Context Flashcards
Which country had a lot of religious variety?
India
What did this religious variety lead to?
A wider variety of worldviews and perspectives.
How did people use their spirituality?
People expected it to influence their daily lives positively.
Who was Buddha?
Siddhartha Gautama - He was born into the Hindu culture
What did the term Hinduism refer to?
The Indus Valley People
What did Hindu culture contain?
Social hierarchies, core religious values and life expectations
What did the Buddha become?
A wandering holy man
Is a lot known about Buddha?
No, little is known about him apart from later texts etc
What was the social revolution that occurred during Buddha’s time?
There was growing opposition to the caste system in India
There was the Aryan Invasion of the Indus Valley
What did the west bring?
Vedas - strict religious ruling.
What is the caste system?
A social hierarchy comprised of each type of group in India.
Who were at the top of the hierarchy?
Brahmins
Who were Brahmins?
Priests who controlled the people in terms of traditions and social order
Who were the Kshatriya?
They were warriors who had a duty to fight for justice and protect the commoners - They challenged the Brahmins.
What was the religious setting during Buddha’s time?
Brahminism was the principle expression based on written rules and complicated rituals
What activity shifted from sacrifices to…? Why?
Meditation - There was more of an idea around mental focus.
What was also a developing belief?
Karma
What did the tensions mean for religious groups?
They rejected religious authority of the Brahmins and formed wandering holy men to find answers to ultimate questions.
What were the different types of early Buddhism?
Jainism - the existence of a life essence and the concept of pacifism was developed
What was the existence of a life essence called?
Jiva
Who rejected the idea of karma and replaced it with destiny?
Gosala
Who were the materialists? How were the skeptics different
They were empiricists who focused on celebrating life.
The skeptics weighed things up instead of having particular teachings.
What are the 2 branches of Buddhism?
Theravada and Mahayana
What is Theravada Buddhism?
The most commonly accepted school of thought of Buddhism - the common vehicle
What did they focus on?
Teachings of the elders
What is the Pāḷi Canon?
The only complete Buddhist canon in Hindi.
What is Mahayana Buddhism?
The great vehicle
They focused on Buddhist, traditions, texts, philosophies and practices developed in ancient India.
What did the Mahayanas do to the original canon?
Added some discourse towards it which led to small but long term significance historically.
What did the Mahayanas teach regarding lifetime?
Enlightenment can be achieved by anyone person regardless.
What is the definition of Hagiography?
A religious biography that is not historical fact but an idealised story bringing out the significance of the person representing the religion.
Who claimed that the Buddha’s story was a hagiography?
Paul Williams
What did Williams believe?
It should be how it is read that is more important that specific details.
What did the presence of myth make the hagiography?
Added to the validity of a hagiographic story because of the involvement of the supernatural.
What did the Buddha say regarding the Dhamma?
“He who sees the Dhamma sees me, and who sees me sees the Dhamma”
What is the sasana?
Teachings
“The effectiveness of the Dhamma does not itself depend on the discovery by Buddha”
Why?
Teachings can be effective regardless of if they were self-discovered or discovered by Buddha and therefore shows that Buddha is helpful to give further context and understanding to the hagiography but not essential.
