Happy Birthday, Mr. Buddha!

(Bumped up from earlier this evening.)

In this age of religious extremism and terrorists abusing religious ideology, a pacifistic religion like Buddhism must resonate well with everyone. Last week, coinciding with the full moon (aka Buddha Poornima), India, Sri Lanka, and many Southeast Asian countries celebrated the birth anniversary of the founder of the religion, Siddhartha Gautama Buddha.

Buddhism and Jainism were two religions that caught the imagination of parts of India about 2500 years ago. While Buddhism did not explicitly preach non-violence, Jainism did and influenced other religions including Hinduism in many ways — for instance, vegetarianism seen in Hindu culture is said to be an adoption of Jain philosophy. Though Buddhism flourished for centuries in India, it gradually declined for lack of royal patronage. Jainism on the other hand has survived to this day with some noticeable following.

Siddhartha Gautama was born in 563 BC (approximate date) into a royal family and led a life of opulence until he was about 29 when he was exposed to the vagaries of the real world outside his palace. He then rejected his princely way of life and in his quest for the truth, attained nirvana or enlightenment at the age of thirty five from which point on he opened up to share his thoughts with the populace. He was then given the title Buddha to mean the enlightened one. Here is more on the fundamental teachings of Buddha.

Buddhism enjoyed the patronage of many kings at its peak in India, most notably that of Emperor Ashoka from the 3rd century BC. Legend has it that Ashoka after surveying the destruction of what was his last battle decided to adopt the new religion and the philosophy of non-violence and helped spread it far and wide (See here for a brief introduction). Another well known royal to promote Buddhism was Emperor Harshavardhana from the 7th century AD (more here). He is also known to have followed Mahayana Buddhism.

The best archeological evidence of Buddha and the religion he founded is preserved in the Ajanta caves in Northern India. There are about 29 caves carved into the cliff side of a magnificent gorge along the river Waghora. Paintings and sculptures in these caves beautifully depict the remarkable life story of Buddha as seen through the eyes of his followers over a number of centuries. These paintings and sculptures were created by Buddhist monks and other artisans over a period of 800 years starting as early as 2nd century BC. As Buddhism began to decline, the caves fell into natural degradation and remained hidden for centuries before they were discovered by a British Infantry captain stationed in Madras in 1819 who was on the hunt for a tiger in the vicinity. Religious or not, this remarkable human history of magnificent arts and creativity takes my breath away. The pictures above show a reclining Buddha on his deathbed surrounded by his followers as seen sculpted in Cave 26.

See this audio slide show from the NYTimes for an introduction to the caves. An accompanying article can be found here . The picture above the fold is from Cave 12 and the one below is in Cave 26 (more pictures here).

In addition to the Ajanta caves, we find Buddhist sculptures dating from 500 – 750 AD in the nearby Ellora caves. The activity continued in the Ellora caves between the 6th and 10th centuries with Buddhist caves being carved in the beginning of that period. All three religions Buddhism, Jainism, and Hinduism are represented in the Ellora caves which many note is a testament to the long and historic religious tolerance in India. Below is a picture from a Buddhist cave, one of 12 in Ellora. More here.

I will end this brief post about Buddhism and Buddha with this perhaps mundane note. For a while I had a rule in my house of not having any religious symbols in any part of the house. Then I came across this beautiful idol of Buddha in an artsy store near Big Sur, CA and I had to have it. My Buddha is wearing a red shawl and his hair is perfect and I fell in love with him. He sits in the center of my living room now to everyone’s attention. In stressful periods in my life, I had a ritual — coming down the stairs every morning, I would call out jauntily “Hello Mr. Buddha, how are you today?” The days I didn’t feel like doing that I knew I had to calibrate my emotions as I stepped out into the world. But today I say to my beloved friend, “Happy Birthday, Mr. Buddha!” I guess it is possible even for an atheist to intellectualize and then personalize a benevolent religious figure.

[h/t to Preeti Aroon and her photo essay at FP]