[Advaita-l] reference to Boudhavatara

[Jaldhar H. Vyas]

On Fri, 13 May 2011, Srikanta Narayanaswami wrote:

> with reference to the above,it is not clear why  the word Boudhavatara 
> is introduced in the sankalpa.Given that Buddha was a jnani,why the name 
> of Boudhavatara was introduced in a ritual which is purely in 
> karmakhanda.I think this reference is derogatorily introduced by the 
> mimamsakas,I donot know when.But,in some parts of  the country this 
> reference is not there.I think this means that since Buddha was 
> responsible for banishing all Yagas and yajnas,in the Bouddhavatara in 
> kaliyuga,this pertains to evil which are due to the non-performance of 
> all yajnas.

I don't know why Advaita-L keeps getting on the topic of the Buddha but it 
is not necessary to have any views on him pro or con to understand the 
reference in the samkalpa.  Bauddhavatare simply means that the 
(relatively) most recent of the 10 major avataras was Buddha as 
Venkateshmurthy pointed out.

Given that the actual injunction in dharmashastras is only deshakalau 
samkirtya ("recite the place and time"), the actual form of the samkalpa 
varies quite a bit by region, jati and sampradaya but bauddhavatare is 
fairly common across Bharata.  I really doubt the Mimamsakas would have 
inserted it given that they themselves were implacable foes of Buddhism 
and other types of nastikata.

-- 
Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar at braincells.com>