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Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c21.s1: The Controversies and Conversions of the Buddha

Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c21.s1

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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].

Cites (10)