On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v1.c14.s5: Pi-Sho-Ka
On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v1.c14.s5
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Pi-Sho-Ka
v1.c14.s5.1
From Kāśapura, the pilgrim narrates, he went north 170 or 180 *li* to the country which he calls *Pi* (or *Ping*, or *Pi* or *Fi*)-sho-ka (that is, perhaps, Viśoka). This country was above 4000 *li* in circuit and its chief city was sixteen *li* in circuit. The grain crops of the country were very plentiful, fruit and flowers abounded, it had a genial climate, and the people had good ways, were studious and given to good works. It had above twenty Buddhist monasteries and 3000 Brethren who were all adherents of the Saṃmatiya School. There were above 50 Deva-Temples and the non-Buddhists were very numerous.
v1.c14.s5.2
On the east side of the road south of the capital was a large monastery. In it the arhat Devaśarman composed his "Shih-shên-lun" in which he denied the Ego and the non-Ego. At this place there had also been another arhat by name Gopa, who wrote the treatise "Shêng-chiao-yao-shih-lun" (or "Śāstra on the essential realities of Buddhism"), affirming the existence of the Ego and the non-Ego. The opposite doctrines of these two great religious philosophers led to serious controversies in the church.
v1.c14.s5.3
The Life, which as we have seen makes Viśoka to be 500 *li* to the east of Kosambi, places the large monastery of this passage on "the left side (east) of the south-east road", but *tung*, "east" is possibly a clerical error for *ch'êng*, "city". The Life also gives the name of Devaśarman's treatise as "Shih-shên-tsu-lun (識身足論)", "the śāstra of the Foot of the Perception Body". We have the work in Yuan-chuang's translation, the title being as in the Life with the word Abhidharma prefixed.¹ Its Sanskrit title has been restored as "Abhidharma Vijñānakāyapāda śāstra”, but its short title, is “Vijñānakāya śāstra” as in our pilgrim’s translation here. The treatise is one of the Six Pāda (Tsu) called Abhidharma sūtra of the Sarvāstivādin School, and it was considered by the Vaibhāshikas as canonical, but by the Sautrāntikas as only the work of a bhikshu. Yuan-chuang, it will be noticed, calls the author an arhat, but in other places he is merely a bhikshu or sthavira. The work is a tedious argumentative treatise combating the views of a Moginlin who denied the reality of the Past and the Future, and arguing against other tenets apparently held by other early Buddhists. Our pilgrim’s statement that it denied the Ego and the non-Ego, or “I and men”, is a very unsatisfactory one.
v1.c14.s5.4
¹ No. 1281. See Bur. Int. p. 448: Tār. S. 56 and 296.
v1.c14.s5.5
The treatise by Gopa mentioned in the present passage does not seem to be in the Chinese collections of Buddhist works, and nothing is known apparently about the author or his work. As Devaśarman is supposed to have lived about 400, or, according to some, about 100 years after the Buddha’s decease Gopa must have lived about the same time.
v1.c14.s5.6
At this large monastery also, Yuan-chuang proceeds to narrate, Hu-fa (Dharmapāla) P’usa once held a discussion for seven days with 100 Hinayāna śāstra-masters and utterly defeated them. In this district, moreover, the Buddha lived for six years preaching and teaching. Near the tope which commemorated his stay and work and which stood near the large monastery was a marvellous tree; it was six or seven feet high. This tree had been developed from a tooth-stick which the Buddha after using it had cast down. The tooth-stick took root and grew and flourished, and it still remained a tree in spite of the persistent efforts of heretics to cut it down and destroy it.
v1.c14.s5.7
The Tooth-stick tree of this passage was above 70 feet high according to the Life and the Fang-chih. Fa-hsien, it will be remembered, has a similar story about his city of Sha-ki, and there the tree, as in our text, was only seven feet high.
v1.c14.s5.8
Cunningham thinks he proves that the Pi-sho-ka or Viśoka (?) of Yuan-chuang is the Sha-ki (or Sha-ti) of Fa-hsien, and the Saketā or Ayodhyā of Indian literature.¹ But in his arguments he seems to quite ignore the fact that Fa-hsien places Shaki thirteen (not as Legge has by a slip, three) yojanas or nearly 100 miles in a south-east direction from Kanauj and so either at or near Yuan-chuang’s Ayudha which was 100 miles south-east from Kanauj. Then Cunningham makes the name of this city to be the same as that of the lady Visākhā: but Yuan-chuang, like others, transcribes the lady’s name by three characters different from those which he uses for writing the name of this city. Further, from Shaki to Śrāvastī the direction was south and the distance eight yojanas or less than 50 miles, while from Viśoka to Śrāvastī it was 500 *li* or about 100 miles in a north-east direction. Moreover, the Life, as has been stated, places Viśoka 500 *li* to the east of Kosambī. So, unless we agree with Mr V. Smith in treating Fa-hsien’s distances and directions as mistakes, we cannot make Yuan-chuang’s Viśoka to be Fa-hsien’s Shaki, but the former may perhaps be taken to represent the Saketa of the Buddhist scriptures.
v1.c14.s5.9
¹ A. G. I. p. 401.
v1.c14.s5.10
The precisely similar stories about the Buddha’s tooth-stick becoming and remaining a miraculous tree are in favour of the identification of Sha-ki and Viśoka. But they are not enough to prove that the two names denoted one city, as such stories were probably invented for several places. We have already met with a tooth-stick tree in the early part of the Records, and we are to meet with a third in a future chapter.
v1.c14.s5.11
It is not impossible that Yuan-chuang made an excursion from Kosambī to Kaśapura, returned to Kosambī, and from the latter continued his journey going east to Viśoka. This would agree with the account in the Life which does not mention Kaśapura. Mr V. Smith thinks that Yuan-chuang’s Kaśapura “may very plausibly be identified with the group of ruins centreing round Mohanlālganj” fourteen miles south of Lucknow. He adds— “Kursī, in the Bārabanki District, about 27 miles in a direct line from Mohan-lālganj, corresponds admirably in position with Viśakha [that is Viśoka] which was 170 or 180 *li* (less than 30 miles) from Kaśapura".¹ But these proposed identifications are not given as strictly accurate, and, as Mr Smith admits, the identifications must await further researches.
v1.c14.s5.12
¹ op. c. p. 523.