Everything about Gautama Buddha In Hinduism totally explained
Gautama Buddha in Hinduism is viewed as an
Avatar of
Vishnu. In the Hindu
Puranic text
Bhagavata Purana, he's twenty fourth of twenty five avatars, prefiguring a forthcoming final incarnation. A number of
Hindu traditions portray Buddha as the most recent of ten principal avatars, known as the
"Dasavatara" (
Ten Incarnations of God). The Buddhist Dasharatha
Jataka (Jataka Atthakatha 461) represents
Rama as a previous incarnation of the Buddha as a
Bodhisattva and supreme
Dharma King of great wisdom.
Siddhartha Gautama's teachings deny the authority of the
Vedas and consequently Buddhism is generally viewed as a
nāstika school (heterodox, literally "It isn't so") from the perspective of orthodox Hinduism.
Views of the Buddha in Hinduism
Due to the diversity of traditions within Hinduism there's no specific viewpoint or consensus on the Buddha's exact position in reference to the Vedic tradition:
In the Dasavatara-stotra section of his
Gita Govinda, the influential
Vaishnava poet
Jayadeva Goswami (13th C AD) includes the Buddha amongst the ten principle avatars of Vishnu and writes a prayer regarding him as follows:
O Keshava! O Lord of the universe! O Lord Hari, who have assumed the form of Buddha! All glories to You! O Buddha of compassionate heart, you decry the slaughtering of poor animals performed according to the rules of Vedic sacrifice.
This viewpoint of the Buddha as an avatar who primarily promoted non-violence (
ahimsa) remains a popular belief amongst a number of modern Vaishnava organisations, including
ISKCON.
Other prominent modern proponents of Hinduism, such as
Radhakrishnan and
Vivekananda, consider the
Buddha as a teacher of the same universal truth that underlies all religions of the world:
Vivekananda: May He who is the Brahman of the Hindus, the Ahura Mazda of Zoroastrians, the Buddha of Buddhists, the Jehovah of the Jews, the Father in Heavens of Christians, give strength to you to carry out your noble ideas!
Radhakrishnan: If a Hindu chants the Vedas on the banks of the Ganges, ... if the Japanese worship the image of Buddha, if the European is convinced of Christ's mediatorship, if the Arab reads the Koran in the mosque ... It is their deepest apprehension of God and God's fullest revelation to them.
Within Hinduism,
avatars such as
Rama or
Krishna are popularly worshipped as the Supreme
God, but it's much less common to find Buddha the avatar being worshipped by Hindus in the same way.
Reaction to reforms instigated by the Buddha within Hinduism
A number of revolutionary figures in modern Hinduism, including
Gandhi have been inspired by the life and teachings of the Buddha and many of his attempted reforms.
Buddhism finds favor in contemporary
Hindutva movement, with Lama
Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th
Dalai Lama being honored at Hindu events, like the
Vishva Hindu Parishad's second World Hindu Conference in
Allahabad in 1979.
The Buddha in Hindu scriptures
Amongst the
Puranic texts he's mentioned as one of the ten
Avataras of
Vishnu.
The Buddha is described in important Hindu scriptures, including the Puranas. A partial list of Puranas mentioning the Buddha is as follows:
Another important scriptures which mention him is an Avatar is Rishi
Parashara's
Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra (2:1-5/7).
In some of the
Puranas, he's described as having taken birth to "mislead the demons":
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- attributed to Brahmanda Purana
Translation:
In order to delude the demons, he (Lord Buddha) was present in the form of a child on the way while the foolish Jina (a demon), imagined him to be his son. Later on, Lord Sri Hari (as avatara-buddha) expertly deluded Jina and other demons by his strong words of non-violence.
In the
Srimad Bhagavatam Buddha is said to have taken birth to restore the
devas to power:
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- (srimad-bhagavatam 1.3.24)
Translation:
Then, in the beginning of Kali-yuga [he] will become the Buddha by name, the son of Anjana, in Bihar, for the purpose of confusing those who were enemies of the devas.
In many Puranas, the Buddha is described as an incarnation of
Vishnu who incarnated in order to delude either demons or mankind away from the Vedic dharma. The
Bhavishya Purana contains the following:
At this time, reminded of the Kali Age, the god Vishnu became born as Gautama, the Shakyamuni, and taught the Buddhist dharma for ten years. Then Shuddodana ruled for twenty years, and Shakyasimha for twenty. At the first stage of the Kali Age, the path of the Vedas was destroyed and all men became Buddhists. Those who sought refuge with Vishnu were deluded.
The Buddha avatar, which occurs in different versions in various Puranas, may represent an attempt by orthodox Brahminism to slander the Buddhists by identifying them with the demons.
Helmuth von Glasenapp attributed these developments to a Hindu desire to absorb Buddhism in a peaceful manner, both to win Buddhists to Vishnuism and also to account for the fact that such a significant heresy could exist in India.
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