Let’s go back to around 500 BC, when the Buddha was active.
The Brahmins, who were based in the upper reaches of the Ganges River, around present-day Delhi, and boasted of pure Aryan blood, established a rigid caste order based on rural society and reigned over the people as the highest privileged class with a monopoly on rituals.
They called the middle and lower reaches of the Ganges the end of the world beyond the reach of the Vedas, and despised the people living there as half-breeds or barbarians. But by that point, the barbarians were already far outstripping the Aryan-led society in terms of economic power.
Compared to the conservative Brahmin culture, which basically despised commerce as a lowly occupation, the people of the middle and lower Ganges reaches, where the indigenous culture prevailed, were liberal, and after they had digested the superior culture of the Aryans (especially their chariot-making methods, metallurgy, mathematics and astronomy, and rich linguistic concepts), the indigenous people were rising rather more powerful in terms of economic and military power.
During the time of the Buddha, a number of commercial cities flourished in the middle and lower reaches of the Ganges. Many new thinkers emerged in this region, creating a golden age in the history of Indian thought, where a hundred schools of thought contend.
One of the important stances in the diversity of thought, also known as 62 views, was the denial of the authority of the Vedas and the validity of Brahmin rituals, especially the offerings of sacrificial beasts. Another criticism was the status discrimination of varna (skin colour) with Brahmins at the top.
Around the Magadha region at that time, the indigenous Dravidians, the Mongoloid rice farmers from the northeast, and the Aryans in the west lived in habitat differentiation, but there was much exchange of people, especially around the big cities, and mixed brad was progressing partially.
The free economic people living in the cities were therefore relatively less racist and had a more critical, in spite of respectful on the surface, disposition towards traditional Brahmanism. That is why new ideas were born and nurtured there and welcomed by all, from royals and riches to the lower classes.
In the middle of such a Magadha region, Gautama Buddha appeared and burst into fame. For the people, it was the arrival of a long-awaited saviour.
It has already been mentioned that at this time, 16 major nations were flourishing in the middle and lower reaches of the Ganges. Among them, the Shakas, from whom Buddha, or Siddhartha, was born, had a more liberal republican system. I consider these Shakas to be indigenous Mongoloid peoples who cultivated rice.
The name of Siddhartha’s father king, Suddhodana, means ‘pure rice’, as is evident in the Chinese translation of the name ‘King of Pure Rice’, suggesting that they were rice farmers. Perhaps the same stream of Mongoloid rice farmers from the area around present-day Assam was then spreading from the Tarai plains of Nepal to the east half of northern India.
Born into the Shakha tribe as a prince of the warrior class Kshatriyas, Siddhartha was taught the Vedas at an early age, as is usual for the upper classes. However, as he grew and awoke to the hardships of life, he became deeply despairing that the Vedas and Brahmanism had no power to resolve his anguish.
Finally, at the age of 29, he abandoned his wife and children and left the kingdom and began walking the path of an ordained practitioner (samana) in search of true salvation for his soul.
In contrast to the Brahmins who perform grandiose ceremonies, receive large sums of money and goods, and indulge in luxury, these Samanas live a simple and virtuous life, looking for liberation from reincarnation: a never-ending cycle of life and death, and practised ascetic life for gaining immortality or Moksha as their ideal goal.
Initially, Siddhartha travelled to various masters who were well-known around the Magadha country to broaden his knowledge, but he eventually studied under two meditation masters and devoted himself to their practice.
In my previous post, I presented a meditating statue of Shiva and wrote that his seated form directly inherited the Indus ‘seated ascetic’, but this sitting meditation was already being actively practised in Buddha’s time as a non-Vedic alternative ‘forest tradition’. Siddhartha probably followed such a predecessor.
He trained under two masters and within a short period of time he reached the highest level of each of them. However, this did not solve his affliction.
Disappointed, he plunged into the other mainstream of his time – fasting and asceticism – and other forms of hardship. However, he couldn’t achieve any results yet after six years passed.
Having become emaciated from fasting, he wanders out of the forest in despair just before his death and met Sujata, a kindly village girl, by chance. After eating the milk porridge she offered him, he suddenly realised the powerlessness of ascetic practices so far and, after purifying himself in the river, went into sitting meditation alone under a Bodhi Tree. It was a great determination not to stand up again unless attaining enlightenment.
One theory is that he had an experience as a child when he went into Samadhi (Jhāna) as a natural high and that he revived the memory of the experience at this time. He may have found a ray of light in returning to his own nature and mastering Samadhi until death, rather than emaciating to die by the hardships taught by others.
According to Buddhist tradition, a large army of Mara demons attacked and interfered with his meditation. The demons took the form of fearsome warriors, waving swords above his head, cunningly smiling and tempting him to interrupt the meditation, and naked beauties seduced him with their bewitching hips in front of his eyes.
Perhaps this was not such demons coming from outside, but an eruption of his inner desires and conflicts. Either way, he had overcome and was unmoved by them.
After the transcendental process, suddenly ‘the moment’ has come and he finally got enlightenment. According to tradition, the bright star of dawn was shining coolly in the eastern sky, which he was facing at that time.
Later, starting with his first sermon in Sarnath, the Buddha’s teachings spread like a wildfire across the Ganges basin of northern India. Departing from the vague notion of the power of Vedic rituals, his teachings, which thoroughly focused on the suffering of life and practical salvation from it, were eventually summarised as the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path.
He preached plainly. It is neither caste nor Vedic incantation-dependent rituals that determine man’s destiny. It is how one acts (karma), based on what thoughts and feelings. That is the most important ’cause and effect’ that determines a person’s destiny.
It was the ‘Dharma’ captured by pure intelligence to all intents and purposes, and it brought about a revolutionary change in the consciousness of the people of that time as revealed unwavering truth.
Eventually, his great enlightened steps were superimposed on the running Godly wheel, and the image of the turning Dharma Chakra was established. This would be the birth of the Holy Chakra (wheel) in the true sense of the word. It would have been born when the ideas of the Warrior God Ratha Chakra and the Sun God Surya Chakra, which were established in the distant Indra period (or earlier), were combined with the Chakra Vision of the indigenous meditating sages of Indus which overlapped on the Buddha.
The teachings of the Buddha, which rejected the authority of the Vedas and the validity of Brahmanic rituals and criticised caste discrimination, were greeted with acclaim by the liberal citizen of the cities. However, no one could have imagined at the time that such a very liberal character of Buddhism would be the cause of its subsequent decline in India.
Later, the chakra symbol broke out all over India when the Buddha’s Dharma wheel was featured extensively by King Ashoka, who united the Indian subcontinent for the first time in the third century BC. The Chakra (wheel), which until then had been confined to the Aryans and the surrounding areas under their cultural influence, established itself as a universal symbol for the whole Indian world.
Incidentally, the Magadha State, which gave birth to the Mauryan dynasty, was long despised as a country of native Shudras by the Brahmins of pure blood in the Delhi area. History is interesting because he has now swallowed up the proud Brahmins and become the champion of the whole of India with its holy wheel, which was originally derived from the Aryan traditions.
It is not known whether this was before or after the Buddha, but from ancient times in northern India there was the idea of the ‘Chakra Vartin Raja’. King Ashoka’s dharma chakra was deeply related to this.
One legend remains.
When an ideal king is born in this world, a shining golden wheel of treasure appears in the sky, and when the king follows it, the kings in his path obey him without fighting. Then the world is ruled and unified by the power of law and virtue rather than military might under this Holy King with the shining treasure of the Turning Wheel.
Since the Aryan invasion, war after war may have exhausted the people in northern India. While the great king turning military wheels were praised for conquering the enemy with their Ratha chariots, it is highly likely that a deep pessimism and war-weary were surely spreading under the surface.
They who in such mind created this ideal king who ruled the world without resorting to force, the Holy King of the Turning Wheel. This is expressed in the fact that the wheel of the Ratha chariot, which in the Vedas was a symbol of military might overrunning the world, has become a symbol of non-war. It was originally only an ideological, dream-like utopia (fairy tale) that could not be real.
But King Ashoka, deeply repentant after witnessing the horrors of the Kalinga war, boldly vowed to build this utopia. He erected stone pillars with Dharma Chakras all over his vast empire, built roads, promoted industry, planted medicinal herbs, built sanatoria all over the country, banned senseless killing and urged the establishment of a ‘Dharma’ (morality) in human relations.
In a sense, his reign, which has been known today, may be said to have anticipated the ideal world of modern society more than 2,000 years ago.
At the root of his policies were the teachings of the Buddha. King Ashoka protected all religions, including Brahmanism, equally, but he was also harshly critical of caste discrimination and animal sacrifices.
Most importantly, it should be noted that Buddhism was catapulted by him from a regional religion in India to a world religion.
He sent Buddhist missionaries not only inside the empire but also to Sri Lanka, South-East Asia, present-day Afghanistan and as far away as the Greek world to spread Buddha’s teachings.
The name of the Thai town of Nakhon Pathom means ‘first town’ in Pali, and the first stupa in South East Asia was built here by an envoy of King Ashoka. An ancient stone Dharma Wheel excavated there is still on display in the Phra Pathom Chedi Temple museum as if to commemorate his achievements.
Perhaps King Ashoka likened himself to the Holy King of the Chakra Vartin Raja. After having reached the pinnacle of a military king, he may have despaired of it and decided to become the ideal holy king based on virtue and law by holding up Buddha’s Dharma Chakra as a treasure wheel.
Unfortunately, the project was interrupted by his death. However, the ruts of the wheels he left behind have been passed down from generation to generation beyond time and place.
Later Indian kings admired Great Ashoka as an ideal king, and displaying Buddha’s wheel of law in honour came to be regarded as proof of the legitimacy, holiness and greatness of his kingship. It could be called the “Ashoka Complex”.
Its sensitising power reaches as far away as Japan.
Ashoka the Great’s name is often mentioned in Chinese translations of Buddhist scriptures under the name of King Aiku (阿育王), and his achievements as the Greatest Buddhist King in Indian history had no small impact on the rulers of ancient Japan, who had just adopted Buddhism.
Ishido-Ji (Stone Pagoda Temple) in Higashiomi, Shiga Prefecture, Japan takes its name from the oldest stone pagoda in Japan. It’s known as the Aiku-O-Ji (King Ashoka Temple) and is said to have been founded by Prince Shotoku.
Prince Shotoku played a central role when ancient Japan accepted the Buddhism from China continent for the first time.
Ishido-ji Temple, a Tendai sect temple said to have been founded by Prince Shotoku, is located in the centre of the small rural town of Gamo, which is like a hidden village.
History of Ishido-Ji
On the mountaintop of Ishido-Ji is a cluster of stone Buddhas and stone pagodas, with the three-storey stone pagoda at the centre, numbering around 10,000. This three-storey stone pagoda is called the Ashoka Pagoda and is said to be one of the 84,000 pagodas built by King Ashoka of India.
The pagoda is the oldest and largest of the stone pagodas existing in Japan and is said to have been constructed in the early Nara Period (late 7th century). The pagoda stands on a platform and is 7.5m high and made of granite. It is similar to the Baekje-style pagodas remaining in Buyeo, South Korea, and it is assumed that these people built the pagoda, given the migration of people from Baekje to Gamo County in the 8th year of Tenchi (AD 669).
Famous writers such as Ryotaro Shiba, Jakucho Setouchi, Masako Hakushu and Hiroyuki Itsuki have visited Seokto-ji and praised the beauty of the great Aiku-O Pagoda in their writings.
Prince Shotoku introduced excellent cultures from the continent, built many temples, including the five-storey pagoda of Horyu-ji Temple, and established a centralised state system centred on the emperor by establishing the Crown Twelve Ranks and the Seventeen-Article Constitution.
Article 2 of his Seventeen-Article Constitution reads as follows.
Respect the Three Treasures. The Three Treasures are the Buddha, the Dharma and the Monks.
Wikipedia
They are the final return of the four lives and the supreme religion of all nations. In every generation, everybody respects the Dharma.
There are few which are extremely bad. Obey it as it is well taught. If you do not refuge to the Three Treasures, what will you do to correct your bad destiny?
In this ‘Declaration’, does not Prince Shotoku’s strong sense of pride in himself and in his aim to create an ideal country centred on Buddhism like King Ashoka appear clearly?
The Osaka Shitennoji Temple, also built by Prince Shotoku, has a pharmacy and a sanatorium for the sick and a nursing home for the elderly, the spirit of which is reminiscent of King Ashoka’s welfare policies. The revolving wheel set on the west gate known as the Gokuraku-mon (heavenly gate), would be a tribute to king Ashoka, I think…
There is little doubt that once upon a time in ancient Japan, passion for King Ashoka was a major momentum driving politics, society and even ‘nation-building’ itself.
There is one more thing that I would like to address as a personal thought, although I cannot provide clear evidence on this. It is the imperial chrysanthemum crest.
The crest of the chrysanthemum, the symbol of the Japanese imperial family, has a beautiful double 16-petaled flower design. That also coincides with the 16-spoke wheel from a different perspective. In my past travels throughout India, I have encountered many chakra designs that bear a striking resemblance to the chrysanthemum crest.
Also, 16 petaled are a multiple of 8, which can be interpreted as double 8 petals, and concealing the Buddha’s Dharma wheel of the Eightfold Path, as is clear from the Tamil example above. Looking back at the above-mentioned Shitennoji Dharma wheel, the eight spokes with eight ‘gaps’ make 16.
Japan’s imperial family has consistently played a central role in the development of Buddhism since its arrival from the continent. Prince Shotoku was a pioneer in this field. Many emperors and members of the imperial family have also been ordained and devoted themselves to Buddhism in history.
I imagined, that inspired by the achievements of King Ashoka recorded in Buddhist scriptures, the ancient emperors who aspired to become the Holy King of the Chakra Vartin in the Land of Sunrise prayed for the peace and prosperity of the nation and raised the Dharma Wheel overlaid on (or concealed in) the shape of a chrysanthemum.
King Ashoka’s own ideal empire was extremely short-lived, but it played a major role in uniting the whole Indian subcontinent and encouraging the sharing of various cultures. One of the most important of these was in the field of religious architecture and art.
In fact, this theme is deeply related to the ‘five-storey pagodas (五重塔)’ too, which were built all over Japan, starting with Prince Shotoku.
~to be continued~
INDIA~The Land of Holy Chakra 