1
00:00:00,462 --> 00:00:01,577
after killing a hundred thousand people

2
00:00:01,782 --> 00:00:03,157
he chose the Buddha

3
00:00:03,501 --> 00:00:04,256
at the end of the last episode

4
00:00:04,501 --> 00:00:05,956
I mentioned an emperor

5
00:00:06,341 --> 00:00:07,860
one who killed a hundred thousand people

6
00:00:07,862 --> 00:00:10,517
an emperor kneeling and weeping in a sea of blood and corpses

7
00:00:11,021 --> 00:00:11,417
today

8
00:00:11,781 --> 00:00:13,997
we finally step into his story

9
00:00:14,421 --> 00:00:15,337
his name is Ashoka

10
00:00:15,861 --> 00:00:18,277
the third ruler of the Maurya dynasty

11
00:00:18,702 --> 00:00:19,917
he did one thing

12
00:00:20,022 --> 00:00:22,316
that completely changed the fate of Buddhism

13
00:00:22,895 --> 00:00:23,209
hello

14
00:00:23,694 --> 00:00:24,170
everyone

15
00:00:24,654 --> 00:00:25,909
I'm Leo Wang

16
00:00:26,372 --> 00:00:28,026
let me first lay out a timeline for you

17
00:00:28,291 --> 00:00:30,986
the Buddha passed away around the fifth century BC

18
00:00:31,331 --> 00:00:32,826
in the centuries after his passing

19
00:00:32,851 --> 00:00:35,586
we've walked through it across the last dozen or so episodes

20
00:00:35,811 --> 00:00:37,126
the disciples compiled the scriptures

21
00:00:37,292 --> 00:00:38,626
the schools began to split

22
00:00:38,811 --> 00:00:41,626
the Sarvastivada built an intricate philosophical edifice

23
00:00:41,771 --> 00:00:44,427
and the Sautrantika blew a hole in its foundation from within

24
00:00:44,692 --> 00:00:47,667
but all of this happened at the level of ideas

25
00:00:47,851 --> 00:00:48,847
the sangha was debating

26
00:00:49,211 --> 00:00:50,570
the masters were writing treatises

27
00:00:50,571 --> 00:00:51,987
the practitioners were meditating

28
00:00:52,251 --> 00:00:55,091
Buddhism stayed within a relatively small circle

29
00:00:55,092 --> 00:00:56,411
around the Ganges valley

30
00:00:56,412 --> 00:00:57,427
it never went beyond

31
00:00:57,964 --> 00:00:58,398
sometimes

32
00:00:58,843 --> 00:01:01,099
what changes everything is not a new theory

33
00:01:01,324 --> 00:01:03,938
but a man holding a sword who lays it down

34
00:01:04,524 --> 00:01:05,358
and this time

35
00:01:05,723 --> 00:01:07,218
it wasn't an ordinary sword

36
00:01:07,524 --> 00:01:09,059
it was the sword of an empire

37
00:01:10,070 --> 00:01:12,725
Ashoka's grandfather was Chandragupta

38
00:01:12,831 --> 00:01:14,245
also called the Moon-Protected King

39
00:01:14,550 --> 00:01:16,805
this man is a legend in Indian history

40
00:01:17,150 --> 00:01:19,445
after Alexander the Great's eastern campaign

41
00:01:19,591 --> 00:01:21,005
seizing the power vacuum

42
00:01:21,111 --> 00:01:24,046
he overthrew the Nanda dynasty that ruled the Ganges valley

43
00:01:24,150 --> 00:01:25,846
and founded the Maurya dynasty

44
00:01:26,070 --> 00:01:29,445
this was the first truly unified empire in Indian history

45
00:01:29,671 --> 00:01:33,445
its territory stretched from the Afghan border all the way to the southern tip of India

46
00:01:34,414 --> 00:01:37,709
Chandragupta's son Bindusara inherited the empire

47
00:01:38,135 --> 00:01:38,689
Ashoka

48
00:01:39,094 --> 00:01:40,870
was Bindusara's son

49
00:01:41,094 --> 00:01:43,629
but he didn't come to the throne smoothly

50
00:01:43,814 --> 00:01:45,629
according to Buddhist texts

51
00:01:45,735 --> 00:01:47,950
Bindusara had many sons

52
00:01:48,054 --> 00:01:50,390
and Ashoka was not his favorite

53
00:01:50,575 --> 00:01:53,510
some accounts even say Ashoka was coarse in appearance

54
00:01:53,575 --> 00:01:54,989
and not favored by his father

55
00:01:55,215 --> 00:01:56,530
but Ashoka had one thing

56
00:01:56,974 --> 00:01:58,230
that the other princes didn't

57
00:01:58,575 --> 00:01:59,590
and that was his ruthlessness

58
00:02:00,289 --> 00:02:01,705
after Bindusara died

59
00:02:01,770 --> 00:02:03,864
a brutal struggle for the throne broke out

60
00:02:04,170 --> 00:02:06,504
Ashoka came out on top in this bloody fight

61
00:02:06,970 --> 00:02:08,164
as for how he won

62
00:02:08,489 --> 00:02:10,304
different texts tell it differently

63
00:02:10,850 --> 00:02:14,265
Theravada accounts say he killed ninety-nine of his brothers

64
00:02:14,290 --> 00:02:16,145
sparing only one younger brother from the same mother

65
00:02:16,489 --> 00:02:18,705
this number is very likely exaggerated

66
00:02:18,809 --> 00:02:20,904
but the message it conveys is clear

67
00:02:21,089 --> 00:02:21,605
Ashoka

68
00:02:21,969 --> 00:02:23,344
came to power over a trail of blood

69
00:02:24,134 --> 00:02:24,769
after taking the throne

70
00:02:25,093 --> 00:02:26,669
Ashoka kept expanding

71
00:02:27,014 --> 00:02:31,109
the Maurya empire already covered most of the Indian subcontinent

72
00:02:31,294 --> 00:02:34,509
but one region on the east coast had never been taken

73
00:02:34,574 --> 00:02:35,789
it was called Kalinga

74
00:02:36,213 --> 00:02:38,308
around 261 BC

75
00:02:38,373 --> 00:02:40,549
he launched the war against Kalinga

76
00:02:40,886 --> 00:02:41,845
this war

77
00:02:41,845 --> 00:02:45,261
was among the most brutal of the ancient world

78
00:02:45,566 --> 00:02:48,020
and we know just how brutal it was

79
00:02:48,085 --> 00:02:49,764
not because later generations recorded it

80
00:02:49,766 --> 00:02:52,300
but because Ashoka himself carved it into stone

81
00:02:52,365 --> 00:02:55,421
in his later Thirteenth Rock Edict

82
00:02:55,446 --> 00:02:57,020
he wrote in the first person

83
00:02:57,206 --> 00:02:59,261
the Beloved of the Gods conquered Kalinga

84
00:02:59,365 --> 00:02:59,881
there

85
00:03:00,206 --> 00:03:01,381
a hundred thousand were killed

86
00:03:01,486 --> 00:03:03,020
a hundred and fifty thousand were carried away

87
00:03:03,046 --> 00:03:07,821
and the civilians who died from the famine and plague the war caused were beyond counting

88
00:03:08,166 --> 00:03:09,541
pay attention to this detail

89
00:03:09,685 --> 00:03:13,740
an emperor who had just won the most important battle in his empire's expansion

90
00:03:13,805 --> 00:03:16,541
carved the death toll into an official proclamation

91
00:03:16,998 --> 00:03:17,393
and then

92
00:03:17,798 --> 00:03:19,574
the story takes a turn

93
00:03:20,039 --> 00:03:23,613
a turn extremely rare in all of human history

94
00:03:24,199 --> 00:03:25,453
Ashoka had won

95
00:03:25,958 --> 00:03:27,814
Kalinga was conquered

96
00:03:28,359 --> 00:03:29,673
but standing on the battlefield

97
00:03:30,199 --> 00:03:31,854
looking at the corpses everywhere

98
00:03:32,039 --> 00:03:35,094
he did something conquerors never do

99
00:03:35,599 --> 00:03:36,814
he felt remorse

100
00:03:37,566 --> 00:03:40,420
not the light kind of regret that says if only I'd known

101
00:03:40,765 --> 00:03:43,541
but the kind of remorse that hollows out your whole body

102
00:03:44,045 --> 00:03:44,960
on that stone

103
00:03:45,325 --> 00:03:46,420
he went on to write

104
00:03:46,765 --> 00:03:49,700
the Beloved of the Gods feels deep sorrow and remorse over this

105
00:03:50,085 --> 00:03:50,441
he said

106
00:03:50,966 --> 00:03:52,484
in the conquered land

107
00:03:52,485 --> 00:03:55,300
the Brahmins and ascetics who followed the Dharma

108
00:03:55,406 --> 00:03:57,261
and the ordinary householders

109
00:03:57,406 --> 00:04:01,180
the slaughter death and forced displacement they suffered

110
00:04:01,246 --> 00:04:03,180
caused him great anguish

111
00:04:03,635 --> 00:04:05,651
try to put yourself in that scene

112
00:04:06,035 --> 00:04:09,051
you are the ruler of the most powerful empire in the ancient world

113
00:04:09,276 --> 00:04:12,331
your army has just won you the last piece of the puzzle

114
00:04:12,516 --> 00:04:14,515
by the script of every ancient emperor

115
00:04:14,516 --> 00:04:16,350
you should now hold celebrations

116
00:04:16,635 --> 00:04:17,754
reward your troops

117
00:04:17,755 --> 00:04:20,730
then head back to the capital to receive the homage of your people

118
00:04:20,995 --> 00:04:21,970
but you don't

119
00:04:22,276 --> 00:04:23,110
you stand there

120
00:04:23,316 --> 00:04:24,651
looking at the blood at your feet

121
00:04:24,756 --> 00:04:27,331
and your chest feels like something is choking it

122
00:04:27,595 --> 00:04:28,071
in that moment

123
00:04:28,516 --> 00:04:30,370
it's not Ashoka making the decision

124
00:04:30,555 --> 00:04:33,131
it's those hundred thousand lives making it for him

125
00:04:33,516 --> 00:04:34,751
Alexander wouldn't have done this

126
00:04:35,115 --> 00:04:36,290
Qin Shi Huang wouldn't

127
00:04:36,316 --> 00:04:37,691
Genghis Khan wouldn't

128
00:04:37,876 --> 00:04:38,970
only Ashoka

129
00:04:39,035 --> 00:04:41,451
carved his own remorse into stone

130
00:04:42,394 --> 00:04:44,229
what exactly was the catalyst

131
00:04:44,674 --> 00:04:46,769
different texts tell it differently

132
00:04:47,154 --> 00:04:50,128
some say he saw a monk on the battlefield

133
00:04:50,193 --> 00:04:52,149
walking quietly through the piles of corpses

134
00:04:52,513 --> 00:04:53,649
his face showing neither grief nor joy

135
00:04:53,794 --> 00:04:56,729
that calm struck him with tremendous force

136
00:04:57,073 --> 00:04:59,873
some say he had encountered Buddhism in his early years

137
00:04:59,873 --> 00:05:01,888
he just never took it seriously

138
00:05:02,234 --> 00:05:04,688
but whatever exactly triggered him

139
00:05:04,794 --> 00:05:06,368
the result was the same

140
00:05:06,633 --> 00:05:07,868
after the war of Kalinga

141
00:05:08,154 --> 00:05:09,928
Ashoka converted to Buddhism

142
00:05:10,481 --> 00:05:14,257
and he wasn't the kind of believer who burns a stick of incense and leaves

143
00:05:14,481 --> 00:05:15,777
he truly changed

144
00:05:16,041 --> 00:05:17,277
he declared in his edicts

145
00:05:17,721 --> 00:05:18,760
from now on

146
00:05:18,762 --> 00:05:20,721
he would no longer take pride in conquest by force

147
00:05:20,721 --> 00:05:22,697
but in the conquest by Dharma

148
00:05:22,921 --> 00:05:23,837
the Dharma he spoke of

149
00:05:24,161 --> 00:05:25,416
in Sanskrit is called dharma

150
00:05:25,721 --> 00:05:27,616
isn't exactly the same as Buddhist doctrine

151
00:05:27,681 --> 00:05:29,577
it's more like a moral order

152
00:05:29,762 --> 00:05:31,616
but the core spirit of Buddhism

153
00:05:31,681 --> 00:05:34,176
non-killing compassion right view

154
00:05:34,281 --> 00:05:36,496
is the foundation of his whole Dharma policy

155
00:05:36,921 --> 00:05:41,217
then he did a series of things remarkably ahead of their time for the ancient world

156
00:05:41,442 --> 00:05:42,317
he built hospitals

157
00:05:42,762 --> 00:05:44,080
not just to treat people

158
00:05:44,082 --> 00:05:45,377
but to treat animals too

159
00:05:45,601 --> 00:05:49,361
he planted trees along the roads built rest houses and dug wells

160
00:05:49,361 --> 00:05:50,697
for travelers to rest

161
00:05:51,322 --> 00:05:53,017
he restricted the slaughter of animals

162
00:05:53,041 --> 00:05:55,856
and sharply cut the extravagance of the court

163
00:05:56,082 --> 00:05:57,556
he sent out special officials

164
00:05:57,842 --> 00:05:59,337
called Dharma ministers

165
00:05:59,361 --> 00:06:00,957
to tour the whole country

166
00:06:01,241 --> 00:06:02,817
promoting moral education

167
00:06:03,999 --> 00:06:05,078
and more importantly

168
00:06:05,078 --> 00:06:08,853
he did something that fundamentally changed the course of Buddhist history

169
00:06:09,398 --> 00:06:11,494
he convened the Third Council

170
00:06:11,958 --> 00:06:14,293
we've talked about the first two councils before

171
00:06:14,679 --> 00:06:17,413
the first was led by Mahakasyapa after the Buddha's death

172
00:06:17,799 --> 00:06:21,333
the second was the one a century later sparked by the ten points

173
00:06:21,398 --> 00:06:23,893
and from then on the Sthavira and the Mahasanghika parted ways

174
00:06:24,518 --> 00:06:25,434
the Third Council

175
00:06:25,718 --> 00:06:28,093
took place around 250 BC

176
00:06:28,278 --> 00:06:31,134
in Pataliputra the capital of the Maurya dynasty

177
00:06:31,158 --> 00:06:33,134
which is today's Patna in India

178
00:06:33,439 --> 00:06:36,694
it was presided over by an elder named Moggaliputta Tissa

179
00:06:37,465 --> 00:06:40,121
this council had a very particular background

180
00:06:40,385 --> 00:06:42,441
Ashoka strongly supported Buddhism

181
00:06:42,465 --> 00:06:45,080
and gave the sangha abundant material support

182
00:06:45,465 --> 00:06:48,121
but this had a side effect no one expected

183
00:06:48,465 --> 00:06:50,921
many people became monks not out of faith

184
00:06:50,945 --> 00:06:52,161
but to fill their stomachs

185
00:06:52,546 --> 00:06:55,241
many heretics and opportunists slipped into the sangha

186
00:06:55,426 --> 00:06:57,880
bringing their own old teachings with them

187
00:06:57,986 --> 00:06:59,361
and passing them off as the Buddha's teaching

188
00:06:59,705 --> 00:07:00,801
the sangha fell into disorder

189
00:07:01,066 --> 00:07:04,601
orthodox monks even refused to hold the uposatha with these people

190
00:07:04,746 --> 00:07:07,601
that is the regular ceremony of confession and reciting the precepts

191
00:07:08,617 --> 00:07:09,893
seeing this situation Ashoka

192
00:07:10,057 --> 00:07:11,073
decided to step in

193
00:07:11,218 --> 00:07:15,033
he asked Moggaliputta Tissa to lead a large-scale screening

194
00:07:15,177 --> 00:07:17,472
to purge the unqualified monks

195
00:07:17,698 --> 00:07:19,456
according to Theravada texts

196
00:07:19,458 --> 00:07:21,672
sixty thousand were expelled from the order

197
00:07:22,018 --> 00:07:26,472
at this council Moggaliputta Tissa compiled an important treatise

198
00:07:26,497 --> 00:07:27,213
called the Kathavatthu

199
00:07:27,778 --> 00:07:32,472
this work refuted one by one more than two hundred dissenting views of the schools of the time

200
00:07:32,617 --> 00:07:36,393
its core stance was the orthodox view of the Theravada Vibhajyavada

201
00:07:36,751 --> 00:07:37,746
there's a detail here

202
00:07:38,111 --> 00:07:39,926
worth stopping to think about

203
00:07:40,590 --> 00:07:42,006
the Third Council

204
00:07:42,150 --> 00:07:45,166
was initiated and backed by an emperor

205
00:07:45,510 --> 00:07:47,686
this was completely different from the first two

206
00:07:48,150 --> 00:07:51,566
the first two were organized by the sangha itself

207
00:07:51,991 --> 00:07:52,666
the third

208
00:07:53,111 --> 00:07:54,606
imperial power intervened

209
00:07:54,991 --> 00:07:55,905
what does this mean

210
00:07:56,390 --> 00:07:58,366
it means that from this moment on

211
00:07:58,590 --> 00:08:03,126
the direction of Buddhism no longer depended only on the consensus within the sangha

212
00:08:03,311 --> 00:08:05,926
but also on the preferences of political power

213
00:08:06,351 --> 00:08:09,325
Ashoka chose to back the Theravada position

214
00:08:09,431 --> 00:08:11,525
and the Theravada voice was amplified

215
00:08:11,791 --> 00:08:13,525
he chose to purge the heretics

216
00:08:13,551 --> 00:08:17,645
and who counted as a heretic was defined by him and the elders he trusted

217
00:08:18,727 --> 00:08:20,742
this isn't to say Ashoka did wrong

218
00:08:20,968 --> 00:08:23,102
a sangha in such a mixed and murky state

219
00:08:23,167 --> 00:08:24,783
would rot if it weren't cleaned up

220
00:08:25,167 --> 00:08:27,903
but you can't ignore this structural change

221
00:08:28,247 --> 00:08:29,583
when the Buddha was alive

222
00:08:29,768 --> 00:08:33,383
he never relied on any king to solve the sangha's problems

223
00:08:33,927 --> 00:08:36,662
the rule he left was that the sangha governs itself

224
00:08:36,768 --> 00:08:38,102
rely on the Dharma not on persons

225
00:08:38,527 --> 00:08:38,923
now

226
00:08:39,367 --> 00:08:41,823
what handles the problems is no longer just the Vinaya

227
00:08:41,928 --> 00:08:43,622
but also the will of the emperor

228
00:08:44,535 --> 00:08:45,491
what's this like

229
00:08:46,096 --> 00:08:47,390
you start a company

230
00:08:47,496 --> 00:08:48,951
and run into an internal management problem

231
00:08:49,496 --> 00:08:52,711
normally you could solve it through the bylaws and the board

232
00:08:53,135 --> 00:08:55,790
but then a major shareholder walks over and says

233
00:08:55,856 --> 00:08:57,030
let me handle it for you

234
00:08:57,696 --> 00:08:59,310
and he really does handle it well

235
00:08:59,576 --> 00:09:00,871
but from then on

236
00:09:00,895 --> 00:09:03,910
the company's rules are no longer decided by the bylaws alone

237
00:09:04,175 --> 00:09:06,471
but by what the major shareholder thinks

238
00:09:07,135 --> 00:09:08,331
Buddhism's era of the major shareholder

239
00:09:08,696 --> 00:09:10,270
began with Ashoka

240
00:09:10,576 --> 00:09:11,774
and this pattern

241
00:09:11,775 --> 00:09:14,871
would profoundly shape the next two thousand years of Buddhist history

242
00:09:15,919 --> 00:09:17,534
we mentioned in episode eight

243
00:09:17,639 --> 00:09:21,814
the Buddha had close interactions with King Bimbisara and King Ajatashatru

244
00:09:22,279 --> 00:09:23,975
he accepted the kings' offerings

245
00:09:24,039 --> 00:09:26,174
and built monasteries on the kings' land

246
00:09:26,600 --> 00:09:30,975
but he never let any king take charge of the sangha's affairs

247
00:09:31,279 --> 00:09:31,835
Ashoka

248
00:09:32,120 --> 00:09:33,615
broke this boundary

249
00:09:33,919 --> 00:09:35,235
his intention was good

250
00:09:35,559 --> 00:09:37,095
the effect was remarkable

251
00:09:37,399 --> 00:09:38,794
but once a boundary is broken

252
00:09:39,039 --> 00:09:40,735
it's very hard to draw it back

253
00:09:41,519 --> 00:09:44,573
this is the central tension in Ashoka's story

254
00:09:44,999 --> 00:09:47,773
he is the greatest protector of the Dharma in Buddhist history

255
00:09:47,798 --> 00:09:48,813
without exception

256
00:09:49,198 --> 00:09:50,413
but it was also he

257
00:09:50,438 --> 00:09:54,453
who opened a pattern of Buddhism deeply bound to political power

258
00:09:55,078 --> 00:09:56,014
after him

259
00:09:56,078 --> 00:09:58,573
almost every era in which Buddhism flourished

260
00:09:58,599 --> 00:10:01,094
had a powerful monarch standing behind it

261
00:10:01,519 --> 00:10:03,693
and every time a monarch withdrew his support

262
00:10:03,759 --> 00:10:06,173
Buddhism faced a crisis of life and death

263
00:10:06,558 --> 00:10:07,533
this pattern

264
00:10:07,639 --> 00:10:10,854
would play out in the cruelest way more than a thousand years later

265
00:10:11,794 --> 00:10:13,610
but let's not look that far ahead yet

266
00:10:13,794 --> 00:10:16,169
let's first see what Ashoka gave to Buddhism

267
00:10:16,355 --> 00:10:17,713
after the Third Council

268
00:10:17,714 --> 00:10:20,809
he did something whose impact is beyond measure

269
00:10:21,115 --> 00:10:23,289
he sent out a great many missionary delegations

270
00:10:23,434 --> 00:10:26,010
carrying the Dharma beyond the Indian subcontinent

271
00:10:26,287 --> 00:10:27,823
the most crucial of them

272
00:10:27,848 --> 00:10:29,686
was led by his son Mahinda

273
00:10:29,687 --> 00:10:30,902
and went to Sri Lanka

274
00:10:31,088 --> 00:10:31,442
note this

275
00:10:31,728 --> 00:10:33,142
it was his own son

276
00:10:33,248 --> 00:10:36,223
an emperor sending his own son out to spread the Dharma

277
00:10:36,248 --> 00:10:38,142
you can weigh what that means

278
00:10:38,328 --> 00:10:40,223
after Mahinda arrived in Sri Lanka

279
00:10:40,248 --> 00:10:42,583
he was received by King Devanampiya Tissa

280
00:10:42,687 --> 00:10:44,463
and established a sangha there

281
00:10:44,527 --> 00:10:46,182
spreading Theravada Buddhism

282
00:10:46,247 --> 00:10:46,968
later

283
00:10:46,968 --> 00:10:49,926
Ashoka's daughter Sanghamitta also came there

284
00:10:49,927 --> 00:10:52,062
bringing a branch of the Bodhi tree

285
00:10:52,287 --> 00:10:53,662
not just any tree

286
00:10:53,728 --> 00:10:56,863
but cut from the very Bodhi tree under which the Buddha attained enlightenment

287
00:10:57,047 --> 00:10:59,782
this tree was planted in Anuradhapura

288
00:10:59,807 --> 00:11:01,463
and it's still alive today

289
00:11:02,368 --> 00:11:03,863
more than two thousand three hundred years old

290
00:11:03,887 --> 00:11:07,046
it's the oldest human-planted tree in the world

291
00:11:07,047 --> 00:11:09,182
with a confirmed planting date on record

292
00:11:09,849 --> 00:11:11,064
besides Sri Lanka

293
00:11:11,089 --> 00:11:15,008
missionary delegations were also sent to Suvarnabhumi toward Burma and Thailand

294
00:11:15,008 --> 00:11:17,944
to Gandhara toward Afghanistan and Central Asia

295
00:11:18,048 --> 00:11:20,143
and even toward the Mediterranean world

296
00:11:20,609 --> 00:11:25,104
in his edicts Ashoka named five kings of the Hellenistic kingdoms

297
00:11:25,128 --> 00:11:29,263
Antiochus Ptolemy Antigonus Magas and Alexander

298
00:11:29,488 --> 00:11:33,743
he said he had sent Dharma envoys to these kings' realms as well

299
00:11:34,128 --> 00:11:37,663
from a local practice community in the Ganges valley

300
00:11:37,809 --> 00:11:39,567
driven by one emperor

301
00:11:39,569 --> 00:11:42,023
Buddhism became a faith spanning continents

302
00:11:42,248 --> 00:11:43,263
this is a fact

303
00:11:43,609 --> 00:11:44,567
without Ashoka

304
00:11:44,569 --> 00:11:47,783
there would be no map of the Buddhist world as we see it today

305
00:11:48,756 --> 00:11:50,611
but you also have to ask another question

306
00:11:51,317 --> 00:11:52,072
in this story

307
00:11:52,397 --> 00:11:53,711
what did Buddhism lose

308
00:11:54,356 --> 00:11:56,452
it lost a certain independence

309
00:11:57,116 --> 00:11:59,611
when the spread of the Dharma relies on state power

310
00:11:59,677 --> 00:12:02,652
when the purity of the sangha needs an emperor to maintain it

311
00:12:02,797 --> 00:12:07,172
when who is orthodox and who is heretic must be decided by political power

312
00:12:07,437 --> 00:12:11,251
Buddhism is no longer just a teaching about awakening

313
00:12:11,437 --> 00:12:13,971
it also becomes a political resource

314
00:12:14,516 --> 00:12:17,731
so the question we keep asking throughout this series

315
00:12:18,077 --> 00:12:19,155
this development

316
00:12:19,157 --> 00:12:22,371
from what the Buddha saw under the Bodhi tree

317
00:12:22,557 --> 00:12:24,111
is it closer or farther

318
00:12:24,677 --> 00:12:25,631
the answer is perhaps

319
00:12:25,956 --> 00:12:26,831
closer

320
00:12:27,037 --> 00:12:28,532
and farther at the same time

321
00:12:29,456 --> 00:12:30,170
closer how

322
00:12:30,616 --> 00:12:33,871
Ashoka turned compassion and non-killing into state policy

323
00:12:34,135 --> 00:12:38,191
pushing the Buddha's teaching from personal practice into social practice

324
00:12:38,736 --> 00:12:39,930
the Buddha said do not kill

325
00:12:40,255 --> 00:12:41,750
that was said to the individual

326
00:12:42,015 --> 00:12:44,871
Ashoka turned it into the policy of an empire

327
00:12:45,255 --> 00:12:48,510
this was the first time the Dharma was practiced at the level of a state

328
00:12:49,175 --> 00:12:50,010
farther how

329
00:12:50,576 --> 00:12:54,270
he got Buddhism used to relying on outside forces to survive

330
00:12:54,576 --> 00:12:56,951
once you get used to someone holding an umbrella for you

331
00:12:57,096 --> 00:12:59,550
you forget how to walk in the rain

332
00:13:00,015 --> 00:13:01,534
the price of this habit

333
00:13:01,535 --> 00:13:04,270
wouldn't show itself for more than a thousand years

334
00:13:04,973 --> 00:13:07,868
but history never runs in only one direction

335
00:13:08,174 --> 00:13:10,828
the seeds Ashoka sent out

336
00:13:10,894 --> 00:13:13,029
in places he never imagined

337
00:13:13,054 --> 00:13:13,868
took root

338
00:13:14,294 --> 00:13:18,149
the Theravada Buddhism his son Mahinda brought to Sri Lanka

339
00:13:18,254 --> 00:13:19,988
did not keep relying on monarchs

340
00:13:20,134 --> 00:13:22,348
but on the strength of the sangha itself

341
00:13:22,414 --> 00:13:24,188
passed down generation after generation

342
00:13:24,453 --> 00:13:27,669
the Pali Canon was preserved intact on that island

343
00:13:27,813 --> 00:13:32,828
becoming the text closest to the Buddha's original teaching that we can reach today

344
00:13:33,414 --> 00:13:35,068
the seed a monarch planted

345
00:13:35,174 --> 00:13:38,228
in the end survived longest where there were no monarchs

346
00:13:38,613 --> 00:13:40,828
wouldn't you call that a kind of irony

347
00:13:41,813 --> 00:13:42,328
next time

348
00:13:42,614 --> 00:13:44,869
we'll step into the world of Theravada Buddhism

349
00:13:45,093 --> 00:13:47,813
to see the Buddha's factory settings

350
00:13:47,813 --> 00:13:49,852
over more than two thousand years of transmission

351
00:13:49,853 --> 00:13:51,509
how much of it has actually been kept

352
00:13:52,213 --> 00:13:53,708
have you ever thought about this question

353
00:13:54,014 --> 00:13:57,629
when a good thing can only move forward with the help of power

354
00:13:57,734 --> 00:13:59,372
does it grow stronger

355
00:13:59,374 --> 00:14:00,448
or does it grow more fragile

356
00:14:01,213 --> 00:14:02,468
tell me in the comments

357
00:14:02,813 --> 00:14:03,529
I'm Leo Wang

358
00:14:03,853 --> 00:14:05,269
see you next time