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Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey

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Speaker 1: brain Stuff, Lauren Bogebaum here with another classic episode for you.

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Speaker 1: In this one, we're talking about the deities sometimes depicted

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Speaker 1: next to cash registers in Chinese American restaurants, The Laughing Buddha.

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Speaker 1: Hey brain Stuff, Lauren bogle Bam Here. You've probably seen

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Speaker 1: him seated next to the cash register at your local

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Speaker 1: Chinese American restaurant, A shiny bronze statue of a bald,

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Speaker 1: p bellied man with a laughing grin on his face.

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Speaker 1: The same jolly fella immortalized in key chains and other

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Speaker 1: trinkets sold in Chinatown tourist shops all across the US.

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Speaker 1: That's not the Buddha, but it's in the right religious ballpark.

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Speaker 1: He's called the Laughing Buddha, and the story behind him

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Speaker 1: is complicated. We spoke with Denise Lady, currently the Curator

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Speaker 1: of Asian Art at the Yale University Art Gallery. She

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Speaker 1: held the same position at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

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Speaker 1: for twenty two years and is no stranger to Westerners

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Speaker 1: can fusion over the Laughing Buddha statue. She said, in Christianity,

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Speaker 1: there's this one guy. So when people see this fun guy,

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Speaker 1: they think that's the Buddha. But it's not. The Buddha

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Speaker 1: in the singular is Saddarka Gultma. But the Buddhist religion

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Speaker 1: over time has added multiple layers of deities, many of

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Speaker 1: whom have multiple avatars, and so it's gotten mind bogglingly complicated. Buddha,

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Speaker 1: the story goes, was a man named Saddarka Gultma who

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Speaker 1: lived around the sixth century b c. In India. Born

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Speaker 1: a wealthy prince, he chose to live an ascetic lifestyle

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Speaker 1: in search of the meaning of existence, which he found

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Speaker 1: while meditating for forty days under a fig tree. After

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Speaker 1: achieving nirvana, which is the escape from the endless cycle

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Speaker 1: of suffering, death and rebirth, he became the Buddha, or

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Speaker 1: the awakened One. Over the centuries, his teachings spread throughout India,

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Speaker 1: into China, across Asia, and eventually around the world. Today

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Speaker 1: there aren't estimated three hundred and seventy six million followers

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Speaker 1: of Buddhism worldwide, But so who is the laughing Buddha.

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Speaker 1: Buddhism has expanded over the millennia to include a pantheon

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Speaker 1: of deities. In addition, to Gotma Buddha. Those include numerous bodhisatva,

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Speaker 1: the term for sage like individuals who work for the

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Speaker 1: enlightenment of all sentient beings. In Thetavad Buddhism, practiced mainly

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Speaker 1: in Southeast Asia. Guttma Buddha is only the most recent

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Speaker 1: of twenty eight Buddhas described in holy texts. And then

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Speaker 1: there are avatars, humans believed to be incarnations of deities.

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Speaker 1: The Laughing Buddha was one such avatar, a tenth century

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Speaker 1: Chinese monk named Buddai. According to accounts written centuries later,

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Speaker 1: but I was a gregarious, pot bellied monk who wandered

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Speaker 1: from village to village carrying a large sack over his

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Speaker 1: shoulder Buddhai meaning cloth sack. He was beloved by children

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Speaker 1: and the poor, to whom he would give rice and

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Speaker 1: sweets from his sack. On his deathbed, bud I penned

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Speaker 1: a poem in which he revealed himself as the avatar

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Speaker 1: of Maitrea, a deity also known as the future Buddha.

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Speaker 1: Lightie explains, in our lifetime, this great cosmic era you

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Speaker 1: and I are sharing, there's a teaching Buddha named Suddarta Gotma.

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Speaker 1: The world will ultimately destroy itself. I don't know when,

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Speaker 1: but when the world is reborn, Matreo will come back

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Speaker 1: as the teaching Buddha of that era. Over time, Buddhai

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Speaker 1: became the subject of popular devotion in Zen Buddhism, both

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Speaker 1: in China and Japan. His large belly and sack are

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Speaker 1: believed to represent abundance, and he's included among these seven

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Speaker 1: Lucky Gods of Japan as a harbinger of abundance and

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Speaker 1: good health. At some point, he also became the patron

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Speaker 1: deity of restaurants and bartenders, hence his prized location next

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Speaker 1: to the cash register. Lightie isn't sure of the exact

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Speaker 1: historical providence of today's laughing Buddha statues, but she believes

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Speaker 1: the Boddhai imagery in Chinese art and sculpture started popping

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Speaker 1: up in the fifteenth century. She said. As global trade

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Speaker 1: begins to expand in the late sixteenth and seventeenth century

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Speaker 1: and porcelain is totally transforming global ceramics, there's probably some

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Speaker 1: imagery of this guy that snuck in it got picked

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Speaker 1: up in the West, turned into the laughing Buddha and

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Speaker 1: made into this kitchy thing that you can buy anywhere.

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Speaker 1: Although rubbing Buddhai's belly for good luck is not Buddhist

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Speaker 1: teaching and generally considered impolite, devotees of Buddhism don't seem

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Speaker 1: to have a problem with the spread of the icon.

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Speaker 1: Barbara O'Brien, a journalist and zen Buddhism student, wrote, it

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Speaker 1: is indicative of Buddhism's broad tolerance of diversity that this

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Speaker 1: laughing Buddha of folklore is accepted into the official practice

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Speaker 1: for Buddhists. In equality that represents Buddha nature is to

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Speaker 1: be encouraged, and the folklore of the kind laughing Buddha

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Speaker 1: is not regarded as any kind of sacrilege, even though

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Speaker 1: people may unwittingly confuse him with gultma Buddha. Today's episode

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Speaker 1: is based on the article that fat Jolly Fella Isn't

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Speaker 1: Buddha on house Stuffworks dot com, written by Dave Bruce.

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Speaker 1: Brain stuff In's production of by Heart Radio in partnership

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Speaker 1: with house stuff works dot Com, and it's produced by

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Speaker 1: Tyler Klang. For more podcasts from My heart Radio, visit

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