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If one followed the Buddhism Pathway, it would bring a spiritual pilgrim - clear vision, insight, wisdom, tranquility, awakening, enlightenment, and nirvana. A compassionate man of philosophical intellect and inspirational wisdom, Gautama Buddha's disciplines included all social classes from kings to bankers to courtesans. Basic Buddhism principles that he taught were to treat all sentient beings like oneself and to cultivate compassion, kindliness, empathy and fairness. Gautama Buddha emphasized that a good society was casteless and everyone was equal under karmic law. He traveled around and taught in the Ganges basin until he was eighty four when Gautama Buddha passed on in Kushinagara, India. Buddha’s teachings were recollected by his followers and transmitted orally as Buddhism and Buddhist teachings.
It was not until many
years after his death in 483 B.C. that the Buddhist principles of Buddhism were
written down. The Pali dialogues or sutras are believed to be the closest
approximation to what Gautama Buddha actually taught. Unique in religious
history, no blood has ever been shed to convert others to Buddhism.
Buddhism disappeared from India around the end of the thirteenth century, due to the take-over of India by Islamic conquerors. By this time, however, Buddhism had spread out from India to become a dominant faith in many Himalayan areas (Nepal, Tibet which remains a great repository of a vast body of important literature, Sikkim, Bhutan, and Ladak). The teaching of Buddha also spread through Central and East Asia (China, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Tibet, and Mongolia); as well as, into Southeast Asia (Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Burma, and Laos). Buddhism is practiced today by over 500 million people worldwide. In recent years, many Americans and Europeans have also embraced the teachings of the Buddha or "The Middle Way", being moderate, avoiding the extremes of asceticism and of hedonism. The practical teachings of Buddhism are meant to carry us to safety, peace, happiness, tranquility and the attainment of nirvana. Following the Buddhic teachings led one to salvation and individual emancipation through diligently developing wholesome, virtuous qualities and eliminating unwholesome, non-virtuous qualities from the personality.
There are two major
schools of Buddhism, Mahayana and Theravada. The Great vehicle or Mahayana
Buddhism is divided into many schools which for the most part agree with the
doctrines of Theravada Buddhism with the exception that they identify a
transcendent, eternal reality or Suchness, Truth, or Law that permeates and
regulates the universe and coexists with the everchanging cycles of human
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