Chapter – 4

Thinkers, Beliefs and Buildings

In this post, we have given the detailed notes of Class 12 History Chapter 4 (Thinkers, Beliefs and Buildings) in English. These notes are useful for the students who are going to appear in class 12 board exams.

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In Buddhism

• Gautam Buddha was the founder of Buddhism
• Born – 563 BCE
• Birthplace – Lumbini
• Father – King Shuddhodhan
• Mother – Queen Maya Devi
• His mother Maya Devi died 7 days after his birth and after that he was brought up by his midwife, mother Gautami.
• In childhood he was called Siddhartha and his childhood was rich with all the pleasures.
• At the age of 16, he was married to Yashodhara.
• After this marriage, they had a boy named Rahul.
• Growing up in palaces, Siddhartha did not see much of the outside world.
• Once he went out of the palace he saw the poor, sick and unhappy people and seeing this he realized that this is the real truth of life and thus cannot escape from the reality of life by staying in the palace
• The desire to understand life and get rid of sorrows arose in the mind of a Buddhist and left his palace at the age of 29 to fulfill this desire.
• He traveled to many places and finally went to the region of Magadha kingdom in Gaya, at the age of 35, the Buddhist attained enlightenment, it was called Nirvana.
• He gave his first education in Sarnath and it was called Dharmachakrapravartan.
• The Buddhist died at the age of 80 at Kushinagar in 483 BC and is called Mahaparinirvana.

Development of Enlightenment in Buddhism

• In the era of Buddhism, different teachers used to gain knowledge through debate and contemplation among themselves.
• During this period, different teachers used to visit different places with their followers and discussed with other teachers.
• In the discussion of 2 teachers, the teacher who used to explain his points to the person in front and got his consent became his teacher.
• In this way there was tolerance and wisdom in the discussion
• These discussions used to happen in Kuta Garshala
• The huts with pointed roof were called Kuta Garshala
• Gautam Buddha and Mahavir were also one of such teachers.

Teachings of Buddhism

• The most important of Buddhist teachings are the Four Noble Truths and the Eight Paths.
• Four Noble Truths
  • The world is full of sorrows and sufferings
  • There is only one cause of all suffering which is desire
  • Suffering can be ended by getting rid of desires
  • And desires can be ended in the following 8 ways
• Eight Way
  • right idea
  • true belief
  • correct
  • right action
  • decent living
  • right effort
  • correct memory and
  • right tomb

Buddhist Music

Four times after the death of Gautam Buddha, efforts were made to collect Buddhist ideas and create Buddhist texts.

The First Music

• In 483 BC, the first council was organized by King Ajatashatru in Rajagriha, during which Vinaya Pitaka and Sutta Pitaka were composed.

Second Council

• In 383 BC the second council was organized at Vaishali.

The Third Music

• It was organized by Ashoka at Pataliputra in 250 BC, during which Tripitaka was composed.

The Fourth Music

• It was organized by King Kanishka in 72 AD, during this time Buddhism was divided into two parts, Mahayana, Hinayana.
• Mahayana: – These were the supporters of Buddhism who believe in Buddhism as a god and worship him as a god.
• Hinayana: – This is the proponent of Buddhism who believe that Buddhists were like ordinary people, only they attained enlightenment, so their knowledge should be believed, that is, they keep knowledge above Buddhist

Tripitaka (Three Boxes)

• Vinaya Pitaka – Rules of the Buddhist Sangha
• Sutta – Pitaka teachings
• Abhidhamma Pitaka – Philosophical Principles

Spread of Buddhism

• Influenced by Buddha, many people joined him and a sangha was formed.
• All the people involved in this sangha lived a simple life and used to carry only the necessities.
• Initially only men could become a member of this union but later women were also allowed to join the union.
• The men in the sangha were called bhikkhus and the women were called bhikkhnis.
• Prajapati Gautami, mother of Lord Gautam Buddha, became the first woman to join the Sangh.
• People from all sections of the society were included in this sangha for example kings, traders, farmers, craftsmen were all part of the sangha and all were treated as equals.
• All of them used to spread the Dhamma by roaming in different places.

Stupa

• Mahaparinirvana i.e. after the death of the Buddhist
• A place was built to keep his relics which was called a stupa.
• The most important stupa in this is the stupa of Sanchi.
• It is in a village called Sanchi, located near Bhopal, the capital of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh.
• It is an important place related to Buddhism
• Stupas were built mainly from donations given by kings, merchants, craftsmen etc.

Structure of Stupas

• The stupas were specially composed
• The work at the bottom is a circular dome called an egg.
• There is a visor over it which is called Harmika.
• Above it is a straight vertical structure which is called Yashti and
• At the top is a Kshatriya-like structure called a chhatra.

Protection of Stupas

• Stupa of Sanchi
  • During the British era, the French and the British showed special interest in the Stupa of Sanchi.
  • He liked the archway from outside the stupa and wanted to take it with him.
  • But at that time this place was protected by the queen Shahjahan Begum.
  • He made a replica of the toran gate and handed it over to the British, this replica was exactly like the toran gate.
  • In this way he protected the stupa of Sanchi, as well as built a guest house and museum there and laid special emphasis on the maintenance of the stupa of Sanchi.
• Amaravati Stupa
  • On the contrary, due to lack of special maintenance of the stupa of Amravati, it has become a ruin in the present time.
  • In the olden times, people felt that there was a treasure under the stupa and thinking that they started excavation there, due to which these ancient stupas became ruins.

Jainism

• Teachers in Jainism are called Tirthankaras
• Like other religions, there is no one main person in this Jainism till date there have been 24 Tirthankaras who have played an important role in the development of Jainism.
• Establishment (First Tirthankara) – Swami Rishabhdev (Adinath)
• 23rd Tirthankara – Parshvanath
• The 24th and last Tirthankara was – Lord Mahavir

Jainism Teachings

• Non-violence is the most important principle in Jainism
• According to Jainism, there is life in everything present in the world, according to them, there is life in every living and non-living thing, that is why man should be non-violent towards everyone, he should not kill any kind of plants, insects, animals or humans.
• According to Jainism, the cycle of birth and rebirth is carried out by the actions of man.
• The purpose of human life is to get out of this cycle and attain salvation.
• This salvation can be attained only by renunciation and penance.
• That is why renunciation and penance were made a mandatory rule in Jainism.

Five Fasts of Jain Sadhu and Sadhvi

• truth – don’t lie
• Asteya – not stealing
• Aparigraha – not collecting wealth
• celibacy – observance of celibacy
• non-violence – non-killing

Propagation of Jainism _

• Like Buddhism, scholars of Jainism also wrote their literature in languages ​​like Prakrit, Sanskrit and Tamil so that the general public could understand it comfortably and created many idols.

Sacrifice system

• During this period, the Yagya system also became prevalent in many areas of India.
• Yagya used to be a collective ritual, it was performed to please the gods and goddesses and attain happiness and peace.

Reasons for performing Yajna

• to please the gods
• for cattle
• to have a son
• for long life
• for the property
• for good health
• for prosperity

Who performed the Yagya ?

• In the beginning, the Yagyas were performed collectively, but after some time the Yagyas started being done by the kings, merchants, the owners of the house, some Yagyas are also done by collecting donations from different people.

Types of Sacrifice

• Some yagyas used to be simple, whose purpose was to please the gods and goddesses and happiness and prosperity, while some yagyas were difficult.

for example

• Rajasuya Yagya
  • This yagya was performed during the coronation of the king.
• ashwamedha yagya
  • This yagya used to be very complicated, it could only be done by a majestic king.
  • under this sacrifice
  • A horse was groomed and decorated and let free. The king’s soldiers used to accompany that horse.
  • That horse could go anywhere freely, when that horse went to another state, the king of that state had two options.
  • The first is that he should become subordinate to that king, that is, accept his defeat.
  • Or fight with the king who has the horse of Ashwamedha
  • For this reason, the place where the horse went, all the area would be under the king or else the king of that area had to fight with the shwamedha king.
  • That is why only the majestic, that is, a very powerful king, could get this war done.
  • Ashwamedha Yagya has been performed by kings like Samudragupta, Vikramaditya, Sri Rama and Yudhishthira.

Buddhism , Jainism and Brahmanism

• The Brahmin system was completely rejected by Buddhism and Jainism.
• He completely opposed the caste system and the varna system.
• done after establishing equality in the society
• The ideology of place in the society on the basis of birth was misunderstood
• Emphasis on attainment of salvation through right actions

Jainism and Buddhism have similarities _ _ _

• The founders of both religions belonged to Bihar.
• Brahmanical system was opposed by both the religions
• protest against idol worship
• emphasis on nonviolence
• Emphasis on purity and truthfulness
• protest against racism
• The ultimate goal of life is attainment of salvation

Differences in Jainism and Buddhism

• Jainism did not believe in the existence of God; Buddhism was silent in the matter of God.
• It was said by Buddhism that it is necessary to do work to attain salvation, whereas Jainism believed that salvation can be achieved only through austerity and fasting.
• The rules of Buddhism were simple whereas the rules of Jainism were difficult.
• According to Buddhism, salvation can be achieved by adopting the middle path, according to Jainism, salvation can be achieved only by causing maximum pain to oneself.
• In Buddhism, non-violence towards living things is considered to be the biggest religion, whereas in Jainism non-living things are also considered alive and emphasis is also on non-violence towards them.
• There were sanghas for the propagation of religion in Buddhism whereas in Jainism there were preachers for the propagation of religion.

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