Vesak (Buddha Day) · Vesak

Culture of origin: Buddhist · Cultural

Holiday sources: Buddhism

Vesak commemorates the birth, the enlightenment and the death of the Buddha, and is the holiest day of the Theravada year; in 1999 the UN General Assembly recognised it in resolution 54/115. Buddhists gather at temples before dawn, give alms, keep the eight precepts and eat vegetarian food; in Sri Lanka streets are hung with lanterns and lit pandals tell the Jataka tales. In the centuries before the Arab conquest Buddhism had spread across the eastern Iranian world, and the earliest known translator of Buddhist texts into Chinese, An Shigao, was by legend a Parthian prince who settled in Luoyang in 148 CE. Under the Ilkhans Buddhism was Iran's official religion and temples were built across the realm, until Ghazan converted to Islam on 16 June 1295 as the condition of the emir Nawruz's military support. Nawruz issued an edict against the other religions, and his followers persecuted Buddhists and Christians so severely that Buddhism in Iran never recovered; its practice was banned, and monks whose temples had been destroyed were allowed to leave for Tibet, Kashmir and India.