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Dharmaraksita - A Greek Buddhist missionary

Dharmaraksita - A Greek Buddhist missionary: Encyclopedia II - Dharmaraksita - A Greek Buddhist missionary

The efforts of Emperor Ashoka to spread the Buddhist faith are described in the Edicts of Ashoka carved during his reign on stone pillars and cave walls: "Here in the king's domain among the Greeks, the Kambojas, the Nabhakas, the Nabhapamkits, the Bhojas, the Pitinikas, the Andhras and the Palidas, everywhere people are following Beloved-of-the-Gods' instructions in Dhamma." Rock Edict Nb13 (S. Dhammika) Ashoka also claimed to have sent emissaries beyond his borders, as far as the Greek kings of the Mediterranean: ...

Dharmaraksita: Encyclopedia II - Dharmaraksita - A Greek Buddhist missionary

Dharmaraksita - A Greek Buddhist missionary

The efforts of Emperor Ashoka to spread the Buddhist faith are described in the Edicts of Ashoka carved during his reign on stone pillars and cave walls:

"Here in the king's domain among the Greeks, the Kambojas, the Nabhakas, the Nabhapamkits, the Bhojas, the Pitinikas, the Andhras and the Palidas, everywhere people are following Beloved-of-the-Gods' instructions in Dhamma." Rock Edict Nb13 (S. Dhammika)

Ashoka also claimed to have sent emissaries beyond his borders, as far as the Greek kings of the Mediterranean:

"Now it is conquest by Dhamma that Beloved-of-the-Gods considers to be the best conquest. And it (conquest by Dhamma) has been won here, on the borders, even six hundred yojanas away, where the Greek king Antiochos rules, beyond there where the four kings named Ptolemy, Antigonos, Magas and Alexander rule, likewise in the south among the Cholas, the Pandyas, and as far as Tamraparni." Rock Edict Nb13 (S. Dhammika)

Dharmaraksita is then described in important Buddhist Pali historial texts, the Dipavamsa and the Mahavamsa, as being a Greek Buddhist missionary, in charge of propagating the faith to the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent.

"When the thera Moggaliputta, the illuminator of the religion of the Conqueror, had brought the (third) council to an end (…) he sent forth theras, one here and one there:

The thera Mahyantika he sent to Kasmira and Gandhara,
The thera, MaMdeva he sent to Mahisamandala.
To Vanavasa be sent the thera named Rakkhita,
and to Aparantaka (he sent) the Yona named Dhammarakkhita;
to Maharattha (he sent) the thera named Mahadhammarakkhita,
but the thera Maharakkhita he sent into the country of the Yona.
He sent the thera Majjhima to the Himalaya country,
and to Suvambhurni he sent the two theras Sona and Uttara.
The great thera Mahinda, the theras Utthiya, Uttiya, Sambala and Bhaddasala his disciples, these five theras he sent forth with the charge: `Ye shall found in the lovely island of Lanka the lovely religion of the Conqueror.'" (Mahavamsa, XII)

The country of Aparantaka has been identified as the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent, and comprises Northern Gujarat, Kathiawar, Kachch, and Sindh, the area where Greek communities were probably concentrated. To this day, a city in Gujarat is named Junagadh, originally "Yonagadh", lit. "City of the Greeks".

Dharmarashita is said to have preached the Aggikkhandopama Sutra, so that 37,000 people were converted in Aparantaka and that thousands of men and women entered the Order ("pabbajja"):

"The thera Dhammarakkhita the Yona, being gone to Aparantaka and having preached in the midst of the people the Aggikkhandhopama-sutta gave to drink of the nectar of truth to thirty-seven thousand living beings who had come together there, lie who perfectly understood truth and untruth. A thousand men and yet more women went forth from noble families and received the pabbajja" (Mahavamsa XII, Dipavamsa.VIII.7)

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160 BCE, 1st century BCE, 323 BCE, Alexander the Great, Ashoka, Bactria, Buddhist, Edicts of Ashoka, Greco-Bactrian, Greco-Buddhism, Greco-Buddhist monasticism, Greek, Gujarat, Indo-Greek, Ionian, Ionians, Junagadh, Kambojas, Kathiawar, Mahavamsa, Mauryan, Mediterranean, Menander, Milinda Panha, Nagasena, Pali, Pataliputra, Punjab, Sagala, Sindh, Theravada, Tripitaka, Yona, arhat, enlightenment

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "A Greek Buddhist missionary", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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