The Illustrated Life of the Buddha

(ORIAS, Changhwan Park)

1. The Conception of the Buddha 6. Enlightenment
2. The Birth of the Buddha 7. The Uruvela Conversion
3. The Four Encounters 8. Return to Kapilavastu
4. The Great Departure 9. Subjugation of the Mad Elephant
5. Austerities 10. The Great Passing
Glossary for Illustrated Life of Buddha
Web links for images and text resources
 
Workshop Notes, Carol Murphey
Images from the YUNGANG CAVES from Carol Murphey
Click on images in text for larger view.
 

The life of the Buddha presented in the subsequent ten acts is neither history nor a
myth. It is a pious report of the founder of Buddhism as the Buddhist tradition tells
it. The whole story of the Buddha takes on a mythic and legendary character. A
wealth of detail is to modern sensibilities of a decidedly "miraculous" and
"supernatural" nature so that readers who want to see it from a historian's
perspective might be puzzled over its authenticity. Of course, modern scholars have
attempted to find out who was the historical Buddha and have agreed upon a few
bare facts of the life of a man who, some 2,500 years ago, left home to become a
wandering ascetic and attained perfect enlightenment. But then they have faced
another problem of missing the story's own sense of truth, which has made a great
impact on the mentality of Buddhist followers throughout Asia. In other words, that
legendary account of the Buddha in turn constituted another reality on which
Buddhist thoughts and practices have prevailed. Thus, the upcoming account of the
life of the Buddha is no more than a pious story faithful to the earliest literary and
iconographic sources available. Now, let us the story speak for itself.

Traditionally, the  Buddha's life story centers on events from his conception to his
Awakening and his first teaching. In this particular account of the life of the Buddha,
however, we'll add to the narrative a few more post-enlightenment episodes which
are fascinating in their own right.

1. The Conception of the Buddha

The earliest Buddhist sources state that the future Buddha Shakyamuni was
born SiddharthaGautama, the son of a local king in Kapilavastu on what is now the
Indian-Nepalese border around the fifth century BCE. He was thus a member of a
relatively privileged and wealthy family, and enjoyed a comfortable upbringing.
Buddhist world-view, however, views his birth not as a onetime event so much as a
grand finale of a long series of countless previous lives as an enthusiastic seeker of
religious truth.

The story goes back incalculable numbers of aeons ago to when there lived an ascetic
called Sumedha (the future Buddha Shakyamuni) who encountered
the buddhaDipamkara. This meeting affected Sumedha in such a way that he too
aspired to becoming a buddha. Sumedha thus set out on the path of the cultivation
of the "Ten Perfections."
(Nepalese image of Dimpankara from Patan Museum)
The Bodhisattva cultivated these perfections over many lifetimes. The life in
which he becomes the Buddha Shakyamuni some time in the fifth century
BCE, represents the fruition of Sumedha's distant aspiration and tireless
endeavors. An old tradition tells us that shortly before his final rebirth the
Bodhisattva spent his life as a god in Tusita (the Heaven of the Contented).
Surveying the world from Tusita, the Bodhisattva saw the time had come
for him to take a human birth and at last become a buddha; he saw that the
"Middle Country" of the great continent of Jambudvipa (India) was the
place in which to take birth, for its inhabitants would be receptive to his
message. The Bodhisattva was conceived on the full moon night in July; that night
his mother, Maya, dreamt that a white elephant carrying a white lotus in its trunk
came and entered her womb through her right flank.

Figure 1 and 2 depict the scene of the Boddhisatva's descent into earth and entry into
her mother's womb.Figure 1, the sculpture from the stupa of Bharhut,
took on the task of illustrating the above-mentioned story in a simple
manner. Maya is shown reclining, her head to the left of the spectator,
on a four-legged bed. A water pitcher and a lighted lamp (indicating
that the scene took place at night) complete the furnishings.
Maidservants at the bottom watch over their mistress' sleep, one
holding a fly whisk and the other being startled to see the entry of the
white elephant into Maya. Above the medallion there are inscribed the words "the
descent of the Blessed One." The white elephant here symbolizes perfect wisdom
and royal power; in India, an elephant is accounted the most sacred animal on earth.
As a matter of fact, prior to the descent, the Bodhisattva in the Tusita heaven
consulted with other gods about what guise he should take to enter his mother's
womb. The gods suggested all the divine forms imaginable, but one of them, who
knew the writings of the brahmins better because of his recent birth, closed the
discussion by stating, "In the form of a white elephant having six tusks."

Now the Bodhisattva enters his mother's womb in the form of a white elephant, but
here we encounter a little problem in that we are not informed at what moment he
exchanges his animal form for a human one. The Chinese thought they solved this
problem by showing the Bodhisattva as entering his mother's womb "mounted on an
elephant" as shown in Figure 2, the Chinese painting of the same
scene. One more point that attracts our attention is that at this
decisive moment of conception Maya is always shown alone on her
couch; her husband is always absent. This restraint can be attributed
to the religious belief of the time that everything having to do with
the birth of the Buddha be physically and morally pure. This
preoccupation with moral purity is carried over to the second act, the
birth of the Buddha.

2. The Birth of the Buddha

Having carried the Boddhisattva in her womb for precisely ten lunar months, Maya
gave a birth to him. On the full moon in May, passing by the Lumbini grove on her
way to her home town, she was captivated by the beauty of the flowering sala trees
and stepped down from her palanquin to walk amongst the trees in the grove. As
she reached for a branch of a sala tree, which bent itself down to meet her hand, the
pangs of birth came upon her. Thus, while other women are depicted as giving birth
sitting or lying down, the Bodhisattva's mother is shown delivering her child while
standing and holding on to the branch of a sala tree in the garden of Lumbini.

(See this moment illustrated on the murals of

Baiya Monastery, Tibet.)