“Buddhism has the characteristics of what would be expected in a cosmic religion for the future, it transcends a personal God, avoids dogmas and theology, it covers both the natural and spiritual and it is based on a religious sense aspiring from the experience of all things, natural and spiritual, as a meaningful unity”...Albert Einstein
 

                  Buddhism is more than a religion, in fact many believe that it is not a religion at all, Buddhism is a philosophy of life that was expounded by Guatama Buddha (“Buddha” means the “enlightened one”). Buddha was born around 560BC in Lumbini, which is in modern day Nepal. It is important to note that Buddha was not a god and the philosophy of Buddhism does not entail any theistic world-view. The teachings of Buddha are aimed solely to liberate beings from suffering. But what does Buddhism entail, what does it mean?
 

                  At the age of 29 Buddha left his wife, children and political involvements in order to seek truth, this was an accepted practice at the time for some men to leave their family and lead the life of an ascetic. He studied other philosophies such as Brahmanism but ultimately rejected them choosing instead the ‘Middle Way’, rejecting both extremes of mortification of the flesh and hedonism as paths towards achieving the state of ‘Nirvana’. In 535BC he reached enlightenment and assumed the title of ‘Buddha’.

                  Buddhism evolved around the teachings of the Buddha. During his lifetime the religion prospered and spread rapidly through the personality of the founder himself, and he was assisted by a large and fast growing community of noble disciples who drew inspiration from his example of renunciation and self-sacrifice. Before Buddha passed away at around the age of 80, his teachings and philosophy (the religion of Buddhism) had become well established in what is now modern day India and Nepal the land of it’s birth. The Lord Buddha had the satisfaction of realizing that his teachings would continue to benefit the world after he was gone. After his death, his disciples took upon themselves the responsibility of carrying his message of love and wisdom to even farther corners of the earth.

                  To greatly simplify the teachings of Buddha (it will be covered in more detail later), Buddhism is a religion/ philosophy that shares few concepts with other religions such as Christianity. For example it doesn’t believe in a transcendent of any other type of God or Gods or the need for a personal savior, the power of prayer and eternal life in heaven or hell after death. However it does believe in reincarnation, the concept that one must go through many cycles of birth, living and death. After many such cycles, if a person releases their attachment to desire and the self, they can achieve Nirvana.
 

 

                  To achieve Nirvana/Enlightenment, Lord Buddha taught from his own personal experience of enlightenment or awakening to truth. The core of enlightenment was the realization of the ‘Four Noble Truths’, which are bases of all schools of Buddhism. The first truth is that life is suffering (Dukkha). The second is that suffering is caused by selfish craving and attachment (Trishna). The third is that suffering can be ended by overcoming craving and attachment (Nirvana) and the fourth truth is that there is a path to the termination of suffering through ‘The Eightfold Path’ of: Right views, right resolve, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration. Also in Buddhism like Moses Ten Commandments, there are ‘Five Basic Precepts’ which are: Do not; kill, tell a lie, steal, drink intoxicants or take drugs and commit obscene sexual acts. As with other religions and philosophies Buddha’s teachings are open to many different interpretations.
 

                  While Buddha spent several decades teaching, none of his teachings were written down to several hundred years after his death. Originally, Buddha’s teachings were preserved and handed down from one generation of monk to another. Disturbed by the prolific growth of heresies, councils of eminent and learned monks gathered to verify and confirm those teachings in order that their purity be preserved. The shift from oral tradition to literary format, which took place for the first time in Sri Lanka, made it possible for monks as guardians of the religion, to ensure the authenticity of Buddha’s teachings through the subsequent centuries of it’s troubled history.

                  When the teachings of Buddha were finally written into a canon, they were written not in Sandskrit, but in a language derived from Sanskrit, called Pali. This language was spoken in  the Western regions of the Indian peninsula but from Sri Lanka (which is
  
 
off the eastern coast of India) to Burma; the Pali scriptures would become the definitive canon. This canon is called the Tripitaka, or ‘Three Baskets’, for it is divided into three parts, the Vinaya, or ‘Conduct’, the Sutta, or ‘Discourses’ and the Abhidhamma, or ‘Supplementary discourses’. The second part, the ‘Discourses’ are the most important in Buddhism. These are the discourses of Buddha and contain the whole of Buddhist philosophy and morality.

                  One of the most significant events in the history of Buddhism is the chance encounter of the monk Nigroha and the emperor Ashoka Maurya. Ashoka, succeeding his father after a bloody power struggle for the Magadra empire in India, found himself deeply disturbed by the carnage he caused while suppressing the revolt. Meeting Nigrodha convinced Emperor Ashoka to devote himself to peace. He renounced the policy of Conquest by War, which necessarily involved killing and destruction, and embarked upon the policy of Conquest by Dharma (Buddha’s teachings) which subsequently became his lifelong passion and mission.
 
 

                  It was under the auspices of Ashoka that the third Buddhist council was held. This council was attended by over one thousand Arahants (Enlightened Beings). After successful conclusion of the council, nine missions of elders were dispatched to spread the Dharma in various states and foreign countries. It was the first recorded instance of state sponsored missionary activities in the history of religion.

                  Over the centuries following Buddha’s death the unity of Buddhism began to fragment. The most significant split occurred after the second great council. After debates between a more liberal group and traditionalists, the liberal group left and labeled themselves the Mahasangha- ‘the great Sangha. They would eventually evolve into the Mahayana tradition (The Greater Vehicle) of Northern Asia.
 

                  The traditionalists, now referred to as the Sthaviravada or ‘Way of the Elders’ (or in Pali ‘Theravada’), developed a complex set of philosophical ideas beyond those elucidated by Buddha. These were collected into the ‘Higher Teachings’. But they, too, encouraged disagreements, so that one splinter group after another left the fold. Ultimately, 18 schools developed, each with their own interpretations of various issues, and spread all over India and Southeast Asia. Today only the school stemming from the Sri Lankan Theravada survives.