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Shakyamuni Buddha - Encyclopedia of Buddhism. Religious environment

BUDDHA SIDDHARTHA(Sanskrit “Enlightened by the Highest Knowledge”, “Overshadowed by the Truth”, “Achieved Insight”, “The one to whom all the laws of the Universe are open”) (c. 567-488 BC) - founder of the world religion of Buddhism and creator of the original philosophical concepts. Siddhartha was the name given to Gautama, the prince of Kapilavastu, at his birth. It is short for "Sarvartthasiddha" and means "fulfillment of all desires." Gautama, which means "the most victorious (tama) on earth (go)", was the name of the priestly branch of the Shakya family, the royal family name of the dynasty to which Gautama's father, King Shuddhodhana of Kapilavastu, belonged. Kapilavastu was an ancient city that was destroyed during the life of Buddha. In the name Shakyamuni, the last component ("muni") is translated as meaning "powerful in mercy, solitude and silence", and the first - Shakya - is a family name. Siddhartha's mother - Maya (Mahamaya, i.e. Great Maya) - died a few days after his birth. The father tried to protect his son from the slightest contact with the realities of earthly life: the boy indulged in vague dreams; plunging into the deepest contemplation, he experienced moments of enlightenment. At the age of 27, Gautama married, and soon his son Rahula was born. Despite his father's opposition, Gautama saw poverty, serious illness, old age, death: these four meetings determined his future fate. Shocked by the knowledge that illness, old age, and death are the common lot of all people, Gautama realized that the earthly world and life in it were unacceptable for him. Talking to a happy and calm beggar ascetic, Gautama said to himself: “I will do what this man did. I will renounce all wealth and follow my own path. By leaving the world with its pleasures, I will find peace and know the truth with which I will teach people to overcome the poverty of earthly life." At the age of 29, Gautama leaves home. Later Buddha will say: “And so I left my native home for the sake of homelessness and became a wanderer, seeking the blessings of the true on the incomparable path of the upper world.” After studying all the philosophical systems that existed at that time, Gautama realized that they would not solve the problems that tormented him. According to ancient customs, he turned to practicing yogis, and then retired to the jungle to lead an ascetic lifestyle and study the sacred texts of the Brahmins. Many years later, Gautama, after a deep faint from prolonged exhaustion, realized the futility of asceticism. As a result of long-term deep contemplation under the sacred Boddhi tree on the banks of the Nairanjana River in the village of Uruvilva (modern Boddh Gaya, Bihar, India), he achieved Enlightenment: he clearly saw his whole life and the inextricability of connections between people, the relationship between the individual and the Invisible World. One thing comes from the other, everything is fleeting, and Trishna - the thirst for the existence of life - disturbs the peace of the World, leading to an already departed existence. Gautama reflected: “People indulge in passions, desires, aspirations... Their thoughts are directed towards possessing something. They worry, rejoice, are upset, not realizing that the cause of joy and suffering lies in the bodily, destructible, transitory. If people see The source and meaning of life is in destruction, in the physical, then they must inevitably suffer and die. They seek pleasure, but then sadness and fear of losing the object of pleasure arise. Those who are free from pleasure are also free from suffering. own houses, fields, cattle, wealth, imagining that they own sons, daughters, wives - such people are inevitably doomed to suffering. All this is temporary, everything is subject to destruction, and therefore it is vain to strive to possess something. What a person must master is the wisdom of knowledge, and he must strive for it alone. He who strives for pleasure grows only his own lusts, he forges only strong chains that bind him to a life full of suffering.” Now Gautama knew with whom and how to fight for deliverance from the earthly world of sorrow and pain; he realized that life - this emanation of our thoughts - is born in the human heart. Initially, a person’s unfaithful life is stopped by death. The only path to immortality is to know the meaning of true life, before which death is powerless. So at the age of 40 Gautama became Buddha - To the Enlightened: “When I regained my sight, my soul found redemption from the sin of earthly lusts, redemption from sinful attachment to earthly existence; found redemption from the sin of delusion, redemption from the sin of ignorance. Holiness, purity of life was achieved, duty was fulfilled, and I will never return more to that world - that’s what I came to know.” In his First (Benares) Sermon, delivered in the Deer Park of Sarnath (modern Varanasi) to five disciples and two deer, the Buddha formulated the foundations of the Teaching and, as recorded in the Sutras, “set in motion the wheel of Dharma” (Dharmachakra parvartana). Buddha recognized the Four Noble Truths (Arya-satya): dukkha (suffering, evil) exists; there is a cause of dukkha - desire, aspiration; there is a possibility of liberation from dukkha; there is a Noble Eightfold (Middle) Path to redemption and the cessation of dukkha. The basic postulate of the Buddha's teaching is the renunciation of everything sensual. The Buddha said: “Ill-controlled passions (feelings), like an unbroken horse, break out and bring misfortune upon us in this world, and constant suffering in the other world. They (feelings) lead us, like a wild horse, to certain death; therefore, the wise and a cautious person does not give freedom to his feelings. In fact, these feelings are our greatest enemies, the cause of misfortune, since people, becoming attached to sensory objects, bring upon themselves all the suffering." The cause of evil is the existence of man in the world of desires, the dominance of feelings over the nature of the spirit of the individual. The Enlightened One taught: “Meditation is the path to immortality, frivolity is the path to death. Those who are awake in meditation never die; the frivolous, the ignorant are like the dead”; “Whoever is engulfed in the flames of passionate desires, who thirsts only for pleasures, grows only his own lusts and fetters himself in chains”; “Only he can be called wise who has quenched his passions, tamed his feelings, torn out every attraction from his heart and did not allow the attraction to take root again in his heart - only he who walks his own path in solitude”; “If you eradicate in yourself every desire for the temporary, the physical, if you extinguish your passions, everything earthly, then there will be no such force that could cause you death”; “From pleasure arises sorrow, from pleasure arises fear; whoever is free from pleasure has no more sorrow or fear”; “A person does not become wise because of learning. He becomes wise because he is freed from passions and desires.” The philosophical doctrines of the Buddha's teachings are based on the two components of the Noble Eightfold (Middle) Path to redemption and cessation of dukkha - right concentration and right knowledge. Correct concentration is a constant concentration of attention, stopping the kaleidoscopic flickering of the constituent empirical components. The basis of correct knowledge is the understanding that the material world (Samsara) is only a deception of the senses, an independently non-existent manifestation of the spiritual Origin. At the same time, the principle of total relativism is postulated: each object (process) is Dharma - continuously changing and arising under the influence of other objects (processes) and influencing others. The universe in this concept is a flow of impersonally and beginninglessly transforming interconnected short-term components. The Buddha teaches that the human soul is nothing more than a chain of Dharmas. The death of a person is not a complete disappearance, but a recombination of the Dharmas that constituted him in a previous life into a new image of any living being. Correct knowledge gives a true understanding of suffering, which is the continuous transformation of Dharmas, their agitation, underlying the impermanence of human states. Achieved on the basis of trance meditation, Nirvana (Sanskrit “extinction”, “peace”, “non-existence”) in the teachings of the Buddha is the highest possible state of a person, when the processes of unrest in his life are at peace, and in one of the Sutras it is described as “... refuge where there is no earth, no water, no light, no air; where there is neither the infinity of space, nor the infinity of mind, where there is neither ideas nor the absence of them; where there is neither this world nor another world, nor the sun, nor the moon. This is not manifestation, not destruction and not permanence, this is not dying and not birth. This is existence without a basis, without development, without support. In the practice of preaching Buddha's teachings for monastics he intended a philosophical theory of reality and Nirvana, for the laity - a set of commandments and life norms: the reward for fulfilling the commandments on earth - do not kill living things, do not steal, beware of looking at women, do not tell lies, do not drink intoxicants - is subsequent bliss in another life. V. Grube (Germany) wrote: “Buddhism goes in its commandment of love for one’s neighbor even much further than Christianity, applying it not only to people, but also to the entire kingdom of living beings. This moral commandment is in Buddhism a natural consequence of the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, according to which every person, as punishment for bad deeds in earthly life, is reborn in a future life in the form of an animal." Buddha preached his teachings until the end of his life, performing, according to legend, miracles: He could become invisible, fly through the air, walk on water, hold the Sun and the Moon in his hands at the same time, and talk with the gods. In addition to ordinary human vision, the Buddha was All-Seeing, also possessing the eye of Wisdom. He could see the past, present, future, the Noble Eightfold (Middle) Path to redemption and the cessation of dukkha. The Buddha's knowledge includes his ability to sense, feel, see and hear everything that happens in many Universes. The omniscience of the Buddha is knowledge of the Four Noble Truths, the ability for great Compassion, knowledge of the constant transformability of existence, etc. In the Sutras, the Buddha was awarded such epithets as the Lord of the Universe, God of gods, Arhat (one who destroyed the attachment of his human shell to Samsara), Sugata (Creator of Good) and many others. etc. The great transition of the Buddha from earthly life to Nirvana - Mahaparinirvana - took place on the full moon of the month of Vaishakha (May) in Kushinagar (modern Kasiya, Uttar Pradesh, India). This date is also considered the Buddha's birthday and the day of his Enlightenment - the Thrice Holy Day. Under the Boddhi tree, he said to those present: “Now, monks, I have nothing more to say to you, except that everything created is doomed to destruction! Strive with all your might for Salvation.” The cremation of the remains of the Buddha took place with royal honors. According to H. P. Blavatsky, every orientalist and pandit knows by heart biography of Buddha, the most perfect mortal this world has ever seen, but none of them seems to suspect the esoteric meaning underlying the account of his life before birth, that is, the meaning of popular history. Buddha would not have been mortal if he had not passed through hundreds and thousands of births before his last appearance. Yet the detailed enumeration of them and the statement that during them he made his way through all the stages of migration from the lowest - animate and inanimate atom and insect - to the highest - man - simply contains the well-known occult aphorism: “The stone becomes a plant, the plant becomes an animal.” , animal - human." According to Blavatsky, every person who has ever existed has gone through the same evolution. But the hidden symbolism in the sequence of these rebirths (or "jatakas") contains the complete history of evolution on this earth - pre- and post-human - and is a scientific statement of natural facts. One not veiled, but open and obvious truth can be found in their list, namely, as soon as Gautama achieved human form, he began to manifest the highest selflessness, self-sacrifice and mercy in each individual. In the texts telling about the life and deeds of the Buddha, gods, deities, demons, and spirits are constantly mentioned that come to him, accompany him and talk with him. Buddha himself ascended to the world of the celestials and read his sermons there, and the gods, in turn, repeatedly visited his cell on earth. In addition to ordinary vision, the Buddha had the eye of wisdom in his forehead and the ability to see everything. According to tradition, the Buddha's omniscience, in addition to ordinary vision, was provided by an eye that saw the past, present and future; the eye that sees the Eightfold (or Middle) Path; the eye that sees the intentions and actions of all beings of the Universe; an eye that sees everything that happens in countless Universes. As is clear from the texts, the Buddha sensed, felt, saw, heard everything that was happening on earth and in other worlds - these qualities are designated as the six-factor knowledge of the Buddha. In its turn, Buddha's omniscience is divided into 14 types: knowledge of the four truths, the ability to achieve great compassion, knowledge of the constant variability of existence, knowledge of the double miracle and other types of knowledge. Buddha, according to legend, possessed many magical qualities: he could descend underground, rise to heaven, fly through the air, evoke fiery mysteries, take on any form, there were 32 large and 80 small marks on his body, including moles endowed magical properties. In the sacred texts, the Buddha is awarded with many epithets indicating that he is the lord of the universe, the God of gods, the king of kings, the omnipotent, the healer, etc. He is also called tathagata (one who comes and goes), arhat (destroying attachment to existence samsara), sugata (creator of good), jina (victor), bhagavat (triumphant), maha sramana (great hermit), singhanadin (lion-voiced); in total more than 30 epithets. From Blavatsky's point of view, the Buddha achieved the state of Bodhisattva on earth under the name Prabhapala. The choice of the Shakya family and its mother Maya, as “the purest on earth,” occurs in accordance with the birth model of every Savior, God or deified reformer. The story of his entry into the womb of his mother in the form of a white elephant is a hint of his innate wisdom: an elephant of this color is the symbol of every Bodhisattva. The statement that at the birth of Gautama the new-born child walked seven steps in four directions, that the Udumbara flower blossomed in all its rare beauty and that the Naga kings immediately went to "baptize him" - all are allegories so numerous in the phraseologies of the Initiates, and are well understood by every Oriental. occultist. All the events of his noble life are given in sacred numbers and every so-called miraculous incident - so condemned by the Orientalists as confusing the narrative and making it impossible to separate truth from fantasy - is simply an allegorical cover for the truth. This, as understandable as it is to an occultist trained in symbolism, is so difficult to comprehend for a European scientist ignorant of occultism. Every detail of the story after his death and before his cremation is a chapter of facts, written in a language that must be studied before it becomes understandable, otherwise the dead letter will lead it into absurd contradictions. For example, while reminding his disciples of the immortality of the dharmakaya, the Buddha - as it is said - entered samadhi and plunged deeply into Nirvana - from where no one can return. And yet, despite this, the Buddha is depicted throwing open the lid of the coffin and emerging from it, greeting with folded hands his mother Maya, who suddenly appeared in the air, although she died seven days after his birth, etc. d. Since the Buddha was a Chakravarti (one who operates the wheel of the Law), his body during cremation could not be destroyed by ordinary fire. What's going on? Suddenly, a stream of flame erupted from the swastika on his chest and reduced his body to ash. According to Blavatsky, regarding the fact that the Buddha was one of the real and indisputable Saviors of the world, it is enough to say that the most ardent orthodox missionary, unless he is hopelessly insane or lacking the slightest respect for historical truth, cannot find the slightest accusation against life and the personal character of the Buddha. Without any pretension to divinity, allowing his followers to fall into atheism rather than into the degrading superstition of deva or idol worship, the course of his life from beginning to end is holy and divine. During his 45 years of mission, he is as untainted and pure as the course of a god's life - or as the latter should be. He is the perfect example of the divine, the human god. He achieved Buddhahood, that is, complete enlightenment, solely by his own merit and thanks to his individual efforts, while a god is not supposed to have any personal merit in the realization of goodness and holiness by him. Esoteric teachings claim that Buddha renounced Nirvana and left the robe of the Dharmakaya to remain the "Buddha of Compassion" within the tribulations of this world. And the religious philosophy that he left to the world, for more than 2000 years, created generations of kind and selfless people. His religion is the only one absolutely bloodless among all existing ones: tolerant and free, teaching universal compassion and mercy, love and self-sacrifice, poverty and satisfaction with one’s fate, whatever it may be. No persecution, no inculcation of faith by fire and sword has ever disgraced her. No thunder and lightning God ever interfered with her pure commandments; and if the majority of mankind, Blavatsky concludes, would accept this simple, humane and philosophical code of daily life, left to us by the greatest Reformer Man ever known, then truly an era of bliss and peace would bloom over humanity. S. V. Silkov, Yandex Dictionary

") - spiritual teacher, legendary founder of Buddhism, one of the three world religions.

Given a name at birth Siddhattha Gotama(pali) / Siddhartha Gautama(Sanskrit) (Descendant of Gotama, successful in achieving goals), he later became known as Buddha(literally - “Awakened”, Skt.) and A completely perfect buddha(Sammāsambuddha). It is also called: Tathāgata (“thus come/gone”), Bhagavan ("blessed"), Sugata(“walking in good”) Gina("winner"), Lokajyeshtha(“honored by the world”)

Siddhartha Gautama is a key figure in Buddhism. Stories about his life, his sayings, dialogues with his disciples and monastic precepts were summarized by his followers after his death and formed the basis of the Buddhist canon - “Tipitaka". Buddha is also a character in the pantheon of many dharmic religions, including Hinduism, as well as the Bon (late Bon) religion. In the Middle Ages, in the later Indian Puranas (for example, in the Bhagavata Purana), he was included among the avatars of Vishnu instead of Balarama.

The birthday of Shakyamuni Buddha is traditionally celebrated (in most schools of Buddhism) in the spring - April 5 is a national holiday in the Republic of Kalmykia, Japan, and in Theravada countries - Thailand, Myanmar, Sri Lanka [ ] Buddha's birthday is celebrated on the day of one of the spring full moons, most often falling in the month of May.

Biography

Modern science does not have enough material for a scientific reconstruction of the Buddha’s biography. Therefore, traditionally, the biography of the Buddha is given on the basis of a number of Buddhist texts: suttas (sutras) written in the Pali language, which contain fragments of the Buddha’s biography, as well as Sanskrit scriptures created, probably at a later time: “Buddacharita” (“Life of the Buddha”) Ashvaghoshi, "Lalitavistara" etc.

However, it should be borne in mind that the first texts relating to the Buddha appeared only four hundred years after his death. By this time, changes were made to the stories about him by the monks themselves, in particular, to exaggerate the figure of Buddha.

In addition, the works of the ancient Indians did not cover chronological aspects, concentrating more on philosophical aspects. This is well reflected in Buddhist texts, in which the description of the thoughts of Buddha Shakyamuni prevails over the description of the time when all this happened.

Previous Lives

The path of the future Buddha Shakyamuni to awakening began hundreds and hundreds of lives before his complete exit from the “wheel of alternating lives and deaths.” It began, according to the description contained in the Mahayana work Lalitavistara, with the meeting of the rich and learned brahman Sumedha with the Buddha Dipankara (“Dipankara” means “Lighting Lamp”, Sanskrit). Sumedha was amazed by the serenity of the Buddha and promised himself to achieve the same state. Therefore, they began to call him “Bodhisattva”.

After Sumedha's death, the strength of his desire for awakening determined his birth in different bodies, both human and animal. During these lives, the bodhisattva perfected wisdom and mercy and was born for the penultimate time among the devas (gods), where he could choose an auspicious place for his last birth on earth. And he chose the family of the venerable Shakya king so that people would have more confidence in his future sermons.

Conception and birth

According to traditional biography, the father of the future Buddha was Shuddhodana, the raja of one of the small Indian principalities, the head of the Shakya tribe with the capital of Kapilavatthu (Kapilavastu). Gautama is his gotra, the equivalent of a modern surname.

Although the Buddhist tradition calls it “raja,” judging by the information contained in some sources, the government in the Shakya country was built on a republican type. Therefore, most likely, he was a member of the ruling kshatriya assembly (sabha), which consisted of representatives of the military aristocracy.

According to the long-standing Shakya tradition, Mahamaya went to her parents’ house to give birth. However, she gave birth along the way, in the Lumbini (Rummini) grove [ ] (20 km from the border of modern Nepal and India, 160 km from the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu), under the Ashoka tree [ ] . Andrew Skilton noted that "Buddha denied being merely a man or a god" [ ]

The birthday of Siddhartha Gautama (which is also the day of his Awakening and the day of his final departure from the world, Parinibbana), the May full moon, is widely celebrated in Buddhist countries (Vesak), and in Lumbini, the SAARC countries (Association of Regional South Asian Cooperation) and Japan. A temple was erected at the birthplace, where excavations of Siddhartha’s birthplace - the foundation and a fragment of the walls of the park pavilion - are available for viewing. Near the temple there is a pond in which Mahamaya bathed the newborn.

Most sources (Buddhacharita, ch. 2, Tipitaka, Lalitavistara, ch. 3) claim that Mahamaya died a few days after giving birth [ ] .

Invited to bless the baby, the hermit-seer Asita, who lived in a mountain monastery, discovered 32 signs of a great man on his body. Based on them, he declared that the baby would become either a great king (cakravartin) or a great holy Buddha.

Shuddhodana performed a naming ceremony for the child on the fifth day of his birth, calling him Siddhartha, which means “one who has achieved his goal.” Eight learned Brahmins were invited to predict the future child. They also confirmed Siddhartha's dual future.

Early life and marriage

Siddhartha was raised by his mother's younger sister, Maha Prajapati. Wanting Siddhartha to become a great king, his father in every possible way protected his son from religious teachings or knowledge of human suffering. Three palaces were specially built for the boy [ ] . In his development, he was ahead of all his peers in science and sports, but showed a tendency to think.

As soon as the son turned 16, his father arranged a wedding with Princess Yashodhara, a cousin who also turned 16. A few years later, she bore him a son, Rahula. Siddhartha spent 29 years of his life as the prince of Kapilavastu. Although the father gave his son everything he might need in life, Siddhartha felt that material wealth was not the ultimate goal of life [ ] .

One day, in the thirtieth year of his life, Siddhartha, accompanied by the charioteer Channa, got out of the palace. There he first saw “four sights” that changed his entire subsequent life: an old beggar, a sick man, a decomposing corpse and a hermit. Gautama then realized the harsh reality of life - that illness, suffering, aging and death are inevitable, and neither wealth nor nobility can protect against them, and that the path of self-knowledge is the only way to understand the causes of suffering. This prompted Gautama, in his thirtieth year, to leave his home, family and property and go in search of a way to get rid of suffering.

Withdrawal and ascetic lifestyle

Siddhartha left his palace accompanied by his servant Channa. The legend says that "the sound of his horse's hooves was muffled by the gods" [ ] so that his departure would remain a secret. Having left the city, the prince changed into simple clothes, exchanged clothes with the first beggar he met, and dismissed the servant. This event is called the "Great Departure".

Siddhartha began his ascetic life in Rajagriha, where he begged on the street. After King Bimbisara learned of his journey, he offered Siddhartha the throne. Siddhartha refused the offer, but promised to visit the kingdom of Magadha immediately after he achieved enlightenment.

Siddhartha left Rajagaha and began to learn yogic meditation from two brahmin hermits. After he mastered the teachings of Alara (Arada) Kalama, Kalama himself asked Siddhartha to join him, but Siddhartha left him after some time. Then Siddhartha became a student of Udaka Ramaputta (Udraka Ramaputra), but after achieving the highest level of meditative concentration, he also left the teacher [ ] .

Siddhartha then headed to southeastern India. There he, along with five companions under the leadership of Kaundinya (Kondanna), tried to achieve enlightenment through severe austerity and mortification. Six years later, on the verge of death, he discovered that harsh ascetic methods did not lead to greater understanding, but simply clouded the mind and exhausted the body. After this, Siddhartha began to reconsider his path. He remembered a moment from childhood when, during the plowing holiday, he experienced a immersion in a trance. This brought him into a state of concentration that he found blissful and refreshing, a state of dhyana.

Awakening (enlightenment)

His four companions, believing that Gautama had abandoned further searches, left him. Therefore, he went on to wander further alone, until he reached a grove not far from Gaia.

After this, the Buddha headed to Varanasi, intending to tell his former teachers, Kalama and Ramaputta, what he had achieved. But the gods told him that they were already dead.

Then the Buddha went to Deer Grove (Sarnath), where he read his first sermon, “The First Turn of the Wheel of Dharma,” to his former ascetic comrades. This sermon described the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. Thus, the Buddha set into motion the Wheel of Dharma. His first listeners became the first members of the Buddhist sangha, completing the formation of the Three Jewels (Buddha, dharma and sangha). All five soon became arhats.

Later Yasa with his fifty-four companions and three brothers Kassapa (Sanskrit: Kashyapa) with disciples (1000 people), who then brought the Dharma to people.

Spreading the Teaching

For the remaining 45 years of his life, Buddha traveled along the Ganges River valley in central India in the company of his disciples, teaching his Teaching to a variety of people, regardless of their religious and philosophical views and caste - from warriors to cleaners, murderers (Angulimala) and cannibals (Alavaka ). At the same time, he performed many supernatural acts.

The Sangha, led by the Buddha, traveled annually for eight months. During the remaining four months of the rainy season (approximately: July - August [ ]) it was quite difficult to walk, so the monks spent them in some monastery (vihara), park or forest. People from nearby villages themselves came to them to listen to instructions.

In Samskrita-samskrita-vinishaya-nama it is said:

“Our Teacher Shakyamuni lived 80 years. He spent 29 years in his palace. For six years he labored as an ascetic. Having achieved Enlightenment, he spent his first summer at the place where the Wheel of the Law turns (Dharmachakrapravartan). He spent his second summer in Veluwan. The fourth is also in Veluvan. The fifth is in Vaishali. The sixth is at Gola (i.e. Golangulaparivartan) in Zhugma Gyurve, which is near Rajagriha. The seventh is in the Abode of the 33 Gods, on a platform made of Armonig stone. He spent his eighth summer in Shishumaragiri. The ninth is in Kaushambi. The tenth is at a place called Kapijit (Teutul) in the Parileyakawana forest. The eleventh is in Rajagriha (Gyalpyo-kab). The twelfth is in the village of Veranja. The thirteenth is in Chaityagiri (Choten-ri). The fourteenth is in the temple of Raja Jetavana. The fifteenth is at Nyag-rodharam in Kapilavastu. The sixteenth is in Atawak. The seventeenth is in Rajagriha. The eighteenth - in the Jvalini cave (near Gaya). The nineteenth is in Jvalini (Barve-pug). The twentieth is in Rajagriha. There were four summer stays in the Mrigamatri aram east of Shravasti. Then the twenty-first summer stay was in Shravasti. Buddha went into nirvana in the Shala grove, in Kushinagar, in the country of Malla."

Reliability of historical data

Early Western scholarship accepted the biography of the Buddha as presented in Buddhist scriptures as true history, but nowadays "scholars are reluctant to give anecdotal evidence of historical facts related to the life of the Buddha and his Teachings."

The key reference point for dating the life of the Buddha is the beginning of the reign of the Buddhist Emperor Ashoka. Based on Ashoka's edicts and the reigns of the Hellenistic kings to whom he sent envoys, scholars date Ashoka's reign to 268 BC. e. Buddha is said to have died 218 years before this event. Since all sources agree that Gautama was eighty years old when he died (eg Dīgha Nikāya 2.100), we get the following dates: 566-486 BC. e. This is the so-called “long chronology”. An alternative "short chronology" is based on Sanskrit sources of North Indian Buddhism preserved in East Asia. According to this version, Buddha died 100 years before Ashoka's inauguration, which gives the following dates: 448-368. BC e. Moreover, in some East Asian traditions the date of Buddha’s death is 949 or 878 BC. e., and in Tibet - 881 BC. e. In the past, the generally accepted dates among Western scholars were 486 or 483 BC. e., but now it is believed that the grounds for this are too shaky.

Relatives of Siddhartha Gautama

The mother of the future Buddha was Maya. In Mahavastu the names of her sisters are given - Maha-Prajapati, Mahamaya, Atimaya, Anantamaya, Chulia and Kolisova. Siddhartha's natural mother died seven days after his birth and her sister Maha-Prajapati (Sanskrit; Pali - Maha-Pajapati), who was also married to Shuddhodana, took care of the child.

The Buddha had no siblings, but had a half-brother Nanda, the son of Maha-Prajapati and Suddhodana. The Theravada tradition says that the Buddha also had a half-sister, Sundara-Nanda. The brother and sister later entered the Sangha and achieved arhatship.

The following cousins of the Buddha are known: Ananda, who in the Theravada tradition was considered the son of Amitodana, and in the Mahavastu is called the son of Shuklodan and Mriga; Devadatta, son of maternal uncle Suppabuddha and paternal aunt Amita.

The identity of Gautama's wife remains unclear. In the Theravada tradition, Rahula's mother (see below) is called Bhaddakachcha, but the Mahavamsa and commentaries on the Anguttara Nikaya call her Bhaddakaccana and see her as the cousin of the Buddha and the sister of Devadatta. Mahavastu ( Mahavastu 2.69), however, names the Buddha's wife Yashodhara and implies that she was not Devadatta's sister, since Devadatta wooed her. Buddhavamsa also uses this name, but in the Pali version it is Yasodhara. The same name is most often found in North Indian Sanskrit texts (also in Chinese and Tibetan translations). Lalitavistara ( Lalitavistara) says that the Buddha's wife was Gopa, the mother of Dandapani's maternal uncle. Some texts [ which?] state that Gautama had three wives: Yashodhara, Gopika and Mrigaya.

Siddhartha had an only son, Rahula, who, having matured, joined the Sangha. Over time he became an arhat. One of the Suttas of the Sutta-nipata, which is part of the Buddhist Pali canon, is dedicated to him: Sutta-nipata, 22:91.

Notes

The dates of his life cannot be precisely determined, and various historians date his life in different ways: - gg. BC e.; - Messrs. BC e.; - Messrs. BC e.; - Messrs. BC e.; - Messrs. BC e.; - Messrs. BC e. See also the special section in this article
Not to be confused with the Sakya school of Tibetan Buddhism.
Law of the Republic of Kalmykia dated October 16, 2006 N 298-III-Z “On amendments to the Law of the Republic of Kalmykia “On non-working holidays and memorial days in the Republic of Kalmykia””
Michael Carriers, The Buddha, 1983, pages 13, 14. Found in Founders of Faith, Oxford University Press, 1986.
Michael Carriers, The Buddha, 1983, page 15. Found in Founders of Faith, Oxford University Press, 1986.
Robert C. Lester(trans. Koval A. N.) Buddhism // Religious traditions of the world vol. 2 - M.: KRON-PRESS, 1996 - pp. 308-309 - ISBN 5-232-00313-5;
Buddhavamsa.
Armstrong K. (2000), Buddha, (UK) Orion, ISBN 978-0-7538-1340-9
Ermakova T.V., Ostrovskaya E.P. Classical Buddhism - St. Petersburg: Petersburg Oriental Studies, 1999. ISBN 5-85803-132-3.
Sacred-texts.com (unavailable link)
Buddhanet.net
Sarca indica, Ashoka Tree, Ashoka(English) . Retrieved November 6, 2010. Archived February 17, 2011.
the Buddha himself denied that he was either a man or a god (Skilton, Andrew (2004), A Concise History of Buddhism 2004, p. 64-65.
Narada. A Manual of Buddhism. - Buddha Educational Foundation, 1992. - P. 9-12. - ISBN 967-9920-58-5.
Narada (1992), p14
Narada (1992), pp15-16
Narada (1992), pp19-20
Ashvaghosha, Buddhacarita or Life of the Buddha. Per. K. Balmont. M. 1990, p. 136
in some traditions it is believed that this happened in the fifth lunar month, in others - in the twelfth
Angulimala Sutta // Pali Canon (MN 86).
Maha-parinibbana Sutta (16), verse 56
Lopez. Buddhism in Practice. - Princeton University Press, 1995. - P. 16.
and “As is now almost universally accepted by informed Indological scholarship, a re-examination of early Buddhist historical material, ..., necessitates a redating of the Buddha’s death to between 411 and 400 BCE.” - Dundas P. (English)Russian The Jains, 2nd edition, (Routledge, 2001), p. 24
Mahavastu 1,355
Suttanipāta commentary 1,357, Mahāvaṃsa II.18-22
Dīgha Nikāya 2.52
Mahavastu 1.355-7
Therīgāthā commentaries 83 and Aṅguttara Nikāya commentaries 1,363
Mahāvaṃsa II.21-4
Buddhavaṃsa

Literature

in Russian

Agadzhanyan A. S. Buddha // Encyclopedia of Religions / Ed. A. P. Zabiyako, A. N. Krasnikova, E. S. Elbakyan. - M.: Academic project, Gaudeamus, 2008. - P. 203. - 1520 p. - (Summa). - 3000 copies. -

Buddhism is one of the three world religions and the oldest of them. It originated in India and has spread throughout the world over time. The largest Buddhist communities are concentrated in the countries of East Asia - Japan, China, Korea, etc. The number of Buddhists in our country is very large. Most of them are in Kalmykia, Transbaikalia, Tyva and Buryatia. In 2005, a beautiful temple, the “Golden Abode of Buddha Shakyamuni”, built with the blessing of the 14th, was consecrated in Elista.

The founder of the Buddhism religion is Siddhartha Gautama Shakyamuni or Buddha. In spiritual literature, he is called by many names - Bhagavan (Blessed), Sugata (Walking in Good), Tathagata (Coming and Gone), Lokajyeshtha (Revered by the World), Jina (Conqueror), Bodhisattva (Purifying the awakened consciousness from evil and suffering).

Shakyamuni was not the first Buddha. There were others before him, but only Gautama Buddha became the Great Teacher. He discovered that human life is constant suffering. A person is born in new incarnations, but suffering is the essence of every rebirth. The wheel of samsara (predestination) does not let him go. He set himself the goal of finding the cause of people's suffering and eliminating it. As a result of many years of complete asceticism and meditation, he acquired great wisdom and knowledge. He understood how to free a person from suffering, that is, give him the opportunity to enter nirvana during earthly life, and passed on his knowledge to his students.

The life path of Buddha Shakyamuni is usually divided into 12 periods, which are called 12 feats, or acts of the Buddha.

First feat

The first feat of the Buddha is associated with his coming into the world. According to legend, many hundreds of lives before Siddhartha, the brahman Sumedhi lived in India. One day he met the Buddha Dipankara. He was struck by the serenity of the Buddha, and he decided at all costs to learn the same attitude towards life. In Lalitavistara he is called the first bodhisattva. Sumedhi discovered great wisdom: in order to give people knowledge of how to achieve nirvana, you need to incarnate many times into different living beings, feel and understand all their suffering. His desire to free people from predestination was so great that it did not leave Sumedha even after death. It was present in him during all his rebirths. And in each new incarnation he gained new knowledge and wisdom. He was the twenty-four Nirmanakaya Buddhas who preceded the founder of the religion of Buddhism. Each nirmanakaya realized a certain one of the deeds of Shakyamuni Buddha.

Second feat

The second feat of the Buddha is associated with the choice of his earthly parents.

Sumedha's penultimate birth was in Tushita heaven in the form of one of the gods. This gave him the opportunity to pass on his knowledge to people, choosing the next incarnation of his own free will. He decided that it would be the family of Raja Shuddhodan.

The government in the principality of Shuddhodana was based on the principles of a republic, and Shuddhodana himself headed the ruling assembly, which consisted of representatives of the most significant military classes. Another circumstance indicated to Sumedhi that the choice was correct - the ancestors of Raja Shuddhodan for seven generations in a row did not have incestuous marriages.

The mother of Buddha Shakyamuni was the wife of Raja Shuddhodana - a princess from the Koli family, Mahamaya. It is said about her that she was devoid of 32 harmful qualities and embodied virtue and mercy.

3rd feat

The divine conception and birth of Buddha Shakyamuni is described in the Tripitaka, a collection of sacred Buddhist texts. They were compiled after the V-III centuries. BC e.

The mother of the future great teacher conceived on the full moon of the fifteenth day of the second month of the year. She fell asleep and saw herself on a high mountain, soft as a down pillow. A baby elephant with six tusks touched her side and she felt the sun rise within her. Throughout her pregnancy, she had wonderful dreams in which she saw herself giving knowledge to many different living beings. In nine months, she was completely freed from kleshas, that is, from the poison of thoughts that poison the mind.

On the eve of Buddha Shakyamuni's birthday, Mahamaya went to her mother's house, as was customary according to local traditions. However, she did not have time to get there before giving birth. They began a little earlier than scheduled, on the seventh lunar day of the fourth month of 624 BC. e. Mahamaya approached the laksa tree, and it lowered a branch directly to her right hand. The woman took hold of the branch, and a baby came out of her right side. She did not feel any painful labor pains or pain. The baby was enveloped in a golden glow. He immediately got to his feet and took a few steps. Where the boy walked, beautiful lotuses bloomed.

Mahamaya died on the seventh day after the birth of her son. Before her death, she asked her sister Maha Prajapati to take care of the boy as her own child.

The hermit-soothsayer Asita came to congratulate Shuddhodan on the birth of his son. He said that the child had a great future ahead of him. The 32 marks on his body indicate that he will become a powerful king or a holy Teacher of many nations.

Fourth feat

The biography of Buddha Shakyamuni contains information about the excellent education that Siddhartha received in his father's house. Shuddhodan understood: to become the king of kings, you need to possess many knowledge and skills. He did not want to see his son as a saint and a Teacher. His goal was to make him a great warrior and a smart politician.

Shuddhodan hired the best teachers to ensure that Gautama received a comprehensive education. He read a lot and was absolutely literate in languages. At that time, mathematics, literature and astrology were considered the most advanced sciences. Buddha mastered them too.

Sports and games also played a big role in education. The boy learned various martial arts from a young age and easily won competitions. He could deftly control an elephant or a chariot, was an excellent horseman, accurately shot a bow, threw a spear and fought with a sword.

He was also unsurpassed in his skill in singing, dancing, composing music and playing various musical instruments.

Siddhartha knew how to draw and compose scent compositions.

Fifth feat

The future Great Teacher lived in Kapilavastu, a city protected from the outside world by high walls, until he was 29 years old. The father protected his son from any manifestations of evil. The boy did not see any old, sick, or ugly people.

When Siddhartha turned 16 years old, Shuddhodan chose Princess Yashodhara as his wife. The king built three palaces for the young people at different times of the year. The summer palace had a pool with red lotuses, the winter palace with white ones, and the rainy season palace with blue ones. Yashodhara came to Sidhartha with a retinue of 84 thousand people. After 13 years, the couple had a son. He was given the name Ruhul.

The entire biography of Buddha Shakyamuni confirms the information that until the age of 29, the prince did not know what illness, hunger, cold, resentment, anger or envy were. In Kapilavastu, even the servants dressed in beautiful clothes and ate wheat, meat and choice rice, while the usual food of the poor consisted of broken rice and lentils.

The Sutra on Luxury, included in the Teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha, speaks of life in Kapilavastu as an endless series of pleasures and pleasant communication.

The sixth feat

From early childhood, Siddhardha showed a desire for reflection. This bothered my father. Therefore, he created such conditions for his son so that Siddhartha Gautama’s mind would be occupied only with science and art, and so that he would never know what good and evil are.

The sixth labor of Buddha is the departure of the prince from his father's house. This happened when he turned 29 years old.

Shortly before this event, Siddhartha secretly left the palace three times. For the first time he saw a man who was groaning from the illness that tormented him. His body was covered with bleeding sores, covered with flies. On his second visit, the prince saw a hunched, gray-haired old man, whose face was covered with wrinkles. And when he again went outside the palace, he met a funeral procession and saw many tears of grief on the faces of people.

In some sources, Shakyamuni contains information that the Buddha wandered secretly outside his hometown four times. On his fourth visit, he met a sage who told him about the sorrows of people, as well as the passions and vices that torment them.

This is how Buddha Shakyamuni learned about the existence of suffering, but he also realized that suffering can be overcome. To find out real life, the young man decided to leave the palace.

The father opposed his plan - he organized new entertainment for his son and strengthened the security of the palace. Siddhartha did not change his decision. He asked his father if he could save him from old age and death. Having received no answer, the prince waited until night, saddled his horse and, together with his devoted servant, left Kapilavastu.

Seventh feat

The seventh labor of the Buddha is designated as the path of the ascetic.

Buddha moved a considerable distance away from the palace, gave his horse to a servant, exchanged clothes with the first beggar wanderer he came across, and set off on a journey in search of truth. From that moment on, Shakyamuni Buddha's life changed forever. He took the path leading to spiritual perfection.

The biography of Buddha Shakyamuni contains the story of how Prince Siddhartha came to Magadha. The Rajagriha ruler, Raja Bimbisar, invited Gautama to his palace. He talked a lot with the poor hermit, who appeared to be the prince, and was fascinated by his intelligence and knowledge. Raja needed such an adviser and offered Siddhartha a high post under his own person, but the future Teacher of Nations refused.

During his wanderings, Siddhartha Gautama Shakyamuni joined various groups of ascetics preaching self-denial and spiritual purification. He had his own students. He gained great respect among philosophers and sages.

One day, Siddhartha met a girl who offered the hermit food and drink. By this time, Gautama had already accumulated a huge store of knowledge about what real life was like. However, he was extremely emaciated - his ribs were visible through his skin, and he himself was close to physical death. He entered a period of existential crisis. The inability to change the world made him doubt that asceticism is the only path to nirvana. He felt that knowledge and experience should be taken to the next level. This will allow them to be generalized and turned into a universal teaching.

After eating regular food and bathing in clean water, he felt renewed. His students did not accept the change in their teacher. They considered him an apostate who had betrayed his destiny as an ascetic hermit. Siddhartha objected: “To learn is to change, otherwise learning has no meaning.”

Shakyamuni lowered his bowl into the river water and said to his disciples: “If it floats against the current, then I am right,” and the bowl began to move up the river. Nevertheless, the students decided to leave their teacher and comrade and move on through asceticism.

Eighth feat

The eighth feat, or act of the Buddha, is meditation. Six years of asceticism strengthened his will. Having fueled his strength with normal food and cleansed his body of dirt, he decided to plunge into himself.

At night, Gautama saw five symbolic dreams that told him what to do next. He remembered how, in his distant childhood, while playing with his friends, he lost consciousness for a short time and felt unprecedented lightness and self-detachment. This is exactly how a person feels when immersed in meditation. Now Shakyamuni's goal was to learn complete renunciation.

Gautama went to the north of India to the town of Bodhgaya. There he settled down under a large ficus (Bodhghai tree) and sat under it for seven days and seven nights. He intended to completely renounce everything earthly. The famous statue of Shakyamuni Buddha in the lotus position depicts the Teacher during meditation.

Ninth feat

The ninth labor of the Buddha was the victory over the evil forces represented by the god Parinimitra-vashavartin Mara. On the seventh day of meditation, Mara sent his daughters to Buddha, personifying various earthly temptations. They came to him in the form of beautiful maidens offering all kinds of pleasures. For seven weeks Shakyamuni's mind struggled with the demons. All this time the Bodhisattva remained motionless. He relived his past incarnations again and again, in which he was either various animals or people. He also freely penetrated into the consciousness of living beings with whom fate simply brought him together, but with whom he was not. And each time Gautama consciously rejected evil, because, as he later told his disciples, Mara has power only over those who want to fall under his influence.

Feat No. 10

On the last night of meditation, Sidhartha achieved the state of samadhi, that is, enlightenment. He got rid of the kleshas, gained clairvoyance and absolute wisdom. His soul, having gone through all stages of development, was completely free and felt endless peace and joy. Siddhartha's body began to emit golden light - he became the Great Buddha. He was 35 years old.

Buddha Shakyamuni got up and went to his ascetic friends who had left him on the eve of meditation. They were in the Deer Park. There, Buddha Shakyamuni delivered his first sermon to them. Quotations from it are often quoted as the main tenets of the doctrine. Teacher's goal was to free people from suffering. He said: “The cause of human suffering is ignorance. There is no need to try to find the beginning of suffering. It is pointless. You can stop suffering by realizing it. There are four noble truths. The first is that suffering really exists. Second, suffering arises from desires. The third is the cessation of suffering - nirvana. The fourth is a way to get rid of suffering. This method represents the eightfold path."

The Eightfold Path is the eight steps to Nirvana.

The first step requires recognizing the presence of suffering in your life.

The second step requires the desire to embark on the path of liberation from suffering.

The third stage requires correct speech, that is, rejection of lies, rudeness, slander and idle talk.

The fourth stage requires correct behavior, that is, renunciation of murder, theft and adultery.

The fifth stage requires the refusal of work related to violence against living beings, the production of weapons, drugs and alcohol. You should also refuse work that involves accumulating wealth through unjust means.

The sixth stage requires directing efforts to concentrate thoughts in the spiritual sphere - developing a positive mood (joy, peace, peacefulness).

The seventh stage requires learning, without delay, to pass through your mind thoughts and desires that can cause negative feelings and suffering.

The eighth stage requires mastery of the art of meditation and complete detachment.

11th feat

Buddha Shakyamuni opened a new milestone in the destiny of mankind. He identified the causes of suffering, found a way to get rid of them and started the so-called wheel of Dharma (law). Having performed the third act, he set people up for liberation from suffering. Buddha turned the wheel of Dharma three times. The first time was when I preached a sermon in Deer Park and revealed to the disciples the truth about suffering. The second turn occurred when the Teacher explained to the students the relationship between all living beings and the responsibility of each person for the fate of the whole world. The third turn is associated with the Buddha's teaching about the eightfold path, as a way to exit the wheel of samsara.

Twelfth labor

Buddha preached his teachings for 45 years. He walked around India with his students and talked with different people - from beggar dervishes to kings. He again visited the Raja of Bimbisara, who built a monastery for him.

One day Buddha came to his native Kapilavastu. His father, wife, son, friends and relatives joined the teachings of the Bodhisattva.

At the 81st year of his life, the Great Teacher left this world and moved to Parinirvana. Three months earlier, he told his disciple Ananda about this. Then, accompanied by his disciples, Buddha continued his wanderings throughout India, preaching his teaching, called Dharma. Finally they ended up in Pava, where in the house of the blacksmith Chunda, the travelers were presented with refreshments. In accordance with their rules, the monks, so as not to offend the owner, could not refuse, but Buddha Shakyamuni forbade them to eat. He himself tasted the dried pork or mushrooms offered to him, which became the cause of his death. The Buddha's transition to Parinirvana occurred on the fifteenth day of the fourth month according to the lunar calendar. This day is considered the most important day in Buddhism because it increases the forces of both good and evil by 10 million times.

Even without professing Buddhism, on this day you can say the prayer of Buddha Shakyamuni, and it will turn the next wheel of Dharma: “Om - Muni - Muni - Maha - Munye - Suha.” In Russian it sounds something like this: “My ordinary consciousness, mind and body become the consciousness, body and mind of the Buddha.”

Siddhartha Gautama is a key figure in Buddhism, whose life, wise sayings, conversations with his followers and monastic precepts became the basis of the complete set of sacred texts of Buddhism, the Tripitaka. In addition, the Buddha is a hero of numerous dharmic religions, including late Bon and Hinduism, and a character included in the avatars of Vishnu instead of Balarāma, one of the forms of God in Hinduism.

Gautama Buddha was born around 563 BC. e. or 623 BC BC, however, there is so little reliable information about his life that traditionally his biography is based on a number of Buddhist texts, including the Lalitavistara Sūtra. But even the first texts associated with the name of the Buddha appeared 400 years after his death and went through hyperbole approved by the monks.

Buddha Shakyamuni began his path to enlightenment many hundreds of lives before leaving the painful “wheel of alternating lives and deaths”, with the meeting of the learned Brahmin Sumedha with the Buddha Dipankara. Struck by the serenity of the Buddha, Sumedha wanted a similar state, and after his death the strength of this desire influenced his subsequent incarnations in human and animal bodies, and Sumedha himself began to be called “Bodhisattva”. Living through the cycle and improving, the bodhisattva appeared among the gods for the penultimate time, where he had the opportunity to choose a place for his final birth on earth. And he chose the family of the Shakya king, so that people would show greater respect and trust in the upcoming sermons of the Buddha.

Traditional biography states that Raja Suddhodana, most likely a member of the ruling Kshatriya assembly, was the father of the Buddha and the mother of Queen Maha Maya, a princess from the Koliya kingdom. On the night of the conception of the future founder of Buddhism, Maha saw in a dream an elephant with six white tusks, which entered her right side.

Paying tribute to the Shakya tradition, Maha Maya came to her parents' house, where the birth was supposed to take place, but the child was born earlier - along the road, under the Ashoka tree, in the Lumbini grove. The newborn immediately rose to his feet, declaring that he was a being superior to gods and men. Almost all sources claim that Maha Maya died a few days after the birth of her miracle son. The hermit-seer Asita counted 32 signs of greatness on the baby's body and blessed him, promising that the boy would become a chakravartin or great saint. On the child’s fifth birthday, they named him Siddhartha (“the one who achieved his goal”), eight brahmins were invited, and with their help, his dual future was confirmed.

Siddhartha was raised by Maha Pajapati, the sister of Maha Maya, while his father did his best to protect his son from religious teachings and knowledge of the frailty of existence. The boy lived in three palaces, was ahead of his peers in both physical and mental development, and had a tendency to think. At the age of 16, he married his cousin, Princess Yaśodharā, who a few years later bore him a son, Rahula. For many years, Siddhartha was the prince of Kapilavastu, but inside himself he felt that material wealth was by no means the final goal of his existence.

When Siddhartha celebrated his 29th birthday, he and his charioteer Channa managed to go outside the palace, where the serene prince saw “four spectacles.” He realized all the realities of harsh life when he came across a beggar, a sick man, a hermit and a stinking corpse, and realized: the only way to comprehend all human suffering is the path of self-knowledge. After this, Siddhartha secretly left home, family and his wealth in order to find ways to get rid of suffering through long wanderings.

Dressed as a commoner, Siddhartha became an ascetic, begged alms, studied yogic meditation, mastered the teachings of Alara Kalama and became a disciple of Udaka Ramaputta. Having reached the highest level of meditative concentration, Siddhartha, along with five companions, found himself in southeastern India, where he practiced severe asceticism and mortification, but after six years - on the threshold of life and death - he came to the conclusion that asceticism does not provide greater understanding, but only clouds the mind and exhausts the body.

Best of the day

For 45 years he wandered through the valley of the Ganges River, imparting knowledge and performing miracles without partiality. However, not everyone responded joyfully to his message, and opposition religious groups repeatedly tried to kill the Buddha.

At the age of 80, Gautama Buddha declared that very soon he would reach the final stage of immortality, Parinirvana, and get rid of his earthly body. Legend has it that before his death, the Buddha told his disciples: “Strive for your own liberation with special zeal.” After a special cremation, his relics were divided into eight parts and placed at the base of the stupas. The site of Dalada Maligawa in Sri Lanka is believed to house a sacred relic, the Tooth of Buddha.

Interpretations of the Buddha's life story abound. And, if early Western science willingly accepted the biography of a spiritual teacher from ancient India, today scientists are in no hurry to share unconfirmed information about historical facts, one way or another connected with the Buddha.

Buddha Shakyamuni at Wikimedia Commons

The birthday of Buddha Shakyamuni is a national holiday of the Republic of India, the Republic of Kalmykia, Japan, Thailand, Myanmar, Sri Lanka [ ] and a number of other countries in Southeast Asia.

Biography of Buddha

Buddhism

However, it should be borne in mind that the first written canonical texts relating to the Buddha did not appear until four hundred years after his death. (The stelae installed by King Ashoka and containing certain information about Buddha and Buddhism were created two hundred years or more after Buddha's nirvana). By this time, changes had been made to the stories about him by the monks themselves, in particular, to exaggerate the figure of Buddha.