The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c10.2.3

c10.2.3

It is argued that the whole Buddhist canon is posterior to Aśoka and could not have taken shape prior to the second or first century before Christ. Sylvain Lévi and others have shown that the Pâli idiom itself, in which the southern canon is composed, did not arise till sometime after Aśoka. The great Mauryan emperor does not use it in his Edicts. The Buddha as well as his contemporary Mahâvira, the founder or renovator of Jainism, must have preached in some Prâkṛit language, Mâgadhî or Ardha-Mâgadhî. It is impossible to assign any more specific dates to Buddhist scriptures. It is certain that they do not represent the work of a single mind or generation. It is also certain that the Pâli version is earlier than the Sanskrit.¹ The political data which this literature can be pressed to yield have therefore to be used with the utmost caution. Generally, they fall into two classes, either furnishing the names of old states, kings or ministers and recording their deeds, or incidentally reflecting the working of institutions. Facts of the former character are best reserved for treatment in connection with regular political history. The inferential data must be dealt with like those of the Mahâbhârata and the Râmâyaṇa. They are particularly abundant in that portion of the Khuddaka Nikâya which gives the Jâtakas, the 547 stories of the Buddha’s previous births and which is one of the noblest monuments of Buddhist literature.