Did Vedanta have any influence on Buddhism?
Was Vedanta ever mentioned in early Buddhism or mentioned by the Buddha? No it was not. Okay, how about the Upanishads? No, they were not mentioned either. Although the early Upanishads had already been completed even before the rise of Buddhism, there is no mention of them in early Buddhism (Nakamura, A History of Early Vedanta Philosophy, volume 1, 133-4).
Was the Buddha aware of Brahmins? Most assuredly. The Buddha even referred to himself as a Brahmin (Itivuttaka 101). In addition, there is a whole chapter in the Dhammapada dedicated to Brahmins. Were these Brahmins versed in the Vedic canon? Most likely. Were they also versed in the Upanishads. Not necessarily. On this same thread, was the notion of âtman prevalent during the early period of Buddhism? Not exactly. Nothing in early Buddhism, especially found in the Brahmajala Sutta, coincides, adequately, with Vedanta thought according to Nakamura (p. 139).
Even the most conservative scholars have to agree that Buddhism was not influenced by the Upanishads.
"The number of passages in the Pali canon dealing with Upanishadic doctrines, is very small. It is true that early Buddhism shares many doctrines with the Upanishads (Karma, rebirth, liberation through insight), but these tenets were so widely held in philosophical circles of those times that we can no longer regard the Upanishads are the direct source from which the Buddha has drawn. The special metaphysical concern of the Upanishads, the identity of the individual and the universal Atman, has been mentioned and rejected only in a few passages in the early Zen Buddhism texts, for instance in the saying of the Buddha quoted earlier (Helmuth von Glasenapp, Vedanta and Buddhism, The Middle Way Vol. XXXI, No. 4 [1957]).
If the Buddha was influenced by any religion, it was more likely to have been Jainism—not the Upanishads or Vedanta.
To sum up this blog, there is no rock hard evidence that some notions found in Buddhism such as rebirth or karma came from Vedanta or the Upanishads. One might as well claim that Jainism arose from Vedanta or the Upanishads.
Comments
Post a Comment