Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c17.s5.2

c17.s5.2

As regards these Brāhmaṇas, the Sanskrit version of the *Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra* seems to give more reliable, though confused, information which, if analyzed, gives accurate knowledge about the Brāhmaṇas who also claimed a share in the relics of the Buddha. The Pāli version tells that a single Brāhmaṇa also claimed a share, saying "The Exalted One was a Kṣatriya, and I am a Brāhmaṇa. I am worthy to receive a portion of the relics of the Exalted One."¹ The corresponding Sanskrit passage has *Viṣṇudvīpīvakā brāhmaṇā*² in the plural, and the same phrase is repeated in a later passage³ which does not correspond to the Pāli, though it occurs in both the Tibetan and the Chinese versions. The following page of the Sanskrit version and its corresponding Tibetan and Chinese versions have, *Dhūmrasagotro brāhmaṇaḥ*, whereas the Pāli version has only *Doṇo brāhmaṇo*⁴ who proposes to divide the remains of the Buddha into eight portions in order to avoid a quarrel among the claimants. He then asks them to give him a portion over which they would build a *stūpa* in Droṇagrāma⁵ and duly honour it. The succeeding passage of the Sanskrit version refers to the *Dhūmrasagotro brāhmaṇo* and *Viṣṇudvīpīvakā brāhmaṇā* and has no corresponding Pāli text. However, in the next passage we have again the expression *Vayaṁ Droṇagrāmake*, which is followed by *Dhūmrasagotrasya brāhmaṇasya*,⁶ also occurring in the ensuing sentence.⁷ But the Pāli version has only *Doṇo brāhmaṇo*. In the Sanskrit version it is the *Dhūmrasagotro brāhmaṇa* who, as the representative of the other Brāhmaṇas, addresses the Mallian *gaṇa*. When the distribution takes place, a portion goes to the Brāhmaṇas of Viṣṇudvīpa, in all the versions,⁸ though the Pāli version accredits it to a single Brāhmaṇa. Yet the next page contains a significant statement in the Sanskrit version, which does not have a Pāli counterpart, that "the Brāhmaṇas of Dhūmrasagotra erected a *stūpa* in Droṇagrāma".¹