What is the essential characteristic of Buddhism?

Answer 1

I would say that the essential characteristics of Buddhism are peace, compassion and kindness.

Buddhism is a religion based upon the principal that each person is responsible for their own liberation from the illusions of the world, and our minds, and to gain enlightenment; where enlightenment is a state of being free from preconceptions, judgments, delusions and illusions. The Buddha's findings was that our happiness and suffering all starts and ends with our own minds and that training our minds to see the world and ourselves clearly was the way to attain peace and happiness. As for training our minds the Buddha indicated that our ego-centric lives, full of desires and aversions, is the main cause of all suffering and that overcoming these desires and aversions (which are all transitory and illusionary) is necessary step in our progress towards enlightenment. The Buddha also taught that we need to lead a moral, kind, compassionate, peaceful and generous life.

It is a religion and a way of life devoid of authority, ritual, speculation, tradition, and the supernatural. There is no dogma that a person needs to believe in to be a Buddhist. The Buddha also asked each of his followers to challenge his findings and put it to the test to see if he was correct. 2500 years later we can find no fault with his logic and reason. It is also scientific; many of the Buddha's findings and practices have been scientifically proven correct even today.