So What's the Difference Between Nikaya and Other "Buddhisms?"

So, in my last post concerning the stats on the World Religions, I alluded to the difference between Nikaya Buddhism and other "Buddhisms." I thought now might be a good time to start to delineate those differences. This will probably take two to three posts, but, you always want to leave your fans wanting more, right?

Anyway, the legend of "the Buddha" (the Enlightened One) goes something like this...

About 2500 years ago, in Northern India, which was principally Hindu, a prince or king of the Sakya clan had a son, whom he named Siddhartha Gautema. Now, this ruler took his son to a wise man named, Ashita, who did a "seeing" on the child. After this seeing, Ashita said the boy would either become a religious mendicant or a great ruler.

Well, the father certainly did not want his son to become a mendicant (for they were poor beggars), and decided he would ensure that his son would follow the latter path. To do this, he sealed off the palace from anything that smacked of suffering or labor. Thus, young Siddhartha grew up pampered and groomed toward being a king in his own right. However, when Siddhartha became older, he grew bored with the constant pleasures of the court and its homogeneity, and persuaded a palace guard to take him on a trip outside the palace.

While Siddhartha was journeying through the countryside, he saw four things that shocked him, for, after all, he had never experienced such things before--his father had ensured that he wouldn't: he saw a sick man, an old man, a dead man, and laborers slaving away in some fields. Moreover, nobody besides himself seemed to think these phenomena noteworthy--they walked past the dead man, and of course, nobody thought the laborers in the field an aberration--it's how things were.

Well, Siddhartha went back to the palace flummoxed, and decided that the palace life was not appropriate for him, for sooner or later he too would have to face the same kinds of tribulations...he reasoned it would be better to be ready for them, than think as his father did and try to avoid them. Therefore, he left the palace and joined an ascetic mendicant Hindu order. What happened next is critical in his story, but that is for the next post...