The History of Buddhist Thought c28.s5.2

c28.s5.2

Some of their characteristic doctrines can already be traced in the Avadānas of the Sarvāstivādins and Mahāsanghikas. Such doctrines must have been taught in the monasteries, and we find the teaching about bodhisattvas, the Perfections, and the two kinds of truth infecting even Ceylon Buddhism. The doctrine that bodhisattvas utter true teaching owing to their being inspired by the direct power of Buddha (*buddhānubhāvena*) is frequent in the Mahāyāna sūtras, and it is possible that their composers may have been influenced by some such theory, which would make it unnecessary to class all the sūtras as conscious fabrications.