Buddhist Meditations on Islamic Contemplative Paths: Less Traveled Roads and Abandoned Junctions

Copyright 2015 by Snjeana Veljai-Akpnar, Ph.D. Dharma Realm Buddhist University. All rights
reserved.

First Print Edition: May 2015

ISBN: 978-1-60103-061-0 (print)
ISBN: 978-1-60103-062-7 (ebook)

Dharma Realm Buddhist University

Attn: Permissions Coordinator
4951 Bodhi Way
Ukiah CA 95482
United States of America
[email protected]
707-462-5486

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form
or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without
the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical
reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by fair use doctrine. For permission requests,
write to the publisher at the following address:

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available from the Library of Congress.

Snjeana Veljai-Akpnar, Ph.D., 1941Buddhist Meditations on Islamic Contemplative Paths: Less Traveled Roads and Abandoned Junctions
The six chapters were previously published separately as academic papers.
Tile in cover graphic reprinted by permission of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
The Madina Collection of Islamic Art, gift of Camilla Chandler Frost (M.2002.1.19).
For more information contact: www.lacma.org..

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword 
Preface 
Acknowledgments 
Chapter One: Sacred Knowledge in Central Asia:
The Kutadgu Bilig 
Chapter Two: The Jains of Arabia 
Chapter Three: Paths of Contemplative Absorption:
Islamic and Buddhist Paths 
Chapter Four: Islam and Its Cultural Roots 
Chapter Five: The Place of Doubt in Islam 
Chapter Six: Modernity, Islam, and Buddhism Face-to-Face:
Intellect, Wisdom, and Ensuing Tensions 
About the Author 

vii
ix
xvii
1
27
41
63
95
117
141

FOREWORD
The following chapters reflect a life spent thinking and writing
about an area of increasing interest to Westerners because of
perceived economic potential and geopolitical threats, but an area
little understood and seldom appreciated for its rich culture, its
philosophical and spiritual traditions which are treated in these
pages. I am speaking of the geographical area bounded by the
Central Asian Republics, with Afghanistan and Pakistan in the east,
and the Mediterranean Basin with Turkey and the Fertile Crescent
in the west, an area of largely tribal populations with different
ethnic and linguistic roots. While these populations are very
different they share, in their philosophies and religions, many
themes, ideas, and practices which Westerners would benefit from
a better understanding.
Such an understanding would reveal that this repository of
spiritual insight and practice, is less remote than we might first
imagine, having gained influence and in turn influencing thought
in India to the east, and having had similar vital commerce with
Greece and other cultures to the west. While some ideas will seem
very new, the continuity of thought throughout the east and west
is most compelling and with application may provide a larger,
unbroken sense of the spiritual knowledge and practice of our
world community.
While the following chapters were first conceived as separate
papers, and written over a lengthy period of time, their evolution
into this book was an inevitable project waiting to happen.
Ernest Waugh, Ph.D.
Editor
vi i

PREFACE
Broadly based on the study of Islam, the articles collected in this
book are an attempt to focus on the dynamics of an encounter
between innate human awareness and challenges presented by the
inevitability of lifes realities.
The Jains of Arabia draws on ancient Middle Eastern poetic
traditions. These are gleaned from the poetry found in the Middle
East from archeological finds in Syria, Iraq, and the Arabian
Peninsula, an area connected by the famous spice routes to the
relatively more recent poetic traditions recorded in the century
that preceded Islam. Both contain allusions to a heroic concept of
nonviolence that does not adhere to any religious dogmas as we
understand them today, both are precursors to what we can today
characterize as a monotheistic approach to faith. Although Islam is
the youngest of the three monotheistic religions that sprang forth
from a Semitic culture, it has kept many archaic traits that are
worth revisiting in order to examine what it is that keeps surviving
within our human consciousness and is common to all mankind.
The Epic of Gilgamesh and the Lament over Ur date from a very
early period, possibly 3000 BCE, if not earlier. They share a set
of unique characteristics that scholars and religious leaders call
Semitic. The Epic of Gilgamesh was recorded in two very different
languages Sumerian and Akkadian pointing to the fact that there
were at least two linguistic groups sharing the same tradition. The
Arabs and their modern language are considered the living heirs of
that tradition, which has maintained a continuous presence on the
Arabian Peninsula up to the present day. It is no wonder that their
ix

PRE FAC E

sixth century odes still represent for the Arabs a continuation of

this ancient strand that bypassed some monotheistic religious
dogmas developed in their vicinity.
Sacred Knowledge in Central Asia focuses on another area.
The intent remains similar, to portray the dynamics of our innate
reactions to worldly circumstances as played out for millennia in
Central Asia and its caravan routes. The Place of Doubt in Islam
delves into the universal problem of human doubt as expressed by
one of the major theologians and philosophers who hailed from
Central Asia and succeeded in introducing this important topic not
only into the world of Islam but into the monotheistic West by
influencing European thought at the eve of the Renaissance. The
rest of the chapters represent a short study of what ethics and
contemplative traditions have and possibly do not have in common
across this vast geographical and historical span, while the last
chapter Modernity, Islam, and Buddhism Face-to-Face published
in Istanbul Turkey by Remzi Kitabevi in 2007, as the eighth dialog
of a series edited by Gnl Ayda-Pultar provides a conclusion that
leads into the present day. Dr. Nassiri, has been lecturing at the
Pacific School of Religion, founding member the Berkeley Graduate
Theological Union since 1996 on history of Islam, Islamic theology,
Sufism, Islam and modernity and related comparative topics, such
as Islam in conversation with Buddhism, sponsored by the Institute
for Word Religions of the Dharma Realm Buddhist University.
The trajectory that led to the these writings began on the
Balkan shores of the Mediterranean in the wake of the Second
World War, when it became more and more evident that better
criteria were needed to assess our common worldviews. A quote
from the German existential philosopher Karl Jaspers, who coined
the very term existenz caught the attention of my generation
that was finding its way into adulthood in Yugoslavia, a country
nestled between East and West.
The dialectic approach to culture that G.W.F. Hegel had
revitalized in the early eighteen hundreds did open a door to fresh
thought and its ensuing patterns. However, those age-old carefully
x

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

constructed dams meant to protect our perennial mental forms

soon began to crack under the weight of the unleashed forces and
the onslaught of time. By the fifties of the past century young
minds were turned upside down, faced with a simplified form of
Hegels dialectics as extolled by the socialist establishment on one
side, and the shadowy resistance of the romantic and idealized
realities of a pre-communist world on the other. Both relentlessly
persisted to challenge us.
It is at this juncture that Karl Jaspers caught the attention of
the young generation. It was in the fifties when he began weekly
broadcasts on Radio Basel warning the world about our human
thought trajectories in the following way:
Three millennia of philosophical history are on the
verge of turning into one present. Manifold philosophical
concepts hide within themselves a single truth. Hegel
was the first to attempt to grasp this unity of thought,
but he did this by reducing all of what had happened
before him to an introductory level of apprenticeship
and partial truth that was meant to reach its peak in his
own philosophy.
Now it has become necessary to understand every
individual maturation that philosophical thought
reaches in each age. In this manner we will be able
to grasp its constancy and not assume that we have
conquered past achievements, but that we are capable to
accept them as our contemporaries. Only when the whole
of philosophy becomes our contemporary do we see that
its present is also the manifestation of its source. Only
then can philosophy perceive within the impermanent
being that the present and its contemporariness have in
their essence that what is always true.
(Jaspers pp 130-131)
xi

PRE FAC E

Karl Jaspers above quoted caveats against a simplified

understanding of Hegels dialectics resounded heavily also in the
ears of my teachers and my contemporaries as they reverberated
between communism and capitalism, one represented by dialectical
materialism and the other by existentialism. The most obvious
victim for us on the Balkans was the Ottoman Turkish culture
squeezed between an East-West divide that saw the Orient as the
unquestionable, decadent, dying other. Yet, this decadent other
was very much alive dancing around us with interesting Arabic
words, intriguing architectural feats, bridges breathlessly hewn
out of canyons over fast flowing rivers, delicacies offered in the
markets and kitchens and school teachers who had the courage
to teach us, if not Turkish poetry, then at least Goethes famous
West-East Divan reminds us that East and West should not be torn
asunder.
I decided to study the cultures and languages of the Middle
East, even venture beyond, in order to find more subtle threads
that possibly form a net around this world giving it buoyancy and
the needed strength. I wished to learn how to unravel some of
the tangles and grasp the array of tensions that run through such
invisible threads that keep this planet alive.
By diligently studying Arabic I embarked into the ancient
Semitic world of the Arabian Peninsula and its surroundings that
flourished during the distant millennia preceding our monotheistic
age. But that was only the starting point of my studies and their
ventures which led from Europe, both Eastern and Western, to
the shores of Turkey, Iran, India and China depositing me (for the
time being) on the Pacific shores of the American Wild West as
manifested in todays California.
The original version of The Jains of Arabia was an attempt to
describe my experience of the gentle challenge that these buoyant
tensions presented to me and to my age. They resonated with the
pre-Islamic poets of Arabia who lived in a period of time that we
Westerners know little about, yet their sophisticated poetry is
still a living philosophy. How much better could we describe the
xi i

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

perennial human condition than Shanfara, or even such ancients

as Gilgamesh and his search for a Dilmun where the lion kills not
the lamb? Gilgamesh opens his story by inviting those who can
read to climb and carefully examine his citys ancient walls built
long before him yet better than anything that his own age could
produce, thanks to the wisdom attained by ancient wise men
from all parts of the world, while Shanfara tells us of his canter
and gallop through a wilderness that transformed him by turning
his anger towards mediocrity into the temperament of a gentle
doe?
Awareness that all life stems from a common source seems
to have been an intuition of mankind. Conclusions posited
since earliest times imply that the human mind can obtain this
awareness through a conscious effort and it is the lack of such an
effort which may well be the root of our anxieties. Aldous Huxley
recapitulated and described this subject in his popular work, The
Perennial Philosophy. This he balanced against a time philosophy,
which can be achieved:
With the intervention of eternity on the temporal
domainand eternity cannot intervene unless the
individual will makes a creative act of self-denial, thus
producing a vacuum into which eternity can flow.
(Huxley pp 229 and 276)
The cultivation of such an awareness and the moral necessities
that it implies, form the basis of most world religions which
in their initial purity were and still are very simple. Yet, the
consistent maintenance of such a state within each individual and
its confrontation with an innate ignorance, create a stumbling
block for mankind as well as for its religions.
In our age of careful research and the pursuit of infallible
proofs as the basic requisites for scientific conclusions, there
is a tendency to explain away all similarities between moral
achievements of proto-historic ages as mere coincidences that
xi i i

PRE FAC E

simply reveal comparable stages within the isolated life span of

various lost civilizations.
The Indus Valley discoveries and its connections with the
Middle East as well as with other parts of the world are often
treated as distant mysteries of an epoch that bears little if any
consequence on the further development of mankind. Such an
approach limits comparison to little more than a purely visual
experience. Consequently very few attempts have been made to
analyze the integral worth of cultures, leaving little room for
thought about the ethical and moral energies which motivated
their achievements. In more pessimistic moments one is tempted
to ascribe these attitudes to the fact that in those remote periods
of history man had not yet developed his fancy iron weaponry and
sophisticated warfare, therefore there remained nothing familiar
for us to compare, or to contrast. If we would allow ourselves to
accept the fact that the intellectual aspirations of these ancient
city states and their inhabitants were at least proportionate to the
technical and economic development of which they were capable,
then we would have to agree that the great civilizations of a preAryan past undoubtedly point to inner intellectual, ethical and
cultural connections which could have provided a launching pad
for our contemporary views on life.
If we refuse to dwell upon the question of moral motivation
and intention behind these ancient achievements of humanity,
we could tacitly find ourselves condescending to the fact that
greed was and remains, the only relevant drive behind human
evolution. It seems that the alienation and disintegration we are
witnessing today, makes it a necessity to give more credit to the
unsolved riddles of the past and start paying attention not only to
the technical, but also the moral achievements of mankind. The
following articles are an attempt to analyze such inner ties, which
ancient and not so ancient civilizations had in common with each
other and the present.
xi v

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

References
Akpnar, Snjeana, The Jains of Arabia, Polja Novi Sad, 1983.
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. 2010. West-East Divan. Albany, NY: SUNY
Press.
Huxley, Aldous. 1945. The Perennial Philosophy. New York: Harper &
Brothers.
Jaspers, Karl. 1951. Der Philosophische Glaube, Munchen, Piper

xv

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank my friends and colleagues of Dharma Realm
Buddhist University for their encouragement, help, and support,
most of all, Professor Ron Epstein for encouraging me to publish
these articles, Dr. Ernie Waugh, Marion Robertson, and Ken Faust
for their patient and insightful editorial comments, and rest of
the hard working friends and colleagues from the Dharma Realm
Buddhist Association who make it all possible for these essays the
see the light of day in the twenty first century of the common era.

xvi i

CHAPTER ONE

SACRED KNOWLEDGE
IN CENTRAL ASIA:
THE KUTADGU BILIG
By Snjeana Akpnar
Paper presented at Faithful/Fateful Encounters: Religion
and Cultural exchanges between Asia and the West, Selected
Papers and Presentations from the Proceedings from the
Graduate Theological Union/Chinese Academy of Social
Sciences Conference, Beijing, October 21-26, 2002, page
476.

Young Museum in San Francisco hosted

an exhibit on Central Asia. Among the artifacts that attracted
long lines at the entrance, a beautifully painted lacquered case
drew my attention posing a riddle that begged for an answer.
The caption underneath the case read: Sutra with Painted
Textblock and Wooden Cover. This was followed by captions in
Mongolian, Tibetan, and Sanskrit. The Mongolian version read
o me yea rs a g o the d e

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

as follows: Qutughtu bilig-n cinadu kijaghar-a krkgsen naiman

mingghatu kemekdek yeke klgen sudur orosibai. The Sanskrit : rya
astashasrik prajparamit sutra.
The next exhibit was a Book Cover with Three Buddhas and
Two Monks. It had the same Mongolian and Sanskrit captions as
quoted above, that is to say another Qutughtu bilig or in its modern
Turkish version: Kutadgu bilig. Then came Page Catalog Number
52 with the same captions in Mongolian, Sanskrit, and Tibetan,
but this time also Manchu. The Kutadgu Biligs went on into the
next room linked to what I by now assumed to be Buddhist Prajna
Paramita texts.
I was familiar with the Medieval Turco-Islamic text known as
the Kutadgu Bilig, or Sacred Knowledge written in Kashgar
in the eleventh century. I could not help asking myself, what is
the difference between the Moslem text and these obviously
Buddhist ones bearing the same name? The texts in the de Young
exhibit were mostly from the eighteenth century Qing dynasty,
or the Manchu period. Now, the Manchus were a sinified Turkic
tribe closely related to the Tungus Turks, relatives of both the
Mongolians and the Tibetans. Slowly the whole puzzle grew more
and more intriguing.
My wondering thoughts led to Central Asia and the city of
Kashgar where the Kutadgu Bilig for Muslims was written. It is
located on the northwestern edges of the Turfan Oasis, on one of
the tributaries of the River Tarim. Nestled between the southern
foothills of the Tien Shan, and the Altay mountains, this oasis
represents both the cultural and geographical center of Central
Asia. For Western travelers going east towards China, Kashgar
emerges as a major crossing on the Silk Route. It is where the road
branches into a northern and southern fork, and thus skirts the
Taklamakan Desert to unite again further east in Tun Huang, the
gate to China.
Kashgar has been a Central Asian trading post since the days
when religions, nations, trade and profit found themselves face
to face at a juncture in the middle of this vast geographical
2

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

depression east of the Altay Mountains. Today Kashgar falls under

the jurisdiction of the Peoples Republic of China. The text that I
associated with the Turks, was written at a time when they were in
the process of accepting Islam.

History
Central Asia has been inhabited by the human race from the
Paleolithic onwards. The horse had been domesticated there very
early on, and the concept of wearing trousers also originated in
the region.
Since history emerged as we know it today, this area has
housed two distinct linguistic and racial groups. Scholars of the
pre-historic period named them Scythians and Huns. The Scythians
supposedly belonged to the white race and spoke an Indo-European
language, the Huns apparently belonged to the yellow race and
spoke a Turanian or Turkish language that belongs to the Uralo
Altaic linguistic group.
Migrations and a nomadic lifestyle seem to have characterized
both groups. Their ancestral homes were therefore not as distinct
from each other as historians would have liked them to be. Today
their respective descendants still inhabit the area, and the only
suppositions and theories of races and languages that remain
obvious and uncontested, would be the incessant interminglings
of humanity that at one time or another took place in Central Asia.
Ren Grousset summarizes well the issues in the introduction to
his seminal book, The Empire of the Steppes. (Grousset pp xxii-xxiv)
My questions were nevertheless still pending; is there a
connection between Buddhism and Islam? History can enlighten
us about facts, but there seemed to be more to this puzzle. As I
admired the lacquered boxes in the de Young Museum, my thoughts
led me to old Bactria.
3

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

Bactria
On the Western side of Central Asia there lays an area known to
the ancient world as Bactria. It encompasses parts of Afghanistan,
the Peshawar Valley, Kashmir and the old Soviet Turkish republics
that are now independent. It is a good starting point for untangling
the human knot that still baffles so many historians, linguists,
religionists, not to speak of conquerors and politicians.
My mind attached itself to Bactria hoping to untangle this knot
that started forming inside my thoughts. Historians who follow the
traces and habits of Alexander the Great are still caught in trying
to unravel and reconstruct his demise in Bactria, as are those
who follow the path of the Great Indian Emperor Ashoka. Ashoka
seems to have had much better luck than Alexander due to the fact
that he abandoned the thought of waging battles as a means for
conquering the world.
Let me start at the beginning of the Common Era since from
this age on we find ourselves on somewhat safer ground. It is a
period that succeeded both the death of Alexander the Great and
the death of Emperor Ashoka. Both sovereigns aspired not only
to rule, but also to transform what they considered to be the
worldand possibly the cosmos. After the deaths of both rulers,
their successors found themselves living side by side in Bactria.
The Emperor Ashoka had renounced violence and transformed
his army into a Buddhist ascetic monastic order that began
flourishing there. Alexander on the other hand, barely a century
before Ashoka, told his soldiers not to return to Macedonia, but to
mingle, settle, marry Bactrian women, form local dynasties, absorb
local cultures and thus maintain law and order not only in Bactria
but throughout the cosmos. He established cities that flourished
thanks to trade. These still bear his name and play significant roles
in the world. Alexander believed that he was following the advice
of his tutor, Aristotle. Ashoka renounced violence after awakening
to the advice of the Buddha. Both were set on bringing peace to the
world, albeit each in his own way.
4

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

From these two imperial vantage pointsone leaning on trade,

the other on monastic ordersit becomes possible to tread on
somewhat safer historical ground. The Pillar Edicts of King Asoka
are scattered from Central Asia all the way to Syria, while the
modern state of India took Ashokas pillar as its symbol. Alexander
left various encampments in his wake. They are known under
names such as Alexandria, Skenderun, (S)kandahar, skdar
and Suchidar, depending on local phonetic preferences. When
observed purely from a linguistic point of view, these Alexandrias
scattered throughout the Balkans, the Middle East, and Central Asia
incorporate not only Indo European and Uralo Altaic languages, but
also the Semitic ones, such as Aramaic and its descendant Arabic.

Bactria and the Turks

For the Turks, the political milieu of Bactria becomes important
during the so called Kushana period, which lasted approximately
from the first to the third century CE. And that is one of the reasons
why I chose this period as my point of departure in the attempts
to solve the mysterious puzzle of the Kutadgu Biligs. The Kushana
kings were by no means all of the same ethnic origins. Some may
have been Greek, some Indian, and some Turk.
The famous Turkish Kushanas were known as the Turuska kings,
Kaniska and his descendants being the most notable of the lot. The
eminent scholar of Central Asia, Sir Auriel Stein, in his well-known
book quotes the famous medieval chronicler Kalhana in order to
validate this point:
With the names of the three Turuska kings Huska,
Juska, and Kaniska, we reach once more terra firma of
historical record. The identity of Kaniska with the great
Kuanaof Northwest India so well known to us from
the Buddhist traditionfrom the inscriptions that have
been recognized long ago.
5

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

Kalhanas accounts
historical tradition.

preserve

data

of

genuine

(Stein p 76)

The Turuska kings, as they are still known in the lands of old
Bactria, portrayed on their coins images from the Indian, the
Hellenic, and other pantheons. These keep cropping up in the
fields of local farmers in spite of the wars and pestilences that
still plague this part of the world. 1 This famous syncretism of the
Bactrian pantheon reflects the ethnic and cultural heterogeneity
of the empires population. Mithra embodied Justice, there was
Siva, Buddha, Helios, etc.
However, what best characterizes Bactria is Buddhism. Kaniska
the most famous of the Turuskas, was well known for his kindness
towards and affiliation with Buddhism. His capital was the city of
Kabul, constructed on the river by the same name, a tributary of
the Sind or the Indus. He was the patron of Buddhist monasteries,
the builder of the great stupa, or shrine that houses Buddhas
relics, in Kaniskapura, the convener of the Fourth Buddhist
Council held in Peshawar, as well as the founder of the great
Buddhist monastery in the same area. The council held under him
prepared commentaries on canonical texts that spread across the
Hindu Kush Mountains along the trade routes into China. This is
the period when majestic monuments were built in Bamyan and
Tajikistan. A famous document from that period is the Gandhari
Dharmapada, often considered to be the basic text of Buddhism. Its
famous opening verse sets the tone:
Our life is shaped by our mind; we become
What we think. Suffering follows an evil
Thought as the wheels of a cart follow the oxen
That draw it.
Our life is shaped by our mind; we become
what we think. Joy follows a pure thought
like a shadow that never leaves.
(Dhammapada 1: 1-2)
6

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

These were also the days when the Roman Emperor Hadrian was
in power building walls in the British Isles against the Barbarians,
and the Silk Route was an active highway between China and Rome,
as the two first centuries of the Common Era evolved.
During the so called Parthian/Persian hostilities that were
taking place on the Iranian Plateau, the Turuska kings were able
to divert trade from Balkh to the Indus River Delta and avoid
Parthian skirmishes so that the transport of goods could continue
from China to the West through the Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf
circumventing troubled areas. Thanks to such a maritime bypass,
trade was invigorated, as woolen tapestries, glassware, etc. were
in turn sent from Rome to China via Basra. (Chattopadhyaya)
Contemporary excavations in Bagram provide abundant proof of
such exchanges.
Bactria is also known for its art and literature. There is no
question that cultural exchanges contributed to a new religious
awakening which kept the trade routes alive and relatively
peaceful. It was an intricate process of mutual influences, and
creative adoptions of new doctrines along new bypasses, with
modifications dictated by the impact of local traditions. Literature,
thought processes, and architecture that developed along the road
should not be ignored, nor does it serve any purpose to deny them.

Kashgar and the Tarim Oasis

Chinese writings provide names of Buddhist sages from Bactria,
Sogdia, and Parthia who contributed to the vibrant translation
activities that took place in the Tarim Oasis and Kashgar. The
commentaries included philosophical discourses that incorporated
the many traditions which appeared along the routes and thus
contributed to the branch of Buddhism known as the Mahayana,
the Great Cart, or the cart that accepts all of humanity and the
sentient beings around it, be they divine, human, or subhuman.
The greater part of such writings is labeled today as the Prajna
7

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

Paramita tradition, or the Perfection of Wisdom. And that was

the other operative word that caught my attention in the Central
Asian Exhibit of the de Young Museum, mentioned along with the
Kutadgu Bilig.
The Persian Sassanian conquest that took place between 240-272
CE, as recorded in the inscriptions of Naqshi Rustam, resulted in
the seizure of Peshawar and the conquest of Bactria. This conquest
however did not completely destroy the already well-ingrained
system of travel routes, commerce, and philosophical discourse,
although it might have pushed its central location further away
from the dangers of conquests into the more isolated and harder
to approach Tarim Oasis.

The Hiung Nu
The Turks in Central Asia eventually divided into an eastern and
a western branch. Around the year three hundred of the Common
Era the nomadic Hiung nu as the Chinese chronicles named the
Turks, gradually expanded to form a kingdom in the Tarim Oasis,
around Kucha - northeast of Kashgar along the eastern foothills of
the Tien Shan mountain range.
With time they nominally submitted to the Tang Dynasty
somewhere between 630 and 659. In this manner Turks, while
confronting the Persians and the Arabs in the West, were also kept
busy further east by the Chinese.

The Turfan Oasis, Kashgar and Buddhism

Kumarajiva, the famous translator of Buddhist texts, mentions
Kashgar (Sha-le) in his biography, where around the year 400 he
came across a miraculous begging bowl of the Buddha. Other monks
also mention Kashgar as a great Buddhist center. A well-known
seventh century Chinese Buddhist traveler, the monk Hsuan Tzang
8

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

described the political conditions of the area in his journals. In

his day Central Asia mostly consisted of city states that lacked a
political unity and enjoyed considerable independence under local
rulers.
Documents found in Kashgar in the present day are mostly
in Turkic/Uygur, Tokharian, and Chinese. Although in 843 the
Uygur kingdom along the river Tarim was destroyed by the Kirgiz,
Buddhism and its texts lingered on in the Turfan Oasis. Annals of
the Ming Dynasty tell us that as late as 1420 many people there
were still Buddhist. 2
The role of Buddhism and the part local aristocracies played
in its propagation must not be neglected. The beautiful laquered
boxes that sparked my imagination should be a testimony to that.
Both as a religion and as a philosophy, it served as an integrating
force. It is the heritage of the two great rulers: Alexander Great
and the Indian Emperor Ashoka. I thought about it all, as I kept
admiring the lacquered boxes on exhibit in San Francisco.
It would follow that with the advent of Islam the Arabs would
not wish to destroy this underpinning of free philosophical and
commercial discourse that kept trade routes relatively operable
along these vast stretches of land.
It is notable that many early commentaries on Buddhas
discourses have been preserved in Turkic/Uygur, but lost in the
original Pali. 3

Kutadgu Bilig
The Kutadgu Bilig (Sacred Knowledge) can be characterized as a
learned drama composed in old Turkish using the epic meter of
the pre-Islamic heroic Arab odesthe mutaqarib. It was composed
in the eleventh century of the Common Era and presented in
Kashgar to Bughra Khan, as a gift honoring his conversion to Islam.
The author of this long poem, Yusuf Hass Hajib, was the private
secretary of the Khan. In comparing his work to a carpet weave of
9

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

multi-colored sweet smelling flowers, Yusuf adds when a writer

completes a discourse, it continues to flow. The poem concludes
with words of caution to the ruler for whom it was meant:
Fickle and unsteady is this faithless world,
The man of intellect keeps far from it.
Now you have attached yourself firmly to the world;
Strive to sever your heart from it.
Trust not this world,
But take refuge in God the most trustworthy.
Many a people has the fickle world let go...
Restrain your tongue, control your throat, do not sleep
much,
Close your eyes and stop your ears. Then live in peace.
In you alone I seek refuge,
Oh God! Watch over me
And awaken me from this sleep of neglect.
(Dankoff 6629-6637)
The Kutadgu Bilig was a manual on how to live and how to rule
within the parameters of ancient traditions while embracing a new
faith. The new faith happened to be Islam. The meaning of this
original title carries a syncretic connotation, a term that describes
a holy text of any faith. Its operative assumption was that faith
depended on wisdom.

Prajna Paramita Sutras

On the Buddhist side of the divide, the genre of Buddhist texts
known as the Prajna Paramita, stem mostly from Central Asia and
are classified by this Sanskrit term that could be translated more
exactly as the Awareness that Sustains Wisdom, or the mental
ground from where wisdom can flow. Here a brief linguistic
explanation seems to be necessary. Pali is considered to be the
original canonical language of the Buddhists. In the days of the
10

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

Buddha it was the spoken language of Northern India. He used it

in contradistinction to the more ornate Sanskrit, the language of
literary texts and learned treatises, preferring it as a more direct
method of communication. Pali and Sanskrit are however very
similar and with the passing of time many Buddhist texts were
also recorded in Sanskrit. The suffix pra- both in Pali and Sanskrit,
carries the meaning of forming, or allowing for a possibility to
arise. In todays postmodern and post-hippie world, pra-jna could
be termed as giving knowing a chance. The English word know
and the gno of gnosis stem from the same Indo European source
as the jna within the word pra-jna. The good Buddhist would say
that the most notable characteristic of the Prajna Paramita texts is
that they guide the reader toward a blissful state of being. While
prajna could be translated as sacred knowledge, paramita implies
the other shore, as it were. The reader of such texts is assumed
to be primarily a ruler, or a nobleman, both in the spiritual and
the political meaning of the word, therefore, many texts of the
kind are also seen as manuals for rulers. This accords with the
fact that some early discourses of the Buddha were addressed to
local noblemen and kings who came to ask for advice. Among them
were also deities of various pantheons, ordinary human beings,
and even demons.
Often it is assumed by museum curators that a text titled Kutadgu
Bilig has Buddhist origins, as I found out that day in the de Young
Museum. At times it is also viewed as being Magian (Zoroastrian),
Christian, or Manichean. One could also argue quite effortlessly
that it is an Islamicized text. Good Muslims would insist that the
Islam inherent to the story was merely brought to the fore by an
adept author.
Today while reading such texts, the following questions become
relevant:
1. How was religion understood in Central Asia in those
medieval days?
11

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

2. Do we project our own views on ancient texts, and in doing

so over-dramatize both the conservative and the liberal
elements inherent to such texts?
3. Are we guilty of treating these texts as mere conveniences,
to be used out of context, when needed?
4. Finally, would our discussion benefit by the ancient gnostic
method of including more players into philosophical
discussions in order to highlight the relativity of the player
and the importance of the message?
This last question seemed to be the most relevant for our
globalized setting.
If we use ancient traditions as a starting point, then the role
of philosophical concepts such as faith and the acquisition of
knowledge could become somewhat clearer.

Skandhas and the Art of Literature as an Educational

Tool
The Pali and Buddhist texts from Bactria indicate that the word
skandha (skt.) or kandha (pali), was a pillar of Buddhas teachings.
Buddha never claimed to have invented the concept, but aimed at
reinvigorating its meaning in order to help the deity who created
and who still cared for our imperfect world. The word skandha
meaning simply a heap, describes aggregates, or accumulations
of vital energy needed to generate and support sentient life. A
cultivated human being should become aware of such accumulations
of energy and of their flow in order to direct and perfect the art of
living as much as possible. This in short is the basis of Buddhism.
One cannot help but pose the question where and how did (Al)Skandar the Great get his name?
The Buddha pointed out that humanity could perfect this
art by becoming steadily aware of the processes through which
energies inherent to every molecular particle of our bodies and of
12

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

our universe, can be activated in a harmonious and conscientious

way. To focus on the assumption that the process is constantly
evolving toward perfection would miss the point. By withholding
the finality of an analytical judgment, we keep in mind that this
process is far from over, as its particular attempts may well wax
and wane in the course of our lives and the lives of our cultures,
traditions and ultimately our planet.
Yusuf Hass Hajib, the Muslim Turk who penned his Kutadgu Bilig
or Sacred Knowledge, formulated an important issue as a possible
catalyst to such learned critiques of philosophy, faith and the
acquiring of knowledge in the multicultural ambience of Central
Asian discourse. He did not hesitate to introduce methodologies
and parables from many lands in order to integrate them into the
emerging Islamic norms. He was the private secretary of a khan. As
advisor to the ruler, he deemed it necessary to create a space along
the Silk Road where questions of human existence could continue
to flow, be discussed from many points of view without being
rejected a priori, and that is probably why he compared his work to
a meadow of flowers that continues to flow, bloom, and blossom.
Today the Turks still consider the Kutadgu Bilig a treasure that
links them across national and religious heritages. This is how
Yusuf introduces the work to his readers:
This book is exceedingly precious. It is adorned with
the proverbs of the sages of Chin and the poems of the
learned Machin. But the one who reads its contents and
makes known its verses surpasses the book in excellence.
The sages of Chin and Machin have all agreed, that in the
Eastern realm and in all the lands of Turkestan, in the
tongue of Bughra Khan, and the language of the Turks, no
one has ever composed a book finer than this. Whatever
sovereigns this book has reached, and whatever climes,
the wise and the learned of those lands have accepted it
because of its utmost excellence and boundless beauty.
And each one has given it a title and a name. The people
13

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

of Chin call it Etiquette of Kings and the counselors of

the king of Machin call it The Rule of the Kingdom and
the people of the East call it Adornment of Princes, the
people of Iran call it Shahnameh of the Turks, others
call it Book of Counsel for Kings, and the people of Turan
call it The Blissful Wisdom (Kutadgu Bilig). This book
is built upon four great foundations: Justice, Fortune,
Intellect and Contentment. Each of these is given a
Turkish name. Justice is King Rising Sun. Fortune is
called Full Moon, and he is the vizier, Intellect is called
Highly Praised and he is the viziers son. Contentment
is called Wide Awake, and is the viziers brother. They
have debates and dialogues among themselves.
May the readers heart be light, may he remember
the author in his benediction.
(Dankoff 260-261)
Buddha pointed at the Middle Path as a paradigm for acquiring
an ability to avoid mercilessly breaking away from pathways that
humanity painstakingly creates and continues to adjust as it lives
on.
The story line of the Kutadgu Bilig is relatively simple. It
expounds the Middle Path as the Buddhists call their tradition.
It also reminds one of the Prodigal Son, a parable that entered
Christianity and Buddhism, in almost identical form (BTTS, The
Dharma Flower Sutra) probably around the same time, before the
full blown advent of Christianity and before the arrival of Islam,
when Central Asia was the hub of Buddhist thought and its most
famous proponent was Kaniska the Turkish ruler of Bactria.
The story of the Prodigal Son is still relevant in the world.
Its latest famous Western revival being the Return of the Prodigal
Son, by Andr Gide, while Buddhists from Japan to California still
chant the Dharma Flower Sutra as one of their major texts. But, this
story has deeper roots. It reminds one of the twins that represent
14

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

opposite poles in many Mazdean and Vedic scriptures: Yama and

Yima
At first there were those two twin souls,
of their own accord they called themselves the pure and
the impure,
In thought, word, and deed,
and those whose deeds were good chose one,
those whose deeds were bad the other.
(Avesta 30)
And, needless to say, there are Cain and Abel.
In the Central Asian Kashgar version, more players were added
to the story line. Full Moon, the prodigal happy go lucky fellow,
returns to his homeland after having wasted most of his life away.
He is welcomed with great joy by the ruler of the land, King Rising
Sun. Soon he is elevated to the ranks of a grand vizier. Full Moon
counsels the King from the perspective of one who has led the happy
go lucky life, following his star, in other words, a prodigal son. Our
Prodigal Full Moon proceeds to listen as the Just King Rising Sun
offers his comments on life, without judging nor chastising, but
asking for advice and listening instead.
Soon after his success as grand vizier, Full Moon falls ill and
dies. However, on his death bed, he repents and bequeaths to his
own son, named Intellect, the elevated post of vizier, or advisor
to kings admonishing Intellect to serve well the Just King Rising
Sun. In order to do so, young Intellect counsels the King from his,
intellectual perspective. The King heeds this counsel as well, and
proceeds to comment. Both King and vizier are haunted by a feeling
that things are still somehow amiss, both experience a discomfort.
So, with the blessings of the Just King Rising Sun, Intellect goes to
seek out the Prodigal Sons elder brother who in this story also left
his fathers home, but went in the opposite direction to become
a hermit and live near the fathers kingdom, on a mountain top,
in a forest grove. His name is Wide Awake, i.e. Buddha, since the
15

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

word buddha means nothing more than that in Sanskrit. Wide

Awake benevolently, but determined not to leave his mountain
top, counsels both young Intellect and Just King Rising Sun, about
wisdom and its ramifications. Wide Awake categorically refuses
to relinquish his solitary life-style, explaining that he would not
know how to behave in the milieu of a royal palace. Wide Awake
very politely and compassionately tries to make Just King Rising
Sun and Intellect see where their troubles lie: they lie in too much
worldliness, the unfiltered forces of life. To no avail. Wide Awake
understands that the king and his viziers cannot leave their world,
any more than he can leave his mountain top. Soon after, Wide
Awake also dies of old age.
The Buddha perceived the danger and the tangles of
worldlinesses and mountain tops, forewarned it seems, by our
worlds deity at a crucial moment before his final awakening:
The Buddha said this in Savatthi to a certain deity that came to
him at night and asked him the following question:
The inner tangle and the outer tangle,
This generation is entangled in a tangle.
And so I ask of Gotama this question:
Who succeeds in disentangling this tangle?
When a wise person, established well in Virtue,
Develops Conscience and Understanding,
Then as an ascetic ardent and sagacious,
He succeeds in disentangling this tangle.
Hard to find such a person even among those desiring
purity. 4
(Sutta nipata I,13)
Buddhaghosa, the famous Buddhist commentator, in his analysis
some thousand years after the Buddha, furthered the thought in
his seminal work The Path of Purification: It is a person who has
developed conscience and understanding, and therefore possesses
energy (ardoratapa) who stands a chance. (Rhys-Davids pp 76)
16

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

The Mind, the Emotions, and Rules of the Art

In the early days of searching for a Middle Path in the steppes,
valleys, and mountain passes of Central Asia and their surroundings,
the Buddhas disciples became terrified at the thought that their
teacher might die and leave them without a guide. So they asked
him, what they should do and where to turn for guidance after his
departure from this earth.
Viewed from a wider perspective, this concern is a test that any
mature person needs to face. Buddhas answer was: hold on to the
teachings and the rules of conduct (dharma and vinaya) that arose
from within our community and the answer will clarify itself on
its own.
It is useful to consider how and where these rules and teachings
appeared within the course of Buddhas life. Judging from texts,
they appeared as answers to particular events, rising out of
circumstances, and if carefully attended, were surely meant to
awaken individual minds by gently cleaning out the superfluous
cobwebs and the dust.
The teachings were instigated by a particular questions framed
in a particular settings and a particular spaces. All of that and more
form the settings that allows human thoughts and acts to stand on
their own authority without any props.

The Buddha and Islam

Discipline and concentration then, are parts of a process that
allows individual minds to observe issues as they arise. They
stand guard in order not to allow an onslaught of anger, fear and
overpowering emotion, or the tangles of lifes energy, to take over
the functioning of a calm mind and run amuck with it. That was the
Buddhas answer. It could be described in Moslem terms as the
position between two positions (manzila bayna al manzilatayn),
which became the central point of Muslim jurisprudence.
17

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

An awakened and cultivated mind is a necessity in order to

navigate through life consciously. This is still the main if not the
only, tenet of Buddhism.
Having thus considered the concept of discipline, where does
authority fall in context of religion and faith? Not exclusively on
an outside agent, be it even a god, and that is the danger that the
Buddha gently warned against by saying that even a god came to
him for advice. Authority rests on a whole set of circumstances
that allow the mind to form the appropriate setting for an issue
to arise and be regarded from many points of view with clarity,
patience and the capacity to remove obstacles that may appear
along the way. No more than a majestic mosque, a steeple, or a
minaret, rests on the sole architect that designed its form, but also
on a set of rules and on many other factors capable of working
within the parameters of a specific place.
Wide Awake did not go off into the world heedlessly as did his
prodigal brother, he merely distanced himself by climbing the
nearest mountain in order to gain a better panoramic view of the
kingdom to which he belonged and thus disentangle the tangles
that the mind and the body are prone to create simply out of habit.
Wide Awake represents that awareness that warns us against
mindless habits or habituation processes. The Prodigal Full Moons
son Intellect, represents a tool capable of leading the senses towards
an awakening of consciousness, or conscience. That activity we
commonly call knowing.
Kutadgu Bilig can be described as a didactic gnostic treatise.
The triangle it portrays is the tension between knowledge, or
good thought, and its opposite: thoughtless action. Thus it is the
tension and its constant adjustments, represented by Justice, or
the Indic rta, the rhythm of the world, that acts as a calibrating
agent between these two opposites. In this manner it highlights
the concept of injustice not in contradistinction to justice but to
an existential malaise that an either or type of thinking can lead
us into. Thus Yusuf Hass Hajib points at the dangers of accepting
superficial concepts of selflessness and of virtue, particularly when
18

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

in service of an ill-defined common good into which a king or a god

can easily get entangled.
In view of this Central Asian syncretism, one cannot avoid
posing the question: why do these two texts, the Buddhist and the
Muslim carry the same name, be it in two different languages?
One could jump to the conclusion that this transfer of titles from
religion to religion was a simple trick of conversion, similar to
calling the New Testament the Bible of the Christians as opposed
to the Old Testament being Bible of the Jews. The more relevant
question still remains however: How was the concept of religion
understood by the Central Asians of the eleventh century?
When turning to storytelling and literary metaphors, we
inevitably encounter heroes and their names. In the Kutadgu
Bilig one of the heroes is named Wide Awake. The word buddha
in Indic or in this case its Sanskrit representation, means exactly
that. Today a person of Slavic origin can spot the link easily and
conjure the connection between the two. For one who speaks a
Slavic language which has kept most of its roots intact and close to
Sanskrit, buddha simply means being awake, as opposed to being
asleep. Not so to someone who is from a different part of the world.
So the meaning of someones name, the noun itself, already has a
life energy of its own and can quickly run off on various tangents.
These audio, visual, and mental consciousnesses, or awarenesses,
in the Buddhist context, are called bodhisattvas, provided they be
kind and help humanity, they do their job creating audio, video,
and mental patterns that habituate our thinking process in a
gentle manner. The monotheistic and polytheistic worlds tended to
personify them and consider them as saints, the Buddhists insisted
on seeing them also as mental energies that guide the mind.
It seems that Yusuf intentionally hit chords that resonated with
the many cultures found in Central Asia. Following methodologies
imported from the Middle East, India, Iran, and China, he expanded
the scope of religious discourse, enabling it to flow, as he himself
stated in the passage quoted above. His Sacred Knowledge offers
very traditional dialogues between archetypes of an ancient world.
19

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

They are portrayed as court dignitaries and invited to join, yet

they also represent disembodied, pure, concepts. The implication
is obvious, this is the court of the Sun King, the protagonists are:
Wisdom, Might, Justice, Rising Sun, Waning Moon, etc. Each one of
them explains the role that it should play, in order to effectively
reflect the harmonious moves of the heavens and integrate the
present moment into the timelessness of the universes.
In Yusufs didactic drama there are also minor players,
ethereal creatures who appear between the scenes and perform
a little dance. A Ray of Sunshine for example, is brought in as an
interjection among the serious conversations on norms and ideals
which the main protagonists pontificate upon in the various acts
of this drama. She portrays the moods of the play:
With drooping head, Sol came back to earth and the
World, her bright complexion now blackened with soot,
let down her forelock, and covered her face completely
with her love lock.
(Dankoff 147-48)
Such vignettes interspersed throughout the dialogues remind
one of Homers Helen, and of the Sunlight, as well as the apsaras,
or fire and wind beings, found in the Buddhist Avatamsaka Sutra,
where they enchanted the pilgrim Sudhana on his journey in search
of the source of the water of life, and other heavenly beings who
attempt to come to this earth in ever new incarnations in order to
live the life of human beings without much success.
But, it is in the final act of this didactic Turkic-Muslim story
that Yusuf offers an interesting clue. It lies in the figure of the
elder brother of the Prodigal Sonthe Awakened Sage, the hermit
who has retreated from the world and gone up the mountain. The
Awakened Sage pleads the argument against worldliness with
Justice and with Intellect. He wins by subtly juxtaposing suffering,
a discomfort built into the nature of our world, and injustice. By
inserting suffering and somewhat ignoring the either or between
20

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

justice and injustice, he entreats a king to gain a deeper dimension

of the world and its woes. This presentation thus raises the whole
drama above the constraints of narrow dogmatisms by fine-tuning
crucial concepts without transgressing the limits imposed by any
religion and tradition. The Awakened Sage wins the admiration
of both king and vizier as they themselves awaken to the more
philosophical aspects of life, or to the nature of our intentions
and delve into the deeper insights about our transitory world.
Two concepts: intentionality and mortality became crucial
elements of Muslim theology as it was developed by one of Islams
great philosophers and theologians Al-Ghazali. He also lived in the
eleventh century, and his homeland today known as Afghanistan,
was part of ancient Bactria.
In converting Bughra Khan to Islam the issue of solitude also
needed to be faced and discussed directly, since it must have been
relevant to the customs of society. Yusuf Hass Hajib was well
aware of that, as was Al-Ghazali, who had to leave the hubbub of
a great metropolis, which in his day was Baghdad, and the famous
university which he helped his friend Nizam-ul Mulk create in
order to find wisdom and pen his great work Ihya Ulum- al-din, (The
Revival of Religious Sciences).
As most good story tellers do, Yusuf reserved the argument in
favor of solitude for the finale, having the courage to offer it as a
veritable tour de force. It is only after parading the mundane that
he successfully and openly argues the position of a hermit who
willingly distances himself from the world in order to gain a better
perspective:
Walk alone, perfect man, all company shun.
What harm can the hermit do to the sun?
The parrot learned to speak on his own,
And the hermit performs his worship alone.
You say that to associate with men is praiseworthy;
but how can that be so? Consider, my brother, that I
have been cut off from my devotions ever since you
21

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

arrived here today. If I have incurred so much loss by

associating with you alone, do not make matters worse
by forcing me to reenter society; for in that case, when
shall I have time to worship God?
(Dankoff 3359-3367)

Solitude is a concept that is hard to defend in any society since

it seems to pose a threat to life itself. It has been traditionally
challenged by most socio-religious settings. Its very definition
stands in opposition to community as we commonly understand it,
since for the majority, communal activity seems to lie at the center
of ethics. To arrive at some insights Wide Awake wisely points out
the difference between injustice and suffering. But such awareness
can come only to those who distance themselves from big cities,
powerful kings, and the manipulations of society. The Awakened
Sage, with a mildly cynical rebuke very respectfully declines royal
offers to actively join the multitudes and its kings in order to help
the world.
Can the solitary who ordinarily doesnt engage society be
expected to exert a useful impact on society? Yusuf Hass Hajibs
hermit wisely states:
Such is the worlds way: observe it well, and the gate
of understanding will open. Its pleasures are toil, its
joys care, its precious things are worthless, its comforts
misery. Therefore bear whatever comes without
complaint, for pleasure and pain pass alike.
(Dankoff 6445)
Thus the hermit distances himself from the world in order
to understand it and better grasp its meaning. He advises us to
observe and understand the rhythm of the Universe.
A Turkish Bektashi Baba who found his refuge in the vicinities
of Chicago after the ravages that destroyed his life in Albania in
the wake of World War Two, beautifully described to his American
students the process of opening the mind to the vasteness of the
22

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

universeto paraphrase: The lesson needs to breathe the knowing

of the teachers not-knowing. (Trix)
It is not so much the teacher, but the lesson and its breath that
keeps the student awake.

Notes
1.

A notable and very important branch of the so called White Huns were the Kushanas who ruled
in Bactria. They established a great empire in the Southern parts of Central Asia spilling over to
Afghanistan, Bihar, Kashmir and Sind. The Kushana were instrumental in bringing an integration of
peoples of different nationalities into a single political fabric. They spread Buddhism seeing it as a
unifying element that transcends tribal and ethnic interests. These Bactrian Kushanas were those
who apparently supplanted the so called Scythian Kushanas in their moves Westward from the
Altai, a process that took place before the common era and was apparently accomplished by the
fifth century CE. The cousins of the Bactrians, or the Turanian Huns, also pushed Eastward. They
eventually became the overlords of the whole of Turkestan. In China they are known as the as Tu-Kiu
which according to Chinese sources, stems from the word turgut meaning strong.
In the Indian chronicles of the sixth century CE they were known as Turuska (Bagci 6).

2.

3.
4.

The prominent Indian scholar, Professor B.N. Puri, who delivered UNESCO sponsored seminars in
Dusanbe in 1968 and in Kabul in 1982, in his Buddhism in Central Asia, published soon after in Delhi
1987, quoting Charles Eliots work Hinduism and Buddhism confirms that Buddhist literature is
available in many languages, mostly in a Turkish dialect written in the Uygur aphabet derived from
the Syrianand that Uygur represented the literary form of the various Turkish idioms spoken north
of the Tien Shan (26).
The exact date when Buddhism was introduced into the Turfan Oasis could not have been later than
the first century CE The full picture starts becoming clear around the third century however. The Tsin
dynasty annals tell of a thousand stupas and temples. A member of the Tsin royal family, Po-Yen,
apparently translated sutras in the White Horse monastery in Lo yan. Very clear and meticulous
records were kept. Also many nunneries existed in the area, their members were drawn from the
royal families of the Tarim Basin. The mother of a famous translator of Buddhist texts into Chinese,
Kumarajiva, was one of them. She retired into a convent that the Chinese chronicles named Tsio li in
the vicinity of Kucha. There she learned Sanskrit, or the language of India. Kumarajiva was seven
years old at the time. The monastic environment had great impact on him and his acquisition of
languages. He was responsible for introducing Mahayana Buddhism into the Tarim basin.
See Puri; Zieme and McRae.
Sutta Nipata is also quoted by the verse number, the particular quote here is taken from the Path of
Purification, ( Visuddhi Magga ) of Buddhaghosa as translated by Bh. Nanamoli and published by BPS
Kandy 2010, ISBN 978 955 24 0026-6, pgs 5-10 or I,1-15,(i.e. introductory chapter paragraphs 1-15)

23

S AC RED K NOWLEDGE IN CE NTRA L A SIA : TH E K U TA DGU B IL IG

References
Avesta. 1885-96. The Sacred Books of the Parsis. Edited by K.F. Geldner.
Stuttgart: Kohlhammmer.
Bagci, Prabodh Chandra. [1951] 1975. India and China: A Thousand
Years of Cultural Relations. New York: Philosophical Library.
;Reprint, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Citations refer to the
Greenwood Greenwood edition.
Buddhaghosa. 2010. The Path of Purification: Visuddhimagga.
Translated by Nanamoli. BPS, Kandy.
BTTS, trans. 1979. The Dharma Flower Sutra. San Francisco: Buddhist
Text Translation Society/Dharma Realm Buddhist Association.
Chattopadhyaya, Sudhakar. 1980. The Periplus of the Erythrean Sea
and Ptolemy on Ancient Geography of India. Calcutta: Prajna.
Dankoff, Robert, trans. 1983. Kutadgu Bilig (Wisdom of Royal Glory).
Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Dhammapada, Tomales CA: Nilgiri Press
Eliot, Charles. 1921. Hinduism and Buddhism: An Historical Sketch.
London: E. Arnold.
Gide, Andr. 1960. The Return of the Prodigal Son. Logan: University
of Utah Press.
Grousset, Ren. 1970. Empire of the Steppes. New Brunswick, NJ:
Rutgers University Press.
Lenz, Timothy, Andrew Glass, and Bhikshu Dharmamitra, trans.
2003. A New Version of the Gandhari Dharmapada and a Collection
of Previous-Birth Stories: British Library Karosthi Fragments 16 +
25. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
McRae, John R., and Jan Nattier, eds. 2012. Buddhism Across
Boundaries. Sino-Platonic Papers 222, www.sino-platonic.org,
Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania, Department of
East Asian Languages and Civilizations
Puri, Baij Nath. 1987. Buddhism in Central Asia., New Delhi: Motilal
Banarsidass.
Rhys Davids, Carolyn, Rhys Davids, Thomas William. 1905. Pali
English Dictionary. London, PTS Publisher.
24

BU DDH IST MEDITATIO N S O N I S L A M I C CO N T E M P L AT I V E PAT H S

Stein, Auriel. 1989. Kalhanas Rajatarangini: A Chronicle of the Kings of

Kashmir. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
Sutta Nipata. Access to Insight. <www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka>.
Trix, Frances. 1993. Learning with an Islamic Master. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press.
Yusuf Has Hacib,trans. 1974. Kutadgu Bilig. Edited by Reshid Rahmeti
Arat) Ankara: Turk Tarih Kurumu.
Zieme, Peter, trans. 2012. Akademienvorhaben Turfanforschun. (The
sutra of complete enlightenment in old Turkish Buddhism). Berlin:
Brandenburgischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.

25