Jataka Tales : Stories of the Buddha’s Many Births

The Jataka Tales are an ancient collection of stories, narrating the past lives of the Buddha Siddharta Gautama. The stories exist in different forms across the Buddhist world. In this edition, Misha Glenny and his guests explore the Pali collection of around 550 Jataka Tales. On the night of his Enlightenment, before he became the Buddha, Siddharta Gautama is believed to have gained the ability to recall each of his past lives. In the Jataka collection, he uses the stories of these past lives to relay his teachings. Each rebirth saw him take a different form, he could be an animal like a monkey or a fish, he could be a Prince or even a God. Jatakas have existed for thousands of years, and they are a cornerstone of Buddhist literature, art and religious teachings. The stories contain a multitude of recurring characters in the community around the Buddha, and their influence exists beyond Buddhism into other cultures around the world.

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Guests

• Naomi Appleton 3 episodes
  Professor of Buddhist Studies and Indian Religions at the University of Edinburgh
• Mahinda Deegalle No other episodes
  Bye-Fellow at St Edmund's College, University of Cambridge
• Alexandra Green No other episodes
  SP Shaw Curator for Southeast Asia at the British Museum

Reading list

• The Ten Great Birth Stories of the Buddha: The Mahanipata of the Jatakatthavannana, vol. 1
  Appleton, Naomi and Shaw, Sarah (Silkworm Books, 2015)
• Jataka Stories in Theravada Buddhism: Narrating the Bodhisatta Path
  Appleton, Naomi (Routledge, 2010) Google Books →
• Making Merit, Making Art: A Thai Temple in Wimbledon
  Cate, Sandra (University of Hawai'i Press, 2003) Google Books →
• Buddhist visual cultures, rhetoric and narrative in late Burmese wall paintings
  Green, Alexandra (University of Hong Kong Press, 2018)
• The Religious World of Kirti Sri: Buddhism, Art, and Politics in Late Medieval Sri Lanka
  Holt, John C. (Oxford University Press, 1996) Google Books →
• Apocryphal Birth-Stories, vol. 1
  Horner, I. B. and Jaini, Padmanabh S. (Pali Text Society, 1985)
• Pannasajataka, 2 vols.
  Jaini, Padmanabh S., ed. (Pali Text Society, 1981-83)
• Constructing Multiple Narratives in Theravada Buddhism: The Vessantara Painted Scrolls of Northeast Thailand and Lowland Laos
  Lefferts, Leedom, and Cate, Sandra (Hong Kong University Press, 2013)
• Temples of Gold: Seven Centuries of Thai Buddhist Paintings
  Leksukhum, Santi (Thames and Hudson, 2001) Google Books →
• Buddhist Painting in Cambodia
  Roveda, Vittorio, and Sothon Yem (River Books, 2009) Google Books →
• Sacred Biography in the Buddhist Traditions of South and Southeast Asia
  Schober, Juliane, ed. (University of Hawai'i Press, 1997) Google Books →
• The Jatakas: Birth Stories of the Bodhisatta
  Shaw, Sarah (Penguin, 2006)

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Programme ID: m0033pd5

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0033pd5

Auto-category: 294.382 (Buddhist sacred texts)