Buddhism and Jainism: Teachings, Councils and Exam Facts

The correct answer is B, Sarnath. After his enlightenment the Buddha walked to the deer park at Sarnath near Varanasi and taught the Four Noble Truths to the five ascetics who had earlier deserted him. The sermon is called the Dharmachakra Pravartana, the setting in motion of the wheel of law, and the Buddhist Sangha is dated from it.

Option A, Bodh Gaya, is where he attained enlightenment under a peepal tree on the bank of the Niranjana at the age of thirty-five, not where he first preached. Option C, Kushinagar, is the town of the Mallas where he died at the age of eighty, an event called the Mahaparinirvana. Option D, Lumbini, in the Nepal tarai, is his birthplace and was marked later by an Ashokan pillar. Papers rotate these four sites against one another, so fix exactly one event to each name while revising.

The correct answer is C, Kanishka. The Fourth Buddhist Council met at Kundalvana in Kashmir in the first century CE under the Kushana king Kanishka, with Vasumitra presiding and Ashvaghosha assisting him. Its commentaries were compiled in Sanskrit and the meeting marks the point at which the Mahayana and Hinayana branches finally parted.

Option A, Ashoka, patronised the Third Council at Pataliputra, presided over by Moggaliputta Tissa, which added the Abhidhamma Pitaka and sent missions abroad. Option B, Ajatashatru, patronised the First Council at Rajgriha just after the Buddha death, where Upali recited the Vinaya and Ananda the Sutta. Option D, Kalashoka, patronised the Second Council at Vaishali, which split the order into Sthaviravadins and Mahasanghikas. Learn the councils as a row of four: place, king, president and result.

The correct answer is B, Parshvanatha. He was the twenty-third Tirthankara, a prince of Varanasi and son of King Ashvasena, whose emblem is the serpent. He is placed about two hundred and fifty years before Mahavira and gave his followers four vows: non-violence, truth, non-stealing and non-possession.

Option A, Rishabhadeva, also called Adinath, was the first Tirthankara, whose emblem is the bull and whose name is found in the Rigveda. Option C, Neminatha, was the twenty-second Tirthankara and is traditionally linked with Krishna. Option D, Mahavira, was the twenty-fourth and last Tirthankara, who added brahmacharya as a fifth vow and whose emblem is the lion. Questions usually ask for the first, the twenty-third or the twenty-fourth, so those three numbers are worth memorising with their emblems.

The correct answer is D, brahmacharya. Parshvanatha had prescribed four restraints, and Mahavira added celibacy to them, so Jain monastic discipline rests on five great vows: ahimsa, satya, asteya, aparigraha and brahmacharya. The addition is a favourite one-line question because it separates the two Tirthankaras.

Option A, ahimsa, was the first of the four older vows and is the central principle of the faith, extended by Jainism even to plants and tiny creatures. Option B, satya, and option C, aparigraha, were likewise part of the older four, along with asteya, the vow against stealing. The order of the five, and the fact that a Jain layman follows them in a milder form called the anuvratas while a monk follows them absolutely, are the other details papers pick up from this section.

The correct answer is C, the third council at Pataliputra. Held in the reign of Ashoka under the presidency of Moggaliputta Tissa, it purged the order of dissenters, added the Abhidhamma Pitaka, the philosophical third basket, to the canon, and decided to send missionaries to Sri Lanka and other lands.

Option A, the first council at Rajgriha, only settled the Vinaya and the Sutta Pitakas, recited by Upali and Ananda respectively. Option B, the second council at Vaishali, was called over relaxations in monastic rules and ended in the first great schism of the order. Option D, the fourth council in Kashmir under Kanishka, produced commentaries in Sanskrit rather than a new Pitaka. So the three Pitakas belong to the first and third councils, and the two divisions of the order to the second and fourth.

The correct answer is B, the Rijupalika. After twelve years of severe austerity Mahavira attained kaivalya at the age of forty-two under a sal tree at Jrimbhikagrama, on the bank of the river Rijupalika, and from that moment was known as Jina and Kevalin.

Option A, the Niranjana, the modern Falgu, is the river at Bodh Gaya where the Buddha attained enlightenment under a peepal tree, and it is the standard trap in this question. Option C, the Parushni, the modern Ravi, belongs to the Vedic age as the river of the Battle of Ten Kings. Option D, the Gandak, flows past Vaishali but is not connected with the event. The safest way to hold this pair is a two-line table: Buddha, peepal, Niranjana; Mahavira, sal, Rijupalika.

The correct answer is A, the peepal. The Buddha attained enlightenment seated under a peepal tree at Bodh Gaya, and the tree is therefore called the Bodhi tree; in early Buddhist art, where the Buddha was never shown in human form, the tree itself stands for the enlightenment.

Option B, the sal, appears twice in these stories but never here: the Buddha was born in a grove of sal trees at Lumbini and died between two sal trees at Kushinagar, and Mahavira attained kaivalya under a sal tree. Option C, the banyan, is linked in tradition with the weeks the Buddha spent near Bodh Gaya after enlightenment, not with the event itself. Option D, the ashoka tree, belongs to the Jain and Buddhist birth legends rather than to the enlightenment. Match one tree to one event and the whole set becomes easy.

The correct answer is A, anekantavada. It is the Jain teaching that every object has countless aspects and that no single judgement can capture the whole truth. Its method of statement is syadvada, the sevenfold formula in which each assertion is prefixed by the word syat, meaning in some respect, and the parable of the blind men and the elephant is its usual illustration.

Option B, shunyavada, the doctrine of emptiness, belongs to the Madhyamika school of Mahayana Buddhism founded by Nagarjuna. Option C, vijnanavada, the view that only consciousness is real, is the Yogachara school of Buddhism associated with Vasubandhu and Asanga. Option D, kshanikavada, the theory of momentariness, is again Buddhist and follows from anicca, the impermanence of all things. In exams one term belongs to one faith, so never mix a vada across the two religions.

The correct answer is C, Ardhamagadhi Prakrit. Mahavira preached in the spoken tongue of Magadha, and the twelve Angas that preserve his teaching are in Ardhamagadhi. They were finally written down at the second Jain council held at Vallabhi in Gujarat under Devardhi Kshamashramana.

Option A, Pali, is the language of the Buddhist Tripitaka, not of the Jain canon, and is the commonest trap in this question. Option B, Sanskrit, was used for later Jain commentaries and for works such as the Kalpasutra of Bhadrabahu, but not for the original Angas. Option D, Apabhramsha, is a later stage of the Prakrits used in medieval Jain poetry of western India. Remember the pair as Buddhism with Pali and Jainism with Ardhamagadhi, both chosen in opposition to ritual Sanskrit.

The correct answer is A, Mahakassapa. He presided over the First Buddhist Council, held at Rajgriha soon after the Mahaparinirvana in the reign of Ajatashatru, whose purpose was to settle the teaching before it could be distorted.

Option B, Ananda, was the Buddha personal attendant and did attend the council, where he recited the sermons that became the Sutta Pitaka, but he did not preside. Option C, Upali, recited the rules of the order that became the Vinaya Pitaka, and is remembered as the barber who joined the Sangha. Option D, Moggaliputta Tissa, presided over the Third Council at Pataliputra in the reign of Ashoka and is credited with the text called the Kathavatthu. The distinction between presiding over a council and reciting a part of the canon in it is exactly what this question tests, so keep the four names and their roles separate while revising the councils.

The correct answer is C, his first sermon. Because early sculptors at Sanchi and Bharhut did not show the Buddha in human form, they used signs, and the wheel stands for the first sermon at Sarnath, which is itself called the turning of the wheel of law.

Option A, his birth, is represented by the lotus and the elephant or bull in these reliefs. Option B, his renunciation, is shown by a riderless horse, recalling Kanthaka carrying him away from Kapilavastu. Option D, his death, is represented by the stupa, the burial mound raised over relics, which is why stupas multiply after the Mahaparinirvana. The footprints and the empty throne stand for his presence in general. This set of symbols is asked in art and culture sections as often as in history.

The correct answer is A, Bhadrabahu and Sthulabhadra. During a long famine in Magadha, Bhadrabahu led a body of monks south to Shravanabelagola in Karnataka while Sthulabhadra stayed in the north and convened a council at Pataliputra. The returning monks refused the relaxed practice they found, and the order divided into the naked Digambaras and the white-robed Shvetambaras.

Option B names Makkhali Gosala, founder of the Ajivika sect, and Jamali, Mahavira own son-in-law and first dissenter, neither of whom caused this split. Option C names Devardhi Kshamashramana, who presided over the later Vallabhi council, and Hemachandra, a Chalukya-age Jain scholar. Option D names the president and the deputy of the Fourth Buddhist Council, who belong to Buddhism entirely. Tradition also places Chandragupta Maurya with Bhadrabahu at Shravanabelagola.