Traditional dates of Buddha?

[dean_anderson at SACARI.ORG]

Thanks for the reply. My German has gotten a bit rusty with disuse over the
years but I'm dusting it off.

So, the traditional dates of 1700 and 1000 BC are just one of a multitude of
claimed dates and don't have any particularly large or influential groups
that hold to them?

Dean

----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Wyzlic" <pwyzlic at UNI-BONN.DE>
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2003 4:02 AM
Subject: Re: Traditional dates of Buddha?


On Tue, 1 Apr 2003 dean_anderson at SACARI.ORG wrote:

> I recently ran across mention that (some) Buddhists hold the Buddha's date
> to be around 1700 B.C. Perhaps this is a Tibetan tradition?
>
> Another source said that some hold it to be 1000 B.C. I believe this may
be
> a date from some in the Sankaracarya tradition who would then put Sankara
at
> around 5-600 B.C.
>
> These dates are obviously much earlier than those commonly accepted among
> scholars -- even given the range of differing opinions among them.
>
> Are these dates accepted by a large number of followers in Buddhism and
> Vedanta?
>
> What are their reasons for choosing these dates?

Concerning the dating of Buddha Sakyamuni, see the congress volumes ed. by
H. Bechert. There you will find lots of possible and impossible dates and
where they may come from.

See: The dating of the historical Buddha = Die Datierung des
historischen Buddha / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - Gttingen : Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht 1991-1997 (Symposien zur Buddhismusforschung ; 4) (Abhandlungen der
Akademie der Wissenschaften in G ttingen : philologisch-historische
Klasse ; ...)

1 / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - 1991. - XV, 525 S. -  (Symposien zur
Buddhismusforschung ; 4,1) (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften
in Gttingen : philologisch-historische Klasse ; Folge 3, 189)
ISBN 3-525-82476-9

2 / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - 1992. - X, 530 S. -  (Symposien zur
Buddhismusforschung ; 4,2) (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften
in G ttingen : philologisch-historische Klasse ; Folge 3, 194)
ISBN 3-525-82481-5

3 / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - 1997. - VI, 171 S. -  (Symposien zur
Buddhismusforschung ; 4,3) (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften
in Gttingen : philologisch-historische Klasse ; Folge 3, 222)
ISBN 3-525-82419-X

Hope it helps
Peter Wyzlic