Sacred Places of The Buddhists, Part 5: Jetavana, Shravasti, India

A documentary film by BOGDAN-FLORIN PAUL

Jetavana, or Jeta's Forest, located in Shravasti, Uttar Pradesh, India, is the place where the Buddha spent the longest time after attaining Enlightenment.

He would travel most of the year through the kingdoms of northern India, but he would spend the three months of the rainy season meditating in one place.

Here in Jetavana, in a wooden hut called Gandhakuti, the Buddha spent 24 rainy seasons out of the 45 years in which he expounded his teaching.

At the time, Jetavana was a forested park located just south of Savatthi, the capital of the Kosala kingdom, one of the great Indian kingdoms of the time.

The Buddha had already visited Savatthi several times, but starting in the twentieth year after attaining Liberation, approximately from the age of 56, he spent all his rainy season retreats here at Jetavana, except for the last one.

The place is still permeated today with the peaceful and luminous atmosphere of his practice.

Anathapindika, an extremely wealthy merchant from Savatthi, thought of buying the Jetavana Park to give it to the Buddha as a residence and a place of meditation.

This place, which at the time was covered by a dense forest, was chosen by Anathapindika because it was pleasant and peaceful, and especially because it was uninhabited.

The price asked by the park's owner, Prince Jeta, son of the Maharaja of Kosala, was exorbitant: the buyer had to cover the entire plot of land with gold coins, placed side by side.

Anathapindika, however, accepted the price without hesitation and brought 40 carts full of bags of gold coins, with which his servants paved the ground of Jetavana.

Anathapindika then built several wooden huts for meditation in the park. History mentions three: Gandhakuti, Kosambakuti, and Anandakuti.

According to the commentaries on the Tipitaka, the hut where the Buddha stayed, Gandhakuti, or the Perfumed Hut, was built of expensive sandalwood.

Another possible explanation for its name is that, during certain types of deep meditation, the space where the meditator sits becomes permeated with a very pleasant fragrance, generated by the state of samadhi.

What is specific to this special fragrance is that it is not carried by air currents, as if the space itself, and not the air, were permeated with the fragrance.

In the Buddha's discourses recorded in the Tipitaka, numerous meditation techniques were listed, from the four states of Brahma, to meditation on the impermanence of the body, meditation on the elements, on colors, on light, on the breath, and so on.

Some meditation techniques were aimed at overcoming certain obstacles, reaching certain levels of meditation or achieving certain siddhis, or were especially recommended for certain types of practitioners, depending on each person's personality.

In the centuries after the Buddha, a manual was even developed to classify the various types of human personalities, probably the first work of psychology in the world.

Interview with Asish Lima, Meditation practitioner, India:

It was a wonderful experience meditating there. People from all over the world were coming there and they were giving respects to the Buddha. It was a joy to see the type of respects they were giving to the person who really deserved, the wonderful genius, the great psychological genius of the world, the Buddha. So it was very inspiring. And I learned a little bit of Pali, so they were chanting Pali chantings and while meditating when I was used to think about what they are chanting, that used to give me lots of energy and overall it was a wonderful, blissful experience. I'm looking forward to go there sometime in the future also.

The Pali sutras of the Tipitaka Canon contain invaluable information for meditation, from the mental attitude that a practitioner must cultivate, to the detailed description of a succession of powers of the heart and mind, known as the Satta Bojjhaṅgā, or Sapta Bodhyanga, the Seven Factors of Enlightenment, which ensure the achievement of the final goal.

The Buddha gave many of his discourses on meditation practice here in Jetavana. More than half of his discourses recorded in the Majjhima Nikaya took place here.

In the discourse recorded in the Kayagata Sati Sutta, the Buddha described several ways to practice continuous mindfulness of the body, the increasingly deeper stages of meditation achieved through these practices, and what the meditator actually feels when he attains them.

By analogy with a man who, walking through the forest, sees the footprints of a giant elephant, which he follows, in the Cūḷa Hatthi Padopama Sutta, he called these stages of meditation "The Footprints of The One Who Has Reached the End of The Path".

In India and the Buddhist countries of Southeast Asia, the footprints of the Buddha, or the feet of one's own teacher, are viewed with reverence and they are considered the sources of Knowledge and Liberation.

The Buddha also had another meditation residence near Savatthi, at Pubbarama, located east of Jetavana.

Pubbarama Vihara was a gift to the Buddha from Visakha, a devout lay follower, and a few important meditation discourses were held here as well.

During the rainy season, through intense practice, many young monks made notable progress in meditation under the guidance of more experienced monks.

The Buddha did not want to interrupt this period of fruitful practice and announced that he would remain in Savatthi for one month longer than usual, until Komudi, the full moon night in October when the blooming of the white water lilies was celebrated.

The news spread, and many bhikkhus gathered at Savatthi on the evening of Komudi.

Before this assembly of monks, in which his most advanced disciples were present, the Buddha explained a complete system of meditation practice, composed of sixteen steps, through which the practitioner, going through the four jhanas, gradually moves from continuous attention to each inbreath and outbreath, through the four phases of attention to the body, sensations, states of mind and the fundamental mechanisms of being, until the realization of the Ultimate Truth.

This system of practice, recorded in the Anapana Sati Sutta, is unique in its power to lead the practitioner all the way, from the initial stage of calming the mind to achieving the final goal, the attainment of Liberation.

It remains the central point of all meditative practices from the time of the Buddha that have been preserved to this day, in the Tipitaka Canon.

Asish Lima, meditation practitioner, India:

The Jhanas are basically the deep concentration.

So in the first phase of Jhana, like which the Buddha has described, there is Vitakka and Vichara, which is thought and evaluation, there is Piti, which is mental pleasantness, there is Sukha, which is bodily pleasure, and then there is Ekagrata, which is one-pointedness.

So when you practice the mindfulness of breathing, for a long time —, the instruction has been given by the Buddha in the Anapanasati Sutta —, then you go through the first jhana, followed by the second, third jhana, and they've got different stages, in the second jhana, like, your Vitakka and Vichara, it comes out. You have three or four things left. Similarly, in the third, and the fourth jhana.

The jhanas are important in the sense that it makes your mind very concentrated, number one, and the mind always seeks some food, like, we want some food from the outside world, some entertainment on the mobile phone or some..., it needs food, it needs food all the time, even if we are sleeping.

So jhanas are a very nutritious source of food for the mind. It's full of awareness, full of concentration pleasure, which is one of the factors of Enlightenment also.

In the centuries that followed, monasteries and temples were built successively in the Jetavana park.

One of the monasteries, described by Chinese pilgrims, had seven floors.

Later, with the Muslim invasion at the end of the 12th century, these buildings would be burned down and destroyed, leaving only ruins covered over time by earth and forest.

The commentary on one of the Jataka tales says that at the entrance to Jetavana Park, on the initiative of Ananda, with the consent of the Buddha, and with the help of Mahakasyapa and Anathapindika, from a seed of the Bodhi tree at Bodhi Gaya, a tree was planted that would become known as the Ananda Bodhi Tree.

A Bodhi tree still grows within the park today and is being revered by Buddhist pilgrims as the Ananda Bodhi Tree.

The ruins at Jetavana and Shravasti were first discovered in 1863 by British archaeologist Alexander Cunningham, who identified them based on accounts written by the Chinese pilgrims Fa Hien and Xuen Zhang.

Further archaeological excavations followed in the 19th and 20th centuries, with radioactive carbon dating by a team of Japanese archaeologists between 1986 and 1996.

The site was confirmed as ancient Jetavana based on inscriptions on statues found inside the ruins.

Jetavana has returned today to its simple peace of old, preserving the special charm of the meditation place that it was, and still is.

Through the efforts of generations and generations of Buddhist yogis, bhikkhus, and translators, the words of the Buddha can still be put into practice today, anywhere in the world, including here, in ancient Jetavana.

Asish Lima, meditation practitioner, India:

Meditation for me personally, it's like a touchstone, where, like, the goldsmith takes some gold and he rubs the gold on the touchstone and he can see the purity of it.

So when we meditate more, the mind becomes more sensitive. When the mind becomes more sensitive, we get to know what is right and what is wrong. Nobody has to tell us.

If you are chasing some sensual pleasure, obviously there is some allure in it, there is some thrill in it, there is a pleasure in it, but there is a drawback also. So when you meditate and when your mind becomes very sensitive, you get to see the drawback, and because of that you let go those kind of things which are harmful to you.

Just like a person who is holding a burning charcoal, that person does not have to think that it's good or bad for me, that person will just throw it away because the hand is so sensitive to the heatness.

Similarly when we meditate, the sensitivity increases, and we get to know so much about the harmful sides of the sensual pleasure which leads to a better life. So for me it's like to keep on meditating, to make the mind more and more sensitive, to get to know the habit patterns of the mind in a deeper manner, that's a very fascinating journey. It's so fascinating how the mind works.

So for me it's just like, I'm a humble student of the mind when I'm meditating. I'm just seeing how the mind works. So, it's a lifelong thing, for me.

Ajay Pratap Shakya, a Buddhist monk, is chanting a few verses from the Pali Dhammapada, in Jetavana, India:

Mind precedes all states and phenomena,
mind is their chief, they are all mind-wrought.

If a man speaks or acts with an evil mind,
pain follows him, as the wheel follows the foot
of the ox that draws the carriage.

Mind precedes all states and phenomena,
mind is their chief, they are all mind-wrought.
If a man speaks or acts with a pure mind,
happiness follows him, like his never-departing shadow.

“He insulted me, he struck me, he overpowered me,
he robbed me,” — in those who harbour such thoughts,
hatred will never cease.

“He insulted me, he struck me, he overpowered me,
he robbed me,” — in those who do not harbour such thoughts,
hatred will cease.

For hatred doesn't ever cease by hatred:
hatred ceases by non-hatred, this is the eternal law.

He who lives looking for pleasures only,
his senses uncontrolled,
immoderate in his food, indolent and without energy,
Māra will certainly overthrow him,
as the storm throws down a weak tree.

He who wishes to put on the monk’s yellow robe
without having cleansed himself from depravity,
devoid of self-control and truthfulness,
is unworthy of the monk’s yellow robe.

Not by matted hair, nor by family, nor by birth
does one become a holy man, a Brahman;
but he in whom there is truth and righteousness,
he is pure, he is a holy man, a Brahman.

If by way of body, speech or mind, through heedlessness,
I have done anything wrong,
please forgive me, Venerable Sir, of supreme wisdom,
The One Who Travelled The Way to Its End.

If by way of body, speech or mind, through heedlessness,
I have done anything wrong,
please forgive me, O Dhamma, of good practice,
unsurpassed.

If by way of body, speech or mind, through heedlessness,
I have done anything wrong,
please forgive me, O Sangha, of good practice,
unsurpassed.

All that is evil, not to do,
to engage in doing right,
and one’s own mind to purify,
this is the teaching of the Buddha.

Sacred Places of The Buddhists, Part 5: Jetavana, Shravasti, India

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE