It was the seventh century
before the Christian era. The civilized part of India was divided into
sixteen realms, eight of which were kingdoms and the remaining republics.
Among the kingdoms the most powerful were Magadha and Kosala. The little
Shakya republic was ruled by the king of Kosala who received tribute from
the former. The Shakyas were of the Kshatriya solar race and called
themselves rajas. In the middle of the century, their chief was
Shuddhodana who had his capital at Kapilavastu.
In the year 623
B.C.
his queen, Mahamaya, was travelling in state from Kapilavastu to Devadaha,
her parents’ home, to have her first child. On her way, the queen gave
birth to a divine son in the Lumbini grove between two tall sal trees,
then in their full spring blossom. A monument at birth-place of the
Buddha, erected by Emperor Ashoka 375 years after the event still stands
witness to its historical character.
An old sage named Asita visited king Shuddhodana’s
palace and expressed a desire to see the new born child. On seeing the
marks of greatness on its delicate limbs, Asita laughed and shed tears of
sorrow. He laughed, he said, owing to his joy that a saviour had come to
the earth for the salvation of the people and shed tears because he would
not have the good fortune to live long enough to see the achievements of
the child. The child was name Siddhartha, or one whose purpose has been
fulfilled.
While the Shakyas were celebrating the birth of a
prince, Queen Mahamaya passed away seven days after the birth of her only
child. Gautama was then mothered by his mother’s sister, Mahaprajapati
Gautami, who was also his step-mother. The child preferred solitude and
thoughtfulness to the frolics and pranks natural to his age. His father
observed his spiritual inclinations and tried his best to protect the
young prince from worldly suffering. When he grew into a young man he was
married to Yashodhara, a beautiful girl of the same clan. He was given
three palaces to suit the three seasons. Dancing and singing girls
entertained him and he was taken round in a chariot through the capital.
But human efforts are often balked by destiny. The
tender-hearted prince saw a decrepit old man; then a withered person
affected with an ugly disease, followed by a dead body being carried to
the cremation ground by weeping friends. Lastly, on the same day he saw an
upright ascetic walking majestically along the road. These sights made him
ponder over the miseries of existence and also on a way of escaping from
them.
The marriage of Prince Gautama and Princess Yashodhara
had lately been blessed by the birth of a son. No sooner did Gautama
receive the tidings of his son’s birth than he exclaimed that an obstacle
(rahula) had been born to his cherished dream of an ascetic life. It was
regarded as a good sign by the king who ordered that the baby be named
Rahula. He did not, however, actually prove to be an obstacle, for Gautama
thought it better to relinquish his worldly career before attachments grew
stronger and to adopt the course of a wandered in quest of Truth. Thus did
he reason while the dancing girls tried in vain to divert him with their
art. A feeling of revulsion came upon him when he saw them sprawling in
their sleep in indecorous postures. He made up his mind to leave home that
night, and entered the chamber where Yashodhara was fast asleep with the
baby in her arms.
An oil lamp cast a ‘dim religious light’, and smoke
rose from the incense burner under the bed. He tore himself away and,
unknown to anybody, rode away towards a forest. He discarded his royal
robes, cut his long hair with his sword and became an ascetic.
First he went to a teacher named Adara Kalama and then
to another named Udraka Ramaputra. He imbibed all that they had to teach
him, but as his thirst for Truth remained unquenched he moved on and
ultimately reached a picturesque land, near modern Bodh Gaya, which was
surrounded by luxuriant woods through which ran a gentle stream with banks
of silver sand.
In accordance with the belief that the mind became
elevated by emaciating the body, Gautama practised rigid austerities and
resorted to different kinds of self-torture. Yet real knowledge eluded
him. At the end of six years he realised that physical torture was not the
way to achieve enlightenment and decided to partake of food again. When on
that day he was offered a bowl of milk by Sujata, a rich merchant’s
daughter, who was devoted to him, he accepted it. At the same time he felt
that in the course of that day he would become a Buddha an Awakened One by
attaining bodhi or supreme knowledge. He spent the midday in a
grove of sal trees on the bank of the Niranjana. When dusk fell he
proceeded towards the Bodhi tree. On the way he net a grass at the foot of
the Bodhi tree he sat in meditation and resolved thus:
“Skin, sinew and bone may dry up as it will; my flesh
and blood may dry in my body; but without attaining complete enlightenment
shall I not leave this seat”
His resolute attempt set Mara, the god evil, thinking
that he should not allow Gautama to escape from his thraldom. He caused a
violent thunderstorm to frighten the Bodhisattva that Gautama then was,
but in vain : All the missiles hurled by Mara at his victim turned into
flowers. Mara tried to tempt him with promises of rebirths in heaven but
the Bodhisattva, or the one destined to achieve enlightenment would not
bend. Mara was discomfited in the end and his army fled in all directions.
This battle, of course, was a metaphorical conflict between the higher and
lower aspirations in Gautama’s mind. During the night Gautama discovered
the Law of Causation, a cycle of twelve causes and effects conditioning
the universe. This law had not been thought of before by any philosopher.
Its authorship raised Gautama from his status of Bodhisattva to that of a
Buddha. He exclaimed solemnly:
Truly when things grow plain
To the ardent, meditating Brahmin,
Routing the hosts of Mara does he stand
Like as the sun when lighting up sky.
He spent four weeks in contemplation under the tree,
now called the Bodhi, after which he set out on his travels. On the way
daughters of Mara encountered him and tried to seduce him with their
charms. The Lord was unmoved and asked them to go away. He said that such
attempts might have had success with men who had not subdued the passings
but not with him.
Baffled in their attempts
the daughters returned to their father. Further on, the newly awakened
Buddha met two merchants, Tapussa and Bhallika, who offered him some gruel
of barley and honey. These two came to be the first lay disciples of the
Buddha, and this was the beginning of the formation of a band of lay
disciple.
The Lord then began to have misgivings in his mind.
Said he himself:
This that through many toils I have won,
Enough, why should I make it known?
By folk with lust and hate consumed,
This truth will not be understood.
He was in doubt whether he should preach the Dharma to
the people of the world given to material attachment. While he was thus
hesitating, Brahma and other gods came and begged him to preach the Dharma
which would show mankind the way to salvation. The blessed One began to
wonder to whom he should first reveal the Dharma, since his own teachers
Adara Kalama and Udraka Ramaputra who could have understood the Dharma
were already dead.
He set out for Banaras to preach to his five mendicant
companions who had left him in despair and had settled there. He
approached the deer park of Rsipatana (Sarnath) near Banaras. His
companions had forsaken him when he accepted food from Sujata because they
thought he had given up austerities and taken to a life of ease. Thus when
they saw him approaching they were determined not to show him any respect.
But as he drew near they were overpowered by the radiance on his
countenance and involuntarily rose to offer him a seat. He then preached
his First Sermon to them, thereby setting in motion the wheel of the
Dharma (Dharmachakra-pravartana).
The gist of the First Sermon is given below.
“These two extremes, mendicant brothers, are not to be
approached by him who has withdrawn (from the world). Which two? On the
one hand that which is linked and connected with lust through sensuous
pleasures (kamesu) and is low (hino); ignorant, vulgar,
ignoble (anariyo) and profitless (an-atthasamhito); and on
the other hand that which is connected with self mortification, and is
painful (dukkho), ignoble and profitless.
“Now this, O monk, is the noble truth of pain; birth is
painful, old age is painful, sickness is painful, death is painful.
Contact with unpleasant things is painful and not getting what one wishes
is painful, in short, the five Khandhas of grasping are painful.
“Now this, O monks, is the noble truth of the cause of
pain; that craving, which leads to rebirth, combined with pleasures and
lust, finding pleasure here and there, namely the craving for passion, the
craving for existence, the craving for non-existence.
“Now this, O monks, is the noble of the cessation of
pain; the cessation of pain: the cessation without a remainder of that
craving, abandonment, forsaking, release, non-attachment.
“Now this, O monks, is the noble truth of the way that
leads to the cessation of pain : this is the noble Eightfold path, namely,
Right Views, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right
Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration.”
The five monks became his first disciples after this
sermon.
Kashyapa of Uruvela, a fireworshipping Brahmin with
matted hair, was performing a great sacrifice when the Buddha performed a
miracle. The Brahmins could not kindle a fire without the Buddha’s
permission. When the fire was kindled, there was a great fold. The Buddha,
however, saved the sacrifices and Kashyapa, along with his followers,
joined the Sangha. Accompanied by them all, the Buddha went to the hill of
Gayasirsa and delivered his famous sermon on Burning. From Gayasirsa he
went on to Rajagrha, the capital of Magadha, to redeem the promise he had
made to Bimbisara, the king, who had presented his bamboo-grove to the
Sangha for use as a monastery.
In the capital of Magadha lived Sanjaya, an ascetic,
with a large number of pupils including Sariputra and Maudgalyayana. The
former heard from the lips of Ashvajit, a Buddhist monk the following
verse:
Of those things which spring from cause
The cause has been told by the Buddha;
And their suppression likewise
The great recluse has revealved.
A year after the Awakening, Shuddhodana heard of his
son’s glory and invited him to visit Kapilavastu. The Buddha accordingly
came to his parental home. Shuddhodana did homage to his son as he was now
a holy man. On the following day, the Buddha made a round of the city for
alms. To his wife, Yashodhara, he looked more glorious in the monk’s grab
than he had done in his princely apparel. She threw herself at his feet
and said to her son, “Dear Rahula, ask your father for your inheritance.”
The Buddha conferred on the boy a higher inheritance than worldly pelf by
making him a novice, a probationer for monkhood. Hundreds of Shakya
rajas doffed their finery and put on yellow robes. Even Upali, the
family barber and a keeper of the royal wardrobe, renounced his home and
became a follower of the Buddha.
Important additions continued to be made to the
congregation of lay disciples. Anathapindika
, a rich merchant of Sravasti, bought from Prince Jeta a large
park for as many gold pieces as would cover the whole ground. There he
erected a monastery, Jetavana Vihara, and made a gift of it to the Sangha.
Prasenajit, the king of Kosala, Visakha, a rich lady, and many eminent
people of Kosala became lay disciples of the Buddha. He then went to
Rajagrha where he fell ill and was treated by the royal physician, Jivaka
Kumarabhrtya, a children’s specialist. The patient paid for his bodily
cure by effecting the mental cure of the physician who also joined the lay
Buddhists.
Three years afterwards a quarrel arose between the
Shakyas and Koliyas about the water of the river separating their
territories. Had it not been for Lord Buddha’s intervention, the quarrel
would have grown into a fierce battle. This event was followed by the
death of Suddhodana; and Gautami, the widowed stepmother of the Buddha,
asked her son for admission to the Sangha. Ananda, the personal attendant
of the master, strongly supported her cause. This was the beginning of an
Order of nuns in India. Until then women in the country had no right to
spiritual salvation through the renunciation of the home.
Years rolled by. The Master and his disciples travelled
all over the country combating old superstitions, the old values based on
birth, and animal sacrifice, denouncing the sprit of revenge and praising
morality, the threefold path of purity and rational thought. The Sangha
continued to increase in strength. The Master’s arguments were persuasive
but sometimes he performed miracles to support his claims, much to the
chagrin of the Brahmins and over sectarians. They tried to traduce the
Buddha with the help of a courtesan named Cinca. The poor women suffered
heavy punishment for her guilt of incriminating the Buddha. A similar fate
awaited Sundari who claimed that the Buddha was in love with her.
When the Buddha was 72 years of age, King Bimbisara of
Magadha was murdered by his son Ajatashatru. The new king was an admirer
of Devadatta, a monk of the Sangha. These two had designs on the life of
the Master from a height but only a splinter hit him. A last effort was
made by letting loose a mad elephant on the Buddha, but the animal humbly
bowed down before the Master. Frustrated in his murderous attempts,
Devadatta brought about a schism in the brotherhood and organized a rival
Sangha. Before he could commit more harm he died of bleeding from the
mouth.
Two years before the passing of the Master, his claim
met with a great misfortune. Vidudabha, a son of King Prasenajit of Kosala
and of the daughter of one of the Shakya rajas, was on a visit to
his mother’s family, where he was insulted for his low birth. Enraged, he
vowed to take revenge on the Shakyas. Undeterred by the expostulations of
the Master, he, after the death of his father, marched against Kapilavastu
and put to the sword the whole Shakya clan. Great must have been the
distress of the old Master to receive the news of this massacre, in spite
of his sermons on Peace. Still he kept moving from place to place,
delivering his sermons on morality, peace, universal love and purity.
Amrapali, the famous courtesan, presented her mango-grove to the Sangha,
the last great gift during the Master’s lifetime. When the Buddha
approached his eightieth year, he felt that his end was at hand.
He explained to Ananda many matters concerning the Law
(Dharma) and Discipline and told his pupils that he had unfolded to them
all that a good and benevolent teacher ought and that henceforth his word
should be their teacher. The massacre of the Shakyas was followed by the
death of Sariputra and Maudgalyayana within one week. The master was at
Pava. Cunda, a blacksmith of town, invited him to meal of rice, cakes and
sukaramaddava. There is no agreement among scholars about the
meaning of the last word. It may be either a boar’s tender flesh or some
kind of edible herb. Whatever it might have been, it was difficult to
digest and the Buddha was taken ill with dysentery. His illness, however,
did not prevent him from going on ground on to Kushinagara. Here he asked
Ananda to spread a cloth on ground between two sal trees. He was born
between two sal tress and was to die in a similar place. He lay down like
a lion and gave his last admonitions to thousands of monks and lay folk
who had assembled to have a last glimpse of him. The following were his
last words “ Now, monks, I have nothing more to tell you but that all that
is composed is liable to decay! Strive after salvation energetically”.
His remains were cremated with royal honours, A battle
for the possession of his mortal remains for daily worship was stopped by
Drona, a Brahmin. Eight stupas were erected in different parts of India to
house his relics. The death of the Buddha took place on the full moon of
Vaisakha (May) as did his birth and awakening. The day is therefore called
the thrice-sacred day.
The teachings of the Lord Buddha may be divided into
two: (i) philosophical and (ii) moral. The two groups are interwoven in
such a way that the one cannot be understood properly without a knowledge
of the other. The fundamental principles of the Buddha’s philosophy is the
theory, the continuous existence of a being is like a wheel of causes and
effect. Ignorance gives rise to actions, then in their turn come
consciousness, phenomena (nama-rupa), the six senses-conduct,
feeling, craving, gasping, becoming, birth and suffering. If the last
effect id to be destroyed, the primary cause, which is ignorance, must be
destroyed.
Another important theory of the Buddha concerns the
Four Noble truths, the first being that all existence is full of
suffering. The second truth is that all suffering has a cause. The third
truth is that suffering can be made to come to an end and the last there
is a way to end suffering.
The critics of Buddhism will no doubt consider the
first two truths pessimistic but the other two certainly provide grounds
for optimism. Why does the Buddha sat that the existence of a being is
full of suffering? Because all beings are subject to rebirth, decay,
disease, death, and again rebirth. Even pleasures and worldly happiness
lead one to sorrow because they are transitory and the loss of pleasure
and happiness is worse than never to have had them.
Just as a good doctor tries to discover the cause of he
malady before administering a remedy, the Buddha, the great spiritual
doctor, tried to find the ultimate cause of worldly suffering, not only
the suffering of human beings but that of all animate creatures. He found
the cause to be ignorance or craving arising from it. The doctor removes
the cause of the patient’s disease and thus cures it. The Buddha similarly
asks the people to remove their ignorance of truth and their craving for
happiness. The cessation of suffering is called nirvana, the summum
bonum, beyond description. It is not a negative condition but a
positive, unconditioned state realized by the mind.
How can this nirvana be attained? By the Fourth Noble
Truth, the Noble Eightfold path. It is also called the Middle Path by
which the wayfarer avoids the two extremes. He neither follows the path of
self-mortification nor that self indulgence.
During the Buddha’s time ascetics often observed fasts,
led abhorrent lives, exposed themselves to fires burning around them or
slept upon spikes thinking that the mind was exalted by torturing the
body. Like the Epicureans of Europe, the self-indulgent seekers thought
nothing of this world and the next, of rebirth, karma and its fruit, and
led lives luxury and sin. The Buddha’s Path followed neither, but led to
vision, knowledge, tranquillity and nirvana. Formulated by the Buddha, it
is an evidence of his logical reasoning and practical wisdom. Each step in
the process is an inevitable advance on the path leading to the ideal.
The first step is the ‘Right View’. Rid yourself of all
superstitions, animism and primitive rites, give up your faith in the
cruel animal or human sacrifice, in the inequality of human beings, and in
the existence of a prime creator of the universe and depend on your own
powers of pure reasoning. This step gave Buddhism its rational basis. If
one’s view is wrong, one’s determination is bound to be faulty. ‘Right
Mental Resolve’ is foundation of all great achievements provided it is
based on the right view. If one believes in racial, social or communal
discrimination, one’s determination is sure to prove baneful to the world.
‘Right Speech’ results from right determination and action is preceded by
speech. Words free from lies, anger, abuse; calumny and slander are the
right speech which is followed by ‘Right Action’. Abstinence from killing,
stealing, indulgence in passions and from drinking intoxicants is the
negative aspect of right action, while charity, truth, service and
kindness constitute the positive one.
‘Right Livelihood’ is the outcome of right action.
Wrong means of livelihood are those which cause suffering to others.
Trafficking in deadly weapons, in animals for slaughter, in human beings
for slavery and intoxicating drinks and poisons are examples. A monk is
not allowed to do any bodily service for a layman in exchange for food or
clothing. He must earn his alms only by his goodwill towards others.
‘Right Effort’ consists in strenuous endeavour by a person for his own
mental and moral elevation. He should first give up his bad habits,
acquire new good qualities that he may have acquired already. The Buddha
lays great stress on this step which he counted among the ten perfections
(paramitas) that a Bodhisattva must achieve before his
enlightenment.
‘Right Mindfulness’ is the attention paid to the
activities and weaknesses of one’s body and mind. The last step in the
middle path is ‘Right concentration’ the fixing of mental faculties on a
single object. This ability is useful not only to the spiritually inclined
but is essential in all pursuits, whether they are scientific, literary,
artistic or religious.
The Middle Path is aptly set forth in the following
verse:
Of all sin the avoidance,
Of merit the acquisition,
Of mind the purification,
This is the Buddha’s admonition.
Speaking of this Noble Eightfold Path, Dr, Rhys Davids
says: “If this Buddhist ideal of perfect life is remarkable when compared
with the thought of India at the time, it is equally instructive when
looked at from the comparative point view.”
The Buddha accepted the ancient Indian theory of karma.
It lays down that the deeds of a being determine the state of life into
which he will be reborn. “We find inequality prevailing everywhere. Some
are born rich, others poor; some are beautiful, others ugly; some are
intelligent, and others witless. What is the reason for this? Asked King
Milinda. His teacher replied that this anomaly was due to the karma of
each being in his former life and quoted the Buddha’s words in support.
“Every living being has karma as its matter, its inheritance, its
congenital cause, its kinsman, its refuge. It is karma that differentiates
all beings into low and high states.”
The karma or deed may be mental, oral, or physical. Its
nature is judged by the accompanying volition. Involuntary or unconscious
acts are not treated as karma.
According to the Buddhist doctrine of karma, one is not
always compelled by an iron necessity to go through worldly joys and
sorrows from one life to another. Karma is not predestination imposed on
us by some mysterious creator to which we must helplessly submit
ourselves. Through of pre-Buddhist origin, the doctrine of karma was
highly developed by the Buddha and his followers, who held that a being
possesses the freedom of will to act, irrespective of his acts in his
previous births. Existence, whether in bad or good conditions, is
impermanent though the latter is the better of the two. The best is
freedom from karma, naiskarmya, leading to Arhatship and
consequently to nirvana (moksa of the Brahmanical philosophy), the
total extinction of personality. During one of his sermons, the Buddhist
pointed to flame of a lamp, saying it was passing through a cycle of
rebirth and death. Then he blew out the flame and said “ The flame is now
extinguished. It will not burn any longer. The same is the case with an
Arhat who attains nirvana (lit. extinction) for he will be born no more”.
Nirvana has a secondary
meaning when it stands for the extinction of the springs of action:
craving, hatred, delusion (moha), or their opposites.
Nirvana, the ideal, requires constant spiritual
exercise and contemplation. Before soaring into the subtle regions of
thought, the yogin or the spiritual aspirant cultivates the four noble
sentiments, Brahmaviharas, which give a foretaste of life in the Brahma
world. Metta or universal love, karuna or compassion,
mudita or sympathetic joy and upekkha or equanimity are the
four sentiments which know no bounds of time, space or class. The Buddha
imbued the robber Angulimala’s mind with metta and the robber was
converted into a spiritual wayfarer. When your fellow beings are in
misery, you must feel compassion for them and when they are happy you must
feel happiness. These feelings are not restricted to mankind alone but
cover all beings, past, present, future, whether of this world or of other
worlds. Equanimity should be so real that you should feel the same towards
a man who besmears your arm with sandal paste and one who hacks your other
arm with an axe. Universal love and equanimity are also regarded as the
perfections (paramitas) of the Bodhisattva.
The code of morality of the Buddhist is mainly founded
on the Buddha’s word, while the Buddha himself repeatedly says that the
Dharma is ancient and passed on by the rishis or holy men from age
to age. The rules of conduct for the monks and nuns are definite and are
given in the Book of Discipline. The ideal of the monastic order is
nirvana while that of lay devotees, or worldly folk, is rebirth in a
higher heaven. They perform meritorious acts, give charities to monks,
Brahmins and the indigent people, worship their ancestors and observe
fasts four times every month. The lay devotees take the vow to follow the
five commandments (silas) throughout their lives. They are
forbidden to deprive any animal of its life, to take what is not given, to
tell falsehood, to commit adultery and to use intoxicants. For days when
fasts are to be observed, there are three additional prohibitions.
The Buddha disapproved of superstitious rites
ceremonies and degrading ascetic practices. He strove to remove caste
distinctions:
One does not become a Brahmin by birth.
One does not become an outcast by birth.
One becomes a Brahmin by act.
One becomes an outcast by act.
The Buddha condemned violence against others in any
form whatsoever. Sacrifices in which animals –and sometimes human beings –
were killed and battles in which men were put to the sword were condemned
by him. Forbearance, according to him, was a greater virtue than the
exercise of the martial spirit. He wanted every man to be virtuous and
wise and not only chosen few. He preached the dharma for the welfare and
happiness of everyman (bahujana). He said, “O, monks, go on around
for alms to different places. Don’t go twain to the same place to preach
the Dharma.” He used the mother tongue of the people for his sermons
instead of an artificial language understood only by the learned few. The
Buddha’s religion is not dogmatic and elaborate system of rites, rules or
prayers but a way of life, of purity in thinking, speaking and acting. The
Buddha was the first rationalist of the world who asserted that one was
one’s own saviour and master without references to any outside power.
