| Maitreya Buddha | |
|---|---|
Bodhisattva Maitreya from the 2nd Century Gandharan Art Period
| |
| Sanskrit | मैत्रेय (Maitreya) |
| Pāli | Metteyya |
| Burmese | အရိမေတ္တေယျ [ʔəɹḭmèdja̰] |
| Chinese | 彌勒菩薩 (Mílè Púsa) |
| Japanese | 弥勒菩薩 (Miroku Bosatsu) |
| Korean | 미륵보살 (Mireuk Bosal) |
| Mongolian | ᠮᠠᠶᠢᠳᠠᠷᠢ᠂ ᠠᠰᠠᠷᠠᠯᠲᠣ; Майдар, Асралт; Mayidari, Asaraltu |
| Shan | ဢရီႉမိတ်ႈတေႇယႃႉ |
| Sinhala | මෛත්රී බුදුන් (Maithree Budun) |
| Thai | พระศรีอริยเมตไตรย (Phra Sri Araya Mettrai) |
| Tibetan | བྱམས་པ་ |
| Vietnamese | Di-lặc (Bồ Tát) |
| Information | |
| Venerated by | Theravada, Mahayana,Vajrayana |
| Attributes | Great Benevolence |
| Preceded by | Gautama Buddha |
 Buddhism portal | |
Maitreya (Sanskrit), Metteyya (Pāli), Maithree (Sinhala), Jampa (Tibetan) or Di-Lặc (Vietnamese), is regarded as a future Buddha of this world in Buddhist eschatology. In some Buddhist literature, such as the Amitabha Sutra and theLotus Sutra, he is referred to as Ajita Bodhisattva.
Maitreya is a bodhisattva who in the Buddhist tradition is to appear on Earth, achieve complete enlightenment, and teach the pure dharma. According to scriptures, Maitreya will be a successor of the historic Śākyamuni Buddha. The prophecy of the arrival of Maitreya refers to a time when the Dharma will have been forgotten by most on Jambudvipa. It is found in the canonical literature of all major Buddhist schools (Theravāda, Mahāyāna, Vajrayāna), and is accepted by most Buddhists as a statement about an event that will take place when the Dharma will have been mostly forgotten on Earth.
Contents
[hide]- 1 Origins
- 2 Characteristics
- 3 General description
- 4 Maitreya's Tuṣita Heaven
- 5 Activity of Maitreya in the current age
- 6 Future coming of Maitreya
- 7 Nichiren Buddhism and Maitreya as metaphor
- 8 Non-Buddhist views
- 9 Maitreya claimants
- 10 Maitreya sects in China
- 11 Alternative persona
- 12 See also
- 13 References
- 14 External links
Origins[edit]
The name Maitreya (Metteyya in Pāli) is derived from the Sanskrit word maitrī(Pāli: mettā) meaning "loving-kindness", which is in turn derived from the nounmitra (Pāli: mitta) in the sense of "friend".
Metteyya is mentioned in the Cakavatti (Sihanada) Sutta (Digha Nikaya 26) of the Pali Canon. He appears in no other sutta in the Pali Canon, and this has cast doubt as to the sutta's authenticity. Most of the Buddha's sermons are presented as having been presented in answer to a question, or in some other appropriate context, but this sutta has a beginning and ending in which the Buddha is talking to monks about something totally different. This leads Gombrich to conclude that either the whole sutta is apocryphal, or that it has at least been tampered with.[1]
Maitreya is sometimes represented seated on a throne Western-style, and venerated both in Mahāyāna and non-Mahāyāna Buddhism. Some have speculated that inspiration for Maitreya may have come from the ancient Indo-Iraniandeity Mithra. The primary comparison between the two characters appears to be the similarity of their names. According to a book entitled The Religion of the Iranian Peoples, "No one who has studied the Zoroastrian doctrine of the Saoshyants or the coming saviour-prophets can fail to see their resemblance to the future Maitreya.[2]
Paul Williams claims that some Zoroastrian ideas like Saoshyant influenced the beliefs about Maitreya, such as "expectations of a heavenly helper, the need to opt for positive righteousness, the future millennium, and universal salvation". Possible objections are that these characteristics are not unique to Zoroastrianism, nor are they necessarily characteristic of the belief in Maitreya.
It is also possible that Maitreya Buddha originated with the Hindu Kalki, and that its similarities with the Iranian Mithra have to do with their common Indo-Iranian origin.
In the Greco-Buddhist art of Gandhara, in the first centuries CE in northern India, Maitreya was the most popular figure to be represented, together with the Buddha Śākyamuni. In China, in the 4th–6th Centuries "Buddhist artisans used the names Shakyamuni and Maitreya interchangeably... indicating both that the distinction between the two had not yet been drawn and that their respective iconographies had not yet been firmly set".[3] An example is the stone sculpture found in the Qingzhou cache dedicated to Maitreya in 529 CE as recorded in the inscription (currently in the Qingzhou Museum, Shandong). The religious belief of Maitreya apparently developed around the same time as that of Amitābha, as early as the 3rd century CE.[4]