Buddha and His Dhamma

Book 2: Campaign of Conversion Part 2 The Buddha’s First Sermon v. 2-10

1. Introduction

The Buddha and His Dhamma was B.R. Ambedkar's last work. Published posthumously, it
presented a radical reorientation of Buddhist thought and literature, aptly called Navayana. It
deals with Ambedkar's conceptualization of Buddhism and the possibilities it offered for
liberation and upliftment of the Dalits. It presents his reflections on the life of the Buddha, his
teachings, and the spread of Buddhism by interweaving anecdotes with detailed analyses of the
religion's basic tenets. It is very interesting to note the modification of source materials taken up
by Ambedkar for the push for his ideology. The paper looks at the traditional understanding of
Buddha’s First Sermon and how Ambedkar portrays his version in The Buddha and His
Dhamma.

1.1. Ambedkar and Buddhism

After years of experiencing the oppressive caste system in Hinduism, Ambedkar decided to
forsake Hinduism and convert to Buddhism, because to him Buddhism was a teaching of
"liberty, equality and humanity," which he firmly believed in. 1 It was his wish to look to a
‘Bhartiya’ faith and not a faith from another land although he looked into possibilities of
conversion to other religions such as Christianity and Islam, especially Sikhism. It is in this
context that we see the reappraisal by Ambedkar of the traditional Buddhist terms of construction
as per the navyana2 understanding. Ambedkar’s preoccupation with providing an account of
Buddhism that could serve his broader political ambition of liberation and uplifting of the Dalits
naturally contributed to his ambiguous use of traditional terms. Ambedkar was attracted to the
Buddha because he discarded not only the sacred scriptures that oppressed and exploited people,
but also their authority. He stated that, “You must not only discard the shastras, you must deny
the authority, as did Buddha and Nanak.”3
1
Dhananjay Keer, Dr. Ambedkar: Life and Mission (Mumbai: Popular Prakashan Pvt. Ltd, 1954), 14
2
Ambedkar’s New Vehicle as against the other yanas such as Teravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana
3
B. R. Ambedkar, Annihilation of Caste: The Annotated Critical Edition, edited by S. Anand (New Delhi:
Navayana, 2014), 288

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 2. Traditional Background to the First Sermon (Dhammacakka)4

The story of the Buddha's first sermon begins with the story of the Buddha's enlightenment. This
is said to have happened at Bodh Gaya, in the modern Indian state of Bihar.

Before his realization, the future Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, had been traveling with five
companions, all ascetics. Together they had sought enlightenment through extreme deprivation
and self-mortification -- fasting, sleeping on stones, living outdoors with little clothing -- in the
belief that making themselves suffer would cause a spiritual breakthrough. Siddhartha Gautama
eventually realized that enlightenment would be found through mental cultivation, not through
punishing his body. When he gave up ascetic practices to prepare himself for meditation, his five
companions left him in disgust. After his awakening, the Buddha remained at Bodh Gaya for a
time and considered what to do next. What he had realized was so far outside ordinary human
experience or understanding that he wondered how he could explain it. Yet as great as the
challenge was, the Buddha was too compassionate to keep what he had realized to himself. He
decided that there was a way he could teach people to realize for themselves what he had
realized. And he decided to seek out his five companions and offer to teach them. He found them
at a deer park in Isipatana, which is now called Sarnath, near Benares. This was said to be on a
full moon day of the eighth lunar month, which usually falls in July. This is called
Dhammacakka.5 This sets the scene for one of the most auspicious events in Buddhist history,
the first turning of the dharma wheel.6 Sometimes the dharma wheel is presented in a tableau,
supported on a lotus flower pedestal with two deer, a buck, and a doe on either side. According
to Buddhist legend, the park was home to a herd of ruru deer, and the deer gathered around to
listen to the sermon. The deer depicted by the dharma wheel reminds us that the Buddha taught
to save all beings, not just humans. Typically, when the dharma wheel is represented with deer,
the wheel must be twice the height of the deer. The deer are shown with legs folded under them,
gazing serenely at the wheel with their noses lifted. This recalls the first sermon given by
the historical Buddha after his enlightenment. The sermon is said to have been given to five
4
Dhamma means Wisdom or Knowledge and Cakka means establishment or foundation
5
See Narada Thera Vajirarama, The Buddha and His Teachings (Colombo:1964), 76
6
"Turning the dharma wheel" is a metaphor for the Buddha's teaching of the dharma in the world. In Mahayana
Buddhism, it is said the Buddha turned the dharma wheel three times. Barbara O'Brien, "Buddha's First Sermon."
Learn Religions. https://www.learnreligions.com/the-buddhas-first-sermon-449788 (accessed September 13, 2022).

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mendicants/ ascetics in Sarnath, a deer park in what is now Uttar Pradesh, India. The first turning
was the sermon in the deer park, after the Buddha's enlightenment. The Buddha began with the
doctrine of the Middle Way, which is simply that the path to enlightenment lies between
extremes of self-indulgence and self-denial.

2.1. Ambedkar’s position on the Sermon

Ambedkar was a rationalist logician. He was not of a high opinion of the background of the said
portion as he was particularly not concerned with the traditional understanding unless there was a
social liberative dimension. According to Christopher S. Queen, for Ambedkar it is more honest
and hopeful to alter the social conditions that cause massive suffering such as poverty and
injustice than to attempt to convince the poor or the oppressed that they might achieve individual
happiness in spite of their circumstances. Ambedkar was particularly alert to doubts containing
the canonical record as when he marked in in red pencil the following message from Herman
Oldenberg’s The Buddha: His life, His Doctrine, His Order:

There is a sermon at Banaras which tradition gives as the opening of the ministry of the Buddha
by which he, as his disciples expressed themselves, ‘has set in motion the wheel of the law.’ One
may entertain whatever opinion he pleases regarding the historical truth with which the sermon
is reported - I am inclined for my part to entertain no very high opinion of it (Ambedkar 1928:
130).7

§3. The Buddha's First Sermon

Both Sanders and Vasant Moon analyse that in the Majjhima Nikaya, the whole story of his
welcome (the Buddha’s) by the five Parivrajakas is in the first person where as in this book it is
in the third person.8 This it is clear that this is Ambedkar’s vantage point. For the said text,
Ambedkar has sourced his text of Buddha according to Sanyutta Nikaya, Vinaya (Mahavagga)
and Lalit Vistara.
7
Christopher S. Queen, “Ambedkar’s Dhamma” in Reconstructing the World: B. R. Ambedkar and Buddhism in
India edited by Surendra Jondhale and Johannes Beltz (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004), 141
8
Vasant Moon, “Pali and Other Sources of “The Buddha and His Dhamma”” in Dr. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR
WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Vol. 11 – SUPPLEMENT (Mumbai: Education Department- Government of
Maharashtra, 1995), 29

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    v 2. He said there were two extremes, a life of pleasure and a life of self-mortification.

According to Buddha, the two extremes in life are misleading. The Path to Happiness was not a
purely Indian pursuit. It was sought after by the Greek Philosophers too. The above verse bears
semblance to the ethic of Aristotle in his Nichomachean Ethics. “Happiness depends on
ourselves.” More than anybody else, Aristotle enshrines happiness as a central purpose of human
life and a goal in itself. As a result, he devotes more space to the topic of happiness than many
modern thinkers. The greatest “discovery” of Aristotle in this field is his almost mathematical
definition of virtue (which in Greek means ‘excellence’). It is always a middle point, or “mean”,
between two extremes: one of excess and another of deficiency. Moreover, virtue must always be
in the right measure: neither too much nor too little, at the right time, with regard to the right
person or thing, with the right motive and in the right way. Thus, to act virtuously is not just
about ‘being good’, it is to become an expert in the art of living. His recommendation in most
cases to follow the way of the difficult, rather than the way of the pleasurable.

    v 3. One says let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. The other says, kill
all vasanas (desires) because they bring rebirth. He rejected both as unbecoming to man.

‘Let as eat and drink; for tomorrow we die.’ This is referenced to the Bible in Isaiah 22:13 and
contrasted by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:32. It is very similar to the Epicurean maxim if men
could only look to life in the present, they can find their end in pleasure. This is evident even in
the line of thought of modern Materialism. Even when Ambedkar has Buddha say to Kill all
vasnas (desires), this has biblical and later Christian connotations. St. Paul pushes for purity
from desires of the flesh. “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its
passions and desires.” (Galatians 5:24). Asceticism and self-mortification were subscribed by the
monastic movements across cross cultural religious divides. Many ascetics believe the action of
purifying the body helps to purify the soul, and thus obtain a greater connection with the Divine
or find inner peace.9 These ways were rejected by Buddha.

9
Asceticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asceticism (accessed on September 15, 2022)

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   v 4. He was a believer in the Madhyama Marga (Majjhima Patipada), the middle path,
which is neither the path of pleasure nor the path of self-mortification.

Majjhimā-patipadā or the 'Middle path', as per traditional understanding, is The Noble Eightfold
Middle Path which, by avoiding the two extremes of sensual lust and self-torment, leads to
enlightenment and deliverance from suffering.

To give oneself up to indulgence in sensual pleasure kāma-sukha the base, common, vulgar,
unholy, unprofitable; and also to give oneself up to self-torment atta-kilamatha the painful,
unholy, unprofitable, both these two extremes the Perfect One has avoided and has found the
Middle path which causes one both to see and to know, and which leads to peace, to
discernment, to enlightenment, to Nibbāna. It is the Noble 8-fold path, the way that leads to the
ceasing of suffering, namely: right understanding, right thought, right speech, right bodily action,
right livelihood, right effort, right awareness or mindfulness, and right concentration. 10
The
Eight fold Path leads one to liberation or “emptiness” – to get rid of attachments and desires
which binds us to the world. 11

The upkeep of the ‘Noble eight-fold path’ is a part of two of the 22 vows to be taken by
Ambedkar himself.12 For Ambedkar, the understanding of the word enlightenment is different
than the traditional understanding of nibbana (as a self-conscious liberation) but more in sense
related to eclairrissement (as a civic achievement of liberty, equality and fraternity)13

  v  5. "Answer me this," he said to the Parivrajakas. "So long as your self remains active
and continues to lust after either worldly or heavenly pleasures, is not all mortification
vain?" And they answered, "It is as thou sayest."

10
Maha Thera Nyanatiloka. Manual of Buddhist Terms and Doctrines (Colombo: Buddhist Publication Society,
1952), 103 in https://www.dhammawiki.com/index.php/Majjhima-patipada (accessed on September 15, 2022)
11
Ambrose Mong, “Asian Images of Jesus” Bangalore Theological Forum, 48/1 (June 2016), 8
12
Aakash Singh Rathore and Ajay Verma, “Editors Introduction” in B. R. Ambedkar The Buddha and His Dhamma:
A Critical Edition (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011), xxi
13
Aakash Singh Rathore and Ajay Verma, “Editors Introduction” in B. R. Ambedkar The Buddha and His Dhamma:
A Critical Edition, xxii

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Buddha problematizes the aim of self-mortification as even the negation of this worldly
pleasure seeks to gain heavenly pleasure. Thus self continues to lust in spite of mortification.
Even Augustine sharply criticizes the “philosophy of this world” censured in the New
Testament that distracts from Christ (Colossians 2:8). 14 Thus the middle path is a way out of
the pleasures of life. The direction of Ambedkar’s thought is towards the ethical and social,
away from the mystical and metaphysical.15

    v 6. "How can ye be free from self by leading a wretched life of self-mortification, if ye do
not thereby succeed in quenching the fires of lust?" And they replied, "It is as thou sayest."

The Buddha had abandoned self-torture and extreme fasting and took normal food after giving
up extreme asceticism. Yet his mind was active. The fires of lust appeal to the sensual side of
human nature. Thus the Buddha had an inward search for a new way away from the rigorous
ascetic practices of the time.

  v  7. "Only when the self in ye has been conquered [so] that ye are free from lust; ye will
then not desire worldly pleasures, and the satisfaction of your natural wants will not defile
ye. Let ye eat and drink according to the needs of your body.

Since the basic idea of nibbana is the exercise of control of flames not the passion, for the
Buddha to live in nibbana is dhamma. Ambedkar understood nibanna as enough control over
passions so as to enable one to walk the path of righteousness. 16 Thus the importance given to
getting rid of greed, which is the root cause of social problem’s is as important as the need to
control ones passion.

14
Christian Tornau, “Saint Augustine", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2020 Edition), Edward
N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2020/entries/augustine/>.
15
Adele Fiske and Christoph Emmrich, “B. R. Ambedkar’s The Buddha and His Dhamma” in Reconstructing the
World: B. R. Ambedkar and Buddhism in India edited by Surendra Jondhale and Johannes Beltz (New Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 2004), 98
16
Sam P. Mathew, “Ambedkar’s Interpretation of Buddha’s Message and Jesus’ Message in the Synoptic Gospel”
Bangalore Theological Forum, 48/2 (Dec 2016), 24

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   v 8. "Sensuality of all kinds is enervating. The sensual man is a slave of his passion. All
pleasure-seeking is degrading and vulgar. But I say unto you that to satisfy the needs of life
is not an evil: to keep the body in good health is a duty, or otherwise you shall not be able
to keep your mind strong and clear and have the lamp of wisdom burning.

It is very clear in the understanding of Ambedkar that Buddha gave immense importance to the
mind body connection. The health of Body is a needed for a healthy mind and this leads to the
light of wisdom. According to Ambedkarite Buddhist Shashank Kamble in Keep the Lamp of
Wisdom Burning, “Babasaheb says in The Buddha and His Dhamma in BOOK VII, “Rajagraha
from Lumbini is not less than 250 miles. These distances the Lord walked on foot. He did not
even use a bullock-cart.” Lord Buddha exemplifies this great energy, who ate only one meal per
day, and was still able to walk more than 250 miles. He also mentions that Babasaheb Ambedkar
displayed this same immense energy throughout his lifetime. His energy for acquiring
knowledge and transforming millions of lives was definitely great. Studying 18 to 21 hours per
day with traveling all over India, US and UK requires tremendous zeal and passion.”17

   v 9. "Know ye, O Parivrajakas, that there are these two extremes which man ought not to
follow--the habitual indulgence on the one hand, of those things whose attraction depends
upon the passions, and especially of sensuality--a low and pagan way of seeking
satisfaction, unworthy, unprofitable, and the habitual practice thereof; and on the other
hand, of asceticism or self-mortification, which is painful, unworthy, and unprofitable.

Ambedkar in his Writings and Speeches refers to a theory of utility. The utility of an object
varies according to the varying condition of the organism needing satisfaction. Even an object of
our strongest desire like food may please or disgust, according as we are hungry or have over-
indulged the appetite. Thus utility diminishes as satisfaction increases. In accordance with the
habitual indulgence, he goes on to refer to a theory by Prof Gidding in this regard, “The hunger
of the neglected parts of our nature normally takes possession of consciousness, and diverts our

17
Shashank Kamble, “Keep the Lamp of Wisdom Burning” in Round Table India in
https://www.roundtableindia.co.in/keep-the-lamp-of-wisdom-burning/ (accessed on September 15, 2022)

7
attention and our efforts from the organ which is receiving more than its due share of
indulgence.”18

Thus human nature is against one sided development. The economic dimension in Ambedkar’s
thought is reflected even in the other extreme which is extreme asceticism which he specifically
refers to as being unprofitable.

  v  10. "There is a middle path which avoids both these extremes. Know ye, that, this is the
path which I preach."

The middle path as proposed by Buddha was propounded by Ambedkar too as it gave way for
holistic development in human beings.

3. Buddhism & Christianity: Faith & Praxis

In regard to the authority of Buddha and Christ we can see marked differences. Why did
Buddha’s disciples obey the discipline? Their position was not like that of the Christians who
were dependent on the divine authority of Jesus and had absolute faith in him. The Buddhists’
obedience was not a heteronomous response to the duty imposed by God but, instead, it was
practiced primarily for the liberation of each individual. Autonomy was emphasized - Buddha
and communal faith were secondary.  The heteronomous “Other power” oriented authority of
Christianity and the autonomous “self-power” oriented authority of Buddhism lead to
soteriological differences.19

Marcus Borg, a well-known New Testament Scholar, acknowledges the counter cultural aspects
in the teaching and practice of Jesus and Buddha when he says, “Jesus and the Buddha were
teachers of a world-subverting wisdom that undermined and challenged conventional ways of
seeing and being in their time and in every time.” 20 Despite similarities between the two, Borg

18
Ambedkar, DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Vol. 1 (Mumbai: Education
Department- Government of Maharashtra, 1995), 490
19
Chai- Shin Yu, Early Buddhism and Christianity (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1986), 199
20
Marcus Borg, “Editors Preface”, Marcus Borg (ed.), Jesus and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings (Ulysses Press,
2004, Kindle Edition), 84

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says that the Buddha did not have the ‘social and political passion’ Jesus had. 21 Ambedkar’s
interpretation of the teaching and practice of the Buddha serves as a corrective to such a
misunderstanding of the Buddha’s message.22

4. Conclusion

Far from creating a religion, Ambedkar reinvented one. He held Buddhism to be a social
philosophy based on morality and science, and not on religion at all. Buddhism was a social
institution as well as a personal concern for purifying body, speech and mind, and attaining
nibbana. Ambedkar’s most important innovation was his viewing of Buddhism as totally
secularist and anti-traditional. According to the analysis of Raosaheb Kasbe, Ambedkar’s
Buddha is not just a traditional Buddha; but a Marx like Buddha.23

The social message of the Buddha, as Ambedkar interpreted, is derived from the template of the
basic teachings of the Buddha on the four-noble truths and the eight fold path which are
generally interpreted as focusing only on the individual. According to Sam P. Mathew,
Ambedkar carefully examined the scriptures to cull out the social message of Buddha. Ambedkar
argued convincingly that the teachings and practice of the Buddha was intended to liberate
people from social oppression based on caste, gender and class and endeavored to create a
society based on justice, equality, peace, fraternity and liberty.24

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21
Marcus Borg (ed.), Jesus and Buddha, location 115
22
Sam P. Mathew, “Ambedkar’s Interpretation of Buddha’s Message and Jesus’ Message in the Synoptic Gospel”
Bangalore Theological Forum, 48/2 (Dec 2016), 22
23
Y. T. Vinayaraj, “Ambedkar’s Political Thought,” Bangalore Theological Forum, 48/2 (Dec 2016), 4
24
Sam P Mathew, “Ambedkar’s Interpretation of Buddha’s Message and Jesus’ Message in the Synoptic Gospel”
Bangalore Theological Forum, 48/2 (Dec 2016), 27

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