Chanwit Tudkeao
Doktor Designatus, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany
Ratnaśikhin Buddha is one of the relatively well-known Buddhas of the past, his name and biography are mentioned in several texts of the early Buddhist schools. His own biography, however, does not give us as many details about his life and teachings as those of some other Buddhas, for example of Śākyamuni Buddha, or Vipaśyin Buddha even though he was the one who gave prophecies to three of the most well-known Buddhas –who during his time, were still Bodhisatvas–, i.e. Dīpaṃkara Buddha, Śākyamuni Buddha and Maitreya Buddha. His stories preserved in various Buddhist texts were handed down to us in different versions and in various languages. They were transmitted from an early date from one Buddhist community to another in India and beyond, across much of Asia. One of these legends was widespread even in North and Central Thailand, where his name –Ratnaśikhin– is completely unknown. In this article, the various legends of Ratnaśikhin Buddha are compared in order to study “the mutual relationships of these four Buddhas and their epochal career” and “the relationship of these texts based on their literary genre and school affiliation”.
(Presented in the International Conference – Buddhist Narrative in Asia and Beyond, 9-11 August 2010, Imperial Queen's Park Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies, Chulalongkorn University with support from The Thailand Research Fund (TRF), in co-operation with Faculty of Arts, Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts, Institute of Asian Studies, The Confucius Institute, Chulalongkorn University and l’École française d'Extrême-Orient (EFEO))