Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c9.31

c9.31

The Mahāyānists, however, give only a secondary place to the observance of the Prātimokṣa rules. They say that a bodhisattva would be guilty of mūlāpatti (grave offence) if he says to anybody "What will you do by following the Prātimokṣa-Vinaya? Develop your mind for samyaksambodhi, read the Mahāyāna texts. If there be any evil already done by you in word, thought, or body it will be purified by your reading the texts³". But again it is also enjoined that a bodhisattva should not wholly depend upon the Prātimokṣa-Vinaya, for if a bodhisattva observes the Prātimokṣa rules for many kalpas, living on roots and fruits of trees but with the mind attached to śrāvakayāna, he is guilty of a grave offence⁴. Besides these remarks, one can also perceive from the customs of the Dhyāna school about the ordination of monks, how the prātimokṣa is relegated to a secondary position. De Groot tells us that the Dhyāna school recognised the 250 Prātimokṣa rules as the code of their clergy⁵. The monks are first ordained according to the Prātimokṣa rules, and after two or three days, they pass through a second ordination according to the Brahmajāla sūtra, the accredited Vinaya of the later Mahāyānists, in order to attain to the dignity of a bodhisattva. Thus we see that the Mahāyānists could not or did not do away with the Prātimokṣa rules.