The University of Nalanda c10.45

c10.45

Apart from these praises of Mahāyāna that we have just referred to, Śikṣā-Samuccaya is a very important work. For it is nothing but a collection of all the earlier Mahāyāna Sūtras. Thus it, incidentally, gives us a very exhaustive history of the Mahāyāna literature. The collection of sūtras also shows Śāntideva as a great scholar. He had not only read all the sūtras but mastered them so that he could quote them with ease. The work, as its name suggests, deals with ‘Śikṣā’, that is to say, morality or discipline. The work, thus, is a collection of moral instructions.