Search for the Buddha: The Men Who Discovered India's Lost Religion

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Summary: The keys to ancient India
Review: Ancient India was virtually unknown before the 18th Century. Even the Indians had no idea of their own history. The British Orientalists started the unravelling of a complex puzzle that revealed the buried secrets of ancient India, emperor Asoka and Buddhism. Allen's book reveals this stunning tale.

This is very much an unfinished story with more leads than Allen explores but he has related how the keys to the history of India were discovered via Burma and Sri Lanka in deciphering the Brahmi script and making sense of mysterious pillars that dotted the Indian landscape.

This book is also of great interest from the archaelogical angle. Far more has been found in terms of buildings, ruins and places actually frequented by the Buddha than of Jesus though many scholars still ignore the physical evidence about the Buddha and pretend we only know him from oral traditions. In fact, undoubted relics of the Buddha after his cremation have also been found as detailed in this book. Allen indicates how recorded pilgrimages by Chinese monks lead to the rediscovery of lost monasteries, caves and the ancient city of Pataliputra.

Allen also details the history of Buddhist scholarship in the 19th century and how missionaries and their influences both dogged and abetted researches and a revival in Buddhism.

Allen's work will interest historians, archaeologists, linguists and those interested in Buddhism. There is a great deal more to be done in terms of archaeology, translation and reconstructing Indian history from the fifth century BCE and this book is an ideal launching pad. Not since Rhys David's Buddhist India has a similar tale seen the light. A major publication.

Rating:
Summary: Reads Like a Buddhist Detective Story
Review: I bought this book in preparation for a trip to India, in which I will visit many of the sites that are discussed in this book. This book turned out to be a treasure, and I could hardly put it down. Starting in the 18th century, Allen takes you through the rediscovery of lost, ancient Buddhist sites, the way in which the early Indian portion of Buddhist history was reconstructed, and - perhaps most importantly - the heroic efforts of the remarkable people who accomplished all of this. Weaving the story together is Allen's prose, which is written like a detective story. He takes you through the process of the discoveries in a way that is captivating and engaging. This book is a real page-turner, which is saying something about a book that is ostensibly about archeology!

Rating:
Summary: stumbling onto a find
Review: If you're one of those people who finds stumbling onto an ancient treasure exciting, then this modern treasure by Charles Allen is a book that won't disappoint. It's a phenomenal book for people who are serious about learning something. A rarity among writer's today, Allen packs the book with facts not only words and in doing so creates a wealth of knowledge for the student of things ancient. The book does get a bit crusty at points and dry to read, much like an ancient archaeological dig itself, but the dust makes the finds that much more captivating. If you thought you knew something about Buddhism, Britain and/or India this book will humbly remind you that knowledge has her vast stretches of uncharted territory. Of the books that have been written on Buddhism, this is one that will last, and outlast most. Happy hunting. -JL

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Summary: How Buddhism came to the West
Review: Interest in Buddhism has grown dramatically in the West in recent years. Much of this growth is due to the increased availability of the Buddha's teaching, and to the spread of meditation practice. There is a wealth of books available on Buddhist teachings, including many translations of Buddhist Suttras and on meditation. but too little has been written on how the teachings of Buddhism were recovered so that people in the West (and, in fact, people in Asia as well) could learn from them.

Charles Allen's book, "The Search for the Buddha: The Men who Discovered India's Lost Religion" (2003) helps fill this void. Mr. Allen was born in India to a family with a long record of service to British India and has published several other books dealing with India. His book deals only lightly with Buddhist teachings and doctrines. The book's focus is the activities of a remarkable group of people who, beginning late in the 18th Century, discovered the languages, texts, sacred sites, and teachings of Buddhism and thus prepared the way for their study and recognition. These individuals worked in not only in India, but in Ceylon, Burma, Nepal, and Tibet as well.

The task of discovering Buddhism in India was not as easy as might be supposed since Buddhism had essentially been driven out of India centuries before the British empire. Many of the earliest discoveries of Buddhism were made by employees of the East India Company or the British Government who were amateurs in the study of religion and archaeology and who were sent to England for other reasons. Thus Dr. Francis Buchanan, who wrote early studies of Buddhism in Burma and Nepal was a surgeon with an interest in Botany. Sir William Jones, who established the Asiatic Society and became known as "Oriental" Jones was a Judge. The brilliant James Princep who unraveled a difficult Sanskrit script was trained as a scientist and also was a pioneer in the study of numismatics (coins). Csmoa de Koros was a Hungarian who made the wealth of Tibetan scriptures available to the West as a result of his quixotical notion that Tibetans constituted a sort of lost tribe of Hungarians.

These Orientalists made lasting discoveries about the history of Buddhist India, its languages and sacred sites. Mr. Allen documents their work with a great deal of detail, which I found confusingly organized at times. But there is no doubt of the significance of their endeavors.

The last chapters of the book discuss early students of Buddhism who were more familiar to me. These individuals include the notorious Russian founder of Theosophy, Madame Blavatsky and her one-time assistant Colonel Henry Olcott from the United States. Sir Edwin Arnold, a British newspaper editor composed a famous epic poem in 1879 about the Buddha, "The Light of Asia" which brought Buddhism to the attention of many people in Britain and the United States. Rhys Davis founded the Pali Text Society in 1881, and this group played an invaluable and still ongoing role in making early Buddhist texts available in translation. Dr Lawrence Waddell, a physician, wrote in 1897 an early, highly critical, book about Tibetan Buddhism and also made important archaeological discoveries.

I found the discussion of this latter group of pioneers in the study of Buddhism more accessible than the earlier part of the book, probably because I had some background in their work. But the entire book makes a fascinating study of how the basic facts of Buddhism were learned and organized and brought to the West. The book is replete with many photographs and drawings which help explain and give context to the text.

Mr. Allen writes with affection for Buddhism and with a high, if critical and nuanced regard, for the achievement of the British in India. This book will interest readers interested in the development of knowledge about Buddhism and readers interested in the history of the British in India.