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Ananda was one of the principal disciples of the Buddha
He has been called the beloved disciple of the
Buddhist story. He was the first cousin of the Buddha, and
was devotedly attached to him. Ananda entered the Order
in the second year of the Buddha's ministry, and became one
of his personal attendants, accompanying him on most of his
wanderings and being the interlocutor in many of the recorded
dialogues. He is the subject of a special panegyric delivered
by the Buddha just before his death (Mahaparinibbana Sutta,
Digha Nikaya 16); but it is the panegyric of an unselfish
man, kindly, thoughtful for others and popular; not of the
intellectual man, versed in the theory and practice of the
Buddhist system of self-culture. So in the long list of
the disciples given in the Anguttara (i. xiv.) where each
of them is declared to be the chief in some gift, Ananda is
mentioned five times (which is more often than any other),
but it is as chief in conduct and in service to others and
in power of memory, not in any of the intellectual powers
so highly prized in the community. This explains why he had
not attained to arahatship; and in the earliest account of
the convocation said to have been held by five hundred of
the principal disciples immediately after the Buddha's death,
he was the only one who was not an arahat (Cullavagga,
book xi.). In later accounts this incident is explained
away. Thirty-three verses ascribed to Ananda are preserved
in a collection of lyrics by the principal male members of the order (Theragatha, 1017-1050). They
show a gentle and reverent but simple spirit. (T. W. R. D.)
"Ananda" is the Sanskrit word for "bliss".
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This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica.
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