A History of Sanskrit Literature c10.s3.7

c10.s3.7

Far more interesting as literature is the *Divyāvadāna*,² a collection of legends which draws, like the *Avadānaçataka*, largely on the *Vinayapiṭaka* of the Sarvāstivādin school of Buddhism. Its date is uncertain; its origin is complex; one section is definitely described as a Mahāyāna Sūtra, while the body of the work is still of the Hīnayāna school. The term *dīnāra* occurs, and one famous tale, the Çārdūlakarṇāvadāna, was rendered into Chinese in A.D. 265. It tells how the Buddha by his skill in persuasion converted to the faith the maiden Prakṛti, who had conceived a deep love for the beloved disciple Ānanda and would have won him from his vows, had he not at the moment of his greatest danger sought refuge in his master’s strength. The gem of the collection is doubtless the pathetic legend of Kunāla, son of Açoka,¹ whose false stepmother succeeds in poisoning his father’s mind against him and in having him blinded without his permitting himself either hate or reproach. We find, however, also a still more gruesome and to us repellent theme in the tale of Rūpavatī, who severs her own breasts in order to feed a hungry mother when on the point of eating her own child; Rūpavatī is extolled as a pattern of the Bodhisattva who seeks to save the whole world, and is accorded the somewhat quaint honour of being reborn as a prince, Rūpavata.