Gautama Buddha Not to be confused with Budha, a deity and personifica- tion of the planet Mercury in Hinduism. For Buddhist's title, see Buddha (title). “Buddha”and “Gautama”redirect here. For other uses, see Buddha (disambiguation) and Gautama (dis- ambiguation). Gautama Buddha, also known as Siddhārtha Gau- tama, Shakyamuni,*[note 3] or simply the Buddha, was a sage*[3] on whose teachings Buddhism was founded.*[web 2] He is believed to have lived and taught mostly in the eastern part of the Indian subcon- tinent sometime between the sixth and fourth centuries BCE.*[4]*[note 4] Ancient kingdoms and cities of India during the time of the Bud- The word Buddha means “awakened one”or “the dha. enlightened one”. “Buddha”is also used as a title for the first awakened being in a Yuga era. In most Buddhist traditions, Siddhartha Gautama is regarded as Pakudha Kaccāyana, and Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta, whose the Supreme Buddha (Pali sammāsambuddha, Sanskrit viewpoints the Buddha most certainly must have been ac- samyaksaṃbuddha) of the present age.*[note 5] Gautama quainted with and influenced by.*[8]*[9]*[note 6] Indeed, taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and the Sariputta and Moggallāna, two of the foremost disciples severe asceticism found in the śramaṇa movement*[5] of the Buddha, were formerly the foremost disciples of common in his region. He later taught throughout regions Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta, the skeptic.*[10] There is also ev- of eastern India such as Magadha and Kosala.*[4]*[6] idence to suggest that the two masters, Alara Kalama and Uddaka Ramaputta, were indeed historical figures and Gautama is the primary figure in Buddhism and accounts they most probably taught Buddha two different forms of of his life, discourses, and monastic rules are believed meditative techniques.*[11] While the general sequence by Buddhists to have been summarized after his death of“birth, maturity, renunciation, search, awakening and and memorized by his followers. Various collections of liberation, teaching, death”is widely accepted,*[12] there teachings attributed to him were passed down by oral is less consensus on the veracity of many details contained tradition and first committed to writing about 400 years in traditional biographies.*[13]*[14] later. The times of Gautama's birth and death are uncer- tain. Most historians in the early 20th century dated his lifetime as circa 563 BCE to 483 BCE.*[1]*[15] 1 Historical Siddhārtha Gautama More recently his death is dated later, between 411 and 400 BCE, while at a symposium on this ques- * * * Scholars are hesitant to make unqualified claims about tion held in 1988, [16] [17] [18] the majority of those the historical facts of the Buddha's life. Most accept who presented definite opinions gave dates within 20 years either side of 400 BCE for the Buddha's that he lived, taught and founded a monastic order dur- * * * ing the Mahajanapada era during the reign of Bimbisara, death. [1] [19] [note 4] These alternative chronologies, however, have not yet been accepted by all histori- the ruler of the Magadha empire, and died during the * * * early years of the reign of Ajasattu, who was the succes- ans. [24] [25] [note 7] and that several Yaksha-shrines, where trees were worshipped, were converted into Bud- sor of Bimbisara, thus making him a younger contem- * porary of Mahavira, the Jain tirthankara.*[7] Apart from dhist holy places. [26]</ref> the Vedic Brahmins, the Buddha's lifetime coincided with The evidence of the early texts suggests that Siddhārtha the flourishing of other influential śramaṇa schools of Gautama was born into the Shakya clan, a community thoughts like Ājīvika, Cārvāka, Jainism, and Ajñana. It that was on the periphery, both geographically and cultur- was also the age of influential thinkers like Mahavira, ally, of the eastern Indian subcontinent in the 5th century Pūraṇa Kassapa, Makkhali Gosāla, Ajita Kesakambalī, BCE.*[27] It was either a small republic, in which case his 1 2 2 TRADITIONAL BIOGRAPHIES father was an elected chieftain, or an oligarchy, in which case his father was an oligarch.*[27] According to the Buddhist tradition, Gautama was born in Lumbini, nowa- days in modern-day Nepal, and raised in the Shakya cap- ital of Kapilvastu, which may have been in either present day Tilaurakot, Nepal or Piprahwa, India.*[note 1] • Warder: “The Buddha [...] was born in the Sakya Republic, which was the city state of Kapilavastu, a very small state just inside the modern state bound- ary of Nepal against the Northern Indian fron- tier.*[4] • Walsh: “He belonged to the Sakya clan dwelling on the edge of the Himalayas, his actual birthplace being a few miles north of the present-day North- ern Indian border, in Nepal. His father was in fact an elected chief of the clan rather than the king he was later made out to be, though his title was raja – a term which only partly corresponds to our word 'king'. Some of the states of North India at that time were kingdoms and others republics, and the Sakyan republic was subject to the powerful king of neigh- Buddha by Otgonbayar Ershuu bouring Kosala, which lay to the south”.*[34] 2 Traditional biographies • The exact location of ancient Kapilavastu is un- * known. [33] It may have been either Piprahwa in 2.1 Biographical sources Uttar Pradesh, northern India,*[35]*[36]*[37] or Tilaurakot,*[38] present-day Nepal.*[39]*[33] The two cities are located only fifteen miles from each The sources for the life of Siddhārtha Gautama are a vari- other.*[39] ety of different, and sometimes conflicting, traditional bi- ographies. These include the Buddhacarita, Lalitavistara Sūtra, Mahāvastu, and the Nidānakathā.*[41] Of these, the Buddhacarita*[42]*[43]*[44] is the earliest full bi- See also Conception and birth and Birthplace ography, an epic poem written by the poet Aśvaghoṣa, Sources</ref> He obtained his enlightenment in and dating around the beginning of the 2nd century Bodh Gaya, gave his first sermon in Sarnath, and died in CE.*[41] The Lalitavistara Sūtra is the next oldest bi- Kushinagar. ography, a Mahāyāna/Sarvāstivāda biography dating to * No written records about Gautama have been found from the 3rd century CE. [45] The Mahāvastu from the his lifetime or some centuries thereafter. One Edict of Mahāsāṃghika Lokottaravāda tradition is another ma- jor biography, composed incrementally until perhaps the Asoka, who reigned from circa 269 BCE to 232 BCE, * commemorates the Emperor's pilgrimage to the Buddha's 4th century CE. [45] The Dharmaguptaka biography of the Buddha is the most exhaustive, and is entitled the birthplace in Lumbini. Another one of his edicts men- * tions several Dhamma texts, establishing the existence Abhiniṣkramaṇa Sūtra, [46] and various Chinese trans- of a written Buddhist tradition at least by the time of lations of this date between the 3rd and 6th century the Maurya era and which may be the precursors of the CE. The Nidānakathā is from the Theravada tradition * * in Sri Lanka and was composed in the 5th century by Pāli Canon. [40] [note 8] The oldest surviving Buddhist * manuscripts are the Gandhāran Buddhist texts, reported Buddhaghoṣa. [47] to have been found in or around Haḍḍa near Jalalabad From canonical sources, the Jataka tales, the Maha- in eastern Afghanistan and now preserved in the British padana Sutta (DN 14), and the Achariyabhuta Sutta (MN Library. They are written in the Gāndhārī language 123) which include selective accounts that may be older, using the Kharosthi script on twenty-seven birch bark but are not full biographies. The Jātakas retell previous manuscripts and date from the first century BCE to the lives of Gautama as a bodhisattva, and the first collec- third century CE.*[web 9] tion of these can be dated among the earliest Buddhist 3 texts.*[48] The Mahāpadāna Sutta and Achariyabhuta Andrew Skilton writes that the Buddha was never histori- Sutta both recount miraculous events surrounding Gau- cally regarded by Buddhist traditions as being merely hu- tama's birth, such as the bodhisattva's descent from the man: Tuṣita Heaven into his mother's womb. It is important to stress that, despite mod- ern Theravada teachings to the contrary (often 2.2 Nature of traditional depictions a sop to skeptical Western pupils), he was never seen as being merely human. For instance, he is often described as having the thirty-two major and eighty minor marks or signs of a mahāpuruṣa, “superman"; the Buddha him- self denied that he was either a man or a god; and in the Mahāparinibbāna Sutta he states that he could live for an aeon were he asked to do so.*[52] The ancient Indians were generally unconcerned with chronologies, being more focused on philosophy. Bud- dhist texts reflect this tendency, providing a clearer pic- ture of what Gautama may have taught than of the dates Māyā miraculously giving birth to Siddhārtha. Sanskrit, palm- of the events in his life. These texts contain descrip- leaf manuscript. Nālandā, Bihar, India. Pāla period tions of the culture and daily life of ancient India which can be corroborated from the Jain scriptures, and make In the earliest Buddhists texts, the nikāyas and āgamas, the Buddha's time the earliest period in Indian history the Buddha is not depicted as possessing omniscience for which significant accounts exist.*[53] British author (sabbaññu) *[49] nor is he depicted as being an eternal Karen Armstrong writes that although there is very lit- transcendent (lokottara) being. According to Bhikkhu tle information that can be considered historically sound, Analayo, ideas of the