Buddhism

Buddhism

The history of Buddhism spans from the 6th century BCE to the present, starting with the birth of the Buddha Siddhartha Gautama. This makes it one of the oldest religions practiced today. Throughout this period, the religion evolved as it encountered various countries and cultures, adding to its original Indian foundation Hellenistic as well as Central Asian, East Asian, and Southeast Asian cultural elements. In the process, its geographical extent became considerable so as to affect at one time or another most of the Asian continent. The history of Buddhism is also characterized by the development of numerous movements and schisms, foremost among them the Theravada, Mahāyāna and Vajrayana traditions, punctuated by contrasting periods of expansion and retreat.

According to the Buddhist tradition, the historical Buddha Siddhartha Gautama was born to the Shakya clan, at the beginning of the Magadha period (546–324 BCE), in the plains of Lumbini, Southern Nepal. He is also known as the Shakyamuni (literally "The sage of the Shakya clan").

After an early life of luxury under the protection of his father, Śuddhodana, the ruler of Kapilavastu (later to be incorporated into the state of Magadha), Siddhartha entered into contact with the realities of the world and concluded that real life was about unbearable and inescapable suffering and sorrow. Siddhartha renounced his meaningless life of luxury to became an ascetic. He ultimately decided that asceticism was also meaningless, and instead chose a middle way, a path of moderation away from the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification.

Under a fig tree, now known as the Bodhi tree, he vowed never to leave the position until he found Truth. At the age of 35, he attained Enlightenment. He was then known as Gautama Buddha, or simply "The Buddha", which means "the enlightened one".

For the remaining 45 years of his life, he travelled the Gangetic Plain of central India (a region of the Ganges/Ganga river and its tributaries), teaching his doctrine and discipline to an extremely diverse range of people.

The Buddha's reluctance to name a successor or to formalise his doctrine led to the emergence of many movements during the next 400 years: first the schools of Nikaya Buddhism, of which only Theravada remains today, and then the formation of Mahayana, a pan-Buddhist movement based on the acceptance of new scriptures.