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Early Monastic Buddhism v1.c12.s3: (ii) Patronage of Kings and Clans

Early Monastic Buddhism v1.c12.s3

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(ii) Patronage of Kings and Clans

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It is an undeniable fact that no religion can prosper however excellent may be its teachings without the support of the ruling powers and nobility of the time. Christianity would not have been what it is now without the intervention of emperors like Constantine.

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In the 5th century B.C. there was no paramount sovereignty in Northern India. It was divided into a large number of independent states. Of these, the four monarchies of Magadha, Kosala, Vatsa, and Avanti rose into importance and fought with one another for the conquest of places in the possession of the smaller states. The number of preachers of various religions, working in all these domains, was large, and the more prominent among them vied with one another for gaining the support of one or other of the several kings. There are passages in the Buddhist scriptures hinting that Buddha was anxious to enlist the sympathy and patronage of kings, clans, and noblemen in support of his religion. The story of the conversion of Malla Roja, a nobleman, shows explicitly the anxiety felt by Buddha on this score. When Buddha was entering the city of the Mallas, Malla Roja went to welcome him, not out of reverence but for avoiding the liability of paying a fine laid down by the Mallas for those who refused to welcome Buddha. When he came near Buddha, he spoke out to Ānanda his real feeling at which the latter became sorrowful and requested Buddha to work upon the mind of Malla Roja in such a way as to make him one of his ardent adherents, because he was a distinguished nobleman whose influence and example would go a great way towards making Buddhism popular in the locality. Buddha agreed and overcame the indifferent attitude of Malla Roja by exercising the feeling of love (mettā), whereby he was won over to the doctrine.¹ Though we do not come across any express passage showing that Buddha is acting with a similar motive in connection with any of the royal personages, there are several indications in the Vinaya Piṭaka that Buddha wanted to comply with the wishes of the rulers and noblemen as far as his doctrinal principles permitted. His direction to his disciples to fix the day of commencement of the vassāvāsa in compliance with the wishes of Bimbisāra on a particular occasion points to the same inference.²

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¹ Vinaya, Mahāvagga, VI, 36, 1-4.

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² Ibid., III, 4.

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The first king met by Buddha after his enlightenment was Bimbisāra who accorded him a very warm welcome, placed at Buddha's disposal his pleasure-garden and asked the headmen of the villages in his domain to listen to Buddha's discourses. It was most probably for Bimbisāra that Buddha gained a very wide popularity in Magadha.¹ The king was bent so much upon the welfare of the *sangha* that he issued the decree that none must do any harm to the Sākyaputtiya Samaṇas² and on many occasions he advised Buddha to frame rules for the welfare of the *sangha*. Some of these rules are, for example, not to give ordination to those who were in royal service, as the kings who were not in favour of the faith might harass the *sangha* on that ground;³ to hold religious assemblies on the 8th, 14th and 15th day of each month like the other religious orders for the benefit of the *upāsakas*.⁴

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¹ *Mahāvastu*, III, p 449.

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² *Vinaya*, I, 42, 1.

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³ *Ibid*, I, 40, 4.

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⁴ *Ibid*. II, 1-4.

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Pasenadi of Kosala was also a great benefactor of the *sangha*, but he does not seem to have given his unqualified support like Bimbisāra. Though he supported many Brāhmaṇa teachers, yet his attention to the welfare of Buddha and his *sangha* was not less than that shown to those teachers. His anxiety to make a suitable gift to Ānanda,⁵ his joy at the conversion of the robber Aṅgulimāla who was given immunity for his past misdeeds and was promised a supply of the requisites for a monk;⁶ his earnest desire to marry a Sākya princess and his ultimate marriage with Vāsabhakhattiyā to regain the confidence of the monks lost through inattentions to them;⁷ his expression of pride at the fact that he was of the same age with Buddha and belonged to the same caste and province with him¹ amply show his love for the religion and his desire to be counted as one of its well-wishers and supporters. In the Nikāyas it is stated that he became a lay-devotee and an ardent admirer of Buddha.² The bas-relief depicting him as proceeding to meet Buddha shows that he was respected by the Buddhists of the 2nd or 3rd century B.C. as a patron of the religion.

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⁵ *Majjh Nik*, II, p 116.

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⁶ *Ibid*., II, p 101.

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⁷ Burlingame's *Buddhist Legends*, I, p. 91.

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¹ Majjhima, II, p. 124.

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² Sam Nik., I, p. 70; Ang Nik., V, pp. 65 ff. see also Divyāvadāna, p 154.

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It is doubtful how far Buddha was successful in winning over the other two kings, Pajjota of Avanti and Udena of Kosambī. The references to these kings in the Buddhist scriptures are few and far between. It is said that king Pajjota once sent Mahākaccāyana to welcome Buddha to his dominion, but Buddha, thinking his purpose would be better served by Mahākaccāyana himself preaching the doctrine, did not accede to the king's request. The king was satisfied with Mahākaccāyana's exposition of the Law and became an ardent follower of the religion.³ The Samyutta Nikāya⁴ and the Tibetan translation of the Vinaya⁵ state that king Udena of Kosambī became a convert to Buddhism. The Dhammapadaṭṭhakathā gives in detail the occasion of king Udena's conversion. He was much impressed by the piety of one of his queens Sāmāvatī who had been an upāsikā of Buddha and at whose request the king became a convert to the religion and made generous gifts.⁶ Evidence is not strong that these two kings actively aided the spread of Buddhism but yet it is a great gain that they did not actively oppose its propagation. The mere tolerance of the activities of the Buddhist preachers within their kingdoms should be taken as a favourable circumstance in the spread of the religion.

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³ Psalms of the Brethren, pp 238-9.

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⁴ Sam Nik., IV, p 113

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⁵ Rockhill's Life of the Buddha, p. 74.

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⁶ Burlingame's Buddhist Legends, I, p. 84

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Buddha was successful in making a large number of converts from among the nobles, ministers, bankers and wealthy citizens. That the enlistment of the supports of Anāthapiṇḍika, Visākhā, Siha, Abhayarājakumāra, Jīvaka, Yasa, Ambapālī, Nandaka, etc., furthered the cause of Buddhism to a very great extent needs hardly any comment.

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Last but not the least was the support obtained by Buddha from the various clans of the period. Inspite of the fact that Mahāvīra had already been in the field and obtained a footing among the clans, Buddha was fairly successful in his missionary activities.

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It was not difficult for Buddha to win over the Sākyas because he himself belonged to the clan. Anuruddha, Kimbila, Bhagu, Ānanda, Devadatta, Nanda, Upāli and many other Sākyas joined the order at Buddha's request. Under the leadership of Mahāpajāpati Gotami,¹ many Sākyan ladies also followed the example of the Sākyan youths and joined the order leading to the growth of the order of nuns.

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¹ Majjh. Nik., I, p 462, SBE, XIX, pp 226-227.

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Next to the Sākyas, the Licchavis and the Mallas came under the influence of Buddha, who paid three visits to Vesālī, the city of the Licchavis, and by his preachings brought home to them the charm of Buddhism. He converted many distinguished members of the clan and obtained from them gifts of cetiyas.² His work among the Mallas was also successful. It was perhaps as a token of favour to the faithful Mallas that Buddha selected Kusinārā, an upavana within their country, as a suitable place for his mahāparinibbāna.³

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² Digha, II, p. 102.

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³ Ibid., II, p 169.

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Buddha's missionary activity among the B h a g g a s and the K o l i y a s was not so successful as among the previously stated clans. Buddha visited three nigamas of the Koliyas, and Ānanda one, but there is a remarkable paucity in the number of the converts mentioned as hailing from those places.¹ Still less successful was Buddha's religious mission to the Bhaggas. The only place that was visited by Buddha was the Bhesakalāvana deer-park near Sumsumāragiri and the persons won over were Nakula's parents and Bodhirājakumāra.²

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¹ Kakkarapattam, Haliddavāsanam Uttaram, and Sāpugam.

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² Majjh Nik, II, p 91

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We do not hear of other clans coming under the influence of Buddhism except in the statement of the Mahāparinibbāna Suttanta that the B u l i s of Allakappa and the M o r i y a s of Pipphalivana along with the clans already mentioned claimed Buddha's relics for erecting stūpas in their respective countries.

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Thus we see that Buddhism owed much of its expansion to Buddha's ability in securing sympathy and patronage of kings, nobles, and clans, who in many cases had already been supporting other religions. Though later in the field, Buddhism could supplant at times the other religions, ultimately monopolising the sympathy and support of some of the magnates.

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(iii) Services of Female Devotees

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The part played by women in the spread of Buddhism cannot be ignored or brushed aside as of little importance. On many occasions it was through their influence that whole families were converted to Buddhism. Visākhā and Ambapāli, for instance, rendered signal services to the saṅgha by their munificent gifts and the former's work was more valuable because she became the means of conversion of all the members of her father-in-law's family from Jainism to Buddhism. Anāthapiṇḍika's daughter made it possible through her exertions to establish a centre of Buddhism in Aṅga through the conversion of the whole of her father-in-law's family.¹ The conversion of king Udena was effected through one of her queens named Sāmāvatī.² It was with the help of the Brāhmaṇa girls of Sākya family married at Bhadramukha that Buddha could convert Meṇḍaka gahapati.³ Instances like this can be multiplied to show that ladies helped a good deal in the propagation of Buddhism.

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¹ Kern's Manual of Indian Buddhism, pp. 37-38.

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² Burlingame's Buddhist Legends, I, p. 84.

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³ Divyāvadāna, p. 128.

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The formation of the order of nuns was highly appreciated by the womenfolk generally, while at the same time it furthered the cause of Buddhism to a great extent. Not only did it afford relief to many a woman in her knawing miseries but it also recognised the dignified position in which the women had claim to be placed along with the men through the implication that they were as much eligible to the making of efforts for spiritual emancipation as the males. Those of the nuns who could enter into the mysteries of the religion naturally felt an inclination to initiate others into the same mysteries and offer them a permanent solace in their lives. They like the bhikkhus visited the householders and through their easy access to the ladies of the houses had greater opportunities of working upon their impressionable minds and enlisting them either as lay-devotees or nuns. Conversions of this nature were frequent and there are examples in the Therīgāthā of women becoming nuns through the exertions of the advanced bhikkhunīs. The bhikkhunīs thus carried the light of the new religion from house to house and helped the spread of Buddhism far and wide.

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(iv) Proselytizing

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Conversion by the evangelical method marks out Buddhism as making a radical departure from the traditional lines on which the Indian religions brought new adherents into their fold. The ways in which Brāhmanism extended the boundaries of its domain are peculiar to itself. Its method of enlisting new recruits are in consonance with the caste-system, its spirit of exclusiveness specially in religious matters and its power of slowly adapting itself to the change effected by forces from within or without. The process followed by it consisted in absorbing the new recruits into the brāhmanic society by attracting them slowly and imperceptibly to adopt more or less the social customs and practices approved by the Brāhmaṇas and thus occupy a place within an existing caste or sub-caste, or form a new sub-caste, as the case may be. The alteration of the religious views is left to follow the social absorption that gradually sets in. The radical departure made by the Buddhists from the traditional method was responsible for the rapid way in which Buddhism spread not only in India but also in the countries outside. The very first resolution made by Buddha after the attainment of the *summum bonum* was to become a religious preacher and save mankind from worldly cares and miseries. He went to Sarnath to convert the five Brāhmaṇas, after whom he made many more converts. He formed them into a band of missionaries, of whom he was the leader. In the *Vinaya* we find Buddha speaking thus to his followers who then numbered only sixtyone: "Go, ye now, O Bhikkhus, and wander, for the gain of the many, for the welfare of the many, out of compassion for the world. Let not two of you go the same way. Preach the doctrine which is glorious in the beginning, middle, and end, in the spirit and in the letter; proclaim a consummate, perfect, and pure life of holiness. There are beings whose mental eyes are covered by scarcely any dust, but if the doctrine is not preached to them, they cannot attain salvation. They will understand the doctrine. And I will go also, O Bhikkhus, to Uruvela-senā-nigama in order to preach the doctrine."¹ Buddha passed from one country to another preaching the *dhamma* which is heard by the house-holders who being convinced of its excellence retired from the world leaving their possessions great or small.² This example was followed ardently by his disciples: Sāriputta was considered the fittest person after him to roll the wheel of law;³ Moggalliputta, to preach the religion to the denizens of hell, gods and spirits of heaven; Puṇṇa Mantāṇiputta, to carry on the work among the rough people of Sunāparantaka;⁴ Piṇḍola-Bharadvāja, the chief of the *sīhanādikānam*, to remove doubts regarding the Buddhistic path or fruit.⁵ This shows how the disciples fulfilled their Master's desire. The Master was satisfied with their activities as indicated by his departure from the mortal world, which, as said by him to Māra, was conditional on 'his seeing that his disciples had been sufficiently large in number and able to refute the doctrines of their adversaries, and that his religion was well and widely preached.¹

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¹ *Mahāvagga*, I, pp 20, 21 (translated in the *S. B. E.*, vol XIII, pp. 112, 113; *Saṃ Nik.*, I, pp. 105-6, *Bhadrakalpāvadāna* in Dr. R. L. Mitra's *Nepalese Buddhist Literature*, p. 43).

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² *Majjh. Nik.*, I, p. 179. This is one of the many passages which constantly recur in the *Nikāyas*.

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³ *Aṅg. Nik.*, I, 13, 7; *Milindapañha*, p. 362.

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⁴ *Majjh. Nik.*, III, p. 268. *Divyāvadāna*, p. 39; *Mahāvastu*, I, p. 245.

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⁵ *Psalms of the Brethren*, p. 111.

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¹ *Digha*, II, p 106, Rockhill's *Life of the Buddha*, p 34

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Conversion of non-Buddhists to Buddhism was regarded as a part of the duty of the monks. To attain *Nirvāṇa* and without at the same time giving others the benefit of its realization by taking to the right course has about it a taint of selfishness however slight. The means by which the highest can be known and tasted ought not to be the secret of the select few or of an individual. It should be given a wide publicity in order that all men from the highest to the meanest may have the opportunity of exercising judgment and take to the way leading to *Nirvāṇa*. Animated by the feeling of love and compassion, Buddha and his disciples preached broadcast the truths of their religion in order that the groping humanity may know that there are saving truths which can be attained by particular ways of regulating life and thought. It was from this point of view of looking at proselytizing that the Buddhists drew their stimulus for activities in this direction, and we find the Hinayānists and, in a greater measure, the Mahāyānists exercising their best energies for the propagation of their faith for the diffusion of general well-being and the alleviation of miseries incidental to human existence.

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The art of proselytizing was highly developed by the Mahāyānists who led by their Bodhisattva ideal dedicated their lives to the propagation of the faith. There are in the *Saddharmapuṇḍarīka*² and almost all other Mahāyāna texts, expressions revealing the earnestness which animated the disciples for propagating the religion. Towards the end of a treatise, the Bodhisattvas utter: “When the Tathāgata has become wholly extinct, we, O Lord, want to go in ten directions and persuade all beings to write, read, think over, and proclaim this *dharma-paryāya* by the power of the Lord." The history of Buddhist faith both in its earlier and later phases reveals the fact that the Buddhist monks gave their best energies to the propagation of the religion and thus acted up to the wishes of the founder of the religion. The despatch of missionaries to various countries both within and abroad during the reign of Aśoka, the successful attempt of the Buddhist monks to colonise Central Asia during the reign of Kaniṣka, and the perilous journey and voyages undertaken to China, Tibet, Cambodia, Java and the Malay Archipelago by the monks in the later history of Buddhism amply show to what a great extent the Master's bidding was carried out.

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² See Hoernle's *Manuscript Remains* etc., p 155.

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(v) *Paribbājakas* and their Change of Faith

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The *paribbājakas* and the members of the various contemporary religious orders offered a very fruitful field for the recruitment of converts to Buddhism. Embracing of the religion of the victor by the vanquished in a debate was a general practice and this proved an effective means of spreading Buddhism, because Buddha himself as well as many Buddhist preachers were powerful disputants. It is a peculiar feature of the time that members of many of the religious orders attached more importance to belief based on reasoning than to blind faith, and pursuant to this state of things, the vanquished in a disputation left his religious belief as soon as it was brought home to him in a public debate that there was a flaw in the chain of reasoning upon which his belief was based, while no such flaw could be pointed out in the reasoning upon which the belief of the victor was founded. No stigma attached to the relinquishment of a religious belief by reason of defeat in a controversy or by a change in faith brought about in other ways. It was not so in later times when the ceremonial and social exterior of religion almost ceased to have a living connection with the inner conviction of an individual. At the time of which we are speaking, many students after finishing their education used to wander about in the various parts of India as *paribbājakas* in order to learn the various religious doctrines and gain mastery over the art of disputation.¹ They were at liberty to embrace any religion that appealed to them most as the vehicle of ultimate truths. In spite of the parents' objection, we read of many instances of young Brāhmaṇas and Kṣattriyas joining the Buddhist order. It was this state of things that helped Buddha and his band of preachers a good deal in the spread of the religion. The conversion of the followers of Sañjaya counting among them Sāriputta and Moggallāna, the Jaṭilas, Pokkharasādi, Sakuludāyī, Mahākassapa the Acela, Caṅki, Esukārī, Ghoṭamukha, Vekhanassa, Saccaka, and a host of others signifies a good record of Buddha's success in conversion among the *paribbājakas* and the religious orders both brāhmanical and non-brāhmanical. Dhammika-upāsaka was right in saying that the disputing *titthiyas*, Ājīvikas, Nigaṇṭhas, many of whom were aged, submitted to the captivating power of Buddha's exposition of his religion.² The influx of converts from the aforesaid classes was so great that Buddha had to introduce a bar to a ready ingress of undesirable men into the order by laying down that those who belonged to a religious order must pass a period of probation for four months.

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¹ *Majjh Nik*, II, p. 148. Assalāyana, a master of brāhmanical lore, was asked whether he had wandered about as a *paribbājaka* (to complete his education) "Caritam kho pana bhotā Assalāyanena paribbājakaṃ, ma bhavam Assalāyano ayuddhaparaṃparaṃ parājayiti." See also Barua's *Pre-Buddhist Indian Philosophy*, p. 192.

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² *Sutta-nipāta*, p 67.

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(vi) Catholicity

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Buddhism had in it a large element of catholic spirit which appealed to even the members of other religions. To attack another religion as a whole was never sanctioned by Buddhism.¹ Buddha had to recruit his converts from other religions; he never disparaged any particular religion to which any of them might have belonged, though of course, he showed at times that particular doctrines were wrong and unworthy of being followed. He held the view that the Buddhists should make gifts to the deserving members of all other religious orders and not to the Buddhists alone.² He permitted a Jaina house-holder after his conversion to Buddhism to continue his charity to the Jaina monks winning thereby the admiration of the members of other sects.³ In the *Majjhima Nikāya* it is pointed out that an ascetic though an Ājīvika but being a *kammavādin* would be reborn in heaven. The Brāhmaṇas who led a truly moral life were highly respected by the Buddhists. The spirit of toleration was no doubt a prevailing feature of the religious life of India and it was particularly so among the followers of Buddha, the teacher of *mettā* and *karuṇā*.

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¹ *Majjhima*, I, p 523: na ca saddhamma-okkasana na paradhamma-vambhanā. See also *Aṅguttara*, I, p. 27.

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² *Aṅguttara*, III, 57.1.

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³ *Vinaya*, VI, 32; *Aṅguttara*, IV, p 185.

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(vii) Occult powers

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The last factor but not the least was the resort to occult powers to bring conviction home to the minds of the unconvinced and make them converts. In writing of the spread of a religion, or the life of a founder of a religion, scholars, as a rule, leave this factor out of account, as it is not looked upon as in keeping with the standpoint of the present-day material sciences. It may be said that if once the possession and use of the occult powers be admitted and believed, there will be no criterion by which to sift out the actual expression of the occult powers from the fiction with which the credulous writers would in course of time mix them up, and in consequence, the grossest absurdities will have credence. But apart from the question as to which of the exhibitions of such powers are to be believed and which to be disbelieved, the point that has to be settled is whether it is reasonable to leave altogether out of account a factor without which there would certainly be left a gap in the aggregate of causes that are responsible for the degree and range of influence of a particular religion at a particular time. We often notice in the account of the life of the founder of a religion or its branch that mere appeals to the intellect and reason often fail to convince a person of the truth of a statement or the power of the arguer to lead to the path that takes one to the *summum bonum* of human life. Argumentators, however powerful, are often found to cause bitterness of feeling unless they are aided by other factors including the one under discussion. An exemplary character, a persuasive tongue, acuteness of intelligence, self-abnegation and other elements that make a strong and imposing personality are not sufficient to produce the results that were actually achieved by the founders of religions like Christ, Buddha, Muhammad, and others. A single leper healed by the mere touch of Christ, the power of vision restored to a single blind man are more effective in the spread of a religion than numberless victories in disputations. In the missionary career of Buddha and of his disciples we meet with many cases where arguments failed to achieve the desired ends, and ultimately, resort was taken to occult powers. Buddha utilized his occult powers (pātihāriya) in three ways, viz. iddhis (the ṛddhis of the Hindu Yogaśāstras) which impressed his audience with awe at the sight of physical manifestation of powers ostensibly in transgression of the natural laws, ādesanā or the exhibition of power of thought-reading; and anusāsanī or the warning to a person to give up his discursive or evil thoughts revealed to Buddha through thought-reading.¹ He foresaw the abuses incidental to the cultivation and use of such powers by his disciples, for many of them might be in a lower plane of spiritual culture and utilize them for selfish ends. To avoid such abuses, he strictly enjoined his disciples not to display such powers before the householders.²

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⁴ *Majjhima*, I, p. 483.

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¹ Ang Nik., I, p 276 Digh Nik. I, pp 212-214.

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² Vinaya, II, p. 112; na bhikkhave gihinam uttarimanussa-dhammam iddhipātihāriyam dassetabbam.

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There are several other causes which helped the propagation of the religion but as these have been dealt with in other connections in this work, they are left out here, e.g. internal strength of the organisation of the Buddhist order,⁴ unorthodoxy of the people in and around Magadha,⁵ persuasive methods employed in making converts,⁶ avoidance of metaphysical problems in the teachings,⁷ adoption of popular dialects as the medium of instruction,⁸ and above all the intrinsic merits of the religion.

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⁴ See Ch I.

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⁵ See Ch. X.

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⁶ See infra.

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⁷ See ante, pp. 44 ff.

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⁸ See infra.

Cites (27)