Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c8.s1.4

c8.s1.4

In the Mahāyāna literature, there are a few treatises dwelling exclusively on the stages of progress while there are many which deal with them incidentally. Of the works treating mainly of the Bhūmis, the most important and at the same time comprehensive is the Daśabhūmikasūtra,¹ one of the nine recognised scriptural texts of the Nepalese Buddhists. The next in importance are the Bodhisattvabhūmi² and the Madhyamakāvatāra,³ both following the Daśabhūmikasūtra with minor variations. For works containing an incidental treatment of the Bhūmis, we may refer to the Laṅkāvatāra, Sūtrālaṅkāra and other similar works. The Prajñāpāramitās (Śatasāhasrikā and Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikā) devote a chapter exclusively to the treatment of the Bhūmis, though they do not omit to state that from the standpoint of the highest truth, they are devoid of any reality and are mere matters of convention.⁴ The Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikā again has a peculiar feature of its own. While speaking of the various practices followed by the Bodhisattvas in connection with their progress in the Prajñāpāramitā, it indicates many of the attainments by using expressions which are current among the Hīnayānists, e.g, Kulaṅkula, Ekavīcika, Sotāpanna.⁵ The Śatasāhasrikā⁶ also gives us a list of ten Hīnayānic bhūmis, which are not in use in the Pāli texts. They are Śuklavipaśyanā (or vidarśanā) bhūmi, Gotrabhūmi, Aṣṭamakabhūmi, Darśanabhūmi, Tanubhūmi, Vitarāgabhūmi, Kṛtāvibhūmi, Pratyekabuddhabhūmi, Bodhisattvabhūmi and Buddhabhūmi. The names clearly indicate the stages which they are intended to signify. The first two refer to the pre-sotāpanna stages, the third and the fourth to the sotāpattimagga and sotāpanna stages, i.e., so long as the adept is in the darśanamārga, the fifth to sakadāgāmi, in which stage rāga, dveṣa and moha reach their minimum (tanutva), the sixth to the anāgāmi stage when the above three are completely eradicated, the seventh to the arahatta stage, when the adept completes all that is to be done, for which reason an Arahat is often called kṛtakṛtya (having done what is to be done). The eighth, ninth and tenth are self-explanatory and need no comment. It should be noted that the treatment of the Bhūmis in the Prajñāpāramitās is much simpler than that of the Daśabhūmikasūtra, and very likely it represents a stage in the evolution of the Bhūmi conception, standing midway between the Mahāvastu¹ and the Daśabhūmikasūtra. The account of Bhūmis in the Mahāvastu appears to be the earliest. The names used are not the standard ones. From the name used in the Bodhisattvabhūmi, it seems that the writers on Bhūmis considered it a piece of literary skill to devise names indicative of the qualities attained by a Bodhisattva in a particular stage.² The description of the bhūmis in the *Mahāvastu* is very scanty and does not contain the details which are important and even essential from the Mahāyānic standpoint. On the other hand, it mentions some disciplinary (vinaya) rules which, a Bodhisattva is expected to observe, and the non-observance of which not only impeded his progress but brought about his fall to the next lower stage. In the accounts of the first three bhūmis, some traces of the description contained in the *Daśabhūmikasūtra* are found, but in the next seven, and specially in the last four, there is hardly anything more than a mere mention of the names of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas who attained them. It is apparent that the conception of bhūmis was very hazy to the author of the *Mahāvastu*, who tried to supply the gaps by recounting some legendary lives of Bodhisattvas and fictitious names of Buddhas.