Early Monastic Buddhism v2.c33.s3.1

v2.c33.s3.1

The different traditons about the Second Council indicate that a section of the Vajjiputtakas held another council, Mahāsaṅgiti, at Kusumapura, i.e., Pāṭaliputra, the capital of Kālāsoka. Yuan Chwang also remarks that "the majority of inferior brethren at Pāṭaliputra began the Mahāsaṅghika school."¹ Fa-hien, as stated above, found the Vinaya of this school at Pāṭaliputra, so, it may be safely concluded that the chief centre of this school was at Pāṭaliputra. I-tsing (671-695 A.D.) tells us that the Mahāsaṅghikas were found in his time mostly in Magadha (Central India) and a few in Lāṭa and Sindhu (Western India) and some in a few places in Northern, Southern and Eastern India.² Before I-tsing, both Fa-hien and Yuan Chwang had come across in these localities the adherents of this school though not so frequently as those of the others. The earliest epigraphical notice of this school is found in the inscription on Mathurā Lion Capital (about 120 B.C.),³ mentioning that it had a very strong opponent in Buddhila, an adherent of the Sarvāstivāda school.