Art Work Project: Nalanda Monastic University

Humanities 1
Art Work Project
Nalanda Monastic University

One of the most influencing factors of Buddhism expansion and success in spreading the Buddha doctrine was the use of retreats and parks as monasteries, from the very time of Buddha Shakyamuni. While the followers of the Buddha started increasing over time with monks and nuns including all non-ordained or lay people, they quickly came with the need to find a place for shelter mainly from the heavy rains and other adverse weather conditions this was the origin of the used of parks and building that were donated by the laity to accommodate the monastic community. These retreats were called arama or sngharama and one of the most renowned was Jetavanarama from Sravasti.
The monastic tradition of Buddhism is probably the oldest in the world, and certainly been the most widespread geographically and culturally, and we can say that after a short time after the attainment of Buddha enlightenment he had five disciple established in Benares, in Deer Park after the Buddha first discourse, and by the end of the first year the community had several hundred members and it took no too long when the Buddha had thousands of followers and this quickly spread to all over Asia, so we can see the importance and key the monastic community had in keeping the tradition as intact as possible Many of the scriptures from the Canon describe that many of the first disciple renounced the wealth and lay life simply on hearing the Buddha speak and other said that the renounced their luxury life and comfort because a very intense admiration and inspiring character and his very powerful personality, and in some other cases the renunciation was because the desire to imitate him, but getting ordain really had a very diverse and wide aspect like the most common motive was the need to find an ideal for a more profound and better way of life.
The main activities of a monk were meditation, the study and teaching of the Dharma, the vowed to renounce the ordinary world, to live in poverty, celibacy and peacefulness. In their early times monk and nuns wandered from place to place, and it was only after the Buddha’s death many began to reside in permanent monasteries and start having disagreement among them with the doctrine, canonical texts and monastic discipline this was the cause of the creation of a division of two ,mayor group called the Theravadas and Mahayana schools.

Ancient Nalanda Monastery
Nalanda is an ancient center of higher learning in Bihar, India from 427 to 1197. Nalanda was established in the 5th century AD in Bihar, India. Founded in 427 in northeastern India, not far from what is today the southern border of Nepal, it survived until 1197. It was devoted to Buddhist studies, but it also trained students in fine arts, medicine, mathematics, astronomy, politics and the art of war.
Nalanda was an ancient Indian university. It was one of the famous universities of the world. It was the first Indian residential university. About 10,000 students and 2000 teachers were there in the university. Students were come from all over the world (Korea, Japan, China, Tibet, Indonesia, and Persia). The admission process of the university was very strict. Students have to go through different tests to prove their ability. The university covered a large area about 14 hectares. University had 10 temples, many classrooms and meditation centers and a big library. Many people even today get astonished by the architecture of the building.
The Buddha is said to have stayed several times at Nalanda. Later, King Asoka (250 BC) built a stupa in the memory of Shariputra, on the two close disciples of the Buddha.
Library of the Nalanda University was divided into three buildings- Ratnasagara, Ratnadadhi and Ratnaranjaka. Among this building, Ratnasagara was nine storeyed building. The library did not only contain religious manuscripts, but it had a large collection of books on literature, astrology, astronomy, and medicine.
Great scholars of Nalanda produced a very vast amount of literature from all branches of knowledge and especially the study of the field of logic. Many scholars agree that Nalanda’s monastery library contained the main collection of Mahayana texts in the ancient world called the Mountain of truth and was the most renowned repository of Buddhist knowledge in the world at the time Nālandā traced its roots to the great Buddhist scholar taught at Nalanda, including Nagajurna, Aryadeva, Chandrakirti and Shantideva. The is a very famous and well live tradition to this day that is called the seventeen Pandits of Nalanda Monastery refers to a group of seventeen of the most important and influential Mahayana Buddhist masters from India’s past and that their works are still being admired and study to this day in many monasteries of India China and Nepal .

The scholarly tradition of Nalanda has survived because the great interest and perseverance of many countries like Buthan, Nepal and Tibet preserve this tradition.
Today visitor and pilgrims to Nalanda still enjoy and will find a great vast of many ruins, from the remains of this great university including monasteries , temples and stupas built by different Buddhist Kings, with many Images of Buddhas, statues of deities of the Mahayana tradition, pottery, personal seal of university and a range of other antiquities of historical importance.
We can imagine how significant and important the Nalanda University had for the preservation of many culture and how influenced in a positive way education and Monasticism is even conserved until our present times and at the same time this history and unfolding of all these event help us understand and reflect how arduous was the work to preserve and translate all the manuscripts that came from this tradition for the benefit of past generations and give great examples for our the coming generations.

Worked Cited http://www.aicte-india.org/downloads/ancient.pdf http://www.khenpo.eu/nalanda.pdf http://www.vifindia.org/article/2011/january/27/Recreating-Nalanda-Is-the-Deeper-Raison-d%C3%AAtre-Missing?slide=$slideshow$ http://www.nalandascience.org/pdfs/articles/ShriNalanda.pdf http://www.nalandascience.org/pdfs/articles/NalandaTradition.pdf http://asiasociety.org/blog/asia/qa-nobel-prize-winning-economist-amartya-sen-reviving-nalanda-university http://enlight.lib.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-ENG/heras.htm http://hcimaldives.in/root/hicom/admin/user_imagefile/The%20Great%20Nalanda.pdf

Cited: http://www.aicte-india.org/downloads/ancient.pdf http://www.khenpo.eu/nalanda.pdf http://www.vifindia.org/article/2011/january/27/Recreating-Nalanda-Is-the-Deeper-Raison-d%C3%AAtre-Missing?slide=$slideshow$ http://www.nalandascience.org/pdfs/articles/ShriNalanda.pdf http://www.nalandascience.org/pdfs/articles/NalandaTradition.pdf http://asiasociety.org/blog/asia/qa-nobel-prize-winning-economist-amartya-sen-reviving-nalanda-university http://enlight.lib.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-ENG/heras.htm http://hcimaldives.in/root/hicom/admin/user_imagefile/The%20Great%20Nalanda.pdf