In general, the text records a series of conversations
between the Buddhist monk Nagasena and the Bac-
trian Indo-Greek king Milinda (also called Menander),
who ruled northwestern India from Sagala(modern
Sialkot) during the second century B.C.E. Its main
thrust lies in eighty-one dilemmas, couched in Socratic
dialogue, in which Milinda seeks to reconcile what ap-
pear to him to be contradictory statements by the Bud-
dha in the Pali canon. Most notable of these is
Milinda’s inability to reconcile the supposed doctrine
of anatta(Sanskrit, anatman; no-self) and the Bud-
dha’s belief in REBIRTH, which Nagasena skillfully re-
solves with his account of the chariot, in which he
demonstrates that the terms selfand chariotare simply
concepts superimposed upon what is in fact merely a
collection of parts.
Although clearly regarded as authoritative by the
scholar BUDDHAGHOSA, who quotes from it in his Vi-
suddhimagga(The Path of Purification) and other com-
mentaries (Horner, vol. I, p. xx), the text seemingly
evinces Sarvastivadin influence in maintaining that
both nibbana (NIRVANA) and space are without cause,
whereas for the Theravada only nibbana is non-com-
pounded.
See also:Pali, Buddhist Literature in
Bibliography
Horner, I. B., trans. Milinda’s Questions,2 vols. London: Luzac,
1963–1964.
PETERMASEFIELDMILLENARIANISM AND
MILLENARIAN MOVEMENTS
Like most religious traditions, Buddhism has an un-
derstanding of time, both cyclic and linear, and a de-
veloped tradition of thought concerning the eventual
end of the world. Within Buddhism, this tradition cen-
ters around the person of MAITREYAbodhisattva, who
was identified early on as the future successor to
S ́akyamuni Buddha. Particularly in the MAHAYANAtra-
dition, Maitreya came to be viewed as a messianic fig-
ure. In East Asia, the arrival of Maitreya was linked
both to the apocalyptic end of the current epoch and
the initiation of a future epoch in which the world
would be transformed into a paradise. Historically, the
worship of Maitreya has served as the seed both for
general utopian longing and armed movements meant
to usher in the millennium.Judeo-Christian and Buddhist millenarianism
Millenarianism is a branch of utopianism, one specif-
ically concerned with the arrival (or return) of a di-
vinely portended messianic figure and the subsequent
establishment of an earthly kingdom of peace and
plenty. The term itself derives from the Christian be-
lief in a thousand-year reign of Christ preceding the
final judgment, leading to anticipation that the apoc-
alypse would occur in the year 1000 C.E. For most
Western readers, the concept of millenarianism is
closely connected to the Judeo-Christian tradition,
both the Jewish belief in the arrival of a messiah and
the related Christian belief in Armageddon and the re-
turn of Christ Triumphant as described in the Book of
Revelation. There is an inherent danger in relying too
heavily on these conceptions of the millennium to un-
derstand similar ideas in Buddhism. The scriptural
portents given by prophets of the Old and New Testa-
ments provide a very specific picture of the arrival of
the messiah and the nature of the judgment, reward,
and punishment, none of which fits precisely with
those of Buddhism or has much significance for mil-
lenarian movements in Buddhist history.
At the same time, however, certain elements of
Judeo-Christian millenarianism are conceptually sim-
ilar to those seen in other traditions (including what
might be termed political millenarianism,such as the
anticipated return of a mythical ruler), suggesting that
millenarian thought and movements involve certain
universal themes. The first such element is a system of
reckoning cosmic time. In most traditions, time is
composed of three parts: epochs of the mythical past,
the current age, and the distant future. These three
epochs are separated by events of cosmic significance
in which the old order is destroyed or altered com-
pletely, and thus the recorded history of humankind
falls primarily inside the second age. In the Judeo-
Christian tradition, the pivotal event that marked the
commencement of the age of humans was the expul-
sion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. Hu-
man history progresses in a linear fashion from that
point, reaching its culmination in the arrival or return
of the messiah, at which point humankind as a whole
will be subjected to its final judgment.
The second element is the conception of the post-
millennial paradise, which is depicted in very physical,
earthly terms. Jewish messianism has historically pro-
duced a wide spectrum of ideas and movements, butMILLENARIANISM ANDMILLENARIANMOVEMENTS