About the Book -It is one of the nine Mahayana texts. The Lalitavistara is a biography of Buddha. It has twenty-seven chapters in which an account of the Buddha legend upto the Sermon of Varanasi. It originally contained the biography of Buddha according to the Sarvastivada school of Hinayana. From the view point of History of religion and literature, it is of immense value.Book has incidents like the Buddha is staying at Jetavana with a large gathering of disciples. One evening, a group of divine beings visit the Buddha and request him to tell the story of his awakening for the benefit of all beings. The Buddha consents. The following morning, the Buddha tells his story to the gathered disciples. He begins the story by telling of his previous life, in which the future Buddha was living in the heavenly realms surrounded by divine pleasures. In this previous life, he was known as the Bodhisattva. The Bodhisattva is enjoying the immense pleasures of his heavenly life, but due to his past aspirations, one day the musical instruments of the heavenly palace call out to him, reminding him of his prior commitment to attain awakening. About the Author -: Raja Rajendralal Mitra (1822 – 1891) was among the first Indian cultural researcher and historian writing in English. A polymath, and a member of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, he was a pioneer figure in the Bengali Renaissance. He was an Indian Sanskrit critic. Mitra belonged to a respected family of Bengal writers. After studying by himself, he was hired in 1846 as a librarian in the "Asian Society of Bengal", for which he then worked throughout his life as second secretary, vice president and finally as the first native president in 1885. Mitra published a number of Sanskrit texts (due to lack of accuracy early obsolete) mainly in Bibliotheca indica and major works The antiquities of Orissa (2 volumes, 1875-80), Bodh Gaya (1878), Indo-Aryans (2 volumes, 1881) and more.He was a noted antiquarian and played a substantial
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