Life of the Buddha and Core Teachings

Buddhism is the world's fourth-largest religion, with approximately 535 million adherents concentrated in East Asia, Southeast Asia and pockets globally. Founded by Siddhartha Gautama in northern India in the 6th–5th century BCE, it shares much of Hinduism's metaphysical vocabulary (karma, samsara) but offers a distinctive analysis of the human condition and a distinctive path to liberation.

This lesson covers the life of the Buddha, the historical context of his teaching, the foundational scriptures, and the central doctrines.

The historical context

Siddhartha Gautama lived in northern India during a period of significant religious and social ferment. The 6th–5th century BCE was the Axial Age — the period in which several of the world's foundational religious and philosophical systems took shape almost simultaneously across continents.

In India:

• The Upanishadic tradition was formalising philosophical Hinduism.
• New ascetic movements (shramana traditions) were challenging the priestly authority of the Brahmins.
• The Jain tradition, founded or reformed by Mahavira, emerged in the same milieu.
• Buddhism emerged as another shramana movement.

The shared concerns of these movements: liberation from samsara, the limits of ritualism, the question of the self, and the path to ultimate freedom.

The life of Siddhartha Gautama

The traditional dates for the Buddha are c. 563–483 BCE, though some modern scholars date him a century later. His life is conventionally divided into four major phases.

1. Birth and early life (Lumbini, Kapilavastu)

Siddhartha was born to King Suddhodana and Queen Maya of the Shakya clan in Lumbini (in present-day Nepal, near the Indian border). His mother died seven days after his birth; he was raised by his aunt Mahaprajapati.

The traditional account holds that astrologers predicted he would become either a great king or a great religious teacher. His father, hoping for the former, surrounded him with luxury and shielded him from suffering.

Siddhartha married Yashodhara at sixteen and had a son, Rahula.

2. The four sights and the renunciation (age 29)

According to the tradition, Siddhartha encountered, on successive chariot excursions outside the palace, the Four Sights:

These encounters precipitated his renunciation. At twenty-nine, he left the palace, his wife and infant son, exchanging his royal garments for an ascetic's robe.

3. The search and the enlightenment (age 29–35)

Siddhartha studied with the leading meditation teachers of his day, Alara Kalama and Uddaka Ramaputta, mastering their techniques but finding them insufficient. He then practised severe asceticism for six years with five companions, reducing his body to skeletal weakness.

Realising that extreme austerity was as much a dead end as luxurious indulgence, he accepted food from a village girl named Sujata — and resolved to seek enlightenment through a Middle Way between the two extremes.

He sat under a bodhi tree (a peepul tree) at Bodh Gaya in modern Bihar, vowing not to rise until he had attained understanding. After a night of meditation, at dawn, he attained enlightenment (bodhi) — the realisation of the nature of suffering, its origin, its cessation, and the path to its cessation.

He became the Buddha — "the awakened one."

4. The teaching and the parinirvana (age 35–80)

For forty-five years, the Buddha travelled across northern India, teaching disciples and establishing the Sangha (monastic community). He gave his first sermon in the deer park at Sarnath to his five former companions, setting in motion the Dhammacakka (Wheel of the Dharma).

He attained parinirvana (final liberation) at Kushinagar at the age of eighty, having taught a body of doctrine that would, within centuries, spread across Asia.

The First Sermon — the Four Noble Truths

The Buddha's first sermon at Sarnath set out the doctrinal core that has remained foundational across all Buddhist traditions: the Four Noble Truths.

Dukkha — the fact of suffering

The first noble truth is the diagnosis: human life, in its ordinary form, is marked by suffering. Three forms of dukkha are identified:

• Dukkha-dukkha — the obvious suffering of pain, loss, illness.
• Viparinama-dukkha — the suffering of change; the loss of pleasant states.
• Sankhara-dukkha — the deep, structural unsatisfactoriness of conditioned existence.

This is not nihilism. The Buddha did not deny the reality of pleasure or happiness; he asserted their impermanence and the deeper unsatisfactoriness underlying them.

Samudaya — the origin of suffering

The cause is tanha — thirst, craving, attachment. We crave pleasant experiences, crave the avoidance of unpleasant ones, and crave continued existence. This craving binds us to samsara.

Beneath craving lies avidya (ignorance) — the false view that there is a permanent self to satisfy.

Nirodha — the cessation of suffering

The third noble truth is the most radical and the most distinctive: suffering can end. Not through better satisfaction of craving, but through the cessation of craving itself. This is nibbana (Pali) / nirvana (Sanskrit) — the extinguishing of the flame of craving.

Magga — the path

The fourth noble truth is prescriptive: the path to cessation is the Noble Eightfold Path.

The Noble Eightfold Path

The Eightfold Path is conventionally divided into three sections:

Wisdom (panna)

1. Right View (Samma Ditthi) — understanding the Four Noble Truths and the nature of reality.
2. Right Intention (Samma Sankappa) — renunciation, good will, harmlessness.

Ethical conduct (sila)

3. Right Speech (Samma Vaca) — abstaining from falsehood, divisive speech, harsh speech, idle talk.
4. Right Action (Samma Kammanta) — abstaining from killing, stealing, sexual misconduct.
5. Right Livelihood (Samma Ajiva) — earning one's living without harming others.

Mental discipline (samadhi)

6. Right Effort (Samma Vayama) — sustained effort to abandon unwholesome states and cultivate wholesome ones.
7. Right Mindfulness (Samma Sati) — present-moment awareness of body, feelings, mind and mental contents.
8. Right Concentration (Samma Samadhi) — the cultivation of meditative absorption.

The Path is not a sequence; the eight elements support each other and are cultivated together.

The doctrine of anatta (non-self)

Distinctive to Buddhism — and the most controversial of its doctrines — is anatta (Pali) / anatman (Sanskrit): the doctrine that there is no permanent self.

What we call "self" is a constantly changing constellation of five aggregates (khandhas):

• Rupa — physical form.
• Vedana — feeling.
• Sanna — perception.
• Sankhara — mental formations.
• Vinnana — consciousness.

There is no permanent observer behind the aggregates; the aggregates are all there is. The illusion of a permanent self is the root of attachment, craving and suffering.

This doctrine distinguishes Buddhism from the Hindu atman doctrine (which posits a permanent self). It is also the doctrine that has generated the most interpretive debate within Buddhism itself.

The Tripitaka — the Buddhist canon

Buddhist scripture is organised into the Tripitaka (Pali: Tipitaka) — "the three baskets":

Pitaka	Contents
Vinaya Pitaka	The monastic discipline — rules for monks (bhikkhus) and nuns (bhikkhunis)
Sutta Pitaka	The discourses of the Buddha — sermons, dialogues, narratives
Abhidhamma Pitaka	Systematic philosophy and psychology — analytical exposition of doctrine

The Pali Canon (Tipitaka in Pali) is the scripture of the Theravada tradition. Mahayana Buddhism uses additional scriptures (the Mahayana Sutras) considered to convey deeper or more complete teaching.

The earliest written form of the Pali Canon dates to the 1st century BCE, written down in Sri Lanka. Earlier transmission was oral, through specialised monastic recitation lineages.

What CSS questions on this topic typically demand

Three exam shapes:

1. Biographical — "Discuss the life of the Buddha and the historical context of his teaching."
2. Doctrinal — "Discuss the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path."
3. Comparative — "How does Buddhism differ from Hinduism on the question of the self?"

A strong answer:

• Names the major sites and dates of the Buddha's life.
• Uses indigenous terminology (Pali or Sanskrit).
• Engages with the doctrinal substance, not just the structure.

What you take from this lesson

Buddhism originated in the same Indian religious milieu as Hinduism but developed a distinctive analysis: the Four Noble Truths diagnose the human condition, the Noble Eightfold Path prescribes the cure, and the doctrine of anatta distinguishes the Buddhist view of the self. The next lesson examines the major Buddhist sects — Theravada, Mahayana, Vajrayana — and the geographic spread of the tradition.