot by Order 2/2561 on 31 January B.E. 2561. The ceremony on 15 February celebrated that earlier appointment.
That work continued after Ruay’s death. On 19 July B.E. 2568, the eighth anniversary, Wat Tako and the Ruay foundation supported monastic education, Phachi students, bedridden patients and vulnerable elders in Don Ya Nang. They also funded sterilizing equipment for the local health-promoting hospital and distributed rice and necessities. These were later temple and foundation activities, not projects personally completed during Ruay’s lifetime.
Residents of Klong Sakae recalled offering money and goods to Ruay at Wat Tako during his lifetime. After his death, they continued visiting his preserved body, bringing fresh jasmine and placing donations in the temple’s collection boxes.
Alongside monastic administration, Buddhist education and public service, Ruay repeatedly counselled people to avoid debt, work within their means and remember that “what one does brings the corresponding result,” connecting practice with everyday conduct.