Buddha Temple, Dehradoon and Truths About Lord Buddha's Life.

 A Spiritual Escape To Buddhism

103ft statue of Lord Buddha in Buddha temple, Dehradun. PC. The Dehratdun Project

Buddha Temple, Dehradun: A  Buddhist temple built to protect and promote the Tibetan culture, enlightening people to the teachings of Lord Buddha and his life.

So when you visit a giftedly scenic city called Dehradun for the very first time and one thing you just can’t overlook, other than the beautiful mountains and the place’s own distinctive culture, is the strong hold of Tibetan Buddhists in the city and its tourist attractions which makes the city’s culture more diverse and magnificent. 

Buddha Temple in Clement Town is one big proof of the aforementioned fact. A Tibetan Monastery’s look-alike temple was said to be built to protect and promote the Tibetan Culture in the city. The temple has a 103 feet high statue of Lord Buddha which is built in the honour of Dalai Lama, the spiritual head of Tibetan People. Being a best place which provides a peaceful as well as spiritual ambiance in the city, it gets the highest number of foot falls every day compared to city’s other tourist attractions.

A one of the most fascinating thing about the temple is its wall paintings which beautifully shows the life events of Buddha. Hence compels a person to wonder more about Buddha’s life and his teachings.

So let us know some of the amazing facts about Lord Buddha that we generally aren’t aware of.

How Lord Buddha was conceived.

So any idea how Buddha “is believed” to be conceived? Legend says, some ten months before the birth of Buddha, the queen of Shakya, Maya (Buddha’s mother) saw a dream in which a white elephant with six tusks entered her from right side. This is the part where the fine line between myth and reality blurs a little in Buddha’s Life which suggests him being other-worldly and divine.

The white elephant with six tusks. Photo : Golden Statue of Puxian

Lumbini was not his hometown. 

When Queen Maya became pregnant, she had to leave Kapilavastu for her father’s place to give birth as a mandatory Shakya tradition. However she could not complete the journey in time and gave birth to Lord Buddha on the way under a sal tree in Lumbini which is today believed to be the birth place of Buddha in present day Nepal.

Photo : Queen Mayadevi Temple in Lumbini, Birthplace of Lord Buddha

According to the prophecy, Lord Buddha was either destined to be a great ruler or a sage.

Just after the birth of Siddhartha Gautama (Lord Buddha), Asita, a renowned astrologer of that time, visited Buddha’s father, King Sudhodana making a prophecy that Gautama would either become a powerful king or world’s most influential ascetic, if he happens to see the world outside the palace.

Asita shown prophesying infant Buddha's life, painted by Solias Mendis

Buddha after visually encountering some harsh truths of human life decided to abandon his royal life to go on a spiritual quest.

And when the king heard the prophecy, he made all the arrangements so that Buddha doesn’t leave the palace walls and made sure he did not for years. But his destiny had some other plans and he came out to witness a series of encounters of truth called “four sights” which finally compelled him to go on a spiritual quest abandoning royalty and materialism at the mere age of 29. After which he found his enlightenment in Bodh Gaya, passed his wisdom to his followers in Sarnath and finally died in Kushinagar.

Picture  describing the "four sights". PC. Blogger

All the teachings and the information we presently know about Buddha was never jotted down for 400 years of his death and was passed through oral tradition.

Till 400 years after Buddha’s death, people did not have anything written about his life events or his teachings. All the information were first summarized and then memorized by his followers and passed to each generation followed through oral tradition. The first text about Buddha was appeared in the Edicts of Ashoka.

 Oral culture in India. PC. martripblog

Was Buddha elder or younger to Mahavira?

Because of the oral tradition of passing information, historians and the scholars have never been accurate to the facts about Buddha’s life. Buddhist tradition believes he lived from 563 BCE to 483 BCE and hence was elder to his contemporary ascetic, and founder of Jainism, Mahavira. But while some major group of present world historians believe he was born approximately between 411 BCE to 400 BCE which suggest he was younger to Mahavira. So who was the elder one? Go ahead and read both of them and compare their wisdom. You’ll eventually get to know. However result can be subjective to person to person.

Photos of Lord Buddha (left) and Mahavira. PC. Quara

Was Lord Buddha raised in India or in present day Nepal before his enlightenment?

The other most debated thing about Buddha’s life is where exactly he grew up. Buddhist tradition says he lived in Kapilavastu for the first 29 years of his life but, the exact site of the ancient Kapilavastu is not known. Either it was Piprahwa in present day Uttar Pradesh which ensures his upbringing in India or, some 20 kms away, it was Tilaurakot in present-day Nepal. So the debates goes on as who will take the credit of Buddha’s baby-sitting.

PC. Livewallpaper