 Title page of the 1885 edition | |
| Author | Sir Edwin Arnold |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Published | 1879 |
The Light of Asia, or The Great Renunciation (Mahâbhinishkramana), is a book by Sir Edwin Arnold. The first edition of the book was published in London in July 1879.
In the form of a narrative poem, the book endeavours to describe the life and time of Prince Gautama Buddha, who, after attaining enlightenment, became the Buddha, The Awakened One. The book presents his life, character, and philosophy in a series of verses. It is a free adaptation of the Lalitavistara.
A few decades before the book's publication, very little was known outside Asia about the Buddha and Buddhism. Arnold's book was one of the first successful efforts to popularize Buddhism for a Western readership.[1][2] After receiving the poem from theosophists, Mahatma Gandhi was awed and his subsequent introduction to Madame Blavatsky and her Key to Theosophy inspired him to study his own religion.[3]
The book has been highly acclaimed from the time it was first published and has been the subject of several reviews. It has been translated into over thirty languages, including Hindi.
- ^ Sutin, L.: All is Change: The Two-Thousand-Year Journey of Buddhism to the West, Little, Brown and Company, 2006. See pages 141 to 143.
- ^ Harvey, P.: An Introduction to Buddhism, Cambridge University Press, 1990. See page 303.
- ^ Gandhi, Mahatma (1993). Gandhi: An Autobiography (Beacon Press ed.). pp. 66. ISBN 0-8070-5909-9.