Originally posted by jeremiah
To bmyers:
Maybe I don't know Buddha as well as I thought. I thought he acheived enlightenment and experienced Nirvana by practicing a severe form of ascetism until he reached that state. I thought he was willing to die until he had overcome his flesh.
I would suggest that you read any of a number of texts regarding Buddhism (the teachings of the Buddha himself are excellent, but I think may be a bit much if all you're looking for is a brief overview of Buddhist traditions, history, and thinking). "Buddhism, Plain and Simple" by Steve Hagen (an American Buddhist monk) or "Buddhism Is Not What You Think: Finding Freedom Beyond Beliefs" by the same author are both excellent introductions. The following, though, is from Huston Smith's "The Religions of Man," which I believe is unfortunately out of print:
"His next step was to join a band of ascetics and give their way full try...He ate so little, one bean a day during one of his fasts, that 'when I thought I would touch the skin of my stomach, I actually took hold of my spine."...In the end he grew so weak that he fell into a faint, and if companions had not been around to feed him warm rice gruel, might easily have died.
This experience taught him the futility of asceticism. He had given this experiment all a man could and it had not been successful. It had not brought him enlightenment."
So while the Buddha did spend time as an ascetic, his philosophy did not come from asceticism nor is Buddhism currently ascetic (which requires denial of even bodily needs, to the extent that the practitioner is capable). Buddhism IS often referred to, though, as the "Middle Way," as it teaches a path between asceticism and indulgence. The basic notion of Buddhist philosophy is that human suffering (what in Sanskrit is written as
dukkha, and is only approximately translated as "suffering") is the result of
tanha, usually translated as "desire" but again only approximately. So Buddhism is not about denying oneself the necessities of life, but rather eliminating "desire" (again, this suffers from the simplicity of the translation) and seeing the world for what it is.
The idea that Buddha was practicing asceticism at the time of his enlightenment probably comes from the legend of his "seating himself underneath a Bo tree and vowing not to move until he achieved enlightenment" - but this is generally seen as referring to his dedication to that cause, not that he was denying himself food, drink, etc., during this period.
I think Buddhist monks today practice certain types of ascetism and certainly isolation from the world. I think at the very least Buddhism could be described as mental ascetism?
Buddhist monks practice humility and poverty, in a manner very similar to, say, their Catholic counterparts. If that is a type of "asceticism", then I suppose you'll find them ascetics. Buddhism certainly does not require its followers in general to practice asceticism, physical or mental - although I'm not at all certain what you mean by "mental asceticism."
ERFIDIÆ 
