Ganges
Ganges River (Skt. Gaṅgānadī; T. gang gA’i klung གང་གཱའི་ཀླུང་; C. Henghe; J. Gōga; K. Hangha 恒河). The major river in the northern and eastern regions of India that begins in the western Himalayas and flows east through the Indo-Gangetic Plain towards the Ganges delta in Bengal.
Several of the important Indian kingdoms that supported the growth of Buddhism were based in the Ganges River valley, including Kosala in the middle and Magadha in the lower Ganges valley.[1] The city Pataliputra, located on the banks of the river, was the capital city of both the Magadha kingdom the later Maurya Empire.
The sand in the Ganges River was reputed to be extremely fine in texture, and it is often used in similes in Buddhist texts to refer to an infinity, i.e. “as many as the grains of sand in the river Ganges.”[1]
According to Buddhist cosmology, the Ganges is one of the four sacred rivers that flow through the southernmost continent of Jambudvipa, along with the Sindhu, Vakṣu, and Sita.[1]
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Robert E. Buswell Jr., Donald S. Lopez Jr., The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism (Princeton: 2014), s.v. Gaṅgānadī
Further reading
Ganges, Wikipedia
གང་གཱའི་ཀླུང་, Christian-Steinert Dictionary
