Who is Buddha ?

Buddha’s original name was Siddhartha. It meant one who had accomplished his aim. Gautama was Siddhartha’s family name. Siddhartha was known all over the world as Buddha, the Enlightened One. He was also known by the name of Sakhya Muni, which meant an ascetic of the Sakhya tribe.

According to the Buddhist tradition, Siddhartha was born in Lumbini and spent his boyhood at Kapilavastu and its vicinity.
The day of the Buddha’s birth is widely celebrated in Theravada countries as Vesak.Buddha’s Birthday is called Buddha Purnima in Nepal, Bangladesh, and India as he is believed to have been born on a full moon day.

According to later biographical legends, during the birth celebrations, the hermit seer Asita journeyed from his mountain abode, analyzed the child for the “32 marks of a great man” and then announced that he would either become a great king (chakravartin) or a great religious leader.The naming ceremony was held on the fifth day and eight Brahmin scholars were invited to read the future. All gave similar predictions.

The legendary biographies depict Gautama’s father as shielding him from religious teachings and from knowledge of human suffering, so that he would become a great king instead of a great religious leader.

While the earliest sources merely depict Gautama seeking a higher spiritual goal and becoming an ascetic or sramana after being disillusioned with lay life, the later legendary biographies tell a more elaborate dramatic story about how he became Buddha.

As the boy reached the age of 16, his father arranged his marriage to Yasodhar, a cousin of the same age. In time, she gave birth to a son, Rahula. Gautama spent 29 years as a prince in Kapilavastu, a place now situated in Nepal. Although his father ensured that Gautama was provided with everything he could want or need, Gautama felt that material wealth was not the ultimate goal of life.

While venturing outside of his palace, Gautama is said to have seen an old crippled man ( old age), a diseased man ( illness), a decaying corpse ( death), and an ascetic. These four scenes are referred to as the four sights, or the four heavenly messengers ( Pali: devaduta). Deeply depressed by these sights, he sought to overcome old age, illness, and death by living the life of an ascetic. Gautama soon left his palace, his possessions, and his entire family at age 29, to take up the lonely life of a wandering monk.

Abandoning his inheritance, he is then said to have dedicated his life to learning how to overcome suffering. He meditated with two hermits, and, although he achieved high levels of meditative consciousness, he was still not satisfied with his path.

Gautama then chose the robes of a mendicant monk and headed to Magadha in what is today Bihar in India. He began his training in the ascetic life and practicing vigorous techniques of physical and mental austerity. Gautama proved quite adept at these practices, and surpassed even his teachers.

After asceticism and concentrating on meditation or Anapana-sati (awareness of breathing in and out), Gautama is said to have discovered what Buddhists call the Middle Way—a path of moderation away from the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification. He accepted a little rice pudding from a village girl named Sujata. Then, sitting under a pipal tree, now known as the Bodhi tree in Bodh Gaya, he vowed never to arise until he had found the Truth. At the age of 35, he attained Enlightenment; according to some traditions, this occurred approximately in May, and according to others in December. Gautama, from then on, was known as “The Perfectly Self-Awakened One”, the Samyaksambuddha.

According to tradition, the Buddha emphasized ethics and correct understanding. He questioned the average person’s notions of divinity and salvation. He stated that there is no intermediary between mankind and the divine; distant gods are subjected to karma themselves in decaying heavens; and the Buddha is solely a guide and teacher for the sentient beings who must tread the path of Nirvāṇa ( Pāli: Nibbāna) themselves to attain the spiritual awakening called bodhi and see truth and reality as it is. The Buddhist system of insight, thought, and meditation practice is not believed to have been revealed divinely, but by the understanding of the true nature of the mind, which could be discovered by anybody.

According to the Mahaparinibbana Sutta of the Pali canon, at the age of 80, the Buddha announced that he would soon enter Parinirvana or the final deathless state abandoning the earthly body. After this, the Buddha ate his last meal, which, according to different translations, was either a mushroom delicacy or soft pork, which he had received as an offering from a blacksmith named Cunda. Falling violently ill, Buddha instructed his attendant Ānanda to convince Cunda that the meal eaten at his place had nothing to do with his passing and that his meal would be a source of the greatest merit as it provided the much-needed energy for the Buddha.

Ananda protested Buddha’s decision to enter Parinirvana in the abandoned jungles of Kuśināra (Pāli: Kusināra) of the Mallas. Buddha, however, reminded Ananda how Kushinara was a land once ruled by a righteous king that resounded with joy:
According to the Mahaparinibbana Sutta of the Pali canon, at the age of 80, the Buddha announced that he would soon enter Parinirvana or the final deathless state abandoning the earthly body. After this, the Buddha ate his last meal, which, according to different translations, was either a mushroom delicacy or soft pork, which he had received as an offering from a blacksmith named Cunda. Falling violently ill, Buddha instructed his attendant Ānanda to convince Cunda that the meal eaten at his place had nothing to do with his passing and that his meal would be a source of the greatest merit as it provided the much-needed energy for the Buddha.

Ananda protested Buddha’s decision to enter Parinirvana in the abandoned jungles of Kuśināra (Pāli: Kusināra) of the Mallas. Buddha, however, reminded Ananda how Kushinara was a land once ruled by a righteous king that resounded with joy:

44. Kusavati, Ananda, resounded unceasingly day and night with ten sounds — the trumpeting of elephants, the neighing of horses, the rattling of chariots, the beating of drums and tabours, music and song, cheers, the clapping of hands, and cries of “Eat, drink, and be merry!”

Buddha then asked all the attendant Bhikshus to clarify any doubts or questions they had. They had none. He then finally entered Parinivana. The Buddha’s final words were, “All composite things pass away. Strive for your own salvation with diligence.” The Buddha’s body was cremated and the relics were placed in monuments or stupas, some of which are believed to have survived until the present. For example, The Temple of the Tooth or “Dalada Maligawa” in Sri Lanka is the place where the right tooth relic of Buddha is kept at present.