The History of Buddhist Thought c21.17

c21.17

The doctrine would not at first produce a schism. We actually find it in Sarvāstivāda works held along with the teaching of the older ideal of arhatship. It would only lead to the rise of a new sect when the older ideal was rejected as a low career (*hīna-yāna*) and the actual consequences of the new doctrine were developed. In any case the oldest form in which we find it expressed is in Sarvāstivāda works. It finds another expression in the *Avadāna-śataka*, in a story repeated in different forms of a king in the far past who was visited by a Buddha. The king was delighted by the Buddha’s description of the qualities that produce enlightenment, and made the vow to win supreme enlightenment. That king, we are told, was the individual who became Gotama Buddha. He thus as a layman put aside the thought of winning the truths under that Buddha in order after repeated rebirths to win all the qualities of a Buddha.