Gréco-Buddhism

The gréco-Buddhism developed between the IV {{E}} century before J. - C. and the 5th century of our era in the kingdoms rested by the generals of Alexandre Large the and their successors, and in the Empire Kouchan which took their continuation (Central Asia, current Afghanistan and Pakistan). It evolved/moved over one period of almost 800 years in a context of Syncrétisme between various cultures, mainly Iranian, north-Indian, Hellénistique, Parthian and perhaps Tokharien. The the most developed schools seem to have been those of the Sarvastivadin, the Dharmaguptaka and the Sautrantika.

It gave place to an original pictorial production (gréco-Buddhist Art) which will exert a great influence on the Buddhist art of the following centuries, characterized inter alia by the appearance of the first iconic representations of the Bouddha. The pluriculturel medium in which it was born would have contributed to the formation of the Mahayana, whose first testimonys appear in Central Asia and India at the beginning of the Christian era. The first missionaries towards the China will come in majority from the areas from extension from gréco-Buddhism, which constitutes in the evolution of Buddhism a big step, but rather badly known because of insufficiency from the hard copies.

Historical background

The relations between hellenistic Greece and Buddhism begin with the conquest of the minor Asia and the Central Asia with Alexandre the Large one, started in 334 front. J. - C. Its armies cross then the Indus and the Jhelum. They come then into contact with India, cradle of Buddhism, stopping in Beas which runs of the Himachal Pradesh to the Punjab. Alexandre founds several cities in Oxus and Bactriane, then in the Passe of Khyber and with the Gandhara. These areas, located between the the Himalayas and the Hindu Kush, become the seat of commercial exchanges and cultural intensive.

With died of the conqueror Macedonian (323 front. J. - C.), its heirs the Diadoque S found their own kingdoms. Among them, Séleucos Ier creates the dynasty of the Séleucide S, whose field reaches Punjab in 304 front. J. - C., before seeing its border moving back in Afghanistan under the pressure of Chandragupta Maurya. The oriental party of the séleucide field becomes towards 250 front. J. - C. the Kingdom gréco-bactrien. Towards 180, with the collapse of the Maurya, appears in the North of India the Royaume indo-Greek, which will be supplanted by the Empire Kouchan (Ier-IIIe centuries of the Christian era).

The exchanges between civilizations Greek Eastern and north-Indian last until the arrival of the Huns white in Transoxiane at the 5th century.

Ionian and Buddhism

See also: Kingdom gréco-bactrien, Kingdom indo-Greek, Empire Kouchan

In -326, Taxila falls to the hands from Alexandre the Large one before being begun again in -317 by Chandragupta Maurya; its Ashoka grandson would have studied there. Buddhism is undoubtedly already present in this city which will become one of its centers of radiation. The king Macedonian is accompanied by several philosophers, of which the skeptic Pyrrhon, his Master Anaxarque and the Cynique Onésicrite, which remain one year and half in India, where they come into contact with naked gymnosophes or “philosophers”. Later, the historian Mégasthènes takes residence at the court of Chandragupta and collects many information which will be often taken again in Occident during the following centuries. He distinguishes the Brahmane S from the Shramana S, the perhaps Buddhist latter, Jaïn S or members of other sects of the time. Deimakos takes its continuation under Bindusâra, wire of Chandragupta. The Indian emperor Ashoka, large promoter of Buddhism, converts according to his dires many Yonas , Yojanas or Yovanas (Ioniens) and sends some on mission, like Dharmaraksita with Aparantaka (north-western of India) where he preaches, accompanied by many compatriots, the Aggikkhandopama Sutra .

Buddhism is protected by the Greek kings from Bactriane against the Sunga (-185 ~ -73) which are a long time unfavourable for him. At the time indo-Greek, Ménandre Ier (-160 ~ -135) probably adopts it like personal religion; he is regarded by the tradition as one of the three large protective kings of Buddhism, with Ashoka and Kanishka Ier. The Milindapañha of the gun faded the met in scene discussing with the Nagasena monk, disciple of Dharmaraksita. Plutarque reports that to its death, as for the Buddha, its ashes were distributed between the cities and of the monuments were high for him. According to the Mahavamsa , in - 130, under her reign, a delegation (according to the chronicle 30.000 people, number undoubtedly symbolic system) the Ionian ones from Alexandria of the Caucasus close to Kabul would have gone to Sri Lanka for the inauguration of large the stupa of Anurâdhapura.

The currencies of Ménandre are marked “king saver” ( basileos sothros menandroy in Greek; maharaja tratasa menadrasa in kharosthi); this association of the soteriologic royalty and the role is not without evoking the figure of the Bodhisattva. On certain coins is reproduced the wheel of the Dharma in company of a Greek symbol of victory, palm or Nike. The currencies of its successors until Archebios are marked “large king protective of the dharma” ( maharajasa dharmika ) in Prakrit and kharoshthi. The elephant, which also often appears, could be Buddhist symbol because when Indo-Parthes Zoroastrien S invade the north of India in Ier century, they will take again on their currencies the reasons indo-Greeks, except for this one. The currencies of the kings indo-Greeks Amyntas, Nicias, Peukolao, Hermaeus, Hippostratos and Ménandre II represent them, as well as the Greek gods, making right hand the Mudrâ of the teaching of the dharma ( vitarka mudrâ ).

Buddhist votive inscriptions emanating from Greeks were discovered, like that in kharoshthi méridarche (provincial civil governor) Theodorus (1st front century. J. - C.), registered on a vase placed in a Stupa. Afghanistan produced manuscripts into cursive Greek on which one reads the names of different Bouddha S.

Later, when the sovereigns kouchan replace the Hellenic kings, it is with a Greek, Agesilas, that Kaniska will entrust the direction of the construction of its large stupa close to Peshawar.

Syncretism and birth of the mahayana

See also: gréco-Buddhist Art

Buddhism of the Greek kingdoms and the Kouchan empire developed in a context of cultural exchanges and intense monks, as it show archeological sites such as Have Khanoum, Hellenic big city including/understanding stupas, temples Hindou S and temples Greek. One finds here and there Greek topics like dionysiaques scenes or the Trojan horse Of the Greek or Iranian influences are exerted on bodhisattvas or other characters of Buddhist mythology. Thus Vajrapani it is often represented at the sides of the Buddha which it protects in the form from Hercules, holding in hand a bludgeon which will take later on the form of a Vajra. According to Katsumi Tanabe, the Japanese god of the wind, Fujin, car its Borated origin of the Greek through gréco-Buddhist Wardo. In the same way, Hariti, ogress reconverted into protective of the children, known in Japan under the name of Kishimojin (鬼子母神), takes as a starting point Tyché. The religious syncretism is particularly obvious under Kanishka which honors with the Iranian divinities, Greek or brahmanic, while being interested in Buddhism. The first iconic representations of the Buddha appear in Ier century in Gandhara and Mathura. The influence of the Greek culture was called upon; some think of seeing there a parallel between the sovereign and the Buddha, established under the inspiration of the sovereign “God-man” of the Eastern hellenistic culture. The Buddha indeed carries in Gandhara a coat as were to carry the Greek kings of them, and some of its represented would resemble statues of Apollon, god-sun associated with the royalty in the Homeric poems. Specialists as Folz consider that many aspects of the mahayana, the Buddhas-déités and the important place granted to the bodhisattvas, seemed in the area gréco-kouchane. The first application to the Buddha of baghavat (glorious, holy), epithet data with the Hindu gods object of devotion, is indeed on the votive vase of the méridarche Greek Théodorus (Ier front century J. - C.); one of the first mentions of the bodhisattva Lokeshvara is on a manuscript bactrien 2nd century. The influence of an Iranian solar god was evoked for the Buddha Amitabha, “light infinite”, unknown of original Buddhism; the popularity of Mithra, towards which Kanishka would have had a devotion personal, could support that of Maitreya, the Buddha of the future, because of proximity of their names. On the philosophical level, Greeks like Phyrron or Onésicrite would have, according to the testimony of their contemporaries, summer influenced by their stay in the East. The reverse is more difficult to prove, because of multiplicity of the exchanges and the influences. Mc Evilley, nevertheless, empirically establishes a parallel between certain Greek ideas and the thoughts Prajnaparamita and Madhyamika.

Influence

Although there remains much of uncertainties concerning the evolution of Buddhism in the Greek kingdoms and the Kouchan Empire, because of its disappearance as from the 7th century, it is certain that gréco-Buddhism is an essential link of the history of this religion. The area was indeed a center of diffusion towards the Tarim, then the China and finally all Far East. Its influence was also exerted on the Bouddhisme Tibetan, by the intermediary inter alia school Yogacara founded by Gandharais Asanga, Maitreyanatha and Vasubandhu. In IIe century, the emperor kouchan Kanishka Ier would have convened a council (said council of the Cashmere), considered as the first council mahayana (“council of the heretics” according to the tradition Theravada), to make write the gun of the Sarvastivadin; it would have also ordered the translation in Sanskrit of the Sutra S written hitherto in Gandhari.

Some missionaries of Central Asia:

kouchanais It Lokaksema, first Buddhist translator of the court of China, arrived at Luoyang in 178 under the Han where he worked ten years.
According to the Book of the Liang, five monks gandharais would have gone in 485 in Fusang (扶桑), which could be on the Japanese archipelago.
Although one considers in general that Bodhidharma (Ve-Life century), patriarch of the chan in China, came from the south of India, the first source which mentions it the fact of coming from Central Asia.
the father of the translator Kumarajiva (IVe century) came from the Cachemire and it is in this area that it began his Buddhist formation; his/her mother would have gone there to continue there her career of nun.

References

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