History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c91.299.3

v7.c91.299.3

This, O Bhikkhus, is that ancient path, that ancient road, followed by the rightly enlightened ones of former times. Along that (path) I have gone and while going along that path, I have fully come to know, old age and death. Having come to know it fully, I have told it to the monks, the nuns, the lay followers, men and women; this brahmacarya is prosperous, flourishing, widespread, widely known, has become popular and made manifest well by gods and men." It will be noticed that the Noble Eightfold Path which the Buddha put forward as the one that would put an end to misery and suffering is here expressly stated to be an ancient path trod by ancient enlightened men. Buddha does not claim that he was unique, but claimed that he was only one of a series of Enlightened men and stressed that the moral qualities which he urged men to cultivate belonged to antiquity. In the Dhammapada and the Suttanipāta (Mahāvagga, Vāseṭṭha sutta) the truly virtuous man is spoken of as brāhmaṇa:, "I speak of him as brāhmaṇa, who causes no harm (or evil) in body, word and thought, who is guarded as regards these three sources"; 'neither by matted hair nor by lineage, nor by caste, does one become a brāhmaṇa';