Search for Origins of Mahayana Buddhism

Aquaris,

(the last time it was destroyed by the Khiljee whatever )

Khiljee sounds like a good Brahmin name.

Regards

[RE:#143 Posted by aquaris on December 6, 2007 6:15:20 am]

Right and you don't seem to understand. Selective quotes from Goyal etc on a Pakistani site don't exactly add up to evidence.
Dalistan.org is also undoubtedly unbiased.
You are so smart.
I thought you were HP but I don't think so, he's got brains.

Now where did I mention Muslim in my post?

Dear Mahfari,

How do you relate holocaust with godhra and nandigram? And secondly, I think we were debating about the tendency of certain groups of people to destroy the religious and cultural places of others. I was trying to inform you that there is enough evidence to show that abrahamic faiths have quashed and estroyed other cultures' temples or learning centers. Don't take it personally but even the portugese did the same in Elephanta caves. This issue is deeply seated in the desert cultures/religions.

Also ,I was trying to point out that most pakistanis falsely assume that objective historical records were made by al beruni and other europeans.
History remains objective as long as it does not concern the author's nationality or religion. Work done by others and translated into one's own language does not automatically bestow a new authorship.

Adios

LOL


who said ' khiljee ' was a Brahmin.


the point is, it was destroyed 'TWiCE' ...before this Khiljee thing , who was a Muslim Invader did that....

note not once, but twice.....

Dalistan usually have stuff from Ambredkar .


and Ambredkar definately is Baised....right..??

Re: # 147
Nationalism can be just as destructive, in japan thousands of Buddhist temples were destroyed by nationalists because it was perceived to be a foreign religion

Today neither we nor most Japanese can readily imagine just how much the Shinto we know has changed from what it used to be. Here is a brief summary of some of those changes. In 1868 the new Meiji regime ordered local gods to be dissociated from Buddhism. In other words, all worship halls for gods were stripped of their Buddhist names, Buddhist powers, Buddhist religious rituals, Buddhist art, and Buddhist symbols, and given new "Japanese" identities. Thousands and thousands of Buddhist temples were destroyed to create what subsequently became known as "Shinto." In 1873 the Meiji government outlawed many so-called "superstitious" religious rites performed at the newly independent Shinto institutions. In 1882 the government ruled that Shinto is NOT a religion but a civic duty. They defined Shinto shrines as "civic centers," the rituals of which bond together royal subjects and government officials with the mythological ancestors of the royal family. They forbad Shinto celebrants from performing private religious rituals. In 1906 the government initiated a nationwide program of shrine "mergers," a euphemism for the elimination of shrines that were too small for government supervision. Nationwide more than 52% of Shinto shrines were destroyed, thereby depriving rural villagers of local worship halls. In 1945 the occupation GHQ forbid Shinto shrines from exercising any government-controlled civic role. Deprived of their nationalist and ideological purpose, most shrines were forced to adopt new identities as primitive nature cults, dependent on private individuals. This is the reason why in 1947 the famed folklorist and scholar Orikuchi Shinobu (1887-1953) wrote that Shinto as a "religion" is only 2 years old. In short, first the Buddhist roles were stripped away, then the religious roles were stripped away, then the local roles were stripped away, and finally the national role was stripped away. What was left? Thus, use of the word "shinto" without historical qualifications begs the question: Which Shinto?

_____
The first person to attract widespread attention to the problems with the label "shinto" was a Japanese scholar named Kuroda Toshio (1926-1993), whose work has revolutionized the way that scholars examine medieval Japan. For a brief English-language summary of his view of Shinto, see:

Kuroda, Toshio. 1981: "Shinto in the History of Japanese Religion." Translated by James C. Dobbins and Suzanne Gay. Journal of Japanese Studies 7: 1-21.

actually when i am not deliberately antagonising people like laddu --cos its fun!--i have a lot of respect for buddha as a person and admire his life but i think his philosophy doesn't explain much about the world...

Dalitistan, makes a lot of unprovable claims. I would not rely on what's produced there.

Re: # 153

yep maybe true , there could be a Bais.
but my point is simple...
Muslims are not the only culprits, before them Nalanda was destroyed ' TWICE ' , and because of what appears as
" Brahimin " VS " Buddism " skirmishes.

so laying all the Blame on ' Muslims ' only is not Fair.

[RE:#154 Posted by aquaris on December 6, 2007 9:54:54 am
Muslims are not the only culprits, before them Nalanda was destroyed ' TWICE ' , and because of what appears as
" Brahimin " VS " Buddism " skirmishes.]

Really, and you have proof of this. That some Brahmins went along and destroyed Nalanda. Now I'd be the last person to say Brahmins are the best of all peoples. They suffer from the same foibles are anybody else. There is also no doubt that Muslims are not the only culprits.

Nalanda was destroyed first by the Hunas under Mihirakula when it had just begun to be a centre of learning. It was rebuilt by Puragupta(Skandagupta's brother) and Narasimhagupta(Skandagupta's son??) who were Skandagupta's heirs. Skandagupta was the king when the destruction took place.
By the way the University was started by Kumaragupta I who was not a Buddhist.In fact the Gupta monarchs patronised Buddhism but were themselves Vaishnvaites(not sure about this but they were definitely Hindus).

The second time it was destroyed it was done by the Gauda kings from East Bengal. It was rebuilt by the Hindu king Harshavardhana.

The last time was by Khilji. There was nobody to rebuild it because there I guess there was a power vacuum , no kings were interested, and there was less interest in Buddhist philosophy.

There doesn't seem to be any proof of Brahminical incitation to destroy the university.

The truth is probably that under the Guptas Buddhism and Brahmanism flourished. But as time went on and Brahmanism in Central and North India split into Shaiva and Vaishnava sects the ruling monarchs allied with one of those sects and Buddhism did not receive royal patronage any more. Religion to a large extent can only be propped up by patronage, either patrician or plebian. If neither exists it will decline.

#152 Posted by Naqshbandi on December 6, 2007 9:09:03 am
( .. but i think his philosophy doesn't explain much about the world...)

Some of the most civilized people on earth (e.g. Japanes, Chinese) have found something in his message. His teachings were adopted voluntarily and he never had to call himself the prophet. May be it takes something to understand him.

University of Nalanda was established 450 CE under the patronage of the Gupta emperors, notably Kumaragupta
it is mentioned Gautum Budh also stayed there a number of times,especially when on his last tour through Magadha.

Mahavira is several times mentioned as staying at Nālandā, which was evidently a centre of activity of the Jains. Mahavira is believed to have attained Moksha at Pavapuri, which is located in Nalanda

There were two devastations on an extensive scale of Buddhist shrines and monasteries of northern India. The first was by the Ephthalites or White Huns, who invaded India in 500-520 AD

At that age, Buddhism had enough vitality to heal the wounds inflicted by the Huns for over a decade. Sangha life picked up again in new monasteries built over the ruins of the demolished ones. However, in the western part of India, namely: Gandhara, Kashmir and western Uttar Pradesh, Buddhism had lost much ground to the neo-Brahmanism of the Gupta age. In the eastern part, in Magadha (Bihar) and West Bengal, it began to revive again under the Buddhist king

During the Pala period of its history from the 9th -11th century AD, Buddhism became heavily adulterated by the Tantric cult, with its magic spells, yoga and practices that were completely alien to the earlier form of Buddhism.


The second time it was destroyed it was done by the Gauda kings from East Bengal. It was rebuilt by the Hindu king Harshavardhana

...From time to time Hindus, especially Shaivites, took aggressive action against Buddhism. At least two Shaivite kings—the Hephthalite invader Mihirakula (early 6th century) and the Bengal king Sasanka (early 7th century)—are reported to have destroyed monasteries and killed monks. The philosophers Kumarila and Shankara were also strongly opposed to Buddhism. In their journeys...


source
http://www.britannica.com/eb/topic-524701/Sasanka


But s it true , this Khiljee was the one,who not just destroyed but annihilated it...

to conclude i will quote from a Budhist site
who put it rather politely


the three factors discussed earlier contributed to the downfall of Buddhism in India, namely:

• Decay and disintegration of the Sangha.

• Extermination of the Sangha by external invaders.

• Internal opposition from the Hindu caste system.

source

http://www.buddhistpilgrimage.info/downfall.htm


Most of what we know about Nalanda is from the accouhts of chinese travellers and visitors....
in one of such narration, writes

"This inroad of the Huna army was bound to be fatal to the kingdom of Magadha and specially to the Buddhist religion then protected and patronized by the Gupta monarchs. Mihirakula, beyond doubt, in his hatred of Buddhism destroyed all its buildings that he found in his way, and killed all its priests"

...what is mostly done here is the acceptance of the First destruction....and then the Last third one, by the Khiljee
while just putting a passing remark to the second One , or rather undermining the second One,....which was rather partial ....and as some one put it somewhere...and Internal struggle between Budhism and Brahminism.

151 aslam: Thanks for an informative piece on shintoism. Note that the link between shintoism and japanese nationalism of the WWII style is not dead yet, and is in fact "enshrined" in the Yusukuni Shrine - the shinto shrine which contains the names of over 2 million japanese "shaheeds", including criminals like those who murdered tens of thousands of civilians in Nanking or did brutal "medical experiments" in the infamous Unit 731.

The "ultraclever" japanese emperor (who quickly surrendered when his own neck was on the line after sending millions to their death for his greater "glory") used to visit this shrine until this link with war criminals became public knowledge and, being "ultraclever", the scoundrel changed his tune. Sounds familiar?

So, once again, religion is used to stay in power

Aquaris/Swarrier,

I guess Buddhism as it was practised required lots of monks and nuns. Now if you look at it from the kings POV it was a whole lot of waste.

Firstly, if you had lots of monks/nuns you were affecting your population growth which meant less soldiers for your army and less workers for your economy.
Secondly, the king had to support a whole of useless parasites.

No wonder in the long run the kings weren't too fond of Buddhists or Buddhism and stopped patronising them. Which in turn meant that these monks would starve. So I guess they decided that the best would be to do some honest work for a change. That's why Buddhism died out.

Regards

Re: # 152

"-i have a lot of respect for buddha as a person and admire his life.."

That a load of BS Taquiyya. You are simply jealous of the peace that Buddha attained in his own life that your Walis could never on this very Earth. On one hand we can clearly see your Walis and Sheikhs popping their blood vessels going about doing Jehad and killing , looting and raping idolators- on the other hand is the Ahimsa, Ego-lessness of Buddha who attained that peace in his very life than conjecturing about peace after the death in some Jannah!!!

If Buddha is to be compared to the Prophet we can clearly see who is the enlightened person!!