Editing The Buddha (section)

=== Historical context ===

====Shakyas====
[[File:Mahajanapadas (c. 500 BCE).png|right|thumb|upright=1.35|Ancient kingdoms and cities of India during the time of the Buddha ({{circa| 500 BCE}})]]

According to the Buddhist tradition, Shakyamuni Buddha was a [[Shakya]], a sub-Himalayan ethnicity and clan of north-eastern region of the Indian subcontinent.{{efn|name="birthplace"}}{{efn|Shakya:
* {{harvnb|Warder|2000|p=45}}: "The Buddha [...] was born in the Sakya Republic, which was the city state of Kapilavastu, a very small state just inside the modern state boundary of Nepal against the Northern Indian frontier.
* {{harvnb|Walshe|1995|p=20}}: "He belonged to the Sakya clan dwelling on the edge of the Himalayas, his actual birthplace being a few kilometres north of the present-day Northern Indian border, in Nepal. His father was, in fact, an elected chief of the clan rather than the king he was later made out to be, though his title was ''raja''—a term which only partly corresponds to our word 'king'. Some of the states of North India at that time were kingdoms and others republics, and the Sakyan republic was subject to the powerful king of neighbouring Kosala, which lay to the south".}} The Shakya community was on the periphery, both geographically and culturally, of the eastern Indian subcontinent in the 5th century BCE.{{sfnp|Gombrich|1988|p=49}} The community, though describable as a small republic, was probably an [[oligarchy]], with his father as the elected chieftain or oligarch.{{sfnp|Gombrich|1988|p=49}} The Shakyas were widely considered to be non-[[Vedas|Vedic]] (and, hence impure) in [[Historical Vedic religion|Brahminic]] texts; their origins remain speculative and debated.<ref name="Levman2013">{{cite journal |last=Levman |first=Bryan Geoffrey |date=2013 |title=Cultural Remnants of the Indigenous Peoples in the Buddhist Scriptures |url=https://journals.equinoxpub.com/BSR/article/view/17899/pdf |journal=Buddhist Studies Review |volume=30 |issue=2 |pages=145–180 |issn=1747-9681 |access-date=23 February 2020 |archive-date=1 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201101132416/https://journals.equinoxpub.com/BSR/article/view/17899/pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> Bronkhorst terms this culture, which grew alongside [[Āryāvarta|Aryavarta]] without being affected by the flourish of Brahminism, as [[Greater Magadha]].<ref>Bronkhorst, J. (2007). "Greater Magadha, Studies in the culture of Early India", p. 6. Leiden, Boston, MA: Brill. {{doi|10.1163/ej.9789004157194.i-416}}</ref>

The Buddha's tribe of origin, the Shakyas, seems to have had non-Vedic religious practices which persist in Buddhism, such as the veneration of trees and sacred groves, and the worship of tree spirits ([[yaksha]]s) and serpent beings ([[nāga]]s). They also seem to have built burial mounds called stupas.<ref name=Levman2013 /> Tree veneration remains important in Buddhism today, particularly in the practice of venerating Bodhi trees. Likewise, yakshas and nāgas have remained important figures in Buddhist religious practices and mythology.<ref name=Levman2013 />

====Shramanas====
The Buddha's lifetime coincided with the flourishing of influential [[śramaṇa]] schools of thought like [[Ājīvika]], [[Charvaka|Cārvāka]], [[Jainism]], and [[Ajñana]].{{sfnp|Jayatilleke|1963|loc=chpt. 1–3}} The ''[[Brahmajala Sutta]]'' records sixty-two such schools of thought. In this context, a śramaṇa refers to one who labours, toils or exerts themselves (for some higher or religious purpose). It was also the age of influential thinkers like [[Mahavira]],<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Clasquin-Johnson|first=Michel|title=Will the real Nigantha Nātaputta please stand up? Reflections on the Buddha and his contemporaries|url=http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_abstract&pid=S1011-76012015000100006&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en|journal=Journal for the Study of Religion|volume=28|issue=1|pages=100–114|issn=1011-7601|access-date=4 July 2016|archive-date=25 August 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160825200441/http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_abstract&pid=S1011-76012015000100006&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en|url-status=live}}</ref> [[Purana Kassapa|Pūraṇa Kassapa]], [[Makkhali Gosala|Makkhali Gosāla]], [[Ajita Kesakambali|Ajita Kesakambalī]], [[Pakudha Kaccayana|Pakudha Kaccāyana]], and [[Sanjaya Belatthaputta|Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta]], as recorded in [[Samaññaphala Sutta]], with whose viewpoints the Buddha must have been acquainted.{{sfnp|Walshe|1995|p=268}}{{sfnp|Collins|2009|pp=199–200}}{{efn|According to Alexander Berzin, "Buddhism developed as a shramana school that accepted rebirth under the force of karma, while rejecting the existence of the type of soul that other schools asserted. In addition, the Buddha accepted as parts of the path to liberation the use of logic and reasoning, as well as ethical behaviour, but not to the degree of Jain asceticism. In this way, Buddhism avoided the extremes of the previous four shramana schools."<ref>{{cite web |url = http://studybuddhism.com/en/advanced-studies/history-culture/buddhism-in-india/indian-society-and-thought-at-the-time-of-buddha |title = Indian Society and Thought before and at the Time of Buddha |first = Alexander |last = Berzin |publisher = Study Buddhism |date = April 2007 |access-date = 20 June 2016 |archive-date = 28 June 2016 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160628154103/http://studybuddhism.com/en/advanced-studies/history-culture/buddhism-in-india/indian-society-and-thought-at-the-time-of-buddha |url-status = live }}</ref>}}

[[Śāriputra]] and [[Maudgalyayana|Moggallāna]], two of the foremost disciples of the Buddha, were formerly the foremost disciples of Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta, the sceptic.{{sfnp|Nakamura|1980|p=20}} The Pāli canon frequently depicts Buddha engaging in debate with the adherents of rival schools of thought. There is philological evidence to suggest that the two masters, [[Alara Kalama]] and [[Uddaka Rāmaputta]], were historical figures and they most probably taught Buddha two different forms of meditative techniques.{{sfnp|Wynne|2007|pp=8–23|loc=ch. 2}} Thus, Buddha was just one of the many śramaṇa philosophers of that time.{{sfnp|Warder|1998|p=45}} In an era where holiness of person was judged by their level of asceticism,{{sfnp|Roy|1984|p=1}} Buddha was a reformist within the śramaṇa movement, rather than a reactionary against Vedic Brahminism.{{sfnp|Roy|1984|p=7}}

Coningham and Young note that both Jains and Buddhists used stupas, while tree shrines can be found in both Buddhism and Hinduism.{{sfn|Coningham|Young|2015|p=65}}

====Urban environment and egalitarianism====
{{See also|Greater Magadha}}

The rise of Buddhism coincided with the [[Second Urbanisation]], in which the Ganges Basin was settled and cities grew, in which [[egalitarianism]] prevailed. According to Thapar, the Buddha's teachings were "also a response to the historical changes of the time, among which were the emergence of the state and the growth of urban centres".{{sfn|Thapar|2004|p=169}} While the Buddhist mendicants renounced society, they lived close to the villages and cities, depending for alms-givings on lay supporters.{{sfn|Thapar|2004|p=169}}

According to Dyson, the Ganges basin was settled from the north-west and the south-east, as well as from within, "[coming] together in what is now [[Bihar]] (the location of [[Pataliputra]])".{{sfn|Dyson|2019}} The Ganges basin was densely forested, and the population grew when new areas were deforestated and cultivated.{{sfn|Dyson|2019}} The society of the middle Ganges basin lay on "the outer fringe of Aryan cultural influence",{{sfn|Ludden|1985}} and differed significantly from the [[Aryavarta|Aryan society]] of the western Ganges basin.{{sfn|Stein|Arnold|2012|p=62}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|2011|p=1}} According to Stein and Burton, "[t]he gods of the brahmanical sacrificial cult were not rejected so much as ignored by Buddhists and their contemporaries."{{sfn|Stein|Arnold|2012|p=62}} Jainism and Buddhism opposed the social stratification of Brahmanism, and their egalitarism prevailed in the cities of the middle Ganges basin.{{sfn|Ludden|1985}} This "allowed Jains and Buddhists to engage in trade more easily than Brahmans, who were forced to follow strict caste prohibitions."{{sfn|Fogelin|2015|p=74}}