Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon c14.s1.2

c14.s1.2

The version of Buddhaghosa and the *Dīpavaṃsa* differing in detail even from the *Mahāvaṃsa*,¹ which is largely based on the same materials, places the first schism at the time of the Council of Vaiçālī, when, as a sequel to the condemnation of the Vajjiputtakas, the Mahāsaṅghikas broke away; from this schismatic school are two others, the Gokulikas and the Ekabbohārikas; the former of these two gave rise to the Paññattivādins and Bāhulikas and later to the Cetiyavādins, apparently all these schools coming into being in the second century after the Parinirvāṇa. In the same century there arose in the Theravāda the schools of the Mahīṁsāsakas and the Vajjiputtakas, the latter giving rise to four branches, Dhammuttariyas, Bhadrayānikas, Channāgarikas, and Sammitiyas. From the Mahīṁsāsakas there arose the Sabbatthivādins and the Dhammaguttikas. The former school was prolific; it gave birth to the Kassapikas, and these in their turn gave rise to the Saṅkantikas, from whom divided off the Suttavādins. Thus, with the six Mahāsāṅghika schools and the original Theravāda, there is a total of eighteen. But the account of Buddhaghosa adds six further schools, the Rājagirikas, Hemavatikas, Siddhatthas, Pubbaseliyas, Aparaseliyas, and Vājiriyas. The Mahāsāṅghikas,¹ however, naturally did not accept the view which made the Vibhajyavādins the true representatives of the Theravāda; they themselves represented the Ācāryavāda, suggesting a learned origin for their tenets, and they claimed that the true division was threefold, Sthavira, Mahāsāṅghika, and Vibhajyavādin. The Sthaviras they subdivided into the Sarvāstivādins and the Vātsīputrīyas, omitting the Mahīçāsakas as a link between the Sthaviras and the Sarvāstivādins. The primacy of the Vibhajyavādins is also challenged in traditions from the north; the Sarvāstivādins are credited with holding that the Mūla-Sarvāstivādins were more primitive than the Vibhajyavādins, though they reckon the monks of the Mahāvihāra, but also those of the Abhayagiri and Jetavana monasteries in Ceylon, as Sthaviras.²