The History of Buddhist Thought c19.50

c19.50

Much of this narrative also occurs in the Vinaya, but there it is in the third person. The Vinaya quotes many sutta passages verbally, and it is unlikely that it would alter the words of the sacred text. It is thus more probable that the story existed first as part of the tradition of the reciters, from where it was inserted both in the Vinaya and the sutta, but in the latter was changed to the first person. Another *Majjhima* passage gives an account of the extreme austerities before enlightenment, which appears to have once formed part of the same narrative or the same collection of traditions.¹