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Buddhist Tradition Series

The Historical Buddha

The Times, Life and Teachings of the Founder of Buddhism

H.W. SC

No m an has had a greater in flu ence on the spirjtual developm en t o f his p eop le than S id d h arth a G autam a. B orn in India in the sixth century B C into a nation hungry for s p ir itu a l e x p e r ie n c e , h e d e v e lo p e d a religious an d m oral teach ing that, to this day, brings com fort and p eace to all who practise it. H a v in g im m e r s e d h im s e lf in th e asceticism an d self-deprivation prevalen t a m o n g re lig io u s te a c h e rs, h e saw th at spiritual em ancipation could be achieved only th rough the m ind. H is eightfold path for right living is a m eans to liberation from su fferin g and form s the basis o f B uddhist hum anism . T h is c o m p re h e n s iv e b io g ra p h y e x a ­ m ines the social, religiou s and political conditions that gave rise to Buddhism as we now know it. It exp lo res the spiritual traditions fro m which B u d d h a broke away and places his teachings an d in flu en ce in a thoroughly researched historical context.

H .W . S c h u m a n n s t u d ie d I n d o lo g y , c o m p a r a tiv e r e lig io n s a n d s o c ia l a n th ro p o lo g y at B o n n U n iv e rs ity a n d e a rn e d his Ph.D d e g re e fo r a thesis on B ud dh ist philosophy. H e lectured at the H indu U niversity in B en aras, In dia, jo in e d th e F o r e ig n S e r v ic e s o f th e F e d e r a l R e p u b lic o f G e r m a n y a n d s e r v e d in consular and diplom atic capacities at the W est G e r m a n m is s io n s in K o lk a t a , R angoon, C hicago an d C olom b o. H e was incharge o f the In d ia desk at the G erm an F oreign O ffice and retired as the ConsulG e n e r a l o f th e F e d e r a l R e p u b lic o f G erm any in M um bai. D r. Sch um ann who, d u rin g his twenty years in Asia, visited all the p laces related to the life o f the B u d d h a , le c tu r e d on B ud dh ism at B o n n University. H e is the auth or o f n in e books on B ud dh ism which were translated into Five languages.

...written in simple language that makes it easy fo r even a lay reader to comprehend the B uddha’s Doctrine. The Buddlia according to Schum ann, who relies heavily on the P a li Canon, "is viewed no longer as c: holy man floating in the air... but as a worldly-wise organiser who knew hoiv to exploit political situations with tactical shill." Certain myths are also cleared, as fo r example, thefact that behind a llsukkha is United dukkha did not strike him just before he adopted the homeless life as legend has it. The book a n d its fe w illustrations is a comprehensive biography examining the social, religious and political conditions that gave rise to Buddhism. — T h e A ftern o o n , M um bai

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3qdf=bdH»Mlj4)'il y tlie Ceylon chronicles, is significant nol merely as hieing in the middle h>ui as being supported by two further, somewhat com plicated calcula­ tions, hjased on South Indian and Singhalese king-lisis, the date o fth e conversion o f C eylon, and also on scattered references to a very ancient system o f dating, only fragm entarily preserved, which is based on 483 as ihie year o fth e Parinibbana. We are thus justified in dating the Buddha's birth with the chronicles in 563 b c , admitting, however, on the basis o f other historical evidence, the possibility o f error o f from plus five to minus nine years. The proljabilily o f an earlier date is slightly higher since it is supported by two methods (b and c), while a later date is supported by only one (d). T H E C I 1Y O F K A P I L A V A T T H U A N D I I S R A JA I f young Siddhattha looked out northwards, he saw a jagged range o f mountains on the horizon. This was, as he knew, about eight yojanas {80 kilometres) distant, but it was difficult lo reach, for K apilavatth u was separated from the mountains t)y a tract o f reeds and jungle in whicli roamed tigers, elephants and rhinoceros, and many men who had ventured to cross this wild forest had died o f fever. But if one succeeded in passing this obstacle the ground rose steadily, and one came to the wooded hills. Behind the foothills •; today Sivalik or C huria) there was a green valley, and behind thal again mountains (the M aliab h arata R an ge), some peaks o f which could be seen from K apilavatth u. Behind these, it was said, came still more and even higher mountains - the Him avat (H im alayas), whose mighty icepeaks reached the sky, and there Ja m b u d ip a , the Rose-Apple C onti­ nent, cam e to an end. T h e prospect to the east was less forbidding. T h ere lay LumbinT, where he, Siddhattha, liad been born under a tree, and beyond that lay D evadaha, where hiis mother, M ay a , whom lie had never known, and M other Pajapati, came from, and where grandfather A njana had lived. From D evadaha one could travel a few days’ journey towards sunrise, but then there was forest again and things became

dangerous. There were dark-skinned hunters roam ing there who spoke a language one could not understand. T o the west was quite dillereni. T h ere there was the road to Setavya and Savatthi and beyond, and in Savatth i lived the king o f whom father Suddhodana often spoke, and before whom one had to do aiijali and a profound obeisance. T he king had a large arm y, individual companies o f which sometimes came to K apilavatth u, where they were m ade welcome. You could travel safely to Savatth i: ihe king’s soldiers took good care to see that the caravans o f ox-carts which carried all kinds o f goods back and forth were not molested by robbers. Often columns o f carts from Savatthi passed by, scarcely halting in K apilavatth u, but continuing along the road to the .south-east towards Kusinara and Vesali and finally across the (ranges to Pataligiima and on to R a ja g a ­ ha, where there dwelt another mighty king. Siddhattha had heard lhai anyone who wanted to could get on a boat in Pataligam a, and sail for several days up the Ganges to V aranasi i Benares) and P ayaga (Allahabad). When he grew up he would visit all these and many other cities, in order to tell people about (hem. Bui whenever he described such plans to his father, Suddhodana only laughed and shook his head, saying a Sakiya was not supposed lo wander about in ihe world like a homeless pnribbajaka, or an oxherd or a merchant, but as a khattiva farm er he should till the land and practise the profession o f arms, in order one day to be elected R aja like he. Suddhodana, himself. And his father would point to the fields round about, between which stood groups o f sal trees, and to the city o f K apilavatth u standing there in the sun with its ‘ palace’ and its clay houses and bam boo huts in the heat-shimmering air. Which modern site corresponds to the original K apilavatthu is still a matter o f discussion by archaeologists. T h e Chinese pilgrim Fahsien, who visited the Buddhist sites in India between a d 399 and 4 14 , makes statements which seem lo point to the ruins by the modern Piprava, on Indian soil, 12 kilometres south o f Lum bini. His compatriot Hsiian-tsang, who visited the Buddha’s lands some two centuries Ialer (629-645) in search o f the sacred scriptures, gives distances and indications o f direction which point to the ruins at Tilaurakot in the kingdom o f N epal, 24 kilometres norlh-west o f

l.um bini. T lie Indian-N epalese hx»rder runs between these two points. T h ey are 16 kilometres apart, but thie landscape is similar in both. T h e deh.>ate ahjout the Buddha’ s home town is not entirely Iree from national prejudices. Nepalese scholars arguing for Tilaurakot stress the extent o fth e ruins, and the existence o f an ancient wall with a moat surrounding Tilaurakot: features which only a ra ja ’s capital city would possess. T h ey point out thiat Tilaurakot, like the K a p ila v a t­ thu o fth e Buddhist texts, lay on a river (the bed o f which has since shifted 400 m to the north-west). In order to stress their claim to possess the historical K apilavatthu, the Nepalese government in 1961 ‘ renam ed’ T ilaurakot and the entire surrounding district K apilavastu (the Sanskrit form o f Kapilavatthu), so that the place appears under this name on recent maps. Indian archaeologists, on the other hand, maintain that K a p ila v a t­ thu is identical with the Indian Piprava, basing their claim on the following discoveries: In 1898, in a brick stupa near Piprava, live vessels were discovered, one o f whiich is described in an inscription in BrahmT script, in the M agad h i language, as the ‘urn o f the Exalted Buddha from the tribe o fth e Sakiyas’ . T h e urn contained ashes and tiny votive offer­ ings. In 19 72, Ijehow this stupa, at a level ascribed to the fifth century a still older stupa was found with two further urns, containing ten or twelve fragments o f bones (of the Buddha?).

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In 19 7 3 -4 , in a monastery ruin o f the first or second century a d in Piprava were found various terracotta panels bearing a variety o f inscriptions which make reference to the ‘monastery o f K a p ilava t­ thu’ or o f ‘Great K ap ilavatth u ’ , and a pot-lid found there bears sim ilar wording. In 19 7 5 -6 , finally, one kilometre south-west o f Piprava, at a place called G an w aria, the remains o f an old building com plex were found which could be interpreted as the ‘ palace’ o f the Sakiya R a ja . Although the inscribed urn o f Piprava found in 1898 - a 15 3 mm-

Tilaurakot in Nepal, Old Kapilavatthu ( = Kapilavatthu 1).

highi steatite vessel withi an inscribed lid - really seems to contain ashes o fth e Buddha, thie Piprava and G an w aria discoveries do not prove incontrovertih)ly iltat Piprava is identical vvitlt ihe Buddha's home town. We prol>ah>i\ liave to distinguish) Old K apilavatth u, ihe scene o f S idd haith a’s youth, and New K apilavatth u. Since V id ud a­ bha, K in g o f K osala, conquered the Sakiyans during the Buddha’s lifetime and destroyed Old K apilavatth u (Tilaurakot), the prohjability is thiat the surviving Sakiyans who fled from Old K apilavatth u later settled at the modern Piprava and there established a New K apilavatth u (or G reat K apilavatth u), where after the Buddhia’s death they buried hiis relics. Certainty aljout the location o f S id d h ai­ tha’s hiome town can only be expected from future excavations. Above all, Tilaurakot needs to h>e more thoroughly investigated. It is possible that aerial archaeology, which has not yet been attempted, might provide important clues. We are well informed aljoui die adm inistrative structure o f the Sakiya republic which) was ruled from K apilavatth u. When the halfbrothers Siddhatthia and Nanda were bom . their father Suddhodana was, as stated, the elected raja who ruled the republic’s territory. How long he had held ihe office is not known, but il is clear that he retained it for several decades: wlien Siddhattha revisited his hiome at the age o f thirty-six, hiis lather was slill in office. As the raja was elected from the w arrior and ministerial nobility, it is to be assumed that such elections did not take place at fixed intervals, but as required, either because the old raja no longer performed his duties satisfactorily, or because ihe K in g o f K osala, thie overlord o f the Sakiya republic, wanted to put a new man in his place. It is certain that the raja, once elected, could only take up hiis post if the K in g o f K osala gave his consent. Thus thi»- Sakiyan raja was alw ays a man in the K in g ’s confidence - a factor which opened many doors for his sons and which was to play a pari subsequently in the success o f Siddhattha’s mission. Unlike in the LicchavT republic, where three rajas ruled jointly, Suddhiodana ruled alone, but not autocratically, since all questions of consequence were dohmted in the council o f the republic. T h e sessions in ihe council hall, which was open on all sides, could be listened to by all castes, though only male members o f the w arrior caste were

allowed to speak, and, therefore, to take an active part in decision­ making. T h ey were therefore called ‘ rulers’ (rajana). There was no voting in ancient India, because the idea that a m ajority could by mere numerical superiority bind a minority o f different opinion to a decision had not yet occurred to people. Discussion simply continued until, whether through conviction or through exhaustion, the opposi­ tion gave in and a consensus was reached. In order lo achieve such unanim ity the raja, as president o fth e council, had to possess consider­ able speaking ability and persuasive powers - characteristics which Suddhodana must have possessed to a high degree and which his son Siddhattha inherited. We can gain an idea o f the size o f the area ruled over by Su d ­ dhodana fronr the Chinese Hsiian-tsang. Me tells us thai the Sakiya region had a circumference o f 4,000 li (about 1880 km) and included ten cities - which the sevenih-cen 11117 traveller found destroyed and deserted. T h e city o f K apilavatth u, he says, was guarded by a wall, the brick foundations o f which were still visible, o f 15 li (about 7 km) in length. A pparently these ten cities must be largely identical with the nine that are described in Buddhist texts as Sakiyan cities: apart from K apilavatth u itself, D evadaha, C atum a, Sam agam a, Khornadussa, Silavatl, M edatalum pa, U lum pa and Sakkara. T h ey were probably regional capitals, each serving as a market and trading centre for a number o f villages. H siian-tsang’s statements enable us, at least very roughly, to draw some conclusions about the area and population o f the Sakiyan republic. Its area may have been about a,000 square kilometres, of which a considerable part consisted o f jungle and was unused for agriculture. I f we assume lor the fertile area o f Central T a ra i working back from a higher figure at the present day - an average population density o f 90 per square kilometre, this gives a total population o f 180,000, o f whom 8,000 will have lived in K apilavatthu and 4,000 in each o f the eight or nine provincial cities. Thus about 40,000 inhabitants o f the Sakiyan republic were town-dwellers, and the remaining 140,000 villagers. T he w arrior nobility may have numbered about 10,000, most o f whom lived in the cities but, like the m ajority o f the population, practised agriculture. T h e least popular o f the ra ja ’s duties was the collection o f taxes,

the extent o f which is unknown. T h e peasants, who used barter among themselves and hardly knew money, had to pay their contribu­ tion in kind, mostly in rice, to special tax-gatherers who also had to provide storehouses and arrange for sale in the cities. T h e tax on the peasants depended on the success o f the harvest, which was established by assessors: the later Indian theory o f taxation, according to which all land belonged to the K in g who levied rent for its use by others, had not yet arisen. W herever possible, taxes were collected not in kind but in money. As there were 110 state-minted coins yet, the currency consisted o f square silver, bronze or copper pieces valued at subdivisions or the kahapana. A milch-cow was worth eight to twelve kahapanas. T he kahapana was divided into 4 padas='ZO masukas. Sm aller sums were reckoned in cowrie-shells. T h e coins bore the hallmark o f a private banker who, as issuer, guaranteed the correct weight and promised to repay the face value in goods. He also did more business as a moneylender. No wonder the bankers became the most influential men in the community. We do not know what share o f the taxes Suddhodana had lo pay over to his overlord in Savatth i, i'ie K in g o f Kosala. Since the income from taxation varied with the harvest, il was probably not a fixed amount. It is also possible that the K in g o f K osala was satisfied with presents which the Sakiya republic sent him from time to time as a mark ofsubservience. O ther duties of the raja included public works such as the building o f roads, caravan-stations, water-tanks, and the provision o f dams and wells..As there were 110 volunteers for such work, all able-bodied men, and especially the artisans with their useful qualifications, were compelled lo give labour (rajakariya). These public works were planned and directed by engineers who were paid a salary by the raja out o f taxes. T h e establishment o f parks, dam s and cisterns was later included by the Buddha in the list o f ethically meritorious activities which would lead to a good rebirth (S N 1.47). In addition to these internal activities, R a ja Suddhodana had to be active in the diplom atic field on two fronts. In particular he had to maintain contact with the K in g of K osala in Savatthi, the overlord over the Sakiya republic. It was necessary to retain the king’s goodwill

and trust towards thie small republic whiile at thie same time keeping liim at a distance so that the semi-independence enjoyed h)y thie republic was preserved. Suddhodana must often hiave travelled to Savatth i, where sometimes conferences o f rajas look place. While the state policy o f Kosala, ihe concluding o f alliances and the waging of wars, was in the hands o f ihe king, the rajas o f ihe republics and tribes were in charge o f ‘good neighbour’ policy. This was the second branch o f Suddhiodana’s diplom atic activity. Th e ohjject was to come to arrangem ents with the immediate neighbours without sacrificing their own essential interests. T h e most common problems were the regulation of pasture and irrigation rights along the frontiers. The ra ja ’s skill was tested by his ability to effect satisfac­ tory agreed solutions. W arfare was not among the functions o f the raja. He had to m aintain peace, h>ul if lie failed in this and armed conflict broke out, this was conducted by the military com mander or general (senapati), who held a post independent o fth e raja. In the kingdom o f K osala all the generals, the com m ander o f ihe central forces as well as those in the republics and tril>es, wen- under the direct command o f the king. In this way the king prevented any o f hiis subject rajas combining wilhi ‘ their’ generals to play power-politics on their own. For the rajas this separation o f political and m ilitary power had two aspects. On ihe one hand they knew thiat llie king had, in the person o f tlie general, an ever-present means o f com pelling them to do his bidding. On the other hand, they were also protected against any attempts at a Putsch on the part o fth e general, because the king would never liavr tolerated the deposition o f a raja hie had appointed and the seizure o f political power by the general. Another field o f activity for R a ja Suddhodana was that o f justice, in both criminal and important civil actions. We have no direct information about how criminals were seized and what form a trial took among the Sakiyas, but we can draw conclusions from the republics o f the K oliyas and the M allas, which adjoined the Sakiyan republic to the south-east. These had a police, force whose members were distinguished l>y a special w ay o f wearing their hair, and who were notorious for arhiitrary brutality and corruption. T h e process o f U w am ong the Sakiyas was probably little different

from that customary in the V ajjian federation. Here, the basis o f jurisdiction was a (written?) code, which presum ably consisted o f maxims or exem plary ease decisions. Legal experts attended every trial and made sure the proceedings were in accordance with this code. T h e interests o f the parties, or o f the accused, were taken care o f by advocates or defence counsel, and the case was decided by one or more judges. A ppeals were lodged with the parliam ent, the general, the vice-raja (who does not seem to have existed am ong the Sakiyas), and the raja. It is assumed that the entire process took place in a single session, and that the raja, as the highest local resort, pro­ nounced the final judgement. T h e raja could not pass a death sentence: this was reserved to the overlord in Savatthi.

S ID D H A T T H A , T H K R A JA ’ S SO N T h at the sons o f R a ja Suddhodana enjoyed a privileged position in K apilavatth u because o f their father’s position, goes without saying. Whereas the m ajority o f the population lived in houses o f clay or huts o f bam boo and reeds, which in the lower-lying parts o f the city were built on piles lo avoid Hooding in the monsoon and the invasion o f rats, snakes and scorpions, the raja’s sons lived in their father's house which, because it was o f several storeys, was called ‘ the Palace’ . 11 was probably built o f brick, stood on a slight eminence and was surrounded by a low wall o f earth which denoted the raja’s private defensive zone. N earby was a pond with blue, red and white lotuses. In Suddhodana’s house the variations o f climate due to the three Indian seasons (winter, summer, rainy season) were met by the seasonal change o f slceping-quarters: in the summer they slept on the roof-terrace. Even the numerous servants in the ra ja ’s house had quite a good life. Instead o f the usual servants’ food o f broken rice and rice soup they got full-grained rice and even m eal (A N 3.39). A m ong the children o f K ap ilavailh u the young Siddhatlha stood out: he was better cared for and turned oul than the others. His clothes were of Benares cloth, and at least in his early days he was continually surrounded by servants and by a nurse. In his own words he was ‘spoilt, very spoilt’ . The Pilli Canon provides (D N 1.1 .1 4 ) a list o f ancient Indian

children’s games. We can picture the young Siddhattha playipg with his half-brother N anda at the eight- or ten-square game (chess? draughts?), or jum ping with other boys over squares marked on the ground. O ther favourite games were jackstraws, hitting sticks, and playing with toy ploughs, carriages and bows. O lder boys could also amuse themselves with guessing thoughts and recognizing letters written in the air or on the guesser’s back: this o f course meant that the player in question knew how to read. W hether Siddhattha could read is uncertain. A later legend indeed tells how' he astonished his teacher by the case with which he mastered the Indian alphabets, but in fact the Pali Canon gives no indication that the Buddha was literate. T h e ability to read was in his day considered a useful accomplishment, but not one that formed part o f elementary education. Th is was especially the case because, owing to the lack of suitable writing m aterial, there were no written books, the only written documents being notices and agreements carved on stone or wood. W riting, literally scratching (lekhd] was considered an art (Sv 2 .2 .1) which was almost alw ays practised as a profession. T h e attitude o f the grown-up Siddhattha appears from his declaration (Ud 3.9) that the acquisition o f skills such as writing was not suitable for a monk, who should be solely concerned with liberation. On the basis o f Siddhattha's lifelong interest in matters intellectual and spiritual, we can assume that the acquisition o f such learning as was required for a youthful khailiya came easily to him. His education was greatly aided by his frequent presence at council meetings and cqurt cases, at which his father presided. T h e council cham ber helped to train his intelligence and teach him skill and accuracy in ex­ pression. However, his intellectual development was accom panied by that o f other qualities which probably worried his 'realistic’ father as being apparent sigtis o f weakness. These included sensitivity and a leaning towards reflection, perhaps even brooding. T h e realization that life was not always pleasant, and that behind all happiness (sukha) there lurk iransitoriness and sorrow (dukkha) did not strike Siddhattha for the first time just before he adopted the homeless life (as legend would have it;, but befell him already as a youth, while he was still living, free from outward sorrows, in the bosom o f the family:

'I lived a spoilt, a very spoilt life, monks (in my parents’ home). And, monks, in the midst o f that happy life the thought came to me: “ T ru ly , the simple worldling, who is him self subject to old age, is disgusted when he sees an old man. But I too am subject to old age and cannot escape it.” At this thought, monks, all delight in my youth left me. “ T ru ly , the simple worldling, who is himself subject to disease, is disgusted when he sees a sick man. But.l too am subject to disease and cannot escape it.” At this thought, monks, all delight in my health left me. “ T ru ly , the simple worldling, who is himself subject to death, is disgusted when he sees a dead man. But I too am subject to death and cannot escape it.” At this thought, monks, all delight in my life left me.’ (A N 3.38) Even in the formal language o f ihe Canon the power o f the initial experience can be genuinely and strongly fell. In a sub-tropical world in which a friend with whom one has just been happily chatting may be suddenly carried o ffb y a fever, killed by the bite o f a krait, or torn in pieces by a tiger, thoughts like those o f the young Siddhattha are never far distant. And in principle they are valid alw ays and every­ where. Another characteristic o f Siddhattha’s appears from the records: his lack o f interest in things m ilitary. E very khattiya boy was expected to be keen on riding, chariot-driving, archery, fencing, wrestling and handling elephants, and no doubt Siddhattha too must have been instructed in these things. Bui to the disappointm ent o f all the G otainas he seems to have been only averagely good ai such activities, which for the son o f the R a ja was rather shameful. Suddhodana nnisl have been quite conccrned at his son’s unworldly and unmilitary ways. When Siddhattha reached the age o f sixteen (in 547 b c ) , Sud­ dhodana decided to bind his over-thoughtful son more firmly to the world h>y m arrying him. O f course it was an arranged m arriage in which the partners were not consulted, but the texts do give an indication thal they were drawn to each other. In accordance with the customs o f endogam y and exogam y, a girl from the wider family

was chosen, a niece o f G otam a’s dead mother and stepmother, the daughter o f his uncle Suppabuddha (or, according to later sources, o f an uncle called D andapani) - in other words, Siddhattha’s cousin. Her name was Bhaddakaccana, but in the Pali texts she is also called BimbadevT, Y asodhara (like Siddhattha's grandm other) and G opa. Some texts simply call her R ahu lam ata ({M other o f R a h u la ’ ). She was the same age as Siddhattha. His prospective father-in-law made difficulties, not wishing to see his daughter married to such an unm ilitary, pensive young man. Siddhat­ tha had to prove that he could stand his ground in skill at arms and sports before he could be trusted to support a family. T h e legend tells o f a contest which was arranged so that Siddhattha might give proof o f his qualities as a w arrior. He passed the test by, allegedly, putting all his opponents in the shade. Thereupon Suppabuddha (or D an­ dapani) overcam e his misgivings and agreed to the wedding. It should not be supposed that the young husband was insensible o f the attractions o f his beautiful wife: he speaks with too much knowledge when, later, he says that there is nothing in the world that binds the spirit o f a man as much as a woman (A N i . i ). But he did not allow sensual pleasures to draw' him aw ay, in the long run, from his contemplation. For whatever reason, the m arriage remained childless for thirteen years. According to Indian custom, the young couple will have lived in the house o f the husband’s father, in R aja Suddhodana’s ‘ palace’ . T he sources do not tell us how he passed his time at this period. Probably Siddhattha assisted his father in his political activities, and took turns with N anda in overseeing the cultivation o f the family fields; he may even have cultivated land o f his own or had this done. In ancient India 75 per cent o f the population lived from agriculture, including the nobility and most o f the Brahmins.

A N A N C I K N T IN D I A N C I T Y Siddhattha was probably not very draw n to.agricultural activity, being by nature a thinker. With him, periods o f retirement alternated with those in which he sought contact with people. T he young Siddhattha must often have wandered around K apilavatth u with his

eyes open, exchanging a few words with a dyer, m aking a remark to an elephant trainer, or greeting a moneylender. T he parables drawn from various trades that we find in his discourses show how sharply and consciously he must have observed the varied activities o f the city. Although we know little about K apilavatth u, we can reconstruct something o f whai it looked like. Literary sources and numerous works o f arl, especially the reliefs o f the Bharahat (Bharhut) stupa give us an impression o f Indian cities in the sixth century b c . T h e cities o f that time generally lay on rivers and had, when the ground permitted, a rectangular form: circular city plans were un­ usual in ancient India. T h e city was surrounded by a moat o f often considerable breadth and depth, which was ted from the river, and which the male youths used for sports and bathing. On the inner side o f the moat the excavated earth was built up to form a ram part, often surmounted by a palisade or a stone wall with a footpath. Every 50 metres, i.e. within bowshot reach o f the next, was a bastion, so that a neighbouring bastion could be cleared by archery o f hostile escalading parties. At the four quarters the wall was pierced by fortified gates. At the centre o f the area enclosed by the wall, which was in principle divided up by a network o f streets at right angles, stood the raja’s ‘ palace’ . The palaces o f some rajas - though not, it seems, that o fS u d d h o d an a - consisted o f five individual houses, three standing parallel to each other, with two long-houses at right angles to them, dosing the ends, so thal the whole complex formed a divided rec­ tangle. O f the two inner courts, one served as a utility yard, while the other was used for pleasure and relaxation. This one was usually planted with trees, and contained a swing with a large seal, suspended from four brass chains, for swinging was a favourite occupation o f Indian ladies. I'he main building was the central structure between the two courtyards. This was usually o f two or even three storeys, each storey being sm aller than the one below, so thal there were open terraces. T h e roof was usually barrel-shaped. Opposite the ‘palace’ was the council hall, open on all sides, actually only a roof supported by columns, and the m ayor’s house. Next cam e the houses o f the officials, i.e. the serving nobility, which

mostly consisted o f four buildings in a square round an inner court­ yard. T h e front portion was used as living-room and sleeping q u ar­ ters, while the other structures housed the kitchen, servants’ quarters and stables. Each o f these houses, which strongly resembled the farmhouse it often still was, was separated from its neighbour by a narrow alley. Th is arrangem ent whereby the officials (who were nearly all o f the w arrior caste) lived close together, created a regular khattiya quarter, naturally interspersed with servants from other castes. T h e cult centre for sacrifices - a m eadow by a town pond with a raised platform as a feeding-place for tjie gods, and three fire-hearths - lay within the city w all, as did the dwellings o f the Brahmins, who lived partly 011 die sacrificial ritual, but m ainly from agriculture. In the M iddle Land, they did not yet enjoy the exaggerated social prestige o f later times, and as a caste ranked second to the w arrior nobles. This was different further west (approxim ately lo the west o f Payaga (A llahabad)), where the Brahm ins had already gained the position o f first caste. Around the bazaar, not far from the better residential quarters, were concentrated the shops and vyorkshops o f the more luxurious and elegant trades, each in its own street: bankers and gold merch­ ants, ivory carvers, clothiers and perfumers, brass and iron merchants, dealers in rice, condiments and sweetmeats. Every branch o f industry, and every trade, was formed into a guild (seni), which exercised extensive regulatory functions. T h e guild decided queslions o f produc­ tion and sale, fixed prices, which even the local raja accepted, took part in the training o f apprentices and even interfered in the domestic differences o f members; if necessary the guild also looked after the widows o f deceased members. T h eir pride showed itself in guild insignia which were carried on the occasion o f public festivities, and also in the fact that the guild banned unworthy members from plying their trade - which often amounted to a sentence o f beggary. All decisions were taken by a guild council, at the head o f which was a guild chairm an (jelthaka, pamukha). A bove him was the guild presi­ dent (se((hi), who represented the interests o f the particular branch o f trade externally. He was usually purveyor to the court, and fre­ quented the raja’s palace.

Thie richest guild was that o f the bankers. T h eir main source o f income cam e from m oneylending, for which there were fixed rates o f interest. A fully secured credit, as for the m arriage and dow ry o f a daughter, cost 15 per cent, an only partially secured credit cost 60 per cent per annum . Com m ercial credits were especially dear owing to the high risks involved. Charges for financing a caravan were up to 120 per cent per annum , and for sea trading up to 240 per cent. T he moneylenders, who belonged almost exclusively to the merchant caste {vessa}, were not very high in the social scale, but in point o f influence they were the leaders. T h eir president usually acted as doyen (makase((hi) o f the local heads o f guilds, and was thus the most important man in the local com mercial com munity. A large house in the city was occupied by a certain lady who is often mentioned in the texts. Prostitutes were common enough in ancient India, and were contemptuously tolerated. But the artistic city courtesan iganika) was viewed with pride. She was not only beautiful and elegant, but also a witty if intriguing wom an who enticed men chiefly through her artistic and literary culture. She was generally kepi by one rich lover, who occasionally changed and sometimes ended up less rich, and she received other gentlemen o f society at her song and dance performances, which were accom panied by a professional orchestra, or at her poetic, contests and conversation parties. Y ou ng men o f the better-off classes learnt good manners and life-style in her salon. No conventionally educated woman o f the time had her command of the various forms o f music, and none was able to converse in the elegant language as she could. Her appearances at weddings and other festivities gave the city acu ltu ral tone. T h e forms o f Indian dancing which have now become classical were partly developed by the town courtesans. We do not know whether K apilavatth u had a town courtesan, but it is probable. T h e names o f the courtesans o f other North Indian cities are known, together with accounts o f some o f their escapades, but also o f their religious foundations. A courtesan could always adopt a bourgeois w ay o f life through m arriage. T h e houses in the central area were solid and well cared for, frequently painted with figures and ornaments, but the further away from the centre, the more this impression changed. In the outer

suburbs (he workers and servanis lived in clay huts and stilled bam boo shelters. T h ey too were grouped according to their trade. There were streets o f carpenters, joiners, carriage-m akers, woodcarvers and instrument-makcrs, melal founders and sionemasons, weavers, dyers, tailors, pollers, lealher-workers and painters, florists and garland-m akers, cattle-dealers and butchers, fishermen and cooks, barbers, balhm en, washermen, and (own attendants. Kach o f the more respectable trades formed a sub-caste (jati) within the system o f the lour castes (vanna). Outside the caste system were the casteless, with whom members o f a caste had no social contact. But the idea o f the ‘ unlouchability’ o f such people had nol yel arisen. This is only referred to in the (centuries later) Jatakas >e.g. Ja t 377). It would be a historical error to interpret the caste system of the sixth century b c in the rigorous lerms o f later ‘ Hinduism ’ . I he Buddha’s contemporaries, especially in ihe M iddle I.atid, where (Inprocess of Brahmini/.aiion had advanced less than in the west, gen­ erally regarded (he casie system as a secular hierarchy o f trades, ranks and piofession.s, and o f education, which could be broken through. Change ol profession, involving the transfer from one subcaste to another, was difficult bill possible, and even ihe ascent inio a higher caste was not mil of the question, for exam ple if the raja took a competent man of lowly descent into his service, or made a rich banker his finance minister. I f one left the city by one of the city gates, which were shut and guarded at nigln, one came, beyond the moat, to the leafy burrows that served as homes lor the very poorest, who probably earned a fraction of a masaka as liiel-gatherers or dung-brick makers, or perhaps found occasional employment cutting the grass in the parks o f the rich. Parks o f this kind were to be found in thu- neighbourhood of every Indian city, and one o f the pleasures of the wealthy was to picnic there, and in summer to enjoy there the relative cool o f evening. For the young Siddhattha, these parks had a .particular attraction, because it was hen- in the shade o f the banyan trees that the w ander­ ing mendicants cam ped. Unkempt and with matted locks, they were often intelligent and subtle adventurers o f the spirit, w ho scorned the sacred hymns o f the V ed a and the Brahmin sacrificial cults, and who

had adopted the homeless life in the search for enlightenment. It was these free-thinking samanas and parihbajakas, who sought lor mystical experience outside traditional forms, that Siddhattha liked to listen to as they philosophized, but the G otam a fam ily, observing with anxiety his unworldliness and his curiosity about the transcendental, tried as far as possible to put a stop to this. When the legend tells us that Suddhodana guarded his son from contact with the world in order lo keep the sight o f suffering from him, the real reason may have been to keep him from ideas o f renouncing the world. T H K V K I) I C S A G R I F I C 1A I. C U l . T No doubt the sacrificial religion o f the sixth century bc: disappointed anyone with serious religious aspirations. T h e divinatory enthusiasm that, a thousand years earlier, had enabled the Indo-A ryan seers 10 hear the wisdom (veda) o f the gods in their own hearts and to turn that which they heard [sruti) into hymns; the literary pride with which they had collected their hymns to form the V ed a, the ‘sacred science’ , and to chant them in solemn rhythms at the sacrifice - all this had gone. T he hymns were still chanted at the sacrifice as before, but in G otam a’s time they were regarded merely as m echanically operating magic spells. T h e sacrifices had become more and more com plicated and prolonged, and the sacrificial offerings and the fees for the priests had become more and more expensive for the sacrificer. T h e weight o f mechanical ‘good works' had almost sullocated the numinous. T h e development from the inspired cults o f early times to the ritualistic sacrificial religion o f the sixth century can be followed in broad outline in the texts. A part from the 1028 hymns of the Rgveda, the oldest document o f Indian culture (ca. 1500 b c :) , we have the Yajurvtda, the Samaveda and the later canonized Athanmveda. also the prose Brdhmanas (ca. 1000 b c ) which elucidate the ritual, the .Iranvakas and the oldest Upanisads (ca. 700 b c). T h e Upani$ads breathe the spirit o f a spiritual renewal, and can already be reckoned as part o f that movement for religious independence into which Siddhattha G otam a, the later Buddha, was to bc drawn. For people o f our time m any o f the god-figures o f the Vedic heaven

are scarcely im aginable, because they combine theistic features with the conceptions o f natural phenomena in a m anner that defies logic. V ery often, the characteristics ascribed to a certain god belong to contradictory categories which cannot be combined in thought. Thus, a large number o f Vcdic gods remain beyond definition in a semi­ darkness, or three-quarter-darkness o f inconceivability. T h e first place in the Vcdic pantheon was occupied by Indra, the Lord o f the Gods, M aster o f a Thousand Powers and guardian-deity o f the Indo-Aryans who had entered the Ganges plain from the west about 1 200 b c . He was a mighty w arrior and had once slain the drought-demon V rtra with his club, thus releasing the waters sealed up in his snake body as rivers. Brandishing the rainbow as his bow, sending forth lightnings from his sceptre {vajra), hie rushed in his divine chariot from one battle to another with the demons who tried to prevent him from sending the fertility-bringing rain lo the thirsty earth. His drink was soma, the sacred intoxicating potion which, mixed with honey and milk, his adherents offered to him in generous libations, in order to gain his good-will. For Indra was nol only the embodiment o f strength and m anhood, and the stim ulator o f ideas and deeds, he was also the provider o f wealth in the form o f cattle, the fulfiller o f material wishes. W hoever had Indi-a on his side lacked nothing. With native impudicity one worshipper o f the great god appeals to his conscience: I f I, oh Indra, were like you, Provider o f all earthly goods. Then he who sings my praises here Would soon obtain the finest herds. I would help him, Lord o f Power, In his honour I would give And give, who gave me praise and thanks, I f only / were Lord o f Herds! i R v 8 .14 .1- 2 ) N ext to Indra cam e V aru na and M itra. V aru n a, the personification o f the all-emhjracing sky, was revered as the guardian o f truth (rta) and the cosmic order. His task was to preserve the regularity that underlies the course o f the sun, the alternation o f day and night, the

phases o f the moon and the seasons. He was also responsible for contracts and oaths, for a broken promise is a lie, and infringes the sacredness o f truth which it is V aru n a’s task to protect. Since V aru n a is regarded in the late Vedic period also as the lord o f oceans and waters, he punished oath-breakers with dropsy: the diseases so common in India, oedema and filaria. A victim ofsuch a disease implores Varuna: I.et me 110I go to the House o f C lay, O V aruna! Forgive, C) gracious I.ord, lorgive! When I go tottering, like a blown-up bladder, Forgive, () gracious Lord, forgive! H oly One, in want o f wisdom I have opposed you. Forgive, O gracious Lord, forgive! Though in the midst o f waters, thirst has seized your worshipper. Forgive, O gracious Lord, forgive! W hatever sin we mortals have committed Against the people o f the gods, If, foolish, we have thwarted your decrees, Oh god, do not destroy us in your anger! (R v 7.89, transl. A. L . Basham) V aru n a is frequently accom panied by M itra, and in this combination V aruna denotes the night sky, and M itra the day sky and the sun. Elsewhere V arun a is addressed as the strict pursuer (oflaw breakers), and M itra {'Friend') as the uniter o f mankind., T h e heavenly bodies and natural phenomena played a predomi­ nant role in the Vedic pantheon. Usas, the daw n, was represented as a tender young maiden. T h e sun-god was called S avitar or Surya; he was worshipped as the originator o f vegetable and anim al life, and also as the dispeller o f ignorance. T h e M aruts were the storm-gods o f monsoon and rain-bearing winds, friends of Indra. V ayu was the name o f the wind-god, who was credited with purifying power and the ability to blow misfortune aw ay. Parjanya, the rain-god, creatcd the germ o f life in plants and other beings. PrthivT was the earthgoddcss, big-bosomed, broad-hipped and fruitful. But how could one have sacrificed to the gods without Agni, the

god o f fire, who carried the sacrifices up to heaven with his tongues o f flame and smoke, and persuaded the heavenly ones to visit the sacrificers on earth? Agni, the sacrifice that you Surrounding it, upwards bear, T h at alone reaches heaven. A gni, powerful with prayer, Faithful, hjright in glory, O G od, bring the gods to us! (R v 1 . 1 . 4-5) Agni was the god o f the sacrificing Brahmins, and also the sacrificial priest o f the gods. As bodily warmth he was a condition o f life, but he was also a destroyer. T h e last sacrifice a man lays 011 A gn i’s altar is him self on the flam ing funeral pyre. And then the grim god o f death, Y am a, carries the deceased off to his realm in the sky. In early Vcdic times the sacrifice had been understood as a ritual feasting o f the gods. T h e word arya, with which the IndoA ryans described themselves, means ‘ hospitable’ and is - since the gods are included in their hospitality - also a name for their religion. Invisible to profane eyes, the gods visited the sacrificer, descending on the open-air altar-like sacrificial seat. T h ey were solemnly enter­ tained by him to food and soma drink, and showed their gratitude with counter-sacrifices, such as causing the sun to rise every day, sending rain and assuring victory and wellbeing, and granting the sacrificer success, progeny, plentiful cattle and long life and strength. T h is counter-sacrifice o f the gods could h>e depended on, provided no mistake had been m ade in the invocation and entertainment o f the ‘ radiant ones’ . It was just this fear o f ritual error which led to a fundamental change in attitude towards the sacrifice. For if it was no longer the intention o f thie sacrificer, but the observation o f the correct forms that was o f decisive importance, it was advisable for the lord o f the sacrifice to entrust the feeding o f the gods to an expert. T h e men who, on the basis o f their command o f the formalities and their knowledge o f the magic word {brahman), undertook the carrying out o f sacrifices

on commission, and who in course o f time came to be regarded as the sacrificial technicians and cultic experts, received the designation, first as an occupational term, later as a caste-title, of Brahmins (brahmanas). And because people believed that the Brahmin celebrant could cause harm to his employer by wrongly performing the ritual, or distorting the hymns, everyone w'ho wanted a sacrifice performed took good care to put the appointed Brahmin in a good mood by promising him a large fee and giving him a sumptuous meal. As the cult-practices became more com plicated, the sacrificial Brahmins became very arrogant, not only towards the sacrificers, but even towards the gods. Statements like, ‘T h e gods depend on the sacrifice’ (§Br 14.6,8,9) are frequent in the Brahmana texts, in fact the idea that the gods-depend on the skill o f the sacrificial Brahmin and could do nothing without the strength they obtain from the sacrifice runs right throughi the Brahmana literature. In fact: ‘T h e [cultic] homage maintains earth and heaven, the homage is for the gods, the homage is lord over them’ (T B r 6 ,5 1,8 ). 'I he sacred sacrificial word {brahman) is a mechanical piece o f magic which compels the gods to do the will o f the Brahmin celebrant. T h e Brahm an is alm ighty, and he who knows it and can utter it properly is superior to all others. It is to the Brahm ins’ credit that, despite the unheard-of arrogance which they derived from their command o f the m agically effective word, they did make efforts to discover the reasons for its magic power. It was, as they recognized, the indwelling truth {rta, satya) which constituted the effective power o f Brahm an. Rta, ‘ truth’ , here means not so much logical truth in the sense o f congruence between fact and statement, as absolute truth, truth as reality. Since Brahm an, the ‘ true’ sacrificial word, contains all reality within itself, since it includes whatever exists or is conceivable, it can perform anything. N aturally, the cult centre o f K apilavatth u was laid out in accord­ ance with the Brahmana texts. T o the west o f the elevated altar platform which served as a feeding-place for the gods, and which before each sacrifice was covered with cut grass, there burnt the fire which served for the preparation o f the sacrificial food. It symbolized the sun, which causes life to come to fruition, and was therefore in a circular hearth. T o the east o f the altar o f the gods was a square hearth, in the

shape o f the world, which was imagined as a rectangular plate. T h e sacrificial food was poured into the tlame that burnt there, so that Agni could carry it aloft. Finally, to the south was the third fire which represented the moon, and was therefore in sem i-circular form.' It was meant to keep aw ay the demons and prevent them from interfering with the sacrifice. A full sacrificial ritual required three celebrants and a supervising priest. At the end o f each sacrificial act came the cry oisvaha!, ‘ h ail!’ In addition to the great commissioned sacrifices, there were many smaller ones and all sorts o f rituals to which the term ‘sacrifice’ is not applicable. There was sympathetic magic (such as causing rain by pouring water), adoptive magic (such as eating a tiger's heart to become brave), and there were rituals associated with the calendar and with domestic events o f all kinds: weddings, births, name-givings, on the occasion o f deaths, and so on. These loo received their effectiveness through the magic word (brahman), which only a profes­ sional celebrant could pronounce with the proper intonation. T he rank o f ceremonial Brahmin was only gained by one who had lived for twelve years as a pupil in the house o f a Brahm in guru, tending the fire, learning the hymns, mantras and rituals and leading a life o f abstinence to develop superiority over the world. O nly at the conclu­ sion o f this training was the young Brahmin allowed to wear the distinctive hair-style o f the professional Brahm in, consisting o f a knot o f hair on the right side o f the head, or in some places o f three knots. I f we consider the long and difficult course o f training required to become a sacrificial Brahmin, we can understand why it was that only a small proportion o f those men who belonged by inheritance to the Brahm in caste became professional priests. TH E RELIG IO U S LIBERATIO N M O VEM ENT With a nation as deeply religious as the Indians, and so eager for spiritual experience, a reaction against the Vedic-Brahm in sacrificial cult in its degenerate, mechanistic form was inevitable. This began in the seventh century b c , caught on am ong sections o f the youth and, in the sixth century, developed into a powerful spiritual movement. It was not a revolution, because it remained tolerant, opposing the

sacrificial religion only in public disputations. It was an unorganized spiritual movement, which left the established religion aside and in the quest for new spiritual goals adopted new paths. Som e o f these turned out to be false paths which led nowhere, others led to previ­ ously undream ed-of heights. In the sixth century b c the Indian mind attained to philosophical and religious heights which are still valid today. T h e variety o f em ancipated groups can be reduccd to four basic types o f seekers after salvation: (i) the Aupam^adas, (2) the m ater­ ialists, (3) the self-mortifiers, and (4.) the wandering mendicants. G otam a came into contact with all o f these for a longer or shorter period, and each group contributed something, if only negatively, to his system. 1 Those closest to the V cdic tradition were the Aupamsadas, the followers o f the U panisads, which had come into being from 700 b c onwards. T h eir doctrine was derived from the Vedas and Brahmanas, but represented such an original development that their authors expected to meet with opposition from the orthodox. T h e Aupanisadas therefore kept their discoveries secret, as the name o f their texts indicates: upa-ni-sad means ‘ to sit down with (someone)’ - in order to convey the doctrine privately to him. However, the texts did not remain secret for long. T h eir central message reached the ears o f the Brahmin ritualists, who adopted a very skilful tactic: recognizing that an idea that has entered circula­ tion can 110 longer be suppressed, they boldly adopted the Upanisads, making them into the superstructure o f their own philosophy of sacrifice, and then added the ‘secret’ texts to the Vedic canon as an appendix (vedanta, ‘end o f the V ed as’ ). In this w ay the Upanishadic doctrine o f all-unity became a part o f the Brahmin tradition. O nly five U panisads are pre-Buddhist in origin: the earliest o f all is the Brhadaranyaka, and the Chandogya is nearly as old. T hen follow, somewhat later, the Taittiriya, Aitareya and the Kausitaki. Since these texts are largely the record o f experim entally based tabulation, and contain long passages o f speculation about identity in the style o f the Brahmanas, they are not altogether enlightening. But in places, par­ ticularly in the narrative passages, sudden flashes o f joyous recogni­

tion appear, intuitive insights that cast a brilliant light on a problem. No single one o f these Upanisads presents a complete philosophy: each one only provides partial contributions. It is only the combination o f the relevant statements o f all the U panisads together that constitutes the system that, under the name o f V edanta, forms a peak o f Hindu thought. T h e system was worked into a precise philosophy by Sankara about a d 800, and, in a renewed form, by R am an u ja about a d i 100. From the Rgveda to the U panisads w:e can follow the historical development o f the word brahman, and its shift o f meaning. In the Veda brahman denoted the sacrificial word which is effective owing to the indwelling truth (rla, satya) in it. In the U panisads it comes to be a full embodiment, a synonym o f truth itself: 'T h e name (i.e. the essence) o f this Brahm an is T ru th ' (ChU 8.3,4), ‘Brahm an is T ru th ’ ( B A U 5.5). M ore than this: Brahman cam e to mean in the Upanisads the Absolute, 'U ltim ate R eality’ , and the Upanishadic thinkers make great efforts to make this Absolute, which em braces totality and is immanent in everything, intelligible in words. T h ey use the typical method o f mysticism, the symbol, the identity o f opposites, and negative description. Brahm an is the cause o f everything ( B A U 1.4 .2 1) ; just as every­ thing that exists in the world is included in space, so space is included in the imperishable, which is Brahman ( B A U 3.8.8). Since it pervades everything as spirit, it is also at home in man: the body is the castle o f Brahm an. It dwells in a tiny em pty space in the heart, minute, and yet as great as the cosmos. In it lies the All, everything that exists and all latent possibilities. When the body grows old and dies, Brahman does not grow^old and die (ChU 8. 1, 1-5 ). W hoever knows the imperishable Brahm an is assured o f deliverance after death ( B A U 3.8. i t ) . T h e task o f whoever seeks liberation is to become a knower o f Brahman. T h e knowing subject is the dtman> the self, and it is this that performs the tasks o f seeing, hearing, thinking and knowing ( B A U 3 .5 .1). T h e dtman creates the worlds, the gods, and earthly beings ( B A U 2 .1.2 3 ), ant* >s ruler over everything ( B A U 4.4.24). It dwells in the heart, smaller than a grain o f rice or barley, but greater than the earth, greater than heaven and these worlds (C h U 3 .14 .2 -3 ) . T h e body is the dwelling-place o f the eternal, non-physical dtman

(ChiU 8 . l a. i ) , and dies as soon as the alman leaves it (ChU 6,t 1,3). But the alman is unborn (hjccause eternal), not subject to ageing or death, invulnerable, immortal ( B A U 4.4.30). It can only be spoken o f in negations ( B A U 4.4.27). The alman, it is true, is the self, the soul, bui it is not confined to the individual, being identical with all almans: ‘This alman o f yours is the alman present in all’ (B A U 3 .4 .1). T h ere is no difference between the souls o f beings; they are all one. E very ‘other’ is in essence ‘ m y self. The parallelism o f the statements about Brahm an and the atman is obvious, and suggests to us that the Brahm an, the Absolute, the W orld-SouI, and the atman, the individual soul, are lo bc regarded as identical. A nd in fact this is the great recognition and central message o f the Upanisads, thus making them the basic texts o f ihe Indian doctrine o f all-unity. T h e relation between the multiplicity o f the em pirical world and the unity o f the Absolute is a problem with which all subsequent Indian philosophy has been concerned. O ver and over again, in the Upanisads, the identity o f Brahman and atman is stressed: ‘T ru ly , (his great unborn alman, ihe unageing, deathless, invulnerable, immortal is Brahm an’ ( B A U 4.4.25). ‘Ju st as a snake-skin, dead and cast-off, might lie upon ail anthill, so the body lies after death. But this non-physical, bodiless alman, consisting o f knowledge, is Brahm an (and lives on)’ ( B A U 4.4.7). ‘Th is alman is Brahm an’ (C h U 3. [4,4). T h e unity o f alman and Brahm an is most readily perceptible in dreamless deep sleep. In the withdraw al o f such sleep, when the alman tem porarily rests, inactive, in Brahm an, it becomes clear: ‘T h at is the iilman, lhai is ihe deathless, the invulner­ able, that is Brahm an’ (C h U H.i i.t). I f this mystic monism was one great discovery o f the Aupanisadas, the doctrine o f transmigration was the other. T h e idea that ihe individual survives death in one form or another had already made its appearance in the Rgveda and the Brahmanas. But it was the Aupanisadas who recognized the compulsion and regularity o f rebirth, and the decisive function o f one’s deeds in determining the outcome. He who is unliberated circles round in the cycle o f metempsychosis i B A U 6 .2 .16 ), driven 011 by lusl (kdmayamana: B A U 4.4.6) and ignorance (avidyil), i.e. ignorance o f the iilman (B A U 4.4. t o - 13). I f lie

performs good deeds (karman), he will have pleaseam rebirth, if evil deeds, an unpleasant one: According as one acts and behaves, so he will be : re born, l ie who does good, will be born as a good man, he who does evil, will be reborn as an evil being . . . Therefore it is said: M an is entirely composed of desire \kdma). As his desire is so is his understanding. As his understanding, so is his action. And according to his action, so he will fare. i ' BAU 4.4.5,' Those who are here o f pleasing behaviour m ay expect to enter a pleasing womb: the womb (of the wile) o f a Brahm in, a K satriya or a V aisya. Bui those who have been o f slinking behaviour may expect lo enter a slinking womb: the womb o f a bilch, a sow or o f a casteless woman. (ChU 5. 10. 71 Liberation from this frightening cycle o f transmigration which is determined by a mechanically operating natural law 011 the basis of one's deeds, is lo be achieved by the person who has destroyed lust (kdma) and ignorance (avidyd). Such a perfected one enters into Brahm an and his dtman is dissolved in Brahm an. Through this extinc­ tion in Brahman he is liberated. Then- is 110 doubt that this recognition o f all-uniiy, and the conception o f rebirth as the product o f natural necessity conditioned by one's deeds, are am ong the profoundest religiousdiscoverie.sofmankind, but they also gave rise to a host o f new philosophical questions. T he doctrine ofunity had overcome the div ision between individuals, but il had drawn a new dividing-line between the eternal, self-sullicienl Brahman/d/wrtn and physical nature iprakrti/; the vertical dichotomy was replaced by a horizontal. At once the problem o f reality presented itself: Is die material world, as opposed to Brahman as the Absolute, real or is it illusion \mdya)? Then, loo, questions arose as lo the relation between Brahman and prakrli: What leads the sell-sufhcient Brahman to become embodied in the world o f transmigration? And how can the actions o f a man bind the dtman. which is possessed offreedornin itself, to a physical body? T h e posl-Upanishadic systems o f India are largely attempts to answer these questions. 2

T h e M aterialists scornfully rejected all doctrines o f em ancipation.

regarding anything beyond the visible world as mere fantasy. T h eir name, Lokayata, ‘directed towards the ; visil>le) world’ , gives expression to this attitude. Another name lor them, Carvaka. is derived from one o f their thinkers. T h eir opponents mockingly called them ‘deniers’ or ‘ negators’ inaslika). As Indian thinking likes to codify its contents - there are guide­ books even on thieving ami love-m aking - the M aterialists too liad their anti-ideology systematized, namely in the sixth century Barhaspalisutra. This work is only known from a few quotations, but we can gain some idea o f the view o f the M aterialists from the ellbrls o f their opponents to refute them. T h e following sum m ary o f tlie l.nkayata position is based on I laribh ad ra's 'Com pendium o f the Six System s’ (Saddtirs'anasamuccay) (eighth century a d ) and M ad h ava’s 'Su m m ary o f All S y ste m s';Sarvadarsanasamgraha) (fourteenth century;. Consistently with their conviction that direct sense-perception is the only source o f knowledge, and that there is therefore no knowledge based on deduction, intuition, experience, teaching or divine revela­ tion, the Lokayalas deny the existence o f another world. W hatever cannot l>e perceived by the senses does not exist. T h ere is no God, no salvation, no soul (atman). Right and wrong idfuirmajadharma) do not exist nor do good and evil deeds lead to a result in another birth. O nce the body has h>een burnt 011 the funeral pyre, it (i.e. the individual) does nol arise again. T h e existence o f a soul cannot be deduced from the vital functions o f living beings. All things, including our bodies, are conglomerates o f the four elements, earth, water, fire and air, which combine, on the h>asis o f their own nature - their indwelling tendencies - to form that particular structure. All psychic activity is merely the result o f the interplay o f tlie four elements, and develops, just as out o f the harmless ingredients rice and molasses, intoxicating alcohol arises through fermentation. W hoever renounces sense-pleasures because they are bound up with pain, acts like a fool. Do we throw a rice-grain aw ay because it is surrounded by spelt? Therefore there can only be one sensible course: Live happily as long as life remains in you, and eat ghee, even iTyou get into debt. T lie only thing o f value in life is what increases happi­ ness.

T u rn ing to the unseen and rejecting the seen — C arvakas know: T h a t’s the folly o f the world! (Saddarsanasamuccaya 9.6) In the anti-m aterialistic polemics o f Indian philosophical literature it is noticeable Ihat the Lokayatas are by no means spurned as immoral or anti-social. T h eir nonconformity was confined to matters o f the spirit. They w-ere sceptics, secularists and hedonists, but they fitted in to the com munity o f city or village without difficulty. A nd at times, when the Brahmins took themselves too seriously, it m ay well be that even pious believers gave vent to their feelings by quoting a disrespect­ ful Lokayata saying. T h e philosophical influence o f the Lokayatas was considerable. By using their sharp-tongued criticism and earthy cynicism to mock the claims o f the idealist schools, they worked against philosophical flights o f fancy and acted as a valuable corrective. 3 T h e Sanskrit word tapasvin, ‘ascetic’ , is often translated ‘ penitent’ , but wrongly. Penance is the attempt to make amends for a sin that has been committed, but asceticism in the Indian sense is the attempt to shape the future. It is based on the belief that self-mortification (lapas as means) produces heat (tapas as result), i.e. psychic-magic power which can t>e stored up and used for em ancipation. A precondi­ tion o f success is absolute sexual restraint. I f the ascetic yields to the sexual drive, the stored-up tapas is at once and totally lost. According to a widespread belief the ascetic acquired supernatural powers by storing up more and more tapas. Already in the Rgveda we learn that the god Indra ow'ed his position in heaven to tapas, but it was only in the seventh/sixth century b c that (he tapas theory became really popular. In the (post-Buddhist) Hindu literature it plays a large part, and we repeatedly hear o f ascetics who became dangerous competitors of the gods by their stored-up tapas. T h e gods, not lost for a solution, sent the ascetic a beautiful nymph who seduced him and thus ruined his tapas. T h at the Vedic-Brahm in sacrificial priests were opposed to the ascetic movement is understandable. Not only did the ascetic, by leaving his family, home and village, reduce the number o f their customers, he also dem onstrated, by replacing the m aterial sacrifice

with the sacrifice o f his own pleasures, that there was a w ay o f self­ em ancipation, thereby reducing the value o f the old sacrificial re­ ligion. In the eyes o f the Brahmins, adopting the life o f an ascetic or wandering mendicant could only be justified in the case o f a man o f advanced years, who had looked after his fam ily, observed his caste duties, and whose son had taken over his functions in domestic and social life. T h e outward signs o f an ascetic were the rejection o f possessions and family, wild hair, and, frequently, total nakedness. Ascetics lodged as hermits alone in the jungle, or in small groups in ‘asceticgroves’, in any case far from villages and towns in order not to be disturbed by householders or inflamed by their daughters. I f an ascetic practised his observances rigorously for a long time, he was regarded as holy, and the nearest village was proud to supply him with the little he needed. T h e aims o f some o f those who imposed severe ascetic observances on themselves were sometimes not very elevated. There was a proverb, ‘ What you do without, will be repaid tenfold’ , and m any an ascetic may have aimed, as the final goal o f his efforts, at precisely those joys he renounced for the present. For others, a half-way goal provided the motive, the development, by the accum ulation o f tafias, o f para­ normal powers such as flying like a bird, walking on w ater, passing through walls, and gaining knowledge ofdistanl or concealed objects, or o f past and future. T h e power to overcome natural laws and physical limitations was assumed by the populace with any advanced ascetic, and admired even without proof. But for those with insight, the real and only worthy goal o f asceticism was em ancipation, whether this was thought o f as acceptance among the gods, as unification with one particular god, or as understanding o f the Absolute, and absorption in it. T h e goals o f the ascetics were more or less conventional, but not their methods. T h e scale reaches from subtle meditation exercises, through various peculiar practices right down to revolting forms o f self-torture, in which a form o f exhibitionist vanity is apparent. Am ong the odder forms may be reckoned the cow- and dog-ascetics mentioned in M N 57. T h e former, according to the com m entary, had put horns 011 his head and fastened a cow ’s tail to his body, and

lived for preference am ong the cattle, while the naked dog-ascetic ate off the ground, barked and slept curled up like a dog. T h e most elem entary form o f ascetic observance was fasting, some­ times till death. Som e ascetics ate only fruit or w hatever grows beneath the earth’s surfacc; others took only liquid nourishment. An original idea was fasting according to the moon: the ascetic ate nothing at new' moon, and from then on till full moon he ate one mouthful more each day, and then reduced his intake in the same w ay till the next new moon. Posture could also be made an ascetic practice. Som e stood all day up to the hips in water, while the ‘ hjat-ascetics’ preferred to spend several hours each day hanging by their knees dow nwards from a tree. There were ever-sitters and ever-bent ascetics who never straight­ ened out, and there were others w'ho spent their time standing, often on one leg, till creepers grew round them. Some ascetics never slept, or lay on beds o f nails or heaps o f thorns. There were occasionally ‘ five-fire ascetics’ who sat in the lotus posture between four fires with their face, the eyes long since blind, turned towards the fifth fire, the sun. T h e number o f self-mutilators was great. Some had cut o ff a limb, others had broken it and allowed it to grow at a strange angle. Quite frequently some deliberately allowed one arm to rot aw ay by holding it aloft, while others bored a hole through their penis, generally attaching a heavy stone to it and thereby simultaneously demonstrat­ ing chastity and painful asceticism. Often ascetic practices were accom panied by a vow o f silence, sometimes so strictly observed that the ascetic would not answer even by a gesture or a nod. M ore important, however, than all these physical practices w'ere the exercises in spiritual self-mastery. Practisers o f breathing exercises used an artificial rhythm for in- and out-breaths, thereby inducing states o f exaltation. In meditation the ascetic plunged deep into his own mind. T h e deepest stage of meditation consisted o f a trancestate, which was regarded as a tem porary em ancipation. 4 M ore numerous than the Aupanisadas, Lokayatas and selfmortifying ascetics were the fourth group o f seekers after salvation, that o f the wandering mendicants. Buddhist sources speak o f them as

paribbajakas (Skt parivrajaka) and samanas (Skt sramana), i.e. ‘w an­ derers’ and ‘strivers’ . Paribbajakas were wandering mendicants o f Brahm in origin, whether their practice was orthodox or not, while the term samana was reserved for those o f other castes who followed various heterodox ways. Tow ards the end o f his life the Buddha tried to narrow down the term samana to wandering mendicants whose doctrine included an eightfold path (D N 16 .5.27 ), in other words to apply it only to bhikkhus o f his discipline (vinaya). It is hard today to understand what made the homeless life appear so attractive to people in ancient India, and what made ihe life o f the wandering religious mendicant such an important movement. We must realize that about 600 b c , in the agrarian society o f northern India with its polytheistic sacrificial religion, a movement arose which sought a w ay out o f the narrow framework o f ritualism and o f the social group. A psychosis o f freedom-seeking and seeking after knowledge, an urge towards spiritual m aturity had seized on men, and induced thousands o f them o f all castes to abandon their em ploy­ ment, entrust their wives and children to the care o f ihe great family, and to leave their bam boo hut, their village or city, in order to adopt a m onastically celibate wandering life in the hope o f gaining liberat­ ing wisdom. T h e break with tradition, and the wandering, mendicant life were the only things these ascetics had in common: ideologically they followed very different ways. Some were sophists, who specialized in refutation without propagating any positive doctrine o f iheir own. Some were .IjTvikas, who as fatalists and determinists held the view that everything, including their own em ancipation, was pre­ determined unalterably. But the m ajority o f the wanderers were experimenters in religion, joining now this, now that guru. Perhaps they sought the goal for a time with the Aupanisadas or in the practice o f asceticism, or else tried some method o f their own for the gaining o f wisdom. T h eir debates with those holding other views, which were generafly held in groves 011 the edge of a village or town, were the intellectual amusement oft he time and attracted many people, includ­ ing the elder son o f the Sakiyan R a ja o f K apilavatthu.

S ID D H A T T H A ’ S PA T H T O T H E H O M E L E S S L IF E These philosophical disputations must have made a deep impression on the young Siddhattha Gotam a. He felt the powerful pull o f the anti-Vedic movement, and the strong temptation to jo in the samanas. As he pul it more than once later: ‘T h e household life, this place o f im purity, is narrow - the samana life is the free open a ir.’ We possess a description ol'his departure for the homeless life in the NidanakathU already mentioned, which dates from the fifth century a d at the earliest. Despite its legendary character, il contains state­ ments which could well he derived from a genuine tradition. I f we place this text side by side with the scanty but reliable autobiogra­ phical statements o f Siddhattha after he had become the Buddha, we can gain some impression o f how his abandonment o f worldly life may have occurred. T h e Nidanakatha has adopted a narrative from die Digha Nikaya (D N 14.2), which tells o f the four excursions o f the (unhistorical) Vipassi, a previous Buddha, and applies them to the historical Siddhat­ tha G otam a. Il lells how Siddhattha, who was living a life o f luxury in K apilavatth u, desired to visit a park outside the city. R idin g in his four-horse chariot, driven l>y a charioteer, hie saw an aged man by the wayside, bent, trembling, grey-haired and with rolling teeth. Dismayed at this sight, he asked the charioteer what kind o f a man this was, and was told he was one whose life-span was approaching its end. Deeply shaken by the realization thal he loo would one day be old, the R a ja ’ s son returned hiome. On three further outings, tlie legend declares, Siddhallhia saw a sick man, a dead man, and a monk. T h is last meeting made him wish to become a monk, so thal he decided to renounce the world that very night. Ju s l in that night his wile Bhaddakaccana for Yasodhara) gave birlhi to a son, who was called Rahula. Whien the time to renounce the world had come, Siddhattlia had a horse bridled by his servant C hanna, but he wanted to see hiis newh)orn son before his departure. When he entered the room o f the sleeping Bliaddakaccana the oil lam p went out, and as the young mother held her hand protectively over her child's head, il was impossible for Siddhattha to have a look at hiis son. Without having

seen him, he left the city o f K apilavatth u at midnight riding his horse K anthaka and accom panied by Ohanna: the (east) gate o f the city, which was closed and guarded, was opened for him by the magical aid o f the gods. Touching the territories o f three rajas, Siddhattha reached the river A nom a in the same night, and on the other bank he cut o ff his hair in monkish fashion and put on the robe o f a samana. He entrusted his horse and ornaments to C hanna, who brought them back to K apilavatth u. Siddhattha spent the firsl week o f his new life in a mango-grove near the village o f A nupiya, and then made his way towards R ajagah a. Thus far the legend, lold here in somewhat demythologized form. T h e probably historical features are that Sidd h atlh a’s renunciation o f the world took place imm ediately after the birth o f his son R ahula, and that he spent the first days o f his open-air life near A nupiya. T he Anom a river is probably the modern Aum i, a tributary o f the G andak in what was then the M alla republic, but the M alta village of A nupiya cannot be identified. T h at he touched the territories o f three rajas to get there is correct, because in order to reach the M alla republic to the south-east o f the Sakyan republic, he had to pass through the territory o f the K oliyas. T h e midnight departure and Sidd h atlh a’s cutting off his hair on the banks o f the Anom a, are features o f the legendary narrative, but not o f the Buddha’s own account. This makes it clear that at least his father Suddhodana and his foster-mother Pajapati knew o f his inten­ tions, but were unable to hold him back: ‘ When I was still a Bodhisatta (one bound for Buddhahood), the thought cam e to me: “ T h e household life, this place o f im purity, is narrow - the samana life is the free open air. Il is not easy for a householder to lead the perfected, utterly pure and perfect holy life. W hat if 1 were now to cut off my hair and beard, don yellow isamana) robes, and go forth from the household into home­ lessness?” And I, being young, a youth with black hair, in the prime o f my youth, in the first stage o f manhood, cut o ff m y hair and beard, although my father and (foster) mother opposed this and wept

with tearful laces, donned the yellow robes and went forth from the household life into homelessness.’ (M N 2 6 .1 6 = M i\ 36.10) I f we put this simple narrative beside the statement in the Nidanukathd that Siddhattha’s renunciation ipahhaja) followed imm ediately 011 the birth) o f R ah u la, the assumption seems plausible that he had long been urging his parents to agree to this step, and that thiey had made their consent dependent on ihe birth o f a grandson. Th is might even explain Siddhiattha’s hjelated fatherhood - after thirteen years of m arriage, when both he and Bhaddakaccanii were twenty-nine: per­ haps Bhaddakacciina, in order not to lose her husband, had long refused lo have children. A i any rale, once the son demanded by Suddhodana and PajapatT was born, Siddhatlha lost no time in realizing his intention to renounce ihe world. Thus this spoilt young man who, as the son o f the Sakiya R a ja , could have had a political career in front o f him, adopted, in 534 u c at the age o f twenty-nine, the hard life o f a w andering mendicant. Where he weni first is not made clear by the sources, though thiey are nol contradictory. According lo the summary account he gave many years later (in M N 26 and 3(1), he went imm ediately alter leaving K apilavatth u lo A ja r a K filam a’s hermitage, but according to ihe .X'irfiinakalha he first spent a week ai A nupiya, and then went on 10 R ajagah a. This visit to R ajagah a, during which Siddhattha met the young K in g Bim bisara o f M agad ha, is confirmed h>y the Sutta Nipdta (S Nip 3 .1) . The king was then twenty-four and had already ruled for nine years. T h e story goes, (hat w'hile tlie ascetic (iotam a was going on his alms-round in (iliribbaja, thie old fortress kernel o f R a ja g a h a (‘ K ings­ bury’ ), K in g Bimbisara saw him from the terrace o f his palace. Rendered curious by the m endicant’s noble appearance, the king had inquiries made, and then went to meet him at the Pandava hill the north-easterly o f ihe five hills surrounding R aja ga h a . On being asked ah>oul hiis origins. Siddhattha replied that he hiad come from the Kingdom o f K o sala in the foothills o f the H im alayas, and belonged 10 the Sakiya clan. He had renounced sensual pleasures and become a wandering mendicant in order to gain self-conquest. With that, the narrative breaks off. It is precisely its paucity o f content that

points to a historical incident, for life seldom provides us with a roundcd-olf story. Th at the king should have gone to meet the young samana, and not the other way round, is plausible. 11 was a pastime o f many people to wait on the religious, especially because it was believed that the sight o f one who w'as spiritually advanced she'd something o f the latter's magical potency on the onlooker. But we do not yet find any indica­ tion o f the friendship which was later to develop l>etwecn Bimbisara and Siddhattha. Siddhattha does not seem to have stayed long in R ajagah a. Im ­ patient for liberation, he: left the royal capital and placed himself under the tutelage o f a teacher called A lara K alam a. A jara did not belong to the leading heads o f schools o f his lime: we only hear o f him from Buddhist sources and in connection with Siddhattha’s quest for enlightenment. Siddhattha describes his studies under A jara as follows: ‘ H aving gone forth in order lo seek for the good, for the incom par­ able peace, 1 went to A lara K alam a and said to him: “ Reverend K alam a, I wish to lead the religious life according to your discipline and leaching.” lie replied: “ Please stay, your reverence. This teaching is such that an intelligent man can, in a short time, attain to understanding equal to that o f his teacher, and dwell in it.” And indeed I quickly learnt this teaching. But I was only paying lipservice and reciting a doctrine I had picked up from the older (pupils), and as others did also, I maintained I had known and understood the teaching. ‘T hen it occurred to me that A jara K alam a must have proclaimed his teaching not out o f mere faith, but because o f having realized il himself by direct knowledge. I said to him: “ Reverend K alam a, how far have you yourself realized this teaching by direct know­ ledge?” And he declared lo me the Sphere o f No-thingness. ‘ I thought: “ Not only A jara has faith, strength o f will, mind­ fulness, concentration and wisdom. I have these things too.” And before long 1 had realized the teaching and abode in that state. I told A jara K ala m a , and he said: “ It is a gain for us, it is profitable for us to have the reverend one as our companion in the holy life.

This doctrine which I have realized, you too have realized. As I am, so you are; as you are, so am 1. Come, your reverence, we will lead this com pany o f pupils together!" ‘ In this w ay the teacher treated me as an equal and honoured me. But I thought: “ This teaching does not lead to revulsion, to dispassion, to cessation, to calm , to knowledge, to awakening, to N ibbana, but only to the Sphere o f No-thingness.” So then I had had enough of this teaching, rejected it and turned a w a y.’ (M N 26. t(jl., abridged) O ur curiosity as to what A jara really taught remains unsatisfied, because Siddhattha did not consider it worth reporting. T h e ex­ pression ‘ Sphere o f No-thingness' denotes a condition o f trance-like meditation in which tlie meditator is aw ake but inturned. This kind o f meditation was A lara K a la m a ’s speciality. Mis pupil Pukkusa, who subsequently became a disciple o f the Buddha’s (D N 16.2.27) lo^ liow A jara had once sat, fully conscious, under a tree without noticing five hundred carts passing close beside him (because his concentration was so strongly turned inw ard). These scanty indications might point to A ja ra ’s system having been an early form o f yoga. A lara's business ability is easier to recognize. T h e fact that he offered a joint shiare in the running o f his school to Siddhattha can have only one explanation: he considered that this son o f a raja, who had recently had a conversation with K in g Bim bisara, must have close connections at the Magadhian court, and hoped through him to gain the king’s patronage for his school, thereh>y gaining more pupils. Siddhattha reacted in accordance with his upright character and his genuine striving for em ancipation: he turned the offer down. He had not gone forth into homelessness in order to be corrupted by a mediocre head o f a school. He would doubtless have considered his stay with A ja r a as time wasted if he had not picked up a few hints from him, ahjout the technique o f meditation, and about the organiza­ tion o f an order o f samanas. T h at is probably the reason why he thought o f A ja r a again years later. Despite his disappointing experience with A ja r a , Siddhattha’s belief in spiritual teachers was unshaken. Confident o f having this time found the right guru, he went to the head o f another school,

U ddaka R am aputta. In the Majijhima ,\'ikaya (M N 2h and 36) he describes his experiences with U ddaka in almost the same words as those for Aliira. All we are told about U d daka’s teaching is that he had not discovered it him self but learnt it from his father R am a, and that it led to the Sphere o f Neither Perception nor Non-Perception. We can, however, deduce something o f its content from a remark made by Siddhattha m any decades later to the novice C unda ( M ahacunda) (D N '29.16), to the eflect that according to U ddaka (ordinary) people see and yet do not see, instancing a well-sharpened razor, o f which one can see the blade but not the operative part, the edge, on account o f its fineness. Those who know the Upanisads will at once be reminded of the parallel with the Chandogya Upanisad (6 .12 ), w'here U ddalaka Aruni bids his son Svetaketu split one o f the tiny seeds o f the fig, and then reveals to him in its imperceptible subtlety the essence o f the Universe and o f the Self. T h e assumption is therefore justified that U ddaka taught Upanishadic ideas, i.e. the doctrine o f Brahm an as the Absolute present in all things. W hatever the Buddha knew o f Upanishadic philosophy and adopted, partly unchanged and partly in antithetic reversal, into his own teaching, he probably learnt from Uddaka. When Siddhattha had attained to the stage o f knowledge reached by U d daka's father R am a, U ddaka offered him, not partnership, like A jara, but the sole leadership o f his school. He recognized in his pupil one with religious gifts greater than his own. But Siddhattha rejected this offer too, flattering though it was. His quest w;as for em ancipation from suffering, not the leadership o f a school. So, since U d daka’s teachings did not satisfy him and he was put oil' by U d d ak a’s selfpraise (S N 3 5 .10 3 ), he left him and continued his wanderings. His studies with these two teachers had lasted for less than a year, perhaps only six months.

S ID D H A T T H A T H E A S C E T IC Leaving behind U ddaka R am ap u tta’s hut and school, which were probably somewhere near R a jagah a, Siddhattha journeyed southwestward till, near L’ ruvela, a garrison city for the troops o f the K in g o f M agadha, he found ‘a charm ing plot o f land, a lovely wtwd and a

clear-flowing river whichi was good for bathing and quite delightful, with villages all about for gathering alm s' (\1 N 26). At this spot on the bank o f tlie N eranjara (today N ilajan a), which combines with the M oliana to form (hie Phalgu, he settled down to practise as­ ceticism. Yoga and Upanishadic teachings ha’d proved unsuitable to him to gain the em ancipatory vision; perhaps asceticism was the proper w ay. Later, he gave his monks a full description o f his adven­ tures o f those six years, because we do not like to speak o f anything so much as o f hardships surmounted. T h e passage quoted describes the forest chosen l>y Siddhattha as ‘lovely’ —however, it would h>e wrong to form too idyllic an impression o f an Indian forest. Thie tree coverage which, in the Buddha’s time spread over the'greater part o f the sub-c.ominent, varies from zone to zone. In tlie region o f present-day Bihar it look and takes thie lorm o f scattered dry deciduous forest, whichi shieds its leaves in the summer and is only green in the rainy season. T h e predominant type o f tree is the sal iSharea rohusta), some specimens o f which reach a height o f 30 metres. The clearings are full o f undergrowth and clumps o f bamboo line the river banks. There is a rich fauna. Bats and Hying foxes hang in dozens like soft velvet l>ags from tlieir favourite trees. Rcd-l>rown and black monkeys chase each other through the branches, and a family o f light brown gazelles stalks gracefully past. Predators are scarcer than is often supposed, h)ut there are enough lo cause one alarm . 11 is not for nothing that tlie Indian peasant is deeply suspicious o f ihe forest, whicli he peoples with spirits and whose semi-darkness he penetrates only to colled firewood or lo look for a runaw ay goal or cow. T h e first period in thie forest was very hard for the thirty-year-old nobleman from K ap ilavaitlm . 'Thie loneliness o f tlie forest is hard to bear, it is hard lo lake pleasure in being alone . . . When at night 1 stayed in such frightening and fearful places, and an animal passed by, or a peacock broke a twig, or thie wind rustled am ong the leaves, I was filled with (error and panic.’ It look time, as he told thie Brahmin Janussoni (M N 4), before lie succeeded in overcom ing this fear through mental self-discipline. We can clearly perceive various stages in the course o f Siddhattha’s ascetic practices. He made several different starts, and he was not

alw ays alone. Descriptions o f that period which the Buddha gave to the Ja in lay follower Saccaka Aggivessana and his own disciple Sariputta are given in ihe Majjhima Nikava (M N 36 and 1 2). T h e young ascetic began his quest for truth by trying to compel understanding with his mind: ‘ With teeth clenched, my tongue pressed against the palate, my mind subdued, ( I endeavoured to) restrain and subjugate my thinking.’ 'I he result was sweat pouring from the arm pits, and the realization that though the mind, as an instrument, can be disciplined, conclusions and insights cannot be obtained by force and without intuition. Equally fruitless was the ‘ non-breathing meditation’ , i.e. holding the breath lor as long as possible. T h e result was not any ecstatic state or higher insight, but a roaring in the ears, sharp-pains in the skull, headache, stomach-cramps and a burning sensation in the entire body. T h e double failure o f such ‘ internal’ methods led Siddhattha to go on to ‘external’ methods. I f we are to believe ihe lext (M N 12), he tried out practically the entire list o f ascetic self-tortures. He went naked and accepted no food brought to him, but begged his own food, which had lo be vegetable. At each house he would accept only a hollow h and’s full, and at times limited himself to an alms-round only every seven days. At other times he ale only what grew wild. When, in the cool season, he wore clothing, il consisted only o f rags, shrouds from corpses, old skins, grass and bark. He did not cut his hair and beard, but pulled out the hairs. He refused to sit down, standing, leaning or squatting on his heels. I f he had to lie dow n, he did so on thorns. He gave up washing, trusting that the thickest dirt would fall off by itself. At the same lime he exercised extreme compassion, tried lo harm 110 creature and felt compassion even for a drop o f water: ‘ I f only I can avoid harm ing the little creatures (in it)!’ He lied aw ay from the cowherds, grass-cutters or firewoodgathcrers who entered the forest, and hid himself. As for his lodging, he spent the days o f the Indian winter (D ecem ber-January) in the woods and the nights, when the tem pera­ ture was only a little above freezing-point, in the open air, while in the sum m er (M ay -Ju n e) he did the opposite, spending the night in the suffocating atmosphere o f the forest, and the days outside in the

hiot sun. Here, he used to cam p out in a charnel-ground, where cowherds’ children spat at him or made w aier over him, threw' dirl at him or tickled hiis ears with blades o f grass. For some time lie led 011 things that were nol even part o f the normal food o f ascetics. When the cowherds left their beasts alone, he fetched the dung o f thie calves, and sometimes hie would eat his own excrement ‘ when it was not fully digested’ . How' far we are to take these descriptions literally, we cannot be sure, bui they are nol mere inventions. His practice o f self-starvation, in particular, can bo regarded as factual. In fact he reduced his intake to the point o f taking only a handful o f grain or a single fruit in the day, so that he seemed on the point o f death by starvation. He gives a vivid description o f this slate o f affairs: ‘Since I took so litile each time, my body reached a stale o f extreme em aciation. M y limbs became like tlie dry and knotted joints o f bamboo. M y buttocks became like a buffalo’s hoof, and my spine with its protruding vertebrae became like beads on a siring. M y ril>s were visible like the exposed rafters o f a dilapidated house. Ju st as in a deep well the surface of the w ater gleams far below, so my pupils, sunk deep in their sockets, gleamed far below. Just as a bitter gourd, when it is cut, quickly dries up and shrivels in the sun, so my scalp dried up and shrivelled. I f I wanted to touch my belly-skin, I encountered my backbone, hiecause the two had come so close together. I f I wanted to pass excrement or urine, I fell over on my face. I f I rubbed my limits, the hair, rotted at the roots, cam e aw ay in my hand.’ (M N 12 .5 2 = M N 36 .21) It is natural that such a rigid observance o f asceticism attracts admirers. In addition to a following o f householders from U ruvela, Siddhattha also had a group o f five adm iring ascetics from hiis home district in the foothills o f the H im alayas. K on dan iia from D onavalthu had been one o f the eight Brahmins who, thirty years before, had perform ed the nam e-giving ceremony for the new-born Siddhattha G otam a: he was therefore at least fifteen years older than G otam a. Bhaddiya, V appa, M ahanam a and Assaji were the sons o f four other Brahmins from that group. Together with K on dan iia, they had followed the young G otam a into the homeless life some time after his

departure, and, fascinated by the honest rigour o f his endeavours, had joined in his observances. T h ey had agreed that the first one o f them to come to an understanding o f the truth (Dhamma) should tell the others. None o f the five doubted that Siddhattha would be the first.

S ID D H A T T H A

TH E BU D D H A

But the five ascetics were disillusioned, shocked and angry: Siddhat­ tha, their model and hero, had become unfaithful to his quest, he had broken o ff his ascetic practice and accepted adequate nourishment a whole bowl o f rice. It seemed that the ra ja ’s son wanted to live a life o f luxury. Shaken, the five turned from him and left him alone. Siddhattha was 110 longer their guide, and should no longer be their com panion. What had happened? We have an explanation from his own mouth: 'B y this method, on this path, by this severe asceticism I did not attain to the highest goal o f human striving, the true A riyan knowledge and wisdom. Why not? Because I had not gained that wisdom (paM a) which, when one has it, is the noble guide (out o f the circle o f rebirth), leading the practiser to the total destruction o f suffering.' (M N 12.56) ‘ W hatever ascetics and Brahmins have ever felt feelings that were painful, sharp and severe, it cannot exceed this. And yet even with this extreme asceticism 1 did not gain the highest goal o f human striving, the true A riyan knowledge and wisdom. M ight there not be another way to awakening?’ (M N 36.22) Pondering 011 this other w ay, he remembered an incident from his youth. M an y years ago, when his father the R a ja had ploughed the field with his own hand, he, Siddhattha, had been sitting at the edge o f the field in the cool shade o f a rose-apple tree, and had unexpectedly entered a state o f aloofness from unwholesome states o f mind, into a slate o f absorption (jhana) accom panied by thinking and pondering, delightful and happy. Could it be that this type o f contemplation was the w ay to enlightenment? And, since an emaciated body showing every sign o f deprivation is not the best equipment for a spiritual

searchi, Siddhattha had, shortly after recalling that youthful experi­ ence, abandoned asceticism and fasting and returned to a more balanced w ay o flife. But thie group o f five ascetics, whio could only see his abandonment o f asceticism and not his adoption o f a new method o f seeking, thereupon deserted him. Left alone in the forest o f U ruvela, Siddhattha, now no longer an ascetic but a samana, started on the new path. In this he was helped by the meditation experience he liad gained under A lara K alam a. Thie meditation winch prepared the ground for his break-through to enlightenment consisted o f the lburlnld absorption {jhdna) fre­ quently mentioned in ihe Canon. T h is practice does nol necessarily lead to enlightenment, but like all meditation is purely a preparatory practice. It makes the mind capable o f enlightenment, but enlighten­ ment itself is a rare event, depending on favourable karmic condition­ ing and a serious striving alter wisdom. Thie four stages o f absorption are descrihjed (e.g. in M N 36.25) as follows: Stage t Cessation ofsense-desires and" unwholesome states o f mind, accom panied by thinking and pondering; well-being resulting from detachment. Stage 2 Cessation o f thinking and pondering, development of tranquillity and one-pointedness; well-being resulting from concen­ tration. Stage 3 Cessation o f delight in favour o f freedom from affects; e q u a n im ity and mindfulness with bodily ease.

Stage 4 Cessation o f feelings o f pleasure and pain; development o f equanim ity free from joy and sorrow in mindfulness and purity. When Siddhattha had thus made his mind icitta), ‘collected and purified, without blemish, free o f defilements, grown soft, workable, fixed and im m ovable’ (M N 36.26), he turned his attention to the recollection o f previous existences: ‘ I recalled many a former existence I had passed itirough: one birthi, two hiirihis, three, four, live, ten, twenty, ihirty, forty, fifty, a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand h)irtlis, in various world-periods. (I knew:) “ I was there, such was my name, such my fam ily, such my

caste, my way o f life. I experienced such and such good and bad fortune, and such was my end. H aving died, I came to life again there, such was my name . . . and such was my end.” In this w ay I recalled many previous existences with their various characteristic features and circumstances. This knowledge (vijja) I gained in the first watch o f the night’ (i.e. between 9 p.m. and midnight). (M N 36.26) In ihe middle watch o f the night, Siddhattha gained the second kind o f knowledge: the natural law o f ethical causality [kamma), in accord­ ance with which good {i.e. wholesome) deeds are followed by good rebirth, and bad (i.e. unwholesome) deeds by evil rebirth: ‘ With the heavenly eye, purified and beyond the range o f human vision, I saw how beings vanish and come to be again. I saw high and low, brilliant and insignificant, and how each obtained according to his kamma a favourable or painful rebirth. 1 recognized: “ Those beings who make evil use o f body, spcech and thought will obtain after ihe breaking-up o f the body at death a painful rebirth, they will sink down, perish, and (go to) hell. But those who make good use o f body, speech and thought will obtain a favourable rebirth, and (go to) heaven.’ ” M X 36.27) Finally, in the last watch, when the horizon was already becoming visible in the east as a white line o flight, Siddhattha broke through to the third knowledge, the understanding of.suffering and the ‘ Four Noble T ru th s' which form the framework o f his doctrine: ‘ I direc ted my mind to ihe knowledge o f ihe destruction o f ihe influences :dsava: and knew as it really is: “ This is suffering (dukkha), 1 his is its cause, this is its cessation, and this is the path that leads to its cessation." And as I recognized this, my mind was free from the in Hue 1ices o f sense-desire, o f becoming and o f ignorance. And the knowledge arose in me: “ Rebirth (for me: is destroyed, I have completed the holy life, done is what had lo be done, there is no more o f being lor me!’ " (M N 36.28) And he uttered the cry o f jubilation:

‘ M y em ancipation is assured, T liis is my last h>irth, Thim* will l>e no more rc-becoming!’ ( M X 26 .21) In this uiglil o f the year 528 b c Siddhattlia G otaina, the thirty-fiveyear-old soil o f the R a ja o f K apilavatth u, bad gained enlightenment (bodhi). He had become a Buddha, an ‘enlightened' or ‘aw akened’ one, and was thus freed from the cycle o f rebirths. T radition dales this event (like G otam a’s birth) in the first lull-moon night o f the month Vesakha {A p ril-M a y ), and locales il near U ruvela (today Bodh-G aya) under a particular assallh'a or pipal tree (Ficus religiosa). T he full moon o f Vesakha is accordingly the most important festival o f the Buddhist world, and the assatlha is the sacred tree. As an event which originated a new school o f thinking and a new religion, the enlightenment o f thie Buddha deserves psychological analysis. Under ihe influence o f Zen Buddhism modern writers have - wrongly described this enlightenment as like a lightning-flash. From G o ta m a ’s account in M X 36 wc learn that the enlightenment was spread over three night-watches (about nine h ou rs;, and was thus a gradual process. This agrees with his statement that in his doctrine progress is gradual and there is 110 sudden, spontaneous understanding {anild), just as the seashore does not lead abru plly into deep water, tml slopes aw ay gradually (Ud 5.5 p. 54). In addition, the process o f enlightenment was guided by reason, as appears clearly from the words, three limes repeated: ‘ I directed my mind lo the understanding o f . . .’ We must therefore picture G o tam a’s enlighten­ ment as a happy condition, lasting several hours, o f extreme mental clarity, which activated all the intellectual abilities and focused them, like a burning glass, on one point at a time. There was nothing ecstatic about this bodhi, it was not an out-of-the-hjody state or a trance. Nor was G otaina's search at this point a blind fum bling in thie dark. He knew precisely on what objects to direct his attention. Since he liad been fam iliar with Upanishadic ideas o f rebirth from his stay with L.ddaka, he was able to dircct his mind to thie profounder penetration o f this theme. T h e same applies to the system o f four

truths, which lie will have known from the well-developed medical theory which already existed in the India o f the sixth century b c . According to this one asked first about the disease, then about its cause, ihen about the possibility o f annihilating that cause, and finally about the medicine. G o tam a’s enlightenment consisted largely in ihe analytical understanding o f pre-existing thought. Hut it went further, because it was also synthetic, i.e. an understand­ ing which opened up new areas o f knowledge. T h e 'ah a' experience of analytical penetration was accom panied by the ‘oh’ experience o f joyous creative intuition, in which accepted opinions and fresh in­ sights combined in G otam a’ s mind like crystals to form a new truth and doctrine [dhamma). In the glorious clarity o f bodhi a new' system o f thought was formed out o f elements old and new, which explained the world ‘as il is’ (yathdbhutam), pointed out a w ay from suffering lo deliverance, and finally transcended all previous insights into one allcomprising truih. 11 is just this overriding element o f illumination which points to beyond ihe visible and gives the Buddha’s teaching that magical fascination that still moves mankind and leads people towards the good. There is no contradiction between G o tam a’s state­ ment on the one hand that his doctrine is like an old, overgrown path tha I he has rediscovered, leading through the jungle to a forgotten ciiy S N 1 2.(15.19 If. 1, and his insistence elsewhere that it is something new, ‘ never heard before’ 'M v 1.6.23). We must distinguish the rational element o f the enlightenment, which forms the content ofthe doctrine \dhamma) from its psychological effect on himself. It has alw ays been a basic conviction o f Indian religions that knowledge, understanding or wisdom could remove the factors that bind us to suffering and rebirth. The Buddha, too, never doubted this. How did he justify breaking off his ascetic practices? Because, he says, they do not lead 10 ‘ that wisdom which, when one has it . . . leatls ihe practitioner to the total destruction o f suffering’ {M N 12.56}. Lack o f knowledge (avijja) binds us to (he cycle o f rebirths, while understanding (Hanoi, knowledge (vijja) or wisdom ipanfta) liberate us from it: T h ey are ihe means o f em ancipation. And therefore it was clear to the Buddha that his enlightenment had definitely freed him o f ihe burden o f rebirth and delivered him: ‘T h ere will be no more re-becoming (for me)!’ was his cry alter attaining Buddhahcxid.

Further, thie experience o f enlightenment gave him thie feeling o f belonging, as a Buddha, to a different category o fb ein g, having only the outward appearance in common with unlil>erated beings. T h e knowledge that pain could still indeed touch him physically, but could no longer affect him mentally, and tlial nothing could reverse hiis liberation, conferred on him that detached superiority to existence which lie alw ays displayed in the forty-five years o f his ministry towards kings and beggars, friends and opponents. O rthodox tradition regards the enlightenment (hodhi) as an experi­ ence o f understanding which revealed to the Buddha all the elements o f his teaching in complete and final form. In other words, orthodox tradition assumes that gaining Iniddhahood turned Siddhattha from a thinker into a possessor o f the truth. Fortunately it can be proved thal G otam a’s creative thought continued even after his bodhi. For him as a person the enlightenment was the end o f his search for em ancipation, but for his teaching it was the beginning o f a course of development. Thiis can bc seen from llie fad d ial Ihe* complete teaching whichi emerges from the M aster’s discourses contains elements which were not present in I he original enlightenment. Precisely tlie most striking point in his whole system, and one which contradicts the philosophy o f ihe Upanisads, namely the doctrine o f non-self (an-attu), according to which a permanent soul [alia, Skt atm an), an ego that survives the death o f the body cannot be found in the em pirical personality and that rebirth takes place without a transm igrating soul as a conditioned process precisely this teaching belongs to the period after the enlightenment, when the young Buddha was m aking his still tjroadmeshed insights more precise and filling out ihe details o f his teach­ ing. T H E -S A C R E D ’ TR EE In the Buddha's accounts o f his enlightenment (M N 26 and 36) it is nowhere mentioned that this evenl occurred under a tree. Some scholars llierefore consider thie tree as the location o f his enlighten­ ment to be unhisiorical, and suggest that pre-Buddhist tree-cults have found their w ay into Buddhism at this point. But is it not

Thie assattha or pipal free ;Ficus religiosa) is easily rccognized by its leaves. In Buddhist countries it is generally known as the bo(dhi) tree. natural that a hiomeless wanderer, wherever he is, would sit down under a tree that would shield him from the dew by night, and from the sub-tropical sun by day? We ran take it as a m atter o f course that Siddhattha pursued his speculations leading to enlightenment at the foot o f a tree. And the fact that the tree was an assattha tree, easily recognizable by its heart-shaped leaves with the long curved point, is something that the Buddha could so easily have mentioned to his monks in passing that we ran readily regard it as a historical fact. 'Yhchodfii tree behind the 5 1 m-tall M ahabodhi temple at Bodh-Gayii (the ancient U ru vela;, which was erected in the first century a d , is visited daily by some dozens o f pilgrims. But only the very credulous believe that it is the original assattha under which G otam a gained his enlightenment 2,500 years ago. It can be shown thiat the tree was replaced several times in thie course o f time, though alw ays with descendants o f the original tree. Th u s the present tree is descended from thie original one in a direct line. T h e bodhi tree was placed under special protection by the Build hist Em peror Asoka, who reigned over India as a peaceful ruler from 265 to 232 b c . Me not only had a stone fence ;no longer existing) built round thie tree, and marked the sarred spot with a [likewise vanished; edirt-pillar with a lion capital; he also arranged for K in g Devanam piyatissa o f Ceylon (Lan ka), who had been converted to Bud­ dhism about 242, to receive a shoot o f the bodhi tree to plant at his capital o f A nuradhapura. The tree that grew from this shoot, and its successors, have repeatedly furnished the shoots or seeds with which the Indian tree was replaced after being destroyed. T h e destruction o f the original bodhi tree o f B odh-G aya is supposed

to have been caused by Tissarakkha, A soka’s beautiful second wife, whom the emperor married four years before his death. Because His M ajesty devoted more attention to the tree than to her, we are told (M hv 20.4!'.;, she pierced the tree (which she probably believed contained a nymph) with a mandu thorn. This is a thorn which is believed in India to possess the power o f destroying the life centre o f plants and causing them to wither. T h is story apparently aims at providing an explanation for the death o f the tree towards the end o f Asoka’s reign. The destruction o f the replacement tree on religious grounds is ascribed to the G au da (Bengal) king ^asanka. Sasanka, a fanatical Sivaite and enemy o f Buddhism, passed through B odh-G aya in the beginning o f the seventh cenlury ah on a cam paign against K an yakubja iK a n au j). f illed with haired, as Hsuan-tsang tells us, he not only had the sacred tree felled, blit in order lo complete its destruction, he had the roots dug oul and burnt. T h e second replacement tree was planted by Purnavarm an, Asoka’s last successor 011 the dirone o f M agadha. In 1876 die bodhi tree o f Bodh-G aya was uprooted by a storm. Whether this was P u rnavarm an’s tree, or yet another replacement, is unknown. T h ere are conflicting accounts of the origins o f the present tree that grows ai Bodh-G aya. Som e say it grew from a shoot laken from the Anuradhapura tree, while others say it grew from the roots o f its uprooted predecessor. However that m ay be, the present tree is a grandchild, or more probably a great- or great-great-grandchild, o f the original assattha tree under which, in a night o f the year 528 b c , the ascetic Siddhattha G otam a became the Buddha.

2

T he foundation o f the Order and the beginning of the mission

F IR S l' SE R M O N S According to tradition, the young Buddha spent the first seven days after his enlightenment at the foot o f the bodhi tree, ‘enjoying the delight o f liberation’ (M v 1.1.1,). We can accept this statement as true, because the fram ework o f the teaching still needed to be filled out with detailed recognitions, and a partly joyous, partly sentimental mood m ay have kept the Enlightened One at the spot which meant so much 10 him. We can give less credence lo the statement (hat, after the seven days under the bodhi tree, he spent seven days under each of a number o f other trees at Uruvclii. U nder the G oatherd's Banyan (Ficusindica) he explained lo a Brahmin who had questioned him the true nature o f Brahminisrn, consisting o f a pure and virtuous life and a good knowledge o f ihe V eda (M v 1.2). Still more fabulous is the event which is supposed to have occurred in the third week after his enlightenment under a mucalinda tree (Barringtonia acuiangula). According lo M v 1.3 , when a pre-monsoon storm broke nut, the cobra living in the root o f the tree wrapped its body round him arnd protected him from the rain with its outspread hood. T he root o f the legend could be that the reptile, being driven out o f its hole by the rain, inflated itselfbefore die Sam an a, bui did him no harm. From the m ucalinda tree the Buddha moved to a rajayatan a tree (Buchanania talifolia), under which he also stayed for a week. It was here lhai the merchants Tapussa and Bhallika, who were travelling from U kkala (in Orissa?), presumably to R aja ga h a , gave him barley gruel and honey as alms, ‘so that it might bring them happiness and good fortune'. He ate the proffered food, and the two merchants 'took refuge in the Enlightened One and his teaching’ - which he had not yel promulgated - thus becoming his first lay followers (M v 1.4).

'Hie fifth week after his enlightenment hy a request from Tapussa and Bhallika for instruction, lie considered whether hiis doctrine, which was 'profound, hard to see, liard to grasp, factual, excellent, inacccssible to .'mere'! logic, subtle, to be apprchiended by the wise (only )", should be kept to himself or revealed to other people. The Pali texts (M v 1.5 and M N 1261 record these doubts in the form o f a conversation w'ilh the God Brahm a Saham pati :'l,o rd over himself’ ). Apparently the Buddha, in order lo make his inner conflict understandable, made use o f this well known god-ligure to present the counter-arguments when lie hesitated to teach. T h at he. like the m ajority o f his contemporaries, believed in the existence o f gods (who, too, were mortal and suhject to the law o f rebirth), is un­ doubted. But that he really saw Brahm a so vividly with his own eyes, as the texts declare, is probably the interpretation o f later monks. In the following "dialogue’ , which has been cut dow'it to essentials, personal and quieiisl arguments are opposed to altruistic ones. The latter win the day. The liuddha 'This world delights in the pleasures o f the senses, but my leaching Dhamma) aims at the renunciation o f all attachments and the destruction o f craving. I f I were to teach this doctrine, which goes against the siream , and people did nol understand me, that would be a weariness and a trouble to me.’ Hrahma ‘T h e world will perish if the Fully F.nlightened One does not decide to teach his doctrine. M ay the Kxalted One therefore leach it! There are some beings with little dust 011 their eyes. If they do not hear the Dhamma they will be lost. But if they hear the Dham m a they will attain [to liberation]!’ Brahm a's arguments aroused G otam a's compassion for the beings, and with the cry: “I.ei the doors to Deathlessness be opened to all who are able to hear!' he agreed to leach. Satisfied, Brahm a bowed to the Buddha, circled round him to the right according to Indian etiquette, and vanished. The gods, too, know' how to behave towards an enlightened one. When he came to consider to whom he should first declare his teaching, the Buddha thought first o f his one-time teachiers A jara

K alam a and U ddaka R am ap u tia. Learning that thiey were h>oth dead, hie next thiouglit o f thie five companions o f hiis ascetic period, who, hy the inner exaltation and the radiance o f the Buddha, and he asked him who was his teacher and whiat was his teaching. Proudly tlie Buddha declared that hie was em ancipated through the destruction of craving, hie was the victor and liad, therefore, no teacher, but was a teacher himself. Unimpressed, Upaka heard him and .said: ‘ It may be so, brother’ , and shaking hiis bead, took another patli to one side (M v i.6; M X 26; M N 85). It would have been easy for the compilers o f the Pali C anon to have cut out thiis episode, whiich is somewhat detrimental to tlie Buddha’s image. T h at they did not do so speaks for their respect for historical truth. K ondaniia, Bhaddiya, V a p p a , M ahanam a and Assaji were not at all pleased when G otam a, their one-time companion who liad deserted them, approaclied them in the deer-park at Isipatana. In fact they agreed neithier to greet him nor to rise in his presence. But as he approached, they were so overwhelmed by his dignity as one liberated thal they treated him with all courtesy. T h ey took his almsbowl and his upper robe, prepared a seat for him, washed his feet acid addressed him, out o f habit, as ‘ Brother’ (avuso). But the Buddha rejected this form o f address: ‘ Monks, do not address tlie “ Thus-C om e” (tathagata) as “ Brothier” (as if he were one o f yourselves). Monks, the Thus-Com e is a Holy One larahant), a Fully-Enlightened O ne.’ (M v 1.6 .12 = M N 26; i, 17 1)

A Buddha represents a unique category o f being, who shares indeed the outward appearance o f mankind, and like human beings is subject lo physical decay (as a result o f unexpired kamma), but who is no longer bound lo the cycle o f birth and .death. Until his final extinction he lives as one emancipated in the world, but inwardly detached from it. All bonds, including family and social ones, have been broken for him. T h e claim o f their former companion to have discovered the way to deathlessness ( = liberation), to have found and realized the truth and the teaching (dhamma), was met by the five ascetics with scep­ ticism. How could il be, they asked, thal one who had abandoned asceticism in favour o f a life o f plenty could have won through lo the truth? T he Buddha explained to them lh al he had by no means succumbed to a life o f abundance, and to make things clear he preached a sermon (sutta) to them, the famous Sermon on the T urning o f the Wheel, with which his mission begins. T h e sutta presents the Dham m a as the middle w ay, and sets forth the system o f the Four Truths: the logical framework within which all detailed teachings are contained. ‘T h ere are these two extremes, monks, which one who has left the world should not pursue. Which two? (On the one hand) giving oneself up to indulgence in sensual pleasure; this is base, common, vulgar, unholy, unprofitable. (On the other hand) giving oneself up to self-torment; this is painful, unholy (and also) unprofit­ able. Boih these extremes, monks, the Perfected One has avoided, having found that it is the M iddle W ay which causes one to see and to know, and which leads to peace, to (higher) knowledge, to enlightenment and N ibbana. (1) T h is, monks, is the Noble T ru th o f Suffering (dukkha)'. Birth is suffering, old age is suffering, sickness is suffering, death is suffering: sorrow, lam entation, pain, grief and distress are suffering; being joined to what one does not like is suffering, being separated from what one likes is suffering; not to get what One wants is suffering: in short, the five aggregates o f clinging (which make up the empirical personality) are suffering. (2) This, monks, is the Noble Truth o f the Origin o f Suffering: It is

that craving {lanha) whiichi gives rise lo rebirth and, bound lip with pleasure and passion, now here now there, finds ever (reshi delight: it is Sensual C ravin g {kdmatanhd), C ravin g for Existence (.bhavalanha), C raving lor Non-Existence (vihhavatanhd). (3) This, monies, is the Nol>le Truth o f the Extinction o f Suffering: il is ihe complete removal and extinction o f this craving, its forsak­ ing and giving up, abandonment and detachment from it. (4) This, monks, is the Noble Truth o f the Path Leading to the Extinction o f Suffering. It is this Nol>le Eightfold Path, namely: Right Right Right Right Right Right Right Right

V iew (savimd-ditthi) Resolve (samma-sankappa) Speechi isamma-vacd) Action (.uimmd-kammanta) Livelihood (samma-ajTvaj Effort fsamma-vayama) M indfulness [samma-sali) Concentration (sammd-samddhi) i M v 1.(». 17 + 19 -2 2 = S N 5 6 .1 1 .5 8)

The five listened to his words with breathless attention, and even as he spoke, Kondaniia gained full understanding o f the teaching: 'W hatever is subject to the law o f origination, is also subject to the law o f decay’ (M v 1.6.29). Soon afterwards, he asked the Buddha to accept him as a disciple, and the Buddha, with the formula: ‘ Come, monk, the doctrine has ln*en well explained: lead a life o f purity in order to attain to the end o f suffering!’, acccpted him as a monk (bhikkhu) (M v 1.6 .32). K oiidanna was thus the first monk in the history of Buddhism, and his ordination marks the beginning o f the order o f monks (sangha} which exists to this day. In Buddhist Asia thie ‘ turning o f the Wheel o f D ham m a’ is celebrated annually at ihe full moon o f the month o f A sajh a (.June-July). Thus a period o f two lunar months (fifty-six days) is assumed to have occurred between G o tam a’s enlightenment in Vesakha and the sermon at Isipatana. Soon the B uddha’s instruction led to V a p p a ’ san d Bhaddiya’s under­ standing o f the T ru th (the D ham m a), and they too were accepted as monks. While the bliikkhus (literally ‘ mendicants’) K ondaniia,

V ap p a and Bhaddiya went on die alms-round to provide food for the group, the Teacher gave private instruction to M ah an am a and Assaji. In a little while they too gained the requisite insight, and sought ordination (M v 1.6 .3 3 -7 ). T h ere were now six bhikkhus in the world - the M aster and his five disciples. A few days after the ordination o f the five, the Buddha gave them a discourse on non-self (M v 1.6 .38 -46 = S N 22.59). ^ *s rem arkable in that it introduces an idea that was not hinted at either at the time o f the enlightenment or in the Isipatana sermon, and which is surprising in a non-materialistic system: the denial o f the existence o f a soul. T h is shows that the Buddha had already developed his doctrine philosophically-since his enlightenment. T h e ‘ Discourse 011 the M arks o f N on -Self’ starts from the assump­ tion that the em pirical personality consists o f five - and only five ‘groups’ (khandha) o f constituents, nam ely body, feelings, perceptions, the mental reactions to these (saikhara;, and consciousness. Since in India an ego, self or soul (alia, Skt Slman) alw ays implies something that survives death and is eternal, and since none o f the ‘ five groups’ is permanent, the conclusion is draw n that none o f them constitutes a soul. In the five groups which exhaustively form the personality there is mental or psychic life, but no soul in the sense o f a permanent entity: the personality is ‘ non -self [analla), without a soul. A second argument supports the first. T h e m utability and perish­ able nature o f the live groups render each o f them ‘ painful’ (dukkha), and something that is painful (and unsatisfactory) cannot be a soul. When the five bhikkhus heard this explanation from the Buddha, their minds were freed from all influences iasara) leading to rebirth, and thus they became ‘saints’ (arahant} (M v 1.6.47). T h eir understand­ ing o f the saving doctrine was now as vast and profound as that o f the Buddha, and they differed from him only in the source o f their understanding. A Buddha is dogm atically defined as one who has found his liberation for himself, whereas an A rahant has gained it under instruction (S N 22.58). T h e relative ease with which the first five, as well as many later monks and lay people, attained enlightenment, has led some readers o f the texts to assume that people in the Buddha’s time were more predisposed to spiritual insight than we are today. Th is is possible,

because in world history periods o f greater and lesser spirituality can bc found. A further reason for the frequent declarations o f Arahantship is that in ancient India the conviction prevailed that understanding and realization were the same thing. W hoever fully comprehends the Four Noble Truths and, in accordance with the second one, recognizes craving (tanhaj as the cause o f rebirth and suffering, has by this very insight destroyed cravin g and has thus become an A rahant. T o d a y we are less optimistic about the effectiveness o f recogni lion.

S A R N A T H - THE A R C H A E O L O G I C A L S I T E After the noise o f car-horns and rickshaw-bells in Benares, Sarnath seems like an oasis o f peace. T h e busy Hindu city is only 8 kilometres from the quiet o f the deer-park of Isipatana, the modern Sarnath (Skt Sarungandtha, ‘ Lord o f the Deer’ ), but how different the world seems here - ordered and solemn. T h e last part o f the asphalt road is fringed by mighty mango and tamarind trees. T h e site, which is enclosed by a stone wall, is carefully tended by the Indian A rchae­ ological Service. Between the •■>mplexes o f ruins are grassy law-ns, dotted here and there with ihe red and violet blossoms o f bougain­ villaea. T h e most striking monument at Sarnath is the 44 m-high Dhamekh Stupa, a round tower, 27 m in diameter, standing on a stone base, built o f brick with, in places, ornamental stonework, narrowing half­ way up to two-thirds o f its base diameter. This all grew through numerous claddings and vertical extensions out o f a small brick and clay stupa from A soka’s time (third century b c ). T h e origin o f the name Dhamekh was disputed until the discovery o f a burnt-clay votive tablet settled ihe m ailer. Its inscription denotes the stupa as Dhamaka {Ski dharmacakra). This means that it marks the spot where the Buddha, in addressing the five ascetics, ‘set the Wheel o f D ham m a’ (Pali: dhammacakka) in motion. Pilgrims venerate the stupa, which like all stupas is solid and so cannot be entered,, by right-handed circum am bulation, an ancient Indian w ay o f paying respect to highly placed persons. Passing the remains o f old monasteries and numerous votive stupas,

thie pilgrim proceeds from the Dhamekh Stupa to tlie former main temple o f Sarnath. whose 2 m-thirk brick walls remain standing to a height o fah o u l 5 m. Judging hy the strength o f the masonry and the statements o f Hsiian-tsang, the original temple tower must have been ah)out 60 111 high. I he remains o f the walls enclose an area o f 13 by 13 m. Th is is tlie floor o f thie former inner hall o f the temple which, as Hsiian-tsang descril>es it in tlie seventh century a n, contained a metal statue o f tlie Buddha. I he temple probably dates from thie second or third century a d , and stands on the site where the five monks erected a hut o f leaves lor the M aster, in which lie spent the rainy season of 528 m;. T h e spot is a favourite meditation-place for pilgrims from Sri Lanka, Burma and T h ailan d. Often, too. Tibetan monks in their purple robes can be seen here holding a lJ uja >:religious cerem ony), or venerating the memory o f the Teacher by 108-lbld prostration and the setting-up o f oil lamps. T o the west o f the main temple ihe visitor finds a monolithic edictcolumn o f the Em peror Asoka (third century b c ). Seventy cm thick ai the l>ase and 55 cm al)ove, originally 16 m high, the column is now broken into several pieces as tlie result o f the destruction o f Benares and Sarnath by General Q iub-ud-D in in 119 4 . T h e capital o f the column, now in the local museum, is rightly famous. It represents four finely sculptured lions, sitting hwck-to-back, for, just as thie lion has the loudest voice am ong l>easts. and roars in all directions, so too the Buddha was the teacher most clearly heard in his time, and he spread hiis Dhamma in all directions. T h e lion capital is today the state crest o f thie Republic o f India, and the twenty-ibur-spoked wheel which appears four times in tlie base o f the capital - whiich is a symbol both o f the Buddha’s leaching and o f just government - now appears 011 the Indian national flag. 'I’he imperial edict engraved in BrahmT script on the still-standing portion o f the pillar does nol really fit in with the dignity o f the place. It warns monks and nuns against schiism, and commands that schis­ matics must put 011 white clothing (instead of the yellow robe o f the O rder; and must leave tlie community o f the O rder. L a y followers are urged to observe special rules on the Uposatka days (new moon, full moon, and the days at the mid-point between the two). Since the edict makes no reference to the events o f Isipatana, it has been

Sarnath (Isipalana), the site of the Buddha’s first discourse and of the foundation of the order of monks (present-day archaeological state). concluded that the pillar was brought to Sarnath from somewhere else. T he content o f the edict is consistent with its having come originally from Kosam bi. A few metres south o f the main shrine and the Asoka pillar the visitor observes a circular platform. This is the basis o f the former

D hafm arajika Stupa, once 30 m high, which originally bore a stone balustrade. O nly a few courses o f brick remain from this stupa, which was also built by Asoka. T h e rest was removed for the sake o f ihe bricks in 1794 b v .Ja g a t Singh, ihe Diwan (minister) o f R a ja Chet Singh o f Benares. D uring the demolition a round stone urn was found 9 rn below the top o f the stupa, containing a reliquary o f green marble. T h is contained lhal portion o f the ashes o f the Buddha that Asoka had had removed from their original burial place to Sarnath, in order that the site ol the First Sermon and the foundation o f the Sangha should also have a share o f the relics. Ja g a t Singh dealt in Hindu fashion with the ashes: he had them cerem onially scattered over the Ganges. Nevertheless, the demolition o f the D harm arajika Stupa and the discovery of relics o f the Buddha had its fortunate side. The report o f the local British Resident drew public attention to Sarnath and led to its archaeological investigation. G R O W T H O F T 11E C O M M U N I I Y Gotam a had little interest in visiting the city o f Benares from Isipatana (Sarnath). A part from the fact that it was an hour and a h alf's walk distant, there was a river, the V an in a, (now Barna) to be crossed, and this was only possible by a ferry which had to be paid lor with money that a mendicant monk did not have. Above all, the popula­ tion o f Benares was so resistant to religious mendicants that it was very difficult to obtain alms-food there. However, contact with Benares was established for ihe Buddha without any action 011 his part. This was through Y asa, the son o f a rich merchant and guild president o f Benares, probably a banker or wholesale cloth merchant. Y asa was a spoilt young man who had had his (ill o f the pleasures o f life, which had left him inw ardly empty. Th e Pali Canon (M v 1.7. if.) mentions the three houses he lived in, according to the season, the female musicians who surrounded him, bul towards whom he was indifferent, and the golden shoes — pre­ sum ably embroidered with gold threat! that he wore. So Y asa, bored by m arriage and luxury and spiritually unsatisfied, visited the deer-park at Isipatana early one morning, greeted the

Buddha, and sat down at a respcetful distance. G otam a, who recog­ nized tlie young tn a n ’s world-wearincss, gave him a ‘graduated discourse’ . T h e metliod, which shows his didactic skill, and which he first used withi Y asa, ‘consisted o f mentioning first such readily com ­ prehensible matters as the giving o f alm s, ethical rules, hieaven, and the worthlessness o f sense-pleasures. I f tlie listener was capable o f taking in more, lie went 011 to teach the Four Noble Truths, i.e. about suffering and its origin, its cessation and the w ay to achieve this. This pedagogical method proved an immediate success with Y asa. Me gained the ‘dust-free and spotless insight into D ham m a, nam ely, that whatever is suh>joct lo the law o f origination, is also subject to the law o f decay’ (M v 1.7.6). In the meantime Y a s a ’s mother was getting worried about her son, and (jogged her husband to go in search o f him. And so Y a sa ’s fatlier came to Isipatana. and he asked thie Buddha where his son was. Instead o f replying directly, ihe Buddha asked him lo sit down, and then delivered lo him ihe same ‘graduated discourse’ which had proved so successful with Y asa. But as Y a s a ’s father was too worried to take in more, he only gave him the first and easier part o f the teaching. Thereupon Y asa senior took hiis refuge in ‘ Buddha, D ham m a and S an gh a’ , and declared himself a lay follower (updsaka). And so hie was, after Tapussa and Bhallika, the third lay member o f the Buddhist com munity, though the first to lie converted with the threefold formula o f Buddha, D ham m a and San gha which is still in use today. Finally, Y asa 's father discovered his son am ong those surrounding the Buddha and begged him 10 return home for thie sake o f his griev ing mother. But Y asa looked so pleadingly at the Buddha that the latter declared that il was impossible for one who scorned worldly life as much as Y asa to resume his former existence. Y asa senior could only accept the Buddha’s argum ent, Iml lie invited the Buddha to a meal for the following day, accom panied h>y Yasa. T h e Buddha accepted by silence, the usual Buddhist form o f agreement - probably accom panied by the still-current indication o f acceptance, describing a horizontal figure-of-eight with thie chin. As soon as his father liad gone, Y asa junior bogged for ordination as a monk. G o iam a acceded 10 his request, and belbre long thie bhikkhu Yasa attained lo

sainthood. ‘ Now there were seven A rahants in the world’ (M v 1.7 .7 -

'5)Despite its edifying character this story is a moving document o f the times. It not only characterizes the religious yearning which had seized India in the sixth century b c , and which drove numberless people to leave their houses and huts to venture on a wandering mendicant life, it also shows us the mental distress which parents, or in other cases wives and children, suffered at the departure o f a son, a husband or a father. T h e meal to which Y asa senior had invited his son’s T eacher and the son himself took place next morning. 'Accom panied by the Venerable (bhikkhu) Y a s a ', the master made his way to the house of Y a sa ’s parents, where Y a s a ’s mother and his ‘ former wile’ welcomed the guests. After they had received the graduated discourse (in full) from the Buddha, both ladies took the threefold refuge, thus becoming G otam a’s first female lay followers [upasikd). Thereupon, assisted by Y asa senior, they served the monks with the meal (M v 1.8). Y a sa ’s conversion had consequences. The fact that a spiritual doctrine had induced the satiated youth to abandon his life o f ease and become a samana was proof enough to his friends that this teaching must be something extraordinary, and inspired four o f them to imitate him. V im ala, Subahu, l’ unnaji and G avam pati, all, like Y asa, m erchants' sons and o f the Vessa caste, were accepted as monks on Y a sa ’s recommendation, and all became Arahants (M v 1.9}. Not long afterwards, a further fifty o f Y a s a ’s friends from the surroundings o f Benares entered the O rder, and also became Arahants. T h e number o f Arahants had thus risen to (it (M v 1.10 ).

B E N A R E S OR T H O D O X Y V E R S U S MOVEMENT

THE S A M A R A

Even in the lifetime o f the Buddha Benares had the reputation o f a place that was especially auspicious for those seeking salvation, though not to the same degree as later, in Hindu times. T h e belief o f many that ritual bathing in the G an ga (Ganges) at Benares w;as specially salvific, and that the dead whose remains were cremated at the Ghats (special bank-siles) o f the city went straight to heaven, gave the place an aura o f sanctity.

Thie name o f VariinasT or BanarasT, from which thie modern forms Banaras or Benares are derived, comes from the names o f thie two rivers between whose mouths the city lies 011 the left (or western) bank o f the G an ga, thie Var(u)na- (Barna) and the Asi, the latter o f whiich is in the dry season a mere trickle. T h e right (eastern) bank o f the G an ga, which at Benares flows-first from south to north and then turns north-east, is uncultivated, a broad expanse o f grey sand, whichi is covered by deep water every monsoon. Anyone dying 011 the east bank opposite the city is believed by the inhabitants to lie reborn as a donkey. T h e tradition that Benares was a royal foundation carries little conviction. T h e city rather seems to have developed out o f a trans­ shipment port that grew up in the angle o f tlie V aru n a and G anga, north-east o f the present MahavTya bridge, wliere goods were unloaded from the punts and barges com ing down the V a ru n a to larger sailingships 011 the G anga. Here, and at the nearby R aj-G h at, archaeologists have discovered the remains o f the oldest stone buildings o f the city, dating back to the sixth century bc., just about the Buddlia's time. T h e com mercial centre o f the city lay 2 km to the south-west on a hill, corresponding to thie present-day Chauk (Gliowk). This hill is about 40 m above the water-level and protects its inhal)itants from the risk o f Hooding to which the parts o f the city along the banks are annually exposed. A lready in antiquity, Benares was known for its fine textiles. Benares cotton, delicate muslin and the lieavy hirocades, often threaded with gold, were famous, and found c ustomers throughout the sub-continent. Any man with the requisite commercial initiative and some capital to invest, who advanced the money for thread to the weavers and provided the fashionahile patterns lor them, and who then took care o f (he export and sales o f their product, could make a fortune. 1’his m ay well have been hiow Y a s a ’s father Ijecame a rich man. Some other hiranches. o f industry and trade were directly related to the religious role o f the city: the manufacture o f clay and copper v essels for the water-cult, the sale o f incense and fuel for the Vedic lire-ceremonies and cremations, the trade in sacrificial animals and in garlands. A considerable proportion o f the Benares inhabitants (who perhaps numbered 120,000 at this period) also lived by providing

services connected witli the pilgrimages, whether as sacrificial or cremation celebrants, as guides, servants in thie inns, or as tricksters preying on the pilgrims. And roiwid about the city in a wide arc were to be found ‘ publicity agents’ o f various kinds who eloquently pro­ claimed the virtues o f the holy city and its value for the salvation o f one’s soul. Though Benares, with its busy riverside life, was a bustling city in the B ud dh a’s time, we must picture it as architecturally com para­ tively modest. Those visual elements we think o f today at the mention o f Benares did not yet exist. There were neither images nor temples, because the Vedic sacrificial cult was carried out in the open air. There were no stone stairs down to'the river, but just lianks o f clay, and there was no imposing city skyline: there were m erely secular buildings o f brick and clay, and they did nol even have the appear­ ance that we regard today as typically Indian. T h e spiritual landscape, too, was poorer:" we have to picture an India still without a Ramdyana, a Mahdbhdrala, a Bhagavadgild; the classical m ythology was still in its infancy, and Siva, whose citadel Benares was to become, was an unimportant minor deity, nor had the worship o f the sacred cow developed. Also - as now - there was no regulating authority in religious matters: all cult acts were per­ formed, not by groups or communities, but by individuals. Every man performed, or had performed for him, whatever observances and rites hie considered effective. W hat then was Benares like in thie B uddha’ s time? T ru e, it was a place o f Upanishadic wisdom, where the still fresh ideas o f reincarna­ tion and the natural law o f retribution were discussed and passed on: but far more than this it was a centre o f the Vedic sacrificial cults, which were in the hands o f a professional guild o f Brahm ins, as well as of the crem ation business - a city in which a heavenly after-life was offered for sale. C learly, all those who were making a good profit out o f this business were no friends o f the em ancipated samana movement with its scorn for the sac rificial practices. T h e m ajority o f tlie Benares citizens, therefore, were cold and unfriendly towards the wandering mendicants who cam ped outside the city in such alarm ing numbers, and preachied heretical ideas. If one o f them ventured into tlie centre o f the city, his alms-bowl might

remain em pty and he him self might be abused. A ccordingly, most o f the samanas kept to the outskirts and avoided contact with the towns­ people. T h e Buddha did the same. Out o f the forty-five years o f his mission, he spent only one rains retreat near Benares, nam ely in 528 b c , the year o f his enlightenment and the foundation o f the Sangha, and that was in the deer-park at Isipatana (Sarnath). L ater he stayed at Isipatana two or three times again, presum ably 011 his way to or from Kosam bi, but he confined his visits to the centre o f Benares to a minimum. I f he was not provided for by the Y asa fam ily, he went for alms not into the city, but to the cattlc-m arket on the outskirts (A N 3 .12 9 ). He had too little in common with the orthodox citizens and their ritualism. In point o f fact, G otam a supported all the views that were an a­ thema to the Vedic-Brahm anists o f Benares: he considered (1) ritual washing and {2) fire-sacrifices as useless, (3) he spoke out against anim al sacrifices, and (4) to the Vedic cult he opposed his view that all cults could be dispensed with. 1 T h e belief that water could wash one free, not only from dirt, but also from the consequences o f errors and omissions o f ritual, or o f breaches o f the caste code o f behaviour, was general in Benares, but elsewhere as well. There were other sacred rivers besides the G ahga. Flow ing water was supposed to have a greater purifying power than that in ponds and reservoirs. T h e water o f the ocean was considered not only ineffective for purification but positively dangerous, because ii harmed the aura. T he more enlightened Brahmins did not have quite such a naive faith in the purifying quality o f the water. For them, it only annulled a person’s sins when he not only totally immersed himself, but did so clearly conscious o f the ritual character o f his washing, com bining it with the right attitude o f mind. It was the inner attitude alone that distinguished the ritual bath from a mere cleansing bath. However, since this requirement was usually overlooked, the washings were, for most people, em pty acts, mere external forms. A typical adherent o f the water-cult was the B iahm in SundarikaB harad vaja: when the Buddha visited Savatthi this Brahm in asked

him in surprise if he did not bathe in the nearby river Bahuka, becausc this river brought liberation, was a source o f merit and purified one from evil deeds (.VI N 7, p. 39). T h e Buddha rejected this idea as false: no amount o f bathing could wash the perpetrator free o f the after-effects o f wicked acts. One should bathe only in pure deeds, in order to bring inner peace to all beings. I le gave sim ilar instruction to the Brahmin San garava, who bathed morning and evening with the express intention o f washing aw ay his sins committed in the night and the day respectively (S N 7 .2 1). G otam a explained to him that the teaching was the pond and moral discipline the bathing-place, and that whoever should bathe here would reach the other shore i.e. liberation. Me made .a sim ilar utter­ ance at the time o f the Astaka festival at G aya when he saw a group o f m atted-hair ascetics (ja lila ; ritually bathing: 'T h e y will not become pure through water, all those who bathe here. He in whom truth and justice are at home is pure - he is a Brahm in!' ''Ud 1.9). Lay people and monks, too, sometimes gave expression to the Buddhist contempt for ritual washings. When someone reminded the LicchavT minister N andaka from V esali, during a discourse by the Buddha, to take his evening bath, he replied: ‘ Enough o f that, my good man! Never mind the outer washing —the inner washing is good enough for me, namely my discipleship to the Enlightened O n e!’ (S N 5 5 .1 1 .3 .1 0 ;. T he theme is varied in verses by Punna, the daughter o f a domestic siave-girl o f the Buddha's rich supporter Anathapindika, who had set her free because she had won the Brahmin Sotthiya for the Buddha's leaching. H aving become a nun, Punna put into verse-lbrm ihe arguments with which she had brought about Sotthiya's conversion: ‘O nly an ignorant person can have declared to you, the ignorant, that bathing frees one from (the consequences of) evil deeds. I (that were so, then fish, turtles, frogs, water-snakes and crocodiles whatever lives in the water - would go straight to heaven. All those who perform evil deeds (or follow an impure trade) such,as sheepand pig-butchers, huntsmen, fishermen, thieves and murderers would be freed from bad K am m a by sprinkling themselves with

water! Besides, if these rivers were to wash aw ay the evil you have done, they would also wash aw ay your religious merits, leaving you behind, hollow and em pty!’ (ThTg 240-3) T he argument is easy to follow, hut only applies to those who hjelieve in the mechanical purification by water. 2 T he B uddha’s attitude to the fire-cult is nol so widely attested. T o the Brahmin Sun darika-B haradvaja previously mentioned, who believed in purification by fire as well as by water, he declared: ‘Think not. Brahm in, that by laying wood C an purity be gained, '[’hat’s external. He who seeks it by such outward means Will nol be purified, so say the wise. ‘ I reject the heaping oflogs on the altar, The fire I kindle is within myself. M y fire burns alw ays, ever clear and bright: An A rahant, I lead the holy life.’ . 1 (S N 7.1.9 ) T h e versification is o f a laier date, but doubtless correctly reflects the meaning o f the saying. Fire rituals existed in various forms in ancient India. T h e most important was tlie Vedic-Brahm in fire-sacrifice, which was carried out to order by professional Brahmins while observing elaborate cultic prescriptions, in order that the fire-god Agni would carry the sacrifice,up to thie gods. O ther fire-ritualists tried to purify their own souls by burning their impurities in the sacred flame. Am ong these were the m attrd-hair ascetics [jatila), several groups o f whom went over to the Buddha. One former leader of the Ja tila s , NadT-Kassapa (Kassapa o f the R iver), reproached himself, having become a bhik­ khu, for his former belief in the effectiveness o f the fire-cult. ‘ M any an offering I ’ve made, Poured upon the sacred flame. “ Thus I ’m purified!” , I th ou gh tFoolish worldling that I w as.’

3 Although thie washing rituals and fire-sacrifices had no religious value in the eyes o f the Buddlia, at least they harmed 110 one. Blood* sacrifices were different. In ancient India these cost tlie lives every year o f some human beings and o f several thousands ofanim als. It must be credited as a cultural achievement to Buddhism that the ritual killing o f living beings no longer belongs lo the standard customs, and that anim al sacrifices are today found only in Bengal, where the Hindu goddess K a li ('the Black’ } is supposed to demand them. A nim als were for the Buddha fellow-beings with a pcrfecl right to life, and his hove {melta) and compassion (karund) were extended to them no less than to mankind. He disliked their slaughter for human food, though he was .sufficient o f a realist to see that universal vegetarianism could not be enforced. But he regarded their ritual killing as an aberration, especially since many people believed that the slow killing o f the sacrificial anim al increased the efficacy o f the sacrifice. Often thie anim als rattle, horses or goats - were strangled. There is lo this day a place on the banks o f thie G an ga at Benares which is called, in memory o f a royal sacrificial cerem ony, Dasasvam edhaghat, ‘G h at o f the Ten-H orse Sacrifice’ . T h at innocent animals had to give their lives for the religious aims o f men offended not only G otam a’s compassion but also hiis sense o f justice. He was convinced thal everyone has to pay for his own deeds, and that neither bribing the gods nor tlie transference o f the results o f evil deeds (kamma) to another - the vicarious atonement I>y means of a sacrificial animal - was possible. W henever opportunity offered, he opposed such ideas, o f course not as a prophet threatening condign punishment, but as an em otionally detached sage who taught and inspired, but did not attem pt to force acceptance o f his teaching on people. As lie said himself, hie avoided striving with the world (SN 22.94). All that he threw into the scale was the reasonableness o f his thoughts and the m agic o f his personality. H e countered the great Vedic blood-sacrifices with pointing out their uselessness. When K in g Pasenadi o f K osala prepared a great sacrifice o f 500 bulls, 500 oxen, 500 cows, 500 goats and 500 rams, and compelled hiis servants and slaves to collect the anim als from their owners, presum ably without paym ent, G otam a commented

that neither human nor anim al sacrifices bore an y fruit. The wise kept aw ay from vast sacrifices at which goats, cattle and other anim als were killed. On the other hand, sacrifices without bloodshed and without great expense helped the sacrificer and pleased the gods (S N 3 .1.9 ). T h e rich Brahmin K utadanta o f Khanum ata planned an even greater sacrifice o f 700 of each kind o f anim al, but the Buddha talked him out o f it. By telling him a tale in the style o f the patakas (‘stories o f the Buddha’s previous lives’ ), he convinced K u tad anta that regular gifts to samanas, building monasteries, taking refuge in the B uddha’s teaching and keeping the precepts (refraining from killing and steal­ ing, sexual misconduct, lying and drunkenness), and meditation were sacrifices not only easier to make but more effective, in fact the most beneficial o f all sacrifices (D N 5 .2 2 -7 ). He used additional arguments against blood-sacrifices when he was asked by some professional Brahmins from K osala whether there were still today (i.e. in the sixth century tic) Brahmins who lived according to the old rules. He denied this, and described the Brahmins o f earlier times as celibate men without possessions, living entirely on alms, who would not let cows bc killed, regarding them as their best friends who provided them with ointment, food, strength, beauty and happiness (S N ip 2951!'.']. Later on the Brahmins, led astray by the exam ple o f the rulers’ splendid life, had urged these to perform horse and human sacrifices, for which they could demand a fee. Then the king had had ‘ m any hundred thousand’ head o f cattle killed with the sword, which even the gods regarded as sinful. Through this slaughter o f innocent living beings the sacrificial priests had fallen aw ay from the right path, and the wise and the general population for good reason reproached the offerers o f such costly sacrifices (S Nip 2 9 9 -3 13 ). 4 Another thing the orthodox held against the Buddha was his opposition to ritual. It was not that he objected to all rules and customs - there were rules and customs within the Buddhist com ­ munity as well. W hat he objected to was the idea that rites and rituals were important for salvation - that one could even compel salvation through them. He expressly included 'attachment to riles and ritual’ as one o f the ten fetters (samyojana) to be broken, and one o f the four attachments (upadana) in his system. Il is easy to imagine

the feelings o f the professional Brahmins, who made their living as ritual technicians and ceremonial experts, when they heard o f these articles in the Buddhist code which ran so contrary to their interests.

T H E RAIN' S R E T R E A T IN I S I P A T A N A Unloved by the citizens o f Benares, in so far as they noticed him at all, and without the expectation o f finding much acceptance o f his teaching in Benares outside the ranks o f the Y asa fam ily, the Buddha and his little band o f monks spent the rainy season 528 in the deerpark at Isipatana (Sarnath). There was not yet a proper monastery. T h e only accom modation consisted o f a few leaf-huts or at best huts o f bam boo and reed-mats, which the bhikkhus had constructed for the M aster and themselves. 'The monsoon is more than a period o f rainfall. It is an event that one longs for from April or M ay onwards as a clim atic relief, and which then comes step by step and far too slowly. A natural phenom­ enon that precedes the monsoon is the blossoming o f beautiful flower­ ing trees, although m any o f those which grace the Indian scene today were brought by European seafarers. India in the Buddha’s time W'as poorer botanically speaking. But the orange-coloured blossoms o f the kadam ba {.S'audea cordifolia), the cam paka (Micheiia champaka) with its scented golden yellow blossoms, the brilliant red flame o f the forest (Butea frondosa), the queen’s tree (iMgerstroemia Jlos-reginae), covered with pale blue candles, the golden shower (Cassia fistula) with its magnificent cascades o f yellow, the shining red coral tree (Erythrina indica), and the Asoka tree [Saraca indica) with its balls o f blossoms which turn from orange to red - all these must have already existed to delight the Indians o f the sixth century h c , 'The glorious spectacle o f flowering trees in A p ril-M ay is followed by a short period o f leaflessness, during which the branches reach skywards thirsty and skeleton-like. 'The dew that had hitherto supplied trees and bushes with a little moisture in the early mornings no longer falls. 'The fields are grey beneath a merciless sun. T h e earth is like dry clay, and shows a pattern o f deep cracks. In places the hot air rises up in spirals which, like funnels, draw up dust from the fields into the air.

Some days later, heralded by falcons and crows fleeing h>efore it, a storm breaks out. Huts lose their roofs, trees are bent over, but just as quickly as it came, thie storm passes. And then at last, about the middle o f Ju n e , the longed-for monsoon rain begins. From mighty clouds thick individual drops fall and quickly hiecome more frequent, and suddenly, with lightning and thie roar o f thunder, a downpour breaks out, which soon turns into continuous rain. Naked children run delightedly through the sheets o f rain, and even the adults are glad to expose their faces briefly to the refreshing wetness. After a period o f continuous rain the clouds reach a compromise with the sun, eacli dom inating the scene in turn for a few hours. In the intervals between rain showers the landscape is steaming, and an oppressive closeness takes the place o f the previous lieat. T h e change in the landscape is enormous. T h e previously sluggish rivers are now broad streams, brown and gurgling, which threaten the riverside dwellings by their rapid rise; roads and paths sink in the mud and become impassable. M any clay huts dissolve and causc the (anyway not very watertight) rush roofs to sink down on thie inhabi­ tants. T h e animal kingdom, too, presents a new aspect: snakes, scorpions and millipedes that have been driven out o f their holes hiy the water are frequently to be seen, jolly little frogs hop across the road, and the mooing o f the ox-toad is heard. In the houses the geckos that run about the walls and ceilings in search o f mosquitoes and moths develop fat tummies. T h e atmosphere o f the approach and arrival o f the monsoon and the transformation it hirings about was later to inspire more than one Buddhist poet, and assuredly the M aster and his pupils too will have observed this natural spectacle in the deer-park at Isipatana. Hut this first rains retreat o f 528 was mainly devoted to the training o f the monks. Besides the Sermon on (he ‘Turning o f the Wheel o f D ham m a', and that on thie ‘ N ot-Self’ (both M v 1.6), three further discourses from thiose weeks are preserved in (he Canon. In one (M v i . I 3 = S N 4.1.4) he recommends to his monks - although they were supposed to lie Arahants already - systematic thought (yoniso manasikara), which he declares had brought him to enlightenment; in the second (M v i . i i = S N 4 .1.5 ) he declares that he and his monks are freed from heavenly and earthly snares; and in the third (A N 3 .(5 ) he gives

them thie parable o f a c.arriage-maker who had to make two wheels for a chariot for a (legendary) K in g Paceiana. One wheel, which was made with utter care, and liad taken six months to produce, remained standing after the running test when the impulse was exhausted; the other, finished in six days, tottered and fell over because tliere were Haws in felloe, spokes and huh). In the same way the monks must get rid o f the faults and flaws in llieir deeds, words and thoughts. T h e Pali Canon contains four more discourses o f tlie Buddha delivered at Isipatana, all u f which date from his two or three later visits to the place. This can be seen from the fact that hiis audience consists o f persons wlio only joined his com m unity after 528. Tow ards the end o f the rainy season the Buddha gave two instruc­ tions whichi were to be o f great importance for tlie future development o f thie monastic order. He decided nol lo confine the promulgation o f the Dham m a to himself, l)ut to include the monks in this task. Accordingly, he called his disciples togeihier, and gave them instruc­ tions to disperse as missionaries: ‘ G o forth, monks, on your (own) w ay for the profit and happiness of the m any, out o f compassion for thie world, for the profit, gain and happiness o f gods and men. Let 110 two go together. Teach, monks, the Teaching (Dhamma) that is lovely in its beginning, lovely in its middle, lovely in its ending, in the spirit and in the letter, and propagate the perfectly pure holy life. T h ere are beings whose eyes have little dust on them, who will perish if they do not hear the teaching. But if thiey hear the teaching, they will gain liberation. I myself, monks, will go to the garrison-city o f U ruvela, there to preach the D ham m a.’ (M v 1 . 1 1 . 1 ) T h e monks went forth as instructed, and before long their mission produced successes. T h ey brought men from all directions to Isi­ patana for ordination. However, they complained thal the Buddha had reserved the right to ordain for hiimself, and requested this right for themselves. T he M aster did not easily grant their wish. First he considered in private, and then he discussed it with the monks. Finally he decided: ‘ I allow you, monks, yourselves in the various countries and districts

to gram the going-forth into homelessuess (pabhajd) and the ordi­ nation (upasarnpadd). It is to be done in (his way: Let him (the candidate) first have his hair and beard shaved ofT, let him put on yellow robes and cover one shoulder (the left) with his upper robe, and when he has saluted the feet o f the (ordaining) monk (as a sign o f discipleshipj, let him squat down and honour the ordaining monk with joined palms. Then he should be bidden to repeat: “ I take my refuge in the Buddha, I take my refuge in the D ham m a, 1 take my refuge in the S an gh a” - this he must repeat a second and a third lime. I allow you, monks, to grant the going-forth and the ordination (of a new bhikkhu) by means o f this threefold refuge.’ (M v 1.12 .3 - 4 ) By the granting o f permission to the monks to ordain, the Buddha cut the umbilical cord binding the Sangha to its founder, and enabled it to live a life o f its own. T h e ordination procedure was later further formalized (M v 1.2 8 .3 -5 ), ilnfl supplemented by specific provisions in regard to the ordinand and the ordaining chapter. T he year 528 b c had been a successful one for G otam a, and he had become the head o f a school within the samana movement. Now the rainy season, and with it the annual period o f imm obility, was over. Forests and fields were green, and the rice that had been planted in m id-June now stood a hand's breadth above the surface o f the water in the fields. Wells and ponds were full, the roads were again passable, and the oppressive closeness o f the monsoon had given w ay to moder­ ately warm days and mild nights. As he had announced, the young Buddha left the deer-park o f Isipatana and set out for Uruvela.

B A C K IN U R U V E I . A G o tam a’s reason for visiting the scene o f his enlightenment once more was to teach the Dham ina to the householders who had once sup­ ported him with alms while he was an ascetic. T h e Pali Canon (M v 1. 14) reports a charm ing episode o f his walk back there, which is said to have occurred in a grove called K appasiya. As the Buddha rested at the fool o f a tree, some excited young men, obviously o f better class, ran to him and asked him if he had seen a woman hurrying

past. T h ey explained dial lhere were thiirty o f them whio had come lo thie grove witli thieir wiv«,s for amusement. One o f them, hieing unmarried, hiad brought a prostitute along. T h ey were in pursuit o f lier, because slie had stolen tlieir'properiy and disappeared. The Buddha ‘What do you think, young men? Is it better lo look for this wom an, or for yourselves?’ Young Men ‘ I.ord, it would h)e better for us to look for ourselves.’ The Buddha ‘ Well then, young men. sit down, and I will teach you D ham m a.' Then he gave them the graduated instruction and explained the Four Noble Truths to them. Won ov er lo the Buddha's teaching, the thirty young men requested ordination as monks, which the Buddha immediately grunted. The episode is probabls historical; only the end seems to have been "improved’ by the redactors o f the Pali Canon. That all thirty young men, full o f the joy o f life, became not lay followers but monks, so that twenty-nine young wives had to return to their village as ‘ monks’ widows’ , is hard to hjelieve. A part from the historicity o f ihe episode, the ordination formula lhat the M aster used should be noted. Il was-nol the triple refuge the Buddha had prescribed, but the words: ‘ Com e, monk . . .’ , the same as he had used when he accepted Kondaniia as the first bhikkhu (M v i .(>.32). It seems lhat this was the ordination formula that only the head o f the school was allowed to use. The M ahavagga relates the incidents lhat occurred on ihe Buddha’s return to U ruvela with pedantic stillness and a determina­ tion to turn everything into a miracle. We will confine ourselves to those episodes from which a crum b o f historical information can be ex­ tracted. N ear U ruvela were three brothers called K assapa w'ho led the life o f m atted-hair ascetics (jatila) and practised the fire- and waler-cult. Each o f them was the head o f a school. U ruvela-K assapa had five hundred jatilas as his pupils, N adl-K assapa ("Kassapa o f the R iv er’ ) had three hundred, and G aya-K assap a (‘ K assapa o f G a y a ’ ) two hundred, though these figures are not to be taken literally. As the Indian winter had already started and night temperatures

were not much above zero, the Buddha went to the hermitage o f U ruvela-Kassapa. and asked if he could spend the night in the cult hut in which the fire maintained by the jatilax was burning. T aken by the stranger's self-confidence and personality U ruvela-K assapa did not dare refuse, but declared that the hut contained a large and venomous serpent. But the Buddha did not allow him self to be frightened off, and spent the night in the hut safely ‘owing to his magic powers’ i M v 1. 1 5). He passed further nights in the forest near U ru vcla-K assap a’s hermitage, and three times the forest around him was illuminated. K assapa, who invited the Buddha to a morning meal in his hermitage, was deeply impressed to learn thal G otam a had been visited by radiant deities: in the first night by the ‘ Four G reat K in gs’ , in the second by Sakka iln d ra ), and in the third by Brahm a Saham pati ; M v 1.16 - 18). The historical kernel o f this legend could be that the Buddha lit a lire at night as a protection against the cold and against wild beasts. M eanwhile, the great annual sacrifice was due at llru v elaK assapa’s hermitage, and visitors were expected from the whole o f M agadhu and the land o f Anga which lay to the east. Fearing that the Buddha might attract some supporters o f the jatilas to himself, Kassapa secretly wished that G otam a might not be present at the sacrifice. Sensing what K assapa was thinking, the Buddha tactfully stayed aw ay from the hermitage on the day o f the sacrifice. Kassapa was astonished that G otam a could read his thoughts (M v 1.19 ). After the Buddha had observed U ruvela-K assapa and his pupils for some time, he look the occasion o f a boastful utterance on ihe part o f the aged ascetic to bring him down to earth. Speaking directly lo his conscience, he said: ‘ K assapa, you are not an A rahant or even on the road lo Arahanlship. Y ou r way o f life is not such that you can become an A rah anl by it, or even enter on (he road lo Arahantship!’ Kassapa, to whom nobody had ever spoken like that before, was completely shattered. Falling at the Buddha’s feel, he begged to be accepted into his O rder (M v 1 .■->0.17). It says much for G otam a’s sense o f justice that he did not al once accept K assapa’ s submission, but warned him to consider ihe consequ­ ences o f such a step for his followers: ‘ K assapa, you are the head o f a

school o f five hundred jatilas. Discuss the m atter with them, so that they can do what they think right!’ Kassapa took his advice, with the result that all (?) his disciples were converted with him to the Buddha’s school. T h ey cut of!' their matted locks, and threw their shoulder-polcs and ihe implements used lor the lire-cult into the river N eranjara. Then the Buddha gave them ordination as monks o f his O rder (M v i . j o . i 7). When the locks o f matted hair and the wooden cult utensils floated down the N eranjara past the hermitage o f N adi-K assapa, he was frightened that some misfortune had befallen his brother He went to the latter's hermitage, and L’ ruvela-K assapa explained lo him the benefits o f joining the Buddha’s com munity, and he too joined the Sangha with all (?) his ihree hundred followers (M v 1 .v>o.2of.i. T h e same thing occurred in the case o f G aya-K assap a, who had also gone to see if his broiher was all right 011 seeing the cult objects floating by. He too joined the O rder with all (?) his two hundred followers (M v 1 ,20.22f.). With his numerous new followers (even if they probably did not number a thousand), the former jatilas whom he had ordained as bhikkhus in I'ru v ela, the Buddha proceeded to G a y a, which was not far distant, where the group camped on a hill 1 kilometre south-west o f the city called G aya Head ;G ayasIsa, now Brahinayoni). Here the M aster delivered a sermon which alluded them atically to the practices of Ihe jatila cult. It is the l'ire Sermon (M v i . 2 i = S N 35.28 ), which begins with the famous words: ‘ Everything is ablaze!’ T h e sutta is hased 011 the Buddhist theory o f perception, according to which there arc not five senses but six: besides eye, car, nose, tongue and body as tactile organ there is also the mind (manas) or, better, the organ of thought. Corresponding lo these six sense's are the sense-fields which are external to the person: forms, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensa­ tions and concepts (dhamma) or objects o f thought. As soon as an organ o f perception (e.g. the eye) and the corresponding sense-field (e.g. forms) come into contact, a consciousness o f perception (e.g. sight-consciousiiess; arises. In this way the object is taken into con­ sciousness, and perceived by man. All reality is brought lo Us by the six senses: the senses create our individual world. It follows that the way in which we see ihe world depends on the

nature o f our senses, and on whether they convey the im age o f the object to consciousness without distortion and in its true colours. I f anyone’s senses are ruled by greed, haired and delusion, all his perceptions will kindle, because they arouse further desires and aver­ sions in him: for him the world is on fire. But whoever exerts control over the six senses is free from lusts and passions, and will gain freedom from rebirth. It must have made a deep impression on the bhikkhus who were former followers o f the fire-cult, to hear fire spoken o f in this profound philosophical sense.

3

T he first twenty years

T H E C O N V E R S I O N O F K I N G BI M B I S A R A t T h e Buddha was very well aw are that the attitude o f the kings towards him would he o f decisive im portance for the spread f N alaka (now Sarichak?) near R ajagah a, and he belonged to the Brahmin fam ily o f Upatissa. He had three younger brothers (Cunda, Upasena and R evata) and three

sisters. Mis father’s name was V a iigan la, and his mother was called RupasarT. lie was called alter her Siiripu iia (‘Son o f S a ri’). M oggallana, who was often called Kolitu because hr lived in K oliiagam a (now K ill?), the next village to Nalaku, was the same age as Sariputta, and they had played together as children. His mother M oggallanI, after whom he was named, was from the Brahmin caste, while his father, the village chicftain o f K oliiagam a, belonged lo the warrior (khattiya) caste which at lliai lime was still considered ihe highest. It is said thal the two friends had decided at the annual ‘ mountain-peak meeting' - perhaps a kind o f fair to become wandering mendicant followers o f S a n j a y a , which they shortly did. T h ey had promised that if either o f them should attain lo insight, he would leach ihe other. It was while he was a disciple o f San jaya's that S arip u u a , during an alms-round in R aja ga h a , met the bhikkhu Assaji, who had once been (io tam a's companion during his ascetic practices and had later been ordained in ihe deer-park at Isipatana as one o f ihe lirsi five bhikkhus. S arip u u a was so struck by the noble and restrained bearing o f the strange monk that he wailed until Assaji had finished his almsround, and then asked him who was his master. T h e bhikkhu replied that he was a disciple o f the samana o f the Sakiya clan, and Sarip u u a asked him about this m aster’s teaching. Although (according lo M v 1.6.47) *,e was an A rah ani, Assaji was not able (o give a full account o f the teaching. He said he was new, having only recently accepted the Buddha's teaching, bul that he could give its contents in brief form. Then he tillered ihe famous verse which has since been adopted as the creed o f Buddhists o f all schools: ‘O i dhammas* arising from a cause, T he Perfect One has explained the cause. And how they come to cessation, That too the (Jreat Sage has taught.’ (M v 1.23.5) Sariputta, whose analytical and philosophical intelligence is often praised in the sources, at once grasped the sense o f this statement: ‘W hatever is subject to the law o f origination (e.g. the empirical •H e r e 'facto rs ofrxislrn ceV

person and its suffering) is also subject to the law o f destruction.’ This means that it can, if no cause for further rebirth is created, be iranscended in the slate of cessation, which is N ibbana. Overwhelmed by ihis insight, Sariputta hastened to his friend M oggallana in order lo acquaint him with this new truth (M v 1.23.5 —6). M oggallana, an especially gifted meditator, grasped the meaning no less quickly than Sariputta, and he proposed that they should both at once go to the Buddha and become his pupils. Sariputta, however, declined as they first had to consult iheir samana companions and Sanjaya. T h ey did so, and their IVIlow-.vr;mrtnfl.i declared their readiness to go over to the Buddha; Sanjaya, 011 the other hand, promised that if they stayed with him they would share in the leadership o f his school. When Sariputta and M oggallana refused his offer, and went with all two hundred and fifty (?) o f his followers to the Vejuvanu Park to request acceptance, into [he Buddha’s order, San jaya was so disappointed that hot blood issued from his mouth. M eanwhile, the two friends were ordained by the Buddha (M v 1.24), and soon became Arahants: M oggallana in a week, and Sariputta shortly after. T h ey soon became G otam a’s two chief followers, and remained such for more than forty years. Not long after Saripuita and M oggallana had become monks in his order, the Buddha received a visitor from his home-town o f K a p ilava t­ thu. This was K aju dayin , ‘ dark U d ayin ’ , as he was called on account o f his dark complexion. He was a friend o f the Buddha’s youth whom R a ja Suddhodana had sent out to look for his son and try to persuade him to visit K apilavatthu. K aju dayin carried oul his mission with great skill. He joined the Sangha and (Inis had access to the Buddha al any time. Then through vivid descriptions he tried to make the M aster homesick for the Sakiya land. With lyrical enthusiasm he described the beauty o f trees in full blossom, as the wanderer sees them at the side o f the road: Trees are there, Lord, which glow in crimson now, In quest o f fruit they’ve cast aside their leaves. But still the blossoms hang (here, red as blood. Now is the time, o Lord, to travel there.

For trees in blossom give us high delight, Th ey spread the sweetest fragrance all around. The loss o f leaves betokens com ing fruit. Now is the time, o Lord, for setting forth. This is the season that is full o f glee: Not over hot is it, nor over cold. Let Sakiyas and K oliyas behold You when you westward cross the RohinT. (T h ag 527-9) Indeed G otam a allowed himself to be persuaded. He promised K aju dayin that he would visit K apilavatth u, not at once, butafter the next rains, which he planned to keep in R ajagah a. K aju d ayin was delighted, and hurried back to K apilavatth u to convey the news to R a ja Suddhodana. He probably did so in flowery language, for he was a m aster o f the flattering compliment, as is shown by the verses (Thag 5 3 3 -5 ) in which he sings the praise o f Suddhodana as father o f the exalted Buddha, and honours the memory o f the Buddha’s deceased mother.

T H E R A I N S IN R A J A G A H A According to plan the Buddha spent the rains o f 527 b c in R ajagah a, where, in the meantime, huts for the monks had been erected in the V ejuvana park - the beginnings o f a monastery. This was the second rains period since the beginning o f his mission, and it was not without its problems. T he continued growth o f the Sangha raised unexpected difficulties for the leader. T he concentration o f so many wandering mendicants doing the rounds in R a jagah a every morning and standing silently before the doors with their alms-vesscls - which were not mere bowls but pots waiting for food, had the effect that m any o f R a ja g a h a ’s possibly 60,000 inhabitants were sick o f the sight ofalms-seekers and considered the ‘ bald beggars’ and ‘scroungers’ a nuisance, whatever school they belonged to. In addition, there was the negative social effect o f mendicancy. Men who had previously earned their living and led a normal fam ily life with wives and children suddenly took a fancy to

the life o f a samana, joined the Sangha, and left their families destitute. T h e com plaint was heard: 'T h e samana Gotam a lives by making (us) childless, making (wives into! widows and splitting up families. He has converted a thousand m atted-hair ascetics and the two hundred and fifty followers o f San jaya, and even cultured young men from the best families in M agadha are following the path o f purity under his leadership!’ Often the monks were teased, especially by children, with a verse they had picked up from their elders: He came to G iribb aja, the master on his w ay, Leading the (bhikkhus) which he took from S an jaya aw ay. Who. will be next (converted and : fall under his sway? T h e Buddha, who heard this invective stanza from his monks, was unperturbed. T h e noise would not last long, he said, but as a smart tactician, knowing human nature, he resorted to a counter-measure. He uttered a reply in verse, which the monks promptly spread about with success: T h e mighty heroes, truth disdosers, T h ey guide by dham m a, true in sooth. Who could be jealous o f wise (masters) Who lead men on by teaching Truth? As the M aster had foreseen, the criticism ceased after a few days (M v 1.2 4 .5 -7 ). Perhaps, too, K in g Bim bisara had taken steps to restrain popular discontent with the yellow-robed samanas. Hand-in-hand with his efforts to gain respect lor the Sangha among the general population went the B uddha’s inward-directed efforts for the disciplining o f his monks. It had become clear that through the mass conversion o f matted-hair ascetics and followers o f San jaya, a number o f men had come into the O rder who lacked the most elementary breeding, and who by their bad behaviour and aggressive demands for alms were causing offence. T o teach them manners, the M aster issued a series o f instructions. He ordered the monks to dress in proper monastic style, to behave modestly in front o f those who gave them alms, and to eat in silence (M v 1.25 .5 ). Cases o f disrespect towards those who instructed the new monks led him to

issue rules 011 this subject too. He ordered ihe bhikkhus to obey their preceptor ;M v 1.25.8H'.), to look after his robe (M v i . 2 5 .1 0 + 2 3 ) , to wash his ahns-bowl (M v 1.2 5 .1 1;, and to dean his lodging (M v 1.2 5 .19 ). As we learn from (he introductory descriptions o f m any suttas, the Buddha also expected ihe same services for himself. Almost alw ays he was accom panied by a dul y monk 1upalthaka;, whose job it was, among other things, to fan the M aster while he preached in the hot weather ( M X ta. i , p. 83); if no young monk was present, prominent monks like Sariputta were not ashamed lo do this. T he duty monks frequently changed, until, in ihe twentieth year o f the Buddha’s mission, his cousin Ananda look on this post and devotedly served in it till the end o f the M aster’s life. T H E B U D D H A V I S I TS H I S H O M E T O W N True to his promise to K iilu dayin, the Buddha set out for K a p ila v a t­ thu as soon as the monsoon was over. He did not go alone: Sariputta and some other monks accom panied him. T h e distance was fio ‘oxstages’ (yojana): one such stage being about the distance a yoked ox could go - roughly 10 km. For the (>00 km between R ajagah a and K apilavatth u, G otam a allowed sixty days. After the first quarter o f ihe journey north-westwards, the Ganges had to be crossed. We can obtain some idea o f what such journeys were like if we think o f ihe long marches undertaken, in our own day, by M ahatm a Gandhi and Vinobha Bhave. T h e master generally goes on alone or occasionally in conversation with one o f his supporters. Five steps in front are a tew resolute disciples who clear the way for him and guard him against pestering watchers, and behind him come the resi, some in atlitudes o f devoted attentiveness or mental concentration, others tired and resigned. Only three outward signs distinguished the Buddha from the M ahatm a and Vinobha: his garment was not white, but coloured yellow-brownish with kasaya clay, he walked barefoot, and did not carry a stick. In ancient India sticks were regarded as weapons, and G olam a refrained from using them. T h e events following his arrival at K apilavatth u are narrated in the Pali C anon only in fragmented form, out o f chronological order,

and with various discrepancies, Inu still we can form a picture of what happened. Since custom forbade the Buddha, as a wandering monk, to pay an unsolicited call oil R aja Suddhodana. he took up residence in the Nigrodha G rove, a place in front o f the city frequented by ascetics and samanas, where old banyan trees (nigrodha, Ficus bmgalensis), whose aerial roots had developed into a forest of supporting trunks, provided welcome shade. T he raja was not immediately told o f the arrival o f his son. It was only next morning, when Siddhattha had been seen going round the streets o f K apilavatth u with his almsbowl, that Suddhodana heard o f his presence. T h e first conversation between lather and son did not pass off harmoniously. Suddhodana reproached his son tor degrading himself as a beggar in his home town in front of everybody. Siddhattha, 011 being thus scolded like a child, defended himsell by saying it was the custom for samanas to live on alms, and that the Buddhas o f the past had also lived this way. T he Buddha's former wife Bliaddakaccana 1 Yasodhara ;, who had lived for eight years as a ‘ monk’s w idow ’ and was embittered about it, lound a w ay to express her anger. When the Buddha paid a second visit to his father’s house, about a week after the first, she sent their son Riihula, now aged eight, lo him, saying: ‘ Rfihula. that is your father. Go and ask him for your inheritance!’ Little R ahu l.1 did as he was told. He greeted the Buddha politely, and waited till he had left the house. Then he followed him with the words: *Samana, give me my inheritance!’ T h e Buddha's reaction was as dignified as it was effective. Hfc instructed Sariputta to accept the boy there and then as a novice. Sariputta thus became R a h u la ’s preceptor. Suddhodana was inconsolable when he heard that now his grand­ son, too, had been withdrawn from the family, and implored his son never to grant the novice ordination (jmhhajd) to anyone without the permission o f his parents. If he had hoped that the Buddha would cancel R ah u la’s novitiate, he was disappointed. T h e M aster simply promised to do as requested in future cases \ M v 1.54). Despite the efforts o f the texts to present the Buddha’s first visit to K apilavatth u as a successful mission, it is clear that its success was restricted. O nly a few accepted the Dham m a. T he citizens o f

K apilavatthu had too vivid memories o f the raja’s son as a spoilt young man lo believe in his role as a Buddha, an ‘ Enlightened One'. Political caution also played a p ari. It was still uncertain how K ing Pasenadi o f Kosala, who resided in Savatih i and was overlord o f the Sakiya republic, would view this new school. One Sakiya who had been ordained as a monk, perhaps before R ah u la’s novitiate, was N anda G otam a, Siddhattha's half-brother, the son o f Suddhodana and S id d h aith a’s aunt and stepmother, MahapajapatT. According to the canon, Siddhattha talked Nanda into becoming a monk, and he consented unwillingly out o f respect for his broiher who was a few days older than himself. There is evidence :Ja t 182) that N anda, at least at first, was not wholly committed lo the bhikkhu life. Perhaps in reply to doubts expressed by his fellow-monks about N an d a’s fitness for the celibate life, the M aster praised his qualities, but in such a diplom atic formula­ tion that in the praise he outlined a path o f practice for Nanda: guarding o f the sense-doors, restraint in eating, watchfulness over mind and body and rejection o f all mental and emotional excitement fA N 8.9). T h e admonition was necessary, for N anda was good-look­ ing and harboured thoughts o f love and considerations o f giving up the yellow robe and returning to worldly life. It was only when the Master indicated to him the relatively slight beauty o f his ex-wife or ex-beloved Jan ap a d a k a ly a m that he began seriously lo practise monastic self-discipline. He even became an Arahant (Ud 3.2). The Buddha ordained seven more Sakiyas, not in K apilavatthu bill in A nupiya, a place in ihe M alla republic that he passed through on his return from K apilavatth u. The seven had left the Sakiya capital in order to become wandering mendicants 011 their own. But when they met the Buddha in A nupiya, they fell il was more sensible to accept his guidance than to experiment for themselves. The first member o f this group whom the Buddha accepted was the former barber Upali (C v 7 .1 .1 - 4 ) , a modest man whom no one expected to develop as he did into a specialist in monastic law and etiquette. Anuruddha and A n a iid a were cousins o f the Buddha - sons of his father’ s brother Atnitodana by different wives. Both distin­ guished themselves by particular devotion lo the Buddha. Other members o f the group were Bhagu, K im b ila and D evadatta. T he

latter was also a cousin o f the Buddha’s, the son o f his mother’ s brother Suppabuddha, and so a brother o f Siddhattha's ex-wife Bhaddakaccana. T h e most prominent o f the seven was Bhaddiya, the son o f K ajigodha, ‘dark G o d h a’, who as the eldest o f the Sak iya ladies had the position o f a dow ager. She m ay have been the widow o f a R a ja who had for a time ruled the Sakiya republic either before Suddhodana or as his representative. This would explain why Bhaddiya is described (C v 7.1.3 ) as the raja ruling over the Sakiyas, through confusion with his father. From A nupiya, we are told (C v 7 .2 .1), the journey went to Kosam bi, capital o f the kingdom o f Varrisa, where the M aster and his com panions lodged in the grove o f the m erchant and banker Ghosita. T h is grove was open to wanderers o f all denominations. Som e time later Ghosita presented il 10 the M aster when, after visiting Savatthi on business and hearing the Buddha there, he became his disciple.

BACK IN R A J A G A H A T h e year 526 b c saw the Buddha once more in R ajagah a, where, as before, he spent the rains in the V ejuvaiia ‘ m onastery’ . One o f the places he visited most frequently was the V ultures' Peak (Gijjh aku ta), a natural platform on the southern slope o f M ount C hatha wiih a fine view of the southern part o f the R a jagah a valley, where it was possible to enjoy the breeze which is so seldom fell in the valley below. 'I he V ultures’ Peak soon became a favourite spot for the M aster, and he ascended it sometimes even in the rain and at night. Here he could conduct conversations undisturbed and devote himself to the instruction o f the monks, and dozens o f discourses were de­ livered here. T h ere were two natural caves on the north side o f the mountain, the larger o f which was the so-called ‘ B oar’s C ave’ , and these gave protection from storms and could be used in an emergency for a night’s lodging. In the second R a jagah a rains period the Buddha had two encoun­ ters which were to prove important and valuable for him and his O rder. Th ey were with JTvaka and with Anathapindika.

T h e contact with JTvaka came about as follows: being tired from his long wanderings, G otam a had left the inner city o f R ajagah a, making for the Vultures’ Peak, and had sal down to rest outside the east gate o f the inner city wall in the shade o f a mango grove. T he grove belonged to the king’s physician, JTvaka K om arabh acca, of whom it was said that he was the son o f the town courtesan o f R ajagah a, who had exposed him after birth. A prince, it was said, had found the boy and brought him up (M v 8 .1.3 -4 ) . In any case the fact was that Jiv a k a had for seven years studied medicine at the famous university o f Takkaslla (Skt TaksasTla = T a x ila in Pakistan) (M v 8 .1.6 ), and had become famous through some spectacular cures. He had recently cured K in g Bim bisara o f a fistula, whereupon the king had appointed him his physician in ordinary and official physi­ cian for the royal ladies and the Buddha’s O rder (M v 8 . 1 .1 3 - 1 5 ) . This physician, JTvaka, seized the opportunity o f G otain a’ s visit to his mango grove in order to have a few words with the great samana for whose health, by royal com m and, he was responsible. Being com m it­ ted through his profession to the preservation o f life, he asked the Buddha about his attitude towards the slaughtering o f anim als and vegetarianism. ‘ I have heard it said thal anim als are killed on your account, and that you eat meat that has been specially provided for you. Is that right?’ ‘JTvaka, whoever says that is not telling the truth. I say, rather, that meat is not to be accepted (as ahns-food) in three cases: if one has seen, heard or suspects (that the animal was specially killed for the monk). But if that is not the case, a monk m ay accept meat. ‘ I f a monk goes on the alms-round through a village or markettown with an inner attitude o f loving-kindness (metta) towards all beings, and a householder invites him for a meal the next day, he may accept the invitation. But, when he is eating next d ay in thal house, he should not have the idea that he would like again to be invited lo such a fine meal. He should rat'her eat the alins-lbod without being caught up in the pleasure o f eating. l)o you think, JTvaka, that a monk who a d s like this is harm ing him self or another being?’

‘ No, L ord .’ ‘ ( If you speaJt o f deliberate destruction by me, JTvaka, that is true in only one sense:) I have destroyed greed, hatred and delusion in m yself so that they cannot arise again. Anyone who kills for my sake or for that o f one o f my disciples commits a fivefold evil: by leading up the anim al, tormenting it, killing it, and thereby tor­ menting it again, and finally by treating me or one o f my disciples in an improper m anner.' (M N 55, paraphrased) Won over by G otam a’s words, JTvaka declared his accession to the lay community. And when the Buddha 011 a later occasion again rested in his mango grove, he sought instruction in the duties o f a lay follower (A N 8.26). JTvaka henceforth gladly undertook the task o f medical attendant to the Sangha, though it gave him a great deal o f work for no fee. T he Buddha once consulted him about a ‘disharm ony o f the bodyfluids’ , which JTvaka cured with oil-massage, laxatives, warm baths (in the hot springs near R a jagah a), and fruit-juice (M v 8 .1.3 0 -3 3 ) . T o monks who looked pale he recommended physical exercise and a heatable bathing-hut (C v 5 .1 4 .1) - 110 doubt a reasonable prescrip­ tion. JTvaka’s appointment as physician to the Sangha had one undesir­ able side-effect, when men with various disorders joined the Sangha as bhikkhus in order to get free treatment from the famous doctor. JTvaka, therefore, begged the Buddha to exclude the sick from ordina­ tion. T h e M aster accepted this suggestion and issued appropriate instructions (M v 1.3 9 .5 -7 ). Deducing from his frequent visits to his mango grove that G otam a was specially fond o f this place, JTvaka presented it to the M aster (JTvakam bavana). O f the monastery which once existed there, the foundations can still be seen o f four long halls with smaller sidcbuildings, all once spanned with vaulted roofing. T h e second especially prominent lay follower who declared himself a supporter and friend o f the Buddha in that same year 52G b c was Sudatta ‘A nathapindika’, the ‘ Feeder o f the Poor’ , as he was called because o f his generosity. A naihapindika lived in Savatthi and was married to the sister o f a merchant from R ajagah a. A gold-dealer

JIvaka’s mango grove (Jivakambavaiia) near Rajagaha, the monastery donated to the Buddha by King Bimbisara’s personal physician. The narrow­ ness of the four apsidal halls was due to the barrel-vaulting. and banker by profession, and as the leading member o f that branch in Savatthi its guild-president, he had come to R ajagah a lo do some business with his brother-in-law. With am azem ent A nathapindika observed the extensive prepara­ tions being m ade in his brother-in-law’s house for feeding the Buddha and his monks on the following day. Filled with curiosity about tin­ man who bore the honoured title o f a Buddha, an ‘ Enlightened O n e’ , he passed a sleepless night and then arose before dawn to seek out the Buddha. T h e M aster had camped on the charnel-ground ‘ Cool G ro ve’ (Sitavana), and had already risen. He was walking up and down to enjoy the coolness o f the morning. A conversation soon developed, during which the Buddha gave A nathapindika graduated instruction. By pronouncing the Three Refuges, A nathapindika declared him self a lay follower o f the D ham m a, and invited the Buddha for a morning meal the following day (C v (i.4 .1-5 ). This meal, too, look place in the house o f A n alh apin d ika’s

brother-in-law in R ajagah a. It ended with A nathapindika’s offering the Buddha an d . the Sangha a place o f retreat for the rains in Savatthi. G o ia m a ’s only stipulation was that such a retreat should be situated in a lonely place (Cv 6.4.7). On his return to Savatthi, Anathapindika at once looked out for a suitable plot o f land. W hat he found was a park o f Prince Je t a , a son o f K in g Pasenadi o f Kosala. Je ta , however, was unwilling to surrender possession. He would not sell the park even for a hundred thousand kahapanas, he declared, a remark whic h Anathapindika, who was well versed in ihe law, imm ediately reported to the royal arbitration court. The court decided that the nam ing o f a sum, even by way o f refusal, constituted a commitment tosell (since any one who did not want tosell would not name a price). And so the park passed into A nathapindika’s hands who, according to popular belief, had to cover practically the whole area o f the park with coins as the purchase price (Civ 6 .4 .9 -10 ).

K IN G P A S E N A D I B E C O M E S A L A Y F O L L O W E R A nathapindika's promise to provide the O rder with a home in Savatthi : 1 to km north-east o f Lucknow; induced the B uddha, not long afterhis conversation with the banker, to set out for the capital o f K osala. His inarch followed the usual caravan route via Vesali (C v 6 .5 .1), capital o f the LicchavT republic, and presum ably also through K apilavatth u, where however, realizing that a prophet is without honour in his own country, he did not stop this time. Arrived in Savatthi, he took up residence in th ejeta va n a (‘ P rin c e je ta ’s Park'), which A naihapindika had just acquired, and which was apparently open to representatives o f all religions. N exl morning there was a meal for the monks at A nathapindika’s house, at which the following conversation took place: Anaihapindika ‘ Lord, how shall I arrange matters with t h e je t a ­ vana?' The Buddha ‘ H ave it arranged for the O rder o f the four points o f the compass, both present and future.' Anathapindika ‘ V ery good, L o rd .’ (C v 6.9) T h ere was no water-pouring ceremony for the formal transfer o f ownership, simply the grant o f the right o f use lo the Sangha - but

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4), and Sun ak kh alla, who claimed that the Buddha had no superhuman knowledge and that his leaching was (not a revelation o f existing fad s, but; merely something intellectually hammered out and freely invented (M N 12 .2; i, (>8). Usually however the return to worldly life was tor personal reasons. There was no social disgrace involved in leaving the O rder, and an ex-bhikkhu was allowed to rejoin the O rder, but for this a regular fresh ordination was necessary. It is said o f the monk C itta that he joined the O rder lour times, having thus left it three times; still he became an Arahant

and so gained the goal (A N 6 .6 0 + D N 9.56). However, it was not possible for those who had changed over from the B uddha’s O rder to another school to change their minds and rejoin the Sangha (M v 1 -25-3) ■ After ordination, the caste origin o f a monk was o f no further consequence: just as the great rivers G aiiga, Y am un a, A ciravati, Sarabhu and MahT lose their name and identity as soon as they flow into the sea, so too the members o f the four castes lose their identity in the Buddha's Sangha, and are henceforth known as Sakiya Sons (A N 8 .19 ). T h e monk was a member o f a casteless monastic society. All the same, his social origin was not alw ays forgotten. T h e Pali Canon mentions the names o f m any monks to which a reference to the owner’s father’s profession or his own former activity is attached: C itta, son o f the mahout, Sati, the fisherman’s son, Tissa, son o f the doorkeeper, D haniya the potter, Arij.tha the vulture-trainer, Suppiya the corpse-bearer, Sunlta the street-sweeper - a long list o f such names can be m ade out. Often, but not alw ays, these additions served to distinguish the bearers from other monks o f the same name. But in no case did his humble origins prevent a monk from becoming prominent in the O rder; for exam ple, the expert in disciplinary law, U p ali, had been a barber. .Vlonks from less favoured classes gained Arahantship as easily, or with the same difficulty, as those from wellto-do families. T h e conquest o f greed, hatred and delusion demands different qualities from those one acquires at school. Seniority according to protocol was determined by the age o f ordination, which was reckoned by the number o f rains retreats (vassa) a monk had spent in the O rder. T h e ju n io r monks had to salute their seniors and offer them the best seats and tfie best almslood (Cv (i.()..(.). However, order o f seniority was disregarded in the queue lor the latrines after a young monk, having made way for his seniors, fainted as a result of restraining his urge (C v 8 .10 .1) . Seniority was o f 110 consequence in regard lo the laity — all monks being outw ardly equal. An elementary precept for all samana.1 was' that o f poverty, but in the course o f the years the Buddha made several concessions in this respec t for his followers. As personal possessions the bhikkhu was originally allowed only eight items: three robes, an alm s-bowl, a

Lower robe (loin-cloth)

Upper robe (shou)der-toga)

Outer robe (folded)

The three robes of a Buddhist monk. razor, a needle, a belt and a waler-filter. T h e robes — loin-cloth, shoulder-toga and outer robe - were originally to be made o f rags that the monk had collected from dust-heaps and charnel-fields, and sometimes skin disease resulted (T hag 207). Later, G otam a allowed the monks to wear robes that had been presented (M v 8 .1.3 5 ). T ° this day the monks w ear cloth that, in order to reduce its material value, has been sewn together out o f square patches. Footw ear was not part o f the original equipment o f the monk, and at least in the early years o f his mission the Buddha went barefoot. Later on, simple sandals were permitted (M v 5 .1.3 0 ). In addition, a woollen shoulder-cloth and a coverlet were allowed (M v 8 .1.3 6 ), finally too a mosquito-fan and, for as long as the bhikkhu was in the monastery precincts, a sunshade (C v 5 .2 3). T h e Buddha also issued rules for personal hygiene. T h e bhikkhus made a pleasant change from some groups o f ascetics who were characterized by the filth that hung about them, and who abstained from any form o f bodily attention, seeing in this a religious observance which demonstrated their contempt for the world. T h e monks washed themselves just like layfolk, by daily pouring water over themselves. Bathing in ponds was permitted to them less often, probably owing to the lack o f control that could so easily develop when young monks bathed together. For cleaning the teeth, a twig o f the iiimba tree

(H indi mm, Azadirachta indica, Margosa) was used. T h e end was chewed to form a small brush with which the teeth were rubbed (C v 5 .3 1) . Th e bitter-tasting nimba-wood has an astringent effect. T h e rules for the collection and consumption o f alms-food were elaborate, but basically liberal. T h e alms-round alw ays took place in the morning. Alone, or in small groups, the monks marched with downcast eyes from house to house and waited silently before every door to see if food would be put in their alms-bowl. O nly prepared food could be accepted, not simply the makings o f a meal. I f there was not enough, the procession continued in single file to the next house. It was not permitted to leave houses out, or to favour streets in more prosperous districts: poor and rifch householders were to be given an equal opportunity to gain kammic merit, and also the monks did nol wish to give ihe impression that they favoured the houses o f the wealthy because the food was better there. T h e idea which soon gained ground, that it wras not the monk as the receiver o f ihe food who benefited from the gift, but the giver who gained merit (puHna) thereby, had the efTect o f ensuring a plentiful supply, so that the O rder seldom suffered from hunger. This idea also gave the monks a chance to show their displeasure at a lay follower who had misbehaved towards the Sangha, by sim ply ‘inverting the bowl’, i.e. not accepting his gift. In this w ay the San gha deprived the person to be punished o f the chance o f m aking good kamma for himself by giving. It is a sign o f G o tam a’s practical common sense that he did not insist on his monks’ being strict vegetarians. T h ey only had to refuse meat or fish when they had reason to assume that the animal had been specially slaughtered or caught lor them (M v 6 .3 1.14 ) . T he compassion that every follower o f the Buddha’s teachings must display to all beings demands that his consumption o f meat should be kept to a minimum. On the other hand, it would have been difficult for the monks to observe a total ban on meat, because since they did not cook for themselves and the monasteries had no kitchens, they were dependent on what was offered them. A monk had to eat what was put in his alms-vessel. There is a story in the Canon concerning the bhikkhu M ahakassapa, who even ate the rotten thumb o f a leper, which had dropped into his bow! (T h ag 1045-56) . Kven if different

donors gave him quite different kinds o f food, a monk was bound to accept them all. It is not surprising that stomach troubles and dysentery were common in the Sangha, being practically an occupa­ tional disease. N or was the sudden overloading o f the stomach very good for health. It was a relaxation o f the bhikkhu life that G otam a accepted invitations from patrons and allowed his monks to do the same. In the house as well they ate from the alms-vessel. T h e meal had to be over before m idday, because the monks were not allowed to eat later, and it usually ended with a discourse to the host. W hatever remained in the vessel was put out in a sandy place for animals, and the vessel was washed out in running water. T h e daily routine for the monks permitted o f few variations. M orning toilet was followed by the alms-round, often involving visits to particular houses by arrangem ent with the laity. T h e alms-round sometimes caused emotional irritations for the younger monks as the m ajority o f donors were women and young girls. Accordingly, in­ creased self-control was necessary when going the rounds, as the M aster stressed: ‘ Here is a monk who has dressed in the morning, has taken his upper garm ent and his alms-vessel and now he goes into a village for alms. But his body, his speech and his thoughts are uncontroller’ There (in the village) he sees a wom an, scantily dressed, scarcely covered, and his heart becomes polluted with desire. 'Therefore, monks, thus must you train yourselves: “ O nly with restrained body, restrained speech, restrained mind, practising mindfulness and with controlled senses will we enter a village for alm s.’” (SN 2 0 .10, abridged) On returning from the alms-round, the monks look their meal at the edge o f the village, in (he shade o f a tree. 11 was their only meal o f the day. After that they set o ff for another place, for the early Sangha took seriously the samana tradition o f wandering. When the m idday heat made it impossible to continue on the move, a rest period ensued, which could be spent in meditation or sleep. In the afternoon the wandering continued till a place was reached near some settle­ ment, and here the little group settled down for the night. T h e late

afternoon was a period for conversations about the D ham m a and for the instruction o f the monks, and the evening was given over to m edita­ tion. D uring the monsoon period (Ju n e to September) the monks lived a settled life. By a decree o f the Buddha’s, which confirmed an old samana custom, they had to keep the 'rains’ (vassa) under a roof (M v 3 .12 .6 ). T h ey had the choice o f building themselves a rain-hut or staying at an already existing monastery. T h e rains retreat, which occupied three o f the four monsoon months, generally began at the full moon o f A-sajha (Ju n t—Ju ly ) , hut it was allowable for any monk to start it one month later, at the Ju ly -A u g u st full moon (M v 3.2.2). T h e ban on wandering ended with the third following full moon, A ssina (Septem ber-O ctobcrj or, for those who had started a month later, K attika (O ctober-N ovem ber). Especially solemn uposatha confessional assemblies (pavarana) con­ cluded the rains retreat. Im m ediately afterwards the monks who were declared freed o f their obligations set forth on their wanderings again. O f course the custom o f keeping the rains had not only traditional but also practical reasons. When the heavens burst open and the rivers flood their banks in gurgling brown streams, when the roads sink in mud and the unflooded patches serve as refuges o f snakes and scorpions, wandering and cam ping in the open are next to impossible. Also, the steaming wetness o f the monsoon created further health risks, and if a monk was ill, it was easier to tend him in a monastery than 011 the move. T h e practice o f keeping the rains was o f benefit to the Sangha in various ways. During the months o f wandering about on their own, it could happen thal the one or other bhikkhu became too lax in his ways. T he rainy period spent under the watchful eye o f older fellow-monks forced the monks to pay attention again lo etiquette, and made them loe ihe line. T h e vassa also strengthened the feeling among ihe monks o f belonging to one great brotherhood. This living together in one place and joint study o f the M aster’s words, the exchange o f experiences and knowledge, led to the establish­ ment o f friendships whose educational value the Buddha rated highly:

T ru ly this whole religious life together (in the Sangha) consists in the friendship o f those who love the good, in their com panionship, in their comradeship. A monk who is a friend o f the good, a companion and com rade, m ay be expected to develop and cultivate this Noble Eightfold Path (for his com panion’ s release as well as his own). (S N 3 .18 ) Not just half, but the whole o f the disciplinary life o f a monk, the M aster told A n an d a (S 4 5 .1.2 ) consisted in friendship with another monk who was striving towards the same goal. Even after cutting all bonds with the world, the monks were not without any human relationships: their world was the Sangha, and their neighbours were their fellow-monks. When Gotam a once found a bhikkhu with dysentery, lying helpless in his own filth untended by anybody, he and A nanda together took care o f him. Then he called the local Sangha together and admonished them: ‘ Monks, you have 110 mother and father to look after you. I f you do not take care o f each other who, I ask you, will do it? Monks, whichever o f you would look after me (if I were ill), he should look after a sick fellow-monk’ (M v 8.26.3). T h e rains retreat was also important for the monks’ knowledge o f Dham m a. In the monastic community they recited the suttas (dis­ courses) o f the Buddha and learnt fresh utterances o f his. This exchange o f knowledge by means o f ‘ hearing1 was not confined to the rains retreat, but it was favoured by the tem porary togetherness o f a larger group o f monks in one place. T h e Dham m a would not have been transmitted to us in such a precise form if the monks had not had the chance, in the annual vassa, o f recapitulating the M aster’s words and passing them on to the younger monks. N aturally, the Buddha himself also kept the custom o f the rains retreat. One com m entary (Manorathapuram, 2.4.5 ii p. 124) gives a list o f the places where he spent the monsoons during the whole period o f his mission (Table 1). The list m ay not be entirely reliable, and in one case (year 7) it fills up a gap in knowledge with a piece o f legend. For the historian o f the Buddha’s career it is nevertheless very useful as a guide, enabling him to give chronological order to some otherwise undated events.

T a b le 1 Tear l i d

528

Year o f mission t 2-4

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5

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7

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8

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Notes

Isipatana R a jagah a (V ejuvana) Vesali (only 8 days, the rest in R ajagaha) Mount M ankula ‘ Heaven o f the 33 Gods’ Sum sum aragiri ' ‘Crocodile M ountain’ ) KosambT Parilcyya X ala

Sarnath near Benares

V eranja Mount C alika Savatthi (Jetavan a) K apilavatthu AjavT R ajagaha M ount Ciiiika R ajagah a Savatthi Vesali

location unknown legendary City o f the Bhaggas tribe in Kingdom o f Variisa V illage near KosambT V illage in M agad ha, near G aya south o f Savatthi location unknown

85 km north o f Benares (unidentified) (see 5 16 )

3 M o n a s t e r ie s In tlx- early days ol' the O rder we can distinguish two types o f monastery: settlements established l>y the monks themselves irlrasa), which were pulled down again alter the rains, and donated monasteries 1drama), which were available to the bhikkhus throughout the year.

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A few poles stuck in the ground al both ends and joined by roof-poles formed the skeleton of the original monk's hut, which each bhikkhu erected for himself for the monsoon period and then took down again. Later lay followers built and donated to the Sangha larger huts, made from the same material, that permitted standing upright. In this way they created the typical Buddhist building style with a gabled entrance, vaulted roof and round apse, which was subsequently executed in wood. T h e fivasa areas were established at the beginning o f the monsoon. 1'his was done by noting outstanding points in the landscape ihills, rocks, curious trees, roads, rivers, etc.) and connecting them by an im aginary line. T h e bhikkhus then agreed to regard the area de­ limited by this boundary tsTm). T h e circumference o f this area must not exceed three yujanas (30 km) (M v 2 .7 .1). T h e monks who built their huts in this area formed, for the period o f the rains, a chapter o f monks \sangha 1, and held their uposatha and consultative sessions together. T he site o f such a seasonal monastery would be a spot not liable to flooding, and not too far from a village where alms could be collected. T he huts, built by the monks themselves, were just high enough for squalling, and jusi long enough for lying down. A few flexible poles were bent over so that both ends could be stuck in the ground in a line. The arches were linked b\ longitudinal poles, and the resultant vaulting covered over with leaves, grass or mats: that was all. When the bhikkhu D haniya, who was fam iliar with clay from his former profession as a potter, built himself a hemi­ spherical hut o f clay and, by firing il from inside, created a solid brick igloo, the Buddha disapproved and ordered its destruction (Sv 2 .1- 2 ) . He not only wanted to prohibit the practice o fb u rn in g , which killed many small creatures, for the future, but he probably

also wanted to stop D haniya, who had stayed there for nearly a year, from establishing a permanent residence. Those monks did better than D haniya who built huts on the slope o f the Isigili mountain (near R ajagaha) and took them down again after the rains (Sv a .i) . We almost hesitate lo use the word ‘ monastery’ (vihara) for such llimsy huts o f leaves and mats, but that is precisely the word used in the Pali texts. The name o f monastery seems more suitably applied to the groves [drama; that rich patrons gave to the Sangha by publicly dedicating them for monks’ dwelling. T h e boundary o f such monastic parks, sometimes o f flowering trees, but usually o f mangoes, was marked by a bam boo fence, a thorn-hedge or a ditch. At first ihe donors o f dramas seem to have merely given the land, and left it to the monks themselves to erect their rain-huts. Later the donors also had dwelling places and assembly halls built. Especially for the latter, they moved with the years lo more stable constructions, using beams instead o f bamboo, but keeping the vaulted roofing. We know what these looked like from the west Indian caves at A janta, Nasik, Kanheri, Ju n n a r, K arla and Bhaja, which copied the vaulting o f the early period and minutely imitated in stone the ribs o f the now van ­ ished wooden buildings. The caves at NTasik and K a rla even reproduce in stone the clay vessels into which the wooden columns were originally set in order to protect them against the depredations o f white ants. As a result o f the increasing construction o f such solid buildings in the monastery groves, some monks stayed in the monastery after the end o f the rains. T h e Buddha did nol forbid this, although he was not pleased with such departures from the samanas' w ay of life. But he himself adop­ ted another custom w hich crept in, nam ely to spend the rains retreat usually at thesam e place, and preferably in the same monastery. Apart from the year .184, when he spent the monsoon months in Vesali,- from 50!! b c onwards he alw ays took rain refuge in the viharas o f Savatthi. These donated monasteries posed a problem in so far as the monks and the Sangha were pledged to poverty. T he first monastery that the O rder received, the V ejuvana near R ajagah a, had been donated with a solemn ceremony by K in g Bim bisara to ‘ the O rder o f monks with the Buddha at their head’ (M v 1.2 2 .18 ). But G otam a, to whom the duties o f possession were irksome, and who had learnt from

The western Indian rock-caves copied the ribbed structure of the early monastic buildings. The peaked frontal arch is reminiscent of the bamboo constructions of the early period. This cave at Bhaja, west of Poona (Pune) was carved out in the second century bc and remained in use until the sixth century a d .

experience, preferred in the ease o f the Jc ta v a n a at Savatthi that A nathapindika should dedicate it to 'the Sangha o f the four points o f the compass, present and future’ , and with no ceremonial transfer o f possession (Civ 6.9). Thus the Je ta v a n a and other monasteries were permanent loans, the O rder possessing the use,' whereas the donor bore the costs o f maintenance. Som e donors em ployed numerous gardeners and artisans specially to m aintain the grounds and build­ ings (M v (). 15.4). Some donors m ay have hoped the monks would at least help with the shaping o f and care for the monastery park, but G otam a did not allow this. A park gardener must fight unwanted plants, but il is not fitting for a bhikkhu to undertake the cutting anti killing o f plants. Also, all garden work presupposes a hope o f success, which binds the spirit to the world. T h e bhikkhu's jo b , however, is to devote himself to his em ancipation from suffering and not be distracted by anything - not even by the jo y o f seeing the work o f his hands flourish. T o the question o f how many monasteries there were in the B uddha’s time, we can only give an approxim ate answer. T h e state­ ment o f one com mentator that at the end o f the M aster’s life there were eighteen viharas near R a jagah a alone, cannot be verified. With certainty there were ten permanent donated monasteries in the M iddle Country. T h ey are all in or near the main cities and almost all arc known by the name o f their donor. Kingdom o f Magadha R ajagah a: V eluvana ('Bam boo G rove’ ), presented by K in g Bimbisara. JTvakam bavana (‘jT vaka’s M ango G ro ve’ ), donated by Jiv a k a , physician in ordinary to the king and medical officer to the B uddha’s Order. Kingdom o f Kosala Savatthi: Je ta v a n a (‘ [Prince] J e t a ’s G rove’ ) or Anatfrapindikaram a (‘A nathapindika’s P ark’ ), bought at an excessive price by the merchantbanker A nathapindika from Prince Je t a and placed at the disposal o f the Order. T h e Buddha’s favourite monastery.

Pubbaram a (‘ East G rove M onastery’ ), given by the faithful laywoman Visakha. R ajakaram a {‘ K in g ’s G ro ve’ ), a nuns’ convent established by K in g Pasenadi for his sister Sum ana, who had become a bhikkhunl. Kingdom o f Vamsa Ghositaram a (‘Ghosita’ s Park’ ), given by a merchant o f that name. K ukkutaram a (K u kku ta’s Park'), given by a merchant o f that name, seldom visited by the Buddha, but often by A n a n d a . Pavarikam bavana {‘ P avarika’s M ango G ro ve’ ): the donor was also a m erchant, a friend o f Ghosita and Kukkuta. Badarikaratna (‘ B ad arika’s Park’ ), about 5 km from Kosam bI, probably visited by the Buddha only once. Republics Vesali: A m bapalivana (‘ A m b apali’s G ro ve’ ), a gift o f the courtesan o f that name, shortly before the Buddha’ s death. Vesali was the only republican capital that could boast a permanent Buddhist monas­ tery. With the aid o f indications by the local population (long since Hinduized) and the work o f archaeologists, the most important o f these monasteries have been located. At R a jagah a (R ajgir), the V ejuvana monastery can be visited, and the foundations o f the JTvaka monas­ tery, near Savatthi (M aheth) we can see the Je ta v a n a , and near Kosam bi (Kosam ) Ghosita’s park - a moving experience o f transitoriness. Where once the Buddha lived and preached and received visits o f the kings, where for centuries there was a flourishing monastic life, today there is nothing but silence and solitude. Tended by the Archaeological Survey o f the Republic o fln d ia , but with no religious life, the monastery sites o f the Buddha's time lie abandoned and desolate in the sun.

4

The spirit o f the Sangha

It was in the nature o f G o lam a ’s Dham m a that a rational and an

intuitive wing o f the Sangha should develop. A doctrine that sees one o f the causes o f suffering in ignorance (avijjS) must logically commend knowledge and understanding {vijja, riana) as remedies against suffering. Knowledge, the Buddlui was convinced, means liberation. It is therefore not surprising that intellectually gifted monks specialized in the gaining o f knowledge, understanding and wisdom ipafina), seeking to gain the goal above all by rational means. O n the other hand, G otam a had taught his followers that suffering originated from craving, and instructed them to fight it by means o f self-control, moral discipline [sila'j, and meditation. Accordingly, many monks and nuns had specialized in exercises in self-restraint and absorption. T h ey did not feel called upon to philosophize for themselves, because the Buddha had revealed everything necessary to em ancipation, so that all that was needful was to follow his instruc­ tions. T h e gap between these two attitudes was never so great as to threaten the unity o f the O rder; nevertheless it disturbed the bhikkhu (M ah a)G unda, S arip u tta’s younger brother, sufficiently to cause him concern. During a stay in Sah ajati he said it was regrettable that some bhikkhus who were devoted to the D ham m a, i.e. aimed at its rational understanding {dhammayoga bhikkhu; made fun o f those who devoted themselves chiefly to m editative absorptions (jhayanli). Rather, the ‘ rationalists7should praise the contem plalives, ‘ who abide having touched w'ith the body the Deathless (i.e. have experienced N ibbana in advance, in their m editation;'; likewise the con­ templative* should praise the ‘rationalists’ , who ‘ penetrate with wisdom a profound utterance and sec it (with clarity)’ (A N 6.46). Those who think and those who experience, Cunda thus made clear, belong together, and neither has any reason lo feel superior to the other. T h e more the Sangha grew, the more people joined it less from an inner calling than as a w ay o f livelihood and support. T h e harm done by bhikkhus who misinterpreted the Dhamma like Arittha ( M X 2 2 .1; i, 132) and Sati (M N 38.2; i, 258) w'as relatively slight. It sufficed that the M aster gave them a talking-to or, in cases like that o f Arittha, who was intractable, that the Sangha imposed a penalty on them. Ii was harder to deal with characters like the bhikkhu

Ljjhan asan n in , who was continually criticizing his fellow-monks, or the undisciplined Udiiyin who boasted o f knowledge he did not possess, or with the quarrelsom e nun C andakalJ. The nun Thullananda too, must be mentioned here. She was an eloquent expounder o f the D ham m a, but restless and given to intrigue, full o f self-importance and too fond o f men. Her positive qualities, which impressed K in g Pasenadi as well as some o f the younger nuns, made her all the more effective as a bad disciplinary exam ple. T he real threat to the unity o f the Sangha came from whole local chapters, like that o f Kosam bi, which were divided by quarrels, or from monks joined together to form indoctrination cells with the intention o f training young monks according to their own views. In KTtagiri (between Savatih i and Alavi) it was the monks Assaji and Punabbasu, in Savatthi it was Panduka and I.ohitaka, and in R ajagah a il was M ettiya and Bhum aja who attempted to undermine the vinaya in this way. Being threatened with a disciplinary punish­ ment, Assaji and Punabbasu, the most active dissidents, finally left the Sangha, which took the heat out o f the situation. T h e indoctrina­ tion o f young monks with divergent ideas was also the method o f D evadatta, who wanted to split the O rder and put himself at the head o f a part o f the Sangha. In one case a chapter o f monks placed itself in danger through overreaction and psychosis. Gotam a had preached to the monks o f Vesali 011 the im purity o f the body, and had recommended them to meditate on the body’s fragility and repulsiveness. He had thereupon withdrawn into solitude for his own meditation. On his return, he was astonished to find that the local Sangha had shrunk. Ananda explained: several monks had become disgusted with their bodies after the M aster’s explanations, and had committed suicide. T he Buddha imm ediately called a meeting o f the monks and proffered them as an alternative the nieditation-practice on breathing (SN 54.9). A parallel account (Sv 3 .1) even mentions a ‘false samana’ called M igalandika who m ade a speciality o f cutting off the heads o f those who wanted to commit suicide. Suicide runs counter to G o tan ia’s teachings in two respects. T he desire for self-destruction which underlies suicide, he was convinced, necessarily prevents the doer from attaining liberation as lil>eration is

freedom from desire. M oreover, suicide means throwing aw ay a chance, because rebirth as a human being is rare ( M N 12 9 .19 ; iii, 169 ;, and only man possesses (lie mental and ethical strength to achieve quickly liberation from suffering. 1'he only excusable kind o f suicide is in the case o f an Arahant, who has overcome greed, hatred and delusion and will not be reborn, and who is suffering from an incurable disease. T h e Pali Canon knows o f three such cases: the monks Godhika, V akkali ami Channa. T h e way in which the Buddha successfully overcam e all subversive attempts and aberrations proves his great skill in guiding people. At the same time we must recognize the sound sense o f the Sangha, whose members for the most part were seriously seeking liberation from suffering and did not allow themselves to be distracted from the M iddle W ay by solitary black sheep. We can gain an impression o f the atmosphere in the early days o f the O rder from the ‘ Hymns o f (he Klder M onks’ [theragathd) and the ‘ Hymns o f (he Klder Nuns' (thenj’athd). T h e enthusiasm which the Buddha inspired in his disciples, the optimism o f the early community to be on the way to salvation, ihe enchantment o f (he encounter with the numinous, and the joy o f libera ted ness - all these are vividly recorded here. There are 264 poems (1279 verses) by monks, and 73 (522 verses) by nuns, each poem being ascribed to a particular member o f the O rder. No one would maintain that they all really go back lo the author whose name (hey bear, or arc all from the lime o f the Buddha. Nevertheless, they document thal monks and nuns were filled with jubilation to such an extent thal they felt urged to give lyrical expression to their stale or realization (ailiid). T h e follow­ ing versions do nol attempt to reproduce Pali verse-fbrms but render the contents line by line. Torn between the life o f the householder and that o f the wandering mendicant was the monk Jenta, the son o f a raja. It was the perception o f the impermanence o f all things that finally decided him in favour of the life o f a bhikkhu: Hard is the homeless life And bard is life at home. Deep is the ( Buddha’s) norm And hard is wealth to win. The choice o f either course

Is difficult to make. A lw ays do hear in mind (The w orld’s) impermanence. (Thag i n ) As full-time seekers after liberation, some monks looked down on the lay followers who they assumed were bound to the world by desires. T h is is apparent in two verses by the monk Isidinna: I know lay followers who praise the Law , ‘ All worldly joys are transient’ , they say. Y et ornaments and jew els fill their hearts. T o wives and sons and daughters cling their minds. T h ey truly do not know the D ham m a’s depth When saying that all joys are transient. Th ey lack the strength to chop their passions off: T h at is why children, wives and wealth keep them in bonds. ( T h a g 18 7- 8 )

The hymns o f the monks and nuns devote much space to the theme o f the change from worldly life to that within the O rder. T h e turning away was both outward and inward: the abandonment o f professional and domestic life, and the rejection o f the world o f Samsara. The monk Sum angala from Savatthi sees the greatest advantage o f the monk's life in the liberation from back-breaking work in the fields. He makes no claim to be near the goal o f liberation from suffering, but spurs him self 011 to renewed endeavours: I’ m freed, I ’ m freed, I ’ m truly freed From these three crooked things: I’ m rid o f sickle, plough and stooping M y back when turning up the soil. Those (drudgeries) are ours forever, Hut / declare: ‘ Enough! Enough!' Do meditate, Sum angala, And stay, Sum angala, alert! O 'hag 43) Likewise liberated from three ‘crooked things’ through joining the O rder was the nun M utta, who as a young girl had been married ofl’toa

hunchbacked Brahmin. In addition to her liberation from marriage and housework, especially crushing spices, she has also gained libera­ tion from rebirth: I'm liberated well and freed From these three crooked things: From crush-stone and from rolling pin And from my hunchbacked lord. I'm free from (re)birth and from death. Shook off what bound me to the world. (Thlg 1 1 ) The stanza by the nun Sangha is a paean ai her release from craving and ignorance. T h e small poem is another proof thal monks and nuns were permitted to describe their liberatedness in poetical form. Home I ’ve left, gone forth to homelessness, Son I’ ve left, and all my cherished herds, I freed m yself from greed and also hate. And ignorance as well I have thrown oil". H aving defeated craving and its root I am composed, have reached N ibbiina’s peace. (T in g 18) The monk Suradha also expresses joy at his deliverance: (R e:b irth is now destroyed for me, The V ictor’s teaching is fulfilled. 1 have thrown off the so-called ‘ net’; For me, becoming is annulled. I he goal for which I wandered forth From home into the homelessness, That goal I have attained at last: All fetters have I cut by now. (T h ag 135-6 ) A sim ilar note o f triumph is found in dozens o f other poems and other utterances in the Pali Canon. This is understandable, for what can still oppress a person who has cut all social and intellectual bonds, who lacks nothing because he wants nothing, and who is convinced thal whatever

happens will not afiect ‘ him ’? W hoever holds such a view cannot be touched by anything,-and has good reason to regard his condition as happy. T h e contrast between life in the Sangha and their one-time worldly life often led monks and nuns to think back to their previous existence in the world. And so the group o f ‘ before and after' poems in the collections o f monks’ and nuns’ poetry is especially numerous. In the next exam ple, the former prostitute V im ala reflects on her past life. From her description, it seems that she was not one o f the educated city courtesans, but a common prostitute o f the streets: Conceited was 1 once o f my complexion, M y figure, beauty, popularity, I trusted that my youth would never dwindle In short: I was unknowing and naive. H aving adorned with jew ellery this body And with make-up, enticing for young men, I waited at the brothel door, desirous For victims, like a hunter setting snares. I showed m yself when I put on my jewels And (shamelessly) revealed my hidden charms, In practising diverse tricks o f seduction I had my fun with a great m any men. T od ay I am bald-shaven, clad as nun And live on alms-food from my daily round. W'hile sitting at a tree’s foot (in the shadow) I reach the state where thought-conceptions cease. From all entanglements which bind the gods As well as men, have I cut free myself. With all the asavas destroyed (forever) I rest in calm , have reached N'ibbana’s peace. (ThTg 72-6) V im ala dwells with such pleasure on her former street-life that the hearer o f her poem might have doubts about the destruction o f the ‘influences’ (asava). T h e thought of an insurance for her old age may have played at least some part in her desire to be ordained.

M ore moving — and perhaps more credible - is the accqunt by him self o f the R a ja g a h a street-sweeper Sunita, whom the Buddha liberated from his miserable existence by accepting him into the Sangha. Like so m any o f his contemporaries, Sunita was profoundly impressed by the Buddha’s personality and his kindliness, and regarded him as a sort o f saviour: Born was I in a humble fam ily In poverty, and scanty was my food. It was my lot to execute mean work: I had to sweep aw ay the withered flowers. I was the scorn o f everyone around, Was disregarded, treated with contempt. As I had given up self-eonlidence I bent my head, servile to everyone. And then one day I saw the Perfect One Surrounded by a retinue o f monks. I saw him, the Great Hero, when he made His entry into M ag ad h a’s chief town. H aving thrown down my carrying-polc 1 went T ow ards him close to greet him with respect. And then it happened that the Best o f Men Stood still out o f compassion just for me. I cast m yself before the M aster’s feet. T hen to one side I stood, entreating him That he, the Highest o f all Beings, might Accept me, graining me the pahhaja. T h e M aster whose compassion does comprise T he world, he felt compassion on me, too. He said to me: 'Gom e, bhikkhu!’ —T h u s 1 had Received my upasampada as monk. Alone 1dwell (from then on! in the forest. Unfaltering and full o f zeal 1 strove T o carry oul the M aster’s word as he. T h e V ictor , had instructed me to do.

And so il happened in the lirsl night-watch T h at I-beheld the Know ledge o f past lives. Then, while the middle watch o f night elapsed I (reached clairvoyance), gained the divine eye. And in the last night-watch eventually I pierced the cloud o f ignorance —(was freed). (T h ag 620--7) In four further (perhaps not genuine) stanzas, Sunlta describes how at sunrise the gods Indra and Brahm a paid homage to him as an A rahant, and the Buddha declared that it was by good conduct and self-discipline that one became a true Brahm in (and not by birth). T h e monk N agasam ala describes his awakening in a poem. A chance meeting was the spur that led to his becoming an A rahant: Bedecked with jewellery and gaily clothed, G arlanded, and made up with sandal-pastc, There, in the main road o f the village, stands A danring-girl, and to the music turns. Into the village I had come for alms, And passing by, the maiden caught my eye: Dressed up and tricked about, she was a snare Like laid by M ara, by the lord o f death. So realizing, there arose in me T h e penetrating thought o f how things are, The danger (ofdesire) was revealed, Established was my disgust (at the world). And thus my mind was set at liberty: C) see the D ham m a’s fundamental trulh! T he Threetold Knowledge had been gained by me, And all the Buddha taught had been fulfilled. (T h ag 267-70) Since ihe 'H ym ns o f the Elder Monks and Nuns' are religious poetry whose purpose is to inspire the hearer to take the path leading to the end o f sulTering. 1 heir main theme is man himself and ihere is little mention o f nature. Frequently, though, we hear o f the great annual rains which compelled the monk to build himself a hut or withdraw

into a fixed monastery to spend the ‘ rains retreat’ . Im patience for the rains to begin is described by the monk Subhuti, brother o f the merchant Anathapindika. T h e little le a f hut that he built is ready, and he him self is inw ardly firm. Boldly, he challenges the (Vedic) rain-god Parjanya to open the sluice-gates o f heaven: Well-roofed and pleasant is my little hut, And screened from winds, so rain, god, when you like! M y mind is well collected, and is free, And keen my mood - so rain, god, send your rain! ( T h a g .) All the poems quoted are in the l-form , none o f them is in the weform, and this is characteristic o f the basic attitude o f the San gha. Since everyone must work out his own salvation, Buddhism is essentially individualistic. T he Sangha is not a cult-com m unity or a sacral fraternity, but a union o f individuals who, each for himself, seek the same goal ofem ancipation by the same methods. When the Buddha lays so much stress on friendship among the bhikkhus (S N 3 . 1 8), one reason certainly is to prevent the monks from inner isolation. T h e group-spiril, then, took second place in the San gha to in­ dividualism . Nevertheless it did (and does) exist. T h is is shown in the following poem by the bhikkhu K im bila. Born o f Sakiyan stock in the Buddha’s home town o f K apilavatth u, K im b ila uses the expression ‘Sons o f the Sakiyan ’ , which denotes all ordained followers o f the Buddha, in a double sense: Here in the Eastern Bamboo G rove we dwell, Sons o f the Sakiyan, in close com radeship. No little wealth have we renounced for this. Contented with what alms-food fills our bowl. W'ith energy and with determined minds We unrelentingly strive (for the goal). Love for the Dham m a, that is our delight: Delight in m undane things we have forsworn. ( 1 hag 155-6 ) Although every monk must gain for him self the victory over greed,

hatred and delusion, as ‘Sons o f the S ak iyan ’ all monks are brothers. T h eir parallel striving forms a common bond o f friendship and trust.

TH E O RD ER AND TH E LA ITY SO C IO LO G IC A LL Y CONSIDERED Entry into the Sangha abolished all distinctions o f caste for the monk, just as all rivers lose their identity as soon as they enter the sea (A N 8 .19 ). It might therefore be thought that especially the lower castes and the casteless would take advantage o f ordination to escape from their restricted surroundings, and that the O rder would form an asylum for people o f the lower social classes. Such was not the case: the Buddha’s O rder attracted the upper levels o f society more than the lower. T h e Pali C anon names 457 historical persons as contemporaries o f the Buddha, who declared themselves followers o f the Dham m a: 291 monks, 61 nuns, 74 male and 3 1 female lay followers. We cannot in all cases determine their caste. In the case o f 92 monks and 22 nuns, their social origins are uncertain, and they are therefore unavailable lor sociological analysis. T h e remaining monks and nuns are divided among the different castes as shown in T a b le 2. Since it depended on various chance circumstances whether a name came to be preserved in the Pali Canon or not, we cannot give much weight to the absolute number ofmonks and nuns. But the proportion of the castes, both for monks and for nuns, is significant, displaying as it does a preponderance o f Brahmins. Th e caste o f those who had been brought up to take a particular interest in religious questions also took the largest part in adopting the teaching o f tlx* Buddha, despite the fact that this teaching ran counter to the interests o f thr professional Brahmins who practised the rituals for a living. Brahm ins were best equipped to appreciate the originality o f the Dham m a, and most easily ready to leave house and home for its sake. A canonical list o f ‘pre-eminent disciples' (A N t.t.|j m entions4t prominent bhikkhus; 17 ( = 4 1.5 per cent) o f these were o f Brahm in stock. A sim ilar result is obtained from the 259 monks whose poems are recorded in the T h eragatha; 1 1 3 ( = 44 per cent) o f them were o f Brahmin origin. However, the com parable figures for Brahm in-born nuns are considerably lower. While khattiyas (Skt ksatriya, the w arrior nobility) and vessas (Skt

Table 2 Monks

. \'uns

No.

O. /O

No.

0 ,0

Brahmins K h attiyas Vessas Castelfcss Suddas

96

48.2 28.6

■5 ■3

38-4 33-*

>3-5 (i.ti

10 i

6

3'

•25.8 2 A) 0

Total

*99

100

39

100

57 27 *4(51'.,

a n a tta . f>(>, 81, 138(1., 150 A nalliapit.uJika, 103II'. A n g u lim a la , ia(> a n im a l saeriliccs, 7HC.. 110 A n u ra d h a p u ra , 59 A n u ru d d lia , 100, 120. 251 a r a h a n t. (ifi, 197. 259 A ry a n s, 32 a s a n k h a ta , 150; see «/.athini> ritu a l. 72, 75I. b ecom ing. 143 B eluva, 24O B enares, (17, 70. 72II. B h a d d a k u c c a n a , 24, 5, 115; frien d sh ip in the, 171; lea d er o f Ihe, 156, 250; legal basis o f th e. 153; nona d m itta n c e to th e. 103, 154, 161, 164I'.; o f n u n s, 11 see also nuns; o rd in a tio n , (>5, 82, 8 4 ,9 9 , 1a 1, 163II.; robes, 167; schism in the 120II.. 237I.; sociology o f th e 187(1'.; a n d sta te 154I'. P a c re k a -B u d d h a , 196 P a k u d h a K a c c a y a n a , 222 Pali c an o n , a fii, 263 Pali lan g u a g e , 2(il p a rin ib b a n a , 152, 250 P a rsv a n a th a , 223 P a se n a d i, 100, 1051!., 107(1'., 127, 207, 238f., 240(1 P a ta lig a m a , 240, 245 P a ta lip u tta , 240, 262 p a th , eig h tfo ld , (>5, 147 p a tic c a -s a m u p p a d a , 142, 145 P a tim o k k lia , 157(1. P a v a , 247 p e rce p tio n s, 86, 124, 134 P in d o la, 119 pi pal t ree, 59 P ip ra v a , 1 4 I I see'also K a p ila v a tth u p o v e rty , t66f., 174 p ra g m a tis m , aooff.

prostitution, 27, 84, 183, 245 Pubbarama, 107; see also East Grove monastery Pukkusa, 248 punishments, 112, 127, 154 Purana Kassapa, 21 ^f. Rahula, 99, i23f. Rahulamata, 24, 99 rains retreats, 8off, 112, 126, 1 7ofr. Rajagaha, 88IT., 96, 101, 176, 240, 242, 244f., 259f. rebirth, 135, 139(1"., 1 4 4 see also samsara relics, 253 republics, 4 Revata, 261 ritual, 32, 72,75, 79, 147, 251 rivers, 73, 75, 166, 231 rta. 35 sacrifices, 78!'., 110, 189C. saint, 66; see also arahant Sakiyas, 4, 18, 100, 242, 254 sala tree, 50, 248, 255 samanas, 43f., 99, 159, 161, 229 Samma-Sambuddha, 196 sarpsara, 64, 135f., 145f.; in Jainism, 226 sangha, 65, 1 77(T., 186; see also Order Sanjaya, 93f., 97; S. Bdatthiputta, 222 sankhara, 134, 137, 140, 143 Sariputta, 931!'., gSf., 156, 232, 237, 244 Sarnath, 67fT., 75, 8of. Sattapanni cave, 260 Savatthi, 3, 14, 105, 107, 11 if., 231, 242

schism, 120, 236 seasons, if., 5 1, 8ofF., 170, 229 self, 66, 139, 150; see also anatta senses, 86, 124 sense objects, 86, 143 sense-spheres, 143 Siddhattha (beforeenlightenment): ascetic practices, 5 iff.; enlightenment, 54(1.; genealogy of, 6f.; literacy, 22; his marriage. 23; his wandering forth, 44ff.; his youth, 2 iff.; see also Buddha Siha, 207 similes, 25, 206 soul. 66, 139, 150 state, 154I'. Subhadda: bhikkhu, 252I., 258; novice, 249^ Suddhodana, 6, 17, 9 5f, 99, 115 suffering, 64, i25f., i32ff, 178; see also samsara suicide, 1 79f., 208 siikara-maddava, 247 TakkasTIa, 102, io8f., 126 tanha, 146 Tapussa, 61 taxes, 19 teaching, i3off.; see also Dhamma Tilaurako}, 14 (f.; see also Kapilavatthu trades, 28 trade routes. 232 trees, 58, 80 tribes, 4 Truths, Four Noble, 64ff, I32ff. Uddaka Ramaputta, 49

Udcna, 3, 117fT. untouchability, 28, 192 Upaka, 63 Upali, 100, 157, 260 Upanisads, 35^., 49, 74, 137, 144,

'50 Upavana, 251 uposalha, 68, isgf., 170 Uruvela, 49, 52, 83 Uruvcla-Kassapa, 8g(T. Vamsa, 3, 118 Vappa, 52, 63c. Varanasi, 73; see also Benares Vardhamana, 229f.; set also Mahavira vassa, 170; see also rains retreats Vassakara, 240, 245 Veda, 29, 34, 74, 78, 189!".

vegetarianism, 102, 168 Vejuvana, 92, 101, 174, 176 Vesali, ii3flf., 116, 245, 247, 261 vessas, i8yf. Videhas, 4, 240 Vidudabha, 242 vinaya, 157II'., 161 Visakha, 1240. Vultures’ Peak, 101, 236 warfare, 20 water cults, 7!)ff., 84 women, 117, 2()8f. worlds, five, 135 writing, 22 Yasa, 7o(r. Yasodhara, 24, 99

Buddhist Tradition Series

Edited by A lex Wayman (ISBN: 81-208-0287-x)

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Indian Buddhism—Hajime Nakamura 27 Philosophy and its Development in the Nikayas and Abhidhamma—Fumimaro Nagarjuniana—Chr. Lindtner Watanabe Chinese Monks in India—Latika Lahiri Buddhism in Central Asia—B.N. Purl 28 Untying the Knots in Buddhism—Alex D h a rm a k lrti’s T heory of HetuWayman Centricity of Anumana—M. R. Chinchore 29 Early Buddhist Theory of Knowledge— 6 The Legend of King Aioka—John S. Strong K. N. Jayatilleke 7 Buddhist Insight—George R. Elder 30 Calming the Mind and Discerning the 8 B uddhism T ran sfo rm ed —Richard Real—Tr. Alex Wayman Gombrich and Gananath Obeyesekere 31 A Comparative Study of the PrStimok^a— 9 The Buddhist Tantras—Alex Wayman W. Pachow 10 The Lion’s Roar of Queen &rimalS— 32 The Rise of Esoteric Buddhism in the Alex Wayman and Hideko Wayman Tibet—Eva M. Dargyay 11 The Buddha Nature—Brian E. Brown 12 Evolution of Stupas in Burma—Sujata Soni 33-35 Saipyuktabhidharm ahfdaya (3 Parts) — Bart Dessein 13 Buddhist Parables—E. W. Burlingame 36 A Millennium of Buddhist Logic—Alex 14 T he D ebate of King M ilinda— Wayman Bhikkhu Pesala 37 The Buddhist Pilgrimage—Duncan Forbes 15 The Chinese Madhyama Agama and the Pali M ajjhlma Nikaya— Bhikfu Thich 38 Chanting the Names of MaftjuSrl—Alex Minh Chau Wayman 16 Sudden and Gradual—Peter N. Gregory 39 The Literature of the Personalists of Early 17 Yoga of the GuhyasamSJatantra—Alex Buddhism—Bhikshu Thich Thien Chau Wayman 40 The Larikavatara Sutra—D.T. Suzuki 18 The Enlightenment of Vairocana—Alex 41 Studies in the LahkSvatara SOtra—D.T. Wayman and R. Tajima Suzuki 19 A History of Indian Buddhism—Tr. 42 The Vimalakirti Sutra—Burton Watson Hirakawa Akira, Ed. Paul Groner 43 The GandhSri Dharmapada—John Brough 20 Introduction to the Buddhist Tantric 44 Imaging Wisdom—Jacob N. Kinnard Systems—F.D. Lessing and Alex Wayman 21 A nSgatavaipsa D esana— T r. Vdaya 45 Pain and Its Ending—Carol S. Anderson Meddegama, Ed. John Clifford Holt 46 Apparitions of the Self—Janet Gyatso . 22 ChinnamastS—Elisabeth Anne Benard 47-49 Rules for Nuns according to the Dharma23 On V oidness—Fernando Tola and guptakavlnaya (3 Parts)—Ann Heirman Carmen Dragonetti 50 The Chinese Hevajratantra—Ch. Willemen 24 NSgarjuna’s Refutation of Logic (NySya) 51 The Historical Buddha—H.W. Schumann Vaidalyaprakarana— Fernando Tola and 52 DSna—Ellison Banks Findly Carmen Dragonetti 53 H erm eneutics & T radition in the 25 The Buddhist Art of NfigSrjunakonija Satpdhinirmocana-sutra—John Powers — Elizabeth Rosen Stone 54 Skillful Means—John W. Schroeder 26 Discipline—John C. Holt SBN 8 1 - 2 0 8 18 7 - 2

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