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Manual of Indian Buddhism c7.s8: 8. The Four Philosophical Schools. Mahāyāna in the Ascendency. Decline of the Church in India

Manual of Indian Buddhism c7.s8

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8. The Four Philosophical Schools. Mahāyāna in the Ascendency. Decline of the Church in India

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When the last named Chinese pilgrim stayed in India, the four philosophical schools of the Vaibhāṣikas, Sautrāntikas, Yogācāras, and Mādhyamikas had already reached their full development. The former two clung to the Hinayāna party; the latter two supported the tendencies of the Mahāyāna.

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The Vaibhāṣikas and the Sautrāntikas may be qualified as realists⁴, acknowledging the real existence of the phenomenal world, but whilst the former acknowledge the direct perception of exterior objects, the latter hold that exterior objects merely exist as images, and thus are indirectly apprehended. The Vaibhāṣikas reject the authority of the Sūtras altogether, only acknowledging that of the Abhidharma. In their dogmatical system Sākyamuni is a common human being, who after attaining the qualified Nirvāṇa by his Buddhahood, and final Nirvāṇa by his death, passed into Nothingness. What may be called divine in the Buddha, is his intuitive knowledge of the truth without the aid of others.

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⁴ WASSILIEF B. 226—286; Śaṅkara on Brahma-S. II, 2, 18 ff. Sarvad. Saṅg. 9—24; BURNOUF Intr. 447 ff.

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The Sautrāntikas, in their turn, deny all authority to the Abhidharma, and keep to the Sūtras. Their Buddha is that of Scripture, possessed of the ten Powers (Daśabala), the four Vaiśaradyas, the three Smṛtyupasthānas, and of all pervading compassion. They ascribe to him a Dharmakāya and a Sambhogakāya.

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The Yogācāras and Mādhyamikas, the supporters of Mahāyānism, are idealists. The former deny the real existence of all except vijñāna, consciousness, and are therefore often designed as Vijñānavādins. The Mādhyamikas are complete nihilists⁵. Their system is the legitimate logical outcome of the principles underlying ancient Buddhism, and in so far they are entitled to the glory of being more orthodox than the Orthodox. In their nihilism, the Buddhist counterpart, or rather adaptation of the scholastic Vedānta, of the theory of Name-and-Form, in its extreme interpretation⁶, they teach that the whole of the phenomenal world is a mere illusion. Like the scholastic Vedāntins they recognize two kinds of truth, the Paramārtha and the Saṃvṛti, answering to the Pāramārthika and the Vyāvahārika of the Vedānta¹. The second kind of truth is, properly speaking, no truth at all, for it is the produce of Reason (*buddhi*), and truth lies outside the domain of Reason; Reason is Saṃvṛti. Hence, in fact, all is delusion, dream-like. There is no existence, there is no cessation of being; there is no Nirvāṇa; there is no difference between those who have attained Nirvāṇa and those who have not. All conditions, in fact, are like dreams².

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⁵ WASSILIEF B. 288; 309; Śaṅkara l. c.; Sarvad. Saṅg. 22: 24; BURNOUF l. c.

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⁶ The interpretation combated by Vijñāna Bhikṣu on Sāṅkhya-Pravacana 1, 22.

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¹ Cp. the stanzas from Nāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamaka quoted by MINAYEF Recherches 1, 226. On this and other works ascribed to Nāgārjuna see WASSILIEF in Tar. 302.

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² All this is forcibly expressed by Śantideva, Bodhicary. IX, 2 and 150, 151:

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The Mādhyamikas try to avoid the usual term Māyā, and use instead Prajñā and Upāya, which answer to the Pradhāna and the Prakṛti of the Sāṅkhyas, apart from the difference between ideal and real³.

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³ Cp. HODGSON Ess. 72; 78; 89; 104. The origin of these queer terms is not to be solved by etymology; both seem to be conundrums for māyā. Prajñā in the sense of "cunning", and upāya in that of "a trick" coincide with one of the meanings of māyā. The distinction between Prajñā and Upāya is conventional. Another explanation would be that Prajñā = Mūla-prakṛti, answers to the ἔννοια of Gnosticism, "in which", to use the words of MULL. in JASB. of 1835, p. 386, "νοῦς, intellect, buddhi, — is the first-born offspring".

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It must be observed that morality is not jeopardized by this theoretical nihilism, for the force of illusion is irresistible, and as all distinctions are equally an illusion, the distinction of good and evil, of virtue and vice, remains unaffected⁴. The reasonable objection that if all is illusion, their idea of illusion is as non-existent as all the rest, would fail to trouble those philosophers, because, in their system, the decrees of Reason are not only fallible, but absolutely false.

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⁴ In the highest truth there is, of course, no good nor evil. This is expressed by Śantideva in the following phrases:

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The reputed founder of the Mādhyamika school is Nāgārjuna⁵, whereas his contemporary Kumāralabdha is said to be the originator of the Sautrāntika system⁶. As two other celebrated contemporaries figure Ārya-Deva and Aśvaghoṣa. The former we have already met; to the latter many works in prose and verse are ascribed. He is claimed by the Mahāyānists as one of their party⁷.

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⁵ It is doubtful whether any of the existing works fathered upon Nāgārjuna be genuine. The Suhrd-lekha has been translated by WENZEL from Tibetan, JPTS. of 1886. Cp. BEAL, On the Suhrillekha, Ind. Ant. XVI, 169. According to Śantideva, Bodhicary. V, 106 N. was the author of the Sūtrasamuccaya. It is proved by his testimony that the Tib. record ascribing the Sūtrasamuccaya and the Śikṣāsamuccaya to Śantideva (WASSILIEF B. 208) is wrong.

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⁶ Voy. I, 89; II, 154.

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⁷ Tar. distinguishes two Aśvaghoṣas, one of them being confounded with Śūra, and bearing no less than 11 names, a suspicious coincidence with the 11 Rudras; 90; 216; 297; 300; 306; 311 ff. WASSILIEF B. 211 calls him a pupil of Parśva, which would make him somewhat older than Nāgārjuna. Cp. MAX MÜLLER, India 312. A younger namesake occurs Tar. 102.

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Saṃvṛtiṃ paramārthaś ca satyadvayam idaṃ matam,
buddher agocaras tattvam; buddhiḥ saṃvṛtir ucyate.
Evam na ca nirodho 'sti na ca bhāvo 'sti sarvadā,
ajātam aniruddham ca tasmāt sarvam idaṃ jagat.
Svapnopamās tu gatayo vicāre kadalisamāḥ,
nirvatānirvātāṃ ca viśeṣo nāsti vastutaḥ.

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The poet is reckoned among the Mādhyamikas WASSILIEF B. 326, but he occurs also as an authority of the Yogacāra; 314.

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māyāpuruṣaghātādau cittābhāvan na pāpakam,
citte mayāsamete tu papapuṇyasamudbhavaḥ.

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Zapiski IV, p. 208.

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As a younger contemporary of Nāgārjuna and Deva, and their successor at the college of Nālandā, we find somewhere mentioned a certain Nāgāhvaya, otherwise named Tathāgatabhadra¹. As Fa Hian does not speak of the college at Nālandā², though he visited the village, the story deserves no credit. It is more likely that Nāgāhvaya is synonymous with Nāgārjuna³.

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¹ WASSILIEF B. 202; cp. Tār. 83.

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² Rec. 81.

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³ Vyu. § 177 the two names follow one another. A dubious Nāgabodhi in Tib. I. 310.

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The school of the Vaibhāṣikas was illustrated by the Bhadantas⁴ Dharmatrāta, Ghoṣaka, Buddhadeva, and Vasumitra. The first is said to have been the pupil of Ārya-Deva; if this be true, he must have flourished in the first half of the third cent. To him is ascribed the Mahā-Vibhāṣā. He is also the reputed compiler of the Udānavarga, and the author of the Saṃyuktābhidharma-śāstra⁵. Of Ghoṣaka and Buddhadeva little is known⁶. Vasumitra, flourishing in the reign of the son of Kaniṣka, is expressly distinguished from the older Vasumitra, the president of the Third Council, as well as from a younger namesake living in the 6th or 7th century, a disciple of Guṇamati⁷. As pupils of Ārya-Deva are recorded Śūra and Śāntideva. If the notice refers to the two poets whose works are known, they must have lived in the third century. Their comparatively correct Sanskrit renders this very problematical.

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⁴ On the title Bhadanta see BURNOUF Intr. 567.

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⁵ Tib. I. 310; Tār. 67; 297; WASSILIEF B. 50; 270; Voy. II, 105; 119; Vyu. § 117; BURNOUF Intr. 566; ROCKHILL, Udānavarga, Introduction.

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⁶ Tār. 4; 61; 67; WASSILIEF B. 50; 266; 281; BURNOUF Intr. 567. They do not occur Vyu. l. c.

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⁷ Tār. 60; 68. Cp. MAX MÜLLER, op. c. 305, note. A discussion on the various authors bearing the name of Vasumitra is found in MINAYEF'S Recherches I, 196 ff.

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With regard to the condition and the peculiarities of the two great parties about A. D. 400 we possess precious indications in Fa Hian's records. Speaking of Mathurā he notices, as we have seen, that the Abhidharma and the Vinaya-Piṭaka are worshipped by the professors of the Abhidharma and the Vinaya, severally⁸; the Prajñā-Pāramitā, Mañjuśrī and Avalokiteśvara by the Mahāyānists. When the traveller stayed in Pāṭaliputra one of the two monasteries of that city belonged to the Hinayānists, the other, a very grand and beautiful building, to their rivals; the two together containing from six to seven hundred monks. While residing in the Mahāyāna monastery he found a copy of the Vinaya in the Mahāsānghika redaction, which is "the most complete" among the versions of the 18 sects. So he was told of course by the Mahāyānists, who in many respects betray a close affinity to the Mahāsānghikas. Yet the Mahāyānists of the monastery studied also texts appertaining to other sects, for the pilgrim got from them a transcript of the Sarvāstivāda rules, those which were observed by the monks in China. He obtained, moreover, the Saṃyuktābhidharma-hṛdaya, one chapter of the Pari-nirvāṇa-Vaipulya-sūtra, and the Abhidharma of the Mahāsānghikas.

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⁸ The S. Buddhists equally pay honour to the Sacred Books, which are literally worshipped. Upon some occasion they are put upon a kind of rude altar, near the road-side, that those who pass by may put money upon it to obtain merit; HARDY E. M. 192.

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In the sixth century Buddhist scholastic philosophy reached its apogee. The two most illustrious names in that period are Ārya Asaṅga and Vasubandhu, two brothers, from Gāndhāra.

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Asaṅga, the great master of the Yogācāra, was originally an adherent of the semi-orthodox Mahiśāsakas, but became in course of time a convert to the Mahāyāna. He lived for a long time in a monastery near Oudh, and afterwards in Magadha, where he died in Rājagṛha¹. His chief work is a book on Yoga².

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¹ Voy. I, 83; 114; 118; II, 105; 269; Tib. I. 310; Tar. 104; 126; 167. He reached the age of 75 years, and is said to have been 20 years older than Vasubandhu. A pupil of the latter, Guṇaprabha, died before the accession of Harṣa, i. e. before A. D. 610. The approximate date of Asaṅga may be supposed to be A. D. 485—500. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 302—312.

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² Other writings are noticed Voy. II. cc. Tar. 112.

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Vasubandhu, Asaṅga's younger brother, received in his youth his lessons from Saṅghabhadra, a learned Hinayānist in Kashmir. From Kashmir he went to Oudh, where he lived for many years. Being at first a staunch adherent of the Sarvāstivādins³, he disapproved of Asaṅga's Yogaśāstra, but afterwards he became a convert to Mahāyānism. After his conversion he is said to have been teacher in the college of Nālandā. He died at an advanced age in Nepāl, or, as others say, in Oudh⁴. The principal work of this most celebrated of Buddhist philosophers is the Abhidharma-Kośa. He wrote besides several commentaries on Mahāyāna texts⁵.

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³ His teacher, according to Huen Thsang, was Monu-ho-lita, the author of a Vibhāṣa-śāstra, Voy. I, 83, II, 105, 115. BURNOUF Intr. 567 has Manoratha; WASSILIEF II. 219 Maṇiratha. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 289; 302. Another teacher of Vasubandhu was Buddhamitra; WASSILIEF B. 249.

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⁴ Tār. 118; Voy. II. cc. WASSILIEF B. 210; 214; 222. A Chinese biography of V., composed, they say, between A. D. 557 and 588, shows so little acquaintance with Indian customs that we disbelieve the statement of its being a translation. Cp. MAX MÜLLER, op. c. 302—312.

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⁵ WASSILIEF B. 222; cp. 99; Voy. I, 115; II, 274; BURNOUF Intr. 563; 571; Comm. on Harṣacarita p. 490. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 308 f.

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Asaṅga and Vasubandhu were followed by a series of learned authors whose names are little less famous than those of the two great masters. The most prominent among these scholars, partly Hinayānists, partly Mahāyānists, are Diṅnāga, Guṇaprabha, Sthiramati, Saṅghadāsa, Buddhadāsa, Dharmapāla, Śīlabhadra, Jayasena, Candra-Gomin, Candrakīrti, Guṇamati, Vasumitra, Yaśomitra, Bhavya, Buddhapālita, Ravigupta⁶.

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⁶ These and more names of teachers, not all of them Buddhists, are enumerated Vyu. § 177.

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Diṅnāga, from Kāñcī, a pupil of Asaṅga or Vasubandhu, is known as the author of a treatise on Logic, the Pramāṇa-samuccaya. Being a contemporary of Guṇaprabha, he must have lived from A. D. 520—600 or thereabouts⁷.

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⁷ Tār. 127; 131; WASSILIEF B. 78; 206; Tib. I. 310. He was a contemporary of Kālidāsa, according to Mallinatha on Meghadūta vs. 14. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 305—308. D. is often quoted in the Nyāyabinduṭīka; cp. below p. 131, note.

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Guṇaprabha, to whom a hundred treatises are ascribed, was a native of Parvata or Mathurā, and proceeded from the school of Vasubandhu. He became the Guru of the King Harṣa, and numbered among his pupils Mitrasena, who, a man of 90 years, taught Huen Thsang. In his youth a Mahāyānist, Guṇaprabha passed in riper years to the Hinayāna⁸.

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⁸ Tār. 126; 146; Voy. I, 106; cp. 109; WASSILIEF B. 78. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 309.

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Sthiramati and Saṅghadāsa belong to a younger generation than the two preceding masters. Sthiramati, who was teacher at Nālandā when Huen Thsang visited that college, is known as the author of commentaries on the works of Vasubandhu, and of notes on the Ratnakūṭa⁹. Saṅghadāsa, a native of S. India, worked chiefly in Kashmir. Nearly contemporaneous with him was Buddhadāsa¹⁰.

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⁹ Tār. 127; 129; 135; 137; Voy. III, 46; 164; WASSILIEF B. 78. Cp. MAX MÜLLER 305; 310, note.

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¹⁰ Tār. 104; 127; 135.

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Among the teachers in the Nālandā college in the time of Huen Thsang is mentioned Dharmapāla of Kāñcī. If he be identical with the author of the Paramattha-Dīpanī, the commentary on the Therīgāthā — which is extremely doubtful —, he must have become a convert to Mahāyānism after his arrival in N. India. Tradition says that after he had been a teacher in Nālandā, he went to Suvarṇadvīpa¹.

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¹ Tār. 160; Voy. I, 123; 148; 190; II, 287; 452; III, 46; 112; 119. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 310.

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Other celebrities at Nālandā between A. D. 630 and 640 were Śīlabhadra and the laics Jayasena² and Candra-Gomin, whose opponent was Candrakīrti³. Further Guṇamati, the author of a commentary on Vasubandhu's Abhidharma-Kośa⁴ and the master of Vasumitra. This Vasumitra, not to be confounded with his two older namesakes, was the author of the commentary Abhidharma-Kośa-Vyākhyā. Possibly he is identical with the realist Vasumitra who about the same time flourished in Kashmir⁵.

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² Voy. I, 144; 152; III, 78. Tār. 205 confounds Harṣa of Kanauj with Śrī-Harṣa of Kashmir. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 310.

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³ WASSILIEF B. 52; 207; Tār. 150; Zapiski IV, 29 ff.

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⁴ Tib. L. 310; Tār. 159; Voy. II, 442; III, 46; 164; BURNOUF Intr. 566.

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⁵ BURNOUF l. c. Voy. I, 94. Tār. calls him the contemporary of Amara-Siṃha, which is far from accurate. An elucidation of the Vyākhyā was written by Yaśomitra; BURNOUF op. c. 448; 512; 563; 566; 571; 574; Tib. L. 310; MINAYEF Recherches I, 197.

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Concerning Bhavya or Bhāvaviveka and Buddhapālita, who although being both Mahāyānists were inimical to one another, we must refer to the sources⁶. Ravigupta is known as an adherent of Asaṅga and as a poet⁷.

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⁶ Tār. 135 ff.; 160; WASSILIEF B. 207; Voy. III, 112; BURNOUF op. c. 560. Cp. MAX MÜLLER op. c. 304; 311; ROCKHILL op. c. 181.

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⁷ Tār. 146; WASSILIEF B. 207; ROCKHILL op. c. 228.

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It is in the sixth and the seventh cent. that Buddhist scholasticism had its palmy days. The contention between the two great parties rather tended to stimulate the literary activity of the schools than to enfeeble the authority of the Church. The old sects, indeed, were fast losing their significance⁸. They continued their separate existence, and kept up some external marks of distinction, but in dogmatics they were either Śrāvakas or Mahāyānists. If the statistics furnished by the Chinese pilgrims are not too inexact, we must conclude that the number of monks was more considerable in the seventh cent. than two hundred years before. On the whole Buddhism was still flourishing when Huen Thsang visited India. The decline dates, roughly speaking, from A. D. 750.

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⁸ The sects mentioned by Huen Thsang in the course of his records are: Sthaviras, Sarvāstivadins, Sammittiyas, Mahīśāsakas, Kaśyapīyas, Dharmaguptas, Mahāsaṅghikas, Lokottaravadins; and in Ceylon: Mahāviharians and Abhayagirians.

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The latest great champion of Buddhism, Dharmakīrti, is stated by the historians to have been the contemporary of Kumārilabhaṭṭa. That can hardly be accurate. The traveller I-tsing, who stayed in India during the last quarter of the 7th century, reckons Dharmakīrti among the recent celebrities, but does not distinctly say that he was still living. On the other hand we can hardly imagine that a celebrity like Dharmakīrti would have been unknown to Huen Thsang. Hence we draw the inference that Dharmakīrti flourished between the stay of Huen Thsang in India and I-tsing's, and that he may have been alive, though not necessarily so, in the last quarter of the 7th century, which approaches the date of Kumārila¹¹.

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⁹ Bhavabhūti's Malatī-Madhava may be adduced as proving the esteem which Buddhist learning enjoyed in the 8th century at Ujjayinī.

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¹⁰ See MINAYEF Zapiski IV, 31 f. and his references.

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¹¹ MAX MÜLLER op. c. 305 and 308 states that Dharmakīrti is quoted by Subandhu. That is a mistake. Subandhu in Vasavadattā p. 235 alludes to the Buddhist work titled

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Kumārila and Śaṅkara live in the traditions of the Buddhists as the most formidable enemies to their creed, as the two great dialecticians whose activity caused the ruin of Buddhism in India¹. Albeit sober history teaches that the Faith has continued in India for more than six centuries after Śaṅkara, there is a grain of truth in those traditions, inasmuch as Budhisın gradually lost ground, became more degraded, and at last died out in the land of its birth.

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¹ WASSILIEF B. 208; Tār. 175-201; HODGSON Ess. 12; 14; 48.

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Our information regarding the external history of N. Buddhism from the second to the eighth century is very fragmentary. Numerous inscriptions dating from Kaniṣka, and ranging over a period of more than two centuries show that the Faith prospered at Mathurā, though Jainism would seem to have been predominant. From other sources we gather that the Church was in a flourishing condition in Kabul, Kashmir, N. W. India². The epigraphic evidence from Kārli, Nāsik and Amarāvatī proves that the Faith had many fervent devotees in W. and S. India. Some of the inscriptions dating from the time of Sri-Pulimāvi or Puḷumāvi — the Siri-Polemios of Ptolemy —, consequently from the second century, teach us that the sanctuary and monastery of Amarāvatī belonged to the Caitikas, a subdivision of the Mahāsāṅghikas; the latter possessed the shrine at Kārli, and the Bhadrāyaṇīyas a cave in Nāsik³.

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² CUNNINGHAM Arch. Surv. III, 30 ff, Rājataraṅgiṇī I, 168; Tār. 65.

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³ BURGESS Arch. Surv. of W. India, X, 33; 34; 36; of S. India, III, p. 26; 41; BHAGVĀNLĀL INDRĀJĪ, Nasik.

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Fa Hian found Buddhism very flourishing in Udyāna, Pañjāb, Mathurā, and in a satisfactory condition more eastward. He does not mention the college at Nālanda, which in the 7th century was the chief centre of Buddhist learning⁴. The great patron of the Faith in the 7th century was the celebrated Harṣa or Harṣavardhana, surnamed Śīlāditya by Huen Thsang, who describes that king as a fervent Mahāyānist, but tolerant and benevolent towards all sects, the Hinayānists excepted⁵. Now, it cannot be doubted that Harṣa had Buddhist sympathies. As we know from the Harṣacarita, his sister Rājyaśrī, widow of Grahavarman, had become a Buddhist nun⁶. Independently from other information tending to the same effect, the utterances of the Chinese traveller impress us with the conviction that in general the relations between the Buddhists and the various shades of Hinduism were peaceful; bitter enmity only raged between Hinayānists and Mahāyānists. Instances like that of Śaśāṅka, king of Karṇa-Suvarṇa, who is stigmatized as hostile to the Faith, are isolated⁷.

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⁴ The story of the foundation is told Voy. I, 213; II, 42.

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⁵ Harṣa was in the 26th year of his reign a Sivaite; BÜHLER, Ep. Ind. 1, 71.

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⁶ We know from the Harṣacarita 484 ff. that H. had a great veneration for the Buddhist teacher Divākaramitra Maitrāyaṇīya.

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⁷ Voy. II, 349; 422.

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In Kashmir, one of the old centres of Buddhist learning, the Church was still powerful in the 7th century during the reign of Durlabhavardhana, though Śivaism was increasing⁸. Instances of liberality shown by one and the same person to Buddhists and to Brahmanists were frequent. As to

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⁸ Rājat. IV, 3 ff.; 80.

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Alaṅkāra, but he does not say that the author is Dharmakīrti. It is the commentator who ascribes the Alaṅkāra to Dharmakīrti. Another work the Nyayabindu, which has been edited by DR. PETERSON, with the Ṭīkā, is ascribed to Dharmakīrti by K. B. PĀṬHAK in his paper "On the Autorship of the Nyāyabindu" (JRB. RAS. XIX, 47). The author of the Ṭīkā is a certain Dharmottara; cp. Tar. 330; WASSILIEF B. 290. Another Dharmottara is the one mentioned above p. 118.

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Nepāl, the kings and the people were no less distinguished by their tolerance¹.

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¹ Voy. II, 407.

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The decline of the Church, as already observed, may be dated from the middle of the eighth century. It was hastened in W. India by the Arab conquest of Sindh in A. D. 712.

Cites (25)