Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c10.s1.10

c10.s1.10

We might have made a better approach to the truth if we had known the text upon which Nāgārjuna commented and produced his famous *Mahāprajñāpāramitāśāstra*. Rosenberg informs us that the text used by Nāgārjuna was the *Pañcaviṃśati.*, but he does not indicate his source of information.¹ A view current in Japan at the present moment is that Nāgārjuna’s *Śāstra* was written upon the *Prajñāpāramitā* called 大明度經 (Ta-ming-tu-ching)². According to Nanjio’s information this is a version of the *Aṣṭa.* or *Daśa.*, at least the fact that the *Ta-ming-tu-ching* contains also thirty chapters like some of the versions of the *Aṣṭa.* and *Daśa.* points towards the probability of its being a translation of a version of the *Aṣṭa.* but on comparison we see that this text does not literally follow the present Sanskrit text. Besides, the number of chapters in the Sanskrit original is thirty-two while that in the Chinese is thirty and so if it be a translation of the *Aṣṭa.* it must be of another version of the same.