Siddhartha was born in Nepal in the 4th century BC, Buddha was a spiritual leader and teacher whose life serves as the foundation of the Buddhist religion.
Who was Buddha?
Siddhartha Gautama, who would one day become known as Buddha ("enlightened one" or "the awakened"), lived in Nepal during the 4th to 6th century BC. While scholars agree that he did in fact live, the events of his life are still debated. According to the most widely known story of his life, after experimenting with different teachings for years, and finding none of them acceptable, Gautama spent a fateful night in deep meditation. During his mediation, all of the answers he had been seeking became clear, and he achieved full awareness, thereby becoming Buddha.
When
Was Buddha Born?
Buddha was born in the 6th
century B.C.
Life
of Buddha
The Buddha, or
"enlightened one," was born Siddhartha (which means "he who
achieves his aim") Gautama to a large clan called the Shakyas in Lumbini,
(today, modern Nepal) in the 6th century B.C. His father was king who ruled the
tribe, known to be economically poor and on the outskirts geographically. His
mother died seven days after giving birth to him, but a holy man prophesized
great things for the young Siddhartha: He would either be a great king or
military leader or he would be a great spiritual leader. To keep his son from
witnessing the miseries and suffering of the world, Siddhartha's father raised
him in opulence in a palace built just for the boy and sheltered him from
knowledge of religion and human hardship. According to custom, he married at
the age of 16, but his life of total seclusion continued for another 13 years.
Siddhartha
Experiences the Real World
The prince reached his late
20s with little experience of the world outside the walls of his opulent
palaces, but one day he ventured out beyond the palace walls and was quickly
confronted with the realities of human frailty: He saw a very old man, and
Siddhartha's charioteer explained that all people grow old. Questions about all
he had not experienced led him to take more journeys of exploration, and on
these subsequent trips he encountered a diseased man, a decaying corpse and an
ascetic. The charioteer explained that the ascetic had renounced the world to
seek release from the human fear of death and suffering. Siddhartha was
overcome by these sights, and the next day, at age 29, he left his kingdom,
wife and son to lead an ascetic life, and determine a way to relieve the
universal suffering that he now understood to be one of the defining traits of
humanity.
The
Ascetic Life and Enlightenment
For the next six years,
Siddhartha lived an ascetic life and partook in its practices, studying and
meditating using the words of various religious teachers as his guide. He
practiced his new way of life with a group of five ascetics, and his dedication
to his quest was so stunning that the five ascetics became Siddhartha's
followers. When answers to his questions did not appear, however, he redoubled
his efforts, enduring pain, fasting nearly to starvation, and refusing water.
Whatever he tried,
Siddhartha could not reach the level of satisfaction he sought, until one day
when a young girl offered him a bowl of rice. As he accepted it, he suddenly
realized that corporeal austerity was not the means to achieve inner
liberation, and that living under harsh physical constraints was not helping
him achieve spiritual release. So he had his rice, drank water and bathed in
the river. The five ascetics decided that Siddhartha had given up the ascetic
life and would now follow the ways of the flesh, and they promptly left him.
From then on, however, Siddhartha encouraged people to follow a path of balance
instead of one characterized by extremism. He called this path the Middle Way.
The
Buddha Emerges
That night, Siddhartha sat
under the Bodhi tree, vowing to not get up until the truths he sought came to
him, and he meditated until the sun came up the next day. He remained there for
several days, purifying his mind, seeing his entire life, and previous lives,
in his thoughts. During this time, he had to overcome the threats of Mara, an
evil demon, who challenged his right to become the Buddha. When Mara attempted
to claim the enlightened state as his own, Siddhartha touched his hand to the
ground and asked the Earth to bear witness to his enlightenment, which it did,
banishing Mara. And soon a picture began to form in his mind of all that
occurred in the universe, and Siddhartha finally saw the answer to the
questions of suffering that he had been seeking for so many years. In that
moment of pure enlightenment, Siddhartha Gautama became the Buddha ("he
who is awake").
Armed with his new
knowledge, the Buddha was initially hesitant to teach, because what he now knew
could not be communicated to others in words. According to legend, it was then
the king of gods, Brahma, convinced Buddha to teach, and he got up from his
spot under the Bodhi tree and set out to do just that.
About 100 miles away, he
came across the five ascetics he had practiced with for so long, who had
abandoned him on the eve of his enlightenment. To them and others who had
gathered, he preached his first sermon (henceforth known as Setting in
Motion the Wheel of the Dharma), in which he explained the Four Noble
Truths and the Eightfold Path, which became the pillars of Buddhism. The
ascetics then became his first disciples and formed the foundation of the
Sangha, or community of monks. Women were admitted to the Sangha, and all
barriers of class, race, sex and previous background were ignored, with only
the desire to reach enlightenment through the banishment of suffering and
spiritual emptiness considered.
For the remainder of his 80
years, Buddha traveled, preaching the Dharma (the name given to the teachings
of the Buddha) in an effort to lead others to and along the path of
enlightenment. When he died, it is said that he told his disciples that they
should follow no leader.
The Buddha is undoubtedly
one of the most influential figures in world history, and his teachings have
affected everything from a variety of other faiths (as many find their origins
in the words of the Buddha) to literature to philosophy, both within India and
to the farthest reaches of the Western world.
