Burma: fierce Naga warrior, famed even in the time of the Buddha (allmyanmar.com)
Enlightened Missionaries originally spread BuddhismSoon after his Great Enlightenment, the Buddha sent out 60 enlightened disciples. They had the mandate to spread the good news (of liberation) to the world, with no two going in the same direction. They made it to Alexandria, Greece, Afghanistan, Persia, and the teaching of these Great Elders (
Maha Theras) eventually made it to the Middle East (by way of
Saint Issa), right to the religious powder keg known as Jerusalem. The teachings traveled throughout Asia, by way of the
Silk Route which had as much to do with commerce as culture.
Eventually, because Chinese missionaries were blown far off course, Buddhism made it to the pre-European-contact New World. It revolutionized cultures wherever it went, often meeting heavily Animistic indigenous views and melding with them. For example, pre-Buddhist Tibet practiced Bon, Japan practiced Shinto, and China was steeped in ancestor worship.
Closer to home (the Buddha after all lived in Northern India, or what was known as the "Middle Country" portion of
Jambudvipa, lit. "the Rose Apple Island," the ancient name of the Indian subcontinent), missionaries arrived in Burma. However, as history records, it was not until a few hundred years later -- during the reign of an empire -- that a Buddhist Council made a concerted effort to establish the teachings in Myanmar (which, of course, bore different borders and different clan and tribal allegiances than the
Naga,
Karen,
Mon, majority Burman, and others seen today).
Burmese tribesmen, young girls from the mountainous region (allmyanmar.com)
Buddhism in Myanmar: A Short History
Roger Bischoff (Access to Insight)
Missionaries of the Third Buddhist Council
The Third Buddhist Council was held during the reign of Emperor Asoka in the year 232 BCE in order to purify the monastic order (Sangha), to reassert orthodox teaching, and to refute heresy. But the work of the Council did not stop there.
18th century Burman replete with Indochinese influences (allmyanmar.com)With the support of Emperor Asoka, experienced teachers were sent to border regions in order to spread the teachings of the Buddha. This dispersal of missionaries is recorded in the
Mahavamsa, a Sri Lankan chronicle on the history of Buddhism:
When the Thera ("Elder") Moggaliputta, the illuminator of the religion of the Conqueror, had brought the (third) council to an end and when, looking into the future, he had beheld the founding of the religion in adjacent countries, then in the month of Katthika he sent forth theras, one here and one there.
The
thera Majjhantika he sent to Kasmira and Gandhara [Kashmir and Afghanistan], the
thera Mahadeva he sent to
Mahisamandala [the region girding the Himalayas]. To Vanavasa he sent the
thera named Rakkhita, and to Aparantaka the Yona named Dhammarakkhita; to Maharattha he sent the
thera named Mahadhammarakkhita, but the
thera Maharakkhita he sent into the country of the Yona. He sent the thera Majjhima to the Himalaya country and together with the
thera Uttara, the
thera Sona of wondrous might went to Suvannabhumi...
12According to the
Sasanavamsa [the "great history of the dispensation"], the above mentioned regions are the following: Kasmira and Gandhara is the right bank of the Indus river south of Kabul; Mahisamandala is Andhra; Vanavasa is the region around Prome; Aparantaka is west of the upper Irrawaddy; Maharattha is Thailand;
Yona, the country of the Shan tribes; and Suvannabhumi is Thaton (Burma). The
Sasanavamsa mentions five places in Southeast Asia where Asoka's missionaries taught the Buddha's doctrine, and through their teaching many gained insight and took refuge in the Triple Gem [Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha].
There are two interesting features mentioned in the text. First, in order to ordain nuns (bhikkhunis), other bhikkhunis had to be present, and secondly, the Brahmajala Sutra ["The All-Embracing Net of Views Discourse"] was preached in Thaton.
The Sasanavamsa goes on to describe sixty-thousand women ordaining in Aparanta. It states that women could not have been ordained without the presence of bhikkhunis, as in Sri Lanka where women could only be ordained after Ven. Mahinda's sister Sanghamitta had followed her brother there. In this case, it is surmised that bhikkhunis must have followed Dhammarakkhita to Aparanta at a later stage.
The Brahmajala Sutra, which the arhats ["enlightened"] Sona and Uttara preached in Thaton, deals in detail with the different schools of philosophical and religious thought prevalent in India at the time of the Buddha. The fact that Sona and Uttara chose this discourse to convert the inhabitants of Suvannabhumi indicates that they were facing a well-informed public, familiar with the views of Brahmanism [early brahmin caste leaning Hinduism] that were refuted by the Buddha in this discourse. There can be no doubt that only Indian colonizers, not the Mon people of Burma, would have been able to follow an analysis of Indian philosophy as profound as the Brahmajala Sutra.
