An Illustrated Outline of Buddhism: The Essentials of Buddhist Spirituality (8 page)

people. Nevertheless, in spite of this precaution, when he was twenty-

nine years old, he came face to face with human suffering. The God

Indra himself appeared before his chariot four times: in the forms of an

old man, a sick man, a dead man, and a monk. The first three symboli-

cal y revealed to him the nature of the world, and in the fourth he saw

a symbol prefiguring a solution. Profoundly concerned with the prob-

lem of suffering and the fragility of earthly happiness, he returned to

his palace a changed man. That very night, in a spirit of renunciation,

he left his sleeping wife and child, taking with him only his charioteer,

Channa, and his horse, Kanthaka. He miraculously passed through the

palace gates which his father had ordered to be locked. When far from

the city, he donned a hermit’s robe and bade Channa take his horse

and fine garments back to the palace. He shaved his head and became

a wandering mendicant.

For six years Siddhārtha Gautama sought a solution. He turned

first to the Hindu ascetics Ārāda Kālāma and Udraka Rāmaputra, but

was not satisfied with their teachings. Then he undertook a long period

of solitary mortification in a forest. He acquired a reputation for sanc-

tity, and five brahmin hermits attached themselves to him. He attained

Opposite page
: Shākyamuni Buddha with scenes from his life, Tibet, 15th century

14

An Illustrated Outline of Buddhism

no enlightenment, however, and final y abandoned his mortification

and began to eat normal y. Thereupon the five hermits were disap-

pointed and left him.

Gautama walked along the banks of the river Nairanjara and, at a

place not far from the city of Gayā, sat down under a pipal tree—the sa-

cred Bodhi-tree (
Ficus religiosa
)
or “Tree of Enlightenment”. He vowed

not to move thence until he had attained enlightenment. He remained

there for some weeks, and was given food by Sujātā, the daughter of a

nearby farmer, who had first mistaken him for a sylvan deity. Māra, the

evil one, came to him, and attacked him with storms, darkness, flood,

and fire. Gautama remained unmoved, and Māra fled. As the day wore

on, his mind became ever clearer, a great peace came over him, and

the significance of all things became apparent. Day and night passed

and, just before dawn, there came perfect knowledge (
bodhi
).
Prince

Siddhārtha Gautama had become
Buddha
, the “Enlightened One”. It

is in this descent of “enlightenment” upon the Buddha—about 531

B.C.—that the Buddhist revelation has its origin. The place where it

occurred was henceforth known as Bodh-Gayā.

The Buddha remained under the Bodhi-tree for forty-nine days,

fearing that the content of his Enlightenment could not be expressed

in words or otherwise conveyed to men. But the God Brahmā himself

descended from Heaven, declared to him that the world left to itself

was lost, and bade him preach to those who wished to be saved. The

Buddha then arose and made his way to Isipatana, the “Deer Park”

at Sārnāth near the holy city of Benares, where he again met the five

brahmin hermits who had deserted him. They had not found libera-

tion through their asceticism and now entreated the radiant and en-

lightened Buddha to instruct them. It was to them that he preached his

famous first sermon, the first “Setting in Motion of the Wheel of the

Law” (
Dharmachakra Pravatana
),1
which included the “Four Noble

Truths” and the “Eightfold Path” (see p. 35). The hermits and others ac-

cepted the Buddha’s teaching and became his followers. Then he made

a return visit to Kapilavastu, where he converted his father, wife, and

son, as well as many members of the court.

For forty-five years, the Buddha preached all over the kingdom

of Māgadha (corresponding approximately to what is now Bihar). His

1 It is said that the “Wheel of the Law” was set in motion three times: in the First Ser-

mon (which gave rise to early or primitive Buddhism), in the origin of the
Mahāyāna
,

and in the origin of the
Vajrayāna
. (See pp. 53-55.)

Life of the Buddha, Origin of Buddhism

15

Mahābodhi Temple, Bodh-Gayā, northern India,

site of the Buddha’s Enlightenment

16

An Illustrated Outline of Buddhism

teaching became known as the
Dharma
(the “Law”).2 He established

an order of monks and an order of nuns, together known as the
Sangha

(the Buddhist community). The legacy of Buddhism is thus tradition-

al y said to consist of the “Three Jewels” (Sanskrit:
Triratna
/Pali:
Tirata-

na
):
the
Buddha
,
the
Dharma
,
and the
Sangha
.
They are also known as the “Three Refuges” (
tri-sharana/ti-sarana
),
in view of the fundamental Buddhist prayer: “I take refuge in the
Buddha
,
the
Dharma
,
and the
Sangha
”.
(See next page.)

From the earliest days—up to present times—the Buddhist com-

munity has been divided into monks (
bhikshus/bhikkus
) and house-

holders (
upāsaka
). The monastic discipline is natural y more strict,

but both monks and householders are subject to the basic tenets and

practices of Buddhism. From a more profound point of view, the fun-

damental spiritual division in Buddhism (as indeed in all religions)

is the one between the “sincere” or total y committed (
āryashrāvaka/

ariyasāvaka
,
literal y “noble hearer”) and the “hypocrite” or less-than-

total y committed (
puthuj ana
).
This “spiritual” distinction completely

cuts across the merely “social” distinction between monk and layman.3

The Buddhist Scriptures are voluminous and record the teach-

ings—sermons, sayings, and actions—of the Buddha. The earliest

comprehensive recension is the Pali Canon (Pali being a North Indian

language related to Sanskrit), which was codified at the First Buddhist

Council in 480 B.C. The Pali Canon is also known as the
Tripitaka/

Tipitaka
(the “Three Baskets”) and comprises the
Vinaya Pitaka
(the

“Discipline Basket”), the
Sutta Pitaka
(the “Instruction Basket”), and

the
Abhidhamma Pitaka
(the “Metaphysical Basket”).

The source of these Scriptures was the prodigious memory of the

Buddha’s closest disciples: Upāli’s recall was the source of the
Vinaya

Pitaka
and Ānanda’s was the source of the
Sutta Pitaka.
The long
Sutta

Pitaka
is
divided into five “groups” or
nikāya
s:
Dīgha
,
Maj hima
,
Samyutta
,
Anguttara
,
and
Khuddaka
.
The
Khuddaka-Nikāya
includes the well-known treatise, the
Dhammapada
or “Footprints of the Law”.

Essential y the same canon also exists in Sanskrit, as do impor-

tant later Scriptures, pertaining particularly to
Mahāyāna
Buddhism,

such as the
Prajñā-Pāramitā-Sūtra
(the “Supreme Wisdom Sūtra”), the

2
Dharma
also has the meanings of “inner law”, “vocation”, “true nature”, “primordial

norm”.

3 See
Divine Revelation in Pali Buddhism
by Peter Masefield, chap. 1 (London: Allen & Unwin; Colombo: Sri Lanka Institute of Traditional Studies, 1986).