Buddhism



 Siddhartha Gautama, known as the Buddha, was born around 500 B.C.E in what is now modern Nepal. His father, Suddhodana, was the ruler of the Sakya people and Siddhartha grew up living the extravagant life of a young prince. According to custom, he married at the young age of sixteen to a girl named Yasodhara. His father had ordered that he live a life of total seclusion, but one day Siddhartha ventured out into the world and was confronted with the reality of the inevitable suffering of life. The next day, at the age of twenty-nine, he left his kingdom and newborn son to lead an ascetic life and determine a way to relieve universal suffering. For six years, Siddhartha submitted himself to rigorous ascetic practices, studying and following different methods of meditation with various religious teachers. But he was never fully satisfied. One day, however, he was offered a bowl of rice from a young girl and he accepted it. In that moment, he realized that physical austerities were not the means to achieve liberation. From then on, he encouraged people to follow a path of balance rather than extremism. He called this The Middle Way. That night Siddhartha sat under the Bodhi tree, and meditated until dawn. He purified his mind of all defilements and attained enlightenment at the age of thirty-five, thus earning the title Buddha, or "Enlightened One". For the remainder of his eighty years, the Buddha preached the Dharma in an effort to help other sentient beings reach enlightenment.

== A quick note on Ashoka:

In 274 BCE Ashoka Maurya was anointed the emporer of The Mauryan Empire. He was considered to be a ruthless emporer when he conquered and nearly wiped the land of Kalinga and all of its Kalingans of the face of the earth. After this conquest he stopped conquering lands because his empire had no more room to grow. According to legend: One day, whilst walking through a Kalingan city days, month, or years(the date of this is openly debated) after his conquest, Ashoka saw the death and destructuion of this city and the thousands of corpes that lay before him. This made him sick and he wondered how can a person do such a thing just for the growth of themselves. After seeing this sight, Asoka went into a deep depression. To seek 'enlightenment' he sought out a buddhist monk to help him with complete this task. The buddhist monk led him to the same Bohdi tree that the buddha himself sat under when he was seeking enlightenment. Ashoka sat under this tree and slowly reached an religous epiphany. After reaching 'enlightenment', Asoka told religious scriptures to spread the new laws on rocks and pillars, these were called edicts. These edicts still stand today and they still influence buddhist followers in India even now. ==