Types of Buddhism

Buddhism flourished in India after the passing away of the Buddha and spread peacefully southward as far as Sri Lanka, northward to the Himalayas, westward to what is now Iran and Afghanistan and eastward to China, Sumatra and Java. After 500 years a new sect called Mahayana emerged, distinguishing itself from the lineage presently known as Theravada. Mahayana tended to be more liberal, freely adapting to new cultures, while Theravada was more conservative, attempting to maintain continuity from the time of the Buddha.

With the arrival of new scriptures, some Mahayana schools depicted the Buddha as a god and replaced the goal of attaining arahantship with the ideal of the Bodhisattva, a person striving to become a Buddha in order to help as many living beings as possible. The Theravada school preserved and looked to the original teachings and lifestyle of the Buddha as its guide.

With the Muslim invasions of the 11th and 12th centuries, Buddhism was violently suppressed and eventually eradicated in its native country. By that time however, Mahayana had taken root in China and from there spread to Japan, Korea and Vietnam. The most popular of the many different sects of those countries is Zen Buddhism.

Mahayana also spread to Tibet, incorporated the local animist religion of Bon, and then spread further to Mongolia and Bhutan. The most well-known Tibetan monk and Nobel Peace Price laureate is the Dalai Lama. Theravada established itself mainly in Sri Lanka, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, Laos and Cambodia. Its scriptures are known as the Pali Canon, the oldest complete Indic record of what the Buddha taught.

Buddhism in the World Today
At present, Buddhism continues to gain an ever-widening acceptance in countries and societies far beyond its original home. many people throughout the world, through their own careful choice, are adopting Buddhism's peaceful, compassionate and responsible ways as guiding principles in their lives. Meditation has always been at the very heart of the Buddhist path, and as its proven benefits to both mental and physical well-being are becoming more widely known, meditation grows increasingly popular. When stress is shown to be such a major cause of human suffering in modern society, the quieting practice of meditation is even more valued.

The world in the 21st century is too small and vulnerable for us to live in isolation or conflict. In all its long history no war has been fought to spread the Buddha's teachings. Tolerance, loving-kindness and forgiveness, essential for world harmony and individual happiness, are generated and developed through virtuous behavior and more deeply through Buddhist meditation. When put into practice in everyday life, the path of the Buddha gradually cultivates the heart with harmlessness. This is then offered to all beings, especially oneself. There is no place for dwelling in guilt or self-hatred in Buddhism.

The down-to-earth teachings and practices of the Buddha culminate in pure joy, unshakeable serenity and penetrating wisdom, qualities identified with Buddhism for over 2,500 years and sorely needed in today's world. The gentle and sagacious peace of enlightenment is what makes the Buddha's message timeless and always vitally relevant.

The Buddhist Monastic Order
The Buddhist monastic community, the Sangha, was created by the Buddha for those people who wanted to fully dedicate their lives toward the realization of enlightenment. The monastic lifestyle enables one to leave behind the worries and entanglements of lay life and focus almost all of one's time and energy on the goal of liberation. It also offers the opportunity to live in solitude, an important factor for the development of deep states of meditation and wisdom. The Buddha also instituted a detailed and refined code of conduct and discipline to aid monastics in their cultivation of virtue.

Between Buddhist monastics and Buddhist lay people, there is a relationship of inter-dependence. The Sangha relies on the lay Buddhists for their material needs, and in return the monks and nuns provide the lay community with spiritual guidance and moral support. As long as the Sangha continues to practice in accordance with the code of monastic discipline and strives for the attainment of enlightenment, Buddhism will be a strong and vibrant religion.

THE TWO GREAT BRANCHES OF BUDDHISM
By the first century B.C., the various schools and divisions within Buddhism had shaped themselves into two large schools or branches: Hinayana (Little Vehicle) and Mahayana (Great Vehicle), Yana means "vehicle," and it is through yana that the Buddhist crosses the river of rebirth and arrives upon the shore of nirvana.
"Little Vehicle" is a derisive name given by the followers of the Great Vehicle to those who insisted on holding to the original Buddhist doctrine and did not attempt to elaborate and embroider upon it so that it would appeal to the masses. This branch is actually the original School of the Elders, and because it strictly follows the doctrine of Buddha it needs little additional explanation. Its chief additions to Buddhism have been in the form of literature, beginning with the parables, discourses, and sermons of Buddha written down by Ananda, later including the rules of the Community and how they were formulated, and much later including a collection of commentaries on doctrine.
The Great Vehicle is actually the original Great Community The major reason for the growth of the Great Vehicle was that Buddhism in its original form, or as taught by Buddha, was too narrow and too difficult for common people to practice. Even in the time of Buddha the laity was separated from and largely ignored by the monks and did not have a feeling of true membership in the religion. In order to give the laity a greater feeling of inclusion, some monks felt that Buddhist doctrine should be expanded.
The teachers of the Great Vehicle did not reject the old Buddhist doctrine but simply declared that it was incomplete. The written tradition was only a part of Buddha's teaching, and only a part was given to the Indian people because they were not yet ready to understand the wisdom in all its fullness. The first had been able to understand only the simpler principles of the Little Vehicle and to seek as their reward nirvana alone. But now Buddha had revealed to them that divine knowledge ought to be theirs and that they should become Buddhas like himself, putting off entering nirvana in order to help others who are still struggling to attain enlightenment.
While the supreme aim of original and Hinayana Buddhism is personal escape from the dreadful cycle of rebirth, the supreme aim of Mahayana Buddhism is to help one's fellowman to attain deliverance. The ideal is not the Arahat, who wishes only his own nirvana, but the Bodhisattva, who upon the threshold of nirvana refuses to enter and chooses instead to stay in the temporal world helping others. After several lifetimes the Bodhisattva attains supreme enlighten- ment, becomes a Buddha, and upon his death, finally enters nirvana.
Although Hinayanists denounce the Mahayanist concept of Boddhisatvas, the concept was already presented in their own teachings. Gautama Buddha, after he had attained supreme enlightenment, himself resisted entering nirvana immediately and chose instead to spend long years wandering and teaching. Mahayanists simply extended the concept.
The Great Vehicle also expanded on the idea of worship of Buddha. During Buddha's lifetime, a man could prove he was a Buddhist by reciting the Triple Refuge formula: "I take refuge in the Buddha. I take refuge in the Law preached by the Buddha. I take refuge in the Order!" After Buddha's death, the formula had to mean that in some way he still existed and that some relationship could be established between him and the worshiper. Early Buddhism had avoided all images of Buddha himself, but with the growth of the Great Vehicle thousands of statues of Buddha appeared, an idolatry that Buddha would have condemned.
Eventually the doctrine of the three bodies of Buddha evolved. He possessed a "body of creation" as long as he traveled upon the earth and engaged in human activity there; a "body of delight" when he entered heavenly regions; and a "body of law" when he joined with the Absolute, the basis and source of all being.
The Mahayanists applied this doctrine not just to Gautama Buddha but to all Buddhas. The Little Vehicle had very early maintained that the Buddha had been preceded by other Buddhas but had not been much concerned with these predecessors. In the Great Vehicle so much emphasis is put upon other Buddhas and Bodhisattvas that Gautama Buddha has been pushed into second place.
With the Great Vehicle, Buddhism becomes a popular religion--- Appealing to the most scholarly thinker and the most illiterate worshiper alike. The chief reason for its success is that it abandoned the atheism of original Buddhism. The atheism could not long satisfy the human spirit in need of knowledge of a higher Being able to change the cause and effect of the law of karma (the process by which acts in one lifetime determine the life into which a person is reborn). Mahayana Buddhism substituted ideas of paradise and hell much like those of Western religions. The Great Vehicle almost completely erases the original character of Buddhism.
LATER HISTORY OF BUDDHISM
Through the missionary activity of Asoka, Buddhism spread across the entire Indian continent and by about the fifth century it had achieved the height of its influence. Much of this influence was due to the liberalism of the Mahayanist doctrine, which generally welcomed and included popular Indian beliefs. But Buddhism was never a serious threat to Hinduism. Hinduism was supported by the caste system and powerful with the authority of the Vedas, while Buddhism stood outside the active life and ignored the sacred tradition of India.
From the beginning of the ninth century, Buddhism no longer flourished expect in those districts where it had been declared a state religion. But it was in the twelfth century, with the Muslim invasion, that the Indian career of Buddhism was truly ended. It has extended over nearly fifteen centuries, far exceeding Gautama Buddha's most optimistic prediction of one thousand years. But not it was truly over. By 1971 not even 1 percent of Indians were Buddhists. Nevertheless, Buddhism was destined to prosper in nearly all the countries of the Far East.
Buddhism was introduced to southern Asia, first in Ceylon and Burma, as a result of Asoka's missionary activity. Later it spread to Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos. From Ceylon and Burma, it spread to China, and from there to Korea and fro Korea to Japan. It entered Tibet from either China or India. Buddhism fared better in some of these countries than in others and although it exists in all of these countries and more, it is the official religion only in Cambodia, Japan and Tibet. Although both Hinayana and Mahayana Buddhism exists in nearly all these countries, Hinayana is found chiefly in Ceylon, Burma, and Thailand, while Mahayana predominates in China, Tibet Mongolia, Korea, and Japan.
It is in Tibet that Buddhism has achieved its greatest triumph One out of every five Tibetan men dedicates himself to the monastic life. But Tibetan Buddhism is based on an offshoot of Mahayana that emphasizes the supernatural and sacred rites directed toward pure magic To this the Tibetans have added their own magic rites and sorcery, their own religion, Bon.
Tibetan Buddhism is called Lamaism. (Lama was originally an honorary title given to very holy monks, although now every Tibetan monk is a lama.) Lamaism believes in the literal reincarnation of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, and thus when a lama who is thought to be a divine incarnation dies, Tibetans immediately begin to look for the child into whose body the lama's soul has passed. The child is discovered by means of some event at his birth or some miracle he has performed and is taken before the the members of the religious order of the late Buddha, where he is required to identify objects belonging to the late Buddha and otherwise to prove himself. Once he has done so, he is immediately raised to the dignity of the deceased lama.
Several attempts were made to extend Buddhism into the West. The emperor Asoka had sent missionaries as far as the Greek kingdoms of Syria, Egypt, Cyrene, and even Macedonia. Some scholars say that Buddhism reached as far into Egypt as those regions where Christianity was born and that Buddhist influence can be detected in the Gospels of St. Mark and St. John. Also, some Buddhists state that Gautama Buddha, under the name of Josaphat (derived from Bodhisattva, and indeed the name of an Indian prince who was converted to Christianity following experiences resembling those of the true Buddha), was able to enter the souls of a number of Christian saints. The Christian Church strongly denies all such speculations.
But the career of Buddhims in the West, unlike that in the East, was practically nonexistent. Some scholars suggest that the reason for this failure was the collapse of the Roman Empire and the triumph of Christianity; the resulting barrier that existed between India and Europe prevented all contact until the discovery of a sea route to the East Indies in 1498. But most agree that the chief reason is the deep incompatibly between Eastern and Western thought. While the West is rich materially, it is very poor spiritually. In contrast, the East is poor materially but rich n spiritual existence.
It was not until the nineteenth century that European thinkers began to study Buddhism, but they gave it more attention than other Indian philosophies, chiefly because of its atheism. Twentieth-century Western thinkers have also been interested in Buddhism and other Indian religions, and in fact some scholars have discerned a pattern to the times when Westerners renewed their interest in the Indian religions. After World War I, which was seen by many European thinkers as the final failure of Western religion, and at the present time, when the young, particularly, reject the materialism and violence of Western society, there has been intense interest in the Eastern religions Perhaps it is true that when the burdens of science and technology become too great, the Western world turns back to the simple spirituality of the East.

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