Maha Bodhi Society
Encyclopedia
The Maha Bodhi Society is a South Asia
n Buddhist
society founded by the Sri Lanka
n Buddhist leader Anagarika Dharmapala
. The organization's self-stated initial efforts were for the resuscitation of Buddhism in India, and restoring the ancient Buddhist shrines at Bodh Gaya, Sarnath
and Kushinara
.
Although some Indians had remained culturally Buddhist for centuries after the decline of Buddhist philosophy
, they did not self-identify as "Buddhist" and were not interested in preserving the teachings of Buddhism. The Maha Bodhi Society renewed this interest, and spawned the Ladakh Buddhist Association
, All Assam Buddhist Association, and Himalayan Buddhist Society, as well as laying the grounds for the Dalit Buddhist movement.
to the recently restored Mahabodhi Temple
at Bodh Gaya, the location where Siddhartha Gautama
(the Buddha) attained enlightenment, Anagarika Dharmapala had experienced a shock to find the temple in the hands of a Saivite priest, the Buddha image transformed into a Hindu
icon and Buddhists barred from worship as a result of which he began an agitation movement. The Buddhist renaissance inaugurated by Anagarika Dharmapala through his Mahabodhi Movement has also been described as "conservative" for it considered Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinent
responsible for the decay of Buddhism in India, in the then current mood of Hindu-Buddhist brotherhood.
The Mahabodhi society at Colombo
was founded in 1891 but its offices were moved to Calcutta the following year. One of its primary aims was the restoration of the Mahabodhi Temple
at Bodh Gaya, the chief of the four ancient Holy sites to Buddhist control. To accomplish this Dharmapala initiated a lawsuit against the Brahmin
priests who had held control of the site for centuries. After a protracted struggle this was successful with the partial restoration of the site to the management of the Maha Bodhi Society in 1949.
After the defeat of the Palas by the Hindu Sena dynasty, Buddhism's position again began to erode and was soon followed by the conquest of Magadha by General Ikhtiar Uddin Muhammad Bin Bakhtiyar Khilji. During this period, the Mahabodhi Temple fell into disrepair and was largely abandoned. During the 16th century, a Hindu
monastery was established near Bodh Gaya. Over the following centuries, the monastery's abbot or mahant
became the area's primary landholder and claimed ownership of the Mahabodhi Temple grounds.
In the 1880s, the-then British government of India began to restore Mahabodhi Temple under the direction of Sir Alexander Cunningham
. In 1891, Anagarika Dharmapala
started a campaign to return control of the temple to Buddhists, over the objections of the mahant. The campaign was partially successful in 1949, when control passed from the Hindu mahant to the state government of Bihar, which established a temple management committee. The committee has nine members, a majority of whom, including the chairman, must by law be Hindus. Mahabodhi's first head monk under the management committee was Anagarika Munindra
, a Bengal
i man who had been an active member of the Maha Bodhi Society.
, an ancient Buddhist site.
parinibbana (physical death) at Kushinagar
has once again become a major attraction for Burmese Buddhists, as it was for many centuries previously.
Maha Bodhi Society branches have been established in several countries, most significantly in India and Sri Lanka. A United States
branch was founded by Dr. Paul Carus
.
The Maha Bodhi Society has a robust tradition of publications, spanning from Pali
translations into modern Indian vernacular languages (such as Hindi
) to scholarly texts and new editions of Pali works typeset in Devanagari
to appeal to a Hindi-educated Indian audience. They have also published books and pamphlets in local/regional languages and dialects, sometimes in partnership with other presses.
As of , the Maha Bodhi Society of India's general secretary is Dombagoda Rewatha Thero. On September 27, , B. K. Modi was elected president; he was previously vice-president. Modi was, until recently, an office-holder in the Vishwa Hindu Parishad.
There is also a Maha Bodhi Society of Bangalore
, founded by Acharya Buddharakkhita in 1956, which is not a part of or tied to the Maha Bodhi Society of India or Sri Lanka.
; he assumed the position of patron. At the same meeting, the 14th Dalai Lama
was given the new title of chief patron.
South Asia
South Asia, also known as Southern Asia, is the southern region of the Asian continent, which comprises the sub-Himalayan countries and, for some authorities , also includes the adjoining countries to the west and the east...
n Buddhist
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
society founded by the Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
n Buddhist leader Anagarika Dharmapala
Anagarika Dharmapala
Anagarika Dharmapala was a leading figure of Buddhism in the twentieth century. He was one of the founding contributors of Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalism and Protestant Buddhism...
. The organization's self-stated initial efforts were for the resuscitation of Buddhism in India, and restoring the ancient Buddhist shrines at Bodh Gaya, Sarnath
Sarnath
Sarnath or Sārnātha is the deer park where Gautama Buddha first taught the Dharma, and where the Buddhist Sangha came into existence through the enlightenment of Kondanna. Sarnath is located 13 kilometres north-east of Varanasi, in Uttar Pradesh, India...
and Kushinara
Kushinagar
Kushinagar , Kusinagar or Kusinara is a town and a nagar panchayat in Kushinagar district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is an important Buddhist pilgrimage site, where Gautama Buddha is believed to have attained Parinirvana after his death.-Demographics: India census, Kushinagar had a...
.
Although some Indians had remained culturally Buddhist for centuries after the decline of Buddhist philosophy
Decline of Buddhism in India
The decline of Buddhism in India, the land of its birth, occurred for a variety of reasons, and happened even as it continued to flourish beyond the frontiers of India. Buddhism was established in the area of ancient Magadha and Kosala by Gautama Buddha in the 6th century BCE, in what is now modern...
, they did not self-identify as "Buddhist" and were not interested in preserving the teachings of Buddhism. The Maha Bodhi Society renewed this interest, and spawned the Ladakh Buddhist Association
Ladakh Buddhist Association
Ladakh Buddhist Association is an organization in Ladakh, Jammu and Kashmir, India concerned with interests of Buddhists in Ladakh. It was founded in 1933 by Kalon Tsewang Rigzin and Munshi Sonam Tsewang...
, All Assam Buddhist Association, and Himalayan Buddhist Society, as well as laying the grounds for the Dalit Buddhist movement.
Origins
In 1891, while on pilgrimagePilgrimage
A pilgrimage is a journey or search of great moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith...
to the recently restored Mahabodhi Temple
Mahabodhi Temple
The Mahabodhi Temple is a Buddhist temple in Bodh Gaya, the location where Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, attained enlightenment. Bodh Gaya is located about from Patna, Bihar state, India. Next to the temple, to its western side, is the holy Bodhi tree...
at Bodh Gaya, the location where Siddhartha Gautama
Gautama Buddha
Siddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...
(the Buddha) attained enlightenment, Anagarika Dharmapala had experienced a shock to find the temple in the hands of a Saivite priest, the Buddha image transformed into a Hindu
Hinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
icon and Buddhists barred from worship as a result of which he began an agitation movement. The Buddhist renaissance inaugurated by Anagarika Dharmapala through his Mahabodhi Movement has also been described as "conservative" for it considered Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinent
Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinent
Muslim conquest in South Asia mainly took place from the 13th to the 16th centuries, though earlier Muslim conquests made limited inroads into the region, beginning during the period of the ascendancy of the Rajput Kingdoms in North India, from the 7th century onwards.However, the Himalayan...
responsible for the decay of Buddhism in India, in the then current mood of Hindu-Buddhist brotherhood.
The Mahabodhi society at Colombo
Colombo
Colombo is the largest city of Sri Lanka. It is located on the west coast of the island and adjacent to Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte, the capital of Sri Lanka. Colombo is often referred to as the capital of the country, since Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte is a satellite city of Colombo...
was founded in 1891 but its offices were moved to Calcutta the following year. One of its primary aims was the restoration of the Mahabodhi Temple
Mahabodhi Temple
The Mahabodhi Temple is a Buddhist temple in Bodh Gaya, the location where Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, attained enlightenment. Bodh Gaya is located about from Patna, Bihar state, India. Next to the temple, to its western side, is the holy Bodhi tree...
at Bodh Gaya, the chief of the four ancient Holy sites to Buddhist control. To accomplish this Dharmapala initiated a lawsuit against the Brahmin
Brahmin
Brahmin Brahman, Brahma and Brahmin.Brahman, Brahmin and Brahma have different meanings. Brahman refers to the Supreme Self...
priests who had held control of the site for centuries. After a protracted struggle this was successful with the partial restoration of the site to the management of the Maha Bodhi Society in 1949.
The Mahabodhi Temple
After the defeat of the Palas by the Hindu Sena dynasty, Buddhism's position again began to erode and was soon followed by the conquest of Magadha by General Ikhtiar Uddin Muhammad Bin Bakhtiyar Khilji. During this period, the Mahabodhi Temple fell into disrepair and was largely abandoned. During the 16th century, a Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
monastery was established near Bodh Gaya. Over the following centuries, the monastery's abbot or mahant
Mahant
A mahant is a religious superior, in particular the chief priest of a temple or the head of a monastery. The Hindi word mahant is from Prakrit mahanta-, from Sanskrit mahat "great". The priest, pundit, gyani, or pastor of any well-known religious place would be a mahant...
became the area's primary landholder and claimed ownership of the Mahabodhi Temple grounds.
In the 1880s, the-then British government of India began to restore Mahabodhi Temple under the direction of Sir Alexander Cunningham
Alexander Cunningham
Sir Alexander Cunningham KCIE CSI was a British archaeologist and army engineer, known as the father of the Archaeological Survey of India...
. In 1891, Anagarika Dharmapala
Anagarika Dharmapala
Anagarika Dharmapala was a leading figure of Buddhism in the twentieth century. He was one of the founding contributors of Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalism and Protestant Buddhism...
started a campaign to return control of the temple to Buddhists, over the objections of the mahant. The campaign was partially successful in 1949, when control passed from the Hindu mahant to the state government of Bihar, which established a temple management committee. The committee has nine members, a majority of whom, including the chairman, must by law be Hindus. Mahabodhi's first head monk under the management committee was Anagarika Munindra
Anagarika Munindra
Anagarika Shri Munindra , also called Munindraji by his disciples, was a Bengali vipassana meditation teacher, who taught many notable teachers including Dipa Ma, Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, and Surya Das. Anagarika simply means a practicing Buddhist who leads a homeless life without...
, a Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...
i man who had been an active member of the Maha Bodhi Society.
Sarnath
In 1931 the Mulaghandakuti Vihara was erected at SarnathSarnath
Sarnath or Sārnātha is the deer park where Gautama Buddha first taught the Dharma, and where the Buddhist Sangha came into existence through the enlightenment of Kondanna. Sarnath is located 13 kilometres north-east of Varanasi, in Uttar Pradesh, India...
, an ancient Buddhist site.
Kushinara
The site of the Buddha'sGautama Buddha
Siddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...
parinibbana (physical death) at Kushinagar
Kushinagar
Kushinagar , Kusinagar or Kusinara is a town and a nagar panchayat in Kushinagar district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is an important Buddhist pilgrimage site, where Gautama Buddha is believed to have attained Parinirvana after his death.-Demographics: India census, Kushinagar had a...
has once again become a major attraction for Burmese Buddhists, as it was for many centuries previously.
Maha Bodhi Society branches have been established in several countries, most significantly in India and Sri Lanka. A United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
branch was founded by Dr. Paul Carus
Paul Carus
Paul Carus, Ph.D. was a German-American author, editor, a student of comparative religion, and professor of philosophy.-Life and education:...
.
The Maha Bodhi Society has a robust tradition of publications, spanning from Pali
Páli
- External links :* *...
translations into modern Indian vernacular languages (such as Hindi
Hindi
Standard Hindi, or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi, also known as Manak Hindi , High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, and Literary Hindi, is a standardized and sanskritized register of the Hindustani language derived from the Khariboli dialect of Delhi...
) to scholarly texts and new editions of Pali works typeset in Devanagari
Devanagari
Devanagari |deva]]" and "nāgarī" ), also called Nagari , is an abugida alphabet of India and Nepal...
to appeal to a Hindi-educated Indian audience. They have also published books and pamphlets in local/regional languages and dialects, sometimes in partnership with other presses.
As of , the Maha Bodhi Society of India's general secretary is Dombagoda Rewatha Thero. On September 27, , B. K. Modi was elected president; he was previously vice-president. Modi was, until recently, an office-holder in the Vishwa Hindu Parishad.
There is also a Maha Bodhi Society of Bangalore
Bangalore
Bengaluru , formerly called Bengaluru is the capital of the Indian state of Karnataka. Bangalore is nicknamed the Garden City and was once called a pensioner's paradise. Located on the Deccan Plateau in the south-eastern part of Karnataka, Bangalore is India's third most populous city and...
, founded by Acharya Buddharakkhita in 1956, which is not a part of or tied to the Maha Bodhi Society of India or Sri Lanka.
Leadership
At a meeting in September 2008, the Maha Bodhi Society passed a rule that only persons born into Buddhist families will be eligible to serve as president or as one of the Indian vice-presidents of the Society. The outgoing president, B. K. Modi, was a HinduHinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
; he assumed the position of patron. At the same meeting, the 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai Lama
The 14th Dalai Lama is the 14th and current Dalai Lama. Dalai Lamas are the most influential figures in the Gelugpa lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, although the 14th has consolidated control over the other lineages in recent years...
was given the new title of chief patron.