Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c25.13

c25.13

**Teaching mainly oral.** Education in the age of these earlier Buddhist texts was not yet depending upon written literature. This, however, does not mean that the art of writing was not developed then. It is referred to as a source of livelihood or an occupation in the *Mahāvagga* [i, 49, 1]. The *Vibhaṅga* recommends to the Bhikkhuṇīs the art of writing [*SBE.*, vol. 13, p. xxxiii], while the Sutta-Vibhaṅga in explaining another passage from the same refers to the possibility of causing the death of a person by mischievous and misleading representations in writing [*SBE.*, op. cit.]. But the evidence available does not point to the use of writing for the purpose of preserving and transmitting an extensive sacred literature. As Doctors Rhys Davids and Oldenberg point out [ib.], there is not the least trace of any reference to manuscripts in the detailed accounts which the Vinaya texts give of the whole of the personal property of the Buddhist Ārāmas and Vihāras, of which all possible items from the bigger furniture to the smallest needle are enumerated or referred to. Along with manuscripts there are no references to such accessories of writing as ink, pen, style, leaves, or other materials for writing, nor to the operations connected with the copying out of manuscripts which must have occupied a large part of the activities of the monks should they have had to do with written literature for their education. But besides this negative evidence, there is positive evidence proving the very limited use of writing in those days for purposes of education. The Bhikkhus of a certain place not knowing the *Pātimokkha*, one of them is commissioned to learn it from a neighbouring fraternity and import the knowledge [*Mahāv.*, ii, 17, 5, 6]. Similarly, we read of a lay-devotee or a Upāsaka inviting a fraternity of Bhikkhus to hear him recite an important Suttanta so that they might learn it and preserve it from oblivion [ib., iii, 5, 9]. These passages show that the system of oral tradition was as much the characteristic of Buddhist as of Brahmanical education, though the causes of its adoption might be different in the two cases. It cannot consistently be supposed of Buddhists that they considered the writing of their sacred texts as an irreverent treatment of them or a sacrilege when they were so advanced in their views or so heterodox as to prefer the popular speech to the refined and sacred Sanskrit and abolish all distinctions of caste within the pale of their fraternity. The disuse of writing was more probably due to the scarcity of any convenient practical material on which the known characters might be inscribed, as pointed out by Rhys Davids and Oldenberg [*SBE.*, op. cit.].