As discussed in Chapters 3 and 4, there is no archaeological, epigraphic, or iconographic evidence for early Buddhist solitary asceticism. On the contrary, from the earliest period in which there is direct evidence—between the third and first century BCE—the sangha lived in well-established monasteries and had regular contact with the laity. While it is possible that a small number of ascetics might have lived in the forests and left no material traces, there is no archaeological, epigraphic, or iconographic evidence of solitary asceticism dating from those early periods. In fact, the only evidence of early Buddhist asceticism comes from early Buddhist texts—texts that were authored, recorded, and transcribed in the beginning of the first millennium CE. If nothing else, the complete lack of material evidence for early Buddhist asceticism should give modern scholars pause. However, even if modern scholars, relying on these later texts, persist in believing that early Buddhism was an ascetic tradition, the rhetoric of the early Mahayana texts demonstrate that the ascetic tradition had been abandoned by the beginning of the first millennium CE. The sangha could not return to the forest unless earlier generations had already left it.
Whether a tradition of Buddhist asceticism existed prior to the first millennium CE or not, the rhetoric and repeated calls to return to the forest
Of early Buddhist texts signify an invention of tradition. That is, the calls to asceticism were a response to the situation in which the sangha found themselves in the second through sixth centuries GE, which took the form of reference to remembered or quasi-mythological history. While most clearly apparent in the early Mahayana texts, the same tradition of asceticism developed among mainstream members of the sangha, as shown in the creation of images of a solitary, ascetic Buddha at pilgrimage sites and monasteries throughout India. There is, however, one more wrinkle in this newfound interest in asceticism—there is no more archaeological evidence of forest monks in the second through sixth centuries GE than there is before the second century GE. The tradition of asceticism was not invented in the second through sixth centuries GE, but rather, at best, a mostly unrealized ascetic ideal was invented in the second through sixth centuries GE.
In the early fifth century GE, the Chinese pilgrim Faxian traveled to India along the Silk Road from China (Rongxi 2002). Faxian entered India in the Northwest, traveled through the Gangetic Plain, and finally left India for Sri Lanka by boat from Tamluk in the Gangetic Delta. Upon returning to China with numerous sacred texts, he wrote a detailed account of his travels. Despite the celebration of asceticism in early Buddhist texts, in Faxian’s account of his travels in India he never mentions solitary forest monks or any other solitary ascetics, except in historical contexts. For example, while Faxian recorded his visit to several isolated caves near Rajgir (Rongxi 2002), his account only states that the caves were used by the Buddha, Ananda, and various other long-passed ascetics. Far from being locations of continued asceticism, by the time of Faxian’s visit, the caves near Rajgir were the focus of pilgrimage to honor the long-dead ascetics who were said to have lived there in the past. In another case, Faxian credited the founding of a monastery to a devout monk who had cleared and restored one of the eight original stupas that contained the cremated remains of the Buddha (Rongxi 2002). In some sense, this account fits neatly within the idea of an ascetic monk abandoning life in a monastery for a purer life in the forest. Critically, however, Faxian did not meet the founding ascetic. Rather, Faxian visited the established monastery said to be founded by the long-dead ascetic. In contrast to the celebration of solitary ascetic monks in traditional Buddhist histories, every living member of the sangha mentioned by Faxian lived in an established monastery.
In his account, Faxian described numerous Buddhist monasteries. Though he consistently overstated the physical size and resident population of the monasteries he encountered, the large, square monasteries described by Faxian concord almost perfectly with the mostly homogenous layout of Buddhist monasteries known archaeologically. Through the omission of public worship spaces within their monasteries and the imposing exterior walls that surrounded them, the sangha isolated themselves from the laity. Critically, this isolation was not individual, but communal. This was just as true for the more mainstream monasteries of the Gangetic Plain as it was at Ajanta and other monasteries in South India. All of this suggests that between the second and sixth centuries ce, many of the Buddhist sangha—both Mahayana Buddhists and mainstream Buddhists—struck a new balance between their contradictory individual and communal desires. With the wealth derived from their new landholdings, the sangha could withdraw from regular contact with the laity, but rather than adopting solitary asceticism, the sangha began practicing communal asceticism in the form of scholasticism. The sangha devoted themselves to the study and creation of Buddhist texts. This, in part, explains why Buddhist textual sources become common only in the first half of the first millennium ce. What is interesting, however, is the discord between what the sangha’s texts advocated and how the sangha lived their lives.
While practicing collective asceticism, the sangha invented, debated, and elaborated on the new ideal of solitary asceticism. Their texts celebrated pratyekabuddhas (solitary Buddhas), while the sangha lived the ordered life of shravakas (disciples). By balancing the practice of collective asceticism with romantic accounts of the solitary ascetics of old, the sangha fashioned a new way to ameliorate the contradictions between the individual and communal desires of their membership. First, the new ascetic ideal legitimized the sangha’s isolation from the laity, at least in the view of the sangha itself. Second, reading or hearing about legendary pratyekabuddhas satisfied some of the ascetic desires of the sangha. Finally, this new compromise between individualism and communalism was legitimized by the placement of Buddha images within the monasteries, within perfumed chambers modeled on the cells in which the sangha themselves lived. By placing the Buddha, the prototypical solitary ascetic, within their monastery, the sangha asserted that the Buddha himself approved of this new compromise. Thus, in the second through sixth centuries CE, through a process of ritualization, formalization, repetition, and calls to remembered or invented traditions, the sangha created a new form of collective asceticism while creating a romanticized ideal of solitary asceticism.
According to the standard histories of Buddhism, between the second and sixth centuries Ce, the previously ascetic sangha was slowly domesticated through regular contact with the laity. In contrast, by looking at the archaeological, iconographic, epigraphic, and textual evidence together, something very much like the opposite seems to occur. That is, a long domesticated sangha withdrew into their monasteries, severing contact with all but the wealthiest laity, as they invented a new ascetic ideal, an ideal only partially realized in their collective rituals. The sangha continued to live domesticated lives within monasteries—as they had for centuries—just more isolated from the laity than had previously been possible.
But with the new ascetic ideal, something new began to happen. Beginning in the fifth or sixth century GE—possibly for the first time in the history of Indian Buddhism—some small portion of the sangha began to take the solitary ascetic ideal seriously, and they began abandoning monasteries for life in the forest. Thus, the history of the Buddhist asceticism is not a process of ascetics slowly being domesticated, but rather a long-domesticated sangha in which some small percentage went feral.
World History
