The story of Buddha, an awakened sage from the Shakya clan, the legendary founder of the world religion of Buddhism and a spiritual teacher, originates in the 5th-6th century BC (the exact date is unknown). Blessed, revered by the world, walking in goodness, completely perfect … He is called differently. The Buddha lived a rather long life, about 80 years, and went an amazing way during this time. But first things first.
Biography reconstruction
Before telling the story of the Buddha, one important nuance should be noted. The fact is that modern science has very little material for the scientific reconstruction of his biography. Therefore, all information known about the Blessed One is taken from a number of Buddhist texts, from a work called "Buddhacharita" for example (translated as "Life of the Buddha"). Its author is Ashvaghosha, an Indian preacher, playwright and poet.
Also one of the sources is labor"Lalitavistara". It translates as "A detailed description of the games of the Buddha." Several authors worked on the creation of this work. Interestingly, it is Lalitavistara that completes the process of deification, deification of the Buddha.
It is also worth mentioning that the first texts relating to the Awakened Sage began to appear only four centuries after his death. By that time, the stories about him had already been slightly modified by the monks to exaggerate his figure.
And you need to remember: in the writings of the ancient Indians, chronological moments were not covered. Attention was focused on philosophical aspects. Having read many Buddhist texts, one can understand this. There, the description of the thoughts of the Buddha prevails over stories about the time in which all events took place.
Life before birth
If you believe the stories and legends about the Buddha, then his path to enlightenment, a holistic and complete awareness of the nature of reality began tens of millennia before his real birth. This is called the wheel of alternation of life and death. The concept is more common under the name "samsara". This cycle is limited by karma - the universal law of cause and effect, according to which the sinful or righteous actions of a person determine his fate, the pleasures and sufferings intended for him.
So, it all started with the meeting of Dipankara (the first of the 24 buddhas) with a scholar and a we althy brahmin, a representative of the upper class, named Sumedhi. He was simply amazed at his calmness and serenity. Sumedhi after this meeting promised himself to achieve exactly the samestates. So they began to call him a bodhisattva - one who strives for awakening for the benefit of all beings, in order to get out of the state of samsara.
Sumedhi died. But his strength and craving for enlightenment is not. It was she who determined his multiple births in various bodies and images. All the while, the bodhisattva continued to perfect his mercy and wisdom. They say that in his penultimate time he was born among the gods (devas), and was able to choose the most favorable place for his final birth. Therefore, his decision became the family of the venerable Shakya king. He knew that people would have more confidence in the sermons of someone of such noble birth.
Family, conception and birth
According to the traditional biography of the Buddha, his father's name was Shuddhodana, and he was a raja (ruling person) of a small Indian principality and the head of the Shakya tribe, a royal family of the foothills of the Himalayas with the capital Kapilavatthu. Interestingly, Gautama is his gotra, an exogamous clan, an analogue of a surname.
There is, however, another version. According to her, Shuddhodana was a member of the Kshatriya assembly, an influential class in ancient Indian society, which included sovereign warriors.
Buddha's mother was Queen Mahamaya from the kingdom of koli. On the night of the Buddha's conception, she dreamed that a white elephant with six light tusks entered her.
In accordance with Shakya tradition, the queen went to her parents' house to give birth. But Mahamaya did not reach them - everything happened on the road. I had tostop in the Lumbini grove (modern location - the state of Nepal in South Asia, a settlement in the Rupandekhi district). It was there that the future Sage was born - right under the ashoka tree. It happened in the month of Vaishakh - the second from the beginning of the year, lasts from April 21 to May 21.
According to most sources, Queen Mahamaya died a few days after giving birth.
The hermit-seer Asita from the mountain monastery was invited to bless the baby. He found 32 signs of a great man on the body of a child. The seer said - the baby will become either a chakravartin (great king) or a saint.
The boy was called Siddhartha Gautama. The naming ceremony was held on the fifth day after his birth. "Siddhartha" is translated as "one who has achieved his goal." Eight learned brahmins were invited to predict his future. They all confirmed the boy's dual fate.
Youth
Telling about the biography of the Buddha, it should be noted that his younger sister Mahamaya was engaged in his upbringing. Her name was Maha Prajapati. The father also took part in the upbringing. He wanted his son to become a great king, and not a religious sage, therefore, remembering the dual prediction for the future of the boy, he tried his best to protect him from teachings, philosophy and knowledge of human suffering. Especially for the boy, he ordered the construction of three palaces.
The Future God Buddha overtook all his peers in everything - in development, in sports, in science. But most of all he was drawn toreflection.
As soon as the boy was 16 years old, he was married to a princess named Yashodhara, the daughter of King Sauppabuddha of the same age. A few years later they had a son, who was named Rahula. He was the only child of Buddha Shakyamuni. Interestingly, his birth coincided with a lunar eclipse.
Looking ahead, it is worth saying that the boy became a disciple of his father, and later an arhat - one who achieved complete liberation from kleshas (obscurations and affects of consciousness) and left the state of samsara. Rahula experienced enlightenment even when he simply walked beside his father.
For 29 years Siddhartha lived as the prince of the capital Kapilavastu. He got everything he could wish for. But I felt: material we alth is far from the ultimate goal of life.
The thing that changed his life
One day, in the 30th year of his life, Siddhartha Gautama, Buddha in the future, went outside the palace, accompanied by the chariot driver Channa. And he saw four sights that changed his life forever. They were:
- Beggar old man.
- Sick man.
- Decomposing corpse.
- The Hermit (an ascetic person who renounced worldly life).
It was at that moment that Siddhartha realized the whole harsh reality of our reality, which remains relevant to this day, despite the past two and a half millennia. He understood that death, aging, suffering and illness are inevitable. Neither nobility nor we alth will protect them from them. The path to salvation lies only through self-knowledge, since it is through this that one can comprehendcauses of suffering.
That day really changed a lot. What he saw prompted Shakyamuni Buddha to leave his home, family and all property. He gave up his former life to go in search of a way out of suffering.
Gaining Knowledge
From that day a new story of the Buddha began. Siddhartha left the palace with Channa. Legends say that the gods muffled the sound of his horse's hooves to keep his departure a secret.
As soon as the prince left the city, he stopped the first beggar he met and exchanged clothes with him, after which he released his servant. This event even has a name - "The Great Departure".
Siddhartha began his ascetic life in Rajagriha, a city in the Nalanda district, which is now called Rajgir. There he begged on the street for alms.
Of course, they found out about it. King Bimbisara even offered him the throne. Siddhartha refused him, but promised to go to the kingdom of Magadha after achieving enlightenment.
So the life of the Buddha in Rajagriha did not work out, and he left the city, eventually coming to two brahmin hermits, where he began to study yogic meditation. Having mastered the teaching, he came to a sage named Udaka Ramaputta. He became his disciple, and upon reaching the highest level of meditative concentration, he set off again.
His target was southeast India. There, Siddhartha, along with five other people seeking the truth, tried to come to enlightenment under the leadership of the monk Kaundinya. The methods were the most severe - asceticism, self-torture,all kinds of vows and mortification.
Being on the verge of death after six (!) years of such an existence, he realized that this does not lead to clarity of mind, but only clouds it and exhausts the body. Therefore, Gautama began to reconsider his path. He remembered how as a child he plunged into a trance during the celebration of the beginning of plowing, felt that refreshing and blissful state of concentration. And plunged into Dhyana. This is a special state of contemplation, concentrated reflection, which leads to a calming of the mind and, in the future, to a complete cessation of mental activity for a while.
Enlightenment
After renouncing self-torture, the life of the Buddha began to take shape differently - he went to wander alone, and his path continued until he reached a grove located near the town of Gaya (Bihar).
Accidentally, he came across the house of a village woman, Sujata Nanda, who believed that Siddhartha is the spirit of a tree. He looked so emaciated. The woman fed him rice and milk, after which he sat under a large ficus tree (now called the Bodhi tree) and vowed not to get up until he came to the Truth.
This was not to the liking of the tempting demon Mara, who headed the realm of the gods. He seduced the future God Buddha with various visions, showed him beautiful women, trying in every possible way to distract him from meditation by demonstrating the attractiveness of earthly life. However, Gautama was steadfast and the demon retreated.
For 49 days he sat under the ficus. And on the full moon, in the month of Vaishakh, on the same night,when Siddhartha was born, he attained Awakening. He was 35 years old. That night, he gained a complete understanding of the causes of human suffering, nature, and what it takes to achieve the same state for other people.
This knowledge was then called the "Four Noble Truths". They can be summarized as follows: “There is suffering. And there is its cause, which is desire. The cessation of suffering is nirvana. And there is a path that leads to its achievement, called the Eightfold.”
For a few more days, Gautama was thinking, being in a state of samadhi (disappearance of the idea of his own individuality), whether to teach the received knowledge to others. He doubted whether it would be possible for them to come to Awakening, because they are all filled with deceit, hatred and greed. And the ideas of Enlightenment are very subtle and deep to understand. But the highest deva Brahma Sahampati (god) stood up for people, who asked Gautama to bring the Teaching to this world, since there will always be those who will understand him.
The Eightfold Path
Telling about who the Buddha is, one cannot fail to mention the Noble Eightfold Path, which the Awakened One himself passed. This is the road leading to the cessation of suffering and liberation from the state of samsara. You can talk about this for hours, but in short, the Eightfold Path of the Buddha is 8 rules, following which you can come to Awakening. Here's what they are:
- Correct view. It implies the comprehension of the four truths that were indicated above, andas well as other provisions of the doctrine that need to be experienced and formed felt into the motivation of one's behavior.
- The right intention. One must be firmly convinced of one's decision to follow the eightfold path of the Buddha, leading to nirvana and liberation. And start cultivating metta in yourself - friendliness, benevolence, loving kindness and kindness to all living things.
- Correct speech. Refusal of foul language and lies, slander and stupidity, obscenity and meanness, idle talk and strife.
- Correct behavior. Do not kill, do not steal, do not fornicate, do not drink, do not lie, do not commit any other atrocities. This is the path to social, contemplative, karmic and psychological harmony.
- The right way of life. Everything that can cause suffering to any living beings must be abandoned. Choose the appropriate type of activity - earn in accordance with Buddhist values. Refuse luxury, we alth and excesses. This will get rid of envy and other passions.
- The right effort. The desire to realize oneself and learn to distinguish between dharmas, joy, peace and tranquility, to concentrate on achieving the truth.
- Correct mindfulness. Be aware of your own body, mind, sensations. Trying to learn to see yourself as an accumulation of physical and mental states, to distinguish the "ego", to destroy it.
- Correct concentration. Going into deep meditation or dhyana. Helps to achieve ultimate contemplation, to be released.
And that's it in a nutshell. First of all, the name is associated with these concepts. Buddha. And, by the way, they also formed the basis of the Zen school.
On spreading the teachings
From the moment Siddhartha attained enlightenment, people began to learn who the Buddha was. He was engaged in the dissemination of knowledge. The first students were merchants - Bhallika and Tapussa. Gautama gave them several hairs from his head, which, according to legend, are stored in a 98-meter gilded stupa in Yangon (Shwedagon Pagoda).
Then the story of the Buddha develops in such a way that he goes to Varanasi (a city that means the same to Hindus as the Vatican to Catholics). Siddhartha wanted to tell his former teachers about his achievements, but it turned out that they had already died.
Then he went to the suburb of Sarnath, where he held the first sermon, in which he told his fellow ascetics about the Eightfold Path and the Four Truths. Everyone who listened to him soon became an arhat.
The next 45 years, the name of the Buddha became more and more recognizable. He traveled around India, taught the Doctrine to everyone, no matter who they were - even cannibals, even warriors, even cleaners. Gautama was also accompanied by the sangha, his community.
His father, Shuddhodana, found out about all this. The king sent as many as 10 delegations for his son to bring him back to Kapilavastu. But it was in ordinary life that Buddha was a prince. Everything has long since become the past. Delegations came to Siddhartha and eventually 9 out of 10 joined his sangha, becoming arhats. The tenth Buddha accepted and agreed to go to Kapilavastu. He went there on foot, preaching on the wayDharma.
Back in Kapilavastu, Gautama learned of his father's impending death. He came to him and spoke about the Dharma. Right before his death, Shuddhodana became an arhat.
After that, he returned to Rajagaha. Maha Prajapati, who raised him, asked to be accepted into the sangha, but Gautama refused. However, the woman did not accept this, and went after him along with several noble girls of the Koliya and Shakya clans. In the end, the Buddha accepted them nobly, seeing that their capacity for enlightenment was on a par with that of men.
Death
The years of the Buddha's life were eventful. When he turned 80, he said that he would soon reach Parinirvana, the final stage of immortality, and free his earthly body. Before entering this state, he asked his disciples if they had any questions. There were none. Then he spoke his last words: “All composite things are short-lived. Strive for your own release with special diligence.”
When he died, he was cremated according to the rules of the rite for the Universal Ruler. The remains were divided into 8 parts and placed at the base of the stupas, specially erected for this purpose. It is believed that some monuments have survived to this day. Dalada Maligawa Temple, for example, which houses the tooth of the great sage.
In ordinary life, the Buddha was just a status person. And having gone through a difficult path, he became the one who was able to achieve the highest state of spiritual perfection and put knowledge into the minds of thousands of people. It is he who is the founder of the most ancient world doctrine, which has an indescribablemeaning. It is not surprising that the celebration of the Buddha's birthday is a large-scale and high-profile holiday celebrated in all countries of East Asia (except Japan), and in some it is official. The date changes annually, but always falls in April or May.
