Gautama Buddha
Encyclopedia : G : GA : GAU : Gautama Buddha
- "Siddhartha" redirects here. For other uses, see Siddhartha (disambiguation).
- "Gautama" redirects here. For other uses, see Gautama (disambiguation).
Encyclopedia : G : GA : GAU : Gautama Buddha
The Buddha in some Hindu scriptures is referred to as a "Nastik", since he did not give preeminence to the Vedas. However, it was the most well-known Buddhist scholar Rahula Vipola, who wrote that the Buddha was trying to shed the true meaning of the Vedas. Buddha is said to be a knower of the Veda (vedajña) or of the Vedanta (vedântajña) (Sa.myutta, i. 168); Sutta Nipâta, 463)
One theory is that these similarities may indicate the propagation of Buddhist ideals into the Western World, with the Greeks acting as intermediaries and religious syncretists.
For example, the "miracle" of walking on water, which is frequently attributed to Jesus in the New Testament, is first found in Buddhist literature in the oldest Pali Canon Digha Nikaya 11, in the Kevatta Sutta. This is not found in any other literature in the world except 500 years later in the Christian New Testament.
Early 3rd-4th century Christian writers such as Hippolytus and Epiphanius write about a Scythianus, who visited India around 50 AD from where he brought "the doctrine of the Two Principles". According to these writers, Scythianus' pupil Terebinthus presented himself as a "Buddha" ("he called himself Buddas" Cyril of Jerusalem). Terebinthus went to Palestine and Judaea where he met the Apostles ("becoming known and condemned" Isaia), and ultimately settled in Babylon, where he transmitted his teachings to Mani, thereby creating the foundation of what could be called Persian syncretic Buddhism, Manicheism. One of the greatest thinkers and saints of western Christianity, Augustine of Hippo was originally a Manichean.
In the 2nd century CE, the Christian dogmatist Clement of Alexandria recognized Bactrian Buddhists (Sramanas) and Indian Gymnosophists for their influence on Greek thought:
The Greek legend of "Barlaam and Ioasaph", sometimes mistakenly attributed to the 7th century John of Damascus but actually written by the Georgian monk Euthymios in the 11th century, was ultimately derived, through a variety of intermediate versions (Arabic and Georgian) from the life story of the Buddha. The king-turned-monk Ioasaph (Georgian Iodasaph, Arabic Yūdhasaf or Būdhasaf) ultimately derives his name from the Sanskrit Bodhisattva, the name used in Buddhist accounts for Gautama before he became a Buddha. Barlaam and Ioasaph were placed in the Greek calendar of saints on 26 August, and in the West they were canonized (as "Barlaam and Josaphat") in the Roman Martyrology on the date of 27 November.
The story was translated into Hebrew in the Middle Ages as "Ben-Hamelekh Vehanazir" ("The Prince and the Nazirite"), and is widely read by Jews to this day.
The Sanskrit word, "bodhisatva" is translated as "nazir" and in Hebrew means: ("One who abstains"); and is generally a word used for monks. Jesus too is referred throughout the Greek New Testament as a Nazarene:
Mark 01:24 ΝΑΖΑΡΗΝΕ Nazarene Jesus Nazarian Mark 10:47 Mark 14:67 Mark 16:06 Luke 04:34 Luke 24:19 Matthew 02:23 Matthew 26:71 Luke 18:37 John 18:05 John 18:07 John 19:19 Acts 02:22 Acts 03:06 Acts 04:10 Acts 06:14 Acts 22:08 Acts 26:09
Buddha exhorts us to study the Dharma (which is translated as the truth, law or way), for those who see the Dharma see the Buddha, in other words, Buddha is the law and the law is the Buddha. We read in the Kindred Sayings (III, Khandhaa-vagga, Middle Fifty, Ch 4, 87, Vakkali) that the Buddha said to Vakkali:
The Buddhist monastic class flowed into what came to be called Islamic monasticism, meaning Sufism - which has given many poets and scientists to both Islam and the world. A Muslim mystical movement, the Kalandarriya Sufi Order, which arose in 9th Century as a result of the malamattiya, became established in Khorasan as early in the 11th Century...had many Buddhist monks. (Gabriel Mandel Khan, from Great Biographies, Buddha).
Ascetic practices within the sufi philosophy are associated with Buddhism. The notion of purification (cleaning one' s soul from all evil things and trying to reach Nirvana and to become immortal in Nirvana) plays an important role in Buddhism. The same idea shows itself in the belief of "vuslat" (communion with God) in Sufi philosophy. (Kamuran Godelek, The Neoplatonist Roots of Sufi Philosophy)
“The mission of the Buddha was quite unique in its character, and therefore it stands quite apart from the many other religions of the world. His mission was to bring the birds of idealism flying in the air nearer to the earth, because the food for their bodies belonged to the earth.” Hazrat Inayat Khan, "The Sufi Message"
"...to the normal or dualistic consciousness it is precisely the shadows `which pass and are done' which constitute perceptibly: what man "sees" is in fact just that which obstructs the rays of light. This is the justification for the Buddha saying: "Everything is Sorrow": in that word "Everything" he is most careful to include specifically all those things which men count joyous. And this is not really a paradox; for to him all reactions which produce consciousness are ultimately sorrowful, as being disturbances of the Perfection of Peace, or (if you prefer it) as obstructions to the free flow of Energy.
"Joy and Sorrow are thus to him relative terms; subdivisions of one great sorrow, which is manifestation. We need not trouble to contest this view; indeed, the `Shadows' of which our book speaks are those interferences with Light caused by the partiality of our apprehension."[link].
Siddhartha is considered to be a magus of the A.'.A.'. due to his introduction of a new Logos. "His Word was ANATTA; for the Root of His whole Doctrine was that there is no Atman, or Soul, as Men ill translate it, meaning a Substance incapable of Change. Thus He, like Lao-tze, based all upon a Movement, instead of a fixed Point." (Cap. 70. Liber 111). The tenet "Existance of Sorrow" is contradictory and complimentary to "Existance is Pure Joy." Siddhartha is a saint recognized in the Collects of The Gnostic Mass of Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica.
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