Who presided over the First Buddhist Council held at Rajgriha?

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.