Historical Overview the Context out of Which Buddhism Emerged
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Chapter 1 HISTORICAL OVERVIEW The Context out of which Buddhism Emerged The Brahmanical World took the particlar shape that it did. In order to understand the Buddha’s teachings, we The founder of Buddhism, Siddhartha must, in a sense, acquaint ourselves with the Gautama, was by birth what we would now basic religious and philosophical vocabulary call a “Hindu,” and although Siddhartha was of the time. highly critical of the religion into which he The dominant religious system in the north- was born, and although the movement that he ern Indian world into which the Buddha was founded broke with this dominant religious born is often called Brahmanism—the word tradition in significant ways, Buddhism did “Hinduism” is a foreign label describing the not emerge from a religious vacuum. Indeed, diverse religious culture of India, first used by it is important to recognize that Buddhism Arab traders in the eighteenth century—a reli- was at the start very much a reform move- gion based on a body of texts called the Vedas ment from within Hinduism. It is thus essen- that had developed orally beginning around tial to understand something of the social 1500 b.c.e.; this religious tradition is thus and religious world of sixth-century-b.c.e. sometimes also called the Vedic tradition. The India in order to understand the Buddha’s Vedic religious world was one inhabited by own religious worldview and why Buddhism numerous gods, or devas—a word related to 1 2 v THE EMERGENCE OF BUDDHISM the English word “divinity”—many of whom themselves as a subset of this general group of were personified forces of nature. Humans, itinerant religious seekers. Also among these although very much at the mercy and whim groups was Mahavira, the founder of another of these powerful beings, could nonethe- new religious tradition, Jainism. less interact with and influence the devas by At about the same time, important social praising them and offering them sacrifices. changes were also in process along the In return, humans received boons from the Gangetic plains in northern India. Kingdoms gods—abundant crops, healthy sons, protec- began to emerge out of the traditional kinship tion, and long lives. structures that had governed social and politi- A new genre of religious discourse began to cal life for centuries, and with these kingdoms emerge out of the Vedic religious world some- emerged cities and highly structured systems of time between the seventh and the fifth centu- government. Furthermore, trade routes began ries b.c.e., a body of doctrines known as the to develop between these cities, and with trade Upanishads. Although they would eventually came both economic growth and the emer- become part of Hinduism, these texts—orally gence of a merchant class. This latter group transmitted, like the Vedas—questioned the is particularly important in the emergence of efficacy of the formal sacrifice and introduced Buddhism, for although they had economic new, essential religious ideas, many of which status, the merchants and traders did not have would eventually be adopted by the Buddha: religious status; the Buddha would offer them the cyclical idea of rebirth (samsara), the ethi- a new religious path that would allow them to cal law of cause and effect (karma), the con- develop that status in part through their mate- cept of liberation (moksha) from the world of rial support of him and his followers. samsara through the path of asceticism, and the importance of calming the mind through meditation (yoga). The Vedic Worldview and As the ideas of the Upanishads began to the Centrality of Sacrifice spread in India, some individuals, mostly men of the educated class, took them to heart, and The Sanskrit word Veda literally means set out to experience the liberation that these “knowledge,” specifically, the specialized, ideas described. To do so, they renounced divinely inspired knowledge contained within their ties to the material world—in order to the verses of these massive texts. It is a knowl- be able to focus on their spiritual pursuits— edge that unlocks the power of the ritual, a and undertook spreading these new ideas knowledge that is, furthermore, the spe- even further, and debating philosophical and cial province of the Vedic priests, known as meditational points. These various religious brahmins. seekers were called shramanas—literally, There are several important aspects of “wanderers”—and the earliest Buddhists saw the Vedas that should be noted at the outset Chapter 1: Historical Overview v 3 here. First, these were said to be revealed texts, from one person to another, and only spe- called shruti—which means “heard”—by the cial persons—brahmin priests—could learn, Hindu tradition. They were said to have not speak, and hear them. been composed, but rather orally revealed The texts that make up the Vedas are a mix- to humans by the gods. The Vedas were ture of hymns of praise, myths, and ritual for- thus authorless, not written but “heard” and mulas. The ritual texts, particularly the group remembered and passed down by the brah- of liturgical texts called Brahmanas, present mins to other brahmins. As such, they were highly elaborate, often intricately detailed considered absolute authority, infallible truth. directions for how to properly perform sacri- Furthermore, they were, and continue to be, fices to the various gods, how many bricks to considered by the Hindu tradition to be eter- use in the altars, what offerings to make and nal, having always existed and forever exist- when and by whom, and so on. Other Vedic ing, and thus were held not only to be perfect, texts, however, are directed to the many gods but also to be, essentially, religious and social who control the cosmos. This, then, is a world imperatives, rules to be followed absolutely. in which the different gods are active forces The Vedas, then, and the brahmins who pro- in human life and, furthermore, in which tected and perpetuated them—and who the actions of these gods can be influenced were the only people who could speak and by proper—or improper, as the case may hear the Vedic verses and perform the Vedic be—ritual performance. The basic goal of the rituals—were the hallmark of Indian religious Vedic rituals was to maintain order—cosmic orthodoxy, and it was precisely this exclusive order among the realm of the devas, and, in and restricted sense of religious practice that a parallel sense, human order. The concept of would be challenged by the Buddha. order is indeed at the very core of the entire Perhaps because the Vedas were exclusively Hindu tradition. oral texts, sound (or vac) was considered to be The religious path expressed by the Vedas the primary creative force in the world, a god is one of “action,” the literal meaning of the (or sometimes goddess) in its own right—it is word karma, and it is most fundamentally a sound that unleashes the power of the sacrifice path concerned with ritual. As such, this is a and also that which reproduces the structure religious worldview concerned not primarily of the world. Hence the Vedas contain verbal with salvation, with what comes after this life, formulas called mantras, which, when recited, but with this world—happiness, health, and were thought to bring about creation. These wealth. Religion, in fact, was understood in formulas were in a language called “Sanskrit” early India to be a kind of work, which when (literally, “well formed”), which was the special properly performed produced worldly bene- language of the sacrifice and which embodied fits. Thus, there is in theVedas an emphasis on the properly constructed cosmos. These verbal sacrificial action, or work, and on the correct formulas were memorized and passed down performance of that action. 4 v THE EMERGENCE OF BUDDHISM The hymns of the Vedas were chiefly com- of sacrifice and making the purification pro- posed for chanting at sacrifices, where animals, cess an entirely internal one. grains, milk, and clarified butter ghee( ) were The sacrificial world of the Vedas was offered to the gods. On the most basic level, extremely complex, involving elaborate prep- sacrifice was conceived of as a meal offered arations to ensure the purity of the ritual to the devas by the humans. The medium of priests, the sacred space, and the sacrificial these offerings was fire, or agni—both in an offerings. The construction of the sacrificial earthly sense (the word “agni” is related to the fire altar, likewise, involved days of careful English word “ignite”) and in a divine sense and exacting preparations. In fact, large por- (Agni was considered the god of fire). Fire was tions of the Vedas consist of highly technical essential to the Vedic religious world because instructions as to how to perform these com- it had tremendous power: It (a) transforms plex rituals. Finally, the sacrifices themselves the physical, material goods offered into would often go on for many days, involving “food” for the gods; (b) purifies the offerings dozens of priests and multiple offerings to made to the gods; (c) represents both creative multiple gods. and destructive energy; and (d) is the very In the early Vedic period, probably begin- basis of human domestic life (without heat ning sometime around 1500 b.c.e., the gods and cooking, there can be no life). Thus Agni were considered to be the creators and pre- was one of the most prominent gods in all of servers of the cosmos, and these devas were the Vedas, the messenger between the human the dominant focus of the religion. Gradually, and the divine realm, the transporter of the as the Vedic worldview developed over several dead, and, in some verses, the embodiment hundred years, the religious emphasis shifted, of all gods.