Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c5.s1.4

c5.s1.4

¹ Not all the suttas of all the Nikāyas, because there are many that were incorporated in a later period. The Khuddaka Nikāya contains a few early works, but many are of much later date. The Divyāvadāna always speaks of four Āgamas, implying that the four Nikāyas or Āgamas were the only recognised canonical texts even at the time of the compilation of the Divyāvadāna. See Divyā., pp. 17, 253, 333. Prof. Bapat contends in his article, "The different strata in the literary material of the Dīgha Nikāya" in the Annals of the Bhandarkar Institute (vol. VIII, pt. i) that the Pāli canon like all other sacred literatures is 'a mosaic of earlier and later material.' His view is that the suttas, containing among other things, accounts of miracles, mythological, and metaphysical or Buddhological speculations, are later than those which contain simple teachings of sīla, samādhi, and paññā. It is difficult to agree with some of his conclusions, specially his remarks that the suttas of the first volume of the Dīgha Nikāya are earlier than those of the second, and that the suttas of the second are earlier than those of the third, for in the first volume there are suttas like Kevaddha, Ambattha, containing materials, which, according to his own statement, should be of a later date.