According to best estimates, the historical Buddha, named Siddhattha Gotama in Pali, and Siddhartha Gautama in Sanskrit, was born 563 BCE in what is now Lumbini, Nepal.
He was raised in the small kingdom of Kapilavastu. His father was King Suddhodana, the leader of Shakyaclan, whose capital was Kapilavastu, and who were later annexed by the growing Kingdom of Kosala during the Buddha’s lifetime; Gautama was the family name. His mother, Queen Maha Maya (Māyādevī) and Suddhodana’s wife, was a Koliyan princess. Legend has it that, on the night Siddhartha was conceived, Queen Maya dreamt that a white elephant with six white tusks entered her right side, and ten months later Siddhartha was born.
As was the Shakya tradition, when his mother Queen Maya became pregnant, she left Kapilvastu for her father’s kingdom to give birth. However, her son is said to have been born on the way, at Lumbini, in a garden beneath a sal tree.
Sources hold that the Buddha’s mother died at his birth, a few days or seven days later. The infant was given the name Siddhattha, meaning “he who achieves his aim.” During the birth celebrations, the hermit seer Asita journeyed from his mountain abode and announced that the child would either become a great king or a great holy man.
Suddhodana held a naming ceremony on the fifth day, and invited eight brahmin scholars to read the future. All gave a dual prediction that the baby would either become a great king or a great holy man. Kondanna, the youngest, and later to be the first arahant (one who has attained the goal of enlightenment or awakening and thus become a bodhi) other than the Buddha himself, was reputed to be the only one who unequivocally predicted that Siddhartha would become a Buddha.
Early texts suggest that Gautama was not familiar with the dominant religious teachings of his time until he left on his religious quest, which is said to have been motivated by existential concern for the human condition.
Siddhartha was brought up by his mother’s younger sister, Maha Pajapati. By tradition, he is said to have been destined by birth to the life of a prince, and had three palaces (for seasonal occupation) built for him. Although more recent scholarship doubts this status, his father, wishing for his son to be a great king—rather than a holy man—is said to have shielded him from religious teachings and from knowledge of human suffering.
When he reached the age of 16, his father r arranged his marriage to a cousin of the same age named Yasodharā. She gave birth to a son, named Rahula. Siddhartha is then said to have spent 29 years as a prince in Kapilavastu. Although his father ensured that Siddhartha was provided with everything he could want or need, Buddhist scriptures say that the future Buddha felt that material wealth was not life’s ultimate goal.
At the age of 29 Siddhartha left his palace to meet his subjects. Despite his father’s efforts to hide from him the sick, aged and suffering, Siddhartha was said to have seen an old man. When his charioteer Channa explained to him that all people grew old, the prince went on further trips beyond the palace. On these he encountered a diseased man, a decaying corpse, and an ascetic. These depressed him, and he initially strove to overcome ageing, sickness, and death by living the life of an ascetic.
Accompanied by Channa and aboard his horse Kanthaka, Gautama quit his palace for the life of a mendicant. He initially went to Rajagaha and began his ascetic life by begging for alms in the street. He then left Rajagaha and practiced under two hermit teachers. After mastering the teachings of Alara Kalama, he was asked by Kalama to succeed him. However, Gautama felt unsatisfied by the practice, and moved on to become a student of Udaka Ramaputta. With him he achieved high levels of meditative consciousness, and was again asked to succeed his teacher. But, once more, he was not satisfied, and again moved on.
Siddhartha and a group of five companions led by Kaundinya are then said to have set out to take their austerities even further. They tried to find enlightenment through deprivation of worldly goods, including food, and by practising self-mortification. After nearly starving himself to death by restricting his food intake to around a leaf or nut per day, he collapsed in a river while bathing and almost drowned. Siddhartha began to reconsider his path. Then, he remembered a moment in childhood in which he had been watching his father start the season’s plowing. He attained a concentrated and focused state that was blissful and refreshing, the jhāna.
After realizing that meditative jhana was the right path to awakening, but that extreme asceticism didn’t work, Gautama discovered what was to be called the Middle Way—a path of moderation away from the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification.
In a famous incident, after becoming starved and weakened, he is said to have accepted milk and rice pudding from a village girl named Sujata. Such was his emaciated appearance that she wrongly believed him to be a spirit that had granted her a wish.
The Buddha’s Enlightenment
Following this incident, Gautama sat down under a pipal tree—now known as the Bodhi tree—in Bodh Gaya, India, and there vowed not to arise until he had found the truth.
Kaundinya and four other companions, believing that he had abandoned his search and become undisciplined, left. After 49 days of meditation, at the age of 35, he is said to have attained Enlightenment. According to some traditions, this occurred in approximately the fifth lunar month, while, according to others, it was in the twelfth month. From that time, Gautama was known to his followers as the Buddha or "Awakened One." ("Buddha" is also sometimes translated as "The Enlightened One.")
At the time of his awakening he realized complete insight into the cause of suffering, and the steps necessary to eliminate it. These discoveries became known as the “Four Noble Truths,” which are at the heart of Buddhist teaching. Through mastery of these truths, a state of supreme liberation, or Nibbana (Sanskrit: Nirvana) is believed to be possible for any being.
The Buddha described Nibbana as the perfect peace of a mind that’s free from ignorance, greed, hatred and other afflictive states, or “defilements” (kilesas).
According to a story in the Āyācana—a scripture found in the Pāli and other canons—immediately after his awakening, the Buddha debated whether or not he should teach the Dhamma to others. He was concerned that humans were so overpowered by ignorance, greed and hatred that they could never recognise the path, which is subtle, deep and hard to grasp. However, legend has it that Brahmā Sahampati convinced him, arguing that at least some will understand it. The Buddha relented, and agreed to teach.
He then travelled to the Deer Park near Benares in northern India, where he set in motion what Buddhists call the Wheel of Dhamma by delivering his first sermon to the five companions with whom he had sought enlightenment. Together with him, they formed the first sangha: the company of Buddhist monks.
All five become arahants, and within the first two months, with the conversion of Yasa and fifty-four of his friends, the number of such arahants is said to have grown to 60. The conversion of three brothers named Kassapa followed, with their reputed 200, 300 and 500 disciples, respectively. This swelled the sangha to more than 1000.
The Buddha’s Ministry
For the remaining 45 years of his life, the Buddha is said to have traveled in the Gangetic Plain, in what is now Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and southern Nepal, teaching a diverse range of people: from nobles to outcaste street sweepers, murderers such as Angulimala, and cannibals such as Alavaka. From the outset, Buddhism was equally open to all races and classes, and had no caste structure, as was the rule in Hinduism. Although the Buddha’s language remains unknown, it’s likely that he taught in one or more of a variety of closely related Middle Indo-Aryan dialects, of which Pali may be a standardization.
The sangha traveled through the subcontinent, expounding the dhamma. This continued throughout the year, except during the four months of the vassana rainy season when ascetics of all religions rarely traveled. One reason was that it was more difficult to do so without causing harm to animal life. At this time of year, the sangha would retreat to monasteries, public parks or forests, where people would come to them.
The first vassana was spent at Varanasi when the sangha was formed. After this, the Buddha kept a promise to travel to Rajagaha, capital of Magadha, to visit King Bimbisara. During this visit, Sariputta and Mahamoggallana were converted by Assaji, one of the first five disciples, after which they were to become the Buddha’s two foremost followers. The Buddha spent the next three seasons at Veluvana Bamboo Grove monastery in Rajagaha, capital of Magadha.
Upon hearing of his son’s awakening, Suddhodana sent, over a period, ten delegations to ask him to return to Kapilavastu. On the first nine occasions, the delegates failed to deliver the message, and instead joined the sangha to become arahants. The tenth delegation, led by Kaludayi, a childhood friend of Gautama’s (who also became an arahant), however, delivered the message.
Now two years after his awakening, the Buddha agreed to return, and made a two-month journey by foot to Kapilavastu, teaching the dhamma as he went. At his return, the royal palace prepared a midday meal, but the sangha was making an alms round in Kapilavastu. Hearing this, Suddhodana approached his son, the Buddha, saying, “Ours is the warrior lineage of Mahamassata, and not a single warrior has gone seeking alms.” The Buddha is said to have replied, “That is not the custom of your royal lineage. But it is the custom of my Buddha lineage. Several thousands of Buddhas have gone by seeking alms.”
During the visit, many members of the royal family joined the sangha. The Buddha’s cousins Ananda and Anuruddha became two of his five chief disciples. At the age of seven, his son Rahula also joined, and became one of his ten chief disciples. His half-brother Nanda also joined and became an arahant.
Of the Buddha’s disciples, Sariputta, Mahamoggallana, Mahakasyapa, Ananda and Anuruddha are believed to have been the five closest to him.
In the fifth vassana, the Buddha was staying at Mahavana near Vesali when he heard news of the impending death of his father. He is said to have gone to Suddhodana and taught the dhamma, after which his father became an arahant.
The king’s death and cremation was to inspire the creation of an order of nuns. Buddhist texts record that the Buddha was reluctant to ordain women. His foster mother Maha Pajapati, for example, approached him, asking to join the sangha, but he refused. Maha Pajapati, however, was so intent on the path of awakening that she led a group of royal Sakyan and Koliyan ladies, which followed the sangha on a long journey to Rajagaha. In time, after Ananda championed their cause, the Buddha is said to have reconsidered and, five years after the formation of the sangha, agreed to the ordination of women as nuns. He reasoned that males and females had an equal capacity for awakening. But he gave women additional rules to follow.
The Buddha’s Death
According to the Mahaparinibbana Sutta of the Pali canon, at the age of 80, the Buddha announced that he would soon reach Parinibbana, or the final deathless state, and abandon his earthly body. After this, the Buddha ate his last meal, which he had received as an offering from a blacksmith named Cunda. Falling violently ill, Buddha instructed his attendant Ānanda to convince Cunda that the meal eaten at his place had nothing to do with his passing and that his meal would be a source of the greatest merit as it provided the last meal for a Buddha.
The Buddha then asked all the attendant Bhikkhus (monks) to clarify any doubts or questions they had. They had none. According to Buddhist scriptures, he then finally entered Parinibbana. The Buddha’s final words are reported to have been: “All composite things pass away. Strive for your own liberation with diligence.”
—adapted from Wikipedia
Ulf Wolf