Having now traveled in many of the Asian countries which have Buddhism either a state religion or as a dominant religious persuasion, the differences between the daily practices and quality of adherence is as different as light or day. I am sure there are many treatises on how and why they evolved so differently but what amazes me is that there are few questions about how they all may have deviated from the Original Buddha’s sermons. When Buddha passed away in 6th Century B.C, the first Buddhist council was held and oral history points to hectic debates on how and why the teachings should be preserved. There was a schism, with the more orthodox ones actually wanting to incorporate the very rituals and laws and dogmas and orthodoxy that The Buddha preached against. The others were more keen on the Eight Fold Path, a means to live life with beauty and peace outside of the wretched dogmatic Vedic way of life (later called Hinduism). By the 3rd Century B.C, may more kings had adopted Buddhism lending it credibility as well as much needed royal support. The King Ashoka was the well-known one and during his regime, another remarkable event occurred: The Buddhist Council which now decided that Buddhism must be a proselytizing religion for it to gain more adherents. This strategy was later actioned by royally supported missionaries traveling to Sri Lanka, South East Asia, China – all this while the Vedic religious traditions (later termed collectively as “Hinduism”) were firmly entrenched on the South Asian subcontinent! Each of the overseas geographies adapted the Buddhism to include the existing cults. For example , in Thailand, the equally fast spreading Tantric cult affected Buddhism. These cults were based on fertility, in part, and this element was beautifully incorporated into a Tantric form of Buddhism i.e Vajrasena and Lo and Behold! a female Goddess, Tara, was now beginning to get worshipped. Did Buddha ever envisage such a development?! So , what is a PURE religion and how do adherents change a religion and how do mores and social customs get incorporated? I find the religious histories of my subcontinent immensely fascinating. The religion I was born into i.e Hinduism has its roots in 1500 B.C with the Vedas being composed as an oral tradition, yet it is the only one that is NOT self-revelatory i.e no God or Saint or Holy Person established a path unlike Buddhism or Islam or Christianity. Yet the shrewd alacrity with which the priesthood allowed Hindusim to be morphed through the centuries is amazing – from phallic symbols to monotheism swinging back to Gods for every major event in life and natural occurrence to animism and later to a foreign concept – private devotion to The God – a very Islamic influence.
I am still reading on….(Francis Watson is an excellent writer on these histories) and will crystallize my thoughts on this facinating past, which is so much a part of who I am and where I came from.
t/ a person who lives outside their native country.