Buddhist Beliefs

The Buddhism creation story centre around events after the Buddha’s death. It is believed that approximately five hundred monks met under the leadership of Kashyapa at the first council at Rajagrha. A monk called Upali recited the Vinaya (monastic code) as he remembered it. The Buddha’s cousin, friend and disciple Ananda recited the Buddha’s lessons, the Sutras. The monks debated the details recited and decided on final versions. These were then commited to memory by the other monks and remained an oral teaching tradition for over two hundred years, and eventually were translated into the many languages found in India.

Over the next few centuries the original unity of Buddhism began to fragment and during the second council held at Vaishali, some one hundred years after the first, debates between a more liberal group and traditionalists took place. The liberal group left and called themselves the Mahasangha, ‘the great Sangha’. This group further evolved into the Mahayanna tradition of northern Asia.

The traditionalists were referred to as Sthaviravada or ‘way of the elders’. They developed a complex set of philosophical ideas beyond those made clear by Buddha. These were gathered into the Abhidharma or ‘higher teachings’. However, they too began to disagree so that one splinter group after another left the ‘way of the elders’. Eighteen schools developed, each with their own interpretations of various issues. Today, only the school originating from the Sri Lankan Theravadan survives.

There is also a story which tells of a poor young boy who did not have a gift for the Buddha, so he collected a handful of dust and innocently presented it. The story tells how the Buddha smiled and accepted his gift with the same graciousness as he accepted gifts from the wealthy. The young boy is said to have been reborn as the Emperor Ashoka.

Ashoka then sent missionaries all over India and beyond, reaching countries such as Egypt, Plaestine and Greece. The Greeks of the Alexandrian kingdoms of northern India adopted Buddhism after their king had a conversation with a monk called Nagasena and was convinced by him; their conversation was immortalized in the Milinda Panha. Another king in northern India was also converted to Buddhism and a council was held in about 100 ad in Kashmir. The Greek Buddhists recorded the Sutras onto copper sheet, but these have never been recovered.

Buddhism Creation Stories vary, one story which is told is of Orthodox Christianity; a saint called Josaphat, an Indian king, tells a story which is basically that of the Buddha. The name Josaphat is thought to be a distortion of the word Bodhisattva.