Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c9.35

c9.35

The only Mahāyānic works accessible to us that can be called a code of disciplinary rules are the Chinese Brahmajāla sūtra and the two works of Śāntideva, viz., Śikṣāsamuccaya and Bodhicaryāvatāra. Śāntideva is a well-known figure in the Buddhist world of the seventh century, and these two works of his are collections of excerpts from a large number of Mahāyāna sūtras, gathered with a view to present a picture of the duties and functions of a bodhisattva¹. As regards the Brahmajäla sūtra, De Groot informs us that though it had existed from the first century A.D., "it was not thought much of before 730 A.D."² This book was translated by Kumārajīva and formed part of the great work Bodhisattva-hṛdaya-bhūmi³. The fact that Śāntideva had no occasion to refer to this work shows that it was not very popular in his times, or probably, it was not known to him as the other works on Bodhisattva duties were. Like other Mahāyānic sūtras on disciplinary rules, it also attempted to combine the ideal life of a bodhisattva, who might be a monk or a layman with that of a monk as a member of the saṅgha. As the preliminary practices of a bodhisattva, it speaks of the twenty cittāśayas ("sentiers du debut" ⁴) so many of which are found in the Daśabhūmikasūtra⁵, and it says that a bodhisattva must develop these before he can seriously think of attaining bodhi. These cittāśayas are followed by the mention of ten other qualities, called Vajras, which make the bodhisattva firm in his zeal and path. After acquiring these thirty qualities, the bodhisattva is to progress along the ten bhūmis.