The Education System of the Buddhist Age

The Veda has 2 parts:

1. Karmakanda
2. Jiṋánakanda

The Jiṋánakanda has 2 parts:

1. Aranyaka
2. Upaniśads

So the influence of the Upaniśads on the Giitá and even on Krśńa is very clear.

The influence was expressed when Lord Krśńa began to answer the complicated philosophical questions of Arjuna.

Maharsi Kapila’s Sáḿkhya philosophy is just the philosophical explanation of the Upaniśadik Jiṋánakanda.

Around 200 years after the Mahábhárata, there entered philosophical teachings in:

• the catuspathiis and
• the educational complex of India

In that period, philosophy meant Kapil’s Sáḿkhya philosophy.

The teaching of philosophy started 200 years after the Mahábhárata. But we can say that Kapil is a contemporary of the Mahábhárata, as 200 years is not a very long period.

Back then, if people talked of a man of letters, it meant Kapil.

In the Saḿskrta language the word “Kapila” has acquired the meaning of “first scholar” (adi vidvan), i.e., it was Maharshi Kapil who first received recognition as being a scholar.

During the Mahábhárata age, the panditas who were teaching in the catuspathiis were helped both by the government and by the public.

People considered it to be a sacred deed to help the catuspathiis, which they did with food, clothing, etc.

This was something spontaneous.

Each pandita was the conductor of one catuspathii. There was no such thing as a university.

Each pandita set up his educational system and curriculum according to his wishes and his own teaching.

Each student belonging to a catuspathii was the adopter (dharaka), supporter (vahaka), and patron (pariposaka) of a particular thought.

Students connected to different panditas had considerable variation in their knowledge.

There was internal clash of thoughts and interpretations in all these catuspathiis, i.e., every catuspathii was a small university in itself.

But in the Buddhistic age that was not so.

Instead, controlling universities were there.

In East India, there was Vaneshvarpur Vihara University, which is in the Rajasahi district in present Bangladesh.

In East India, in Amga Desha, in the Bhagalpur district near Kahalgaon, was Vikramashila Vihara University.

In East India, in Patna District, was Nalanda University.

Nalanda was the greatest university, the controlling one.

Towards the frontier side near Peshawar was Taksashila University. This was also a controlling university.

In the Mahábhárata period the university system was not set up by the people.

The difference between the catuspathiis of the Mahábhárata age and the viharas of the Buddhistic age was that the latter were not helped by the public but only by the kings.

This had a very damaging effect. After the end of Buddhism’s supremacy, Neo-Hinduism came in full swing.

All the viharas failed, as none of the kings continued aiding them.

So within only 100 years of the end of the Buddhist states, all the viharas in India ceased to exist.

This is why it is dangerous for schools to depend completely on governmental aid.

Educational institutions should depend on public help and not on governmental help.

“Chátra” was first applied in the Mahábhárata period to any of the pupils staying under the canopy (chatra) of any particular pandit.

As the pupils were under the control of, within the jurisdiction of, one pandit with one school of thought, they were known as “chátra”.

“Chátra” has now wrongly been used to mean any student.

Present students are not chatra. “Chátra” means one who is under the control and jurisdiction (chátra) of a school of thought of one guru.