Shakyamuni Buddha

Shakyamuni Buddha, born Siddhartha Gautama, was a spiritual teacher of ancient India, living around the 6th to 5th centuries BC, whom Buddhists revere as the founder of their tradition. According to Buddhist tradition, he was born a prince of the Shakya clan at Lumbini, in present-day Nepal, and raised in comfort. Moved by the sight of old age, sickness, death and a wandering ascetic, he left the palace at twenty-nine to seek an end to suffering. After years of austere practice, he chose a middle way and, meditating beneath the Bodhi tree at Bodh Gaya, attained enlightenment. At Sarnath he gave his first teaching on the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path, and for some forty-five years he taught followers of every background. His teachings of compassion, wisdom and right conduct spread across Asia and guide hundreds of millions of people today.