Buddhism in the Shadow of Brahmanism

Abstract

were Brahmins themselves, 6 that Brahmins may have begun to occupy the place in society which they thought was rightfully theirs.This happened around 185 BCE.Forty or fifty years later, Patañjali the grammarian was still not ready to look upon the Ganges valley east of the confluence with the Jumna as being part of the land of the Āryas.Until Patañjali's date and perhaps for some time after him, our sources suggest, the region east of the confluence of the Gaṅgā and the Yamunā was not brahmanical.I call this area Greater Magadha.Greater Magadha covers Magadha and its surrounding lands: roughly the geographical area in which the Buddha and Mahāvīra lived and taught.With regard to the Buddha, this area stretched by and large from Śrāvastī, the capital of Kosala, in the northwest to Rājagṛha, the capital of Magadha, in the southeast.This area was neither without culture nor without religion.It is in this area that most of the second urbanization of South Asia took place from around 500 BCE onward.It is also in this area that a number of religious and spiritual movements arose, most famous among them Buddhism and Jainism.All these events took place within, and were manifestations of, the culture of that part of northern India.Vedic and early post-vedic literature contains little to inform us about the culture of its eastern neighbours.However, a passage of the Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa speaks about the "demonic people of the east" who were in the habit of 27.10.2010(yona)".20 This may not justify the conclusion that there were Brahmins in all parts of the empire, for the combination "Śramaṇas and Brahmins" or "Brahmins and Śramaṇas" is a fixed expression, often in the shape of a compound, which can also be used where only one of the two is meant.21 It is yet clear that all of them, including Brahmins, were forbidden to kill animals and sacrifice them.This gives rise to the suspicion that Aśoka's impartiality with regard to different religious currents was not perfect: he may have been more impartial with regard to some than with regard to others.This suspicion may find support in the ninth Rock Edict.This inscription is positively rude about what it calls maṃgala "ceremonies".It says: "Men are practising various ceremonies during illness, or at the marriage of a son or a daughter, or at the birth of a son, or when setting out on a journey; on these and other (occasions) men are practising various ceremonies.But in such (cases) women are practising many and various vulgar and useless ceremonies.Now, ceremonies should certainly be practised.But ceremonies like these bear little fruit indeed."22 Aśoka recommends dhamma-maṃgala "Dharma ceremonies" instead.We are at present more interested in what he rejects.A glance at the Dharmasūtras and other traditional texts will make clear that the Brahmins were masters of such kinds of ceremonies (even though the term maṃgala to designate them appears to be rare in their texts).23 It seems, therefore, that Aśoka's ninth Rock Edict is criticizing certain brahmanical customs, or also brahmanical customs, without saying so explicitly.20

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