Mahinda

Mahinda ( Sanskrit : महिन्द्र, Mahindra), at the beginning of the 3rd century BC Born in Magadha (now Bihar , India ), was a Buddhist monk and arhat . He founded Buddhism in Sri Lanka .

As the son of the Indian emperor Ashoka , he grew up in Vidisha , his mother's residence. At the age of 20 he became a monk and a disciple of Moggaliputta Tissa . Twelve years later, after the third Buddhist council presided over by his teacher , he was sent by his father to Sri Lanka (then Tamraparni ) to teach the Buddhas there, along with the monks Itthiya, Uttiya, Sambala, Bhaddasāla and Sumanasāmanera as well as the lay Bhankuka to make the Dharma known.

so-called Mahindabett in Mihintale

According to the Sinhalese chronicles Mahavamsa and Dipavamsa , the group arrived on the island during the full moon. Tradition has it that King Devanampiya Tissa met the monks while he was hunting. He knew Ashoka, the two rulers had given each other presents on their accession to the throne and were not hostile to one another. After the king had welcomed the guests, Mahinda recited a sutra that prompted Devanampiya Tissa and his followers to turn to the Buddha-Dharma. The monks were invited to the king's residence in Anuradhapura to give further lectures. Two public lectures by Mahinda in the royal city laid the foundation for the spread of Buddhism on the island. The Mahamegha royal garden was made available to the monks, from which the Mahavira monastery developed, the earliest center of Buddhist culture in Sri Lanka. The Chetiyagirivihara monastery was founded in Mihintale , where Mahinda had retired after a month of teaching (cf. Vassa , Khao Phansa ).

The Sri Mahabodhi in Anuradhapura

In order to found an order of women (see Bhikkhuni ) Mahinda called his sister Sanghamitta to Sri Lanka. She also brought an offshoot of the Bodhi tree from Bodhgaya under which, according to tradition, Siddharta Gautama had attained enlightenment . The tree was planted in the Mahavira Temple, where it is still honored as Sri Mahabodhi today. In the Buddhist architecture of Sri Lanka, a new one was added to the usual temple buildings: the Bodhighara , a shrine without a roof in honor of the Bodhi tree. Instead of pictorial representations of the Mahabodhi as they were known from India, a living tree is the focus of the building.

On Mahinda's initiative, the first stupa in Sri Lanka was also built to enclose relics of the Buddha, which, like the sapling of Sanghamitta, had been brought from the empire of Ashoka. Arittha, a nephew of King Devanampiya Tissas, who had joined the monastic order, was given the task of teaching the Vinaya (Buddhist rules of the order).

Mahinda died at the age of 60. King Uttiya, the successor of Devanampiya Tissa, had his ashes laid to rest with great honor in a specially built stupa, the Mihindu Seya in Mihintale.

Today Mahinda is not only venerated as the founder of Buddhism in Sri Lanka, he is also considered the creator of Sinhala literature, as he translated the Tipitaka into Sinhalese and wrote comments on it in the local language.

Web links

• Biography Mahinda (English)
• Sri Lanka virtual library: The arrival of Buddhism in Sri Lanka