On his last night, the Buddha named four places that a devout person should visit with reverence and awe: where the Tathagata was born, where he attained supreme awakening, where he set the wheel of Dharma in motion, and where he attained final nibbana.

The four sites are Lumbini, Bodh Gaya, Sarnath, and Kushinagar. Three are in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar; one is in Nepal. Together they form the core Buddhist pilgrimage circuit and have done for some two thousand three hundred years.

Lumbini — the birth #

Nepal, Rupandehi district, near the Indian border.

The site is unusually well attested. Ashoka erected a pillar here around 249 BCE recording that he visited in the twentieth year of his reign, honoured the spot as the birthplace of “the Buddha, the Shakya sage,” and reduced the village’s tax. The pillar is still standing, with its inscription legible.

What is there: the Ashokan pillar; the Maya Devi Temple, enclosing excavated foundations and a marker stone identifying the exact spot; the sacred pond where Maya is said to have bathed; the remains of monasteries from several periods; and a large park with monasteries built by Buddhist countries from around the world — Thai, Burmese, Chinese, Korean, German, and others — each in its national style.

Excavations beneath the Maya Devi temple have found earlier structures, including timber remains that the excavators dated considerably earlier than the Ashokan period, though the interpretation is contested.

See The Buddha’s Birth and Early Life.

Bodh Gaya — the awakening #

Bihar, India, on the Nairanjana river.

The most important of the four, and the busiest.

What is there: the Mahabodhi Temple, a tall brick structure whose present form dates substantially from the Gupta period with major later restoration, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Beside it, the Bodhi tree — a descendant of the original, propagated from the cutting Ashoka’s daughter Sanghamitta took to Sri Lanka in the third century BCE and brought back after the original was destroyed. Beneath it, the Vajrasana, the “diamond throne,” a polished sandstone slab attributed to Ashoka marking the seat of the awakening.

Around the temple are the seven sites associated with the seven weeks after the awakening, including the spot where Mucalinda the serpent-king is said to have sheltered the Buddha from a storm.

The town is full of monasteries built by every Buddhist nation, and it is the single best place in the world to see the range of the tradition in one square kilometre. The Dalai Lama teaches here periodically, and the town fills.

The contested history is worth knowing. The site was in Hindu mahant control from the sixteenth century, and a long campaign led initially by Anagarika Dharmapala from 1891 sought to restore Buddhist management. The Bodh Gaya Temple Act of 1949 established a management committee with both Hindu and Buddhist members, and the arrangement remains disputed by some Buddhist groups.

Sarnath — the first teaching #

Uttar Pradesh, a few kilometres from Varanasi.

Ancient Isipatana, the deer park where the Buddha delivered the first sermon to the five companions, and where the Sangha came into existence.

What is there: the Dhamekh Stupa, a massive cylindrical structure some 43 metres high whose present form dates to around 500 CE, marking the traditional spot. The remains of the Dharmarajika Stupa and of extensive monastic complexes. The stump of Ashoka’s pillar.

The Sarnath Museum holds the lion capital from that pillar — four lions back to back on a drum carved with four wheels and four animals. It was adopted as the State Emblem of India in 1950, and the wheel from it is the chakra at the centre of the Indian flag. The museum also holds the fifth-century seated Buddha in the teaching gesture that is among the finest pieces of Indian sculpture.

Sarnath is close enough to Varanasi to be visited in a morning, which makes the contrast between a major Hindu pilgrimage city and a Buddhist site a few kilometres away unusually vivid.

Kushinagar — the parinirvana #

Uttar Pradesh, Kushinagar district.

The most subdued of the four, and for many pilgrims the most affecting. This is where the Buddha died, between two sal trees, at about eighty.

What is there: the Mahaparinirvana Temple, containing a 6-metre reclining Buddha in red sandstone, dated to the fifth century, showing him lying on his right side. Behind it, the Mahaparinirvana Stupa. About a kilometre away, the Ramabhar Stupa, a large brick mound marking the cremation site.

The reclining figure is worth sitting with. It depicts a death, without transfiguration, and the tradition’s insistence on this — an old man who ate a bad meal and died of dysentery — is the point of the site. See The Parinirvana.

The eight great sites #

Later tradition expanded the circuit to eight, adding four places associated with miracles:

Rajgir (Rajagaha) — Vulture Peak, where many discourses were given, and the site of the First Council nearby. Sravasti — Jeta’s Grove, where the Buddha spent more rains retreats than anywhere else, and the setting of a large proportion of the discourses. Sankasya — where he is said to have descended from the Heaven of the Thirty-Three after teaching the Abhidhamma to his mother. Vaishali — where he announced his approaching death, and the site of the Second Council.

Nalanda, the great monastic university, and Rajgir are usually included in modern tours.

Going #

When. October to March. The North Indian plain is extremely hot from April and monsoon-affected from June. December and January bring fog that can disrupt travel.

How. Organised pilgrimage tours from most Buddhist countries; independent travel by train and car; Bodh Gaya has an international airport, and Varanasi and Gorakhpur serve Sarnath and Kushinagar.

Where to stay. Every major site has monasteries offering accommodation, often very cheaply, run by particular national traditions. Staying in one is a substantially different experience from a hotel.

How long. A week covers the four at a rush; two weeks including the eight is more comfortable. Many practitioners spend extended periods in Bodh Gaya, which has meditation courses running through the winter.

What to expect. These are working pilgrimage sites in some of the poorest districts of India, not managed heritage attractions. There will be beggars, touts, and considerable noise, alongside people from a dozen countries doing prostrations. Pilgrims report both the intensity and the difficulty; some find the contrast between the sites’ significance and their surroundings the most instructive part.

Etiquette. Remove shoes at temples, dress modestly, circumambulate clockwise, ask before photographing people at practice, and do not take leaves from the Bodhi tree — fallen ones are collected and distributed.

Why pilgrimage #

The Buddha’s stated reason, in the Mahaparinibbana Sutta, is modest: that those who die while on pilgrimage with a confident heart will be reborn in a good destination.

The tradition has offered more. Pilgrimage makes the Buddha’s life geographically real: the distances are walkable, the places are ordinary, and the man who taught there was a person in a landscape rather than a figure in a text. Pilgrims consistently report that Kushinagar in particular does something that reading cannot.

There is also a straightforward practice dimension: weeks of travel, discomfort, and shared purpose with strangers is a container of a kind, and the sites are full of people doing prostrations, circumambulating, and sitting.

Common questions #

Are these sites authentic? Bodh Gaya, Sarnath, and Lumbini have strong claims, with Ashokan-period evidence at Lumbini and Sarnath and continuous veneration at Bodh Gaya. Kushinagar’s identification was established by nineteenth-century archaeology and is generally accepted. The precise spots within each site are traditional rather than demonstrated.

Do I have to be Buddhist to visit? No. All four are open to anyone.

Is Bodh Gaya safe? The pilgrimage circuit is generally safe, with ordinary precautions for travel in the region. A bomb attack at the Mahabodhi Temple in 2013 caused injuries; security has been substantially increased since.

Can I meditate under the Bodhi tree? Yes, and large numbers of people do. The immediate area around the Vajrasana is fenced, and the surrounding platform is open for sitting.

What about Buddhist sites outside India? Enormous numbers — Borobudur in Java, Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka, the Shwedagon in Yangon, the Jokhang in Lhasa, Mount Wutai in China, the Shikoku circuit in Japan. The four are distinctive in being named by the Buddha himself.

Sources & further reading #

Maurice Walshe (trans.), The Long Discourses of the Buddha (Wisdom, 1995), DN 16 — the Buddha’s own recommendation. Toni Huber, The Holy Land Reborn (University of Chicago Press, 2008) — on Tibetan pilgrimage to India and how the circuit was reconstructed. Chan Khoon San, Buddhist Pilgrimage (Subang Jaya Buddhist Association, rev. ed. 2009) — a practical guide, freely available. John S. Strong, Relics of the Buddha (Princeton, 2004). Alan Trevithick, The Revival of Buddhist Pilgrimage at Bodh Gaya (Motilal Banarsidass, 2006) — on the contested modern history.