Vastu-shastra (Vol. I: Hindu Science of Architecture; Vol. II: Hindu Canons of Iconography and Painting) v2.c75.s3.7

v2.c75.s3.7

Without going into the details of the doctrines like Śūnyavāda and the teachings and views held by the great Buddhist scholars like Nāgārjuna and Āryadeva who propounded these abtruse philosophical ideas in the fold of Mahāyāna, it may be pointed out that the bedrock of Śūnyatā of the Mahāyānis could not satisfy their hankerings and so Maitreyanātha, after some generations after Nāgārjuna, added Vijñāna to it; and founded what developed later on, the Yogācāra system. The things did not end here. There were controversies between these two speculative doctrines of the Śūnyavāda and in the 8th century a new doctrine of Mahāsukhavāda became a historical necessity for the edification of people, to rationalise their leanings towards something tangible, something concrete and something edifying. All these doctrines were conceived in relation to the ultimate reality after ordinary Nirvāṇa. Some took it Śūnyatā, others Vijñāna and a good many Mahāsukha. It is, as already said, from the doctrine of Mahāsukha, that the Vajrayāna, a system rich in iconographical ideas, and a school fascinating to the multitude, orginated. It may however be remembered that this Vajrayāna was a school within the Mahāyāna itself and the so called two principal schools of Buddhism, the Hīnayāna and Mahāyāna really resulted in the condemnation by the latter of the two original Yānas, the Śrāvaka and the Pratyeka which the great Buddha himself had patronized. Thus there were three Yānas—Hīna (the Śrāvaka and the Pratyeka), the Mahā and the Vajra (a sub-yāna of the latter). The Mahāyāna, in its latter onslaughts again assumed two shapes, Pārmitāyāna and Mantra-yānā, the latter fully accepting the theory of Mahāsukha, dilates upon its various stages of the development in which the Śakti, the embodiment of Karuṇā plays a predominent part. It is thus nothing but a great influence of Hindu Tāntricism, another name of Śāktism.