lpetrich

I will use the criteria I'd stated in my BC&A thread "Jesus Christ: Mythic Hero". Here is my score for Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha:

1. 0.5 - Not sure about the royalty or the virginity part as regards his mother Maya.

2. 1 - His father Suddhodhana had been a king, or at least a noble.

3. 0 - No hint of this.

4. 1 - He was conceived when Maya dreamed that a white elephant had entered her body through her side.

5. 1 - He was an enlightened being on his last reincarnation before achieving Nirvana.

6. 0.5 - Suddhodhana tries to keep him from his future career by spoiling him instead of by trying to kill him.

7. 0 - He suffers that spoilage through his childhood.

8. 0.5 - Maya dies and he is raised by her sister Mahaprajaprati.

9. 1 - Apparently so.

10. 1 - He sees an old man, a monk, a sick man, and a dead man, and deserts his wife and son in search of enlightenment.

11. 1 - He goes on a long quest, mortifying the flesh, and experiencing Mara the Tempter trying to lead him astray, until he achieves enlightenment under a Bodhi tree.

12. 1 - He decides to spread the word about what he has learned.

13. 0 - He stays single all his life.

14. 1 - Correct.

15. 1 - He issues his teachings, which contain laws of a sort.

16. 0 - Does not seem to happen.

17. 0 - Does not seem to happen.

18. 1 - He eats a meal of poisoned pork, an oddity because Buddhism has the ideal of vegetarianism.

19. 0 - Nothing special about where he died.

20. 1 - His son does not succeed him.

21. 0 - He is cremated, which is like burial in being a normal way to dispose of a body.

22. 0 - He has no tomb.

My score: 12.5 -- a bit lower than Moses and Krishna, and significantly lower than Jesus Christ.

[ January 07, 2002: Message edited by: lpetrich ]</p>

hinduwoman

Well, Maya was a queen but not a virgin.

RyanS2

Dunno, the Virgin status of Maya was long debated. Even though she was married, like Krishna's father, both of the births' were clearly supernatural, i.e. not impregnated by a mortal.

boneyard bill

I'm not aware of the details of all the criteria used here. However, I think there is a very important difference between Buddha and Jesus as well as between Buddha and Krishna. The mythic elements surrounding the life of Buddha are not central to the Buddhist faith. Buddhism is based, at least roughly, on what the Buddha supposedly taught. If he never lived, it is basically irrelevant to the teaching itself. It merely means he is a composite figure for other teachers.

This is not the case with Jesus or Krishna. They are salvation figures who play a definite supernatural role in the process of salvation. The same is true of the pure land schools of Buddhism where the Amida Buddha is said to play a supernatural role. But these schools are limited basically to Japan.

phaedrus

But he can be considered as the founder of a religion while krishna cant be........hinduism cant be attributed to a single being (human or superhuman), but to zillions of gods (and ofcourse maybe the attempt of the ancient philosophers to distill the "way of life" in an easy way for the masses in the form of religion)

YHWH666

i think that if the buddha did really exist he was probably the first secular humanist

sure there are some super natural elements to buddhisim. this varies from alot of supernatural stuff (pureland sect, tantric) ,to very little at all (theravadin buddisim).
other than the obvious blief in Karma, reincarnation and a few others tharavidin buddhists are humanists.
Perhaps (if he existed) the buddha saw that any teaching that did not acknowledge an afterlife would never be excepted, so he allowed people to believe the standered dogma around back then. or maybe it was added later by people who believed it. either way some forms of buddisim are more like Secular Humanisim than a religion.

and yes the buddha does have a tomb(if he is really in it). "the Grand stupa" or something. he supposed to be under it, i saw a picture it's like a big dome. i wish some one would dig it up and find out if the buddha is real or not. they could carbon date his ashes and other things that are supposed to be in there. but i don't think that the buddhists would approve.

[ February 20, 2002: Message edited by: YHWH666 ]

[ February 20, 2002: Message edited by: YHWH666 ]</p>

Panta Pei

The most significant aspect of Zen is keeping it simple, just as the Buddha did.

Observe the Four Noble Truths and follow the Eightfold Path. All else, useless distraction.

As with any other ideology, the assorted doctrine, monastic dogma and sects arose from neglecting simplicity.

Worship is unnecessary. Go there yourself.

Be still and know.

Bokonon

Can you please provide a link to the thread this criteria refers to?

leonarde

Ipetrich,
Are you suggesting that Buddha was not a real,
flesh-and-blood human being????

Panta Pei

It is certainly not necessary to 'believe' Siddharta Gautama was a historically accurate figure.

Though some orders or sects have engaged in this fallacy, the concept is empty and meaningless.

'Buddha' (awakened) is a state of being, not a deity.

Right view is to consider the teachings attributed to Buddha available to you and live your life accordingly.

(refer to my post above)

~ Steve

The whole world we travel with our thoughts, finding nowhere anyone as precious as one's own self. Since each and every person is so precious to themselves, let the self-respecting harm no other being. - Samyutta Nikaya