ut 350 million followers. According to an article by Frank E. Reynolds, most of them live in Sri Lanka, the mainland nations of southeast Asia, and Japan. ( Reynolds p. 1). This is a much smaller amount of followers than that of Christianity, Islam, or Hinduism.
However, at various times, Buddhism has been a dominant religious, cultural, and social force in most of Asia. ( Reynolds p. 1). Buddha’s real name was Siddhartha Gautama. He was born sometime during the 500’s or 400’s B. C. in South Western Nepal. He was a member of a royal and powerful family. He was never allowed to see all of the parts of life that are bad and even normal for most of us. He did not know about death or sickness. He did not know about the spiritual side of life either. He had been protected from all of these things since the day he was born.
He couldn’t take the questions that had arisen from his life of protection so he started sneaking out to see what was really going on. On one of his ventures outside of the castle walls he saw an old man first, then he saw a sick man, and then he saw a dead man laying in the street. This really frightened young Siddhartha to a point where he didn’t know if life was worth living. (Boeree p. 1) On another one of his ventures he saw an ascetic, which is a person that has denied themselves pleasure. He then bega
