Buddhism, we know, started with the doctrine that all idea of marriage,
or of happy home-life, was to be abandoned by wise men—by all who aimed
at becoming true Buddhists (in direct contradistinction, we may note, to
the primary Christian truth that it is not good for created man to be
alone, and that therefore his Creator created a help meet for him—a
truth confirmed in a remarkable manner by the Founder of the Christian
Church when He gave the first sign of His divine commission at a
marriage ceremony).
What, then, followed on the Buddha’s original unnatural teaching in
regard to marriage?
Of course an immediate result was that, although according to the
Buddha’s ordinance any one who aimed at perfect sanctity was bound to
lead a celibate life, the rule against marriage was admitted to be
inapplicable to the majority of human beings living in the world. The
mass of the people, in short, were necessarily offenders against the
primary law of Buddhism. Though called lay-Buddhists, they were not
‘wise men’ in the Buddhist sense of the term (pp. 86, 88). There is even
evidence that among certain monkish communities in Northern countries
the law against marriage was soon relaxed. It is well known that at the
present day Lamaseries in Sikkim and Tibet swarm with the children of
monks, though called their nephews and nieces[62]. And far worse than
this, Buddhism ultimately allied itself with Tāntrism or the worship of
the female principle (ṡakti), and under its sanction encouraged the
grossest violations of decency and the worst forms of profligacy.
It was the same in regard to the unnatural vow of poverty. Monasteries
and Lamaseries now possess immense revenues, and monks are often wealthy
men.
Then again, what resulted from the Buddha’s ignoring the existence of a
God, and telling his disciples to abstain from depending on any Being
higher than what man himself could become? Of course this was opposed to
every man’s innermost sense of his own needs and of his own nature. For
man is so constituted that he cannot be happy without loving and
trusting a Being higher than himself—a Being who takes the initiative in
loving His creatures and is the proper object of their loftiest
affections. Nor can man in his secret heart regard either himself or any
one of his fellow-men as a being worthy of his highest adoration. Nor
can he set his affections on a blank or an abstraction. And so, in spite
of the Buddha’s teaching, his followers would act on their own
convictions. They would believe in beings higher than themselves, and in
a personal Creator knowable and lovable by themselves, and knowing and
loving His creatures. Nay, they ultimately converted the Buddha himself
into the very God he denied, calling him ‘The chief god of all the gods’
(Devātideva).
Again, what was the effect of the Buddha’s leading men to believe that
all supernatural revelation was unneeded—that all enlightenment came
from within, and that every man was competent to think out true
knowledge for himself by the exercise of his own reasoning powers, in
the way that the Buddha himself had done?
Of course the result was that the generality of men who shrank from the
effort of thinking out truth for themselves, and were wholly destitute
of any faculty for doing so, insisted on believing in a revelation from
an external power, and ended in attributing infallibility to the
Buddha’s own teaching, and worshipping the Law of Buddhism—as a visible
embodiment of their deceased teacher—with all the ardour of enthusiastic
bibliolatrists.
Furthermore, what followed on the Buddha’s denying that any prayer,
however earnest, could have any power to modify the operation of natural
laws?
Of course men longed for some form of supplication to a higher power,
and so the Buddha’s disciples not only composed prayer-formularies, but
invested the mere letters and syllables of such forms with an efficacy
which no other body of religionists has ever thought of attributing to
prayer of any kind.
They not only repeated mystical sentences, which were called prayers,
though really mere charms, believing that an occult virtue was inherent
in the words, but invented a method of manufacturing such sentences
(Dhāraṇī) like marketable commodities.
They fabricated prayers, in fact, by machinery, inscribing them on
wheels or on rolls inserted in cylinders, which in the present day are
made to revolve by hand or by the force of water and wind, and will
possibly, with the spread of science, be impelled by steam-power, so
that each revolution may count for an infinite number of repetitions,
and be set down to the credit of the owner or manager of the mechanism.
Yet again, what was the inevitable consequence of the Buddha’s rejection
of the doctrine that any benefit could accrue to human beings from
religious services conducted by regularly ordained priests, and of his
instituting in their stead an Order of Monks, who were little better
than a community of drones, contributing nothing to the wealth of the
world, doing nothing of any utility to any one, and taught to regard
inaction as the path of true wisdom?
Naturally, men craved for spiritual helpers, guides, and intercessors,
and so by degrees these very monks conducted elaborate religious
services, and a complicated hierarchy was organized in Tibet, even more
intricate and far-reaching in its ramifications than that of the modern
Romish Church.
And once more, what resulted from the Buddha’s objection to provide
visible images and material objects of worship, with a view to stimulate
devotion or aid meditation?
Of course concrete and objective Buddhism of some kind became a
necessity. It became essential to make concessions to the weakness and
infirmity of human nature, which required external aids, and declined to
be devoted to an ideal void, or to meditate on a pure abstraction. Even
the Founder of Buddhism himself seems to have felt, as we shall see,
that his hold on the memory of his followers would depend on their
venerating certain objects and symbols after his death. Unhappily for
the purity of Buddhism, but quite in conformity with the inveterate
tendencies of humanity, the Buddha’s disciples pushed veneration of
external objects to an extreme. They were not contented with mere
reverence shown to the relics of the Buddha’s burnt body and the shrines
containing them. They worshipped the tree under which he attained
Buddhahood, the seat on which he sat, the prints of his feet, his shadow
supposed to be impressed on rocks, the utensils he used, the books
containing the Law, the wheel which symbolized both the propagation and
the character of his doctrine, and finally bowed down before carved
representations of his body and images of all kinds. It is remarkable
that in Buddhist countries idols are far more numerous than among any
other idolatrous people in the world.
Lastly, what resulted from the Buddha’s teaching that the ultimate end
to which men’s efforts ought to be directed was Nirvāṇa—that is, the
total extinction of all individual existence and personal identity?
Of course men instinctively recoiled from utter self-annihilation, and
so the Buddha’s followers ended in changing the true idea of Nirvāṇa and
converting it from a condition of non-existence into a state of hazy
beatitude in celestial regions, while they encouraged all men—whether
monks or laymen—to make a sense of dreamy bliss in heaven, and not total
extinction of life, the end of all their efforts.
But it was not only this natural and inevitable recoil to the opposite
extreme that ultimately brought about an entire change in primitive
Buddhism. Another cause must also be taken into account.
We have already explained the nature of the tie which bound Buddhism to
Brāhmanism, from the first day on which Gautama sat as a disciple at the
feet of the Brāhman philosophers Udraka and Āḷāra (p. 29). Now, although
this tie was soon loosened, and although the Buddha struck out a line of
his own, and a separation took place, yet the two systems stood on so
much common ground that they were always ready to draw together again.
At all events, it is probable that one system never expelled the other,
and that the constant attrition and contact which took place between
Brāhmanism and Buddhism, led to a considerable splitting up of the
original fabric of Buddhism, involving, of course, many divisions and
subdivisions of Buddhistic thought, some of which were closely allied to
the later developments of Brāhmanical philosophy.
In the Sarva-darṡana-saṅgraha four principal sects of Buddhism are
enumerated, which must have taken root early on Indian soil.
These four were the Vaibhāshika, Sautrāntika, Mādhyamika, and Yogāćāra.
Of these the first two with their subdivisions[63] were realistic, and
were established—though not perhaps thoroughly formulated and
systematized—in very early times, long before the council of Kanishka;
while the two later schools are described as idealistic, the Mādhyamika
being a Buddhistic form of the Vedānta philosophy, and the Yogāćāra
agreeing generally with the Yoga system.
Indeed there is good evidence that Buddhism developed in India a greater
number of schools and phases of thought than Brāhmanism itself. Some
authorities enumerate eighteen divisions (corresponding perhaps to the
eighteen original disciples, pp. 47-73) which existed in king Kanishka’s
time—that is, in the first century of our era, while others specify
thirty-two; and in the fourth century we find the Chinese traveller
Fā-hien (p. 160) making allusion to as many as ninety-six (Dr. Legge’s
translation, p. 62).
We cannot wonder then that the author of the Sarva-darṡana-saṅgraha
expressed himself in rather strong language to the following effect:—
‘Though the venerated Buddha be the only one teacher, his disciples are
manifold; just as when the sun has set, the thief and other evil doers,
the theological student and others understand that it is time to set
about their occupations, according to their several inclinations.’
Yet, after all, it was chiefly in the North, and in consequence of the
council held by Kanishka, India’s greatest Buddhist king after Aṡoka[64]
(see p. 69), that the original features of Buddhism underwent the
greatest change and became overlaid with coating after coating of
extraneous matter. It was there, in Northern regions, in the valley of
the Indus, that the Protean system called Mahā-yāna arose, and grew, by
the operation of the usual laws of accretion, conglomeration,
disintegration, and reintegration, into a congeries of heterogeneous
doctrines, including the worship of Bodhi-sattvas, deified saints, and
personal gods.
Naturally the adherents of this wider method spoke disparagingly of the
simpler system prevalent in the South, whose sacred books were the
Tri-piṭaka of Ceylon written in the ancient vernacular (Pāli). That
system they designated Hīna-yāna, ‘the defective method,’ not denying
however that their own enlarged system grew out of and included the
simpler one.
There arose, too, a third method, or ‘vehicle’ of salvation, called ‘the
middle method’ (Madhyama-yāna). This, however, is not so well known,
and, being a compromise between the other two, never gained many
adherents, though it is still recognized in Tibet—the Tibetans often
speaking of Tri-yāna, or ‘the three vehicles.’
At all events, it is only necessary for practical purposes to recognize
the distinction of the Great and Little Vehicle—the Mahā-yāna[65] and
the Hīna-yāna. And it may be stated generally that the inhabitants of
Nepāl, Tibet, China, Manchuria, Mongolia, and Japan have always shown a
preference for the Mahā-yāna, or ‘Great Vehicle,’ while the people of
Ceylon, Burma, and Siam have always preferred the ‘Little Vehicle.’
At the same time, it is important to note that while the Buddhists of
Northern countries are supposed to be disciples of the Mahā-yāna or
Great Way of Salvation, the Buddhism of each Northern country differs
greatly from that of the other, and that the countries nearest to India
have still further complicated the Mahā-yāna system by adopting mystical
doctrines, and introducing magic and other practices supposed to aid in
the acquisition of supernatural powers.
It must also be borne in mind that, although the Mahā-yāna or Great
Method originated on the Indus, and the Hīna-yāna or Little Method, on
the Ganges, the two streams of teaching were not always confined to
these two areas, even on Indian soil.
In point of fact they were often intermixed, and the changes thus
brought about in Buddhism will become more evident by referring to the
narratives of three well-known Buddhist travellers from China.
Buddhism was introduced into China between 58 and 75 of our era[66], but
it was not till much later that Chinese pilgrims visited India—the holy
land of Buddhism.
The first traveller of whom we have any record was a certain Chinese
Buddhist monk named Fā-hien, who set out on a pilgrimage to India about
the year 399 of our era, with the definite object of searching for and
carrying back to China complete copies of the Vinaya or Rules of
discipline for the Order. He wrote a very simple and straightforward
account of his travels[67]—which lasted for fourteen years—and of his
visits to all the spots in India held most sacred by Buddhists. He was
followed by a Chinese traveller of less mark, named Sang Yun, who
started about 518 A.D., and seems to have ended his journey at Peshawar,
or at least not to have penetrated much further South. Peshawar, we
know, was a great Buddhist centre, and there was a fine Stūpa there,
containing the alms-bowl of Buddha. Then after another interval a much
more celebrated Chinese pilgrim named Hiouen Thsang[68] started for
India (A.D. 629-644). The narrative of his travels for about fifteen
years is perhaps the best known and most commonly quoted of the three.
In Chang Yueh’s preface[69] to these travels Hiouen Thsang is described
as ‘a Doctor of the three Piṭakas, and is said to have translated 657
works from the original Sanskṛit. In all the districts through which he
journeyed he learnt the dialects and investigated the deep secrets of
religion.’
All three travellers give information in regard to the prevalence of
Buddhism in India up to the seventh century of our era, and the
narratives of two—Fā-hien and Hiouen Thsang—are invaluable for the light
they throw on the changes which Buddhism underwent in the interval of
their travels. Here and there the pilgrims exaggerate, especially when
they venture on numerical statistics or write from hearsay; but on the
whole their accounts may be accepted, and we learn that Hiouen Thsang
found some monasteries in ruins which were flourishing in Fā-hien’s
time, and that the Mahā-yāna had supplanted the earlier form of
Buddhism, or rather co-existed with it in many parts of the South as
well as of the North, and was to be found even in Ceylon[70].
And this brings us face to face with the greatest change of all—the
total dying out of Buddhism in the place of its origin. How is it to be
accounted for that no adherents of either the greater or lesser Buddhist
systems—of either the Mahā-yāna or Hīna-yāna—are to be found in India at
the present moment?
The problem is difficult of solution, and I can only offer a few
suggestions for its elucidation.
In the first place, I think it may be confidently asserted that the
disappearance of Buddhism from India was a very gradual process, and
unattended by any serious or violent religious revolution.
We have already alluded to the tolerant, liberal, and eclectic spirit
which has characterized Buddhism ever since the period of its first
promulgation at Benares.
Such toleration of the doctrines and ideas of co-existing systems had
its advantages, especially in the early stages of the Buddhistic
movement. It certainly had a prophylactic effect in warding off violent
attacks, and helped to promote the diffusion of Buddhism throughout the
numerous countries to which it ultimately spread. In India itself, as we
have already seen, Buddhism was never aggressive or combative. Its motto
everywhere was persuasion and conciliation. Composure, tranquillity, and
absence of acrimony were stamped on all its features. The very
foundation on which it was reared—the very establishment of a celibate
monastic Order, by means of which true knowledge was to be
propagated—had in it something altogether agreeable to the spirit and
usages of Brāhmanism.
We have seen, too, that the Buddha took care to show his respect for
Brāhmanical traditions, even while promulgating a philosophical theory
and preaching doctrines opposed to all sacerdotalism, priestly
privileges, supernatural revelation, and Vedic ceremonial.
It does not, of course, follow that the great teacher, to whom the
majority of Asiatic races have for centuries looked as their chosen
example, had not the courage of his opinions, and was not competent to
fill the rôle of a religious reformer.
The real fact was that he was too wise to enter upon any open crusade
against inveterate customs and ideas. The peculiar calm of an Indian
atmosphere, though occasionally disturbed by political storms sweeping
from distant regions, has rarely been stirred by violent religious
antagonisms. The various currents of Hindū religious life have flowed
peacefully side by side, and reformers have generally done their work
quietly. As for Gautama, there can be little doubt that his whole career
was stamped with the impress of his early surroundings, and that he
imbibed his tolerant ideas from the Brāhmanism in which he had been
trained.
It has been usual to blame the Brāhmans for their arrogant
exclusiveness, but their arrogance has been rather shown in magnifying
their own caste-privileges and carrying them to an extravagant pitch,
than in preventing any discussion of their own dogmas, or in resenting
any dissent from them.
The very essence of Brāhmanism was tolerance. Every form of opinion was
admissible under a system which made every person and every object in
existence manifestations of the one Being, Brahmă.
The only delicate ground, on which it was dangerous for any reformer to
tread, was caste. The only unpardonable sin was infringement of
caste-rules. Nor was any one tempted to adopt the rôle of a violent
agitator, when all were free to express any opinion they liked without
hindrance, provided they took care to abstain from any act of
interference with caste-privileges.
It does not appear, in short, that the preachers of either Buddhism, or
Vaishṇavism, or Ṡaivism, or Ṡāktism, or of any form of these sectarian
systems, ever incurred the special animosity of the Brāhmans or of each
other, or ever indulged in very violent denunciations of each other’s
religious doctrines.
In real truth, these systems of doctrine were all evolved out of
Brāhmanism. They were, therefore, not only tolerated by Brāhmanism, but
accepted as the inevitable outcome of its own pantheistic creed.
No doubt each received at first a strong stamp of individuality from its
founder, marking it off from other systems, but with the lapse of years
the deeper shades of difference grew fainter. Then it became a question
which should become merged in the other. In such a competition between
rival systems Buddhism had less chance of holding its own than either
Vaishṇavism or Ṡaivism; for its root-ideas—as we have seen—were not
rooted in the eternal instincts of human nature.
Buddhism, in fact, could never have maintained itself in India till the
twelfth or thirteenth century of our era, had it not gradually, and to a
great extent through interaction with Vaishṇavism and Ṡaivism, dropped
its unnatural pessimistic theory of life and its unpopular atheistic
character, and accommodated itself to those systems.
But Buddhism in parting with its ultra-pessimism and its atheistic and
agnostic ideas, lost its chief elements of individuality and its chief
independent stand-point.
Vaishṇavism, on the other hand, was quite alive to its own interests,
and had an eye to the spread of its own doctrines. It took care to adopt
all the popular features of Buddhism. It vied with Buddhism in
inculcating universal love, toleration, liberality, benevolence, and
abstinence from injury. It preached equality, fraternity, and even in
some cases the abolition of caste distinctions. It taught a succession
of incarnations or rather descents (Avatāra[71]) of divine beings upon
earth (as Buddhism taught a succession of Buddhas), and it even adopted
the Buddha himself as one of the incarnations of Vishṇu.
This, indeed, is the best explanation of what has happened at Purī in
Orissa, where a temple once dedicated to Gautama Buddha, and supposed to
contain a relic of his burnt body, was afterwards dedicated to the
Jagannāth form of Kṛishṇa and supposed to enshrine one of his bones, and
where low-caste and high-caste both eat together the food cooked in the
house of that popular god.
The same may be said of the interaction which took place between
Buddhism and Ṡaivism; for Ṡaivism, of course, was quite as bent on the
propagation of its own creed as other systems were. It vied with
Buddhism in encouraging abstract meditation, and although it had less
sympathy than Vaishṇavism had with that system, it approached in some
respects so closely to its rival, that when Buddhism disappeared from
India, images of Gautama were converted into representations of Ṡiva
seated in profound contemplation.
Ultimately, the interaction between the three systems proceeded to such
a point that each was influenced and modified by the other; each learnt
something, or adopted some practice from the other.
It was thus, too, that Ṡāktism, i. e. the worship of energy or force
(Ṡakti), identified with Ṡiva’s consort, was imported into Buddhism; its
doctrine of the self-evolution of all things from Prakṛiti having much
that harmonized with the Buddhist theory of the origin of the Universe.
Thus, too, even Tāntrism in its worst forms became intermixed with
Buddhistic practice.
Enough, then, has been said to justify the assertion that Buddhism was
not forcibly expelled from India by the Brāhmans. It simply in the
end—possibly as late as the thirteenth century of our era—became blended
with the systems which surrounded it, though the process of blending was
gradual.
It would certainly be easy to prove from the records of the three
Chinese travellers, that Buddhism and Brāhmanism existed together in
Northern and Central India as quite distinct systems till at least the
seventh century of our era, if not always quite amicably, yet without
any violent internecine conflict. Bitter controversies between the two
rival creeds are without doubt clearly alluded to, and Fā-hien in one
passage states that ‘the Brāhmans with their contrary doctrine became
full of hatred and envy in their hearts[72].’ Yet, on the other hand, we
find that at a Council held by the great Buddhist king Ṡilāditya
(Harsha-vardhana), whose meritorious acts are fully described by Hiouen
Thsang (ch. v), and who had his capital at Kanouj, in the year 634 of
our era[73], controversial points relating to both Buddhism and
Brāhmanism were discussed in a tolerant spirit, though it is said that
in discussing questions between the Northern and Southern Buddhists, the
‘Little Vehicle’ was condemned.
Again, the Buddhist drama called Nāgānanda, ‘joy of the snake
world[74],’ throws great light on the amicable relations existing
between the various sectarians and religionists in the days of king
Ṡilāditya. It is the only Sanskṛit play in which the Nāndī or opening
prayer invokes the power of Buddha, thus:—
‘“On whom dost thou meditate, putting on a pretence of religious
abstraction, yet opening thine eyes? See, saviour that thou art, thou
dost not pity us sick with the shafts of Love. Falsely art thou
compassionate. Who is more cruel than thou?” May Buddha, the conqueror,
who was thus jealously addressed by the Apsarasas (daughters) of Māra
(p. 34), protect you!’
Professor E. B. Cowell has shown in his valuable Preface that both this
play and the sister Hindū play called Ratnāvali were probably put forth
or at least patronised by Harsha-vardhana (Ṡilāditya), and that both
were probably acted at the same period, the king being as much a Hindū
as a Buddhist. Hiouen Thsang praises Harsha-vardhana for his support of
Buddhism, but in his description of the two Convocations held by that
king, states that both Buddhists and Brāhmans were equally honoured by
him, and intimates that half his subjects held one doctrine and half the
other. In the second Convocation which took place at Prayāga (now
Allahābād) eighteen kings were present and 500,000 monks and laymen. On
the first day the statue of Buddha was installed; on the second day that
of the Sun, and on the third that of Ṡiva. Alms were distributed to
Brāhmans and Buddhists alike, and even to the Nirgranthas or Jaina naked
heretics.
Again the well-known play called Mālatī-Mādhava (by Bhava-bhūti, who
lived at Kanauj in the beginning of the eighth century) has an opening
prayer addressed to Ṡiva, and yet a female Buddhist ascetic and her
attendant constitute two of the principal dramatis personæ, proving that
an intermixture of the two creeds prevailed everywhere.
It was also during the reign of Ṡilāditya that the immense monastery at
Nālanda near Rāja-gṛiha formed a seat of learning, which might suggest a
comparison with the learned monkish communities and even with the
universities of mediæval Europe[75]. In that monastery might be seen
several thousand novices and monks of the eighteen Buddhist schools—all
of them supported by royal grants, and thus enabled both to perform
their religious duties, and to prosecute the study of philosophy, law,
and science in literary ease. It is probable that if disputes and
disagreements upon burning questions occurred, they rarely led to
serious conflicts, and were not general throughout India, but confined
to particular localities; and I think it may be safely affirmed that if
Buddhism was ever anywhere persecuted, it never anywhere persecuted in
return.
I myself was much struck in a visit I paid to Ellora in the Nizām’s
territory by the evidence I there saw of the friendly tolerance which
must have prevailed between Brāhmans, Buddhists, and Jains. Brāhmanical,
Buddhist, and Jaina caves are there seen side by side, and their inmates
no doubt lived on terms of fairly friendly tolerance, much as the
members of the Anglican, Roman Catholic, and Wesleyan communions live in
Europe at the present day.
Even at Benares, the stronghold of Brāhmanism, I witnessed similar
proofs of amicable mutual intercourse, and at Nāsik—the Benares of
Western India—the proximity of the Buddhist caves and ruined monasteries
which I visited, made it abundantly clear that Brāhmans and Buddhists
agreed to differ and to avoid serious quarrels.
It must nevertheless be admitted, that in the extreme South of India,
and perhaps eventually at Benares and a few other strongholds of
Brāhmanism, the difference between the systems became so accentuated as
to lead to grievous conflicts. Whether blood was shed it is impossible
to prove; but it is alleged, with some degree of probability, that
violent crusades against Buddhism were instituted by Kumārila and
Ṡaṅkara—two well-known Southern Brāhmans noted for their bigotry—in the
seventh and eighth centuries of our era. It does not appear, however,
that they were very successful either in the conversion or extermination
of Buddhists.
It may, I think, be confidently affirmed that what ultimately happened
in most parts of India was, that Vaishṇavas and Ṡaivas crept up softly
to their rival and drew the vitality out of its body by close and
friendly embraces, and that instead of the Buddhists being expelled from
India, Buddhism gradually and quietly lost itself in Vaishṇavism and
Ṡaivism. In fact, by the beginning of the thirteenth century very little
Buddhism remained on Indian soil. In a philosophical drama, called ‘the
Rise of the Moon of Knowledge’ (Prabodha-ćandrodaya), written probably
about the twelfth century, the approaching triumph of Brāhmanism over
Buddhism is clearly indicated; for the Buddhist and other heretical
sects are represented as belonging to the losing side.
Yet, after all, it is scarcely correct to say that Buddhism ever wholly
died away in India. Its name indeed perished there, but its spirit
survived, and its sacred places remain to this day. Its ruined temples,
monasteries, monuments, and idols are scattered everywhere, while some
of these have been perpetuated and adopted by those later phases of
Hindūism which its own toleration helped to bring into existence.
At all events it may be safely affirmed that the passing away of the
Buddhistic system in India was on the whole like the peaceful passing
away of a moribund man surrounded by his relatives, and was at least
unattended with any agonizing pangs[76].
LECTURE VIII.
_Rise of Theistic and Polytheistic Buddhism._
In the preceding Lecture we have endeavoured to show generally how
Buddhism was evolved out of Brāhmanism, how it flourished side by side
with Brāhmanism, and how after a chequered career and protracted
senility in the land of its birth—lasting for at least fifteen
centuries[77]—it ultimately merged its individuality in Vaishṇavism and
Ṡaivism, or, in other words, disappeared and became lost in a composite
system called Hindūism.
We have now to trace more closely the gradual sliding of a simple
agnostic and atheistic creed, into a variety of theistic and
polytheistic conceptions.
We have already seen how the expansion of the Hīna-yāna into the
Mahā-yāna became an inevitable result of the Buddha’s own teaching—in
other words, how a rebound from atheism to theism was as unavoidable as
the return swing of a heavy pendulum. We need only repeat here that it
could not have been otherwise, when a teacher, who never claimed to be
more than a man, attempted to indoctrinate his human followers with
principles opposed to the inextinguishable instincts and eternal
intuitions of humanity.
In fact the teachers of the Mahā-yāna school were not slow to perceive
that, if Buddhism was to gain any hold over the masses, it was essential
that it should adapt itself to their human needs. It became imperatively
necessary, as a simple preservative measure, to convert a cold
philosophical creed, based on an ultra-pessimistic theory of existence,
into some sort of belief in the value of human life as worth living. And
if life was not to be an invariable current of misery it followed that
there must also be some sort of faith in a superintending God
controlling that life, and interesting Himself in Man’s welfare.
Unfortunately, having once advanced beyond definite limits, the more
progressive teachers found it impossible to draw the line at any given
point.
No doubt the theistic movement began by simple saint-worship—that is, by
veneration for the extinct Buddha as for a perfect saint. This was
accompanied by homage offered to his relics and to various memorials of
his person.
Then mere veneration and homage led to actual worship, and the Buddha,
who from first to last made his own perfect humanity an essential
principle of his teaching, became elevated to a pinnacle far above
humanity and converted into a veritable god.
Next, it is easy to see that a further development of the theistic
movement became inevitable.
For indeed it was only natural that in process of time some of the more
eminent of the Buddha’s followers should become almost equally revered
with himself. It was not, however, till some time after their death that
they received any homage resembling that accorded to their Master.
It was then that, instead of being thought of as extinct, according to
the orthodox Buddhist doctrine, they were continually elevated in the
imagination of their admirers to heavenly regions of beatitude.
Of course this constant increase of saint-worship tended to land men by
degrees in a mass of theistic and polytheistic conceptions.
And polytheism could not prevail in Eastern countries without its usual
reverse side—polydemonism; and polydemonism could not prevail without
its usual adjuncts of mysticism and magic. And all of these again
entailed idolatry, relic-worship, fetish-worship, and various other
gross superstitions.
Such was the natural termination of the process of degeneration. Let us
now trace it more in detail.
And in the first place it must not be forgotten that Gautama himself
seems to have foreseen this result.
He seems to have been quite aware of the ineradicable tendency inherent
in the nature of human beings, impelling them to elevate their saints
and heroes to the position of gods. He therefore took pains to make his
beloved disciple and cousin Ānanda understand that the truth embodied in
the Dharma or Law which he had taught, was all that ought to take his
place and represent him when he was gone.
Accordingly we learn from ancient inscriptions that for many years
afterwards the only allowable object of veneration among primitive
Buddhists was the Law—that is, the precepts, rules, and ordinances
propounded by Gautama himself—many of which may have been committed to
writing in early times, though oral transmission was at first the usual
rule, as it was among Brāhmans.
In time, however, the interconnexion between Brāhmanism and Buddhism,
and the tendency to group sacred objects in triads[78], which showed
itself very early in Hindū religious thought and mythology, seems to
have led to the idea of a corresponding triple arrangement of venerated
objects among Buddhists. Hence three precious things—sometimes called
the three jewels (_tri-ratna_), or the ‘three Holies[79]’—came first to
be held in honour and then actually worshipped; a kind of personality
being accorded to all three, very similar to that supposed to belong to
the three chief gods of the Hindū Pantheon.
This triad of personalities consisted of (1) the Buddha himself, that is
to say, Gautama Buddha, or the Buddha of the present age of the world;
(2) his Dharma or Law, that is, the word and doctrine of the Buddha
personified, or so to speak incarnated and manifested in a visible form
after his Pari-nirvāṇa; and (3) his Saṅgha or Order of monks, also in a
manner personified—that is, embodied in a kind of ideal impersonation or
collective unity of his true disciples.
This last word, Saṅgha, which means in Sanskṛit ‘a collection’ or
‘assemblage,’ is sometimes, as we have already seen (p. 85), very
unsuitably rendered by the expression ‘Buddhist Church.’ It simply
denotes ‘the collective body of Buddhist monks;’ that is to say, the
entire monastic fraternity, comprising in its widest sense the whole
assemblage of monks, Arhats, Pratyeka-Buddhas, Bodhi-sattvas, perfected
Buddhas and not yet perfected saints of all classes, whether on the
earth or in any other division of the Universe; but not including—be it
carefully borne in mind—the still vaster community of living persons
constituting the whole body of the Buddhist laity.
These three, then,—the Buddha, his Law, and his Order of Monks,—passed
into the first three divine personifications of early theistic Buddhism,
commonly known as the first Buddhist Triad.
Hence we find that the Khuddaka-pāṭha or ‘lesser readings[80]’ of the
fifteen divisions of the Khuddaka-nikāya (p. 63) begins thus:—
‘I put my trust in the Buddha, in the Law, in the Order’ (repeated three
times).
‘Ye beings (Bhūtāni) here assembled of earth and air, let us bow, let us
bow before the Buddha, revered by gods and men. May there be prosperity!
‘Ye beings of earth and air, let us bow before the Law.
‘Ye beings of earth and air, let us bow before the Order of Monks.’
When Fā-hien was on his return home and in great peril at sea, he
committed his life to the protection of the Saṅgha, saying:—‘I have
travelled far in search of the Law, let me, by your dread and
supernatural power, return from my wanderings and reach my
resting-place.’
And again, on ending his travels, he gratefully acknowledged that he had
been guarded in his perils by the dread power of the ‘three honoured
ones’ or ‘three precious ones’ or ‘three Holies’—thus acknowledging the
personality of the Law as well as of the Buddha himself and of the
Saṅgha or collective body of Monks[81].
But it must be borne in mind that this did not necessarily imply any
worship of images. It is certain that for a long time even Buddha
himself was not represented visibly. This is proved by the sculptures on
the Bharhut Stūpa. Even in the present day the simple expression of
trust in the three revered ones constitutes the only formula of worship
current in Ceylon. It is true that images of the Buddha are now common
in that country, and while travelling there I saw numbers of persons
offering homage and flowers to these images. But no prayer was addressed
to them, and I noticed no visible representations of the personified Law
or Saṅgha[82].
Nor, when I was at the Buddhist monastery near Darjīling, did I see any
image of the Law side by side with that of Gautama, though every book
examined by me in the temple-library began with the words:—Namo
Buddhāya, ‘reverence to the Buddha;’ namo Dharmāya, ‘reverence to the
Law;’ namo Saṅghāya, ‘reverence to the Order.’ The only visible symbol
of the three so-called ‘Holies’ was a long staff with three prongs, like
the Indian Tri-ṡūla.
It seems clear, therefore, that while, in process of time, images of
Gautama Buddha were multiplied everywhere—and, as we shall see, in
various attitudes and shapes—images of the personified Law and Saṅgha
were never common, and indeed rarely found, except among Northern
Buddhists. Those images of the Law which I have examined are in the form
of a man[83] with four arms and hands, two of which are folded in
worship, while one holds a book (or sometimes a lotus) and the other a
rosary[84].
Sometimes, however, the representation of a book alone is held to be a
sufficient symbol of the Law.
The Saṅgha, on the other hand, is generally symbolized by the image of a
man with two arms and hands, one of which, as in the images of Buddha,
rests on the knees and the other holds a lotus.
And it may be observed here that of the three images of the Buddha, the
Law, and the Order, sometimes one occupies the central position and
sometimes the other. This circumstance has led scholars to speak of what
it is the fashion to term a Buddhist trinity; but in real fact neither
Buddhism nor Brāhmanism has any trinity in the true meaning of the term,
for although Buddhists claim a kind of tri-unity for their triad, and
say that the first contains the second, and that the third proceeds from
the first two and contains them, yet the first is clearly never regarded
as either the Father or Creator of the world, in the Christian sense.
It appears, in fact, that the earliest Buddhist worship was exactly what
might have been expected to follow on the death of a religious Reformer
and author of a new system. It was merely the natural expression of deep
reverence for the founder of Buddhism, his doctrine, and the collective
body of his disciples.
So simple a form of worship, however, did not long satisfy the
devotional aspirations of the Buddha’s followers, even in the sacred
land of pure Buddhism.
The mere offering of homage, either to a system of Law, or to a
community of living monks or to departed human saints—even though their
memory was kept alive by visible representations, and stimulated by
meditation and repetition of prayer-formularies—had in it nothing
calculated to support or comfort men in seasons of sickness,
bereavement, or calamity. This kind of simple Buddhism might have
satisfied the needs of men in times of peace and prosperity. Under other
conditions it broke down. It could offer no shelter and give no help
amid the storms and tempests of life. Hence the development of the later
phases of the Mahā-yāna system, the chief feature of which was a marked
change in the meaning attached to the term ‘Bodhi-sattva.’
This change will be better understood if we go back to what has already
been mentioned (at p. 98). We have before explained that, according to
the original theory of Buddhism, a Bodhi-sattva is one who has knowledge
(derived from self-enlightening intellect) for his essence; that is, he
is a being who through all his bodily existences is destined in some
final existence to become a Buddha, or self-enlightened man. Until his
final birth, however, a Bodhi-sattva is a being in whom true knowledge
is rather latent and undeveloped than perfected. Gautama had been a
Bodhi-sattva of this character (see p. 134), the merit of whose actions
(Karma) in each of his countless previous existences (see p. 109) had
been transmitted to succeeding corporeal forms, till in the state
immediately preceding his last birth on earth he existed as a
Bodhi-sattva in the Tushita heaven (see p. 120). There he continued
until the time came for him to be born on earth as the Buddha of the
present age, when he entered the right side of his mother in the form of
a white elephant (p. 23)[85].
And it may be repeated here that the white elephant, as something rare
and beautiful of its kind, was simply symbolical of the perfect
Arhatship which he was destined to achieve in the ensuing birth.
Born, then, at last as the child Gautama, son of Ṡuddhodana, and
purified by a long observance of the six transcendent virtues (p. 128),
he ultimately attained to perfect knowledge and Arhatship under the
Bodhi-tree, and in so attaining passed from the condition of a
Bodhi-sattva to that of the highest of all Arhats—a supreme Buddha.
Then, after about forty-five years of diligent discharge of his
self-imposed task as a teacher of the right way of salvation, he
ultimately passed away in Pari-nirvāṇa, or absolute non-existence.
It is important, however, to remember, that at the moment of his
attaining Buddhahood he had transferred the Bodhi-sattvaship to
Maitreya, ‘the loving and compassionate one,’ who became the
Buddha-elect, dwelling and presiding as his predecessor had done in the
heaven of contented beings (Tushita; see p. 120). There he watches over
and promotes the interests of the Buddhist faith, while awaiting the
time when he is to appear on earth as Maitreya, or the fifth Buddha of
the present age. His advent will not take place till the lapse of five
thousand years after the Nirvāṇa of Gautama, when the world will have
become so corrupt that the Buddhist Law will be no more obeyed, nor even
remembered.
No wonder then that this Maitreya—whose very name implies love and
tenderness towards mankind, and who was destined to become, like
Gautama, a Saviour of the world by teaching its inhabitants how to save
themselves—became a favourite object of personal worship after Gautama
Buddha’s death. Even when the worship of other Bodhi-sattvas was
introduced, Maitreya retained the distinction of being the only
Bodhi-sattva worshipped by all Buddhist countries, whether in the South
or in the North. Not that Gautama’s memory was neglected. He was, of
course, held to be superior to Maitreya, who was still a mere
Bodhi-sattva or Buddha-designate. But the feeling towards Gautama
Buddha, after his Nirvāṇa and death, became different, and the object of
bringing flowers and offerings to his shrines was simply to honour the
memory of a departed, not an existing saint. It was a mere mechanical
act, fraught with beneficial consequences, but not supplying any real
religious need. On the other hand actual prayers were addressed to
Maitreya, as to a living merciful being, whose favour it was
all-important to secure, and whose heaven was believed to be a region of
perfect love and contentment, to which all his worshippers were
admitted.
In Hiouen Thsang’s Travels a heavenly Ṛishi is represented as
saying:—‘No words can describe the personal beauty of Maitreya. He
declares a law not different from ours. His exquisite voice is soft and
pure. Those who hear it can never tire; those who listen are never
satiated[86].’
In fact, the aspirations of few pious Buddhists in early times ever led
them to soar higher than the happiness of living with Maitreya and
listening to his voice in his own Tushita heaven.
It is true that afterwards when the worship of the Dhyāni-Buddha
Amitābha came into vogue in Northern countries this Buddha’s heaven,
called Sukhāvatī, fabled to be somewhere in the Western sky, seems to
have taken the place of the heaven of Maitreya. But this belongs to a
later phase of Buddhism, to be explained when we speak of the
Dhyāni-Buddhas (p. 203).
It was for Maitreya’s Tushita heaven that Hiouen Thsang, and other
devout men of his day, prayed on their death-beds, and the one Chinese
inscription found at Buddha-Gayā is full of expressions indicative of
the same longing[87].
If then, we are able to enter into the feelings of Buddhists everywhere
in depending on the living, loving, and energizing Maitreya, rather than
on the extinct Buddha who existed only in their memories, we shall find
it less difficult to understand how it came to pass that the idea of, so
to speak, canonizing every great saint or popular head of a monastic
community, and elevating him at death to the position of a Bodhi-sattva
like Maitreya, living in permanent regions of bliss, and able to help
his votaries to the same position, came into vogue.
It may make the course of development of Theistic Buddhism clearer if we
here revert to the early constitution of the Buddhist monastic
brotherhood, and endeavour to show how the homage paid to eminent and
saint-like men led, first to the multiplication of Bodhi-sattvas, and
then to polytheism and every form of polytheistic superstition.
A full explanation of the early monastic system is given in the learned
work of Koeppen[88]. It is clear that as long as Gautama was alive he
was the sole Head of the brotherhood of monks. After his death the
Headship (as in the Christian brotherhood after the death of Christ) was
not assigned to any one leader. The Buddha himself forbade this. The
term Saṇgha at that time merely denoted a republican fraternity of
monks, bound by no irrevocable vows and subject to no hierarchical
Superior, but all intent on following the example, and propagating the
doctrines of their departed leader. Soon, however, the formation of
separate centres of union and teaching became inevitable, and the term
Saṇgha was then applied to each separate society, and sometimes even to
a separate Conclave of each society, as well as to the whole body. It
seems at least certain that each monastic association had the right to
admit monks, to hear confession, and to excommunicate. Naturally, too,
in course of time it became necessary for each society to have some sort
of governing body and choose a kind of president, and this presiding
officer was originally the senior monk, and accordingly had the simple
title of Sthavira (Thera), ‘Elder.’ This title appears to have been
introduced immediately after Gautama’s death.
It is believed that ever since the time of the great Aṡoka, Sthaviras or
Elders who became actual superintendents of monasteries, exercised
administrative powers, like those of Abbots; each over his own monastic
community. This was the first kind of Headship recognized. It was simply
a superiority of age.
As to any still higher form of authority corresponding to that of Pope,
Archbishop, or Bishop, and extending over several monasteries, this did
not belong to early Buddhism or to its earliest developments. Lists of
uninterrupted series of pretended Buddhist Hierarchs exist, but are mere
fanciful fabrications. Nevertheless, it is certainly a historical fact
that along with the superiority of mere age, seniority, and experience,
there rapidly grew up _pari passu_ a superiority of knowledge, learning,
and sanctity, which were generally, though not invariably, combined in
the person of the presiding Elder.
Any one, in fact, who was distinguished for the practice of the highest
degree of meditation, for complete acquaintance with the Law, for
special purity of conduct, and perfect fulfilment of the precepts, was
naturally elevated above the class of ordinary Bhikshus. Such a monk was
from the earliest times dignified by the title Arhat, ‘very reverend,’
i. e. more worthy of honour than the generality. Arhat, in short, was
from the first a name for the higher grade of saint-like Bhikshu. Such a
man, too, before long, was raised to a still higher level in the
estimation of his fellow-monks. He was believed to have delivered
himself from all the consequences of acts, whether bad or good—from all
the fetters (see p. 127) of life, and therefore from all re-birth. He
was even elevated to a still loftier pinnacle. He was believed by his
superstitious admirers to possess unlimited dominion over nature, space,
time, and matter; to be all-seeing, all-powerful, and capable of working
every kind of miracle. Then, of course, at death he passed away in
Pari-nirvāṇa and was, so to speak, canonized. Be it noted, however, that
such canonization was never accorded to an Arhat till after his
departure from the world.
Probably the immediate disciples of Gautama Buddha—that is, his
so-called ‘great pupils’ (see p. 47), were all considered perfect
Arhats. And these perfect Arhats were probably the only saints of the
earliest period of Buddhism. Yet there was one who surpassed them all by
an immeasurable interval, and that one was Gautama Buddha himself. It
was the distinguishing mark of a supreme Buddha that he was infinitely
greater than all other Arhats, because he had not only gained perfect
knowledge himself, but had become the Saviour of the whole world by
imparting to men the knowledge of how they were to save themselves.
It seems, therefore, only natural that the followers of Buddha, and
probably the Buddha himself, before his decease, should have thought it
desirable to establish a more systematic gradation of saintship by
filling up the immense gap between ordinary Arhats and the supreme
Buddha. It was this that led to the idea of Pratyeka-Buddhas, that is,
self-dependent solitary Buddhas[89] (see p. 134), as well as to the
notion of a still higher being called a Bodhi-sattva, who, as the
Buddha-designate and future successor of Gautama, occupied a still more
exalted intermediate position than a Pratyeka-Buddha.
Of course it became difficult to fix on any living man, or any recently
deceased saint worthy of the highest stage of Bodhi, to which a being
about to become a perfect Buddha was supposed to attain.
The first to be so elevated (though apparently not by Gautama himself)
was, as frequently mentioned before, the mythical individual Maitreya.
He was, we repeat, for a long time the only Bodhi-sattva recognized by
all Buddhists alike, whether adherents of the Hīna-yāna or Mahā-yāna.
But he was not a historical personage, like Gautama or his immediate
disciples. He was a mere mythological personification of that spirit of
love—of that kindly and friendly disposition towards all living beings
by force of which Buddhism hoped one day to conquer the world, and win
it over to itself.
And in conformity with his mythical character, and probably to prevent
the rivalry of pretenders among future ambitious heads of monasteries,
he was not to appear for five thousand years, till the teaching of
Gautama had lost its power.
Indeed, it was only to be expected that this rank should at first have
been accorded to one person alone—just as in worldly affairs there could
be only one Heir-apparent to the throne.
Such was the more simple doctrine of early Buddhism in regard to the
relative position of the members of the Buddhist community.
How then did the teachers of the Mahā-yāna proceed to amplify this
doctrine?
They taught that there were two methods of salvation or, so to speak,
two ways or two vehicles—the Great and the Little (Mahā-yāna and
Hīna-yāna)—and indeed two Bodhis or forms of true knowledge which these
vehicles had to convey[90]. The former was for ordinary persons, the
latter for beings of larger talents and higher spiritual powers. The
‘Little Way’ was the simple doctrine, which had many Arhats but only one
Bodhi-sattva; the ‘Great Way,’ on the other hand, was the wider and
broader, which had many Bodhi-sattvas as well as many Arhats. He who
satisfied the usual requirements of Saintship received the rank of an
Arhat in both systems. But in the wider system every one who aimed at
unusual sanctity on the one hand, and knowledge (Bodhi) on the other,
might walk on the Great road leading to Bodhi-sattvaship, and receive
the title Bodhi-sattva.
We have seen (p. 136) that the Hīna-yāna, or ‘Little system,’ taught
that there were only twenty-four Buddhas who had preceded Gautama. Three
of these (viz. Kraku-ććhanda, Kanaka-muni, and Kāṡyapa), with Gautama as
a fourth, had appeared in the present age, and only one Bodhi-sattva
(Maitreya) was to come.
But according to the ‘Great System,’ it was a mistake to limit the
acquisition of the highest Saintship in this manner. It maintained that
there would be numberless supreme Buddhas (and, in addition to them,
self-taught, solitary Buddhas, called Pratyeka-Buddhas), as well as
numberless Bodhi-sattvas, even in the present age of the world. In other
words, it propounded the doctrine that the practice of the six (or ten)
transcendent virtues (p. 128), and especially the acquisition of
transcendent wisdom (prajñā pāramitā), might qualify many saints for the
attainment of Bodhi-sattvaship and Buddhaship. According to one theory,
there were to be at least a thousand Bodhi-sattvas, followed by a
thousand Buddhas, while, according to others, Buddhas and Bodhi-sattvas
were to be reckoned by myriads.
But this theory of numberless Bodhi-sattvas involved an entirely new
view of their nature and of the meaning of the term.
In fact, the Bodhi-sattvas of the more developed Mahā-yāna school were
not Bodhi-sattvas at all, according to the strict sense of the term. It
is true they resembled the genuine Bodhi-sattva in having gone through a
long series of existences leading them at last to perfect saintship and
to a heaven of their own, but they were under no obligation to give up
their Bodhi-sattvaship, quit their celestial abodes, or descend
ultimately as human Buddhas upon earth.
Furthermore, they never appeared to aim at Pari-nirvāṇa like their
earthly counterparts. Their most obvious _raison d’être_ seems to have
been to supply the need of personal objects of worship, and though in
Tibet they were believed to have their own secondary corporeal
emanations—sometimes called their ‘incarnations,’ but more properly
described as descents (avatāra) of portions of their essence in a
constant succession of human saints,—they never really left their own
permanent stations in the heavenly regions. Indeed, it is probable that
the chief cause of their popularity, as personal objects of adoration,
was that they were able to help their worshippers to attain to the same
permanent and unchangeable regions of bliss.
It was thus that the ‘Great Vehicle’ took up an attitude which raised it
not only above the simple effort to suppress the passions and desires,
but also above the hopeless Nihilism of early Buddhism; for it soon
became the fashion for the most devoted and pious of Buddhist monks to
aspire to the title and actual blessedness of Bodhi-sattvaship rather
than to the doubtful blessedness of utter personal annihilation involved
in Buddhahood. At any rate the numerous Bodhi-sattvas of the ‘Great
Method’ appear to have remained quite contented with their condition, so
long as it involved perpetual residence in the heavens, and quite
willing to put off all desire for Buddhahood and Pari-nirvāṇa.
Without doubt, this more amplified system was the result of a reaction
of Brāhmanism on Buddhism. It was at first a mere plan for creating a
close Hierarchy like that of the Brāhman caste—that is to say, a
privileged class of men possessed of higher knowledge and sanctity and
superior to the majority of Bhikshus of the common stamp. Then it soon
developed into a scheme for satisfying the craving of the masses for
divinities of some kind to whom they might appeal for help in time of
need.
In all probability the first to receive the title of Bodhi-sattva, next
to Maitreya, were the most celebrated Arhats before mentioned, who were
immediate disciples of Gautama, not however till death had separated
them from their human frames, when, as a matter of course, they received
a kind of worship like that accorded to all leaders of men, just as the
earliest saints, heroes, and teachers of Brāhmanism did.
To specify all the Arhats who were elevated to the rank of Bodhi-sattva
and became objects of veneration in later times would be a difficult and
unprofitable task.
We may also dismiss, as unworthy of note, statements such as that in the
Lalita-vistara, in which it is declared that 32,000 Bodhi-sattvas joined
the Buddha’s assembly in the Jetavana garden. But we may notice the
quasi-deification of a few historical personages mentioned by the two
Chinese travellers, whose account of the state of Buddhism in India from
the fourth to the seventh centuries has been so often quoted.
First of all came the immediate followers and so-called ‘great pupils’
(see p. 47) of Gautama, namely, his two chief disciples, Ṡāri-puttra and
Moggallāna (Maudgalyāyana = Modgala-puttra)[91], both of whom are
believed to have died before him. Then came the three great leaders at
the first Council: 1. Kāṡyapa (pp. 46, 55); 2. Gautama’s cousin and
beloved pupil Ānanda; 3. Upāli (note, p. 56).
Next to these perhaps the most celebrated teacher elevated to
Bodhi-sattvaship was Nāgārjuna[92]—noticed before as the alleged founder
of the Mahā-yāna system and its introducer into Tibet. According to one
account he was the son of a Brāhman of Vidarbha, and taught Buddhism in
the south of India. He had a celebrated disciple named Deva (or
Ārya-deva)[93]. Nāgārjuna was at any rate a great teacher and developer
of the Mahā-yāna. A legend relates that he was skilled in magic, and was
able thereby to prolong his own and a Southern Indian king’s life
indefinitely. This caused great grief to the mother of the
Heir-apparent, who instigated her son to ask Nāgārjuna for his own head.
Nāgārjuna complied with the request, and cut his own head off with a
blade of Kuṡa grass, nothing else having the power to injure him. He is
said by Hiouen Thsang to have lived in Southern Koṡala about 400 years
after the death of Gautama, and is worshipped under different epithets
in Tibet, China, Mongolia, and even Ceylon. Probably he lived in the
first or second century—Beal places him between A.D. 166 and 200.
Wassiljew considers him a wholly mythical personage. The additions he
made to Buddhist doctrines were undoubtedly great. When he died Stūpas
were erected to his memory, and in some places he was even worshipped as
Buddha.
Among other deified, or partially deified Bodhi-sattvas, whose images
and Stūpas (p. 161) the Chinese pilgrims found scattered in various
parts of India, may be mentioned, those of the mythical Buddhas who
preceded Gautama, especially Kāṡyapa[94]. Then we have Rāhula (son of
Gautama), the patron of all novices, and founder of the realistic school
called Vaibhāshika[95]; Dharma-pāla, Vasu-mitra (or Vasu-bandhu),
Aṡva-ghosha, Guṇamati, Sthiramati, and others. In this practice of
deifying their saints, Buddhists merely followed the example of the
adherents of Hindūism. And we may add that this tendency is constantly
repeating itself in the religious history of all nations.
There is even a tendency to press the saints of other countries into the
service. This is remarkably exemplified in the history of Barlaam and
Josaphat, current in Europe in the Middle Ages. The zealous Roman
Catholics of those days thought that they could not exclude so noble a
monk as Buddha from the catalogue of their own saints, and so they
registered him in their list as St. Josaphat (Josaphat being a
corruption of Bodhisat). Colonel Yule, in his Marco Polo, states that a
church in Palermo is dedicated to this saint.
And here mention may be made of a modern deified Hindū teacher or sage,
named Gorakh-nāth, who is said to have gone from India into Nepāl, and
is worshipped there as well as at Gorakh-pur and throughout the Panjāb.
Very little is known about him, and he belongs more to Hindūism than to
Buddhism. Some say that he was a contemporary of Kabīr (1488-1512), and,
according to a Janamsākhī, he once had an interview with Nānak, the
founder of the Sikh sect. Such legendary accounts as are current are
wrapped in much mystery. One legend describes him as born from a lotus.
Others describe him as the third or fourth in a series of Ṡaiva
teachers, and the founder of the Kānphāṭā sect of Yogīs. The remarkable
thing about him is that he succeeded in achieving an extraordinary
degree of popularity among Northern Hindūs and among some adherents of
Buddhism in Nepāl. His tomb is in the Panjāb, and he is to this day
adored as a kind of god by immense numbers of the inhabitants of North
Western India under the hills.
But the canonization of such historical teachers in India and their
elevation to semi-divine rank did not satisfy the craving of the
uneducated masses, either among Buddhists or Hindūs, for personal
deities, possessed of powers over human affairs far greater than any
departed human beings, however eminent. In Buddhism the supposed
existence of the more god-like Bodhi-sattva Maitreya—venerated by both
the Mahā-yāna and the Hīna-yāna schools—was not sufficient to satisfy
this craving.
Hence the ‘Great Vehicle’ soon began to teach the existence of numerous
mythological Bodhi-sattvas, other than Maitreya, to whom no historical
character belonged, but whose functions were more divine.
LECTURE IX.
_Theistic and Polytheistic Buddhism._
In the preceding Lecture I have endeavoured to sketch the rise of
theistic and polytheistic Buddhism.
We have now to turn our attention to its development, especially in
regard to the worship of mythical Bodhi-sattvas, and of the Hindū gods
and other mythological beings.
Some of the Bodhi-sattvas of the Mahā-yāna or Great System were merely
quasi-deifications of eminent saints and teachers. Others were
impersonations of certain qualities or forces; and just as in early
Buddhism we have the simple triad of the Buddha, his Law, and his Order,
so in Northern Buddhism the worship of mythical Bodhi-sattvas—other than
Maitreya—was originally confined to a triad, namely (1) Mañju-ṡrī, ‘he
of beautiful glory;’ (2) Avalokiteṡvara, ‘the looking-down lord,’ often
called Padma-pāṇi, ‘the lotus-handed;’ (3) Vajra-pāṇi or Vajra-dhara,
‘the thunderbolt-handed.’
These three mythical Bodhi-sattvas were not known to early Buddhists,
nor to the Buddhists of Ceylon. They are not even found in the oldest
books of the Northern School (such as the Lalita-vistara), though they
occur conspicuously in the Saddharma-puṇḍarīka.
All we can say with certainty is, that when Fā-hien visited Mathurā on
the Jumnā 400 years after Christ, their cult certainly existed there at
that time.
We shall not be far wrong if we assert that it was adopted in about the
third century of our era.
As already indicated (see p. 175), the idea of the first Buddhist
triad—the Buddha, the Law, and the Monastic Order—accepted by the
adherents of both Vehicles—was probably derived from the earliest
Brāhmanical triad. (See also Brāhmanism and Hindūism, pp. 9, 44. 74.)
In the same way the second Buddhist triad introduced by the advanced
teachers of the ‘Great Vehicle,’ viz. Mañju-ṡrī, Avalokiteṡvara (=
Padma-pāṇi), and Vajra-pāṇi, corresponded to the later Hindū triad
(tri-mūrti) of deities, Brahmā, Vishṇu, and Ṡiva.
I have explained in ‘Brāhmanism and Hindūism’ (pp. 54, 73) how the gods
Vishṇu and Ṡiva gradually usurped the position of the god Brahmā, whom
they dispossessed of his co-equality with themselves, and how the whole
mythology of the Hindūs, which was originally complicated by a large
admixture of pre-Āryan and Vedic elements, ultimately became more
simplified by arranging itself under the two heads of Vaishṇavism and
Ṡaivism, all other mythological personages being regarded as forms of
either Vishṇu or Ṡiva.
In contradistinction to this, we find that each member of the two
Buddhist triads holds its own, and we are led on to a system which
bewilders us by ever increasing complications—a system which preserves
the individuality of its own triads and deified saints, and yet
recognizes almost all the gods, demigods, demons, and supernatural
beings of Hindūism.
I propose now to offer some account of the development of the Buddhist
Pantheon, beginning with the mythical conceptions peculiar to Buddhism,
and passing on to those held in common with Hindūism.