I would emphasize that there are many types of Buddhism. Some, apparently, as previously mentioned, regard the Buddha as having existed from the beginning of time. Many Buddhists in the East commonly regard him as a god. Some types of Buddhism have a myriads of gods and goddesses, named and identified. However, the Buddha himself, is commonly attributed as saying, “If you see the Buddha, kill him!” He resisted all attempts to make himself a god or to be worshiped.
You’re correct that the Buddha never considered himself a deity. But, just to clarify things I’ll be shamelessly quoting myself, but here goes:
That being said, Mahayana Buddhism does have this concept of the more god-like
Eternal Buddha. In some Mahayana sutras, the Buddha himself teaches that the Buddha is no longer essentially a human being but has become a being of a different order altogether and that, in his ultimate transcendental “body/mind” mode as
Dharmakaya, he has eternal and infinite life, is present in all things (i.e., is “the boundless
dharmadhatu”, according to the
Nirvana Sutra), and is possessed of great and immeasurable qualities. The Lotus Sutra portrays the Buddha as indicating that he became ‘awakened’ countless, immeasurable, inconceivable myriads of trillions of aeons (
kalpas) ago and that his lifetime is “forever existing and immortal”. Thus, from the human perspective, it would seem as though the Buddha has always existed.
Now, there is indeed
no direct equivalent concept of ‘God’ (in the way we understand it) in Buddhism, a non-theistic religion, in the sense of not teaching the existence of a supreme creator god or depending on any supreme being for salvation or enlightenment. The Buddha is merely a guide and teacher who points the way to enlightenment, however the struggle for enlightenment is one’s own. While certain Mahayana texts do present a picture of the Buddha close to conceptions of godhead, it differs in that anyone can become a Buddha, as compared to general theistic religions in which it is generally considered impossible to become a god or God.
The closest thing to ‘gods’ in Buddhism are the superhuman
devas, but even then they are still inferior to buddhas or ‘awakened’ beings in that they are still bound by
kilesa and are thus still bound under the cycle of
saṃsāra. Not to mention that unlike conventional ‘gods’, devas are not immortal (they live for very long but finite periods of time), did and do not create or shape the world, are beings who came into existence based upon their past karmas (like everybody else according to Buddhism), are not omniscient nor omnipotent nor morally perfect, and are not to be taken as a refuge as no deva can show the way of escape from
saṃsāra or control one’s rebirth - these honors are reserved for the Three Jewels: Buddha, Dharma, and Saṅgha.
By the way, the one who talked about killing the Buddha when meeting him is not Siddharta, but the founder of the
Rinzai school of Chan/Zen Buddhism (one of three schools of Chan/Zen in Japanese Buddhism),
Linji (Japanese:
Rinzai). Linji was actually quite well-known for discourses that were unconventional and iconoclastic, which he did to encourage his students to free themselves from the influence of masters and doctrinal concepts, in order to be able to better discover their own Buddha-nature. Two examples of his teaching are:
Those who have fulfilled the
ten stages of bodhisattva practice are no better than hired field hands; those who have attained the enlightenment of the fifty-first and fifty-second stages are prisoners shackled and bound;
arhats and
pratyekabuddhas are so much filth in the latrine;
bodhi and
nirvana are hitching posts for donkeys.
Followers of the Way [of Chán], if you want to get the kind of understanding that accords with the Dharma, never be misled by others. Whether you’re facing inward or facing outward, whatever you meet up with, just kill it! If you meet a
buddha, kill the buddha. If you meet a
patriarch, kill the patriarch. If you meet an arhat, kill the arhat. If you meet your parents, kill your parents. If you meet your kinfolk, kill your kinfolk. Then for the first time you will gain emancipation, will not be entangled with things, will pass freely anywhere you wish to go.
