1.
Religious text
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Religious texts are texts which religious traditions consider to be central to their religious practice or set of beliefs. It is not possible to create an exhaustive list of religious texts, one of the oldest known religious texts is the Kesh Temple Hymn of Ancient Sumer, a set of inscribed clay tablets which scholars typically date around 2600 BCE. For example, the content of a Protestant Bible may differ from the content of a Catholic Bible, the word canon comes from the Sumerian word meaning standard. Hierographology is the study of sacred texts, the following is an in-exhaustive list of links to specific religious texts which may be used for further, more in-depth study. The writings of Franklin Albert Jones a. k. a, some denominations also include the Apocrypha. For Protestantism, this is the 66-book canon - the Jewish Tanakh of 24 books divided differently, some denominations also include the 15 books of the Apocrypha between the Old Testament and the New Testament, for a total of 81 books. For Catholicism, this includes seven deuterocanonical books in the Old Testament for a total of 73 books, called the Canon of Trent. For the Eastern Orthodox Church, this includes the anagignoskomena, which consist of the Catholic deuterocanon, plus 3 Maccabees, Psalm 151, the Prayer of Manasseh,4 Maccabees is considered to be canonical by the Georgian Orthodox Church. Some Syriac churches accept the Letter of Baruch as scripture, christian Scientists The Bible Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. This textbook, along with the Bible, serves as the permanent impersonal pastor of the church, the Community of Christ uses the Joseph Smith Translation, which it calls the Inspired Version, as well as updated modern translations. Seventh-day Adventists The Bible The writings of Ellen White are held to a status, though not equal with the Bible. Also known as the Gospel of Mani and The Living Gospel the Treasure of Life the Pragmateia the Book of Mysteries The Book of Giants the Epistles the Psalms, the Shabuhragan The Arzhang The Kephalaia, Discourses, found in Coptic translation. Odù Ifá Jaap Verduijns Odu Ifa Collection Primary religious texts, that is, the Avesta collection, The Yasna, the Visperad, a collection of supplements to the Yasna. The Yashts, hymns in honor of the divinities, the Vendidad, describes the various forms of evil spirits and ways to confound them. Shorter texts and prayers, the Yashts the five Nyaishes, the Sirozeh, there are some 60 secondary religious texts, none of which are considered scripture. The Khordeh Avesta, Zoroastrian prayer book for lay people from the Avesta, religious full text online library Ancient texts library Internet Sacred Text Archive
2.
Wat Chedi Liam
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Wat Chedi Liam is one of the wats in the ancient Thai city of Wiang Kum Kam, now part of present-day Chiang Mai. The original name Wat Ku Kham means The temple of the Gold Chedi, the temple was built c.1287 and remained in use during the early Lan Na period after the new city of Chiang Mai had been established by King Mangrai the Great. The current buildings are from a renovation in 1908 CE by a Burmese trader, because of this many of the decorations of the wat are Burmese in style. For example, all but one of the Buddha images on the chedi are wearing the yellow Burmese colourings rather than the white Thai colours, the chedi was also renovated in 1992 CE when a number of other improvements were made to the site. Not all of these improvements were popular, nor were some needed repairs carried out, despite its great age the wat is used in much the same way as later wats. The Chedi is a design common in the early Lanna period. Each corner of the chedi is guarded by a large, outward facing lion, the main hall decorations are in very good condition both inside and out. History of Wiang Kum Kam & Ancient remains - Anonymous
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Thailand
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Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand, formerly known as Siam, is a country at the centre of the Indochinese peninsula in Southeast Asia. With a total area of approximately 513,000 km2, Thailand is the worlds 51st-largest country and it is the 20th-most-populous country in the world, with around 66 million people. The capital and largest city is Bangkok, Thailand is a constitutional monarchy and has switched between parliamentary democracy and military junta for decades, the latest coup being in May 2014 by the National Council for Peace and Order. Its capital and most populous city is Bangkok and its maritime boundaries include Vietnam in the Gulf of Thailand to the southeast, and Indonesia and India on the Andaman Sea to the southwest. The Thai economy is the worlds 20th largest by GDP at PPP and it became a newly industrialised country and a major exporter in the 1990s. Manufacturing, agriculture, and tourism are leading sectors of the economy and it is considered a middle power in the region and around the world. The country has always been called Mueang Thai by its citizens, by outsiders prior to 1949, it was usually known by the exonym Siam. The word Siam has been identified with the Sanskrit Śyāma, the names Shan and A-hom seem to be variants of the same word. The word Śyâma is possibly not its origin, but a learned, another theory is the name derives from Chinese, Ayutthaya emerged as a dominant centre in the late fourteenth century. The Chinese called this region Xian, which the Portuguese converted into Siam, the signature of King Mongkut reads SPPM Mongkut King of the Siamese, giving the name Siam official status until 24 June 1939 when it was changed to Thailand. Thailand was renamed Siam from 1945 to 11 May 1949, after which it reverted to Thailand. According to George Cœdès, the word Thai means free man in the Thai language, ratcha Anachak Thai means kingdom of Thailand or kingdom of Thai. Etymologically, its components are, ratcha, -ana- -chak, the Thai National Anthem, written by Luang Saranupraphan during the extremely patriotic 1930s, refers to the Thai nation as, prathet Thai. The first line of the anthem is, prathet thai ruam lueat nuea chat chuea thai, Thailand is the unity of Thai flesh. There is evidence of habitation in Thailand that has been dated at 40,000 years before the present. Similar to other regions in Southeast Asia, Thailand was heavily influenced by the culture and religions of India, Thailand in its earliest days was under the rule of the Khmer Empire, which had strong Hindu roots, and the influence among Thais remains even today. Voretzsch believes that Buddhism must have been flowing into Siam from India in the time of the Indian Emperor Ashoka of the Maurya Empire, later Thailand was influenced by the south Indian Pallava dynasty and north Indian Gupta Empire. The Menam Basin was originally populated by the Mons, and the location of Dvaravati in the 7th century, the History of the Yuan mentions an embassy from the kingdom of Sukhothai in 1282
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Gautama Buddha
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Gautama Buddha, also known as Siddhārtha Gautama, Shakyamuni Buddha, or simply the Buddha, after the title of Buddha, was an ascetic and sage, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. He is believed to have lived and taught mostly in the part of ancient India sometime between the sixth and fourth centuries BCE. Gautama taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and the severe asceticism found in the śramaṇa movement common in his region and he later taught throughout other regions of eastern India such as Magadha and Kosala. Gautama is the figure in Buddhism. He is recognized by Buddhists as a teacher who attained full Buddhahood. Accounts of his life, discourses, and monastic rules are believed by Buddhists to have been summarized after his death, various collections of teachings attributed to him were passed down by oral tradition and first committed to writing about 400 years later. Scholars are hesitant to make unqualified claims about the facts of the Buddhas life. Apart from the Vedic Brahmins, the Buddhas lifetime coincided with the flourishing of influential schools of thought like Ājīvika, Cārvāka, Jainism. Brahmajala Sutta records sixty-two such schools of thought, thus, Buddha was just one of the many śramaṇa philosophers of that time. The times of Gautamas birth and death are uncertain, most historians in the early 20th century dated his lifetime as circa 563 BCE to 483 BCE. These alternative chronologies, however, have not yet accepted by all historians. It was either a republic, or an oligarchy, and his father was an elected chieftain. He obtained his enlightenment in Bodh Gaya, gave his first sermon in Sarnath, no written records about Gautama were found from his lifetime or some centuries thereafter. One Edict of Asoka, who reigned from circa 269 BCE to 232 BCE, another one of his edicts mentions the titles of several Dhamma texts, establishing the existence of a written Buddhist tradition at least by the time of the Maurya era. These texts may be the precursor of the Pāli Canon and they are written in the Gāndhārī language using the Kharosthi script on twenty-seven birch bark manuscripts and date from the first century BCE to the third century CE. The sources for the life of Siddhārtha Gautama are a variety of different and these include the Buddhacarita, Lalitavistara Sūtra, Mahāvastu, and the Nidānakathā. Of these, the Buddhacarita is the earliest full biography, a poem written by the poet Aśvaghoṣa in the first century CE. The Lalitavistara Sūtra is the next oldest biography, a Mahāyāna/Sarvāstivāda biography dating to the 3rd century CE, the Mahāvastu from the Mahāsāṃghika Lokottaravāda tradition is another major biography, composed incrementally until perhaps the 4th century CE
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Miraculous births
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‘Ea, his triumph over his enemies secured, in his sacred chamber in profound peace he rested. ’ Then he took over the place which Apsu had used for his cult and dwelt there with his spouse, Damkina. ”It was here that Marduk, the “most potent and wisest of gods” was created in the heart of Apsu and “He who begot him was Ea, his father, she who conceived him was Damkina, his mother”. According to Norman Lockyer, Ea, Ia, or Oannes was the god of Babylon. He was a ‘Great God, Maker of Men, Potter, Artist and Workman. ’ He formed a Triad with Anu and he was believed to have been reincarnated several times. Berossos, priest of the Temple of Bel, in Babylon, the stories of Buddha’s unusual birth developed through the centuries. These are the Majjhima-Nikāya,123 Acchariyabbhutadhammasuta III, 119-124, and Māhapadānasutta, Dīgha ii.12. 12, is the description of the incarnation of the Vipassī Buddha, now Vipassi, brethren, when, as Bodhisat, he ceased to belong to the hosts of the heaven of Delight, descended into his mother’s womb mindful and self-possessed. According to this text, the Vipassī Buddha was the first of six incarnations to precede Gautama, the others listed are Sikhī, Vessabhū, Kakusandha, Koṇāgamana, and Kassapa. The most popular account of the birth of Buddha is in the Nidanakatha Jataka which accounted for the lives of Buddha in previous incarnations. In this account, the “Great Being” chose the time and place of his birth, the tribe into which he would be born, and who his mother would be. In the time chosen by him, Maya, his mother, fell asleep, in her dream the Great Being soon entered her womb from her side, in the form of a white elephant. When she woke, she told her dream to the Raja, some Taoist schools held that Laozi was conceived when his mother gazed upon a falling star. He was born while his mother was leaning against a plum tree, Laozi was said to have emerged as an old man with a full grey beard. This may be because his name – Old Master – can also be read as Old Child, there are some legends about the birth of Abaoji, the Emperor Taizu of Liao. According to the legends, his mother dreamed that the sun fell from the sky, when she gave birth, the room is said to have become filled with a mysterious light and extraordinary fragrance. As a newborn, his body was that of a three-year-old, and the legends go on to say that he was walking at the age of three months. According to tradition of the Catholic church, the Virgin Marys parents, St. Anne and St. Joachim, were childless, during the conception of Mary, she was preserved from the stain of original sin. The Gospel of Luke and the Gospel of Matthew describe the nativity of Jesus, in the account in the Gospel of Luke, Mary learns from the angel Gabriel that she will conceive and bear a child. When she asks how this can be, since she is a virgin, he tells her that the Holy Spirit would come upon her and she responds, Here am I, the servant of the Lord, let it be with me according to your word
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Greco-Buddhist art
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It is also a strong example of cultural syncretism between eastern and western traditions. The influence of Greco-Buddhist art also spread northward towards Central Asia, strongly affecting the art of the Tarim Basin, and ultimately the arts of China, Korea, and Japan. The clearest examples of Hellenistic art are found in the coins of the Greco-Bactrian kings of the period, fortified Greek cities, such as Sirkap in northern Pakistan, were established. Architectural styles used Hellenistic decorative motifs such as fruit garland and scrolls, stone palettes for aromatic oils representing purely Hellenistic themes such as a Nereid riding a Ketos sea monster are found. In Hadda, Hellenistic deities, such as Atlas are found, wind gods are depicted, which will affect the representation of wind deities as far as Japan. Dionysiac scenes represent people in Classical style drinking wine from amphoras and this artistic trend then developed for several centuries and seemed to flourish further during the Kushan Empire from the 1st century AD. Greco-Buddhist art depicts the life of the Buddha in a manner, probably by incorporating the real-life models. The Bodhisattvas are depicted as bare-chested and jewelled Indian princes, the buildings in which they are depicted incorporate Greek style, with the ubiquitous Indo-Corinthian capitals and Greek decorative scrolls. Surrounding deities form a pantheon of Greek and Indian gods, stucco as well as stone was widely used by sculptors in Gandhara for the decoration of monastic and cult buildings. Stucco provided the artist with a medium of great plasticity, enabling a high degree of expressiveness to be given to the sculpture, sculpting in stucco was popular wherever Buddhism spread from Gandhara - India, Afghanistan, Central Asia and China. It then lost this sophisticated realism, becoming progressively more symbolic, the style is Greek, adorned with Corinthian columns in excellent Hellenistic execution. Later in Hadda, the Greek divinity Atlas is represented holding Buddhist monuments with decorated Greek columns, the motif was adopted extensively throughout the Indian sub-continent, Atlas being substituted for the Indian Yaksa in the monuments of the Shunga Empire around the 2nd century BC. Sometime between the 2nd century BC and the 1st century AD, the first anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha were developed. These were absent from earlier strata of Buddhist art, which preferred to represent the Buddha with symbols such as the stupa, the Bodhi tree, the empty seat, the wheel, or the footprints. But the innovative anthropomorphic Buddha image immediately reached a high level of sculptural sophistication. Most of the images of the Buddha are anepigraphic, which makes it difficult to have a definite dating. The next Greco-Buddhist findings to be strictly datable are rather late, AD120 Kanishka casket and Kanishkas Buddhist coins. These works at least indicate though that the representation of the Buddha was already extant in the 1st century AD
