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World History 1

<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Indian culture, religion, and art were forever transformed with the life of <OpenstaxTerm>Buddha</OpenstaxTerm> Sakyamuni around 563 BCE. The son of a royal family living near India’s eastern border with Nepal and sometimes known as Siddartha or Gautama, Sakyamuni abandoned a life of luxury in his family’s palace after experiencing an awakening, upon which he embarked on a spiritual journey that lasted the rest of his life. He came to be called the Buddha, meaning “enlightened,” because his teachings offered an alternative to the then-dominant Brahmanist values.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	<OpenstaxTerm>Buddhism</OpenstaxTerm> explores the depths of human suffering, desire, envy, decadence, and death, offering adherents a way out of an eternal cycle of misery if they adopt the <OpenstaxTerm>Four Noble Truths</OpenstaxTerm> leading to the <OpenstaxTerm>Eightfold Path</OpenstaxTerm>. The Four Noble Truths acknowledge that pain and disappointment are an unavoidable part of life and that by focusing on spiritual matters via the Eightfold Path, pain and suffering can be overcome. By adopting Buddha’s teachings about how to think, speak, and act with respect for all life, and many other practices, followers eventually arrive at an enlightened salvation called <OpenstaxEm>nirvana</OpenstaxEm>. Nirvana is a state of ultimate peace found in the extinction of all desire and transcendence of the person’s very being. Without <OpenstaxTerm>nirvana</OpenstaxTerm>, upon death the soul is reincarnated into a new life that will again run the gamut of suffering, misery, and the search for enlightenment.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	The teachings of Buddha and his followers issued a direct challenge to the status quo in ancient <OpenstaxTerm>India</OpenstaxTerm>. In his time, Buddha relished criticizing the Brahmans, questioning their authority and their dependence on ritualism. Continued generations of teachers, missionaries, and lay Buddhists used his teachings to assail the Brahmanist-based caste system. Female Buddhists were attracted by ideas promoting the opportunity for women to achieve enlightenment on an equal basis with men.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Before Buddhism, Brahmanist teachings had supported a system of gender that in the first centuries of the common era pronounced women’s genitalia foul, leading women to be excluded from public rituals and worship. Buddhism protected women from being seen as spiritually unclean, promising them an elevated status and greater participation in the community’s spiritual life. The same was true for members of the lower castes despite their inherited class. Both women and lower castes were drawn to Buddhism by the greater independence and freedom they found in it. But women adopting Buddhism often found the religion just as patriarchal: Buddhist monasteries were segregated into spheres for male monks and female nuns, and women were given lower positions and fewer privileges.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Buddhism never supplanted <OpenstaxTerm>Brahmanism</OpenstaxTerm> as the dominant religion in India. In later centuries, Buddhist thought and institutions were influenced by Brahmanism, incorporating deities such as Shiva and concepts such as karma. Boundaries between the two religions became blurred, a development that helped followers of Brahmanism and Buddhists find a means for coexistence and even cooperation. Buddhism arose in a historical context dominated by a Brahmanist society, and many Buddhist teachings and practices such as meditation reflect the influence of Brahmanism. Likewise, Brahmanism was greatly influenced by Buddhism and its popularity with certain classes in India. As a result, over several centuries between around 400 BCE and 200 CE, Brahmanism evolved into more of a devotional religion, allowing individual practitioners to communicate directly with the gods, not just through the Brahman priests. Worship became more personalized and private, centered on prayer and songs within the home. In this way, Brahmanism emerged as <OpenstaxTerm>Hinduism</OpenstaxTerm>, which retained the caste system and belief in the Vedas while also offering a prescription for common followers seeking to live a moral and fulfilling life. What emerged as the central text of Hinduism was called the <OpenstaxEm>Bhagavad Gita</OpenstaxEm>. Finished around 300 CE, it taught that commoners, not just Brahmans, could lead exemplary moral lives by abandoning bodily desires and seeking inner peace.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Both Buddhism and <OpenstaxTerm>Hinduism</OpenstaxTerm> were and remained diverse, branching into hundreds of schools of thought and sects that were each quite adaptable to local contexts. As it became institutionalized, however, Buddhism lost some of its early character as a means for liberation of the lowly of India. Instead it attracted the patronage of elites, who elevated it into Asia’s most influential source of inspiration for monumental architecture and high art. Buddhism made inroads across all of <OpenstaxTerm>Asia</OpenstaxTerm>, coming to be adopted by millions in China, Korea, Thailand, Japan, and many other communities in Southeast Asia.
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<OpenstaxNote>
	<OpenstaxNoteTitle> Dueling Voices </OpenstaxNoteTitle> <OpenstaxH3> Hinduism and Buddhism in Ancient India </OpenstaxH3>
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		The first excerpt, concerning the Hindu tradition, is from the <OpenstaxEm>Bhagavad Gita</OpenstaxEm>, titled “Perform Action, Free from Attachment.” The second, “Basic Teachings of the Buddha,” includes a version of Buddhism’s teachings on the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. Notice how each spiritual system conceived of immorality, the proper way to demonstrate right conduct and living, and the purpose of life.
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	<OpenstaxBlockquote>
		<OpenstaxParagraph>
			8. Perform thou action that is (religiously) required;<OpenstaxBr /> For action is better than inaction.<OpenstaxBr /> And even the maintenance of the body for thee<OpenstaxBr /> Can not succeed without action.<OpenstaxBr /> 9. Except action for the purpose of worship,<OpenstaxBr /> This world is bound by actions;<OpenstaxBr /> Action for that purpose, son of Kunti,<OpenstaxBr /> Perform thou, free from attachment (to its fruits)<OpenstaxBr /> 10. Therefore unattached ever<OpenstaxBr /> Perform action that must be done;<OpenstaxBr /> For performing action without attachment<OpenstaxBr /> Man attains the highest. . . .<OpenstaxBr /> 21. Whatsoever the noblest does,<OpenstaxBr /> Just that in every case other folk (do);<OpenstaxBr /> What he makes his standard,<OpenstaxBr /> That the world follows.<OpenstaxBr /> 35. Better one’s own duty, (tho) imperfect,<OpenstaxBr /> Than another’s duty well performed;<OpenstaxBr /> Better death in (doing) one’s own duty;<OpenstaxBr /> Another’s duty brings danger.
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		<OpenstaxParagraph>
			—<OpenstaxTerm><OpenstaxEm>Bhagavad Gita</OpenstaxEm></OpenstaxTerm>, translated by Franklin Edgerton
		</OpenstaxParagraph>
	</OpenstaxBlockquote>
	<OpenstaxBlockquote>
		<OpenstaxParagraph>
			What, now, is the Noble Truth of Suffering? Birth is suffering; Decay is suffering; Death is suffering; Sorrow, Lamentation, Pain, Grief, and Despair, are suffering; not to get what one desires, is suffering. . . .
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			What, now, is the Noble Truth of the Origin of Suffering? It is that craving which gives rise to fresh rebirth, and, bound up with pleasure and lust, now here, now there, finds ever fresh delight.
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			What, now, is the Noble Truth of the Extinction of Suffering? It is the complete fading away and extinction of this desire, its forsaking and giving up, the liberation and detachment from it. . . .
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			It is the Noble Eightfold Path, the way that leads to the extinction of suffering, namely: 1. Right Understanding, 2. Right Mindedness, which together are Wisdom. 3. Right Speech, 4. Right Action, 5. Right Living, which together are Morality. 6. Right Effort, 7. Right Attentiveness, 8. Right Concentration, which together are Concentration. This is the Middle Path which the Perfect One has found out, which makes one both to see and to know, which leads to peace, to discernment, to enlightenment, to Nirvana. . . .
		</OpenstaxParagraph> 
		<OpenstaxParagraph>
			—<OpenstaxTerm><OpenstaxEm>Buddha, the Word</OpenstaxEm></OpenstaxTerm>, edited by Nyanatiloka
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	</OpenstaxBlockquote>
	<OpenstaxUl>
		<OpenstaxLi>
			Based on these excerpts, what does it mean for one to lead a moral life in each of these distinct traditions?
		</OpenstaxLi>
		<OpenstaxLi>
			How is the Eightfold Path in the Buddhist excerpt similar to or different from the call for action in the Hindu excerpt?
		</OpenstaxLi>
	</OpenstaxUl>
</OpenstaxNote>

5.4.3 Buddhism

1 Understanding the Past

1.1 Developing a Global Perspective

1.1.1 World History as Preparation for Life after College

1.1.2 World History and Global Citizenship

1.1.3 Features of This Textbook

1.2 Primary Sources

1.2.1 Learning to Evaluate Documents and Images

1.2.2 Documentary Sources: Competing Narratives

1.2.3 Textual Sources: The Importance of Language

1.2.4 Hidden in History

1.3 Causation and Interpretation in History

1.3.1 Levels of Causation

1.3.2 Interpretation in History

2 Early Humans

2.1 Early Human Evolution and Migration

2.1.1 Human Evolution

2.1.2 Why Did Humans Move and Where Did They Go?

2.1.3 Early Human Technologies

2.2 People in the Paleolithic Age

2.2.1 Ice, Ice, and More Ice

2.2.2 Life in the Paleolithic Age

2.2.3 Diverse Paleolithic Peoples

2.3 The Neolithic Revolution

2.3.1 The Development of Agriculture

2.3.2 How Farming Changed the Human Experience

2.3.3 Neolithic Peoples

3 Early Civilizations and Urban Societies

3.1 Early Civilizations

3.1.1 Attributes of Early Civilizations

3.1.2 The First Urban Societies

3.2 Ancient Mesopotamia

3.2.1 The Rise and Eclipse of Sumer

3.2.2 The Rise of the World’s First Empire

3.2.3 Later Empires in Mesopotamia

3.2.4 Society and Religion in Ancient Mesopotamia

3.3 Ancient Egypt

3.3.1 The Origins of Ancient Egypt

3.3.2 The Age of Pyramid Building

3.3.3 A Second Age of Egyptian Greatness

3.4 The Indus Valley Civilization

3.4.1 The Origins of the Indus Valley Civilization

3.4.2 Trade, Writing, and Religion

3.4.3 The Era of Decline

4 The Near East

4.1 From Old Babylon to the Medes

4.1.1 Power Politics in the Near East

4.1.2 Foreign Affairs and Trade

4.1.3 Daily Life and the Family in the Near East

4.2 Egypt’s New Kingdom

4.2.1 The Hyksos in Egypt

4.2.2 The Pharaohs of the New Kingdom

4.2.3 Egypt’s Foreign Policy

4.3 The Persian Empire

4.3.1 The Rise of Persia

4.3.2 Darius I and the Reorganization of the Empire

4.3.3 Persian Culture and Daily Life

4.4 The Hebrews

4.4.1 The History of the Hebrews

4.4.2 The Culture of the Hebrews

5 Asia in Ancient Times

5.1 Ancient China

5.1.1 Prehistoric China

5.1.2 Early Dynastic China

5.1.3 The Zhou Dynasty

5.1.4 The Warring States Era and Qin Unification

5.2 The Steppes

5.2.1 The Nomadic Culture of the Steppes

5.2.2 Tribes, Confederations, and Settled Neighbors

5.3 Korea, Japan, and Southeast Asia

5.3.1 Ancient Korea

5.3.2 Ancient Japan

5.4 Vedic India to the Fall of the Maurya Empire

5.4.1 Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro

5.4.2 The Aryans and Brahmanism

5.4.4 The Mauryan Empire

5.4.5 The Gupta Dynasty

6 Mediterranean Peoples

6.1 Early Mediterranean Peoples

6.1.1 The Late Bronze Age World

6.1.2 Phoenicians, Greeks, and Etruscans

6.2 Ancient Greece

6.2.1 Archaic Greece

6.2.2 Sparta and Athens

6.2.3 Classical Greece

6.3 The Hellenistic Era

6.3.1 The Kingdom of Macedon

6.3.2 Hellenistic Culture

6.4 The Roman Republic

6.4.1 The Foundation and Function of the Roman Republic

6.4.2 The Expansion of the Roman Republic

6.5 The Age of Augustus

6.5.1 The First Triumvirate

6.5.2 From Republic to Principate

7 Experiencing the Roman Empire

7.1 The Daily Life of a Roman Family

7.1.1 The Structure of Roman Families

7.1.2 A Day in the Life of a Roman Family

7.1.3 What Family Meant in Rome

7.2 Slavery in the Roman Empire