Samuel Beal (27 November 1825, in

Devonport, Devon Devonport ( ), formerly named Plymouth Dock or just Dock, is a district of Plymouth in the English county of Devon, although it was, at one time, the more important settlement. It became a county borough in 1889. Devonport was originally one o ...

– 20 August 1889, in Greens Norton, Northamptonshire) was an Oriental scholar, and the first

Englishman The English people are an ethnic group and nation native to England, who speak the English language, a West Germanic language, and share a common history and culture. The English identity is of Anglo-Saxon origin, when they were known in ...

to translate directly from the Chinese the early records of

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religions, Indian religion or Indian philosophy#Buddhist philosophy, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha. ...

, thus illuminating

Indian history According to consensus in modern genetics, anatomically modern humans first arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa between 73,000 and 55,000 years ago. Quote: "Y-Chromosome and Mt-DNA data support the colonization of South Asia by m ...

Life and work

Samuel Beal was born in

, and went to

Kingswood School (''In The Right Way Quickly'') , established = , closed = , type = Independent , religious_affiliation = Methodist , president = , head_label = Headmaste ...

and Devonport. He graduated from

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...

in 1847. He was the son of a Wesleyan minister, reverend William Beal; and brother of William Beal and Philip Beal who survived a shipwreck in Kenn Reef. From 1848 to 1850 he was headmaster of Bramham College, Yorkshire. He was ordained

deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian churches, such as the Catholic Chur ...

in 1850, and priest in the following year. After serving as curate at Brooke in

Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...

and

Sopley Sopley is a village and civil parish situated in the New Forest National Park of Hampshire, England. It lies on the old main road from Christchurch to Ringwood, on the east bank of the River Avon. The parish extends east as far as Thorny Hill ...

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in western South East England on the coast of the English Channel. Home to two major English cities on its south coast, Southampton and Portsmouth, Hampshire ...

, he applied for the office of naval chaplain, and was appointed to H.M.S. ''Sybille'' (1847) during the China War of 1856–58. He was chaplain to the Marine Artillery and later to Pembroke and Devonport dockyards 1873–77. In 1857, he printed for private circulation a pamphlet showing that the Tycoon of Yedo (i.e. Tokugawa ''

shōgun , officially , was the title of the military dictators of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, though during part of the Kamak ...

'' of Edo), with whom foreigners had made treaties, was not the real

Emperor of Japan The Emperor of Japan is the monarch and the head of the Imperial Family of Japan. Under the Constitution of Japan, he is defined as the symbol of the Japanese state and the unity of the Japanese people, and his position is derived from "the ...

. In 1861 he married Martha Ann Paris, 1836–81. In September 1872 he was appointed to examine the Buddhist Chinese books in the India Office Library, London. Of the Chinese language books held by the library, Beale found 72 Buddhist compilations across 112 volumes. His research illustrated key philosophical differences between Indian and Chinese Buddhism. An example was the Chinese version of the Indian

Mahāparinibbāṇa Sutta The ''Mahāparinibbāṇa Sutta'' is Sutta 16 in the ''Digha Nikaya'', a scripture belonging to the Sutta Pitaka of Theravada Buddhism. It concerns the end of Gautama Buddha's life - his parinibbana - and is the longest sutta of the Pāli Ca ...

. Beale's exegesis of the Chinese narrative revealed a key doctrinal divergence from the Indian version, and therefore between Northern and Southern Asian Buddhism, namely that Nirvana is not the cessation of Being but its perfection. He retired from the navy in 1877, when he was appointed Professor of Chinese at

University College, London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = � ...

. He was Rector of Falstone, Northumberland 1877–80; Rector of Wark, Northumberland 1880–88; and of Greens Norton, Northamptonshire, 1888–89. He was awarded DCL (Durham) in 1885 "in recognition of the value of his researches into Chinese Buddhism." Beale's reputation was established by his series of works which traced the travels of the Chinese Buddhists in India from the fifth to the seventh centuries AD, and by his books on Buddhism, which have become classics.

The Buddhist Tripitaka

In 1874, Beale requested a Japanese copy of the Chinese Buddhist Tripitaka, the sacred books of Chinese and Japanese Buddhists, from Japanese ambassador Iwakura Tomomi. The copy was deposited at the India Office Library in 1875. This was the first time that the work became available in the West. Beal finished cataloging the books in June 1876.Bunyiu Nanjio, A Catalogue of the Chinese Translation of the Buddhist Tripitaka, the Sacred Canon of the Buddhists in China and Japan, Clarendon Press, 1883, xi

Partial list of works

* ''Travels of Fah-Hian and Sung-Yun, Buddhist pilgrims, from China to India (400 A.D. and 518 A.D.).'' (1869) * ''The Catena of Buddhist Scriptures from the Chinese'' (1872) * ''The Romantic Legend of Buddha'' (1876) * ''Texts from the Buddhist Canon, Dhammapada'' (1878) * ''Buddhism in China'' (1884) * ''Si-Yu-Ki: Buddhist Records of the Western World, by Hiuen Tsiang''. 2 vols. Translated by Samuel Beal. London. 1884. Reprint: Delhi. Oriental Books Reprint Corporation. 1969. (Includes ''The Travels of Sung-Yun and Fa-Hien''). * ''The Life of Hiuen-Tsiang. Translated from the Chinese of Shaman Hwui Li'' by Samuel Beal. London. 1911. Reprint Munshiram Manoharlal, New Delhi. 1973.

References

;Attribution

External links

Xuanzang's Record of the Western Regions Book 1
from Buddhist Records of the Western World, by Hiuen Tsiang (

Xuanzang Xuanzang (, ; 602–664), born Chen Hui / Chen Yi (), also known as Hiuen Tsang, was a 7th-century Chinese Buddhist monk, scholar, traveler, and translator. He is known for the epoch-making contributions to Chinese Buddhism, the travelogue of ...

) * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Beal, Samuel 1825 births 1889 deaths English religious writers Writers from Devonport, Plymouth Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge Royal Navy officers Chinese–English translators Royal Navy personnel of the Second Opium War Clergy from Plymouth, Devon Royal Navy chaplains Second Opium War chaplains 19th-century translators Military personnel from Devonport, Plymouth