Buddhism is an ancient Indian religion and philosophy, which arose in and around the ancient Kingdom of Magadha (now Bihar, India). It is based on the teachings of Gautama Buddha, who lived in the 6th or 5th century BCE and was deemed a "Buddha" or an "Awakened One".
In the 3rd century BCE and during the reign of the Mauryan Emperor Ashoka, the Buddhist community split into two schools: the Mahāsāṃghika and the Sthaviravāda, each of which spread throughout India and grew into numerous sub-schools.Akira Hirakawa, Paul Groner, A history of Indian Buddhism: from Śākyamuni to early Mahāyāna. Reprint published by Motilal Banarsidass Publ., 1993, page 2. In modern times, three major branches of Buddhism exist: the Theravada in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, and the Mahayana in the Himalayas and East Asia, and the Vajrayana throughout Asia and specifically in Tibet, Nepal, and Bhutan.
The practice of Buddhism lost influence in India around the 7th century CE, after the collapse of the Gupta Empire. The last large empire to support Buddhism was the Pala Empire, that fell in the 12th century. By the end of the 12th century and after the invasions by the Turkic Muslims, Buddhism had largely disappeared from India with the exception of western and central Tibet and isolated remnants in parts of south India.
Since the 19th century, modern revivals of Buddhism have included the Maha Bodhi Society, the Vipassana movement, and the Dalit Buddhist movement spearheaded by B. R. Ambedkar. There has also been a growth in Tibetan Buddhism with the arrival of Tibetan diaspora and the Tibetan government in exile to India, following the Chinese occupation of Tibet in 1950. According to the 2011 census, there are 8.4 million Buddhists in India (0.70% of the total population).
Background Gautama Buddha
The Buddha was born to a Kapilavastu head of the Shakya republic named Suddhodana. He employed sramana practices in a specific way, denouncing extreme asceticism and sole concentration-meditation, which were sramanic practices. Instead, he propagated a Middle Way between the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification, in which self-restraint and compassion are central elements.
According to tradition, as recorded in the Pali Canon and the Agamas, Siddhārtha Gautama attained awakening sitting under a pipal tree, now known as the Bodhi tree in Bodh Gaya, India. Gautama referred to himself as the tathagata, the "thus-gone"; the developing tradition later regarded him to be as a Samyaksambuddha, a "Perfectly Self-Awakened One." According to tradition, he found patronage in the ruler of Magadha, emperor Bimbisāra. The emperor accepted Buddhism as a personal faith and allowed the establishment of many Buddhist "Vihāras." This eventually led to the renaming of the entire region as Bihar.India by Stanley Wolpert (Page 32)
According to tradition, in the Deer Park in Sarnath near in northern India, Buddha set in motion the Wheel of Dharma by delivering his first sermon to the group of five companions with whom he had previously sought liberation. They, together with the Buddha, formed the first , the company of Buddhist monks, and hence, the first formation of the Triple Gem (Buddha, Dharma and Sangha) was completed.
For the remaining years of his life, the Buddha is said to have travelled in the Gangetic Plain of Northern India and other regions.
Buddha died in Kushinagar, Uttar Pradesh, India. Modern historians place his death, according to tradition at the age of 80, in the decades around 400 BC, several decades later than the date in Buddhist tradition.
Adherents Followers of Buddhism called Buddhists in English, referred to themselves as Saugata.P. 178 The Vision of Dhamma: Buddhist Writings of Nyanaponika Thera By Nyanaponika (Thera), Erich Fromm Other terms were Sakyans or Sakyabhiksu in ancient India.Beyond Enlightenment: Buddhism, Religion, Modernity by Richard Cohen. Routledge 1999. . pg 33. "Donors adopted Sakyamuni Buddha's family name to assert their legitimacy as his heirs, both institutionally and ideologically. To take the name of Sakya was to define oneself by one's affiliation with the Buddha, somewhat like calling oneself a Buddhist today."Sakya or Buddhist Origins by Caroline Rhys Davids (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1931) pg 1. "Put away the word "Buddhism" and think of your subject as "Sakya." This will at once place you for your perspective at a true point . . You are now concerned to learn less about 'Buddha' and 'Buddhism,' and more about him whom India has ever known as Sakya-muni, and about his men who, as their records admit, were spoken of as the Sakya-sons, or men of the Sakyas." Sakyaputto was another term used by Buddhists, as well as AriyasavakoP. 56 A Dictionary of the Pali Language By Robert Cæsar Childers and Jinaputto.P. 171 A Dictionary of the Pali Language By Robert Cæsar Childers Buddhist scholar Donald S. Lopez states they also used the term Bauddha.Curators of the Buddha By Donald S. Lopez. University of Chicago Press. pg 7 The scholar Richard Cohen in his discussion about the 5th-century Ajanta Caves, states that Bauddha is not attested therein, and was used by outsiders to describe Buddhists, except for occasional use as an adjective.Beyond Enlightenment: Buddhism, Religion, Modernity by Richard Cohen. Routledge 1999. . pg 33. Quote: [Bauddha is] "a secondary derivative of Buddha, in which the vowel's lengthening indicates connection or relation. Things that are bauddha pertain to the Buddha, just as things-saiva relate to Shiva and things-Vaisnava belong to Vishnu. (...) bauddha can be both adjectival and nominal; it can be used for doctrines spoken by the Buddha, objects enjoyed by him, texts attributed to him, as well as individuals, communities, and societies that offer him reverence or accept ideologies certified through his name. Strictly speaking, Sakya is preferable to bauddha since the latter is not attested at Ajanta. In fact, as a collective noun, bauddha is an outsider's term. The bauddha did not call themselves this in India, though they did sometimes use the word adjectivally (e.g., as a possessive, the Buddha's)."
Early developments Early Buddhist Councils
The Buddha did not appoint any successor and asked his followers to work toward liberation following the instructions he had left. The teachings of the Buddha existed only in oral traditions. The Sangha held a number of Buddhist councils in order to reach consensus on matters of Buddhist doctrine and practice.
Mahākāśyapa, a disciple of the Buddha, presided over the first Buddhist council held at Rājagṛha. Its purpose was to recite and agree on the Buddha's actual teachings and monastic discipline. Some scholars consider this council fictitious.Williams, Mahayana Buddhism, Routledge, 1989, page 6 The Second Buddhist Council is said to have taken place at Vaiśālī. Its purpose was to deal with questionable monastic practices like the use of money, the drinking of palm wine, and other irregularities; the council declared these practices unlawful. What is commonly called the Third Buddhist Council was held at Pāṭaliputra, and was allegedly called by Emperor Aśoka in the 3rd century BC. Organized by the monk Moggaliputta Tissa, it was held in order to rid the sangha of the large number of monks who had joined the order because of its royal patronage. Most scholars now believe this council was exclusively Theravada, and that the dispatch of missionaries to various countries at about this time had nothing to do with it. What is often called the Fourth Buddhist council is generally believed to have been held under the patronage of Emperor Kaniṣka in Kashmir, though the late Monseigneur Professor Lamotte considered it fictitious.the Teaching of Vimalakīrti, Pali Text Society, page XCIII It is generally believed to have been a council of the Sarvastivāda school.
Early schools of Buddhism
The Early Buddhist Schools were the various schools in which pre-sectarian Buddhism split in the first few centuries after the passing away of the Buddha (in about the 5th century BC). The earliest division was between the majority Mahāsāṃghika and the minority Sthaviravāda. Some existing Buddhist traditions follow the vinayas of early Buddhist schools.
Theravāda: practised mainly in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Bangladesh. Dharmaguptaka: followed in China, Korea, Vietnam, and Taiwan. Mūlasarvāstivāda: followed in Tibetan Buddhism.
The Dharmaguptakas made more efforts than any other sect to spread Buddhism outside India, to areas such as Afghanistan, Central Asia, and China, and they had great success in doing so.Warder, A.K. Indian Buddhism. 2000. p. 278 Therefore, most countries which adopted Buddhism from China, also adopted the Dharmaguptaka vinaya and ordination lineage for bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs.
During the early period of Chinese Buddhism, the Indian Buddhist sects recognized as important, and whose texts were studied, were the Dharmaguptakas, Mahīśāsakas, Kāśyapīyas Sarvāstivādins, and the Mahāsāṃghikas.Warder, A.K. Indian Buddhism. 2000. p. 281 Complete vinayas preserved in the Chinese Buddhist canon include the Mahīśāsaka Vinaya (T. 1421), Mahāsāṃghika Vinaya (T. 1425), Dharmaguptaka Vinaya (T. 1428), Sarvāstivāda Vinaya (T. 1435), and the Mūlasarvāstivāda Vinaya (T. 1442). Also preserved are a set of Āgamas (Sūtra Piṭaka), a complete Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma Piṭaka, and many other texts of the early Buddhist schools.
Early Buddhist schools in India often divided modes of Buddhist practice into several "vehicles" (yāna). For example, the Vaibhāṣika Sarvāstivādins are known to have employed the outlook of Buddhist practice as consisting of the Three Vehicles:Nakamura, Hajime. Indian Buddhism: A Survey With Bibliographical Notes. 1999. p. 189
Śrāvakayāna Pratyekabuddhayāna Bodhisattvayāna
The early spread of Buddhism In the sixth and fifth centuries BC, economic development made the merchant class increasingly important. Merchants were attracted to Buddhist teachings, which contrasted with existing Brahmin religious practices. The latter focused on the social position of the Brahmin caste to the exclusion of the interests of other classes."During the sixth and fifth centuries B.C.E. (Before Common Era), commerce and cash became increasingly important in an economy previously dominated by self-sufficient production and bartered exchange. Merchants found Buddhist moral and ethical teachings an attractive alternative to the esoteric rituals of the traditional Brahmin priesthood, which seemed to cater exclusively to Brahmin interests while ignoring those of the new and emerging social classes." Jerry Bentley, Old World Encounters: Cross-Cultural Contacts and Exchanges in Pre-Modern Times (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 43. Buddhism became prominent in merchant communities and then spread throughout the Mauryan empire through commercial connections and along trade routes."Furthermore, Buddhism was prominent in communities of merchants, who found it well suited to their needs and who increasingly established commercial links throughout the Mauryan empire". Jerry Bentley, Old World Encounters: Cross-Cultural Contacts and Exchanges in Pre-Modern Times (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 46. In this way, Buddhism also spread through the silk route into central Asia."Merchants proved to be an efficient vector of the Buddhist faith, as they established diaspora communities in the string of oasis towns-Merv, Bukhara, Samarkand, Kashgar, Khotan, Kuqa, Turpan, Dunhuang – that served as lifeline of the silk roads through central Asia." Jerry Bentley, Old World Encounters: Cross-Cultural Contacts and Exchanges in Pre-Modern Times (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 47-48.
Ashoka and the Mauryan Empire