The Buddha
Buddha is a verbally-derived noun in PÄli meaning âunderstood; knownâ (Coneâs Dictionary of Pali), and it can also be used to refer to someone who has understood. Therefore, it is an epithet to refer to the person we call the âBuddhaâ today. In his teachings he seldom or perhaps never referred to himself as such, so this may be a term that later generations of Buddhists have adopted (particularly modern Buddhists).
These days, some scholars eg. (Schopen, 1997), (Drewes, 2017) argue that the Buddha is âahistoricalâ (âlacking historical perspective or contextâ). By this, they mean we cannot validate any aspect of his life or his teachings, or even whether he existed as a person. Everything we know about the Buddha comes from Buddhist texts, where he is often portrayed as a legendary or mystical figure. Some Buddhists admit a lot of the details around his life seem fanciful and made up, constructed possibly centuries after his death. There are no accounts of him or his life from non-Buddhist sources. Even if he existed, we donât know precisely where he was born, what his lineage was, his real name, or even what language he spoke. For more details, refer to the section entitled Did the Buddha actually existed in history?.
For the purposes of this website, I would like to assume the Buddha was a real person and accept a âminimum viable biographyâ. He was allegedly born in Lumbini sometime in the 5th century BCE from the Gotama clan of the Shakya tribe, in present-day Nepal, and spent his life living and travelling around the Ganges Plain (in what has been termed the âGreater Magadhaâ cultural region in (Bronkhorst, 2007)), near the modern NepalâIndia border.
The origin of the Shakya tribe is unclear, and they have possibly mixed Aryan and indigenous lineage. (Levman, 2014) They were an eastern sub-Himalayan ethnic group living on the periphery, both geographically and culturally, of Greater Magadha. The Buddhaâs father (Suddhodana) was supposedly a member of the ruling oligarchy but this may have been an invention and he may have had humble beginnings. In any case, the Shakyans, who were organised into a gaáčasaáč
gha (an aristocratic oligarchic republic) had become a vassal state in the Kingdom of Kosala by the time of the Buddha, so the Buddha was hardly a prince as portrayed in some accounts. The Shakyans were not well regarded by the brahmins, as narrated in 6D/3 Ambaáčáčhasutta.
(HinĂŒber, 2006) even claims that he can identify an archaic syntactical structure in the way the opening text of some suttas describe place names as âtraceable to Indo-Iranian.â Indeed, some scholars such as Michael Witzel have equated the Shakyas with Central Asian nomads who were called Scythians by the Greeks, SakÄs by the Achaemenid Persians, and ĆÄka by the Indo-Aryans. (Attwood, 2012)
Although the Buddha was sometimes regarded as a khattiya (a member of the royal or aristocratic caste), in reality the Shakyas were probably outside the [S]caturvaráča caste system. (Levman, 2014) It is unclear whether he has had much exposure to Vedic texts or brahmins growing up. Accounts of the Buddha conversing and debating with brahmins, and apparently exhibiting an advanced knowledge of Brahmanism, are probably invented by disciples who are former brahmins, eager to portray the Buddhaâs superiority over their former beliefs. It is also likely these accounts are invented for the purpose of winning debates at the royal court, as Buddhism - particularly after the Buddhaâs death - was highly dependent on royal patronage. As (Bronkhorst, 2007) wrote, the Greater Magadha region was not settled by brahmins until nearly a millennium after the Buddhaâs death, so it is unlikely the Buddha would have encountered many brahmins in his lifetime.
Significant parts of the Buddhaâs teaching and biography were subsequently âbrahmanizedâ, presumably to attract brahmin converts. Brahmanization can be seen even in the Khandhaka, where the author was probably a former brahmin (see The Author of the Khandhaka). (Shults, 2014) gives a few examples of Brahmanical motifs appearing in Buddhist texts. (Levman, 2014) suggests the Buddha, due to his unique heritage, probably stood midway between two cultures, one coming from outside of India, the other from its native soil, and this may be the secret to his success across a broad range of converts, even today.
(Levman, 2014) writes:
Establishing the Buddhaâs social space and time is critical to understanding his appeal. He was, in effect, at the âmiddle wayâ or juncture between two cultures, the colonizing Aryan vaidikas (Vedists) and the colonized indigenous peoples.
A Minimum Viable Biography of the Buddha
According to 7D/1.17 DevatÄrocana, an âassembly of gods and deitiesâ provides the following short description of the Buddha (translation by me):
Indeed, Venerable Sir, in this very fortunate aeon, the Blessed One has now arisen in the world, an Arahant, a Perfectly Enlightened One. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, is a Khattiya by birth, born into a Khattiya family. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, is Gotama by clan. The Blessed Oneâs lifespan, Venerable Sir, is short, limited, and brief; [in this age] one who lives long lives for a hundred years or a little more. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, was fully enlightened at the foot of an Assattha tree. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, had a pair of disciples named SÄriputta and MoggallÄna, a chief, excellent pair. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, had one assembly of disciples of twelve hundred and fifty monks. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, this one assembly of His disciples consisted entirely of those whose taints were destroyed. The Blessed One, Venerable Sir, had a monk named Änanda as attendant, the chief attendant. The Blessed Oneâs father, Venerable Sir, was a king named Suddhodana. A lady named MÄyÄ was His mother, His birth-mother. A city named Kapilavatthu was His royal capital. Of the Blessed One, Venerable Sir, thus was the renunciation, thus the going forth into homelessness, thus the striving, thus the full enlightenment, thus the setting in motion of the Wheel of Dhamma. We, Venerable Sir, having lived the holy life under the Blessed One, having eradicated sensual desire for sensual pleasures, are reborn here.â
According to 9M/4.6 MahÄsaccakasutta, as a young man he started to question the nature of existence, of being born and subject to the negative consequences of life such as growing old, falling sick, dying, sorrow. He started to search for a path out of these consequences. He renounced and became a âwandering recluseâ (samaáča) and followed the practices of various teachers. samaáča ([S] Ćramaáča) was an established feature of Greater Magadha society in the Buddhaâs time, and the renunciants can follow various beliefs and practices, including asceticism. The word originally would have a connotation of âwearyâ (as in someone who is weary of life and looking for salvation). (Shults, 2016) He eventually concluded these teachings did not lead to satisfactory answers.
He ultimately discovered the answers himself and attained âawakeningâ or âPerfect Understandingâ (sammÄsambodhi). The story of his life post awakening is told in the Khandhaka.
Out of compassion for other living beings, he taught a way for others to achieve âawakeningâ too.
It would appear the Buddhaâs teachings were successful - thousands of people became enlightened as a result of his teachings and became arahant (enlightened beings) in his lifetime.
What did the Buddha teach?
The Buddha can be described as advocating a âsoteriologyâ that prescribes a way of eradicating dukkha, which is often translated as âsufferingâ in English. However, dukkha has a broader meaning than âsufferingâ, with nuances ranging from vague discomfort, unease, and lack of satisfaction all the way to pain, loss, illness, old age and eventually death. Dukkha is everything that is âunsatisfactoryâ with life and encompasses everything âbadâ that has ever happened to you, might happen, or will happen.
What does âsoteriologyâ mean? The Oxford Dictionary of English defines it as âthe doctrine of salvationâ, from the Greek sĆtÄria (âsalvationâ) + -logy (âstudyâ or âdiscourseâ).
So the Buddhaâs soteriology is the Buddhaâs understanding, and description of his âsalvationâ, which is the release, liberation, cessation and extinguishment from dukkha.
The answer turns out to be both profound and simple, but perhaps not easy to implement.
It is âprofoundâ because the Buddha started by trying to answer two questions: âWhat causes dukkha?â, and âWho experiences dukkha?â or more colloquially âWho suffers?â
For the first question (âWhat causes dukkha?â) the Buddha traced the origin of dukkha by progressively working backwards through a set of linked causes. He started by observing that the ultimate âsufferingâ, ie. aging and death, is an inevitable consequence of life. All living beings will eventually age and die, therefore the cause of dukkha can be traced right back to the birth of living beings. All the other forms of dukkha, such as sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief and despair, can similarly be traced back to conception and birth, for if we had not been born we would not experience any dukkha.
But what causes birth? The Buddha determined this is the survival instinct, or will to live. This âwill to liveâ is fueled by a clinging or attachment to life, which in turn is caused by a craving or innate desire to live, and to continue living.
What generates this craving? It is caused by our accumulated feelings, our experiences, originating from our senses, triggered by the external world and from our consciousness itself.
What of consciousness itself? The Buddha tackled this question by asking the second question: âWho experiences dukkha?â
For there to be dukkha, there must be âsomeoneâ who is affected by, and experiences dukkha. So the Buddha started to investigate the nature of âthe selfâ, or our notion of personal identity and âselfhood.â
The Buddha came to the (logical) conclusion that our sense of âselfâ is generated from our subjective experiences (phenomena) and our accumulated thoughts. In other words, our âconsciousnessâ is âconstructedâ and ephemeral. Furthermore, we are unaware or ignorant of the âconstructedâ or transient nature of our consciousness, and hence ignorance is the ultimate cause of dukkha.
The Buddhaâs concept of consciousness is similar to âartificial intelligenceâ - we behave like a neural network âtrainedâ on sensory input and generates âresponsesâ that impact our bodies and influences future reactions and responses. Our âselfâ and âsentienceâ is therefore also generated - it is a survival instinct to enable us to cope and respond to the world around us.
This was a radical and original idea formulated by the Buddha, different from other beliefs common during his time. It predates many modern philosophical theories. The Buddha was quite possibly the worldâs first âphenomenologistâ.
According to the Buddha, what we regard as a âselfâ is nothing more than the sum total of all our accumulated memories of perceptual phenomena, sensory stimuli, feelings, emotions, apperceptions, thoughts, beliefs, attitudes, and other mental constructs.
The Buddhaâs viewpoint can be described as âphenomenalismâ - everything we experience is through our senses and our imagination. Because of that. we are unable to determine whether the real world or physical universe actually exists. Our âworldâ is effectively a mental construct, formed from previous experiences, apperceptions, influenced and shaped by language (we ânameâ things that we can perceive). Therefore our âselfâ also is named and constructed.
The Buddha points out that this âselfâ and all the mental constructs are impermanent. They have no existence outside of our minds, and disappear when we die. Therefore the âworldâ that we perceive is also impermanent, because it is nothing more than a mental construction.
It is important to clarify that the Buddha did not deny the existence of the physical universe (contrary to what some Buddhists believe - that the âworldâ is an illusion), nor did he deny the possible existence of a metaphysical self which is greater than, and possibly separate from, the constructed self. He simply points out that it is impossible for us to verify or refute these abstract or metaphysical concepts. Nor did he deny the possibility of a Creator of the universe, or the existence of other universes and realms, or the existence of beings superior or inferior to ourselves, such as gods and demons. However, I suggest these concepts are ultimately irrelevant in the soteriology - they have no impact on whether we can eliminate or avoid dukkha.
The Buddhaâs solution turned out to be surprisingly âsimpleâ. If our sense of self is constructed, then dukkha is also a mental construction. In other words, the âsuffererâ self-generates suffering. It is our âignoranceâ of the constructed nature of our consciousness that ultimately causes dukkha. Therefore, to avoid dukkha, the âsuffererâ simply has to stop generating thoughts or performing actions that will inevitably lead to suffering.
This sounds straightforward, but does it really work? Potentially one can imagine this would work with a sense of unease or dissatisfaction. One also could argue that grief or loss is an emotion that can be dealt with, and even physical pain can be ignored. Can we truly avoid or eliminate sickness, old age and death?
Crucially, this is where the Buddhaâs concept of phenomenalism comes in. Given we cannot verify or substantiate the physical universe, illness, old age and death are just concepts in our minds, and we suffer because we find these concepts distasteful. If we can treat them as mere phenomena and not react to them, we avoid dukkha altogether. We accept that whatever happens happens, and at the end of the day everything is just a construction.
The Buddhaâs soteriological goal can be likened to giving up smoking. We understand that smoking is bad for us. The solution is deceptively simple: just stop smoking. However, many people find this is difficult to do. Ingrained habits and addiction are hard to change or stop. However, once the objective is accomplished, nothing further needs to be done (apart from guarding against the danger of a relapse).
In the same way, we understand that dukkha is not pleasant. The solution is deceptively simple: just stop generating thoughts or performing actions that will lead to dukkha. However, many people find this is difficult to do. Ingrained habits and desires are hard to change or stop. However, once the objective is accomplished, nothing further needs to be done (apart from guarding against the danger of a relapse).
In other words, the Buddhaâs teaching can be summarised as âItâs all in the mind, just let it go.â By doing so, one is relieved from the burden of dukkha, one is no longer concerned by dukkha, one is therefore liberated from dukkha and it is extinguished.
Buddhism
The Buddha embarked on a career of teaching upon his âawakeningâ (or realisation of the soteriology). He travelled around significant parts of todayâs India and eventually formed a community of followers which evolved into Buddhism today.
Unfortunately, Buddhism died out in India, where it originated from, due to various reasons.(Salomon, 2018). However, the Buddhaâs teachings spread throughout much of Asia along trading routes. Even today the Buddhaâs teachings is highly appealing to many people, and there has been a surge of interest in the last century or so from industrialised and developed countries.
Although it originated as a philosophy and soteriology, today Buddhism is regarded as a religion (the fourth most popular in the world1, with approximately 500 million adherents).
However, as a percentage of the world population, Buddhism is a declining religion, with the number of adherents expect to reduce from 7.1% of the world population in 2010 to 5.2% by 2050.
Buddhism is a rapidly growing religion in Australia since the 1980s and now represents about 2.4% of Australiaâs population2 based on the 2021 census but the growth has been primarily due to immigration.
According to Norman
(Norman, 1997) writes:
We are all familiar with the account of the origin of Buddhism which we find in the Indian tradition. The Buddha-to-be was the son of an Indian king. Despite his fatherâs attempts to ensure that his son should see no sign of old age, sickness or death, he became acquainted with the suffering existing in the world and the advantages of the ascetic life by seeing four signs at the age of twenty-nine. He left his wife and new-born son and became a wanderer. He tried severe ascetic practices, and followed various teachers, but found that he could not obtain the goal he was seeking. By meditation he obtained nirvÄna, and then began to teach to others the way which he had found to be successful, beginning with those with whom he had earlier practised asceticism.
What light can a philological approach throw on this narrative?
It goes without saying that the origins of Buddhism lie in the political, economic, social and religious environment of the time.
The political and economic picture which we gain from early PÄli texts is one where the urbanisation of the Gangetic plain was well under way. There were large, well fortified cities, with powerful rulers. Movement between those cities was easy, and trade between them was flourishing. We read of merchants setting out with large caravans, and there are frequent references to the coinage which must have facilitated the growth of trade. The ksatriyas, the ruling class, had gained a more imposing identity - they were no longer minor chieftains - and the vaiĆyas, the mercantile class, had begun to gain wealth, and power arising from that wealth, as opposed to an earlier situation where they were merely itinerant traders. This must have lead to a situation where the ksatriyas and the vaiĆyas would be very open to a religion which gave them a social position equal to, or even superior to, that of members of the brahmanical caste. It is very clear that the brahmanical caste was regarded as superior, at least by the members of that caste. As a ksatriya the Buddha might be expected to oppose the brahmanical caste and much of his teaching was devoted to defining the word brÄhmana as a moral term, and denying that one became a brahman simply by birth. He insisted that it was actions which made a brahman. A consequence of the Buddhaâs teaching about this was that (although there are many references to brÄhmanas becoming his followers) the main support for his religion came from ksatriyas and vaiĆyas, particularly from the latter. This was presumably because they were wealthy and were well placed to gain merit by dÄna âgiving, generosityâ. They also travelled widely, and were able to act as missionaries, taking the message to other vaiĆya communities. It is a striking fact that, as Buddhism spread, it followed the trade routes, being propagated either by âmissionaryâ traders or by bhikkhus who travelled with the caravans under the protection of the traders.
The Buddha was born in Nepal, and his name was Siddhattha. The traditional story states that his father Suddhodana was a king, that is to say a rÄja. This word, however, may mean nothing more than a man of the royal tribe or the military caste, i.e. a ksatriya, and in this context, in a place some way away from the Gangetic plain, it is probable that it still meant a minor tribal chieftain, at the head of the ĆÄkya clan. Siddhatthaâs gotra name was Gotama, but Gotama is not a ksatriya name, so it probably represents a borrowing of the family purohitaâs gotra name. This suggests that the ĆÄkyas were a fairly recent entrant into the caste system, which in turn suggests that perhaps the Buddhaâs family was not in origin Indo-Aryan. There are other examples of clans or tribes being assimilated into the caste system in a comparable way. It has been pointed out that important parts of the commentarial tradition concerning the Buddhaâs family relations followed Dravidian marriage patterns, which is taken, by some, as proving that the commentarial tradition must have been composed in areas where Dravidian marriage patterns prevailed, i.e. in the southern half of India or in Sri Lanka. The tradition, it is suggested, must therefore be a late story from South India. It is, however, quite arguable and, I think, more likely that it represents the actual clan relationships at that time among non-Indo-Aryan tribes in the North, or among tribes which had until recently been non-IndoAryan.
According to Gombrich
(Gombrich, 2009) summarises the Buddha and Buddhism:
Time
Since the Buddha lived well before writing was used in India, it is not surprising that the various Buddhist traditions differ widely about his date. The canonical account of his death says that he passed away aged eighty. For a while modern scholarship dated this to 483 BC or thereabouts and this dating is still found in many reference works. But it is too early. He must have died round 405 BC.
For more detail, including an explanation of the limits of possible precision, see my âDating the Buddha: a red herring revealedâ, in The Dating of the Historical Buddha/Die Datierung des historischen Buddha, Part 2 (Symposien zur Buddhismusforschung, IV, 2), Heinz Bechert, editor (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1992), pp. 237-59. For a less technical account, see my âDiscovering the Buddhaâs dateâ, in Lakshman S. Perera (ed.), Buddhism for the New Millennium, London: World Buddhist Foundation, 2000, pp. 9-25.
The emperor Asoka, who was largely responsible for the spread of Buddhism, ruled from c .269 to c .231 BC.
Space
The Buddha was born close to the modern border between India and Nepal, which did not then exist, into a tribe called the Shakyas. He spent his life in the part of north-east India now known as Bihar (the name is derived from the Buddhist word for âmonasteryâ) and the eastern UP. Modern Benares (Varanasi in Indian languages) already existed; Patna (ancient name: Pataliputra), which was to be Asokaâs capital, was founded soon after his lifetime.
Social environment
The Buddha lived when the first cities were coming up in India. (We ignore the prehistoric Indus Valley civilization.) With this arose larger and better organized states, mostly monarchies, and a great increase in trade, which led to contact with the world beyond India.
A complex religious and cultural system had already been articulated by the brahmins. Their leadership was, however, contested by the new political and mercantile classes, who tended to support heterodox teachers. (âHeterodoxâ means not accepting the authority of the Vedas and hence of their brahmin interpreters.) The Buddhaâs contemporary MahÄvira was one of them; he taught, though he did not found, Jainism, a religion still alive today.
Brahmin religion and society
Brahmin ideology posited a hierarchic social structure which we call âthe caste systemâ. According to this, society had four strata, which they called âcoloursâ (S: varna). The brahmins (S: brÄhmaáča) were at the top, then came the nobility (S: káčŁatriya or rÄjanya), then the vaiĆya, originally stock-rearers and farmers but by the Buddhaâs day primarily traders, and then the sĂŒdra, artisans and labourers. Even below these came the outcastes, who in theory were associated with unclean work dealing with corpses and/or excreta. This brahmin theory is first mentioned in the tenth book of the áčg Veda. Kings were supposed by the theory to enforce its rules. In fact, however, enforcement has always been extremely variable.
Early brahmin religious literature is vast. It all carries the name Veda, meaning âknowledgeâ, and is all in an ancient (but not uniform) kind of Sanskrit. It is internally stratified by genre and to some extent the genres also constitute a chronological sequence. The oldest genre is sometimes known in the West as the Vedas, which is confusing. The áčg Veda, a collection of 1,028 hymns, is the oldest text in this genre. The latest genre/stratum is that of the Upanisads. These were composed over several centuries; the oldest and longest is the Báčhad-Äranyaka UpaniáčŁad, which was certainly known to the Buddha, though not necessarily in exactly its present form, so it must antedate 500 BC.
Kinds of Buddhism
There are two main Buddhist traditions in the world today: Theravada and Mahayana. Theravada is a Pali word (TheravÄda) meaning âDoctrine of the Eldersâ. Mahayana is a Sanskrit word (MahÄyÄna) and means either âGreat Pathâ or âGreat Vehicleâ - it is ambiguous. The Theravada regards only the Pali Canon as authoritative, the Mahayana arose around the beginning of the Christian era and venerates many other texts. Theravada is dominant in most (not all) of South and Southeast Asia, Mahayana in East and Central Asia.
Did the Buddha actually existed in history?
Although many Buddhists would assume the Buddha was a historical person, there is no direct evidence of his existence apart from his teachings, or at least none that have survived.
Some scholars, notably (Schopen, 1997), question the authenticity of Buddhist texts and believe a more historical picture of Buddhism comes from archaeological and epigraphic evidence, and none of these attest the existence of an actual person placed in âhistorical timeâ. More recently (Drewes, 2017) argued that the Buddha may have been a legendary or mystical figure, created as a founder persona and imbued with a simple, authoritative origin story, and that in many teachings he is simply a a generic, supernatural being and lack key biographical details. The names commonly associated with him are problematic: âSiddhÄrthaâ is not found in the earliest texts, the Shakya tribe is unverified in non-Buddhist sources, and âGautamaâ is a broad clan name used by many figures, not a personal surname. Drewes suggests that the concept of the Buddha as a historical person may be the result of fallacious assumptions and weak arguments by European scholars.
This has been challenged by various scholars including (Wynne, 2019), (Levman, 2019) and (HinĂŒber, 2019).
(Wynne, 2019) argues that the Buddhist texts consistently depict a âpre-Imperial Indiaâ that is seemingly accurate, with the Buddha depicted with human frailties in non-glorifying stories that suggest a historical record rather than an idealised invention. (Levman, 2019) adds that the texts mention historical figures such as kings (AjÄtasattu, BimbisÄra) and rival religious leaders (like Nigantha NÄtaputta, the founder of Jainism), whose existences are confirmed in non-Buddhist sources. Also, place names correspond to real historical locations. (HinĂŒber, 2019) makes an interesting argument that inconsistencies and contradictions between what are regarded as early texts vs later, grander versions support the notion of the Buddha was originally portrayed simply as a âhumanâ and was only later mythologised.
(Drewes, 2023) rejects the above rebuttals as not proof of historicity and refutes HinĂŒberâs examples, contending they are flawed, based on misinterpretation, or self-undermining. (HinĂŒber, 2023) then provided additional examples citing inscriptions, chronicles, and a personal analogy of family memory, and argues that authentic, if fragmentary, memories of the Buddha could have easily been preserved and passed down by his followers in the century after his death. (Drewes, 2023b) defends his skeptical stance on the historical Buddha, arguing that there is no evidence for how Buddhism originated before the 3rd century BCE and no scholar has ever presented primary textual evidence to prove the Buddhaâs historicity.
In conclusion, I do agree with Drewes that there is no proof of the Buddhaâs historicity but I also concur with his opponents that the uniqueness and profundity of the Buddhist teachings are best explained by assuming a single founder (with unverified biography) rather than a committee.
Other Opinions
- Norman - A Philological Approach To Buddhism (1997) (Norman, 1997)
In Chapter II (Buddhism and Its Origins) Norman examines the origins of Buddhism through a philological lens, situating it within the socio-political and religious environment of ancient India around 400 BCE. It argues that Buddhism emerged as a challenge to Brahmanical orthodoxy, finding support among the rising merchant and warrior castes by reinterpreting existing concepts and rejecting the Upanishadic universal self (Ätman) with the core doctrine of anattÄ (not-self). The analysis highlights that Buddhism shared significant terminology, ascetic practices, and even titles like âBuddhaâ and âJinaâ with other contemporary Ćramaáča movements, particularly Jainism, indicating a common religious background. The path to release (nibbÄna) is shown to involve meditative states (jhÄnas) and an understanding of dependent causation, which was adapted into two systems: a direct path for monastics and a gradual, merit-based path for lay followers, creating a unique synthesis of pre-existing ideas from the broader Ćramaáča culture. - HinĆ«ber - Hoary Past And Hazy Memory - On The History Of Early Buddhist Texts (2006) [@HinĆ«ber2006]
Oskar V. HinĆ«ber argues that early Buddhist texts contain âhistorical memoryâ which can be used for dating and cautious historical analysis, challenging the notion that ancient India lacked a sense of history. By examining the evolution of sutta opening formulas, he identifies an archaic syntactical structure, traceable to Indo-Iranian, that refers to obscure market towns (nigamas) and Brahmin villages (brÄhmaáčagÄmas), representing an older textual layer than the more common references to major cities and monasteries. Applying this critical method to the MahÄparinibbÄnasuttanta, he posits a pre-Mauryan composition date (c. 350-320 BC) based on its description of PÄtaliputta as a future commercial hub rather than a political capital and its downplaying of the Moriyas, which contrasts with later Buddhist texts that actively incorporated contemporary rulers like AĆoka and KaniáčŁka. This early dating suggests that while the text is primarily hagiography replete with mythology, it may preserve genuine historical details from the decades immediately following the Buddhaâs death. - Gombrich - What the Buddha Thought (2009) (Gombrich, 2009)
In What the Buddha Thought, Richard Gombrich argues that the Buddha was a brilliant and original thinker whose coherent system of thought can only be understood by placing it in its historical context as a pragmatic debate with and reaction to contemporary Brahminical and Jain ideas. Gombrich posits that the Buddha was not an essentialist philosopher but a practical teacher focused on how things function, redefining concepts like kamma from ritual action to ethical intention and clarifying âno-selfâ as the absence of an unchanging essence. A central thesis is that subsequent generations, failing to grasp the Buddhaâs use of metaphor, irony, and context-dependent arguments, took his teachings literally, thereby creating new scholastic doctrinesâsuch as misinterpreting the brahma-vihÄras as a path to heaven rather than nirvana. This process of misinterpretation, Gombrich contends, explains many apparent inconsistencies in the Pali Canon, which he establishes as the key evidence for understanding how the Buddha used fire as a central metaphor for non-random process and satirized Vedic cosmogony in the Chain of Dependent Origination. - Attwood - Possible Iranian Origins for the ĆÄkyas and Aspects of Buddhism (2012) (Attwood, 2012)
This article explores Michael Witzelâs theory that the ĆÄkya tribe, the Buddhaâs clan, had Iranian origins, potentially as an early migration of Scythians (Sakas). The argument rests on circumstantial evidence linking ĆÄkya and early Buddhist characteristics to Iranian or Zoroastrian culture, such as the origin story of sibling marriage (a known Iranian custom), the moral triad of body, speech, and mind, and an ethicized eschatology featuring post-mortem judgment, none of which are prominent in contemporary Brahmanical traditions. The author proposes that these ideas were transmitted via a migration of tribes like the ĆÄkyas into the Central Ganges region around the 9th century BCE, bypassing the main Vedic cultural centers. This thesis challenges the view of Buddhism as solely a reaction to Brahmanism, suggesting instead that it emerged from a broader cultural milieu and that the Buddha may have been a product of his tribeâs assimilated Iranian heritage. - Levman - Cultural Remnants of the Indigenous Peoples in the Buddhist Scriptures (2014) (Levman, 2014)
Bryan Levmanâs article argues that Buddhist scriptures contain significant cultural remnants from Indiaâs indigenous Munda, Dravidian, and Tibeto-Burman peoples, which have been obscured by a later âbrahmanizationâ that historicized the Buddha within the dominant Indo-Aryan (IA) tradition. The author identifies this indigenous influence by examining the hostility between IA immigrants and eastern ethnic groups like the Buddhaâs Sakya clan, whose distinct socio-political organization (gaáčasaáč gha), rejection of the Brahmanical class system, and non-Aryan marriage customs are evident in the texts. Furthermore, key Buddhist concepts and practices are traced to autochthonous roots, including the idea of the MahÄpuruáčŁa (Great Man), the veneration of trees and serpents (nÄgas), the culture of sacred groves, and the unique funeral rites described for the Buddhaâs parinibbÄna, all of which differ significantly from Vedic norms. - Shults - On the Buddhaâs Use of Some Brahmanical Motifs in Pali Texts (2014) (Shults, 2014)
This paper by Brett Shults argues that Pali texts demonstrate a sophisticated and deliberate engagement with Brahmanical culture by strategically adopting and reinterpreting its motifs to articulate Buddhist teachings. Moving beyond the idea of a shared cultural vocabulary, the author illustrates how early Buddhists repurposed specific Brahmanical elements for their own didactic purposes. Examples range from metallurgical similes, where the Brahmanical concept of refining gold for ritual purity is transformed into a metaphor for mental purification, to the Buddhaâs detailed technical knowledge of the SÄvitrÄ« mantraâs gÄyatrÄ« meter. The analysis further shows how core Brahmanical practices, such as the agnihotra (fire sacrifice) and the three Vedic ritual fires, are systematically interiorized and ethicized, shifting their focus from external rites to internal development and social responsibilities, thereby challenging and supplanting the original Brahmanical framework using its own terms. - Shults - A Note on Ćramaáča in Vedic Texts (2016) (Shults, 2016)
This article refutes Christopher Beckwithâs claim that the term Ćramaáča exclusively meant âBuddhist practitionerâ in antiquity by demonstrating its pre-Buddhist origins and broader semantic range within the Vedic tradition. Citing evidence from texts such as the TaittirÄ«ya Äraáčyaka, JaiminÄ«ya BrÄhmaáča, and the Rgveda SaáčhitÄ, the author shows that Ćramaáča was used to mean âone who toils,â âweary,â or âunwearyingâ in contexts describing Vedic seers, sacrificial rituals, cattle, and even stones, all unrelated to Buddhism. The author supports and expands upon Patrick Olivelleâs âdevelopment model,â which traces the wordâs etymology to the Vedic root âĆram (to toil, become weary), arguing that its various meanings developed organically within Brahmanical circles, thus providing the pre-existing conceptual framework for the term to be later applied to the Buddha and other ascetics. - Drewes - The Idea Of The Historical Buddha (2017) (Drewes, 2017)
In a reevaluation of the Buddhaâs historicity, David Drewes argues that scholarship has never actually established that the Buddha was a real person and that he cannot be properly considered a historical figure. The author traces the development of the idea from the early nineteenth century, when the Buddhaâs existence was an open question, through the pivotal work of scholars like EugĂšne Burnouf, who separated the final Buddha, ĆÄkyamuni, from his mythical predecessors based on Nepalese tradition rather than new evidence. Drewes contends that subsequent influential scholars, such as T.W. Rhys Davids and Hermann Oldenberg, cemented the Buddhaâs historicity not through factual discovery but by presupposing it and defending it with fallacious arguments, such as the logical necessity of a founder or appeals to a scholarly consensus that was not yet established. Even major twentieth-century proponents like E.J. Thomas, Ătienne Lamotte, and AndrĂ© Bareau admitted that no reliable historical data could be extracted from the legends. Drewes concludes that since early texts depict a generic, supernatural being rather than a specific individualâwith names like âSiddhÄrthaâ being late additions and clan names like âĆÄkyaâ being potentially mythicalâthe Buddha belongs in the same category as other ahistorical founders like VyÄsa or Laozi, whose existence is a matter of belief rather than empirical fact. - Salomon - What Happened To Buddhism In India? (2018) (Salomon, 2018)
Richard Salomonâs essay explores the complex and controversial question of why Buddhism disappeared from India around the 13th century after thriving for over a millennium. Critiquing the common practice of listing multiple, disconnected causesâsuch as loss of patronage, persecution, internal decay, and Muslim invasionsâSalomon argues that asking âwhyâ is less fruitful than asking âhowâ the decline occurred. He contrasts the two dominant scholarly narratives - the âfriendly embraceâ theory, which posits that Hinduism peacefully assimilated a weakened Buddhism (Monier-Williams, R.C. Mitra), and the opposing view of relentless hostility and persecution (Giovanni Verardi). Through an analysis of several inscriptions, Salomon demonstrates a long and complex process of syncretism and absorption, showing the Buddhaâs incorporation as an avatÄra of ViáčŁáču, the equation of Buddhist and Hindu deities, and the veneration of Hindu gods like VÄsudeva within Buddhist contexts from an early period. Ultimately, he concludes that the most compelling explanation for Buddhismâs demise is its gradual assimilation into the broader Hindu religious milieu, which caused it to lose its distinct identity over time. - Levman - The Historical Buddha (2019) (Levman, 2019)
In response to the hypothesis that the Buddha was a mythical figure, this article establishes his historicity through four main arguments. The Buddhist canon is situated in a verifiable historical context, with its places, rulers, and rivalries corroborated by external sources like the AĆokan edicts and Jain texts, while linguistic analysis of names and cultural terms reveals authentic indigenous roots. The unique, coherent, and profound system of Buddhist teachings is most parsimoniously explained as the product of a single, brilliant individual rather than an invention or organic evolution. Furthermore, the canonâs un-idealized portrayal of the Buddha as a human being who aged, suffered from physical ailments like a bad back, expressed anger, and died a painful death contradicts the notion of a purely mythologized character. Finally, despite later biographical embellishments, a core, unembellished biography of a real person can be discerned in the earliest scriptural layers, suggesting an authentic figure whose life was later aggrandized rather than a complete fabrication. - Wynne - Did the Buddha exist (2019) (Wynne, 2019)
In his article, Alexander Wynne argues against extreme skepticism regarding the Buddhaâs existence, presenting evidence that early Buddhist discourses are largely authentic historical records. He refutes claims that the Buddha is a myth by citing the high fidelity of the textsâ oral transmission, archaeological and inscriptional evidence from the AĆokan era that corroborates details about the Buddhaâs clan and disciples, and the textsâ consistent depiction of a pre-imperial India before the rise of large cities, coinage, and brick architecture. Wynneâs central thesis is that the teachings reveal a singular and idiosyncratic personalityâa quiet, pragmatic, and sometimes reticent teacherâwhose unique and coherent philosophical system, characterized by concepts like ânot-selfâ and the dialectic of silence, is too distinctive and complex to have been invented by a committee, pointing instead to a single, historical founder. - HinĂŒber - The Buddha As A Historical Person (2019) (HinĂŒber, 2019)
In response to claims that the Buddha was not a historical person, Oskar von HinĂŒber argues for his historicity by analyzing early PÄli texts for archaic elements and genuine memories. He posits that details contradicting later, more mythological biographies are unlikely to be inventions and may represent a historical core. Evidence includes the AĆokan inscription confirming LumbinÄ« as the Buddhaâs birthplace; textual accounts of his father as a working farmer rather than a king; and a description of his parents weeping as he left home, which conflicts with later narratives. A key example is the Buddhaâs failure to impress the ÄjÄ«vika Upaka, an embarrassing episode for the tradition, whose antiquity is supported by archaic linguistic forms and its subsequent alteration or omission in later texts. Further evidence from the MahÄparinibbÄnasuttanta, such as the obscure name of the Buddhaâs last meal (sĆ«karamaddava) and moments of human frailty, also suggest the preservation of authentic details from the life of a real person. - Drewes - A Historical Buddha After All? (2023) (Drewes, 2023a)
In this paper, David Drewes refutes Oskar von HinĂŒberâs arguments for the historicity of the Buddha, reaffirming his position that there is no reliable evidence to establish the Buddha as a historical figure. Drewes systematically dismantles von HinĂŒberâs reasoning, arguing that the earliness of a text does not guarantee its historicity, as the early Buddhist texts are fundamentally concerned with supernatural events rather than historical records. He deconstructs specific claims, such as the interpretation of the Upaka story through the âcriterion of embarrassmentâ and the early dating of the MahÄparinibbÄnasutta, by providing alternative explanations rooted in literary tropes, polemics, or philological analysis. Drewes concludes that scholarship on the historical Buddha has relied on fallacious arguments from authority and subjective interpretations rather than scientific evidence, and that without such evidence, the Buddhaâs existence remains a matter of faith rather than a demonstrable historical fact. - HinĂŒber - The Historical Dr. Drewes And The Buddha (2023) (HinĂŒber, 2023)
In a rebuttal to Dr. Drewesâs critique, Oskar von HinĂŒber defends his argument for the Buddha as a historical person by asserting that Drewes focuses on the opinions of other scholars rather than engaging with primary sources. HinĂŒber reiterates his own method, which involves analyzing the earliest possible texts for linguistic clues and for details that were later suppressed by the tradition, as these are likely to contain fragments of historical memory. He refutes Drewesâs specific counterarguments concerning the Upaka episode and the Jambu tree meditation, defending his philological analysis and dismissing Drewesâs claims of textual corruption and flawed mythological parallels. Ultimately, HinĂŒber argues that while a full biography is impossible, a vivid historical memory existed in ancient India, distinct from formal historiography, and that traces of this memory of a real person can be found in the oldest Buddhist texts through careful scholarly application rather than abstract debate. - Drewes - Toward Blue Skies Ahead: Reply To Von HinĂŒberâs Second Response (2023) (Drewes, 2023b)
In this reply, David Drewes defends his thesis on the lack of evidence for the historical Buddha against critiques from Prof. Dr. von HinĂŒber, clarifying that his original paper targeted the scholarly inconsistency of affirming historicity without proof. Drewes explains that his focus on secondary sources is due to the absence of any primary texts being presented as evidence, and he posits that the origins of Buddhism before the mid-third century BCE are unknowable, cautioning against projecting modern concepts like âmystical experienceâ onto its prehistory. He systematically refutes von HinĂŒberâs specific counterarguments by employing detailed linguistic and manuscript evidence to defend his textual emendations in the DÄ«rghÄgama and Sañghabhedavastu, and he substantiates his mythological analysis by showing that numerous Indian myths, including the SÄ«tÄ story, feature a ritualistic golden plow, thereby connecting a Pali story about the Buddhaâs youth to this broader narrative tradition.
Footnotes
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The Future of World Religions: Population Growth Projections, 2010-2050 Pew Research Centerâs Religion & Public Life Project. â©