Download ORIGINS AND SPREAD OF BUDDHISM

•Siddhartha
Gautama (563 483 B.C.) –
founder
searching for
understanding of
suffering
•Emperor Asoka
(3rd Century
B.C.) Spread
Buddhism in India
ORIGINS AND
SPREAD OF
BUDDHISM
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•Objected to harsher features
of Hinduism such as the caste
system
BUDDHIS
M
•Focuses on knowledge,
especially self-knowledge
•Enlightenment ends the cycle
of reincarnation
•Elimination of worldly desires
•Ahimsa - determination not to
hurt or kill people or animals
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FOUR NOBLE TRUTHS
• Sorrow and suffering are part of all life.
• People suffer because they desire
things they cannot have.
• The way to escape suffering is to end
desire, to stop wanting, and to reach a
stage of not wanting (NIRVANA).
• To end desire, follow the “middle path,”
i.e., the path that avoids the extremes
of too much pleasure and desire.
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EIGHTFOLD PATH TO THE MIDDLE WAY
•Right understanding
•Right purpose
•Right speech
•Right conduct
•Right means of
earning a living
•Right effort
•Right awareness
•Right meditation
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Practices of Buddhism
• Meditation – derived from
Buddha’s experience and
teachings
• Mantras – Sacred sounds
believed to possess
superpowers
• Prayer Wheel – Spinning
the wheel is effective as
reciting sacred texts (saw
them in Mt. Everest video)
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Sects of Buddhism
• Theravada – stressed monastic life as the
way to reach nirvana.
– Respected the Buddha, but did not see him as
a god.
• Mahayana – Offers a more mainstream way
of practicing Buddhism (allows work,
marriage, possessions). Some in this sect
worshipped the Buddha and other
enlightened ones as gods…
Globalization & Diversity: Rowntree, Lewis,
Price, Wyckoff
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How and where did Buddhism
spread?
• Buddha set up monasteries and covenants
• Followers spread Buddha’s teaching through
word of mouth
• Three Baskets of Wisdom – book of Buddha’s
teachings
• Spread throughout parts of Asia (China, Tibet,
Japan, Burma, Thailand, etc.)
FALL OF BUDDHISM
ON THE SUBCONTINENT
• Hinduism - broad and tolerant, accepting many
of the teachings of Buddha
• Buddhists in India - willing to compromise with the
beliefs and customs of Hinduism
• Final blow - 8th century - arrival of Islam
-- Destroyed the great Buddhist monasteries
-- Burned libraries
-- Killed monks
-- Mughal Empire conquered the lower Indus
valley
• Today - only 1 million Buddhists in India
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Religious Rivalries in South Asia
– Hinduism
• Major faith of India and Nepal
• Forms of worship differ by region – roots lie within the
Aryan culture
– Islam
• 400 million Muslims in the region, among the largest
Muslim communities in the world
– Pakistan, Bangladesh, Maldives are mostly Muslim
– In India, Muslims concentrated in the cities, in the north, the
upper and central Ganges plain, and in Kerala
– Sikhism
• Sikhism: faith incorporating elements of Hinduism and
Islam
• Originated in Punjab in 1400s, still concentrated in Punjab
• Sikh men noted for work as soldiers and bodyguards
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Religious Rivalries (cont.)
– Buddhism and Jainism
• Buddhism virtually disappeared in India but persisted
in Sri Lanka, mainland Southeast Asia, and the high
valleys of the Himalayas
• Jainism – religion that emerged around 500 B.C. as
protest to Hinduism ties to the caste system
– Stressed extreme non-violence
– Other Religious Groups
• Parsis (Zoroastrians): an ancient religion focusing on
the cosmic struggle between good and evil
– Concentrated in the Mumbai area
• More Indian Christians than either Parsis or Jains
• British missionaries converted animists to
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Protestantism
Hindu/Muslim-practices/perceptions
•Hindus tend to be
vegetarians (ahimsa and
reincarnation beliefs
foster this)
•Cows are sacred animals
•Believe in reincarnation
•Brahman, if it is God, is
an impersonal one
•Acknowledges multiple
gods
•Follow caste system – no
social or religious mobility
within one lifetime
•Muslims see Hindus as
polytheistic infidels not to be
tolerated
•Muslims eat meat (cows) –
not pork
•Eternal life in heaven or hell
•Muslims are strict
monotheists
•Muslims reject the concept
of castes – equality of
believers
•Reject reincarnation
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