Buddhism is a religion founded by Gautama Buddha in north-eastern India, during the period from the late 6th century to the early 4th century BC. From India, the teachings of the Buddha spread across the east to the Far East regions of China, Korea, Japan and other South Asian countries. It influenced the spiritual, cultural, and social life of much of the Eastern world.  

Early life
Gautama Buddha was born Siddhartha, a prince of the Gotama clan (as written in Pali) or the Gautama clan (as written in Sanskrit), in the sixth or fifth century BC, in the kingdom of Sakyas, which was located on the present day Indo-Nepalese border. He was born to the royal couple, Suddhodana, and Mahamaya. Some historians have mentioned that the night before Siddhartha was born, the mother dreamt that a silver white elephant entered her womb from the side. Experts in the court predicted that the dream was an indication of a great man who would either become a universal monarch or the enlightened one, that is a buddha. Seven days after he was born, Siddhartha’s mother died. Fearing that the prediction about the young prince becoming an ascetic would become true, the king brought up Siddhartha in great luxury.  He married his cousin, Yasodhara, when he was sixteen years of age.

The turning point  
When he was twenty nine years of age, there occurred a series of revelations that irreversibly changed the course of life for Siddhartha. He saw an old man for the first time in his life and came to know that old age was inevitable. Similarly, on other occasions, he came across a sick man and a dead body. When the truth about the certainty of death, sickness and old age dawned on him, he was shocked. On a fourth occasion he saw a wandering mendicant and Siddhartha came away impressed with the man's peaceful demeanor. He instantly decided to become shraman (an ascetic). Such was Siddhartha’s state of mind when returning to the palace after seeing the mendicant that on being informed about the birth of his son, the royal prince named him Rahula, which meant fetter or bond. That night, Siddhartha left the city of Kapilavasthu, accompanied by his charioteer and companion, Channa. After crossing the Anoma River, he sent back his charioteer to the palace.  

A statue of Gautama Buddha

The gurus  
Initially, Alara Kalama, a renowned sage, introduced him to the stage of “sphere of no-thing.” Later, Uddaka Ramaputta, another great teacher, taught him to attain the “sphere of neither-perception-nor-nonperception, a higher mystical state than the previous one. However, Siddhartha was still not satisfied.

He was in quest of ultimate truth, nirvana, and thus he left Alara Kalama. In an area near the modern day Gaya, (known as Uruvela), Siddhartha practiced severe austerities and self-mortification. However, he soon realized that denial of food took its toll on his body and distracted him from his goal. He therefore began to partake simple but nutritious food, which disillusioned some of his followers who left him in disgust.  

The night of the Enlightenment  
Finally, he sat cross-legged at the base of a peepal tree, determined to attain enlightenment. He sat in deep meditation. He soon gained insight into his past births. Then he attained the power to see the passing away and rebirth of beings. Next he directed his mind to the knowledge of the destruction of wounds and indignities. And Siddhartha got his enlightenment that night, when he was thirty five. The word Buddha was attached as a suffix to indicate that he was the enlightened one. He came to be known as the “Enlightened one from the Gautama clan”, or the Gautama Buddha on a full moon day in the Hindu calendar of Visakha.  

Buddha then preached his philosophy and trained his followers to do the same. He propagated dharma and advocated following the Middle path between worldly attachments and extremes of self-denial.  

The Buddha’s passing away  
At the age of eighty, on a full moon day of the month of Visakha, the Buddha arrived at Kushinagara. He positioned a couch between two sal trees in a park and “laid himself down on his right side, with one leg resting on the other, mindful and self-possessed.” A week after he passed away, he was cremated. When there was a fight over the claims of his remains, it was divided into eight portions and placed at eight different places. Stupas were built at the eight places, in honor of the Enlightened one.  

The philosophy
Gautama the Buddha, essentially preached these truths: that life is fundamentally disappointment and suffering; that suffering is a result of one’s desires for pleasure, power, and continued existence; that in order to stop disappointment and suffering one must stop desiring; and that the way to stop desiring and thus suffering is the Noble Eightfold Path, namely “right views, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right awareness, and right concentration”.  

The Theravada and the Mahayana traditions
Years after the passing away of the Buddha, there arose a distinction between two groups of his followers, the Buddhists. One group believed that they held the most ancient traditions (the Theravadins) and those who claimed their understandings represented the highest and most complete account of Buddha's message (the Mahayanists). Images are important features of temples, monasteries, and shrines in both traditions.