Kashmiri Pandit
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Until fairly recently it had been generally misunderstood that the Buddha's heritage was essentially Vedic and that his movement was a reaction against Brahmanism, though as recent research has concluded it would seem that Śākyamuni's Indo-European culture was related to yet distinct from the Vedic Āryans to the west, and moreover Brahmanism was not so significant in his homeland.
Bronkhorst in his works Greater Magadha and Buddhism Under the Shadow of Brahmanism details in great length how the Greater Magadha region (present day Bihar and West Bengal in modern India) was related to but culturally quite distinct from the Vedic peoples to the west (the Kuru-Pañcāla region comprising northwest India/Pakistan around the upper to mid reaches of the Gaṅgā and Yamunā rivers). Both peoples were migrants into the Indian subcontinent and shared a common ancestry as Indo-Āryans, though they diverged from one another culturally and linguistically over time. They initially had many common gods, such as Indra among others, though their religious proclivities went in different directions.
The Kuru-Pañcāla in a period before the Buddha's time developed what we would understand as Vedic orthodoxy and orthopraxy, while Magadha to the east maintained their earlier traditions along with embracing śramaṇa spirituality. The Vedic peoples in this period regarded the peoples of Magadha as impure and uncultivated – a land that spoke a distorted dialect and was polluted, requiring purification when returning from it. While it appears Magadha was aware of the Vedas and probably hosted their own native Brahmin priests, neither were so significant.
Nevertheless, the earlier idea that Buddhism was a reaction to Brahmanism is still widespread. Geoffrey Samuel in his work The Origins of Yoga and Tantra Indic Religions to the Thirteenth Century explains as follows:
It would seem that by the time of the historical Buddha and of the Jaina teacher Mahāvīra, the generic Indo-Aryan cultural tradition was an accepted part of society through much of the Central Gangetic region. There were also Brahmins and a degree of movement between the Brahmins of this region and those of Kuru-Pañcāla. It seems clear, however, that the nature of Vedic and Brahmanical religion in this region was different and considerably less dominant than in the Kuru-Pañcāla region.1
Basically around the Buddha's era there were two unique and clearly self-conscious cultural spheres in northern India: the Brahmanical heartland to the west and a “Greater Magadha” to the east.
This is also reflected in the archaeological record. The distribution of two pottery styles seem to reflect these two cultural spheres: the painted gray ware (PGW) in the Indo-Gangetic divide throughout the Doab and the black slipped ware (BSW) towards the east. The former is generally linked to the early Brahmanical culture of the area. While nothing definitive can be concluded from pottery distribution, it is still remarkable. Erdosy notes the following:
While it may be a mistake to equate the distribution of this ware [PGW] with an effective social group, the coincidence of the territory of madhyadeśa, representing the heartland of ārya orthodoxy, with it is striking.2
To some extent the Buddha's homeland was even materially different from the Brahmanical cultures to the west. The misunderstanding that Buddhism was a reaction to Brahmanism further arises from later sources which, as Bronkhorst explains, “colonized” the past and made it seem more significant than it really was:
Among the methods used by the new Brahmanism to attain its goals we must count the adoption of a new life-style, and the composition of literary works that address both a brahmanical and non-brahmanical audience to emphasize the features and claims that Brahmins presented as rightfully and inherently theirs. All these tolls share one feature: they all deny that the new Brahmanism is new at all. Brahmanism and all that is part of it has always been there, and is the very opposite of new. The sacred language of the Brahmins, for example, came to be thought of as being without beginning: Sanskrit is eternal, the original language that is as old or older than the world itself. The same applies to other aspects of brahmanical culture.
This tendency to colonize the past expresses itself in a particularly interesting manner in the way in which Brahmanism came to think of the cause of their past agonies. Remember that the Maurya empire had spelt disaster for Brahmanism. What better way to take revenge than by claiming that this mighty empire, far from almost vanquishing Brahmanism, had obeyed the brahmanical order of things? Rudradāman's inscription, studied in the preceding chapter, shows that this is what he, or his advisers believed. What is more, the Maurya empire had itself been created by brahmanical acumen. … Such colonization of the past became all the easier in later days when the influence of Brahmins at court had become a fact with which all were familiar. ...[T]he Buddhists of the subcontinent came to reformulate their own past in brahmanical terms. Accepting that the Maurya empire had been created with the help of a brahmanical minister may have come to be looked upon as natural, even by Buddhists.3
A reading of early and later Buddhist literature will reveal said reformulation the past which understandably if not understood gives the modern reader the impression that Brahmanical culture was much more significant in Magadha than it really was originally. The Buddha was aware of Vedic culture and clearly interacted with it, but he was not reacting against it. This misconception still pervades mainstream thought as Samuel points out:
As for the suggestion, still prevalent in the popular literature, that Buddhism represented a protest against the pre-existing Brahmanical caste system, there seems little truth in this. The Buddha's comments on Brahmin claims of high caste suggest less an opposition to an already imposed caste system than a refusal by a spiritual leader belonging to an established group of high status to accept a new imported Vedic-Brahmanical model in which the Brahmins are supreme. References to Vedic material in the earliest Buddhist literature are limited although there is evident knowledge of the existence of the Rg, Sāma and Yajur Vedas and suggestions of detailed engagement with Vedic ideas.4
Essentially we can discern two major Indo-Āryan cultures of north India during and before the Buddha's time stemming from a common source. We can trace such a common source back further. The Indo-Āryans were related to the Indo-Iranians whose own Avestan (the language of Zoroastrian scripture) hymns are often near identical to certain Vedic hymns. Consider the following:
yo vo apo vasvish yajate asuranish asurasya vashishthabyo hotrabhyo
(Sanskrit)
yo vo apo vanguhish yazaite ahuranish ahurahe vahishtabyo zaothrabyo
(Avestan)
He who worships you, the good waters, the Ahurian wives of Ahura, with best
libations.
Bronkhorst in his works Greater Magadha and Buddhism Under the Shadow of Brahmanism details in great length how the Greater Magadha region (present day Bihar and West Bengal in modern India) was related to but culturally quite distinct from the Vedic peoples to the west (the Kuru-Pañcāla region comprising northwest India/Pakistan around the upper to mid reaches of the Gaṅgā and Yamunā rivers). Both peoples were migrants into the Indian subcontinent and shared a common ancestry as Indo-Āryans, though they diverged from one another culturally and linguistically over time. They initially had many common gods, such as Indra among others, though their religious proclivities went in different directions.
The Kuru-Pañcāla in a period before the Buddha's time developed what we would understand as Vedic orthodoxy and orthopraxy, while Magadha to the east maintained their earlier traditions along with embracing śramaṇa spirituality. The Vedic peoples in this period regarded the peoples of Magadha as impure and uncultivated – a land that spoke a distorted dialect and was polluted, requiring purification when returning from it. While it appears Magadha was aware of the Vedas and probably hosted their own native Brahmin priests, neither were so significant.
Nevertheless, the earlier idea that Buddhism was a reaction to Brahmanism is still widespread. Geoffrey Samuel in his work The Origins of Yoga and Tantra Indic Religions to the Thirteenth Century explains as follows:
It would seem that by the time of the historical Buddha and of the Jaina teacher Mahāvīra, the generic Indo-Aryan cultural tradition was an accepted part of society through much of the Central Gangetic region. There were also Brahmins and a degree of movement between the Brahmins of this region and those of Kuru-Pañcāla. It seems clear, however, that the nature of Vedic and Brahmanical religion in this region was different and considerably less dominant than in the Kuru-Pañcāla region.1
Basically around the Buddha's era there were two unique and clearly self-conscious cultural spheres in northern India: the Brahmanical heartland to the west and a “Greater Magadha” to the east.
This is also reflected in the archaeological record. The distribution of two pottery styles seem to reflect these two cultural spheres: the painted gray ware (PGW) in the Indo-Gangetic divide throughout the Doab and the black slipped ware (BSW) towards the east. The former is generally linked to the early Brahmanical culture of the area. While nothing definitive can be concluded from pottery distribution, it is still remarkable. Erdosy notes the following:
While it may be a mistake to equate the distribution of this ware [PGW] with an effective social group, the coincidence of the territory of madhyadeśa, representing the heartland of ārya orthodoxy, with it is striking.2
To some extent the Buddha's homeland was even materially different from the Brahmanical cultures to the west. The misunderstanding that Buddhism was a reaction to Brahmanism further arises from later sources which, as Bronkhorst explains, “colonized” the past and made it seem more significant than it really was:
Among the methods used by the new Brahmanism to attain its goals we must count the adoption of a new life-style, and the composition of literary works that address both a brahmanical and non-brahmanical audience to emphasize the features and claims that Brahmins presented as rightfully and inherently theirs. All these tolls share one feature: they all deny that the new Brahmanism is new at all. Brahmanism and all that is part of it has always been there, and is the very opposite of new. The sacred language of the Brahmins, for example, came to be thought of as being without beginning: Sanskrit is eternal, the original language that is as old or older than the world itself. The same applies to other aspects of brahmanical culture.
This tendency to colonize the past expresses itself in a particularly interesting manner in the way in which Brahmanism came to think of the cause of their past agonies. Remember that the Maurya empire had spelt disaster for Brahmanism. What better way to take revenge than by claiming that this mighty empire, far from almost vanquishing Brahmanism, had obeyed the brahmanical order of things? Rudradāman's inscription, studied in the preceding chapter, shows that this is what he, or his advisers believed. What is more, the Maurya empire had itself been created by brahmanical acumen. … Such colonization of the past became all the easier in later days when the influence of Brahmins at court had become a fact with which all were familiar. ...[T]he Buddhists of the subcontinent came to reformulate their own past in brahmanical terms. Accepting that the Maurya empire had been created with the help of a brahmanical minister may have come to be looked upon as natural, even by Buddhists.3
A reading of early and later Buddhist literature will reveal said reformulation the past which understandably if not understood gives the modern reader the impression that Brahmanical culture was much more significant in Magadha than it really was originally. The Buddha was aware of Vedic culture and clearly interacted with it, but he was not reacting against it. This misconception still pervades mainstream thought as Samuel points out:
As for the suggestion, still prevalent in the popular literature, that Buddhism represented a protest against the pre-existing Brahmanical caste system, there seems little truth in this. The Buddha's comments on Brahmin claims of high caste suggest less an opposition to an already imposed caste system than a refusal by a spiritual leader belonging to an established group of high status to accept a new imported Vedic-Brahmanical model in which the Brahmins are supreme. References to Vedic material in the earliest Buddhist literature are limited although there is evident knowledge of the existence of the Rg, Sāma and Yajur Vedas and suggestions of detailed engagement with Vedic ideas.4
Essentially we can discern two major Indo-Āryan cultures of north India during and before the Buddha's time stemming from a common source. We can trace such a common source back further. The Indo-Āryans were related to the Indo-Iranians whose own Avestan (the language of Zoroastrian scripture) hymns are often near identical to certain Vedic hymns. Consider the following:
yo vo apo vasvish yajate asuranish asurasya vashishthabyo hotrabhyo
(Sanskrit)
yo vo apo vanguhish yazaite ahuranish ahurahe vahishtabyo zaothrabyo
(Avestan)
He who worships you, the good waters, the Ahurian wives of Ahura, with best
libations.
