What is Theravada Buddhism?

The Buddha The Buddha was born aprince of the Shakya province in ancient India on theFull Moon day of May 563 B.C. (Mahayana school typically uses April 8 for thebirthday celebration). He lived over 500 years before the birth of JesusChrist. He gave up his kingdom and claim to the throne in search ofphilosophical Truth. He tried all of the ascetic, extremist practices andreached high levels of tranquility and trance, but no ultimate liberation.Finally after six years of struggle in the forests of India including practicessuch as extreme fasting to the point of near death, he discovered that themiddle way was best. By avoiding the extremes he attained enlightenment withfull wisdom into the answers of birth, death, suffering, and the end to suffering.Enlightenment came to him at the age of 35 in the year 528 B.C. He taught toall for 45 years until his death at the age of 80 in the year 483 B.C. Modernhistorians have uncovered information, which states that he may not have beenthe son of a king, but rather the son of an elected official. Whichever thecase may be, his father being an elected leader or king, he clearly was of aprivileged birth due to the evidence of life in palaces with many servants. Hewas born into a high (warrior) caste, but rejected these hereditary rights andpower for the pursuit to the answers that will lead to the end of suffering.Archaeological evidence has confirmed the life of the Buddha who was born in Lumbini, in present day Nepal. The famous King Ashoka of India erected many stone pillars and edictspraising the Buddha and marking his sites. Buddhist writings on locations,culture, and cities have been confirmed in the physical archaeological record.The information we have about the Buddha and his teachings, like most religionsalso come from scriptures. The Theravada-Paliscriptures are about 20,000 pages in length. Other schools of Buddhism, such asthe Mahayana and Vajrayana (Tibetan) have additionalscriptures, but not as long or detailed as the Pali.In general, the other schools of Buddhism accept all or nearly all of theTheravada scriptures and simply have added other writings to be inclusive withthem. The Theravada scriptures are written in Pali,which is by historical records either the language of the Buddha or the closestwritten language to the Buddha`s dialect. The Mahayana scriptures are inSanskrit that is further removed from the Buddha`s language, but a closerelative in linguistic form. Like other religions the Buddha`s teachingsremained oral for 150 to 300 years before being written down into scriptures.The same is true in regard to the scriptures of Christianity, Judaism, Islam,Taoism, etc. The story we hear in the Buddhist scriptures is that the oraltradition (up until the time it was written) was maintained by enlightenedmonks who because of their full-enlightenment had the same insights as theBuddha and thus, the words and teachings were the same, with no deviation fromtruth or the Buddha. The authenticity of religious scriptures strikes greatdebates and controversy in every religion. The difference, however, with theBuddha`s teachings is that there is no blind-faith. As we have seen in theBuddha`s quote at the beginning of this chapter, the authenticity is not quiteso important in Buddhism. This is because the Buddha`s teachings are a comeand see approach. The Buddha advises us, perhaps even commands us to see foryourself if the teachings make Page 26 sense, are scientific, are and agreeableto what is correct and good. Thus, the literal word of each verse has littlemeaning or purpose in the Buddha`s teachings. The Buddha explains hisphilosophy, but in the end it is up to us to discover the truth on our own.