The History of Buddhist Thought c15.43

c15.43

The polemics of Buddhism help to show the kind of intellectual world in which its early expounders moved, but do not tell us of the fundamental beliefs which led its followers to abandon household life and undertake a long course of training. Buddhism rejected the worship of gods and the celebration of sacrifices as a means to final happiness. It rejected speculations about ultimate beginnings, especially about whether the self and the world were eternal, and a number of speculations about the ultimate state of the self in the future. What the Buddhist theories were as to the nature of this self and the ultimate state called Nirvāṇa are still matters of discussion.