Dictionary of Pali Proper Names v1.c6.3656

v1.c6.3656

Assalāyana.—A young brahmin, sixteen years old, of Sāvatthi, very learned in the Vedas and allied subjects. Five hundred brahmins staying in the city asked him to hold a discussion with the Buddha and refute his views. He agreed only after repeated requests, because, he said, Gotama was a thinker with views of his own and, therefore, difficult to defeat in controversy. He visits the Buddha and asks what he has to say concerning the claims of the brahmins to be the only superior class, the legitimate sons of Brahmā. The Buddha points out to him that such pretensions are baseless, and that virtue, which alone leads to purity, can be cultivated by any of the four classes. Assalāyana sits silent and upset at the end of the discourse, but when the Buddha relates to him a story of the past where Asita Devala had defeated brahmins who held these same views, Assalāyana feels relieved and expresses his admiration of the Buddha's exposition. He declares himself a follower of the Buddha.¹ Buddhaghosa² tells us further that Assalāyana became a devoted follower of the faith and built a cetiya in his own residence for worship, and that all his descendants, down to Buddhaghosa's day, built similar cetiyas in their houses.