Founder of Buddhism: Lord GAUTAMA BUDDHA

ALL THAT WE ARE IS THE RESULT OF WHAT WE HAVE THOUGHT. IF A MAN SPEAKS OR ACTS WITH AN EVIL THOUGHT, PAIN FOLLOWS HIM. IF A MAN SPEAKS OR ACTS WITH A PURE THOUGHT, HAPPINESS FOLLOWS HIM, LIKE A SHADOW THAT NEVER LEAVES HIM.

-GAUTAM BUDDHA

‘Buddha’ means ‘Awakened One’. Buddha is a person who is completely free from all faults and mental obstructions. Gautama Buddha is the founder of the Buddhism.

• Place &Family

Birth

Childhood 

Skills

Renunciation

Marriage and Married life 

Search 

The Enlightenment of the Buddha  

The life as a Buddha 

The life teachings 

Inspirational story

 

 

 
Place &Family: About 2500 years before, there was a beautiful city in Bharat named Kapilvastu in Shakya clan. One of the kings of this clan was the king Shuddhodana who had 2 queens Mayawati (Mahamaya) and Gautami. With Mayawati he had a son who afterwards gets famous as Gautama Buddha. 

Birth: Gautama Buddha was born as a royal prince in 624 BC. With his birth the king felt as if all his wishes had been fulfilled. He named him Siddhartha (the one who achieves his aim.) The day of the Buddha's birth is widely celebrated in Theravada countries as Vesak. Buddha's birth anniversary is known as “Buddha Poornima" in India as Buddha is believed to have been born on a full moon day. On the 7^th day of his birth, his mother died. So he was brought up by his step-mother Gautami. One day, the king called Brahmins to predict about the future of the prince. After seeing the child he said that, “There are signs that the boy could become either a chakravati king (a ruler of the entire world) or a fully enlightened Buddha. But the king wanted him to be a great king as his descendant, so he shielded him from religious teachings and all human sufferings

Childhood: Siddhartha led a luxurious life in his palace. His extraordinary qualities could even be seen when he was a child.
        The main occupation of people of Kapilvastu was farming for which animals were used in a bad way. Seeing this, he himself felt the pains of these animals. To improve this pitiable condition of animals he had talk with the king. The king saw his soft heart towards animals and bowed him.
There is one another story of his childhood that shows his soft heart towards animals. Devdatta, his cousin, once shot an arrow to swan (hans) flying in the sky. When the bird fall on the ground, Siddhartha saw it and put it into his lap. He took out the arrow and gave it aid. Meanwhile Devdatta came. He told him to be the master of that bird as he had shot the bird. Then prince refused to give it to him as he would kill the bird. To resolve the dispute they went to the king. The king thought an idea to resolve it. He put the bird in the centre and both the cousins on opposite sides of the bird. Then he king said that the bird will be of the person to who it will go. Devdatta started calling the bird to his side but the bird went to the side of his life saver, Siddhartha.  So the king gave the bird to Siddhartha. 

Skills: He was a master of traditional arts, mathematics and sciences. He knew sixty-four different languages. He once told his father that he could count all the atoms in the world in the time it takes to draw a single breath.
        At his father’s advice he joined a school where, in addition to various academic subjects, he became skilled at martial arts and archery.
        The prince always tried to encourage others to follow spiritual paths. So one time, when he took part in an archery contest, he declared that with the bow of meditative concentration he would fire the arrow of wisdom to kill the tiger of ignorance in living beings. He then impressed everybody present there by releasing an arrow straight through five iron tigers and seven trees before disappearing into the earth. By seeing all this, many people developed faith in him.
         Although he had everything he could want, he still was not happy. He wanted to learn the meaning of his existence as he comes to know that wealth is not the ultimate goal.

Renunciation: Sometimes, the prince Siddhartha would go to see Kapilvastu. Then he comes across with many inevitable truths of life by seeing old people, sick people and a corpse. These stark realities of life seized and sickened the Prince. These left a deep impression on his mind and soul. He started realising that all living beings have to experience the sufferings of birth, sickness, ageing and death without any exception. These are attached to them as their reflection.
The prince got very upset and started to get rid of it. When the king came to know the sadness of his prince he did everything to change his mind.

Marriage and Married life: The king arranged his marriage at the age of 16 to a girl of the same age named Yashodhara and they had a son named Rahula. Siddhartha is said to have spent 29 years as a prince in Kapilavastu. Still he was not happy from inside as he was continuously in search of the answers to the problem of birth, old age, sickness, and death. So he decided to give up his worldly life, wife, son, family and even his palace and to become a holy man. For this he left his home in a dark and stormy night and went to the solitude of the forest where he would engage in profound meditation until he attained enlightenment.

Search: Siddhartha put himself to rigorous ascetic practices, studying and following different methods of meditation with various religious teachers. He was never fully satisfied. So he went away from there with his five companions and started mediating in solitude(so he and five disciples left to find enlightenment by themselves.). Six years passed away. They were not taking proper food for which their physical strength lowers down. Siddhartha realized that instead of starvation, he needed nourishment to build up his strength for the effort as physical austerities were not the means to achieve liberation. From then, he encouraged people to follow a path of balance rather than extremism. He found The Middle Way between those two extremes. But this was not liked by his companions abandoned him. He was still in search of his answers. He went away from them.

The Enlightenment of the Buddha: He walked to the village senani (now known as Bodh Gaya, India) and seated himself under a pipal tree (Ficus religiosa /sacred fig) now known as the Bodhi tree in the meditation posture. He vowed not to rise from meditation until he had attained perfect enlightenment. The devil Mara (Destruction) got frightened from his meditation and tried everything to break his concentration, but Siddhartha responded by developing even deeper concentration.
With his strong and deep concentration, he reached very last mind of a limited being, he removed the final veils of ignorance from his mind and in the next moment, a fully enlightened being at the age of thirty-five. Now from prince Siddhartha, he earned the title of Buddha
As he triumphed over all the demons of this world, he became a “Conqueror Buddha.”

The life as a Buddha

When Buddha got enlightenment, he knew answers to all his problems. But he was not sure if he should teach his new ideas or not. But in the end, he conformed himself to show people the path of pleasure. He went to his five companions at the place called Rishipattan. There he taught them Wheel of Dharma after listening which they become his first disciples. Then all the six formed the first sangha (the company of Buddhist monks and nuns.) Later at this place the king Asoka formed sarnath stoop. He also taught about the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path. The people listened to him.
        When he taught, he did not pretend to be a God. For the rest of his life, he walked in many parts of Nepal and India to teach people. When his father, the king Suddhodana, heard about his son's awakening, he called him to return to Kapilavastu. The Buddha agreed to come. There he taught the people about dharma. During the visit, many members of the royal family joined the sangha along with his seven years old son Rahula. Thousands of people got enlightenment because of him.  
At the age of 80, Gautama Buddha came to know that these are his last days. So he called all his disciples to him and told them if they want to ask any question. In his answer to the first question about Brahmin (saint,) he said the one who has control all his desires and is well wisher of all the people is Brahmin. Second question   died of food poisoning.

The life teachings

The teachings of the Buddha are known as Buddhism. Buddhism is mostly about ending the feeling of pain that all people feel inside. Gautama Buddha taught that pain is a part of all life. He taught that pain is because of desire. And he showed that there is a way to end desire and end pain by doing good things, not doing bad things, and training one's mind. This is done to end pain and gain enlightenment.
        Buddhism teaches non-harm and balance – not going too far one way or the other. The Buddha taught people to meditate while sitting in the lotus position. Buddha would not say if God exist or not, according to him people should not look at God to save them or bring them enlightenment. 
        

Inspirational story: Once Buddha was traveling with a few of his followers.While they were passing a lake,Buddha told one of his disciples, "I am thirsty.Do get me some water from the lake."
            The disciple walked up to the lake. At that moment, a bullock cart started crossing through the lake. As a result, the water became very muddy and turbid. The disciple thought, "How can I give this muddy water to Buddha to drink?"So he came back and told Buddha, "The water in there is very muddy. I don't think it is fit to drink."

After about half an hour, again Buddha asked the same disciple to go back to the lake. The disciple went back, and found that the water was still muddy. He returned and informed Buddha about the same.
            After sometime, again Buddha asked the same disciple to go back.This time, the disciple found the mud had settled down, and the water was clean and clear. So he collected some water in a pot and brought it to Buddha.
            Buddha looked at the water, and then he looked up at the disciple and said," See what you did to make the water clean. You let it be, and the mud settled down on its own -- and you have clear water.
            Your mind is like that too! When it is disturbed, just let it be. Give it a little time. It will settle down on its own. You don't have to put in any effort to calm it down. It will happen. It is effortless."

             Having 'Peace of Mind' is not a strenuous job; it is an effortless process!

Inspirational story 2: Ahimsaka (Angulimal) was the robber and murderer. He killed travellers who passed through the forest. In place of taking clothes or jewels from his victims, he took their fingers so as to keep count of their number. He wore them around his neck as a garland. Thus he came to be known as Angulimala ("garland of fingers").

When Buddha come to know about him, he perceived with his "divine eye" (faculty of clairvoyance) that Angulimala had slain 999 victims, and was desperately seeking a thousandth. If the Buddha encountered Angulimala that day, he would become a monk and subsequently attain Nirvana. If Angulimala encountered his mother instead, he would slay her as his thousandth victim and fall into hell for millennia as a matricide. His conversion to monkhood and later to sainthood was exceptional as he seems to have been the only former criminal to be accepted into the Buddhist monastic order. The Buddha had often warned not to judge people from appearances and their external behavior. In Angulimala's case, the Buddha had seen his hidden potential to win freedom, not only from his present low moral status and from rebirth in the lowest worlds of painful existence, but that Angulimala would also be able to gain the highest freedom from all suffering in this very life.

Sayings  of prominent modern proponents about Gautama Buddha: Buddha is a teacher of the same universal truth that underlies all religions of the world:

Swami Vivekananda:- May he who is the Brahman of the Hindus, the Ahura Mazda of Zoroastrians, the Buddha of Buddhists, the Jehovah of the Jews, the Father in Heavens of Christians, give strength to you to carry out your noble ideas! 

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (Indian philosopher, first Vice President of India, second President of India): If a Hindu chants the Vedas on the banks of the Ganges... if the Japanese worship the image of Buddha, if the European is convinced of Christ's mediatorship, if the Arab reads the Koran in the mosque... It is their deepest apprehension of God and God's fullest revelation to them.