The History of Buddhism
...ickness and death. Is it right that I should feel horror, repulsion and disgust when I see another in such plight? And when I reflected thus to my disciples, all the joy of life which there is in life died within me.") The prince remained distraught throughout the remainder of that day pondering these revelations. On the fourth day he behelded a calm ascetic walking toward him as he traveled the road, from this person, who had gained true peace of soul, he learned how freedom from the miseries of old age, disease, and death may be won. His father sensing his son’s troubled thoughts over the past few days decided to hold a great feast in Gautama honor, something to sway his son back to the path chosen for him at birth, but Gautama surveying the scene of debauchery was revolted by its apparent meaninglessness. After the feast when he was awake, alone, and sober he decided it was time to renounce his present life and to seek his own way in the world. So later that night, he bided his wife and son goodbye and set out on a six year quest, searching for an end to life suffering, its true meaning. At the beginning Gautama was anxious not to reject the prevalent Brahmin philosophy until he had tested it for himself. So, for awhile, he traveled India and experimented with the yoga meditation traditions. For years he practice the asceticism of the yogis of the time, nearly staving to death in the process of finding a permanent release from suffering. Finally he came to the conclusion that asceticism in and of itself was not the answer. No matter how much he fasted, he eventually had to replenish his body so that he could continue traveling and learning. Furthermore, he surmised that the only logical conclusion of denying the physical body is death. During his last, life threatening fast, he realized that enlightenment could be reached only through the vessel of the body, and there was a limit to how much deprivation his body could safely endure. So he abandoned the extreme asceticism he had been practicing in favor of what came to be called the Middle Way a path between devotion to pleasures of the senses and the complete denial of them. Accepting food and drink offered him; he ate, to regain his strength. He then went and sat under a nearby Bodhi tree refusing to move until he became enlightened. In the early morning hours as he sat under the tree, he realized the nature and cause of suffering and the way of release from these causes that constituted his enlightenment. He came to understand that one could be freed from suffering in this life by moderating its real causes: passionate craving, hatred, and ignorance. According to legend, after sitting in meditation for seven days, Gautama looked up at the heavens and said, "How wonderful, How wonderful. All things are enlightened exactly as they are!" He then continued to meditate for a total of 49 days, for it was at this time all Buddhist down through the ages believed, Gautama, first experienced Nirvana: the goal of Buddhism; it means freedom from karma; extinction of all craving; the realization of the true nature of the mind. This is the closest thing in Buddhism to the western world’s idea of salvation, the ultimate goal of all religious faiths. The word itself is a Sanskirt word meaning "blown out," like a candle, representing the extinguishing of all craving. It is believed that during this time he was tempted by Mara, the evil one, to keep this insight to himself and continue to realize this bliss, to shed his body and forego a return to the real world. The Buddha: the Enlightening One, as Gautama later became known, chose to wander the land begging for food and shelter and teaching the Middle Way to the men and women of his time. When Buddha preached his first sermon, following his enlightenment, the sermon is usually titled "Setting in Motion the Wheel of Dharma," he put forth the Four Noble Truths that he experienced in the course of his enlightenment. 1) All existence involves suffering (duhkha). 2) The cause of suffering is craving (trishna). 3) Release from suffering (nirvana) comes through eradicating passionate craving for material or sensual satisfaction. 4) The way to achieve that release is the Eightfold Path. These eight ways of right being encompass right understanding, thought, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness, and concentration. For the next 45 years, Buddha preached this path to all that would listen, and at the age of 80, the Buddha died. He left no writings. All Buddhist scriptures are based on accounts of his life and teaching passed down orally by his disciples from generation to generation. Traditionally, the accounts were committed to writing in Sanskrit and in Pali, a Sanskrit derived Indian dialect within 100 years of the Buddha’s death, but modern scholars places the dates closer to the 2nd and 1st century BC. The written records of his sermons and dialogues are known as sutras. Unlike other major religions of the world the concept of a divine being, as in, Hinduism’s Atman-Brahman, Judaism’s Yahwey, and Islam’s Allah, Buddhism does not proclaim any worship of any god. Buddhist believes that the divine being, per say, is not something you believe in, or worship, or can describe but instead something you experience. Buddhism’s concepts of deliverance rest’s solely within the individual experience. Because of this emphasis on experience, the terminology of Buddhism is often elusive. More attention is given to how to attain the experience than a specific description of its character. Indeed Buddhism teaches that no verbal description of the rapture is possible. That is, Buddhism insists that experience is indescribable. This, I believe, can be explained by Buddha’s revelation under the Bodhi tree when he exclaimed, "All things are enlightened exactly as they are!" with no other explanation necessary in his initial experience. With this we can deduce that Buddha believed that all he has searched for was within him and all things all along. To expand upon this let say that if all things are already enlighten as Buddha exclaimed, then we can assume the search for enlightenment should begin and end within ones self. Taking this further we should be able to see that Buddha believed his deliverance from human suffering rested within his own means and that n...