What is "Buddhism"? (World Atlas)

WorldAtlas.com edited and corrected by Wisdom Quarterly, Fall 2022

The historical Buddha (Gandhara art)

Buddhism is considered the 4th largest religion in the world [because 1,000,000,000 Chinese Buddhists are not counted in officially atheist communist China] that originated in Ancient India between the sixth and fourth centuries BCE.

The practice is based on a series of teachings by Siddhartha Gautama, the historical Buddha. From India [in particular Gandhara, now Afghanistan], Buddhism spread to major parts of Asia [particularly along the Silk Road] and the rest of the world.

The largest Buddha statues are in Bamiyan, Afghanistan (one of three real Kapilavastus)

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Currently, there are three major groups of Buddhism. These are:

1. Mahayana Buddhism followed in the countries of China, Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, and Vietnam;
2. Theravada followed in Burma, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, and Laos; 
3. Vajrayana followed in Tibet, Mongolia, Nepal, Bhutan, parts of Russia, and northern India.

Cosmic Amitabha eclipses the historical Buddha

There are also many subsects of Buddhism like Nichiren Buddhism, Zen Buddhism, Tendai, [secular American Vipassana] Buddhism.

Followers of Buddhism are referred to as Buddhists and at present, there are [at least one billion] more than 535 million Buddhists all over the world.

Buddhist beliefs

Shakyamuni the Sage of the Scythians/Shakyians

Buddhism consists of many spiritual practices, traditions, beliefs, and bodies of literature that are part of the teachings of the historical Buddha as well as later [make believe or apocryphal cosmic] "Buddhas."

The principal goal of Buddhism is to escape the endless cycle of rebirth and all forms of suffering and attain a state of awakening (enlightenment) followed by Nirvana, thereby ending the continuous cycle of death and rebirth.

Buddhists believe that the path to enlightenment is through the practice and development of morality, meditation, and wisdom (virtue, stillness, and direct knowing).

The core doctrines or teachings of Buddhism are known as the “Dharma.” These include the Three Universal Marks of Existence, the Four Enlightening Truths, and the Noble Eightfold Path.

Large Japanese Buddha statue in Bodh Gaya ("Enlightenment Grove"), Bihar, India

The Four Enlightening or Noble Truths are:

1. There is a problem called suffering (dukkha);
2. There is a cause of suffering (samudaya);
3. There is an end to suffering (nirodha);
4. There is a path to the end of suffering (magga).

The fourth ennobling or enlightening truth -- the Path -- refers to the factors Buddhists call the Noble Eightfold Path, following which one can awaken in this very life and here make an end of all suffering.

The Noble Eightfold Path to awakening that is often represented by an eight-spoked wheel or “The Wheel of Dharma” is comprised of these eight limbs or factors:

1. right view (samma ditthi),
2. right intention (samma sankappa),
3. right speech (samma vaca),
4. right action (samma kammanta),
5. right livelihood (samma ajiva),
6. right effort (samma vayama),
7. right mindfulness (samma sati),
8. right stillness (samma samadhi).

Maha Bodhi ("Great Awakening") temple reconstruction, Bodh Gaya, Bihar, India

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The Future Buddha Maitreya (Messiah), Thikse

Buddhists view the world as swirling in a sea of rebirth over and over again, where death represents a change not an end. Being are reborn again and again onto different planes of existence in countless worlds with different bodies -- of light, dense matter, or even in immaterial states -- which are dependent on the ripening of “deeds” (karma) or moral conduct of thought, speech, and deed in life after life.

Theravada Buddhists believe that every individual takes rebirth within one of 31 Planes of Existence (with countless individual worlds on each plane), which Mahayana has reduced to six realms.

Buddhist numbers by country (World Atlas)

There are many sutras (discourses) and spiritual texts written in Pali (a commonly spoken form of Sanskrit since Sanskrit was the exclusive language of those in the Brahmin priest caste who used it as an exclusive liturgical language).

Texts revered by Buddhists include the threefold collections of texts (Tipitaka), Mahayana sutras (Agamas), Tantric Texts, the Abhidharma ("Doctrine in Ultimate Terms"), and the early Buddhist texts of the Pali canon. More