Buddha's Birthday (Nepali: बà¥à¤¦à¥à¤§ à¤?यनà¥à¤¤à¥?) the birthday of the Prince Siddhartha Gautama, is a holiday traditionally celebrated in Mahayana Buddhism. According to the Theravada Tripitaka scriptures[which?] (from Pali, meaning ""three baskets""), Gautama was born in Lumbini in modern-day Nepal, around the year 563 BCE, and raised in Kapilavastu.[2][3]
According to this legend, briefly after the birth of young prince Gautama, an astrologer named Asita visited the young prince's fatherâ??King Å?uddhodanaâ??and prophesied that Siddhartha would either become a great king or renounce the material world to become a holy man, depending on whether he saw what life was like outside the palace walls.
Å?uddhodana was determined to see his son become a king, so he prevented him from leaving the palace grounds. But at age 29, despite his father's efforts, Gautama ventured beyond the palace several times. In a series of encountersâ??known in Buddhist literature as the four sightsâ??he learned of the suffering of ordinary people, encountering an old man, a sick man, a corpse and, finally, an ascetic holy man, apparently content and at peace with the world. These experiences prompted Gautama to abandon royal life and take up a spiritual quest.
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All details taken directly from provider content at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha%27s_Birthday
