Architecture of India  
Communion With the Soul:
The Rise of Buddhism

By 500 BC, Vedic society was slowly stratifying into a rigid class system of the familiar four Varnas which exist in some form in Indian society even today - the Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras. The former, being the priestly class, were gradually assuming dominance over society with a tenacious grasp over tedious rituals that controlled every aspect of life. This added a superfluous complication to the busy life of an increasingly urban social fabric.

In stepped two major reformers, Gautama and Mahavira, They made an impact on this scene when, almost contemporaneously, they founded new doctrines based loosely on existing Hindu precepts but denying the role of the priests as media between Man and God. In fact, Buddhism held that only the soul was of import - God was a metaphysical construct of Man's mind. Buddhism was destined to have mass appeal worldwide. Yet at the crucial point of its nascence, it was fortunate to initially receive the patronage of the mercantile class, and later, of a king who would provide vital support - Ashoka the Great. Ashoka proclaimed Buddhism as the state religion and spread its message to the four corners of the land through state-funded monasteries, grants, and his famous rock-edicts, which dot the face of modern Orissa and central India. 

However, every religion needs an icon, and Buddhism was singularly unsuccessful in providing a God to worship. The next thing to a God was the Buddha himself, and his relics, or his (purported) mortal remains, scattered at various sites, became the objects of reverence and magnets for (religious) pilgrimage. 

This is a story of how these pilgrimage points evolved into Buddhist centers of learning and penance. 

The Buddhist Stupa

A trip through rural India reveals the countryside to be dotted with shrines of all sizes, shapes and denominations. (The more famous ones also have a certain notoriety, such that if you frequent them, people look at you a trifle askance!). However, if we look at the modest examples, we will find that they need not be masonry structures - a stone, a tree, a mountain or even an animal will suffice. A variety of natural objects have been conferred divinity because of their association - real or imagined - with a mythological event, or with the 'relics' of some historical/mythological figure. 

Thus it was that during Ashoka's time, the first Buddhist 'shrines' were mere piles of stone or rubble containing relics of the Buddha. Over time it became necessary to 'upgrade' these structures, in conformity with Buddhism's rising status. As is common with ancient structures the world over - for structural reasons it was necessary to have a wide base, tapering towards the top. The form chosen for the Buddhist Stupa was that of a sphere - as much for the shape's metaphysical associations as for the fact that it was an antipode to the square/rectangular form of Hindu temples. According to Satish Grover, "The embryo of the most powerful architectural form of Buddhism, the famous Stupa, thus emerged for the first time under the architectural patronage of Ashoka". **

Sanchi - the center of the Heavens

After Ashoka, by 200 B.C., the royal patronage enjoyed by Buddhism was on the wane. Gradually, under a succession of kings, Brahmanism regained the prestige it used to enjoy. Under the circumstances, Buddhist monks retired from urban conglomerates to secluded spots, where they built their places of worship and in general led a life of penance and meditation. However, assistance from the mercantile class, who had little interest in Brahmanism, was still available, and thus the Buddhist monks could, over the years, transform their humble centers into truly magnificent works of art. The foremost among these centers was Sanchi, near modern Bhopal. Here craftsmen labored for over a hundred years to make Sanchi a point of pilgrimage for devoted Buddhists and scholars from all over Asia for centuries. The magnificent ruin still attracts a large number of tourists today. 

– Continued Next Page

** Grover, Satish The Architecture of India-Buddhist and Hindu, Vikas Publishing House Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi, 1980.

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