File:Southern_India,_Andhra_Pradesh,_possibly_Amaravati,_Satavahana_period_-_Buddha's_Previous_Life_as_a_Woodpecker-_Javasakunda_Jataka_-_1970.350_-_Cleveland_Museum_of_Art_(cropped).tif · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons
Jātaka
Sign in to savecollection of traditional narratives of the previous lives of Buddha before his last life as Gautama
The Jātaka is a collection of stories about the Buddha's lives before he was born as Gautama Buddha, the founder of Buddhism. These tales have been central to Buddhist teaching and culture for centuries, illustrating moral lessons and the Buddha's path toward enlightenment across multiple lifetimes.
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In a previous life, as a woodpecker, the Buddha removes a bone from the throat of a lion, Amaravati style, c. 175–225 CE
The Jātaka (Sanskrit for "of the Birth", "Birth-Related" or "Birth Stories") are a voluminous body of literature native to the Indian subcontinent which mainly concern the previous births of Gautama Buddha in both human and animal form. Jataka stories were depicted on the railings and torans of the stupas. According to Peter Skilling, this genre is "one of the oldest classes of Buddhist literature." Some of these texts are also considered great works of literature in their own right. The various Indian Buddhist schools had different collections of jātakas. The largest known collection is the Jātakatthavaṇṇanā of the Theravada school, as a textual division of the Pāli Canon, included in the Khuddaka Nikaya of the Sutta Pitaka.