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Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c21: Chapter XIII: The Background

Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c21

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Chapter XIII: The Background

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**Buddhism as a phase of Hinduism.** We shall now trace the history and describe the essential features of what may be called Buddhist Education which, rightly regarded, is, however, but a phase of the ancient Hindu or Brahminical system of education as described in the previous chapters. Buddhism itself, especially in its original and ancient form, is, as has been admitted on all hands, rooted deeply in the pre-existing Hindu systems of thought and life. "To my mind," said Max Müller [*Chips from a German Workshop*, i, 434], "having approached Buddhism after a study of the ancient religion of India, the religion of the Veda, Buddhism has always seemed to be, not a new religion, but a natural development of the Indian mind in its various manifestations, religious, philosophical, social, and political." Barth [*The Religions of India*, p. 101] calls Buddhism "a Hindu phenomenon, a natural product, so to speak, of the age and social circle that witnessed its birth", and "when we attempt to reconstruct its primitive doctrine and early history we come upon something so akin to what we meet in the most ancient Upanishads and in the legends of Brahminism that it is not always easy to determine what features belong peculiarly to it". Rhys Davids [*Buddhism*, p. 34] calls Gautama Buddha "the creature of his time", of whose philosophy it must not be supposed that "it was entirely of his own creation". Hopkins goes so far as to assert [*Religions of India*, p. 298] that "the founder of Buddhism did not strike out a new system of morals; he was not a democrat; he did not originate a plot to overthrow the Brahmanic priesthood; he did not invent the order of monks".

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**Doctrines common to both: those of Ātman, Sorrow, Deliverance, Desire, Karma, Rebirth.** Oldenberg [*Buddha*, Introduction] has well shown how "for hundreds of years before Buddha’s time movements were in progress in Indian thought which prepared the way for Buddhism” (p. 6). Hindu thought, turning aside from the very outset from life and its realities, addressed itself to the world of spirit which it peopled with divinities symbolizing the different forces or phenomena of nature to be worshipped through sacrifice. There thus grows up a religion of sacrifice with an elaborate symbolism and literature, but the irresistible quest of the substance soon leads to a search for Unity in all diversity, outgrowing the oldest Vedic thought. Thus arose gradually the conceptions of the Prajāpati, of the Ātman and Brahmā, wherein “the yearning spirit, wearied of wandering in a world of gloomy, formless phantasms, finds its rest” (p. 30). But “the glorification of the Ātman becomes involuntarily an ever increasingly bitter criticism of this world” (p. 42). “When thought, liberal to itself, had laden the idea of the Ātman with all attributes of every perfection, of absolute unity, of unlimited fulness, the world of plurality, measured by the standard of the everlasting One, must have necessarily appeared a state of disruption, restriction, and pain” (ib.). Yājñavalkya declares in the Upanishads: “Whatever is beside Him is full of sorrow”; “as the sun, the eye of the Universe, remains far off and unaffected by all sickness that meets the (human) eye, so also the One, the Ātman, who dwells in all creatures, dwells afar and untouched by the sorrows of the world” (p. 43). Here, for the first time, is delivered that message of sorrow or pessimism which forms the common and abiding note in the manifold expressions and systems of Indian thought through the ages. A natural transition from this philosophy of Pessimism leads to the conceptions of Metempsychosis and to their concomitants and antidotes, the doctrines of Deliverance, a message of Hope against the other message of Despair, the formulation of the ways of escape from the appalling fatality of “the endless migration from world to world, from existence to existence, the endlessness of the struggle against the pallid power of that ever-recurring destruction” (p. 45). The older Vedic conceptions of Deliverance comprised “the use of the right words and the right offerings” (p. 44), and, later, with the rise of the Upanishadic speculations regarding the Ātman, the attainment of “the unity of the soul with its true mode of being, the Brahma”, while, as a natural counterpart of this doctrine, “the wandering of the soul through the domains of death” was regarded as “the fruit of its non-union with the Brahma”

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(p. 47) caused by Desire or attachment to the world of plurality. Thus by a natural process is evolved the great doctrine of Karma "as the power which predetermines the course of the migration of the soul from one state of being to another". Deliverance accordingly comes to mean cessation of Karma through extinction of *Kāma* or through extinction of that Ignorance which is the root of all *Kāma* or Desire, and hence through the attainment of the saving knowledge accomplishing the return from plurality to the One. The different schools of Indian thought arise from the different definitions they give of this highest knowledge or Truth, the different solutions they propose of the problem of existence which is held in common to be an unmixed evil. There is thus a common Indian view of life to which all sects or systems of thought including Buddhism subscribe.

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**Buddhist Scheme of Life as influenced by Brahmanical.** We are not, however, concerned with the doctrines of Buddhism, the answer that Buddhism has sought to give to the question which all other schools of Indian thought try to answer in their own several ways, the question, How is release to be achieved from the endless course of births and rebirths to which life is liable? We are concerned rather with those external practices of Buddhism by means of which it developed its social and educational organization for the advancement and diffusion of its particular truths, the ideals of thought and life for which it stood. Philosophy or Religion, especially in India, has been always lived, and not merely contemplated, and so it has always developed its outer side in strict accordance with the inner. The two developments must always run parallel to each other in vital harmony. Thus it is that as in the old Brahminical speculations we see the sources of the dogmatics of Buddhism, so in the Brahminical scheme and ordering of life or social organization was largely laid the foundation of the Buddhist Community and Church. Far from discarding and denouncing the Brahmanic ideal of life, "Buddhism achieved, in one sense, the full realization of this Brahmanic ideal" [Max Müller, ib., i, 438]. "Buddhist society, as we know it from the sacred writings of the Buddhists, is far more the fulfilment than the denial of the ancient schemes and dreams of the Brahmanic lawgivers" [ib., p. 437].

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Indeed, the entire organization of the Buddhist Church or Community may be deemed to have been based upon the following re-statements or modifications of the older Vedic or Brahminical religion, as pointed out by Max Müller (ib., p. 440) :

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" If sacrifices, particularly those which involve the killing of animals and extravagant expenditure, are not only useless but mischievous, Buddha said, ' Let them be forbidden.'

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" If the Vedas have no claim to a revealed character, let them be treated like any other book, but do not waste your whole youth in learning them by heart.

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" If the Vedic gods are mere figures and names, let us look for something which is more than figure and name.

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" If penances, particularly those excessive penances of the dwellers in the forest, benefit neither the spirit nor the flesh but produce only bodily decrepitude and spiritual pride, let them be abolished, or at all events rendered less severe.

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" Lastly, if he who leaves home, and wife, and children, or who never knew what a home was, is nearer to heaven than the best of householders, let all who can, leave their homes as soon as possible and become 'homeless', the very name which Buddha gave to the members of his fraternity."

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We have already indicated how some of these doubts and questionings raised by Buddhism have been anticipated in the later Vedic or Upanishadic speculations, but what was in a sense implicit or not fully expressed in them has been rendered more explicit and given full utterance to by Buddhism which has thus selected and emphasized some special points in the older religion and ignored others.

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**Monachism not a monopoly of Buddhism.** Thus Monachism was not the exclusive characteristic of Buddhism or its special contribution to Indian religious life. Different forms of religious, ascetic and monastic life had already grown up in close conformity to the speculations regarding the Universal One and deliverance referred to above. The Doctrine of the Ātman dominating the entire range of Indian thought produced a scheme of life under which " man must live as though he lived not ", divesting himself of all earthly ties in a thoroughgoing spirit of a world-disclaiming abstraction. The great Upanishadic utterance rang through the country as a summons to self-sacrifice at the altar of Truth: "The intelligent and wise desire not posterity: what are descendants to us, whose home is the Ātman? They relinquish the desire for children, the struggle for wealth, the pursuit of worldly weal, and go forth as mendicants."

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**Its Brahminical Forms.** The Brahmanical order of life provided for a progressive realization of this idea of renunciation through the discipline of the four Āśramas, of which only the last two directly lead up to it. Even the *Vānaprastha*, the man in the third Āśrama of life, does not wander about absolutely homeless but would have a fixed place of abode in the forest where his wife would follow him as well as their sacred fire, and a part of their old household duties in connection with sacrifice would still be performed. It is, however, to be noted that exceptions to these general rules were also quite common, though these exceptions became the rule with the Buddhist Order or Community. Thus we read of householders at once passing on to the life of hermits, dissolving all earthly ties without undergoing the penances of the third Āśrama. Similarly, a *Brahmachārī* electing perpetual pupilage without marrying and entering upon the householder's state was a very usual phenomenon and a regular institution was made of it with special rules for its governance. This institution was adopted, as we shall see, as the starting-point of the Buddhist religious organization. There are other features in the old Vedic monasticism which are borrowed by Buddhist though it is not so apparent. In the first place, the right to renunciation did not belong exclusively to the Brahman caste alone. We have already seen how the observance of the rule regarding the division of life into four Āśramas or stages was binding upon all the three twice-born classes which made up a large proportion of the total Indian population. We may also recall scenes depicted in the Upanishads of learned disputations at the courts of kings in which scholars of different classes and castes participate equally—the Brahmans equally with the princes and Kshatriyas and even women. Nay, the kings are represented as the enthusiastic and active organizers of these philosophical Congresses and Conferences. And, indeed, if the right to listen to the discourses on deliverance be conceded to all, why should the right to seek the means of that deliverance in a life of renunciation be denied to them? No one, by reason of his caste or social position, was debarred from the citizenship of the kingdom of the spirit, from the sacred, inviolable right or birthright to renounce home, wife, and child, goods and chattels and embrace, as a mendicant monk, a life of poverty and purity in pursuit of the highest end of existence. Princes and peasants equally with Brahmans had the right "to those spiritual treasures to obtain which men parted with all earthly treasure".

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The second feature of this Vedic monasticism seems to have been that these seekers after truth organized themselves as close corporations and treated the knowledge and the doctrines they developed as something fit for the few and the elect, or the specially qualified, and not meant for the masses or to penetrate the national life. "The father might impart the secret to his son, and the teacher to his pupil, but, in the circle of the believers in the Ātman, there was wholly wanting that warm-hearted enthusiasm which holds that it then, and then only, properly enjoys the possession of its own goods, when it has summoned all the world to participate in their possession" [Oldenberg, op. cit., p. 63]. The Upanishads, in the literal sense of the term, signify a body of select and secret doctrines and their esoteric character marks them out sharply from Buddhism. The strongly democratic spirit of the Buddha and his teachings and his overmastering solicitude for the amelioration of the masses receive their culminating expression in the following saying attributed to him: "I shall not enter Nirvāṇa until the life of holiness¹ which I point out has been successful, grown in favour, and entended among all mankind, and is in vogue and thoroughly made known to all men." In the story, this declaration or decision has not been reached by the Buddha without a struggle. For a time he is possessed by the Upanishadic spirit of treating truth he had attained as a select and secret doctrine too high for others and thus to be confined only to himself. The *Mahāvagga* thus recounts the story [i, 5, 2, etc.]: "Into the mind of the Exalted One, while he tarried, retired in solitude, came this thought: 'I have penetrated this deep truth, which is difficult to perceive, and difficult to understand, peace-giving, sublime, which transcends all thought, deeply-significant, which only the wise can grasp. Man moves in an earthly sphere, in an earthly sphere he has his place and finds his enjoyment. For him it will be difficult to grasp this matter, the law of causality, the chain of causes and effects, the extinction of all conformations; the withdrawal from all that is earthly, the extinction of desire, the cessation of longing, the end, the Nirvāṇa. And so—

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¹ It should be observed that it is "the life of holiness" which Buddhism emphasizes much more than the philosophy of life, speculations concerning the mysteries of life and death and such ultimate truths. It is no wonder that on account of its eminently popular character impressed upon Buddhist thought the whole world could be summoned to participate in its truths, while Brahmanism as represented in the Upanishads and Āraṇyakas leads to levels and reaches of thought where only the select few under special training in abstraction can follow. The intellectual strength of Brahmanical speculation which accounts for its exclusive and esoteric character should not be the ground for ascribing to it a moral weakness, a deficiency in sympathy. The Buddha himself is said to have declared as his last words [*Dīgh. Nik.*, ii, 100]: "What, then, Ānanda? Does the Order expect that of me? I have preached the Truth without making any distinction between exoteric and esoteric doctrine; for in respect of the truths, Ānanda, the Tathāgata has no such thing as the closed fist of a teacher who keeps something back." Against this is to be considered the fact that the doctrines of the Upanishads were investigated by select circles of inquirers in the solitude of the woods (as Āraṇyakas) where no distraction was likely to intervene between Truth and its seeker.

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" ' Why reveal to the world what I have won by a severe struggle?
" ' The truth remains hidden from him who desire and hate absorb.
" ' It is difficult, mysterious, deep, hidden from the coarse mind;
" ' He cannot apprehend it, whose mind earthly vocations surround with night.

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" ' When the Exalted One thought thus, his heart was inclined to abide in quietude and not to proclaim the Doctrine,' whereupon Mahābrahmā, exclaiming, 'Alas! the world is lost and undone,' hastens to the Buddha and besought Him to preach the Doctrine. The prayer was granted by the Buddha in the following words:

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" ' Let opened be to all the door of eternity;
" ' He who hath ears, let him hear the word and believe.
" ' I thought of affliction for myself, therefore have I, O Brahmā,
Not yet proclaimed the noble word to the world.' "

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It may be noted in this connection that this spirit of the Buddha suggested one of the essential doctrines of *Mahāyāna* Buddhism as embodied in the ideal of the Bodhisattva who, in contrast with the Śrāvaka (Arahat) and Pachcheka-Buddha (or private Buddha), following the Buddha for the sake of their own complete Nirvāṇa, is distinguished by his determination not to accept the final release "for the sake of the complete *Nirvāṇa* of all beings".

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The third noticeable feature in these pre-Buddhistic religious conditions was that not merely was there a constant stream of recruits swelling the ranks of ascetics, monks, and hermits in the country under the operation of the laws of Āśramas throwing people out of home into homelessness, but these were also being organized into fraternities developing their own systems of doctrine and discipline in different degrees of independence of the authority of Vedic ritualism. Long before the age of the Buddha there arose these monastic orders with the external forms and technique of their religious life fully developed and fixed, for to the religious consciousness of the times the monastic life appeared to offer the best and surest means of attaining their ends to those associated in a common quest of salvation. The most luxuriant growth of these religious fraternities was in the congenial and fruitful soil offered by the eastern parts of the Gangetic valley at a distance from the home and headquarters of conservative Brahmanism. The seat of the Vedic cult was, as has been already pointed out, towards the western parts where the Vedic Aryans first settled themselves in the 'holy land' proper, from which Manu [ix, 225] would expel all heretics. From that centre Vedism in its progress towards the east lost much of its pristine purity, rigid orthodoxy, and formalism, in its assimilation of the foreign elements in a new environment. Parts of the *Satapatha Brāhmaṇa* and some of the Upanishads belonging to these eastern tracts introduce us (as we have already seen) to the moving scenes of lively learned debates at the courts of kings of Kāśī, Kosala, and Videha, where Brahmans contend on equal terms for intellectual supremacy with Kshatriyas and even women to whom orthodoxy would assign the status of the Sūdra in respect of admission to sacred science. But they also show us that the Brahmans themselves permitted, encouraged, and participated in these philosophical controversies which are the true forerunners of the later heresies. From a philosophical standpoint, Jainism or Buddhism has hardly any ground for a break with the previous thought. It is also patent at the same time that in these eastern parts, far away from the base of its supplies, the leadership in religious thought passed considerably and conspicuously to the Kshatriyas, of whom came both the Buddha and Mahāvīra, the two most distinguished heretics.

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**Pre-Buddhist Brahmanical Ascetic Orders.** Thus Hindu society, especially in Eastern India, was possessed of a multitude of religious sects before the rise of Buddhism. The two largest and most prominent of them were distinguished by the names of the Brahmans and Samaṇas. These are mentioned together in various early works, e.g. Megasthenes (who gives a long account of these orders), the edicts of Asoka, Vinaya [ed. Oldenberg, ii, p. 295], Dhammapada (v. 388), Suttanipāta (vv. 99, 129, 189, 440, 529, 859, 1078), Lalita Vistara (pp. 309, 318, and 320), Mahābhāshya [ii, 4, 9], etc.

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The chief characteristics of these orders are best given in the *Sutta-Nipāta*. The Brahmans are called *Vādaśīla* or disputatious (v. 381, etc.), *Lokāyatas* and *Vitaṇḍas*, i.e. casuists and sophists [*Mil. Pan.*, i, 10; also *Chullav.*, v, 3, 2, etc.]. Contrasted with the *Samaṇas*, they are called *Tevijjas*, i.e. versed in three sciences (vv. 594, 1019) or Vedas, *Padakas* (versed in metre), *Veyyākaraṇas* (versed in grammar) and proficient in *Jappa* (recitation or *jalpa*), *Nighaṇḍu* (vocabulary), *Keṭubha* (etymology ?), *Itihāsa* as the fifth Veda, etc. Three different sects of these Brahmans are also mentioned, viz. the Titthiyas (Sans. Tīrthikas), Ājīvikas, and Nigaṇṭhas (vv. 380, 891–2). These sects were constituted by disciples gathering round famous teachers. Among these, six are mentioned as living in the Buddha’s time, viz. Purāṇa Kassapa, Makkhali-Gosāla, Ajita-Kesakambalī, Pakudha-Kachchāyana, Sañjaya-Belaṭṭhiputta, and Nigaṇṭha-Nātaputta. These are described as having “an assembly of Bhikkhus, a crowd of followers”, and as “well-known teachers, famous leaders, considered excellent by the multitude” (*Sabhiyasutta*). Each of these great teachers was known for his own particular philosophical system. [See also *Milinda-pañha*, i, 11.] Besides these, we have also the famous teacher, the Brahman Bāvarī, living on the banks of the Godāvarī in Assaka’s territory who had sixteen other disciples, all Brahmans, each having a ‘host of pupils’ and ‘widely renowned throughout the world’. They are represented as itinerant scholars, visiting by turns the chief centres of culture and civilization, viz. Patiṭṭhāna, Māhissati, Ujjeni, Gonaddha, Vedisā, Vanasāvhaya, Kosāmbī, Sāketa, Sāvatthi, Setavya, Kapilavatthu, Kusinārā, Pāvā, Vesāli, and the city of Magadha, “all with matted hair and bearing hides” [*Sutta-Nipāta-Pārāyaṇavagga*]. We have also another teacher, the Brahman Sela, “versed in the three Vedas, Nighaṇḍu, Keṭubha, Sākkharappabheda (i.e. sa + *akshara* + *prabheda*, and hence akin to the Vedāṅga, *Śikshā*), Itihāsa the fifth Veda, Pada, Veyyākaraṇa, Lokāyata (casuistry or materialism),” and “the teacher of hymns of 300 pupils” [ib. *Selasutta*]. There are also mentioned five other distinguished Brahman teachers, viz. Chaṅkin, Tārukkha, Pokkharasāti, Jāṇussoṇi, Todeyya, with Vāseṭṭha and Bhāradvāja as pupils of Pokkharasāti and Tarukkha respectively, themselves “acknowledged masters of the three Vedas” and other allied subjects [ib., v, 594].

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**Non-Buddhist Orders of Śramaṇas.** As regards the Samaṇas, they are distinguished as of four kinds, viz. Maggajinas (victorious by the way), Maggadesins (teaching the way), Maggajīvins (living in the way), and Maggadūsins (defiling the way) [*Suttanipāta*, vv. 85–8]. There are disputes among these Samaṇas [ib., vv. 828, 883–4], as a result of which different schools of philosophy arise, of which there were as many as sixty-three at the time of the Buddha [ib., v. 538], designated as *Diṭṭhi* (Dṛishṭi) or heresies.¹

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¹ The subject of “Indian Sects or Schools in the time of the Buddha” is discussed in the *JRAS* by Rhys Davids (1898, p. 197) and Bendall (1901, pp. 122 f.). The former mentions that the *Aṅguttara-Nikāya* [part iii, p. 276], refers to ten such sects named as follows: (1) Ājīvako, (2) Nigaṇṭho, (3) Muṇḍasāvako (“a Nigaṇṭha disciple, a Jain”), (4) Jaṭilako, (5) Paribbājako, (6) Māgaṇḍiko (?), (7) Tedaṇḍiko (“school of Brahman beggars who carried three staves bound up as one”), (8) Aviruddhako (?), (9) Gotamako (“a school founded by another Gotama”), (10) Devadhammiko (deva-worshippers?). The latter quotes from another ancient work called *Ratnolkā-dhāranī* a list which mentions the Charakas, Parivrājakas, followers of Gotama (No. 9 in the previous list) who observe the vow of silence, the Achelakas (naked ascetics), the Ājīvikas, ascetics having the *dīrghajaṭā* or taking the vow of celibacy (*kumāravrata*), or practising the penance of *pañchatapa*. He also cites a passage from the *Mahāvastu* (iii, 412, 7–10) which mentions a *Traidaṇḍika* (No. 7 above) and a disciple of a different Gautama.

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While the orders of *Brahmans* depended on birth and were recruited exclusively from one caste, those of Samaṇas laboured under no such restrictions and were thrown open to all, high born or low born, who would adopt the ascetic life, renouncing worldly careers. These orders were further characterized by different degrees of independence of Vedic orthodoxy achieved by their founders and leaders, and, under the absolute freedom of thought and protection of the liberty of conscience that have always prevailed in India, sects were being added to sects according to the different paths of deliverance by which the masters discovering them led their followers in quest of salvation. These numerous ascetic and philosophizing circles were always wandering through the country in search of opportunities to fight out their differences in public disputations before their adherents, opponents, and the general people in the manner of the Greek sophistic. The country also liberally provided for such opportunities as quickening the intellectual life of the people. We read, for instance, of ‘The Hall’ specially erected in Queen Mallikā’s park for the purposes of such discussions of the different systems of opinion prevailing in the country and of the wandering teacher Poṭṭhapāda initiating there a discussion with his large following of 300 mendicants. “The very fact of the erection of such a place is another proof of the freedom of thought prevalent in the eastern valley of the Ganges in the sixth century B.C. Buddhaghosa tells us that after ‘The Hall’ had been established, others near it had been built in honour of various famous teachers; but the group of buildings continued to be known as ‘The Hall’.

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There Brahmans, Nigaṇṭhas, Achelakas, Paribbājakas, and other teachers met and expounded, or discussed, their views" [Rhys Davids in *Dialogues of the Buddha*, i, 224, n.].

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Thus the Buddhists were only one among other Samaṇa sects of the country; the Buddha was only one, though the most illustrious one, among many other religious reformers like Mahāvīra, Gosāla, at first a pupil and later a rival of the former, and his nephew Jamāli leading an independent sect; nay, even the Buddha was not the first to be honoured by that title of 'the enlightened one' or the other title of Jina, the Conqueror. Thus the Buddha himself was frequently styled 'the Samaṇa Gotama', and his disciples 'the Samaṇas who follow the son of the Śākya house'.

The Controversies and Conversions of the Buddha

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Thus Buddhism had to fight its way to supremacy with other Brahman and Samaṇa sects. The texts record numerous instances of such fights, the intellectual tournaments in which the Buddha was proving his mettle. They also record their invariable results, the triumph of Buddha, the accession of converts deserting their old masters who are silenced when the Buddha "raises his lion voice in the assemblies" or "roared like a lion in the forest" [*Sutta-nipāta*, v. 1015], and the impetus given to the spread of the new faith. But, besides these public discussions of the Buddha in assemblies, the texts record his private discussions with individuals and householders whom he might come across in the daily course of his begging rounds. Such would mostly come to scoff, but remained to pray. A Brahman householder of Sāvatthi, seeing the Buddha approach him for alms, accosts him in the following words of contempt: "Stay there, O Shaveling; stay there, O Samaṇaka (i.e. wretched Samaṇa); stay there, O Vasalaka (i.e. outcast)!", but presently becomes converted by Buddha on listening to his discourse on the question put to him [*Suttanipāta-Vasalasutta*]. Sometimes, again, the Buddha would be approached in his place of rest by circles of wandering scholars for the solution of their doubts followed by their conversion [ib.].

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Some of the most important of the Buddha's converts came naturally from the Brahmans. The legends tell us that the Buddha was anxious to impart his gospel first to his two old Brahman teachers who were unfortunately dead by that time. His first sermon at Benares was heard by the group of five Brahman ascetics headed by Kondañña, the quondam partners of his earlier spiritual struggles, whom he himself seeks out to make his first converts and the original members of his church. Next follow the thousand Brahman hermits of Uruvelā under their leaders, the three Kassapa brothers, all devoted to the Vedic cult and performance of sacrifices, till the Buddha converts them. Soon after, at Rājagaha, the Buddha gained as his disciples the two young Brahmans, Sāriputta and Moggallāna, who ranked next to their master in the circles of the church. They were among the 250 disciples of a renowned teacher, Sañjaya, and their conversion led to the dissolution of the entire sect and following of Sañjaya who in vain tried to keep them together under him. This event is stated to have produced a great sensation in the city of Rājagaha where the populace became temporarily agitated over the success of the Buddha’s cult as causing ‘childlessness’, ‘widowhood’, and ‘subversion of families’ in the country through its youths ‘betaking themselves to the ascetic Gotama to lead a religious life’.

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But the Buddha found in the rival Samaṇa sects and their leaders harder material to deal with than in the adherents of the ancient faith. Of one of these heretics, Makkhali Gosāla already referred to, the Buddha declared: “Of all doctrines of other ascetics and Brahmans, the doctrine of Makkhali is deemed the worst.” Another heretic, named Sachchaka, declares: “I know no Samaṇa, and no Brahman, no teacher, no master, no head of a school, even though he calls himself the holy supreme Buddha, who, if he face me in debate, would not totter, tremble, quake; how much more a human being!” Thus some of his worst and most dangerous opponents did the Buddha find in these circles of professional dialecticians and controversialists whose regard for truth and moral life was subdued by their taste for casuistry and an overweening materialism, cynicism, and scepticism which it is always difficult to convince.

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It is also evident from the history of these conversions that the Buddha’s disciples were all drawn from the already existing ascetic orders of the country, whether Brāhmaṇa or Samaṇa, and trained beforehand in the discipline of monastic life. Their entry into the Buddhist brotherhood did not therefore imply any revolution in their ways of life; it meant only a change in their religious opinions, and also in the object of their heart-felt homage. It is thus that we find that the formula with which the Buddha admitted his first disciples into his order ran in the following words: ‘Come hither, O monk; well preached is the doctrine, walk in purity, to make an end of all suffering." It was thus the monks well versed in the doctrines and technique of monastic life, and not the untutored lay men, that constituted the early Buddhist congregation and are called 'ascetics who adhere to the Samaṇa who is the son of the Śākya house', who already bore on their persons all the visible marks, such as the yellow garment and tonsure which signify separation from the home and the world, from all earthly ties.

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We thus see how largely did Buddhism, in the spheres of both thinking and living, work with the materials derived from the previous cultures.

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**The Buddha a product of the Brahmanical System.** This thesis also receives a most conclusive confirmation from the details of the Buddha's own career as preserved in the traditional texts. The details will show how largely was he himself the product of the then prevailing Brahmanical educational systems. We have already seen how in the very first step that he takes towards the Buddhahood, the renunciation of the home¹ and the world, the world of riches to which he was born, he was not at all singular but following the path trodden by all seekers after truth in all ages and all ranks of society. Our ancient literature is full of examples of the spirit of acute, *utkaṭa*, *vairāgya* under which the rich, the fortunate, and the noble not less than the poor, the destitute and the lowly, the young with a distaste for life before tasting it as much as the old who have had enough of it, even women and maidens, as eagerly leave their homes and adopt the ascetic life as a positive good as their dear ones entreat them to desist from such a step. The Buddha's next step was to give himself such training for the new life he chose as was available in the country. He placed himself under the guidance of two successive gurus. The first was the Brahman, Āḷāra Kālāma, at Vesāli, having a following of 300 disciples who taught him the successive stages of meditation and the doctrine of the Ātman, from which the Buddha turns back dissatisfied² on the ground

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¹ "Buddha, on leaving the palace, made perhaps the most noteworthy journey ever made by mortal. Every step almost has since beeen marked by costly marble carvings and shrines and statues under canopy-mounds, which successive generations of pilgrims have smothered in flowers."—Lillie, *Life of Buddha*, p. 67.

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² Regarding this episode, Dr. A. K. Coomaraswamy justly remarks [*Buddha and the Gospel of Buddhism*, pp. 29, 199] : "We recognize here the critical moment where Buddhist and Brahman thought part company on the question of the Ātman. Whether Āḷāra failed to emphasize the negative aspect of the doctrine of the Brahman, or Gautama (who is represented as so far entirely innocent of Brahmanical philosophy) failed to distinguish the neuter Brahman from the god Brahmā, we cannot tell." He also says: "The parting of Gautama and Āḷāra represents, perhaps, the greatest tragedy recorded in religious history. It has been remarked with perfect justice by A. Worsley: 'It is possible that had Gautama chanced to meet, in his earliest wanderings, two teachers of the highest truth, the whole history of the Old World might have been changed [*Concepts of Monism*, p. 197].'" He further points out that from a study of the Buddha's dialogues it would appear that he never encountered a capable exponent of the highest Vedāntic idealism like a Janaka or Yājñavalkya, he meets no foeman worthy of his steel; that either he was acquainted only with popular Brahmanism against which Buddhist polemic is chiefly directed, or he chose to ignore its higher aspects. Cf. Oldenberg's remark: "God and the Universe trouble not the Buddhist; he knows only one question: how shall I in this world of suffering be delivered from suffering?" [*Buddha*, p. 130]. Thus Buddhism became a popular religion with none of the esoteric doctrines and discussions which confine higher Brahmanism or the Vedic, Upanishadic, philosophy and religion to the "fit audience though few". Āḷāra Kālāma is mentioned as the teacher of the young Mallian Pukkusa who spoke to the Buddha about his great power of abstraction shown once when he was not conscious of the passage of a caravan of 500 carts by him sitting on the roadside [*Maha. Par. Suttas.*, iv, 35].

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GAUTAMA AT SCHOOL [Ajanta Painting, Cave No. XVI, *c.* sixth century A.D.].

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The School is "in a verandah in his father's palace; Gautama being instructed, with three other boys, by a Brāhmaṇa teacher. On their laps are tablets . . . Caged birds, musical instruments, a battle-axe, bows, a water-pot (probably of silver) hang against the walls; while pigeons are cooing under the eaves above, where their cot is formed of perforated woodwork with small arched openings". Gautama, as a prince, was given, along with that it "does not lead to aversion, absence of passion, cessation, quiescence, knowledge, supreme wisdom, and Nirvāṇa, but only as far as the realm of nothingness" [Warren, *Buddhism in Translations*, p. 336]. Next, he attaches himself to the sage of Rājagaha with 700 pupils, Uddaka, the disciple of Rama, but "he gained no clear understanding from his treatment of the soul" [Aśvaghosha, *Buddha-charita*, xii, 82, in *S.B.E.*, xlix]. It is, however, evident that, as Rhys Davids points out [*American Lectures*, p. 102], "Gotama, either during this period or before, must have gone through a very systematic and continued course of study in all the deepest philosophy of the time." It is also represented that the Buddha, qualified as he was both mentally and spiritually, mastered the doctrines of these early teachers so quickly that each treated him "every whit the equal of himself" and offered to make him a co-teacher of his disciples [Warren, op. cit., pp. 336, 338].

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Gotama, however, did not "honour these doctrines with his adhesion" (ib.), and "craving the summum bonum, the incomparable peaceful state, came in the course of his journeying among the Magadhans to Uruvela", near Gayā, where perceiving "a delightful spot with an enchanting grove of trees and a silvery flowing river (the Nairañjanā River, according to the *Buddha-charita*), easy of approach and delightful, with a village near by in which to beg, he settled down as everything was suitable for struggling". He settled down to a life of austere penance and engaged himself in a veritable life-and-death struggle for the attainment of the Truth he wanted for a period of six years. The solitude of his struggle was relieved by the fellowship of a group of "five mendicants, desiring deliverance", who attached themselves to him as his disciples. "For six years, vainly trying to attain merit, he practised self-mortification, performing many rules of abstinence, hard for a man to carry out." Then concluding that "truth cannot be attained by one who has lost his strength, he resumed his care for the body", and, on the bank of the River Nairañjanā, persuaded himself to take some milk offered by Nandabālā, the daughter of the leader of the herdsmen of the neighbourhood. "Thinking that he had returned to the world, the five mendicants left him, as the five elements leave the wise soul when it is liberated" [adapted from the *Buddha-charita*].

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They left him at a time when he needed most the strength of human sympathy in his solitary and desperate struggle towards truth,¹ a struggle which is soon ended by his attainment of enlightenment and the doctrine of Nirvāṇa. These details in the history of his education and spiritual development show how largely they were directed by the prevailing Brahmanical theories of self-culture and training. Even where the Buddha's originality in his system of training is most generally asserted, when he gives up penances as mere weariness of the flesh, it cannot be maintained when we consider that Brahmanical thought even in earlier times was quite conscious of their limitations. Yājñavalkya, as a hermit, declares to his wife: "Of a truth, O Gārgī, he who does not know this imperishable One, though in this world he should distribute alms and practise penance for many a thousand years, thereby wins but finite good" [*Bri. Up.*, iii, 8, 10]. This line of criticism culminated later in a different theory of *tapas* as defined by Manu: "The *tapas* of the Brāhman is concentrated study; of the Kshatriya, protection of the weak; of the Vaiśya, trade and agriculture;

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of the Śūdra, service of others." It may be noted in this connection that the Buddha's first teacher Ālāra proposed to him 'a rigorous course of sacred study, discoursing on the supreme Brahman' and 'a rule of conduct' whereby the devotee 'cultivating absolute content with any alms from any person, carries out his lonely life, indifferent to all feelings, and satisfied in himself' [*Buddha-charita*]. It would thus appear that, after he had left the life of penance or extreme self-mortification, he practically reverted to this earlier system of life on the eve of his Buddhahood.

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¹ In the *Mil. Pañh.*, iv, 6, 3 are mentioned as the Buddha's teachers those eight Brahmans who took note of the marks on his body and made known his future glory, viz. Rāma and Dhaja, and Lakkhaṇa and Manti, and Yañña, and Suyāma, and Subhoja, and Sudatta; as also 'the Brahman Sabbamitta of high lineage in the land of Udichcha (north-west), a philologist and grammarian, well read in the six Vedāṅgas whom Suddhodana the king, the Bodhisat's father, sent for and handed over the boy to his charge, to be taught'; besides his later teachers, Ālāra and Uddaka the son of Rāma. According to the tradition of the *Lalita Vistara* (ch. x) the Buddha was sent early to a 'writing school' under its master Viśvāmitra. There he inquires about what he is to be taught among the sixty-four kinds of writing he himself knows of beforehand.

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**General Attitude of Buddhism towards Brahmanism.** In conclusion, we may note the attitude that the Buddha and his system take towards Brahmans and Brahmanical systems. That attitude can be inferred from several typical pieces of evidence. The Buddhist dogmatic [cf. *Lalita Vistara*, ch. iii] asserts that a Buddha can be born only as a Brahman or as a Kshatriya and not 'in a low family such as that of a Chaṇḍāla or of a basket-maker or of a chariot-maker or of a Pukkasa'. This shows that Buddhist thought does not make light of the Brahmanical distinctions of caste. In the *Ambaṭṭha-sutta* more than usual consideration is shown to the young 'pupil of a respected Brahman', for "truly not undesired by the Exalted One is such an interview with such noble youths". Similarly, a scion of the house of the Mallas is welcomed by Ānanda as "a very distinguished and well-known person" whose "adherence" to the new religion is declared to be of "great efficacy" and the Buddha grants him an interview in that view [*Mahāvagga*, vi, 36]. In the texts it is frequently to be found that free access to the Buddha is always accorded to a person if he is "a certain Brahman". Even where persons of lower castes are entertained, it is on the ground of their true and highest Brahmanhood which comes of "holy zeal and chaste living, restraint, and self-repression".

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Sunīta was such a person born of a humble family whose work was to "sweep the withered flowers out of temples and palaces" [Oldenberg's *Buddha*, pp. 156, 157 nn., giving these references]. The case of Sunīta may be compared with that of Satyakāma Jābāla of the Upanishads whose genuine Brahmanhood is recognized behind his doubtful parentage. Oldenberg [ib., p. 155], very forcibly points out that, in spite of its theory of equality, a marked leaning to aristocracy (of all the three varieties, birth, brain, and bullion) lingered in ancient Buddhism as an inheritance from the past, and proves it by a reference to the composition of the inner circle of the Buddha's disciples which counted "Brahmans like Sāriputta, Moggallāna, Kachchāna, nobles like Ānanda, Rāhula, Anuruddha, sons of the greatest merchants and highest municipal dignitaries, like Yasa, invariably men and youths of the most respectable classes of society, and with an education in keeping with their social status", while there is hardly "any instance in which a Chaṇḍāla—the Pariah of that age—is mentioned in the sacred writings as a member of the order". It may be further pointed out that the compound *Samaṇa-Brāhmaṇa* which constantly appears in the Buddhist texts only indicates the equality of position given to the two classes. In the words of Childers [*Dictionary*, p.

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427], "nothing shows more strongly the universal veneration in which the Brāhmans were held in Gautama's time, a veneration due to their birth and intellectual endowments, than the fact that Gautama, whose mission it was to break down the Brahmanical system, nevertheless held up the Brāhmans themselves to the respect of his followers, placed them on a level with his own monks, and even adapted their name into his own system, applying it figuratively to the Arhat or Buddhist monk who has attained the highest sanctification. Hence we have the word *Samaṇa-Brāhmaṇā* (pl.) in which *Brāhmaṇa* sometimes has its ordinary meaning and sometimes its secondary meaning of Arhat." Besides the linguistic evidence, Childers brings forward other evidence in support of his correct contention. In *Vasalasutta* (*vv.* 129, 129), the Buddha condemns as an outcast the man who "by falsehood deceives either a Brāhman or a Samaṇa or any other mendicant" or "by words annoys" such "when meal-time has come and does not give him anything". A passage in the *Dhammapada* (v. 389) enjoins kind treatment of Brāhmans and another (v. 142) declares that a man in fine apparel may yet be a Brāhman, Śramaṇa, and a Bhikshu if he is virtuous. It is man's character, and not his clothes, that counts in religion.

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Childers cites the interesting story of King Prasenajit's minister Santati hearing Buddha's words and instantly attaining Arhatship and Nirvāṇa while the priests cannot settle whether in his courtly attire he is to be considered as a Samaṇa or a Brahman. The Buddha settles their doubt by declaring: "It is right to call a son of mine (i.e. a convert) both a Samaṇa and a Brāhman." The Buddha paid an honour to Brahmanism by exempting the Brāhman ascetics called Jaṭilas, on the ground of their spiritual progress, from the probation necessary to their ordination (*Mahāv.*, i, 38, 3], while a similar honour was shown by his acceptance of invitations from Brāhmans without any idea of converting them. One such host was Keniya whom he praised for his devotion to Brāhmans (ib., vi, 35], and he also applauded the Sāvitrī hymn and fire-sacrifice to confirm him in his faith [ib., vi, 35, 8]. Lastly, it is necessary to note that this attitude of Buddhism towards Brāhmans, thus fixed by its founder, and sanctioned by his high religious authority, persists through later times till it is strengthened by a sort of legislative sanction in the imperial decrees of Asoka who in his Edicts is never tired of repeating his injunction that due reverence must be shown to Brāhmans and followers of other sects as much as to followers of his own faith.

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We may conclude this thesis with the following findings of Rhys Davids: "The fact we should never forget that Gotama was born and brought up and lived and died a Hindu. . . On the whole, he was regarded by the Hindus of that time as a Hindu. . . Without the intellectual work of his predecessors his own work, however original, would have been impossible. . . He was the greatest and wisest and best of the Hindus and, throughout his career, a characteristic Indian" [adapted from his *American Lectures*, pp. 116, 117].

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**Buddhism did not seek Hindu Social Reform.** A word may also be said about the Buddhist principles of social organization as distinguished from the Brahmanical ones. It has been very generally held that Buddhism rose as a revolt against the caste system of Brahmanism. To hold this view is to completely misunderstand the very mission of Buddhism. Although the Buddha was fond of attacking the mere Brahmanhood of birth and insisting on the Brahmanhood of virtue, yet the idea of being a social reformer never entered his mind or into his schemes. Nothing was farther from or more foreign to his nature and temperament than this supposed enthusiasm of the Buddha for the work of social uplift of the masses or asserting the claims of the depressed and oppressed classes, their birthrights as human beings, against those privileged merely on the ground of birth under the Brahmanical system. In the first place, it must be understood that the institution of caste was not known in the Buddha's time as a system of grave and glaring injustice loudly calling for its mending or ending; it did not yet develop the rigidity and inelasticity of the rules of its arbitrary classification in which its critics find its most objectionable and obnoxious features; we have authoritative precedents like that of Satyakāma Jābāla which point to the law then operative that Brahmanhood was conferred on the strength of spiritual qualification where the physical qualification was lacking; and, what is more, the pride of birth with its inevitable inequalities was checked by the law relating to the four Āśramas of life which emphasized the spiritual objective of the institution and made all the castes equal in a common obedience to it. In the second place, it is to be recalled that the Buddha renounced the world to set up and live in an ideal world of his own to be peopled only by persons of the same persuasion. It was not an attempt to reform or abolish castes, it was an attempt to reform entire society out of its existence, to abolish it completely so to speak. He did not believe in the economic, social, or political life of man but only in the religious or spiritual life, the life dedicated to its highest end as conceived by him. Thus caste has no significance for him; the problems of social reform do not trouble him; they have no place in his scheme of life. Buddhist society was thus a society of simplified human beings, of ascetics and monks who divested themselves of the complex and complicated earthly relationships. It was thus itself a kind of a special caste constituted by those who under the Brahmanical system of life would belong to its third and, especially, the fourth Āśrama of life. No doubt, the Buddhist fraternity was open without distinctions of caste to all who would don the garb of monks and embark upon a religious pilgrimage; but so was the Brahmanical fourth Āśrama of life, the life of a *Yati* or *Sannyāsī* who is beyond the pale of society and its conventions. Thus, far from there being any real or fundamental conflict of ideals between Brahmanism and Buddhism, the latter only sets before itself a more limited scope and ideal and covers only a part of the ground trodden by the former. While Brahmanism is a religion of both Time and Eternity, Buddhism addresses itself to Eternity alone.

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**General Indebtedness of Buddhism to Brahmanism.** The characteristic of Buddhism is its organization of Monks into *Saṁgha*. This central idea of Asceticism has its source in Brahmanism. The Brahmanical scheme of life divided it into four *Āśramas*, of which three are based on asceticism. The *Brahmachārī* is of two classes: (1) *Upakurvāṇa*, student for a period; (2) *Naishṭhika*, a life-long student. The Brahmachārī of the second class is a *Sannyāsī* like a Buddhist Bhikshu [*Chhāndogya Upa.*, ii, 23, 1]. The *Vānaprastha* and *Sannyāsī* are regular ascetics like Buddhist monks. Buddhism has adopted for its monks most of the rules of *Brahmacharya*. The first duty of the Brahmachārī is begging and the Buddhist term *Bhikshu* implies one who begs for livelihood. The third *Āśrama* is also called that of a Bhikshu by legal authorities like Gautama or Āpastamba. The rules of *brahmacharya* as to alms-bowl, manner of begging, eating, sitting, sleeping, cutting of hair, clothing, abstention from luxuries like garlands, scents, oils, sporting in water, etc., are all adopted by Buddhism for its Bhikshus. Even the Buddhist doctrine of *Ahiṁsā* is Brahmanical. The texts forbid Brahmachārī tread on land that is ploughed, or grows crops, lest life is destroyed. For the same reason, the *Parivrājaka* is forbidden travelling in rains, but should keep to a rain-retreat, an institution specifically Buddhist. Again, in the Brahmanical system, the Sannyāsī who renounces home is called *Aniketa*, should live under a tree as a *Vṛiksha-mūlika* [*Bau.*, ii, 10, 63, 67]. Later texts allow him better residence such as *Śūnyāgāra*, *Devāgāra* (temple), *Maṭha*, *Kuṭī*, *Araṇya*, *Giriguhā*, and the like [*Vaikhānasa*, vi, 3, 6; *Vaśishṭha*, x, 8-10]. Buddhism also shows the same evolution in the housing of the Bhikshu. He starts as an *Anāgārika*, living under a *Vṛiksha-mūla* [*Mahāvagga*, i, 30, 4], and in *Araṇya* (forest), *Kandara*, *Giriguhā*, etc. [*Chullavagga*, vi, 1, 1-2]. A merchant prince of Rājagṛiha offered to provide for improved housing, whereupon the Buddha allowed the following: (1) *Vihāra*; (2) *Aḍḍhayoga* (= *Suparṇa Vaṅkagṛiha*); (3) *Prāsāda*; (4) *Harmya*; and (5) *Guhā* of "bricks, stone, wood, or earth". Normally, however, the Bhikshu lived in a leafy hut (*tiṇakuṭī*) [*Bhikshu-Prātimoksha*, ii, 1, 1-2]. Again, Buddhism runs after physical purity (*śauchāchāra*) as much as Brahmanism. Brahmanism treats religion as something to be lived, as more a matter of conduct than philosophy. *Brahmacharya* itself means "the practice (*charyā*) of Brahma (= Veda)". The teacher is called *Āchārya*, "he who practises the precepts of religion." Thus Brahminical education emphasizes right habits more than mere study of books. These have been already described. Buddhism is full of such practices (*āchāra*). The *Vinaya* gives regulations regarding such trivial details of life as the size of tooth-brush, of clothing, seat, needle-case, manner of eating, as will be seen below. The dominance of ceremonies in Buddhist life has come in for censure in an Edict of Asoka [Rock Edict, ix]. Lastly, the Brahmanical system of fasting on select days has also been adopted by both Jainism and Buddhism. It is also to be noted that the *Parivrājikā* is the precursor of the Buddhist *Bhikshuṇī*. There were non-Buddhist ascetic Orders before the rise of Buddhism. Thus the Order of Nuns is not an innovation of Buddhism [*cf.* *Bhikshu-Prātimoksha*, 41].

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