Chapter BUCK to BUDDHA of B by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

BUCKYNE, s. H. bakayan, the tree Melia sempervivens, Roxb. (N. O. Meliaceae). It has a considerable resemblance to the nim tree (see NEEM); and in Bengali is called maha-nim, which is also the Skt. name, mahanimba. It is sometimes erroneously called Persian Lilac.

BUDDHA, BUDDHISM, BUDDHIST. These words are often written with a quite erroneous assumption of precision Bhudda, &c. All that we shall do here is to collect some of the earlier mentions of Buddha and the religion called by his name.

c. 200.—“E [Greek Text] is d tn ’Indn oi tos Botta pÎiqómÎnoi paragglmasin òn di’ upÎrboln sÎmnóthtos Îis qÎòn tÎtimkasi.” Clemens Alexandrinus, Stromaton, Liber I. (Oxford ed., 1715, i. 359).

c. 240.—“Wisdom and deeds have always from time to time been brought to mankind by the messengers of God. So in one age they have been brought to mankind by the messenger called Buddha to India, in another by Zarâdusht to Persia, in another by Jesus to the West. Thereupon this revelation has come down, this prophecy in this last age, through me, Mânî, the messenger of the God of truth to Babylonia.”—The Book of Mani, called Shaburkan, quoted by Albiruni, in his Chronology, tr. by Sachau, p. 190.

c. 400.—“Apud Gymnosophistas Indiae quasi per manus hujus opinionis auctoritas traditur, quod Buddam principem dogmatis eorum, e latere suo virgo generaret. Nec hoc mirum de barbaris, quum Minervam quoque de capite Jovis, et Liberum patrem de femore ejus procreatos, docta finxit Graecia.”—St. Jerome, Adv. Jovinianum, Lib. i. ed. Vallarsii, ii. 309.

c. 440.—“… [Greek Text] Thnikauta gar to ’Empedokleouz tou par’ “Ellhsi filosofou dogma, dia tou Manicaiou cristianismon upekrinato … toutou de tou Skuqianou maqhthz ginetai Bouddaz, proteron Terebinqoz kaloumenoz … k.t.l.” (see the same matter from Georgius Cedrenus below).—Socratis, Hist. Eccles. Lib. I. cap. 22.

c. 840.—“An certè Bragmanorum sequemur opinionem, ut quemadmodum illi sectae suae auctorem Bubdam, per virginis latus narrant exortum, ita nos Christum fuisse praedicemus? Vel magis sic nascitur Dei sapientia de virginis cerebro, quomodo Minerva de Jovis vertice, tamquam Liber Pater de femore? Ut Christicolam de virginis partu non solennis natura, vel auctoritas sacrae lectionis, sed superstitio Gentilis, et commenta perdoceant fabulosa.”—Ratramni Corbeiensis L. de Nativitate Xti., cap. iii. in L. D’Achery, Spicilegium, tom. i. p. 54, Paris, 1723.

c. 870.—“The Indians give in general the name of budd to anything connected with their worship, or which forms the object of their veneration. So, an idol is called budd.”—Biláduri, in Elliot, i. 123.

c. 904.—“Budasaf was the founder of the Sabaean Religion … he preached to mankind renunciation (of this world) and the intimate contemplation of the superior worlds.… There was to be read on the gate of the Naobihar¹ at Balkh an inscription in the Persian tongue of which this is the interpretation: ‘The words of Budasaf: In the courts of kings three things are needed, Sense, Patience, Wealth.’ Below had been written in Arabic: ‘Budasaf lies. If a free man possesses any of the three, he will flee from the courts of Kings.’ ”— Mas’udi, iv. 45 and 49.

1000.—“… pseudo-prophets came forward, the number and history of whom it would be impossible to detail.… The first mentioned is Bûdhâsaf, who came forward in India.”—Albirûnî, Chronology, by Sachau, p. 186. This name given to Buddha is specially interesting as showing a step nearer the true Bodhisattca, the origin of the name ’Ivasaf, under which Buddha became a Saint of the Church, and as elucidating Prof. Max Müller’s ingenious suggestion of that origin (see Chips, &c., iv. 184; see also Academy, Sept. 1, 1883, p. 146).

c. 1030.—“A stone was found there in the temple of the great Budda on which an inscription … purporting that the temple had been founded 50,000 years ago.…”— Al ’Utbi, in Elliot, ii. 39.

c. 1060.—“This madman then, Manes (also called Scythianus) was by race a Brachman, and he had for his teacher Budas, formerly called Terebinthus, who having been brought up by Scythianus in the learning of the Greeks became a follower of the sect of Empedocles (who said there were two first principles opposed to one another), and when he entered Persia declared that he had been born of a virgin, and had been brought up among the hills … and this Budas (alias Terebinthus) did perish, crushed by an unclean spirit.”—Georg. Cedrenus, Hist. Comp., Bonn ed., 455 (old ed. i. 259). This wonderful jumble, mainly copied, as we see, from Socrates (supra), seems to bring Buddha and Manes together. “Many of the ideas of Manicheism were but fragments of Buddhism.” —E. B. Cowell, in Smith’s Dict. of Christ. Biog.

c. 1190:—“Very grieved was Sarang Deva. Constantly he performed the worship of the Arihant; the Buddhist religion he adopted; he wore no sword.”—The Poem of Chand Bardai, paraphr. by Beames, in Ind. Ant. i. 271.

1610.—“… This Prince is called in the histories of him by many names: his proper name was Dramá Rajo; but that by which he has been known since they have held him for a saint is the Budao, which is as much as to say ‘Sage’ … and to this name the Gentiles throughout all India have dedicated