The Religions of India c19.39

c19.39

Significant also is the social status of Buddha’s first conversion. It is ‘the rich youth’ of Benares that flock about him,¹ of whom sixty soon are counted, and these are sent out into all the lands to preach the gospel, each to speak in his own tongue, for religion was from this time on no longer to be hid behind the veil of an unintelligible language. And it is not only the aristocracy of wealth that attaches itself to the new teacher and embraces his doctrines with enthusiasm. The next converts are a thousand Brahman priests, who constituted a religious body under the leadership of three ascetic Brahmans. It is described in the old writings how these priests were still performing their Vedic rites when Buddha came again to Bodhi Gayā and found them there. They were overcome with astonishment as they saw his power over the King of Snakes that lived among them. The gods — for Buddhism, if not Buddha, has much to do with the gods — descend from heaven to hear him, and other marvels take place. The Brahmans are all converted. The miracles and the numbers may be stripped off, but thus denuded the truth still remains as important as it is plain. Priests of Brahman caste were among the first to adopt Buddhism. The popular effect of the teaching must have been great, for one reads how, when Buddha, after this great conversion, begins his victorious wanderings in Behār (Māgadha), he converted so many of the young nobles that — since conversion led to the immediate result of renunciation — the people murmured, saying that Gautama (Gotama) was robbing them of their youth.¹