The history of Buddhism

The founder of Buddhism, Siddhartha Gautama, was born circa 563 BCE into a wealthy family. Gautama rejected his life of riches and embraced a lifestyle of asceticism, or extreme self-discipline. After 49 consecutive days of meditation, Gautama became the Buddha, or “enlightened one”. He made this announcement in public at about 528 BCE and gained a group of disciples who became Buddhist monks and traveled throughout northern India spreading his teachings.

Buddhism has a strong individualistic component: everyone has responsibility for their own happiness in life. Buddha presented the Four Noble Truths as guiding principles: there is suffering in life; the cause of suffering is desire; ending desire means ending suffering; and following a controlled and moderate lifestyle will end desire, and therefore end suffering.

In order to achieve these goals, the Buddha presented the Noble Eightfold Path: right belief, right resolve, right speech, right conduct, right occupation, right effort, right mindfulness, and right samadhi—or meditation. According to Buddhist practice, following the Noble Eightfold Path will ultimately result in being liberated from samsara, the cycle of rebirth and suffering.

Many followers of this path to enlightenment participated in an emerging Buddhist monastic tradition. Monasticism is a religious way of life which involves leaving behind worldly pursuits and devoting oneself to spiritual activity.

Buddhism’s individual outlook and disregard for the caste system in attaining enlightenment were appealing to people in lower castes. Buddhism suggested that individual people might be able to attain enlightenment in this life and held that caste was not a punishment for deeds committed in a past life. Women also had some opportunities within Buddhism that they wouldn’t have had access to otherwise, such as the ability to become Buddhist monks. Buddhism gave them an option for work outside the traditional sphere of family and home.

As you can imagine, following the Noble Eightfold Path was not an easy task! Buddhism was less popular with people in the vaishya—merchant—or shudra—servant—classes who could not devote all of their time and mental energy to pursuing these challenging goals. Partly in response, Mahayana Buddhism arose. Mahayana Buddhism is a form of Buddhism in which people could still attain enlightenment by performing acts of devotion or performing the duties of their jobs. This alternative approach made Buddhism more acceptable for a greater number of people. Mahayana means the greater vehicle and refers to the opportunity for more people to gain salvation.

Buddhism also received support from the state. In 260 BCE, King Ashoka adopted Buddhism after a violent war against the feudal state of Kalinga. He wanted to renounce violence and publicly turned to Buddhism in order to achieve this. He may have also turned to Buddhism as a way of uniting people of many castes and cultures under a similar religion, which might have made his empire easier to govern.