Who destroyed Nalanda University and why?

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Before I discuss who destroyed Nalanda University? I want to discuss Who created the great Nalanda
University.

The ruins of Nalanda University are located in the Indian state of Bihar about 52–54 miles southeast of
Patna.

It was the center of learning from 427 to 1197 CE. It has been called “one of the first great universities in
recorded history.

The Ancient University of Nalanda is believed to be founded by the Gupta Dynasty who was ruling in
India. If we look at the Gupta Empire dynasty, Nalanda University was founded around the kingdom of
Chandragupta one of Samudra Gupta. In its middle phase of life, Nalanda University was supported by
the Buddhist emperors and later in the last phase, by the Pala kings who ruled mostly the south and
eastern part of India.

It was a completely residential university believed to have 2,000 teachers and 10,000 students.

The curricula of the university offered the study of abstract knowledge like Philosophy, religion,
Buddhism, and scientific thoughts in astronomy, mathematics, anatomy, etc. in each classroom, there
used to be hundreds of students and they were not allowed to go outside until the lecture was over.

Now comes on the original question which is asked: “ who destroyed Nalanda University”.

Bakhtiyar Khalji destroyed the Nalanda University in 1202 AD. Muḥammad Bakhtiyar Khalji was a Turkic
invader.
At that time Bakhtiyar Khilji had captured some areas ruled by Buddhists in North India and once he
became quite ill. He got enough treatment from his princes but he could not recover and reached a
moribund condition. Then someone advised him to show him the treatment of Acharya Rahul Sribhadra,
who was head of Ayurveda department of Nalanda University and get him treated. But Khilji was not
ready for this. He had more faith in his princes. He was not willing to believe that Indian physicians have
more knowledge than his or her masters or maybe more capable.

But to save his life he had to call Acharya Rahul Sribhadra, head of Ayurveda department of Nalanda
University. Then Bakhtiar Khilji put a strange condition in front of Vaidyaraj and where I will not eat any
kind of medicine given by him. They fix it without medication. After thinking of this, Vaidyaraj accepted
his condition and after a few days, he came to Khilji with a Quran and said that he had to read the page
of the Quran. And after reading these pages you will free from illness.

Bakhtiar Khilji read the Quran according to Vaidyaraj and he was cured. It is said that Rahul Shribhadra
applied medicine on some pages of the Quran. and as he started reading those pages of the Quran he
kept on recovering.

After recovering khilji was shocked by the fact that an Indian scholar and teacher had more knowledge
than his princes and countryman.

After this he decided to destroy the roots of Buddhism and Ayurveda. As a result, Khilji set fire to the
great library of Nalanda and burned around 9 million manuscripts.

Who destroyed Takshashila, and why?

Who was the founder of Nalanda University, in 140 words?

Who destroyed Taxasila? Did any indian king try to defend taxalia?

What is the evidence for Bakhtiyar Khilji burning Nalanda University?

What are the facts or mindblowing facts of Nalanda University?

The fall of Nalanda University

According to the records Nalanda University was destroyed three times by invaders, but rebuilt only
twice. The first destruction was caused by the Huns under Mihirakula during the reign of Skandagupta
(455–467 AD). But Skanda’s successors restored the library and improved it with an even bigger building.

The second destruction came in the early 7th century by the Gaudas. This time, the Buddhist king
Harshavardhana (606–648 AD) restored the university.

The third and most destructive attack came when the ancient Nalanda University was destroyed by the
Muslim army led by the Turkish leader Bakhtiyar Khilji in 1193. It is believed that Buddhism as a major
religion in India had a setback for hundreds of years due to the loss of the religious texts during the
attack. And, since then, the NU has not been restored until the recent developments.

The lesser known story

It is said that Bakhtiyar Khilji had fallen sick and doctors in his court failed to cure him. Then, someone
advised him to get himself cured by Rahul Sri Bhadra, the principal of Nalanda University.

Khilji was too proud of his Islamic culture and refused to get himself treated by a person outside his
religion. But his health worsened and he was left with no other option but to invite Bhadra from
Nalanda.

But Khilji put a condition and asked Bhadra to cure him without any medicines. Bhadra then asked Khilji
to read some pages from the Koran as a remedy to his illness and to everyone’s surprise Khilji was cured.

Disturbed by the fact that an Indian scholar and teacher knew more than the doctors of his court, Khilji
decided to destroy the roots of knowledge, Buddhism and Ayurveda, from the country. He set fire to the
great library of Nalanda and burned down nearly 9 million manuscripts.

The library was so vast and strong that it took three months to completely destroy it. The Turkish
invaders also murdered monks and scholars in the university.
NALANDA THE OLDEST UNIVERSITY IN THE WORLD MASTERPIECE OF THE ANCIENT WORLD

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I wonder why didn't anyone give a scholarly reply to D.N.Jha's .

Jha pretends to know the history of Nalanda better than it's contemporary students and visitors. Yes,
the biography of Dharmasvamin, a 13th-century visitor monk from Tibet, says--“When he visited
Nalanda in 1235, he found it still surviving, but a ghost of its past existence. Most of the buildings had
been damaged by the Turushkas and had since fallen into disrepair. But two viharas, which he named
Dhanbad and Ghunaba, were still in serviceable condition with a 90-year-old teacher named Rahula
Shribhadra instructing a class of about 70 students on the premises.

Not only that, Dharmasvamin was attacked by Turk Soldiers on his way to Tibet.

(source — . Translated by , Introduction by . page. xix. The account was narrated by Dharmasvamin to
his student, Chos-dar.” Actual account. Chap.X page 91).

It's undoubtedly the clearest account of Nalanda's destruction by Turks(or Turushkas).

Now, it is a historical fact that Nalanda went under attack for several times, Hunns at the time of
Skandagupta, also by Gaudas at Shasanka's time. But the Turk destruction was the most massive, for
which, Nalada's vast glory gradually ceased to exist.

Even the fire incident, mentioned by Pag sam jon zang (and also by Lama Taranatha) , Which Jha quotes
to defend his argument, says “viharas at Nalanda were repaired once again by a Buddhist sage named
Mudita Bhadra and that Kukutasiddha, a minister of the reigning king, erected a temple there.”
This means that the fire was set in a recent constructed temple at the Vihara destroyed previously,
which Jha completely ignored. So Bakhtiyaar, as mentioned by Minhaj-i-Siraj, may have attacked
Odantapura, not Nalanda, it were the Turks who did the massive destruction of the ancient university.

Thus, Jha's denial of Nalanda's destruction by Turks, is biased for political or ideological reasons, may be
intentionally or unintentionally.

Jha, in order to defend his statement , has used argumentum-ad-hominem, which is hidden in Indian
Express, to hide his logical fallacy, but revealed in Kafila's version of the article.

Nalanda University was the center of Global culture and education. The highest degree of knowledge
and education was imparted there. Students and teachers from all across the world used to come be a
part of the vibrant well of studies.

Muslim ruler named Bhakhtyar Khillji was the then ruler of Hindustan. The legend is such that he got
severly sick and none of his medical practitioners (Hakeem's) could not treat his ailing health. Then Khillji
came to know about a renound Ayurvedic vaid named, Rahul Arya. He being summend to Khillji was not
appreciated much by Rahul, who on repeated persistence reluctantly agreed to treat Khillji, but on his
own terms that he should not drink or eat meat during the course of the medication and that he would
himself have to read and recite some verses of Quran. Khillji himself had his own terms, that the
medicinal raw material to be used for the making the medicine. Rahul went back and returned after a
month or so with with the Quran segment and asked Khillji to read the Quran himself for a month along
with a placebo.

When Khillji read the Quran each day after a while he began to regain his strength and recovered fully.
Only later did Khillji get to know that Rahul had applied the medicine in liquid form all over the pages of
the holy book. While reading whenever Khillji used to turn the page he used to lick his index finger to do
so. This allowed the medicine to be administered to him without his knowledge.

Feeling bellittled at being cured at the hands of a Hindu Vaid he felt insulted and angry. In his anger and
rage snubbing his basic sense he set Nalanda on fire.

Confused after 12th?

Why is Bakhtiyarpur named after Bakhtiyar when we know that he destroyed Nalanda University and
burned the libraries?

How many days did it take to burn nalanda university completely?

Why was Nalanda University destroyed? Who had given this place the name “Nalanda”?

What happened to the knowledge that was in Nalanda University? Was it completely destroyed or does
it still exists in some form or with some person/s?

How old is Nalanda University, Badhgaya, and Bihar?

Your question makes sense, but in a reverse way, the person who was responsible for the destruction of
Nalanda was happened to be a muslim, but it does not mean that Muslims destroyed Nalanda.

Khilji was not a "scholar", he was an illiterate tribal war-lord from afghanistan, who got noticed (and
later hired) by some turkic rulers for his military skills. He did what he had been told to do. The only
thing he was good at is raging battle and killing people, irrespective of muslim or non-muslim whoever .
It has also been recorded that Khilji even did not know how to sign his name.

If you read "Tabqat-e-Nasiri" by Minhaj-e-Siraj, you will notice that Minhaj, who witnessed the
destruction did not approved of it, who was a muslim scholar used call Nalanda as "madrasah" (college
in persian language) and interestingly used to call the monks as "brahman-alem", "alem" is a very
revered title in islam given to those who are knowledgeable person. Similarly, orientalist al-Biruni
surmised that Buddha is actually a prophet called "Burxan (or Burhaan)". During that time these
minority scholars like Minhaj had no voice in the war decisions, they had to survive solely by the stipend
that they received from the ruling family.

Similarly, if you look at the Hulagu Khan's campaign (Siege of Baghdad) in Iraq, his army did the same
thing. They destroyed all the universities and libraries there, what used to be a center of higher
education in the middle-east. There is also a popular myth about Hulagu's army that when they dumped
all the books from the "House of Wisdom", the books clogged the flow of the nearby river. Hulagu khan
was not a muslim, he used to worship tengri, but it's not such that all the tengri worshippers came and
destroyed Baghdad's "House of Wisdom".

In fact, buddhist philosophers faced a far more severe (and lengthy) forms of persecution from the
Shaivite rulers like king Shashanka, Khilji's massacre is, in that sense, an isolated incident.
We need to see the whole context and also need to consider the mindset of those war-lords from the
middle-ages.

Mainly it was a Buddhist monastery which was home to countless monks from all over the world who
wandered in search of knowledge, It was knows as an institution for higher studies, established by The
Gupta's It was destroyed thrice by Huns, Gaudas & Bhaktiyar Khijli. Khilji attack was the devastating one,
He declined Buddhism in India and to uproot Buddhism he burned every monk alive. After his attack
Nalanda university was never rebuilt.

The university had students from China, Japan , Korea, Persia, Greece, Indonesia, Mongolia,and many
more and topics taught included history, economics, geography, astronomy, law, medicine, geology,
maths, architecture, metallurgy, linguistics and many more.

Nalanda,Taxila,Somnath,Ram temple,Vedic texts etc..There are millions of things destroyed by Muslim

Invaders.So apolozy make no sense here. If you think Indian Muslims should apolize for that then you
are wrong as 99.9% Indian Muslims ancestors were Hindu like you who forcefully got converted by
Islamic invaders.Indian muslims looks like Hindus not arabs. But technically speaking they are victim if
we think of their past.Now Same way in 21st century ISIS destroying ancient Yazidi historical sites and
forcefully converting thoushands of Yazidis in Iraq by killing or raping.After 100 years the converted
Yazidi children's will fight for Islam and will remain extremely religious Muslim.So that time should they
apolize for today's distruction ?I think you have understood what I mean!

Firstly "the Muslims" as a group did not destroy Nalanda University, and his group did.

I do not have a lot of knowledge on this, but according to Wikipedia:

The main Persian source for this explains Khilji attacked the fortress unaware that it was a University.[1]

And yes, Islam holds that gaining knowledge isn't only a good thing, but actually commands Muslims to
seek knowledge.

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: "The seeking of knowledge is obligatory for every
Muslim." - Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 74

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “One who treads a path in search of knowledge has
his path to Paradise made easy by God…” - Riyadh us-Saleheen, 245

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: "A servant of God will remain standing on the Day of
Judgment until he is questioned about his (time on earth) and how he used it; about his knowledge and
how he utilized it; about his wealth and from where he acquired it and in what (activities) he spent it;
and about his body and how he used it." - Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 148

The Prophet also said: "Knowledge from which no benefit is derived is like a treasure out of which
nothing is spent in the cause of God." - Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 108

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: "God, His angels and all those in Heavens and on
Earth, even ants in their hills and fish in the water, call down blessings on those who instruct others in
beneficial knowledge." - Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 422
The Prophet also said: "Acquire knowledge and impart it to the people." - Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 107

There has been some plans to rebuild the site though, according to Wikipedia:

In 2006, Singapore, China, India, Japan, and other nations, announced a proposed plan to restore and
revive the ancient site as . [2]

As for recompense, it's hard to say. I didn't see anything that said did anything. And since you say "they"
I'm assuming you mean all muslims again, which I again say it's rather silly to blame all 1.6 billion of us
for one mans actions 820 years ago.

1.

2.

DN Jha seems like going against Brahminical interest telling such things which might alienate many of
the prejudiced Maithil Brahmin Jhas in Jharkhand,Bihar as also Nepal.Once the Brits told somewhat the
same in a different way---"If you see a Brahmin and a snake,kill the Brahmin first sparing the snake".I am
not a contemporary of 12th century AD Nalanda and DN Jha also not.Brahminical prejudices cannot be
ruled out completely and Khalji simultaneously cannot be exempted.If Brahmins were "Jaichands" of
that time being jealous and many occasions inability to compete Buddhism,Islam was also equally
responsible.

In present day Afghanistan the Bamiya Buddhist statue got destroyed by Talibans.Also in Gujarat,
Somnath Hindu Temple got destroyed by Mahmud of Ghazni,a province in Afghanistan it cannot be
refuted that muslims were not destroying Hindu and Buddhist temples,scriptures,monasteries
plundering the resources and capturing beautiful women as sex slaves.
Nobody followed Khilji with a high-tech video camera to record if he ever came to Nadia through
Jharkhand.The islamic version of texts written by people might include a writer who never came to
Nadia,Bihar or Jharkhand those days.Writings are in many ways influenced

It is not always truth and in most cases mere discussions diverging away from originality to create hype
specially today when historians like presstitutes need also publicity stunt and TRP.

Your question totally makes sense*. It is well known that military leaders are the most scrupulous and
rigidly honest of all professions. They have never been known to use a false pretence to rally their
troops or to seek conquest for personal gain or pure avarice. When a group of men engage in conquest
and plunder, it is but natural to think that there motives are completely pure and totally rooted in
spiritual instruction. It is also totally correct to think that what defines them or their actions is not their
gender or their nationality or their proclivity for riding on horses or loving combat but their religion.
Consequently, the question you raise - why did Muslims destroy the university - fills me with profound
anger that the university was destroyed. If it had been around, perhaps you would have been able to
access a higher quality of education that would have taught you that your question and its premise are
fundamentally junk.

* I am lying, it doesn't.

Records of Nalanda University shows that it was the first and the biggest residential university to be built
in the history with a total of 10,000 students and nearly 2700 faculties. It was destroyed three times by
invaders out of which had been rebuilt twice.

Its first destruction was done by the Huns under Mihirakula during the reign of Skandagupta (455–467
AD). But Skanda’s successors restored the library and improved it with an even bigger building and
better facilities.

Then came the second destruction in the early 7th century by the Gaudas. Their destruction was
restored by the Buddhist king Harshavardhana (606–648 AD).

But the third and most destructive attack came in 1193 when the destruction was done by the army led
by Turkish leader Bakhtiyar Khilji.

It is said that Bakhtiyar Khilji had fallen sick and doctors in his court failed to cure him. Then, someone
advised him to get himself cured by Rahul Sri Bhadra, the principal of Nalanda University.
Khilji was too proud of his Islamic culture and refused to get himself treated by a person outside his
religion. But his health worsened and he was left with no other option but to invite Bhadra from
Nalanda.But Khilji put a condition and asked Bhadra to cure him without any medicines. Bhadra then
asked Khilji to read some pages from the Koran as a remedy to his illness and to everyone’s surprise
Khilji was cured.

Disturbed by the fact that Nalanda University scholar and teacher knew more than the doctors of his
court, Khilji decided to destroy the roots of knowledge, religions and Ayurveda, from the country. He
gave orders to set on fire the great library of Nalanda and burned down nearly 9 million manuscripts.

The library was so vast and strong that it took almost three months to completely destroy it. The Turkish
invader doesn't left anything to restart it. Since then, the NU has not been restored until the recent
developments.