Buddhism in India

Transitoriness and Transformations 95

There were no rituals designed for householders, because

Buddhism very consciously and firmly advocated the replacement

of sacrifice and ritual by moral relationships. However, some com-

promises were made, for instance in the use of ‘protection chants’

called paritta. These were mentioned in the Questions of Milinda

and their use was reluctantly admitted (213–19). These represented

a kind of adaption of customary chants for protection against those

bad spirits (yakkhas) that Buddhists believed in along with most

others of their time. Kalupahana’s study of Buddhist philosophy

notes that where Buddhist lay people ‘take refuge’ in the Buddha,

Dhamma and Sangha, this never implies an orientation to a superior

being; they seek ‘protection’ in contrast from gods and local deities;

seeking protection and going for refuge are socially conceptualised

as different activities (Kalupahana 1994: 113–14). He also argues

that the paritta chants, like Tantric mantras, provided psychological

satisfaction (ibid.: 225–27). In the introduction to the Atanatiya

Suttantadealing with the parittachants, Rhys Davids mades an

important observation that the Buddha never treated any kind of

sentient being as evil; rather the form of the chant was also was

meant to cultivate loving-kindness towards the yakhkas, as they

like all beings were seen to be as in a process of transition not only

to new births but also Enlightenment itself.

The Life of the Sangha

What was the Sangha? The ‘third jewel’ was itself a process. The

Sangha began with the gathering together of monks who at first

may have wandered independently, but then they started settling

during the rainy season; after Gotama’s death these temporary settle-

ments evolved into a permanent, localised year-round residences of

monks. The earliest of these were in semi-urban locations, often in

donated parks, close to cities. Many centered near the stupas or

memorial mounds which were objects of popular worship, and

often (especially, for instance, in western India,) on trade routes.

The monasteries, whether free-standing buildings found in most of

India, or cave-monasteries as in the western Sahyadris, had two

main types of buildings. The viharaor monastery was, architec-

turally, a large hall in the middle surrounded by the small sleeping

cells of monks. The chaityahall was a place for worship or meditation,

with a stupa and later a Buddha image at the heart of it.

people and events of all kinds connected with the Buddha. According
to a legend Asoka himself was responsible for the building of 84,000
stupas; Chinese travellers saw large numbers of these. Later Mahayana
texts glorify their construction, one referring to ‘those magnificent
stupas, made of seven precious substances...always decorated with
flags; a multitude of bells is constantly sounding; men, gods, goblins
and Titans pay their worship with flowers, perfumes and music’
(Saddharmapandarika1974: 15). As old (though not surviving) were
the viharasor residences for monks. The caves, found mostly in
western India where they were constructed under the Satavahanas
and their successors, were also found in the north and east, and
included viharas and chaityas or meeting halls, but often also fea-
tured stupas in the halls. Many of the halls had elaborately carved
columns; they recorded the names of the donors, often included statues
of royalty (such as some of the Satavahana kings), with many entrances,
verandas and later statues of the Buddha.
For several centuries there were no images of the Buddha himself;
instead a blank spot was shown where he otherwise would have
been sitting or standing, and he was symbolised by a wheel, an
empty throne, footprints or a pipal tree (the ‘bo tree’). This was
motivated by the idea that he had really ‘gone away’ after his
death. But images eventually began to be built, and became the
focus of worship. The first images were produced in Mathura
probably around the end of the 1st century BCE, and were inspired
by early yakkhafigures on the stupas and the Jain figures, and
almost the same time in the lower Kabul valley/upper Indus area
images influenced by Greek art began to be produced by the
Gandharva school (Basham 1958: 368).
The lay disciples were encouraged to spend a part of their time
following the discipline appropriate to bhikkhus. In The Questions
of Milinda, for example, the king is shown, after his discussions
with Nagasena, undertaking the observance of vows, putting aside
his normal clothes and dressing like a bhikkhu with yellow robe
and turban; for seven days he decides no legal cases and watches
over all body acts, filling his heart with love and showing ‘a
meek and lowly disposition’ to slaves, servants and dependents
(Milindapanha1963: 138). It is normal in Theravada countries like
Myanmar even today for most young men to spend some time in a
monastery; the origin of this probably lies in the popular Buddhism
in early India.

94 Buddhism in India