Beeeeceeteerce i EEREEEEEE Rasa a He GE sede htanancetai it UTE LAT UL otbet ? mrom eatht tnt omer? Sete a PO ~ Me es i om 7 4acb oP te F ie + i hd AY iy 5 ee = Sn - “ae pel ™ rd be ec o) a oon, PR eli ~o) eee > oe > THEO ASKECES PECTURES:-IN COMPARATIVE RELIGION EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS CHICAGO, ILLINOIS THE BAKER & TAYLOR COMPANY NEW YORK THE CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS LONDON THE MARUZEN-KABUSHIKI-KAISHA TOKYO, OSAKA, KYOTO, FUKUOKA, SENDAI THE MISSION BOOK COMPANY SHANGHAI Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2022 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library https://archive.org/details/epochsinbuddhistOOsaun | SAKYAMUNI (Japanese painting of the Kano School, sixteenth century.) Nr) ai ee raed” OCT 17 1924 EPOCHS IN BUDDH HISTORY THE HASKELL LECTURES, 1921 By KENNETH J. SAUNDERS Author of “The Story of Buddhism,” “Gotama Buddha” Editor of “The Heart of Buddhism,” “The Buddha’s Way of Virtue” Professor of the History of Religion, Pacific School of Religion, Berkeley, and Lecturer in the University of California A a, YY “lt es roy THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS CHICAGO ILLINOIS CopyRIGHT 1924 By THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO All Rights Reserved Published January 1924 Composed and Printed By The University of Chicago Press Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. INTRODUCTION That Buddhism is a stream which has its source in the complex and elusive system of Brahmanism known today as Hinduism; that it is rightly called by the name of Gotama Buddha, the great moral reformer of the sixth century B.c. because he shaped its course and purified its waters; that as the stream flowed in an ever widening bed out over the Eastern World, tributaries poured into it from every side, swelling, coloring, and sometimes defil- ing it—all this is generally accepted. This book is an attempt to describe that remarkable process; and as in the case of the great sister-religion, Christianity, it is difficult to say anything which does not need qualifica- tion. The tributaries of both religions are many and diverse, and the streams are very complex. In Buddhism, in the first place, there are several philosophical systems, ranging from a naive realism to a subtle mystical panthe- ism, and all claiming to be derived from the words of Sakyamuni. The person of the Founder has, in the second place, played a widely different rédle in different schools, from that of an ethical teacher, “supernormal perhaps but not supernatural,” to that of supreme god among the gods. In the third place, the moral reform for which he is so justly famous has been variously interpreted, as different emphasis has been placed now upon one and now upon another part of his teachings, until the Buddhist world finds itself divided between the ideals of a self-centered, individualistic mind-culture, on the one hand, and a passionate, altruistic self-sacrifice, on the other. vii Vill INTRODUCTION Such is the destiny of great and complex teachers; and it is my purpose in this book to show how the noble qualities which he embodied have led almost inevitably to a polytheistic cult, as the stream has found its way into other lands, and first one then another was emphasized and embodied in a new “god,” and to trace its course and the tributaries which have entered it. To put all this into more Buddhistic imagery—the lotus of Buddhism has grown apace; its seeds have germinated and borne rich fruitage. But some have been pollinated from plants of another species, producing hybrids, and some have germinated in desert swamps, becoming weeds. In describing this process it is not my object to criticize or to discriminate between the true and false growths. That must be left to the Buddhist world. My task is merely that of a sympathetic chronicler; yet it is my sincere desire to help Christian and Buddhist scholars toward a friendly and frank discussion. I belonged for some time to a group representing many religions in India; and many were the delightful evenings we spent without heat or conscious propaganda, learning one another’s point of view and growing, as we all believed, in the process. I remember the great Buddhist scholar, Oldenberg, com- ing into our midst and saying: “I did not know such a thing was possible.’ It zs possible, and it ought to be done in every intellectual center in the world;’ indeed, the mutual respect and understanding of the nations can- not be based upon rock until numerous groups of this kind are meeting in an honest attempt to study the great streams which have made our civilizations what they are. To scholars of the West and of the East I am deeply indebted, but it is to the East that I have naturally turned * A very interesting group of this kind, numbering over a hundred, meets in Tokyo. INTRODUCTION 1X for my information, and today there are Eastern scholars trained in the scientific methods of the West who yet see Buddhism from within as adherents. Among these I would mention with special gratitude my teacher in Ceylon the Pundit Wagiswara and my friend, Dr. M. Anesaki, whose name is justly revered wherever Bud- dhism is studied. And with them I would thank the courteous and genial monks of many a monastery from Ceylon to Japan, whose guest I have been. In these quiet haunts I have caught something of the spirit of the great and noble Order of the Yellow Robe, which, in spite of perversions, has shown an amazing power of recovery. And of the thoughts which have come to me during twelve years’ study of the religion of Gotama Buddha, I will here set down by way of introduction these: (1) that the great keynotes of our modern scientific thinking, causality and the unity of the universe, even if Gotama did not first formulate them, were popularized by him; and that this is one of the most remarkable achievements in the history of human thought; (2) that the conviction which rings through his words of a moral purpose govern- ing the universe, of the sure reward of good and evil, is even more sublime; (3) that his anticipation of modern psychological theories deserves close and respectful study; (4) that his “religion,” the influence of his words and deeds, is still very much alive, and still supplies a felt want in Asia; (5) that with all its accretions and corrup- tions it still has much to teach the Western World; (6) and that what men have made of it is eloquent of what they are made of: for its rationalism has needed to be reinforced by mysticism; its moral code has been driven to seek other sanctions than the enlightened common sense x INTRODUCTION he appealed to; and the devotion he strove to disentangle from his own person has clung tenaciously to it. What Buddhism has become is to Christians a vindica- tion also of many of the teachings of Jesus—the Father- hood of God, the brotherhood of man, the harmonizing of the individual and corporate life in a divine Kingdom on earth: and, even more remarkable, it is a vindication also of some of the less simple and more controversial of the dogmas of Christianity, such as the Logos doctrine, the triune nature of the Godhead, and the Atonement. The Buddhist, on the other hand, may see in some of the more philosophical and mystical expressions of Chris- tianity a Buddhist element; and this is true—that there are in Christianity elements which are not much under- stood or used by the Christian church, but which are the very breath of life to the devout Buddhist; such, for instance, as the doctrine of the unity of all life and the practice of communion with it. The followers of the two Ways have every reason to associate in friendship and to unite in social service. They are both faced with immensely difficult problems of social and international relations. I hope this book? may in some measure be a bridge between them. “They who have lived with the eternal Word are Christians—even though we call them atheists.” And the spirit of Christ can only pass between us who call ourselves by his august Name and our Bud- dhist friends, if we are trying to understand and to respect one another. ps BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA Easter, 1922 «Cf. Dr. Anesaki in Hibbert Fournal, IV, 9. 2 Much of the contents of this book was given as Haskell Lectures in the Univer- sity of Chicago in 1921. Chapter vi has appeared in the fournal of Religion and Appen- dix I in the International Review of Missions. 3 Justin Martyr. CONTENTS PI STORV NOTE GUE rt he Rerre CM raiT Mae N Ui a ghar {ips ye! KET CHAPTER TPERATACAH AS THE AVAIDDLE PATH gibi gio ago ahi bit) ables I II. PATALI-PpUTRA; THE SPREAD OF THE DHAMMA AND Its DAVEGUARDING Wurm nr aye n aula diy yal ates lings) t 20 III, GanpHARA AND PurusApurRA; THE BirtHoF MAHAYANA = 47 IV, NALANDA; THE Earty SCHOOLMEN oF THE MAHAYANA 70 V. MInInTALE, ARIMADDANA, AND SUKHOTHAI; FASTNESSES OF THE THERAVADA IN CEYLON, BuRMA, AND SIAM . 105 VI. LoyAnc, Cuanc-An, T’1EN T’at; BupDHISM IN CHINA . 120 VII. Keum Kanosan, NAra, Hie1san, Koyasan; BuDDHISM TOMS OREAVANOD PAP ANG MOTI CeCe ENNGA My uiah mgt iM) pty oO VIII. SvAyaMBHU-NATH AND LHAsa; BuppHism In NEPAL ANDAR me Tannen mcm Sy EL NAT Lai ali abd gh) tad NOL GS APPENDICES DE AATITANLINELEANR AM UY Maal Ne ittW) leo ulee le ie ramueht II. Some Bupputist PRAYERS AND Vows... . . .. 216 III. Synonyms or NIBBANA AND NIRVANA . . . . . 22! IV-VI. Cuarts oF THE Buppuist ScHoots or Inp1a, Cuina, De AR ANISM mn iR Sn As Mea lat MD MALL Maas Pasa) 229 INDEX ® e e s e ° ° ° ° . ° e ° e ° e e 227 xl ae a?) CA Ty ye lee ce Wiss fi! “Al's sy ae tg a. bv eta a UALy 4 PREFATORY NOTES I. THE TERMS HINAYANA AND MAHAYANA Much confusion exists as to the great divisions of Buddhism, and the terms, “Southern and Northern,” “Hinayana and Mahayana,” are all used generally, but quite inaccurately, to describe the primitive and the developed forms of this very complex religion. Many writers who condemn the Mahayana as heretical naively use its contemptuous name Hinayana for the orthodox! The following scheme may prove helpful as an indication of the theory worked out in this book. 1. The teachings and example of Sakyamuni are the original Buddhism (560-480 B.c.). All schools claim to be true to the Founder and his Precepts, and we are depend- ent upon their interpretations and records. It is the task of critical scholarship to edit these, and to separate the various strata within the books. It is impossible, except in rare cases, to be sure which are ipsissima verba of the Founder, but of his main tenets there is little question. 2. They were not written down for some centuries, but preserved in the memory of the monks, who very soon began to differ in the emphasis placed on certain great doctrines, yet continued to live side by side in the same monasteries, and to comment upon the traditions, agreeing to differ as to the letter and the spirit. 3. A great popularization of the Buddhist ethic took place in the Asokan era (250 B.c.), and the layman gained a new significance as the note of service was struck, and a Buddhist world-order envisaged. Xili XIV PREFATORY NOTES 4. A less austere Buddhism began to make itself felt, and to call itself Mahayana (Great Way), labeling the more stoical way Hinayana (the Narrow Sect or Way) and accusing it of losing the spirit of the Founder. The followers of this way are represented best by the Theravada (School of the Elders) of Ceylon, and in my opinion the early criticism of the Mahayana that they were too aloof is justified; they neither attained Arhatship about which they centered their lives, nor appreciated the nobler ideal of the Bodhisattva. 5. In the Mahayana there are differences not only of ethical and philosophical interpretation but of Bud- dhology; its stages may be connoted by the following terms: (a) the Halfway Mahayana (ca. 50 B.c.-S0 A.D.); (4) the Paradise Mahayana (ca. 100 a.D.); (¢) the Full Mahayana (ca. 100-400 A.D.). 6. The philosophical schools of the last-named which flourished from about 100 A.D. to about 400 A.D., or from the 4vatamsaka Sitra to the Yogacara, are concerned with the nature of Reality, and tend for the most part toward monism, though with many differences of emphasis. 7. The various schools are harmonized by Chi-i and others in China (sixth century A.D.) in a pantheistic realism. 8. In the later Mantrayana (ca. 700 a.D.) this philos- ophy is further developed and made the basis for a sensuous polytheism and a magic cultus, degenerating at last into Tantric or Sakta Buddhism. II. THE NATURE OF MAN AND THE PHENOMENAL WORLD 1. For primitive Buddhism the doctrine of transiency is cardinal; this is expressed by two words: anatta, anicca. Anatta means that man is an ever changing stream of PREFATORY NOTES XV consciousness without substantial entity; yet it is taken for granted that he is free to choose the direction in which this stream shall flow. The term anicca as applied to the phenomenal world indicates that this also is a continual process of change without abiding entity. The doctrine of Karma is taken over from Hinduism, and the causality of the universe is recognized, but a Causa causans is ignored. 2. The Hinayana schools have their own interpreta- tions of these doctrines; some are realist, some idealist (see Appendix IV). A Causa causans is denied. 3. The Madhyamaka school of Mahayana carries on the process of analysis, and teaches that all phenomena are unreal, or have only a relative reality; the life of man is either a dream or a total illusion. 4. The Yogacara school finds a Causa causans in the evolution of the Alayavijfidna or receptacle of conscious- ness, which contains all human minds and all phenomena, and is responsible for the illusion of separate existence. 5. The comprehensive schools of T’ien-t’ai and others | find an indwelling Absolute, the Tathata, which gives | reality alike to the noumenal and phenomenal. This | culminates in: 6. The Mantrayana doctrine of Adi-Buddha or First Cause. III NIBBANA AND NIRVANA Nibbana is the Pali word used by early Buddhists, and should be kept to distinguish their view of the ultimate goal alike from that of contemporary Hindu teachers, and that of the Mahayana: for these views the Sanskrit Nirvana may be used. Of Nibbana two interpretations are to be recognized: (1) that of primitive Buddhism, which places the emphasis upon the dying-out of the flame of Tanha, or craving, and XVI PREFATORY NOTES*™ indicates that with this the transient world of Samsara comes to an end in an ineffable state of calm, cool joy beyond human categories; (2) that of the Hinayana school- men of a later, more negative, age who tend to place less emphasis upon the ethical content, and at times teach that it is the cessation not merely of becoming but of being. They differ little in fact from the annihilationists whom their master condemned. Of Nirvana similarly there are various interpretations: (1) that of some parts of the Upanishads, which think of it as a waking-up to the fact of the substantial unity of the soul, or atman, with the supreme Atman, or Brahman; (2) that of the Mahayana, which rejects the negative interpretation of the Hinayana, and regards Nirvana as a permanent supreme Reality, blissful and serene, though ineffable. Some schools interpret it as a life of conscious union with the universal Buddha, and some as the awaken- ing of the true Buddha-self in the human heart. (For synonyms see Appendix III.) IV. THE WAYS TO NIBBANA AND NIRVANA Inasmuch as the Buddhist schools differ mainly as to the way to Nibbana, or Nirvana, as it is called in Sanskrit Buddhism, the outline given above may be amplified as follows: a) The Founder, conceiving himself as the Seer of Reality, teaches both the Arhat ideal of strenuous self- realization by way of detachment, and the Bodhisattva ideal by way of service. The goal in either case is Nibbana —the end of Tanha and of Samsara—the only Absolute recognized in early Buddhism. The Founder may also have made a distinction between Pacceka Buddha (soli- tary, reticent Buddha) and Samma-sam-buddha (per- PREFATORY NOTES XVil fect Buddha who teaches). These distinctions are all based upon phases of his own experience; he had been Arhat but “out of pity for the world” remained to teach it; i.e., he refused to be Pacceka Buddha, but became Buddha, fulfilling his true Bodhisattva nature. He seems | himself to have made little distinction between Buddha, \ Bodhisattva, and Arhat. They are all “in Nibbana”’; i.e.,in them Tanha and Samsara are at an end; but the Bodhisattva remains on earth or in a heaven to help mankind and all living things. 6) As the teachings of the Founder were systematized by the monastic Hinayana commentators four stages are to be distinguished: 1. The stage of the Savaka who is either (a) Sotapanno, i.e., one who has set his feet upon the upward path, or “entered the stream”; (4) Sakadagamino, i.e., one who has made such progress that he will only be once more a man and will then attain Nibbana; (c) Anagamino, i.e., one who attains Nibbana “without returning”; (d) Arhat, he who is already free, having broken the bonds, and is already in Nibbana. 2. The stage of the Pacceka Buddha, iec., a fully enlightened Buddha who keeps his knowledge to himself. 3. The stage of Bodhisattva, who is potentially both Arhat and Buddha, but who prefers to help all sentient things. , 4. The stage of the Buddha, who, having reached full and complete Nibbdana, is the source of truth and the guide to all. : c) Though he does not use the words, Asoka in all his services to his people and in his interpretation of the Dhamma emphasizes the Bodhisattva rather than the Arhat ideal. He is regarded by the Theravada as an oad " XVIll PREFATORY NOTES upasika or lay-adherent, and his works of civilization as by-products. d) Halfway or incipient Mahayana carried on this Bodhisattva tendency, but recognized in deference to the more austere members of the Sangha that Arhatship is one way to Nibbana—even if no one now achieves the goal. Faith in the Buddha begins to supplement and to supplant works. e) The Full Mahayana of the “Lotus” (ca. 100 A.D.) roundly declares that there is only one way, that the Buddha has destined all to Buddhahood, and only by his “skilful strategy’? accommodates truth and speaks of the ways of Savaka, Pacceka-Buddha, and Bodhisattva. In this Mahayana is probably nearer than Hinayana to original Buddhism. Ff) The Paradise Mahayana, agreeing in theory that Buddhahood or Nirvana is the goal, offers to ordinary folk the alluring vision of the Paradise of Amitabha as more easily reached and more satisfying, and develops a progressive emphasis upon faith rather than works as the way of salvation. Vv. BUDDHOLOGY Side by side with this shifting of emphases went on a growing Buddhology which may for schematic purposes be expressed as follows: 1. The Teacher proclaims himself the “Elder Brother of Mankind,” supernormal but not supernatural; he ignores any supreme God, and teaches that the gods of his people are unable to help, being themselves in bondage to Karma and Samsara. 2. He is variously regarded by the monks of the Hinayana as (a) an omniscient Teacher, source of all truth (Theravada); (4) a supernatural Being, not subject PREFATORY NOTES XIX to human passion (Mahasanghika); this is the germ of later Mahayana teachings. 3. The Asokan laity regard him as one of several Buddhas and pay worship to his symbols; this they call “worshiping the Lord” (cf. Asokan sculpture). 4. The early Halfway Mahayana represents him as a God surrounded by adoring Bodhisattvas and other beings (cf. Gandharan sculpture). 5. For the Full Mahayana of the “Lotus” he is the almost Eternal Lord and Father, one of many Buddhas whom he now supersedes. 6. For the Paradise Mahayana of the Sukhavati Vyitha he disappears behind the eternal or semi-eternal Amitabha, and in the Amitayur-dhyana Sutra points to him. 7. For the Madhyamaka and Yogacara schools he is an embodiment more or less real of the Dharmakaya. 8. For the 4vatamsaka he is one of innumerable forms in which the primeval Buddha Vairochana is manifest. g. For the Mantrayana he is an emanation of the self-existent Adi-Buddha. The abbreviation B.N. refers to Dr. Bunyiu Nanjio’s Catalogue of the Chinese Tripitaka, Oxford, 1883; S.B.E. to the Sacred Books of the East; B.T. to Warren’s Buddhism in Translations; E.R.E. to the Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics; P.T.S. to the Pali Text Society; F.R.A.S. to the Fournal of the Royal Asiatic Society. CHAPTER I RAJAGAHA; THE MIDDLE PATH The Differentia of the Buddhist Reform (ca. 525 B.C.) “He that seeth the Dhamma seeth me.” “That there is effective action, resultant action, and power within to do this or that, I, even I, proclaim.” “As the ocean has but one flavour so my teaching has but one essence— deliverance.’ “Engineers control the stream: the wise controlleth himself.’ “Of all that springs from causes the Tathagata has explained the cause.” —SAKYAMUNI. The country of Magadha is famous in Indian literature for its beauty and fertility. On the east side of its ancient capital, Rajagaha, the King’s House, is a natural rampart of five wooded hills, to which from time immemorial have gathered the religious teachers of India; and thither they still come, followed by eager pilgrim crowds, wist- fully seeking peace and comfort. To these hills with their wooded slopes and bare cliffs, honeycombed with hermitages, came the young Siddhartha about the middle of the sixth century B.c., seeking guidance, and here some nine years later he began his work as a reformer of the religion of India, and as her greatest moral teacher. It is not difficult to picture the young reformer whose story has been so often told:* lonely at first, subject to periods of depression at the stupidity and inertia of those about him, repelled as he ate the first meal of scraps thrown into his begging-bowl, but gathering courage and inspiration as disciples began to attach themselves to him, and to help him formulate the rules of a new religious order. We may think of them during the rains in peace- tT have tried to retell it in a biographical sketch, Gotama Buddha. New York: Association Press, 1921; London: Oxford Press, 1923. I Fd 2 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ful retreat upon these hills, gazing down upon the fertile plains of the Ganges Valley, or gathered about him on the bare Peak of the Vulture that rose clear above the wooded slopes, and pouring out in that serene air a paean of thanksgiving and joy in their new-found liberty of mind and peace of soul. As swans who soar in tracks of sunlit air, As sorcerers in realms of space are free; So does the sage win through to mastery Of Mara, and the transient world’s despair. In order to give them this liberty, however, the new teacher first convinced them of the universality of law. Before they could be free in the universe they must realize that it is lawful to the core. This was a truth already accepted in theory,’ but men were ignoring it in practice. Among the first of the converts were two Brahmins, Moggallana and Sariputta, and from the story of their conversion we gather how large a part the mind played in the new Way, and how central in it was the doctrine of causality, which has been well called its keynote.’ These men had been companions and fellow-seekers in the religious life. Like their fellow-Hindus they must have been familiar with such teaching; accepting the axiom that life is evil and that Karma brings rebirth they were seeking Moksha, freedom from the whole process. Meet- ing a Buddhist monk and struck by his calm and radiant bearing, Sariputta learned the essentials of the truth in these simple words: Of all things springing from a cause The Buddha hath the causes told: Of how they all shall cease to be, This, too, our Teacher doth unfold. tE.g.,in the Samkhya-Yoga; cf. Keith’s Samkhya and Philosophy. Oxford Press, 1921. 2M. Anesaki, Nichiren, p. 138. 3 Mahavagga i. 23. 4, 5; B.T., pp. 87-91. RAJAGAHA 3 It is difficult to believe at first sight that this doctrine became to so many a real gospel. Even if they had not heard it from their own religious teachers, was it a truth sO emancipating § ? The answer seems to be twofold: first, that it is one thing to know a doctrine, another to be gripped by it, and to meet men who are radiant with it; and second, that this is what Sakyamuni achieved. Byer today men orphaned in the world of faith find in it, as he popularized it, a gospel of salvation; there are groups of European Buddhist monks, for instance, to whom it has given a new meaning in life. Familiar with it as science, in him they find it as religion! And to men haunted by the idea of capricious deities, on the one hand, and beset, on the other, by determinist teachings of a monistic philos- ophy, here was a great new conviction that the universe is orderly, and that man is free to shape his own destiny. Here is a practical and vital truth: “Put aside these questions of the beginning and the end. This is the Dhamma—that being present this must follow; from the rising of that this arises. That being absent this does not come into being. From the cessation of that this too ceases.”* Here is reality speaking. Gotama has been called atheist, even by many of his own later followers. However this may be, he made here a notable contribu- tion to an ethical theism; his serene faith in righteousness and in the reality of unseen, intangible values may be called religious; and we may well believe that knowing his people and their genius for religion he believed that he might safely leave them to work out a religious inter- pretation of this law of causality. What was wrong with most of them was that they were in the bondage of superstition; before they could become truly religious they 1 Majjhima Nikaya 79. 4 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY must learn to think of the world as a cosmos of ordered sequences, and not a chaos at the mercy of capricious demons or demigods. Until they were free from such vague fears, on the one hand, and from the fatalism of determinist theories and a vague pantheism, on the other, there could be no true morality or religion; and to give them a sound basis for faith he bent all the energies of his great mind and heart. Thus we find him welcoming all who were ready to accept the doctrine of causality, for example, the Jatilas,, and dealing severely alike with determinist teachers who failed to moralize it, and with those who sought by self-mutilation or foolish asceticism to placate the powers of the unseen world.’ Let us picture this courageous son of fact with his disciples grouped about him on the Vulture Peak, or some similar height. For twenty-five centuries Buddhists have sought the mountain tops, and these are still the fastnesses of the Dhamma. Master and disciples sit calmly meditat- ing, and after the Indian manner they wait for him to speak. At last a smile lights up his face, and he points to where a peasant is carrying his burden of fagots down from the hillside: “Listen, O monks.” ‘Speak, lord.” “T will teach you the parable of the burden and its bearer, _ of the taking of it up, and the laying of it down.” He then proceeds to show that the burden is bodily existence, that the bearer is the individual consciousness, that the taking-up of the burden is Tanha, that craving to be and to have which brings man to rebirth, and that the laying- down of the burden is the putting aside of such craving. ' Mahavagga i. 21; B.T., p. 351. They were fire-worshipers of a very intelli- gent kind. 2In Majj. Nik. 71, Gotama is made to say: “In ninety-one cycles of rebirth I can remember only one naked ascetic having attained toa heaven. And Ae held the doctrine of the fruits of actions.” RAJAGAHA 5 And then that they may the better remember it, he sings them a little gatha or hymn: This body is of Khandhas made, "Tis man this burden bears. Oh! with what joy aside ’tis laid, Tis taken up with tears.* And all the company, having already experienced some- thing of the joy of laying aside this burden,’ rejoice with the teacher who has shown them the way. So did Pilgrim rejoice when the load fell from his shoulders. And if it be objected that here was a poor materialistic “gospel,” the Buddhist replies: “It is not materialistic: for of the five Khandhas four are not material: Vedana, feeling; Safina, perception; Vinfhana, consciousness in general; and Samkhara, a complex including will, attention, faith, and other conative groups.” We may imagine another typical scene. The master and his disciples are seated calm and collected on Gaya Head, a hillside near the spot where he attained enlighten- ment, when a fire breaks out in the jungle below; they watch it blaze, and then he begins once more to improve the occasion: “All, O monks, is aflame: eye, ear, nose— all the organs of sense. All nature is aflame. What is the cause of this universal conflagration? It is Tanha.’’ Hate, lust, infatuation—these are the flames. Then, in order that he may help them in their task of teaching a world to extinguish the blaze that is destroying it, he 1 Samyutta Nikaya, B.T., pp. 159-60. This little parable was not unnaturally misunderstood in later days, the Sammitiya school interpreting it to mean that man is something more than the Khandhas which make up his “burden.” (See Poussin, E.R.E., Vol. XI, Sammitiyas, and note his indorsement of this review as “a good and truly Buddhist one.’’) 2 Though still carrying this burden of bodily existence they had got rid of the intolerable obsession of rebirth and of Tanha. 3 Mahavagga i. 21; B.T., pp. 351-53. 6 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY gives them a new and different chant, a dirge that still resounds mournfully in a thousand monasteries: Sabba dukkha, Sabba anatta, Sabba anicca. Sorrow is everywhere, In man is no abiding entity, In things is no abiding reality. The conflagration, in a word, is to be extinguished by the waters of logic. Face life as it is, sorrowful, transient, and you will no longer crave for it. If the doctrine of causality is the keynote of the Buddhist metaphysic, the doctrine of anatta is the unique thing in its psychology. And both doctrines are applied with an ethical purpose. Like Hume, two thousand years later, Gotama with remorseless logic analyzes the “self” into its component parts. He seeks to get rid of the “ego” of animism in order that he may get rid of the ‘“‘ego” of egoism. The “self” is unreal because it is compound. Analyze it, and see that it is a stream of consciousness made up of elements of sensation, of cognition, of volition, and you will realize that there is no “soul” in the ordinary sense of a separate entity or “substance,” such as that which only a century ago men of science in the West were trying to weigh and to locate. Nor is there even a “‘substratum” in which qualities inhere. Much less is there an atman, such as some Hindus conceived in almost physical terms, an in- dwelling microcosm identical with the macrocosm or Brah- man. To believe that is to sacrifice moral freedom; and Gotama knew that this is more vital than even intellectual consistency. ‘The self is real enough, because it is a manifestation of Kamma, energy or action, and it is ™ Buddhaghosa, the great commentator, says authoritatively that the Buddha ana- lyzed man into the five Khandhas “to afford no foothold for animism.” RAJAGAHA ; free, in spite of the past, to direct its energies aright in the present. “Self,” says the Dhammapada, “is custodian of Sling Out of the seeming pessimism of this philosophy of transiency emerges a sane optimism, as is beginning to be recognized by Western writers. Buddhism insists on Dukkham, sorrow, in order that it may show men the way to Sukham, happiness: “One thing only do I teach, O monks—sorrow, and the uprooting of sorrow.” Over against the world of birth and death, of Samsara, it sets the unchanging calm of Nibbana, beyond joy and sorrow, yet often known as the Supreme Bliss. All religions, as William James has pointed out, are alike in having as their basis an uneasiness and its solution. Gotama has his own solution to offer. “He is a physician; if medicine is pessi- mistic then he is a pessimist”; says the Buddhist, “having diagnosed the disease he goes on to prescribe its cure.” Even when he wielded the knife it was to cut out the roots of sorrow, and man learned to kiss that strong yet kindly hand. The early Sangha was therefore a happy company; there was “something vernal in the air,” and at times a contagion of joy can be seen to pass from these monks and nuns to the people about them. They were in the presence of a beloved leader; they had attained to a vision of the unity and lawfulness of the universe so that they were no more afraid; they believed that they were seeing life steadily and seeing it whole, and they had a ' purpose great enough to claim their whole energies—to lead the world out of confusion and superstition and fear into a serene peace; out of the transient flux and confu- sion of becoming to the ordered calm of being. Above all they believed that they would not be reborn to sorrow, and the old obsession was gone forever. Let the student 8 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ponder the Psalms of the Early Buddhists* and he will find himself responding to their joy. This is another hall- mark of the originality of early Buddhism. Much in it was ordinary Hinduism; its spirit was all its own. During his lifetime it is clear that Gotama encouraged them to put their faith in the Dhamma, or teaching. Like most of the terms he used this was one familiar to his countrymen, but as was his wont he redefinedit. Hitherto it had meant the abiding social order, norm, or standard; divorcing it from its connection with social sanction he proclaimed it as the truth of individual existence. Believ- ing that his own enlightenment was a discovery of uni- versal law or order, that all life is a unity, that a moral purpose is at work in it, he saw his task as that of a teacher of these truths. In this lay one of the great secrets of his success; while others seemed to be dealing with vague, intangible things, here was a positivist who insisted upon facing life as individual men and women have to live it, and in whose words there rang the sturdy conviction which comes from personal experience. Men began to say of him, “He knows knowing, sees seeing; he is the eye of the world; he has become knowledge . . . . has become truth .... it is he who teaches us, who reveals the hidden truth, who pours out good and gives immortality; he is the lord of Dhamma.’”? He hath discerned all this life o’ the world, In all the world the how and thus of things, From all detached and leaning upon naught, Who all hath mastered, from all bonds is loosed: Touched is for him high peace and blessed calm Where no fear cometh more. *C, A. F. Rhys Davids, Translation of Theratherigathd, 2 vols. London: P.T.S., Ig0g, 1913. 2In Samyutta, P.T.S. Ed. xiv. 94 f. it is also stated that he is “son of Light, of Wisdom, of Brahma. .... fe 3 Mrs. Rhys Davids’ rendering of Ang. Nik. ii. 24. RAJAGAHA 9 What, in other words, makes him Buddha is that he has found the Dhamma, and having been true to it and identified himself with it proclaims it to the world. In this identification lies the seed for the Buddhology of later ages. The Tathagata, “he who has reached reality,” gives place to the Tathata, reality itself. Meantime it is clear that for the first generation of , disciples he was primarily an ethical teacher, and that he aimed at showing men a middle path of splendid sanity. This is the central thing in his ethics. If they differ from those of orthodox Hinduism it is in their moderation. While the body must be kept in subjection, it is both vain and painful to torture it, as he and countless others in India had done. On the other hand, family life, and life in the world in general, is a life of confused issues, and though it is not impossible to master one’s self while living in the world,’ it is far easier and safer once and for all to cut out these roots, and to join the monastic order. Yet he provided for a “third order” of lay-people, and there ¢ are a score of these upasikas mentioned in the early books, who are said to have won Arhatship; of them it is claimed that they had destroyed Tanha, had cut the bonds of rebirth, and realized in this world and in the midst of it an other-worldly peace and joy. In the midst of Samsara they had been in Nibbana. Like Brother Lawrence they could practice, while immersed in mundane occupations, an other-worldly peace. And this was to them the guaranty that they would not be reborn. They found themselves masters of the universe, not its slaves. What did this doctrine of rebirth mean to the Buddhist ? All the world is now familiar with the Hindu * Hundreds of householders are said to have attained to one of the heavens. 2 See “‘Arhat,” Z.R.E., Vol. I. 10 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY doctrines of Karma and transmigration, already estab- lished in the time of Gotama Buddha: Our actions still pursue us from afar And what we have been makes us what we are. By the sixth century B.c. India accepted the doctrine that each atman is reborn into the state it has earned. But even highly qualified students of Buddhism seem to be greatly befogged as to how this doctrine can be reconciled with the Buddha’s cardinal doctrine of anatta. If there be no “‘soul”’ to transmigrate how can there be transmigra- tion? Here is a dilemma indeed; and the solution lies of course in the definition of the terms. Transmigration is not what Gotama taught, but rather reindividualization or, better, a continuation of the ever changing stream of consciousness in a new channel.t A man is not the same as he was when a boy. Yet he 1s not different. After death he will be the same yet not the same, as a river whose content, ever changing, yet remains within the. self-same river-bed. Asa kinema film which through many minute changes tells a connected story of many reels so are rebirths continuous yet not identical. Sakyamuni was primarily a moral teacher, and yet he had a definite psychology and philosophy. He was neither a realist in the ordinary sense, naively accepting the current phraseology and ideas of the time, nor a nihilist as some of his followers have been. ‘“‘Everything is; this is one extreme view. Everything is not; this is another.” He rejects them both. The “‘self,” he insists, is a part of the whole phenomenal world, and must be seen through scientific or analytic eyes. The old static ideas of it must give place to a dynamic conception. It is this individual ? This is the actual metaphor of scholastic Buddhism; cf. Compendium of Philos- ophy, P.T.S., p. 8. RAJAGAHA II “stream of consciousness” which changes from moment to moment, that 1s “reindividualized”” when the body dies. The change may be more profound; it is only another change. The best discussion of the whole question from the orthodox Buddhist standpoint is in the Questions of King Milinda,* a late work of fiction yet of great authority. The man who is reborn, teaches the sage Nagasena, is neither the same nor yet another. Nothing “substantial” has passed over any more than when one lamp is lit from another—only energy. There is a transference of energy between the two flames. One is responsible for the other. Ifaspark from my house sets fire to my neighbor’s thatch, am I not responsible? A man steals his neigh- bor’s mangoes, but he cannot fool the judge by proving that the mangoes he took are not the same mangoes as his neighbor planted; so by numerous similes and parables the lesson is enforced, and it seems logical enough: Kamma, action, is the energy which passes over from one phase of consciousness to the next. But there are diffi- culties. What, if nothing but energy passes across, is the thread of continuity ? What are the links between one life and the next? They are the same as those between two consecutive moments of our conscious life here and now. Among the senses Buddhist psy- chology numbers Mano, which is at once a sixth sense, and the “resort, the partaker, the field, and range of them all,”*—a sensus communis. It is certainly easier to con- ceive this link between two consecutive phases of the present stream of consciousness than to imagine it connect- 1J.e., Menander, an Indo-Scythian prince of about 100 B.c. See chap, iii. 2 Majj. Nik. i. 295; Sam. Nik. v. 218; quoted by Mrs. Rhys Davids in Buddhist Psychology, p. 69. 12 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ing what seem like two different lives, and we are apt to be impatient with this part of Buddhist philosophy. Perhaps it will help the western reader to tolerate the doctrines of Anatta and Samsara if he thinks of the unexplained, yet well-attested, fact of telepathy. If one mind can influence another through great spaces, why not imagine that the same mind may be influenced by its own past energies or phases of consciousness, and even kept in action by its own psychical momentum, even when the physical organ which it used has been dissolved into its elements? Reindividualization may begin at once. All the habitual arguments by which we buttress our belief in a life after death can be equally well used to support the Buddhist doctrine of Samsara; and we have to pay our respects to the early psychologists of Buddhism. One of the qualities of consciousness on which they lay stress is Manasikara, or attention,’ and this is another link between present and past: we direct our stream of consciousness and determine its direction hereafter as we attend now to this or that range of interests. Another link is memory,’ that deposit or undercurrent of the stream which may be out of sight and forgotten, but which yet exerts a potent influence. The past, however forgotten it may be, is wrought into the present, and operates in ways which surprise us only because of our forgetful memories. But the saint remembers everything! Near these very hills of Rajagaha the great disciple Moggallana was foully murdered. Calmly the aged teacher, who seems (perhaps half-humorously) to have claimed something very like omniscience, related the story of how untold centuries before Moggallana had been an impious son and a parri- * Cf. Majj. Nik.; quoted in Mrs. Rhys Davids’ Buddhist Psychology, p. 97, and many passages of the Abhidhamma. 2 Sam. Nik. xil. 15. RAJAGAHA 13 cide, who, disguised as a bandit, had killed both mother and father. Thus, in his present rebirth, saint and Arhat as he was, it was possible, nay necessary, for bandits to murder him. As for them they had not long to wait before reaping the harvest of their sin. For the king of Magadha, a genial despot and a great champion of Buddhism, buried them up to their navels and then set fire to them, after which (though it seems rather a work of supererogation) he ploughed them into the soil. Deeds done in envy or in hate, Deeds of the fool infatuate, Must bear their fitting punishment Till Karma’s energy be spent. In such homely ways, by adopting folklore and adapting it, by snatches of song, and by astonishing claims to re- member his own past existences, and those of everyone else, did Gotama bring home to his disciples the lessons of Karma and rebirth. And today the simplest peasant in Buddhist lands thinks inevitably in terms of these two doctrines. They are the very warp and woof of the thought of millions who are proud of them and confident, as one said to me, that “they explain the inequalities of human life very nicely.” At the same time they long to escape to some state where these laws no longer hold sway, and the teacher having enforced these lessons—the ubiquity of the harvest law, ‘““as a man soweth so shall he also reap,” and the inevitableness of Samsara—went on to show a way of salvation: As some poor sufferer in prison pent From year to weary year is racked by pain, Longs for release and cannot find content, But ever pines and chafes against his chain; 2 See B.T., p. 221. 14 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY So do thou see in each succeeding birth A prison full of untold misery! Seek to shake off all chains that bind to earth And from existence evermore be free. Who is the freed man? It is he who has snapped the fetters of ignorance, pride, egoism, lust, hatred—the Arhat—who ‘“‘knows that rebirth is exhausted, that he has lived the holy life, that he has done what he had to do, and is no more for this world.” That is the stock description. He is one who has replaced ignoble craving by noble desire—one, in other words, who longs not for rebirth, even as a god, but who longs for the end of rebirth, for Nibbana;? one indeed who has already attained, and has realized his true “self.” Arahatta and Nibbana are usually synonyms, and in such early works as the “‘ Psalms of the Brethren” Arhats are “‘no less Buddha and Tatha- gata than their great master.”4 What then is Nibbana ? This doctrine is the pons asinorum of the learned. It is still gravely debated and strangely misrepresented. Does it mean annihilation? “Yes,” says Gotama, “the annihilation of Tanha, of sorrow, and of rebirth.”5 Does this not involve annihilation of the “‘soul?”’ “How can that be annihilated which has no existence?’ Does the Arhat in whom craving is annihilated, sorrow and rebirth ended, Nibbana reached—does he continue to exist? “That,” says the Buddha, “is not your affair. Your business is with morality.’® Could anything be plainer— t From the Fataka: Heart of Buddhism. Oxford Press, 1916. 2 B.T., p. 137 The Arhat is described in more technical language as one who has “entered the Fourth Path,” “broken the ten fetters,” etc. 3 Cf, idid., p. 333- 4C, A. F. Rhys Davids, Psalms of the Brethren, p. xxii. § Cf, S.B.E., Vol. XIII; Mahdvagga vi. 31. 7. 6 Cf. Sam. Nik. ii. 223, and Majjhima Nik. 63; B.T., pp. 117-22. RAJAGAHA 15 or less satisfying to the inquiring mind? But Gotama is content, as it seems to me, having himself had a mystic experience of peace and joy beyond description, to show others how they too may attain, and to leave it at that. Not the least admirable thing about him is his reticence. What if he has opened up alluring vistas, and then kept silence ? He has only done what all the Mystics must do: Oh could I tell ye surely would believe it! Oh could I only say what I have seen! How can I tell and how can you receive it, How till he bringeth you where I have been ? The highest truth is “ineffable,’* above all relativity, as Buddhist schoolmen later spent themselves to prove, and though he was not an agnostic in most things, yet like all men (except spiritualists) he was necessarily an agnostic as to details of the life after death. But in this life he could show them how to enjoy the Nibbana of a quiet conscience, and of a mind at rest. And though he was not a Mystic in quite the usual sense, Gotama was of that august company: he could not describe the goal, but he could show the way to it; and like other Mystics he became very definite here, and gave to the world his famous Eightfold Noble Path. Before we examine this, let us note here that his refusals to be more definite were interpreted by Buddhist philosophers in later days as denials,? and that much of the confusion which exists as to his teaching is due, as Max Miiller showed fifty years ago, to a confusion between the teachings of Gotama Cf. Dhp. 218. Nipuna, abstruse; apalokita, unlike this world; anidassana, invisible, are synonyms. 2 Poussin has shown that the doctrine of annihilation is clearly taught in the Tripitaka, but holds that it was not the teaching of Sakyamuni who indeed calls it a heresy. The Visuddhi magga calls it a “‘pestiferous delusion.” Cf. “Nirvana,” E.R.E., Pp» 378. 16 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY and those of the schoolmen of later days. ‘‘What Bishop Bigandet and others represent as the popular view of the Nirvana in contradistinction from that of the Buddhist divines was, if I am not mistaken,” he wrote in 1869, “the conception of Buddha and his disciples.”’ It was a great forward step to distinguish between the doctrine of the Founder and that of the later schoolmen, and in the following year Childers wrote as follows: ‘“‘The word Nirvana is applied to two different things; first to the annihilation of existence, which is the ultimate goal of Buddhism, and, secondly, to the state of sanctification, which is the stepping-stone to annihilation, and without which annihilation cannot be obtained.’* That later Buddhists have used the word in both these senses is clear, and yet Dr. Rhys Davids? is surely right when he insists that the Founder laid all the stress upon the ethical process of sanctification, and refused to answer, except in baffling terms, when men pressed him about the con- tinued existence of the saint after death. He seems indeed on occasion to have indicated that both the annihilation- ists and the eternalists are wrong, for both are following vain speculations. And yet to many scholars it seems clear that he did himself sow the seeds which developed into the doctrine of annihilation; is not his basal doctrine of anatta such a seed? Andis not the whole phraseology of “blowing out,” “uprooting,” “killing the germ of re- birth,” open to misinterpretation °* Yet we have always t Tribner, Literary Record, 1870. 2 Dr. Rhys Davids takes a middle course between Burnouf and J. d’Alwis, who are supporters of the nihilistic interpretation, and some who interpret Nibbana as a kind of paradise. 3Cf. B.T., p. 138; Sam. Nik. ili. 109; Points of Controversy, pp. 32, 62: “The Blessed One would never say that on the dissolution of the body the Arhat is annihi- lated.” 4 Cf, J. d’Alwis’ reply to Max Miller, Buddhist Nirvana. London: Tribner, 1871. RAJAGAHA 17 to remember that the records which we possess are the work of later monastic schools and that what their Founder really said is inevitably colored by their own beliefs. Probably we shall never be able to answer these questions finally; what is clear is that two things are explicitly stated in the canonical books, and in the ortho- dox Milinda Paitha to be implied by the term ‘“‘Nibbana,” first the extinction of craving, and second the extinction of the process of becoming. The first is the means to the second, which is the end. It is well to make a careful study of the synonyms which the Buddhist uses to describe what this ideal means to him." It is called santi, peace; mutti, freedom; it is sitibhutam, the coolness that allures the pilgrim of a world in flames; it is the dipam, or island to which he passes from the waters of samsara; it is saranam or lenam, a refuge from this fleeting show of things; and more negatively it is amatam, that which is not dead; acchuta, that which is not dying; akuto-bhaya, a fearless state; and above all it is tanhakkhaya and dukkha-kkhaya, the destruction of craving and of sorrow. This is the essence of Buddhism, and in many places occurs the saying: “As the great ocean has but one flavor, so my doctrine and discipline has but one flavor, that of deliverance from suffering.” In at least one passage this deliverance is defined as bhava-nirddho, the cessation of becoming. But this is not necessarily the same as annihilation; and indeed the Mahayana soon made Nirvana a synonym for the Absolute; it is the Ultimate Reality. And if negatives are used to describe it no less are they used in the Upanishads to describe the Atman, the One and Absolute. ‘Neti, Neti,’’ not so, is the final t See Appendix III. 18 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY word in either case, as in all attempts of mystics to define what they experience. To those who pressed the question: “Does this cessa- tion involve annihilation?’ Gotama seems sometimes to have replied that this is not a question which is of practical importance, that it does not concern the holy life, nor lead to insight; but at others he flatly condemned the annihilationists as heretics. And if we who are not Buddhists cannot conceive how a stream of thoughts, emotions, and volitions can persist ““when Karma’s energy is spent,” the modern Buddhist may quite fairly retort: “What is your own doctrine of the soul or self, here and hereafter?” If we refer to the psychologists, they will be found in some cases at least to agree with Gotama that the thinker and the thought are one, and yet that we are free to believe in, even if we cannot imagine, an existence of this “self” after death. And if we turn to the moralists they may well reply with Emerson and Gotama: “Of immortality, the soul when well employed is incurious. It is so well that it is sure that it will be well.’”? And Sakyamuni was first of all a moral teacher—a physician of sick souls. | Yet this statement needs safeguarding. Above the “details of mere morality”—important as they are— he valued his own mystical experiences, for morality must have an authoritative foundation. If the Buddhist can- not say: “Thus saith the Lord,” he can and does say: “Thus hath the Buddha told us, and he is King of the Dhamma. Has he not experienced truth? Is he not himself the Truth ?” And the Teacher himself bids men praise him, not for his moral teachings, but because he has “‘realized and seen for himself other things, profound, subtle, hard to realize RAJAGAHA 19 and to understand, yet sweet and tranquillizing.”* “He has found the birthless incomparable Yoga-calm of Nirvana.”? And this is beyond the sphere of reason .... felt or experienced only by the wise. In a word, he is an authoritative moral Teacher in virtue of his own deep mystical experience. His citizenship is in heavenly places. And out of this other-worldly spring come the wide waters of his benevolence. All sentient life is one— all are companions in the Great Quest, for all are fellow- victims in the toils of Samsara. Gotama’s ethical system is intimately connected with his more philosophical teaching. It is clearly and closely related to the Hindu systems of his day, and indeed to moral systems everywhere—a fact which still kindles a naive surprise in many minds. The interesting thing in it is rather that it differs from all other types of ethical theory. Though the Buddha did not deny the existence of the gods,3 yet he appeals to no divine sanction but rather to an enlightened self-interest. The man who harms another is a fool, for he also harms himself. Vice brings unhappiness as the shadow follows the body. Happiness is the bloom upon virtue. Let each man be a friend to himself and he will be happy; altruism is really an enlightened egoism. Here, then, is no “‘thus saith the Lord” of the Hebrew prophet, and no appeal even to social sanction. The “eightfold path” is a moral discipline for the individual, and makes its appeal to the reason. It begins with “‘right 1 Cf. Dialogues, I, 26, and Anesaki, ‘‘ Buddhist Ethics,” E.R.E. 2 Bad i Dai h30s 3 Gotama seems to have accepted the gods of the Pantheon of his contemporaries, and Brahma in particular engaged his attention; but all were in bondage to Karma and Samsara. 20 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY opinions,” for the Teacher realized as few have done that all good or evil begins in the mind, and that people can- not act aright unless they first think aright; and the most popular summary of his moral teachings condenses his ethic in a sentence: “Flee evil, set about doing good, cleanse your inmost thought.” Beginning then in the mind, the Noble Path is a carefully graded ascent passing on to right aspirations, right speech, right acts, right means of livelihood, until by right effort and right concentration of mind the high peak of right contemplation and of the four trance-states is reached. Middle Path as it is, it is yet exacting enough to demand a specialization which is only for the few. These are called to break the Ten Fetters and to reach Samadhi, a tranquil, “cool” state of mental equilibrium, and to enjoy the Jhanas. Beginning in a secluded place to meditate upon some subject spe- cially suited to his temperament,’ the recluse is instructed to concentrate his attention until he reaches a condition of ecstatic joy. Here is a third distinctive feature. This Samadhi is the means to the extinction of Tanha, to the increasing of religious knowledge, and to the acquisition of supernormal powers, Abhififia, which include a memory of one’s former existences and the power to pass through . Space, and to work certain other wonders, Iddhi. Here Buddhism owes much to the ancient Yoga, and like it makes faith, energy, wisdom, and other qualities of the moral will prerequisites to these trance-states. “The ideal of early Buddhism is the equilibrium of morals (Sila), meditation (Jhana), and intuitive wisdom t There are five principal subjects for meditation: Karunabhavana—meditation upon pity Mettabhavana—upon compassion Muditabhavana—upon sympathy Asubhabhavana—upon charnel-house, graveyards, etc. Upekhabhavana—upon detachment. RAJAGAHA 21 (Panfa).” And this equlibrium is not easily reached. Whether anyone reaches it is difficult to say; the monk is forbidden to make such a claim on his own behalf, and who else can know? My impression, based on careful investigation, is that in the modern Buddhist world these higher practices are hardly to be found except in some few earnest followers of the Zen school in Japan. That the Founder and some of his immediate followers attained to Samadhi seems clear. That he, or at least the early writers, anticipated that it would become a rare accom- plishment seems equally clear. Arhats are not much mentioned after the close of the Pali canon, partly because of the difficulty of the Way, but more, as we shall see, because it ceased to commend itself to the majority as a true interpretation of the mind of the Founder. The Lohans or Arhats of China are a limited group of eighteen, representing perhaps the “eighteen schools” of orthodoxy, but the Bodhisattvas are innumerable. ‘Save yourself before you can save others’ is the Arhat ideal; ‘“‘Save others and you save yourself” is the Bodhisattva’s creed. | In other words: “‘self-realization” is the former, “self- realization through self-sacrifice,” the latter ideal. From the first it seems clear that Buddhism did empha- size the power of love or compassion, “the unbounded friendly mind,” as a means to reach these high states. “All the means available as grounds for right conduct are not worth a sixteenth part of the liberation of the heart through love. That outshines them all in radiance and absorbs them into itself,” so says the Itivuttaka or Logia of Buddhism, and among the many noble teach- The Buddhist, like the Christian moralist, exhorts us to “put on love” as a girdle which binds together and harmonizes the other virtues; cf. II Peter 1: 5-7. Faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, patience, godliness, love, have all a place in Buddhist ethics. Six of them are paramitas of the Bodhisattva. Rane ae. EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ings of the early Sangha shines out the poem on compas- sion so often quoted but always worthy of comment and study: As, recking nought of self, a mother’s love Enfolds and cherishes her only son, So through the world let thy compassion move And compass living creatures every one; Soaring and sinking in unfettered liberty, Free from ill-will, purged of all enmity! There are, if we may so express it, two other wings in this early Buddhism besides that of contemplation by which the soul may mount to a life truly sublime. One is the wing of wisdom; the other, less developed as yet, is the wing of love. For it is to the mind, after all, that Buddhism makes its chief appeal, and here lies the unique contribution of Buddhist ethics, that it blends with its practical aim a system of theoretical wisdom. And this wisdom is not the ordinary wisdom of the man in the street, but a mystic insight, an intuition which sees things as they are and chooses the best. Through this insight man realizes the Dhamma as the universal truth, and when he reaches Nibbana he has realized what was later defined as an all-embracing intelligence, and a love as all-inclusive. Thus the crown and sum of Buddhist morality may be said to be negatively a dispersal of the clouds of ignorance (Avijja) and positively the dawning of the light of Bodhi. It is morally the thrusting-out of egoism by the awakening of benevolence or altruism. At a later date it was to be religiously interpreted as the surrender of the self to the will of an Eternal Being: for the present it remains a moral communion with all sentient beings. To pervade them with thoughts of love—this is the way to union with Brahman, i.e., to Nibbana. RAJAGAHA 23 Underlying the whole system is this sense of the unity of all things, a germ which was to develop before many centuries into a metaphysical system hardly distinguish- able from the Hindu philosophy against which Buddhism was essentially a rebellion; and into a theology akin to that of orthodox Christianity. And here we must notice the place which faith (Saddha) plays in the ethical system of Sakyamuni; for his followers in millions today believe in salvation by faith; and in him as Savior, whether they are orthodox lay-Hinayanists of Burma and Ceylon or followers of the Mahayana schools of Japan and China. The development of such a doctrine is not unnatural. Faith is one of the cardinal virtues of early Buddhism. It is the first of the indriyas, or “organs,” energy being the second, mindfulness the third, contemplation the fourth, and wisdom the fifth. In other words, the Bud- dhist is to have faith in order that he may attain to wisdom. In one passage it is ranked with intuition as the means of salvation. What is the exact connotation of Saddha, or faith, and what is the object to which it is to cling ? Much has been written upon the subject, and yet it may almost be summed up in two sayings attributed to Gotama himself. The first is in the Majjhima Nikdya: “Whoso shall turn to me with faith and love shall reach one of the heavenly worlds. And whatsoever monk shall conform himself to my teaching, walking in full faith in it, he shall attain to Full Awakening.”* In other words, faith in the teacher has its reward, but it is a less reward than that given to faith in his teachings. The Buddha is the guide, let the disciple trust in his guidance. It is t Majj. Nik. in Discourses, Silacara i. 18; i.e., a heaven for lay-folk by way of pietism; Nibbana for monks by way of the Dhamma. 24 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY clear from other passages that he sought constantly to disentangle the tendrils of devotion which were beginning to cling to his person, and to attach them to the Dhamma: “He that seeth the Teaching, seeth Me,” says the Jt- vuttaka. With this attitude of faith in the teaching should be mentioned that of devotion to the Sangha in which the teaching is embodied: ‘“‘He that would wait upon me, let him wait upon the sick brethren.’” One of the earliest formulas of Buddhism, that of the ordination ceremony, expresses this attitude toward the Three Jewels: “I take refuge in the Buddha, in the Sangha, and in the Dhamma,” and these Three Jewels are the objects of orthodox Buddhist faith. This formula is of great importance. The fact that it puts “The Buddha” first in defiance of his own teachings indicates a somewhat late date; as it stands it represents a Buddhist expression of the later Hindu practice—bhakti, devotion to god or saint; knowledge of religious truth; and asceticism. Hinduism put the second first as the most important, and Gotama seems clearly to have done so too. Knowledge of the Dhamma, trust in the Buddha, the mild asceticism of the Sangha—this is the Buddhist substitute for the Hindu ways to Nirvana. And this “taking refuge” is an act of faith in all three. This faith is a psychological state of mind; the Buddha himself being described as saddha-hattho, or one who has faith as his hand, and by the words pasada, mano-pasada, citta-pasada, is implied a calm, serene attitude which is produced by the Dhamma as a muddy pool is made clear by a magic jewel. Faith is moreover “the root of right views,”? as doubt (Vicikicca) is the source of confusion and conflict. “Right t Majj. Nik. viii. 6. ? Udana, p. 68; Rhys Davids, Dialogues, p. 187. RAJAGAHA a6 ¢ views” says the Itivuttaka conduct.” This attitude soon, however, began to develop into a kind of bhakti, or devotion;’ the great Teacher could not keep men from loving him; and this love kindled their imagination until they came to regard him as knowing things hidden from the great Brahma himself;? as the only source of truth; ‘‘All that is well said is a word of the Blessed One.” Even so, however, the good Buddhist passes on from faith to experience and intuition: ‘“‘ You,” says the Teacher to Ananda, “say this in faith; I know it from experience.” And the Arhat is one who has passed on the wings of faith and love to knowledge. What shall we say as to Gotama’s own faith? It is clear in the first place that he believed in the reasonable- ness of the universe; law is universal. Secondly, he had a conception of law in the moral sphere so thorough-going, so subtle, and intelligent in its workings, as to appear to later Buddhists nothing else than an absolute Mind;* and in some undoubtedly early sayings we may find indications that he was no atheist, as some of his followers have believed. In the Tevijja Sutta he uses the admirable words: “To pervade the world with kindliness, pity, sympathy, and equable feeling—this is the way to union with Brahma.” This saying is isolated and is of course susceptible of more than one interpretation; it may well be an argumentum ad homines: “The devotees of Brahma are busy seeking union with him: very good; let us redefine the Nirvana of Brahma as Nibbana, and show ‘are as essential as right * Cf. Divyavadana, pp. 360-64; a book of the third century a.p., of Hinayana origin. * Digha Nik. i. 215. 3 Ang. Nik. xiv. 163-64. 4 Cf. Poussin, Bouddhisme, passim, 26 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY them a more excellent way.” That this is what the Reformer aimed at doing is clear; but it may well be that it was not Brahma to whom he objected but the methods of worship employed, and the conception of absorption into the absolute Brahman a kind of chemical fusion. In place of this he offered men an ethical har- mony with the universe, and an escape from the flux of becoming to the peace and joy of being. And inasmuch as the ways of Mukti, salvation, offered by the religious leaders of his day were not moral, not related to the hu- man life about them, he did what Jesus did in Judea, and satirized these blind leaders of the blind. They were guilty either of ignoring the real nature of the self or of forgetting the lawfulness of the universe, and the right- eousness which is working init. May it not be that like Jesus the Indian reformer did indeed relate these to a Supreme Being? And that when he used the personal Brahma and the impersonal Brahman he meant them to be understood in the old way, but with a new and purified connotation? That he came to “fulfil, not to destroy” ? This is what the bulk of modern Buddhists believe, and this was his attitude to the whole Hindu system of his day. Brahma and Brahman, the Vedas, the Brahmins, Nirvana, the Dharma, the Atman, Karma itself—he redefined them all. Early Buddhism, like early Chris- tianity, consisted in a revaluation of values, a transforma- tion of ritual rightness into moral righteousness, a bring- ing of an other-worldly joy and peace into the midst of a sorrowful world. Gotama like Jesus towers above our vindication of his originality. These gave the people bread; others told them how it might be made! There were, moreover, in Sakyamuni as in Jesus great and sublime qualities which bound men and women to him RAJAGAHA 27 by enduring bonds. His magnetism was such that they were converted in many cases long before their reasons can have been satisfied, and such was his insight into human hearts that we find him adapting his method with so sure a touch as to win the title “Physician of Souls,” and with so much love that even when he used the knife his patients loved him no less devotedly. They found in him one who was intensely interested in them, never impatient, and in whom was no respect of persons. The poor sweeper Sunita, who had seen him moving serene and majestic among kings and nobles, adored the courtesy with which he smiled as he greeted him, and to the leper he gave of his best, discerning beneath his rags and sores a mind ready “as a clean and spotless robe for the dye,” and only waiting for the right word to be numbered among the saints. Men respected the fearless teacher who redefined so many of their religious and social catchwords, and who set up a new religious democracy in which worth rather than birth was the standard, and in which liberty was sanely tempered and controlled. Here was a new and reasonable Way, which knew nothing of priestcraft and yet gave access to divine Truth, which cut at the roots of religiosity and yet kept much of the mystery and glamor of religion, which struck a sane balance between asceticism and worldliness, and between self-culture and altruism. Here, above all, was an authentic voice speaking of the things of real experience, however ineffable, and a con- tagious joy, quiet yet unmistakable, amid the charlatans and sophists of the day who told men the way to Nirvana, but without conviction or enthusiasm, and who handed out to starving souls either husks or recipes for making bread. The followers of Sakyamuni might be compared to these in the words used by Tertullian of the early Chris- 28 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY tian church: ‘Our common people are more virtuous than your philosophers.” They left all and followed him, accepting his simple . challenge, “Come, Bhikkhu,”’ as a call to life-long discipline, or if he did not so order it, as laymen served him and his brethren with simple and sincere devotion. So this master of men lived among them, in the world yet not of it, “‘as a fair lotus unsullied by the mud in which it grows”’; so he set up a realm of righteousness and love which in his lifetime centered about him, and when he passed away claimed him as its Eternal King. The story of its growth is one of the great chapters in human history. Not least of the claims of early Buddhism to originality is its missionary spirit. Contemporary Hindu philosophy seems in comparison an arid intellectualism. CHAPTER II PATALI-PUTRA The Spread of the Dhamma and Its Safeguarding (ca. 250 B.C.) “Greatest of gifts is the gift of the Dhamma.”’—Asoxa VARDHANA. We have seen that the essence of Sakyamuni’s teach- ing was the universality of the Dhamma and of the Law of Causation, and that with this went the conception of the unity of all existence. Kings and emperors, always eager to find a bond of union among the various elements in their domain, soon began to favor this new teaching; thus during the lifetime of Gotama we find Bimbisara very obviously looking about for a helpful religion, and finally choosing Buddhism, of which he became a devoted cham- pion; and his parricide son, Ajatasattu, later on also became a good Buddhist. Their kingdom of Magadha formed the nucleus of the two mighty empires of the Mauryas and Guptas, aided, no doubt, by the Buddhist religion, which not only unified the people but helped to keep the Brahmins in their place.* Patali-putra, on the northern bank of the Sdn, was the capital of the Mauryas, and though we cannot find evidence of the splendor which made the Chinese pilgrim, Fa-Hian (400 a.D.), attribute its building to genil, yet it was undoubtedly a magnificent city; and Megasthenes, a Greek contemporary, describes it as a fortress with a garrison of a million armed men! A great pillared hall has recently been excavated, and shown to bear a strong resemblance to the Hall of the t This was clearly one reason for the success of the Buddhist reform—that its leader was himself a Kshattriya. 29 @ 30 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY Hundred Pillars at Persepolis.’ Here, two hundred years after the passing of Gotama, the great Asoka Vardhana or Piyadassi seized upon Buddhism—or more truly, per- _ haps, was seized by it—and with his genius for organ- ization used it as a bond of union, and spread its ethical teachings in a simple lay-form far and wide; for the under- lying doctrine of unity had for him political as well as philosophical meaning, and he realized that it had inter- national as well as national bearings. In this greatest of India’s kings, “beloved of the gods” and friend of man and beast, we see what the Dhamma, divorced from its monasticism, and also apparently from its metaphysic. and psychology, can do for a nation. Converted about 260 B.c. by the horrors of a great war of aggression, Asoka became a man of peace and called upon his subjects throughout India and upon neighboring countries to accept this “greatest of gifts,” the code of filial piety, of brotherly kindness, of justice and truth, of tolerance and strenuous endeavor after the higher life. Setting a noble example in his own loving care for the temporal welfare of his people, he urged upon them the pre-eminence of the Dhamma, set about building glorious Stupas, com- memorating not only the life of Sakyamuni but that of two former Buddhas, and in their honor stimulated India to produce an art unsurpassed in her history. By such means he united his people in the bonds of the Dhamma, and Buddhism was established as the_national religion. His guru was, according to northern tradition, the Bhikkhu Upagupta, known in the Ceylon chronicle as Tissa, and it is possible that at the end of his reign the emperor himself became a monk, for the Chinese pilgrim, I-Tsing, has left us a description of a statue of Asoka tSee D. B. Spooner, 7.R.4.S., 1912. THE ANURADHAPURA BUDDHA PATALI-PUTRA 31 dressed in the yellow robe, and his younger brother or son, Mahinda, was undoubtedly a monk, who with his sister, Sanghamitta, laid the foundations of a great Buddhist civilization in Lanka, or Ceylon. Asoka is also credited with missions to Suvarna-Bhumi, or Lower Burma, and in India proper to lands as far north as the Himalaya country around Purusapura, and as far south as Mysore. Of these missions his edicts, carved on rocks and pillars, are sufficient evidence, and it is likely that missionary envoys were sent also to the Greek kingdoms of Asia and to Egypt, whose rulers are mentioned on several of them. Thus did the benign influence of the Dhamma begin to spread, and its significance as an international bond for the next thousand years cannot be estimated. In Asoka it showed not only what it could do as a nation- building power but also as an international force, and in him we may see the Bodhisattva type prevailing over the more austere Arhat, though he is known to the monks of the Ceylon monasteries merely as an Upasika, or lay- adherent. The laity of India were not slow to see in him the fulfilment of the old ideal of Cakkavatti, or uni- versal monarch, who united her peoples and bound other nations to her in the bonds of gratitude and peace. But if Buddhism was to be so great a bond of union, it must itself be united, and already in addition to many ~ minor differences which occasioned no ill-feeling there were by the time of Asoka fundamental points upon which Buddhists disagreed, and already the germs of the amazing divergences of later days are present in the Order. As to what the main differences of opinion were, the texts, which are clearly partisan, give very conflicting accounts. Orthodox tradition maintains that a hundred years or more before the Asokan period a heresy of the Vajjian 30 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY monks of Vesali had been condemned as combining too great freedom of interpretation with laxity in such grave matters as sexual continence. However this may be, no new sect arose for a time, and we should be critical in accepting the statement of their rivals that it was from this heresy that the school of the Mahasanghikas arose in later days. Yet this school has left us a book, the Mahdvastu, which indicates that they were, to say the least, lacking in a sense of proportion. We shall discuss it later, and merely note here that it contains a small nucleus of Vinaya, or rules of discipline, overlaid with a confused mass of birth-stories of the Buddha, and much other irrelevant matter; and this cursory glance at it will help us to realize how much Buddhism needed to safeguard its canon and to insist on maintaining its emphasis on the sane and lofty moral teaching of its Founder. Whether Asoka did it the former service or not, he will always be famous for his championship of this moral law. The following, one of his later edicts, is typical of all: Thus saith his Majesty: Father and mother must be obeyed; respect for all living creatures must be firmly established; truth must be spoken. These are virtues of the Law of Piety, which must be prac- tised. The teacher must be reverenced by the pupil, and proper courtesy must be shown to relatives. This is the ancient nature of piety, this leads to length of days, and according to this men must act. Thus, though Asoka confined himself for the most part to a simple lay-ethic, it seems that he accepted the Buddhist doctrine of Kamma," and recognized an order of the universe making for righteousness—not a bad working religion for an emperor. It is interesting to think of this great layman convening a council of the monks, helping them to put their house T He does not mention either Kamma or Samsara in his edicts. PATALI-PUTRA 33 in order, and advising them on their religious reading; nor is there sufficient reason to reject the large body of tradition which tells us that he did so to fix the canon and to reform abuses. Vincent Smith has made a good case for placing this assembly, which met at Patali-putra, between 243 and 238 B.c. If it had been earlier, the emperor would surely have mentioned it on the Seven Pillar Edicts set up in the thirty-second year of his reign, to commemorate what he had done for the furtherance of the Dhamma. On the Bhabra Edict he commends seven passages, almost all of which have been variously identified by Winternitz, Kosambi, Rhys Davids, and others; they seem to be portions of the Vinaya, Itivuttaka, Sutta Nipata, and Anguttara Nikaya; though “all things spoken by the Blessed One are well spoken,” these are of special moment to monks and nuns. Two of his sermons, the famous fire-sermon and his address to Rahula, are specially mentioned. Now it is reasonable to suppose that the emperor, who seems in his paternalism to have been a forerunner of Wilhelm of Hohenzollern, followed up this advice by organizing a council to make some sort of selection from the Sacred Lore, and though the canon was certainly not fixed with any rigidity at this time, nor reduced to writing even according to the Ceylon chronicle for another two centuries, and though some notable additions have been made even after the Sacred Lore was converted into Sacred Books, yet “the Pali Tipitaka may be regarded as not very different from the Magadhi canon of the third century B.c.’* How great is the credit *Macdonnell in Z.R.E., Vol. VIII. Probably Pali is the literary derivative of Magadhi akin to Kosali, the dialect used by Gotama. But many other theories may be defended: “the cradle of Pali has yet to be discovered,” says Sylvain Lévi. The edicts of Asoka are for the most part in a developed Kosalan dialect. Tipitaka—the three Baskets or collections—passed on from generation to generation like baskets of earth along a line of workmen. 34 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY due to the “‘schools of reciters,” mentioned in an Asokan edict and in the Milinda Paitha, and to the faithful scribes whom Fa-Hian found at work in Ceylon in the fifth | century, for preserving to the world this wonderful collec- tion of ancient literature! It is their edition that has come down to us. It contains works of real genius, and some of the ‘‘Psalms of the Brethren” breathe the fresh- ness and glamor of the dawn, and are yet highly wrought poetry. “In skillful craftsmanship and beauty these songs are worthy to be set beside the hymns of the Rig Veda, and the lyrical poems of Kalidas.’* Nearly the whole of this great library 1s now available in Romanized Pali, and much of it in English and German translations. As its name implies, it is made up of three “Baskets,” or collections: (1) Vinaya, or “Rules of Discipline,” (2) Sutta, or “Dialogues,” and (3) Abhidhamma, “Higher Religion,” or explanatory treatises. I... VINAYA These rules were gradually evolved, and we can trace their growth in the earliest narratives; as occasion arose, Gotama would make a rule, or establish a practice, some- times as a result of criticism from without, as when the people of Magadha complained that his monks kept no retreats in the wet season like those of other orders, some- times to meet schism from within, as in the numerous instances of the unruly monks of Kosambi. After the death of their master the Sangha continued this method of accumulating disciplinary laws for many generations to come, and the Yinaya as a whole maintains the direct- ness and precision of the Founder. To students of the monastic life this ““Basket’’ is full of interest, and indeed 1 A. K. Coomaraswamy, Buddha and the Gospel of Buddhism, p. 283. PATALI-PUTRA 35 it is not possible to understand Buddhism without it.” Yet it almost certainly represents a stage of its evolution later and more monastic than that of the Founder. 2. *SUTTA The second collection, Sutta, or “Dialogues,” consists of five parts, or Nikayas: 1. The Digha, or long dialogues, thirty-four in num- ber, dealing with doctrines of special importance, e.g., (a) the Brahmajala Sutta, or “Perfect Net,” which deals with practices of the Brahmins which are not to be commended, and mentions sixty-two heretical schools; (2) the Samannaphala Sutta, which deals with the fruits of the life of a Bhikkhu, and discusses other sects; (c) the Ambattha Sutia, which deals with the great question of caste; (d) the Siga/lovada Sutta, dealing with the duties of the laity; while others deal with subjects already dis- cussed in chapter 1; thus the Mahdnidana Suita has to do with the Law of Causation, and Arhatship is the theme of many. The collection is clearly of mixed date; amid much that is stilted and conventional it has imbedded in it a rare jewel, the famous Mahdparinibbana Sutta, most authentic of all the Buddhist records of the life of the Founder. In words sublime in their simplicity and pathos it tells the story of his passing, and the characters that it depicts are real human beings, not lay-figures: the fussy and faithful Ananda is drawn from life, and there are touches of humor in the words of Sakyamuni, which no devout Buddhist would or could invent. Yet even this great *The Vinaya has three main sections: (1) Suttavibhanga; (2) Khandaka; and (3) Parivara. The first contains rules of personal conduct for monks and nuns; the second contains the real kernel of the work—Mahdvagga and Cullavagga; the third is a later appendix probably added in Ceylon. See B.T.; S.B.E., Vols. XIII, XVII, and XX. 36 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY fragment of a real “gospel” is mixed up with the miracu- lous, and seems itself to be composite; while another sutta, the Mahapadana, is clearly late in its entirety, deal- ing wholly with miraculous happenings, and exhausting itself in honorifics of Sakyamuni. The twenty-sixth dialogue of this collection puts into the mouth of Saky- amuni the prophecy of another Buddha, Metteyya (only mentioned here in the Pali canon, and in Buddhaghosa’s commentary, but a notable figure in the Sanskrit Mahayana), who will restore the fortunes of the faith when they have fallen; and unless we are to see in this an utterance of the serene Teacher in a rare moment of depression, it would seem to be a “prophecy after the event’’—to belong therefore to a very late era, when the fortunes of Hinayana Buddhism were on the wane. The cult of Metteyya seems to have thriven as the Golden Age of Indian Buddhism was passing. As to the doginatic contents of this collection, as Dr. Macdonnell says: “It already contains the dogma of six Buddhas as precursors of Gautama, and presupposes the whole Buddha legend.’’* He could, if he would, prolong his existence upon earth for an aeon. In some of its highly elaborated dialogues, too, Sakyamuni is depicted as conversing with heavenly beings, and these may well have served as the model for the Mahayana romances which were to become so popular in the first centuries of the Christian Era.? The Tevisja Sutta contains a notable passage in which directions are given for pervading the whole universe with thoughts of love, for “this is the way to union with Brahma.” *“Titerature” (Buddhist), Z.R.Z., Vol. VII. 2 Cf. Dialogue 14 where Gotama explains his knowledge of former births by heav- enly intervention as well as human insight. PATALI-PUTRA 37 2. The Majjhima, or Suttas of middle length, are one hundred and fifty-two sermons and dialogues, which reveal a more human and less artificial Gotama. But these too are of mixed date, containing a fairly large ele- ment of miracle and some ethical teaching like that in the famous “Parable of the Saw,” which may well mark a transition stage between Hinayana and Mahayana ethical ideals, being nearer to that of the Bodhisattva than to that of the Arhat. As to its Buddhology the Majjhima 1s also transitional; its Buddha is a man who has freed himself from passion and delivers others, if they accept his law with unquestioning obedience, for he has attained to absolute truth." He is “the incomparable king of the Dhamma,” and as such “the perfect phy- sician,”’ the “captain of the ship of salvation.’ 3. The Samyutta, or mixed dialogues, fifty-six in number, contain some early verse, the famous “Wheel- turning Sermon,” said to have been the first public utterance of Sakyamuni after his enlightenment, and some later material, such as the story of Punna, which may well be an echo of the missions of Asoka, and which embodies in an exquisite dialogue the Bodhisattva ideal of resolute and indomitable good-will in sacrificial service. The claim that the Buddha is sinless? would also suggest a somewhat late date. Among the undoubtedly early material in this collec- tion are ballads of great beauty and of considerable dramatic skill, especially those in which Mara the Tempter t Cf. Majjhima ii. 173, 1. 265 and 1. 71, 2 Ibid. 92. Cf. Edmunds, Buddhist and Christian Gospels (3d ed.), pp. 140-41. The first fifty dialogues of the Majjhima have been translated into English by the Bhikkhu Silacara, and some are to be found in S.B.£., Vol. XI. 3 Samyutta iii. 103. Some of the book is translated into English in Mrs. Rhys Davids’ Book of the Kindred Sayings, and in Warren’s Buddhism in Translations. 38 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY is defeated by the Buddha or one of his followers, and leaves the stage “‘cast down and very sorrowful.” 4. The Anguttara, or “Adding One Collection,” is clearly late, recapitulating matter found in early collec- tions, and artificial and tedious in its arithmetical arrange- ment. Its structure suggests a later development of the catechetical schools. In its Buddhology too it is advanced; Gotama, who has the physical marks of a superman, is sinless—in the world yet undefiled, and is the only teacher of truth; he is, in fact, an omniscient demigod—a position, be it noted, of unstable equilibrium. Either men must go forward and take the Mahayana posi- tion, or backward and recover that of the earlier Sangha, that he is the wise and loving “elder brother of the world.’” 5. The Khuddaka, or short collection of fifteen books and booklets, mostly in verse, contains prayers and charms, together with some notable poems like that upon Mettam, or compassion, so justly famous. And still more important as a link with the Mahayana is its doctrine of Patidanam, or reversible merit, which teaches that merit gained by one may be shared with others—a seed- thought capable of strange and far-reaching developments, as we shall see, and opening the door at once to the ancient ancestor cults of the whole Orient. The doctrine may indeed be an accommodation on the part of Sakyamuni himself, or of the early Sangha, to meet these inveterate beliefs, and certainly the book as a whole 1s old, containing the Dhammapada and Itivuttaka,? anthologies of Logia or ‘German translation by the Bhikkhu Nanatiloka, Leipsig, and some English renderings in Warren, op. cit.; cf. especially dng. Nik. iv. 36, quoted in Edmunds’ Buddhist and Christian Gospels, p. 135. And in Ceylon Mr. Gooneratne has published an edition of the first three sections (Galle, 1913). ?The Khuddakapatha for neophytes, translated by Maung Tin, Rangoon; the Dhammapada, several translations; the Jtivuttaka, translated by G. Moore, New York; Theratherigatha, translated by Mrs. Rhys Davids, London; 7ataka, translated by E. B. Cowell, 1895. PATALI-PUTRA 39 gnomic utterances, of which the latter was in existence before the time of Asoka, and many of which may well be the actual words of the Founder. Gotama is in this collection a great human teacher whose claim to authority is self-evidencing, but he has qualified for this position by a long series of rebirths, having been Sakra no less than thirty-six times and a universal monarch hundreds of times.7 The ¥ataka book of nearly five hundred and fifty stories of these former births of the Buddha was already in process of compilation before Asoka’s time.? 3. ABHIDHAMMA The five collections of Suttas are all to some extent brightened and relieved by snatches of verse or by anecdotes; almost unrelieved in their tedium are the seven books of the “Third Basket of Higher Religion,” the Abhidhamma. “However,” says so kindly a critic as H. C. Warren, “like the desert of Sahara, they are to be respected for their immensity.” If the Suttas were composed with one eye on the laity, the Abhidhamma is scholastic throughout, and of much later date. It recapitulates, in the form of a catechism, the doctrine of earlier books, and its formal logic is clearly of value to students only, and to them chiefly, we may suppose, in disciplining the mind and in checking the inveterate Indian tendency to let imagination run riot. It is doubtful if there were ever more than a handful who succeeded in practicing these higher flights,* and for the 1 Ttivuttaka 22. 2 Some of the 74aiakas are illustrated on the Barhut Rail and other monuments of this period. 3 All that can be safely said is that the 4bhidhamma as we have it is not known to the older portions of the Milinda Panha; i.e., it is not earlier than the late second century B.C. 4 Cf. Mrs. Rhys Davids’ translation of Dhamma Sangani in A Buddhist Manual of Psychological Ethics, London. I think Mrs. Rhys Davids is a little too sanguine as to the early date of this work. 40 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY rest of us this work does not add much to our knowledge of Buddhism.t Such in outline is the early Pali canon, “from which,” says Professor Poussin, “it would be pos- sible to extract two or three canons all complete, all like one another, and all conflicting!” It is a library which has had an amazing history, and which is worthy of the devoted labors which scholars of East and West have consecrated to it. With all its repeti- tions, contradictions, and fiction thinly veiled, in spite of much in its form that is artificial and much in its matter that is tedious, it is a treasure-house, indeed, of the early history of an ethical reform almost unique, of a great springtide of the human spirit, and, may we not believe, of the Spirit of God? It contains strata of such different dates as to demand long and scientific study, and raises many difficult questions. What, for example, has hap- pened to the original works which must have been com- piled in Magadhi, a dialect akin to that of the Asokan inscriptions ? The Pali canon is in a later literary diction, and is clearly derived from a different source than the Chinese version. | Very interesting too to the student of religion is the process which he can here watch, by which the historic Gotama is being transformed into a god. All the more impressive because of its naiveté is the growing devotion to him which is revealed. So gradual is it, indeed, that the custodians of tradition, who for centuries handed on these stories with the words, “‘“Thus have I heard,”’ seem quite unconscious of discrepancies and contradictions in the narratives they are preserving side by side. Gradually the beloved Teacher “mounts the throne of Brahma” t The only early schools which had the temerity to attribute this Basket to immedi- ate disciples of the Buddha were the Sarvastivadino and their Bereet-ecnoal: This claim Poussin rightly calls “‘a pious fraud” (Opinions, p. 44). PATALI-PUTRA 4l from which his shrewd thrusts have driven this great one among the gods; and the steps are here preserved for us: now he is the infallible teacher; now the sublime being who can, if he will, prolong his life on earth indefi- nitely; now refusing to do this he leaves a finished work, and turns their eyes to the teachings he has given them, only to find that the human heart is not to be satisfied with such a substitute, and that the empty throne cannot remain for long unoccupied. So the Teacher is hailed as lord and controller of the universe, master of men and gods.* If the canon was fixed in Asoka’s reign, one would imagine that the next step would be to transcribe it. But though Asoka’s edicts prove that reading was common, this did not take a place for another two or three cen- turies when, in the reign of Vattagamini of Ceylon, a Pali version was made. And that which has come down to us 1s also due to the Ceylon monks, who, under the leader- ship of the great commentator Buddhaghosa, in the fifth century A.D., re-edited this earlier version. The Tipitaka has therefore undergone accretions and revisions which may well have added to its interpretation of the person of Gotama, but which, being made entirely by orthodox monks, have carefully excluded the ‘“‘heresies of the Mahayana,” and which reveal a cautious attitude toward the supernatural which is shared by the Asokan sculptures, but not by those of Gandhara. Indeed, it is when we turn from the Scriptures to the monuments of early Buddhism that we can watch the + process most clearly. In the first great period of Buddhist art, that of Asoka, there are no images of the Founder, but worship is being paid to his symbols—the empty ™Cf., e.g., Anguttara ii. 23; Samyutta i. 67. 42 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY throne, the Lotus, the Wheel of the Law, the Footprint; before all these gods and men bow, not only in reverence but in worship. In one of the panels, for instance, of the great Barhut rail we see King Ajatasattu kneeling before the Footprint of the Buddha, and the inscription tells us that he is “paying homage to the lord.” It is clear that by the middle of the third century B.c. something very much like worship of Gotama has been estab- lished; and numerous scenes from the ataka are depicted on these railings, and indicate that the Buddha-myth was already well developed. Yet there were no temples but only chaityas, or shrines, with monks in attendance to remind the pilgrims of the limits beyond which worship must not go. It is not until the second great period of Buddhist art, that of Gandhara, that images of the Buddha are found, and that he can be described in words of the Itivuttaka as “having mounted the empty throne of Brahma,” and become a chief among the gods or even as the Milinda Paiha says, “god of all gods.” The sculptures of Bud- dhism seem, indeed, to have lagged behind the Scriptures in this process of deification; they are useful in confirming, and in some cases correcting, the evidence afforded by a critical study of the books. It may be well at this point to touch upon the schools or sects of the Hinayana which now appear, to the great confusion of the student. The best source for a study of these is Buddhaghosa’s commentary on the Kathavatthu. The commentary was not written until the fifth century A.D., but the book itself is attributed to Tissa, the king’s Buddhist teacher, and parts of it may well belong to his age. Unfortunately it is violently partisan, and scorns even to name the schools which it criticizes, and the PATALI-PUTRA 43 commentary is inevitably colored by later developments. Another source is the Abhidharmakosa, or “‘Treasure of Abhidharma,” by Vasubandhu,* who speaks of eighteen schools; and there are also Tibetan accounts. Yet much as the traditions differ, they are agreed that at an early date occurred the “Five Points” of Mahadeva’s heresy about Arhatship, and that this precipitated an agreement to disagree. The two main schools that resulted were the Sthaviravadino or Theravadino, who claimed to represent the true “School of the Elders,” and the Mahdasanghika, or “School of the Great Council,” a name allowed them by their adversaries, and suggesting possibly that they came to be a majority. The former school, with its great subsect, the Sarvastivadino, were realists alike as to the phenomenal world, the self, and the historical Sakyamuni; the subsect differs from its parent in holding that an Arhat can fall from his high estate. The Mahasanghikas and their great subsect, the Lokottaravadino, held a transcendental view of the person of Sakyamuni which at times became even docetic, holding not only that he had been free from human passions but that nothing but a phantom or apparition had been seen by the men of his day. The canon of the Elders or their subsect the Vibhaj- jhavadino is substantially the Pali canon of today. That of another of their subsects, the Sarvastivadino, was in Sanskrit and little remains except Tibetan and Chinese translations. Of the canon of the Mahasanghikas we may take as typical the “Book of Great Events,” or Mahavastu, compiled by their subsect, the Lokottara- vadino. This book is described by Barth as full of “‘need- 1 The date of Vasubandhu is much discussed by scholars; Takakusu places him in the fifth century; Péri thinks his death was not later than 350 a.p. and Winternitz agrees. 44 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY less padding, two, three, or four accounts and more of the same episode from different sources, sometimes con- tradictory, sometimes following one another, sometimes scattered through the book, dovetailed into one another, disjointed, lacerated.’’ Among its contents are a number of birth-stories, long lists of Buddhas, and passages of a marked docetic tendency, all of which point to somewhat late compilation. But there is undoubted early material, and a glance at its chaotic contents helps us to appreciate the service attributed to Asoka in calling for the formation of a canon. The book is interesting, moreover, as helping to bridge the gulf between Hinayana and Mahayana Buddhism. It had, for instance, a section on the ten Bhumis, or “fields,” of the Bodhisattvas, which is apparently a development of the four stages of Arhatship; and in it adoration of the Buddha is the principal way of salvation. Here, in fact, is a document of the tunnel period between Asoka and Kanishka, which is therefore of considerable value. The Mahasanghikas and the Lokottaravadino may be regarded as semi-Mahayanist in their view of the person of Sakyamuni and in their tendency to deny the reality of the phenomenal world. They prepared the way for the idealistic schools of a later day. The Elders claimed to be more orthodox alike in their insistence upon the reality of the historic Sakyamuni, of the self, and of the world. They agree that the world and the self are unreal in a moral sense, as being transient and in a constant flux. But another subdivision of the Elders, the Sautran- tikas—so called because they preferred to adhere to the Suttas and rejected the scholastic Abhidhamma—were idealists, maintaining that all that exists is the momen- PATALI-PUTRA 45 tary act of consciousness, and they too began now to sow the seeds for the subjective idealism of later schools. As to Buddhology, we may thus summarize the views of these schools: for Sthaviras, Sakyamuni is a man, supernormal but not supernatural, though he makes immense claims upon the faith of his followers; he has destroyed all germs of rebirth and embodies the Dhamma. Yet even in this conservative school there are tendencies at work to claim for him a more exalted position; for the Sarvastivadino, for instance, he is a Supreme Being, worshiped by gods and men. For Mahasanghikas, he is lokottara, or supramundane, subject to none of the passions or pains to which men are subject, yet behaving as a man to accommodate himself to human needs; by Yoga he is in union with all truth. For all these schools alike the belief in his pre-existence in a long series of sacrificial lives was axiomatic, and encouraged a tendency natural to Indian minds to relegate history to the background, and to relate the unimportant fact to the eternal principle. We see the Buddhist world, then, busy for some centu- ries accounting for the great hero who had given it birth, and finding in some of his own utterances the basis for a mythologizing process; and in his own principle of the unreality of the worldly life a germ from which there grew almost inevitably, first, an idealistic philosophy, and then a denial of his own real existence as a historic figure. But until much critical work has been done upon the texts these can only be accepted as tentative generalizations; there are crucial questions still to be answered, and among them the very difficult one as to the Sanskrit texts of Hinayana Buddhism, such as the Mahdvastu and the Lalita Vistara, books which may be regarded as belonging 46 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY to the orthodox and yet bridging the gulf between them and the Mahayana. Are these translations from works originally in Pali, or are they original compositions in a mixed dialect coeval with it? This is a problem which is being attacked by Japanese and other scholars from three sides: their language, the ideas they embody, and the form of their composition. Those books which seem to owe most to Pali sources are in language most hetero- geneous; that is one clue. Another is that where there is a tendency to depart from the double standard of morality of the monastic order, and to substitute for it a single standard, we may suspect an original composition in Sanskrit. For this is the essentially new idea of the Mahayana, and was apparently worked out by Sanskrit scholars, such as the group whose work we must now consider. However this may be, there can be no question that the lay-Buddhism of the Asokan period is a link between the old and the new which is most significant; and Buddhists of all schools acknowledge their gratitude to the man who showed on so vast a stage the spectacle of a “theocracy without a God,” and who proved that Buddhism is not merely a religion for world-renouncing monks. Here was a foundation for the new Buddhism, and upon this and two other shafts sunk deep in the Hinayana —the transcendental Buddhology of one school and the subjective idealism of another—a new and lofty edifice was now reared. CHAPTER III GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA (50 B.C.-100 A.D.) The Birth of Mahayana “TIT am the Father of the world: All men are my children; all are destined to Buddhahood.”—SAaDDHARMA PUNDARIKA. “Then shall it be accomplished that no living thing, no particle of dust shall fail to attain unto Buddhahood.”—AvVATAMASAKA SUTRA. About the northwest frontier of India lie countries which during the Buddhist Era were conquered and reconquered by many races. On the fertile plain to its south was the kingdom of Gandhara with its chief city of Purusapura and its University of Taxila, both situated on branches of the Indus. Conquered in part by Cyrus and more fully by Darius Hystaspes, it remained a satrapy until the fall of Persia, when it passed to Alexander and then to the Maurya emperors. It changed hands again several times between the Graeco-Bactrians and Graeco- Indians, until they in turn were driven out by the Sakas, or Scythians, a tribe of whom, the Kushans, under the great Kanishka, established their sway over Northern India." These frontier lands were happy in the early mission- aries of Buddhism, the gentle and indomitable Punna, whom the Master could not turn from his noble purpose of preaching to the wild frontier tribes, as we read in the Tipitaka, and “‘Kassapa, Majjhima, and Gotiputta, teach- ers of all the Himalaya lands,” envoys of Asoka, who are mentioned in the Great Chronicle of Ceylon, and whose 1 For chronology see Rapson, Ancient India, pp. 181-85. 47 48 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY remains have recently been discovered at Sanchi and Sonari.. By the middle of the second century B.c. these tribes were strongly Buddhist enough to win the invading Scythians. Their cities of Khotan and Balkh, great cen- ters of trade, were centers also of a new religious syncret- ism, and in the fourth century of our era, Fa-Hian, first of the Chinese pilgrims, who between 399 and 413 A.D. was visiting India, hails this region as the second Holy Land of uddhism. It was dotted, he tells us, with a thousand monasteries, and was the home of the cult of Maitri, the coming Buddha. His figure is familiar in the art of Gan- dhara, where as a lay-prince he typified the process at work in this region by which Buddhism was being transformed into a less monastic, more picturesque, and more universal religion (a great way—Mahayana) and was being fitted to capture peoples less ascetic and other-worldly than those of India. Purusapura was the capital of Kanishka, a great ruler and a stauncn defender of the faith, in the first century A.D.2. If Asoka is the Constantine of Buddhism, Kanishka is its Clovis, though the comparison in each case does honor to the western ruler. Here at Peshawar a stiipa, the remains of one described by Fa-Hian “‘incomparable in solemn beauty and majesty,” has been recently unearthed, and with it a silver shrine of Greek or Indo-Greek work- manship containing remains of Gotama Buddha. It is not impossible that further search may lay bare a complete commentary upon the Buddhist books, which legend tells us the king engraved upon copper, apparently in Sanskrit. t Archaeological research has several times vindicated the Buddhist chronicles; e.g., at Sanchi, Peshawar, Pataliputra (Patna), etc. 2 Some scholars adhere to an earlier date, about 50 B.c. On this vexed question see F. W. Thomas, 7.R.4.S., 1913; Marshall, Punjab Historical Society, 1913, etc. The Cambridge History of India gives 78 A.D. as the year of his accession. GANDHARA SCULPTURE ee a GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 49 His coins testify to the vastness of his empire, and some of them to his interest in Buddhism. Beyond this it is difficult to say what was the special service which he did it. Hiuen-Tsiang tells us that in the four hundredth year after the Nirvana, Kanishka, “king of Gandhara, at the request of the elder Parsvika, convoked an assembly of saintly men, who were conversant with the exoteric doctrine of the Three Pitakas, and the esoteric doctrine of the Five Vidyas.” It is not possible to be sure that this council ever met, still less that it aimed at establish- ing a new Buddhism. Indeed, in the Chinese life of Vasubandhu it is stated that Kanishka’s object was “‘to protect the orthodox from hostile schools and from the Mahayana,” and this is borne out by Fa-Hian, who tells us that the people of the land were mostly students of the Hinayana.? Some action was clearly called for; indeed, there was imminent danger that Buddhism should lose its individuality; it was beset within and without by tendencies religious and philosophical, which if they did not overwhelm it certainly changed it from a moral reform movement to a pantheistic religion, with polytheistic and almost monotheistic expressions. And about each god or Buddha centered an elaborate worship with liturgies and pomp. “The monks took charge of the cult; so that the old chaitya became a temple and the monk a priest.” : To lay this development upon Kanishka, or upon any one man or group is unscientific; it can only be under- stood by placing the religion of Buddhism in its context, as a part of the complex philosophical and religious move- t Others, however, indicate that he was equally a Hindu and a Zoroastrian! Rulers of India must needs be tolerant, as Akbar found. 2 Cf. R. F. Johnston, Buddhist China, p. 34; James Legge, Travels of Fa-Hian, p. 32. 3 Farquhar, Outlines of the Religious Literature of India, p. 113. 50 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ments of the day. Some account should be taken of Iranian and Greek ideas, such, for example, as those of the neo-Platonists, and some of the cult of Mithras, but it is better to look chiefly to India herself, and we may select aspects of five great movements within Hinduism, all of which may well have had their influence upon the development of Buddhist doctrine. First, we may mention the rationalistic Samkhya, which was probably formulated at the same time. as Buddhism,’ aims like it at the removal of misery and like it rejects the monism of the Upanishads. It teaches that from sentient nature there is developed for the sake of spirit a whole universe; that nature (prakriti) and spirits (purusha) are both eternal; the first universal, invisible, and undifferentiated matter; the second, intelli- gent but passive spectators, incapable of activity. When these two come together the cosmic process begins, and the manifold world appears. Mukti or salvation is made possible by this coming together, because purusha achieves self-realization through it, and so removes or isolates itself once more. In this isolation consists salvation. ‘‘The soul of the wise matter ceases to be active, as the dancer ceases to dance when the spectators are satisfied.”? We can see how readily these tenets might influence the ortho- dox scholasticism of the Hinayana—on the one hand, in its tendency to atheistic interpretations of the teachings of Sakyamuni, for the Samkhya, while insisting upon the order of the cosmos, sees no need for a God; and idealistic schools of the Mahayana, on the other hand, seem to borrow some elements from the same complex system. ‘ Indian tradition says that the Samkhya system anticipated and influenced Bud- dhism. 2 “Samkhya,” £.R.£., Vol. XI. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 1 Meanwhile more popular expressions of Hinduism were also at work, notably the Bhdgavadgita, whose doctrine of Krishna-Vishnu and of his grace in taking the faithful to paradise seems to have exerted a potent influence upon Buddhism in its more popular phases. As we shall see in our study of the “Lotus” scripture, the Bhagavadgita, while it was itself perhaps influenced by the winsome figure of Sakyamuni, helped to work a great change in Buddhism, and to crystallize out Mahayana tendencies, until a popular and picturesque cult was produced, able to compete with polytheistic Hinduism for the devotion of the masses. This Hinduism, whose gods come down partly from the early nature-worship of Vedic times and partly from aboriginal cults, is a pantheism in which the absolute Brahman takes many forms. If they are multiplied it matters nothing; and in any cases the masses will a-worshiping go! One striking example is the famous trimurti, in which the great processes of creation, destruc- tion, and maintenance in being are graphically set forth as the gods Brahma, Siva, and Vishnu. This conception had undoubted influence upon Buddhism; at this time it returned to the pantheistic philosophy against which it had arisen as a protest, and was ready to compromise with all the gods, demigods, demons, and anti-demons it met in its onward march. In other words, the monism of the Vedanta not only helped to provide Buddhism with a philosophy capable of assimilating new gods but influ- enced the theological concepts of the Mahayana, which begins to surround the Buddha with a veritable pantheon. And in this process it may be that the kings and satraps of the northwest also had a part. Sociological conditions inevitably color theological ideas. 52 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY Lastly, though the Yogacara school of Buddhism did not become articulate for some centuries, yet it neverthe- less represents the influence upon Buddhism, which began as we have seen in the days of the Founder himself, of the inveterate Indian practice of Yoga, contemplation, and the practice of trance-states, first as a way to secure magic powers and later as a way to union with the Eternal. With both of these methods Buddhism as it developed had points of contact, and before long established a close kinship. It contains today elements both of magic and of mysticism. By the first century a.p. Buddhists might be found living side by side in the same monasteries and universities, yet influenced by various combinations of these tendencies and schools of thought; and to this century belongs the crystallization of the new Buddhism from this complex solution. It now began to produce a great literature, much of which seems to belong to Gandhara, and some to its great University of Taxila, or Taksasila,* which lay in a pleasant valley now being excavated. The Fatakas represent it as the seat of the study of the Three Vedas, and Pali became its language of instruction. Here Indian, Greek, and Persian culture met and mingled, and here Buddhism took on a new and more liberal phase. We may perhaps trace a beginning of this process in the famous Milinda Paiha, which though accepted by the orthodox and written in Pali, contains the germs of two very important doctrines, which, as they developed, separated the popular Mahayana from the more austere Hinayana Buddhism. These are the doctrines of salva- tion by faith, and of the Bodhisattva, a compassionate * Now Rawal Pindi. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 53 being whose ideal is service, and who is less self-centered than the Arhat. Both ideas are, as we have seen, present in orthodox Buddhism, but the Milinda Pditha carries them a stage farther. It is an apologia in the form of a series of dialogues upon the main teachings of the ortho- dox, and may well have been compiled to win inquiring minds of the day away from the allurements, alike of the new Buddhism and of other popular schools of Hindu- ism. It is on the whole a work of art, “‘the masterpiece of Indian prose,’’* eloquent of the skill and genius of its unknown author. We know that King Milinda, or Menander, was a Graeco-Bactrian ruler of Kabul and Punjab during the second century B.c., and the book must belong within a century of this time, when his memory was still living; for these Bactrian kings were soon after- ward driven out of India. But much work remains to be done in sifting the evidence, internal as well as external, before the strata into which it is clearly divided can be dated with any degree of certainty, and we must be con- tent at present to accept the following conclusions: (1) that the original work is represented by Parts 2 and 3 with some of Part 1, where with great animation and brilliance of style old questions, such as the nature of Nibbana, the Law of Kamma, anatta, and faith are dis- cussed by the sage Nagasena; (2) that Part 4, dealing with the difficulties raised in the king’s mind after his conversion, and ending with his delighted acceptance of the wise if not always logical answers of the sage, is of later date, added by monks in Ceylon; (3) that Parts 5, 6, and 7, with their beautiful if rather fanciful allegory of the City of Righteousness,’ their similes of the “mental and * Rhys Davids, S.B.Z., Introduction, p. xxxvi. 2 See my Heart of Buddhism. $4 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY moral treasures” of the Arhat, and their proofs of the existence of the Blessed One, are similarly late: it is significant that they are not included in the Chinese translations made in the fourth century. These conclusions, tentative as they must be, are borne out by the tendency in these latter parts to present less vital matters in a less notable style. Very important are the facts that the work is almost canonical in authority, that it is quoted by the great commentator, Buddhaghosa, in the fifth century 4.D., and that it refers to almost all the canonical books, though only later passages in it refer to the 4bhidhamma. As to its doctrinal tendency it must suffice to note two points: (1) that the ideal of Arhatship presented verges upon that of the Bodhi- sattva, an indication of an early authorship in Northern India rather than of late composition in Ceylon, which was the citadel of the Sthaviras for many centuries; (2) that the evasions of Nagasena which often satisfy the king, but leave us with a conviction that he has been dodged rather than answered, are evidence of a transition period in Buddhist doctrine. Of this transition a good example is afforded by the second question in Part 3, where Milinda asks how it is that an evil man can go toa heaven simply by thinking at the moment of death about the Buddha, and where Nagasena shirks the real point at issue by asking whether a great load of stones is not borne on the water by a boat; very good, the load of a man’s sins is borne by his good deeds! Here clearly is an attempt to disguise what is really a doctrine of bhakti, or saving faith, by calling it a doctrine of works. And when we turn to the Chinese version we are not surprised to find that it contains a more definite acceptance of the doctrine that it is the sinner’s “earnest thought”’ of the GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 55 Buddha that carries him across. In Part 2 of the Pali text we find faith described in orthodox terms; a crowd of frightened people are standing trembling on the brink of a river in flood when there comes along one who knows his own powers and leaps across; so does the good recluse “by faith aspire to leap, as by a bound, to higher things.” In much the same way the sage deals, or fails to deal, with the king’s shrewd question: ‘How reconcile the repeated assertions of the Buddha that there is no escape from Death, with his promulgation of the Pirit service, a magical performance for prolonging life?’ To which, of course, the true answer is that if the Master ever did sanction any such absurd superstition—well, the less Master he! But the Sage once more, like divines in all periods of transition who seek at once to be orthodox and to appear honest, evades the issue. So instructive are his wrigglings that they should be carefully studied by every student of the history of religion, where a true Mysticism is ever seeking to shake off the coils of Magic. We may be sure that Sakyamuni himself taught neither the efficacy of a death-bed piety, nor of a muttered incan- tation; but human needs are imperious, and human minds not always logical, and by the time of Nagasena these doctrines had clearly established themselves so firmly as to be regarded as of the essence of orthodoxy. Here, of course, the question arises, “Which Nagasena ?” and we can only answer that the first point is taken up in a part of the book that is of early date, and that while the second belongs to a later date, yet the doctrine of Pirit is contained in the canonical Khuddaka Nikdya. Faced with the popular Mahayana, perhaps it was too much to expect of the orthodox that they should adhere to the austere doctrine of Sakyamuni in all its stoical 56 EKPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY purity. It is barely possible that he himself, as Pro- fessor Poussin’ and all Mahayana Buddhists maintain, accommodated his teachings to suit his audiences. But I prefer to believe that in questions of truth he made no such compromise. Indeed, he seems. to have chosen to be labeled agnostic, rather than pander to human weak- ness. And it is one of the strange ironies of history that this great Stoic should become not only a god, but the sanction for strange and wonderful practices of magic and superstition. Another great literary masterpiece of this period is the Lalita Vistara,a Buddha-epic with Mahayana tendencies, based on an earlier work of the Sarvastivada, which praises the Buddha as Supreme, and reveals him surrounded, as in the sculptures of this period, with adoring Bodhisattvas. At this time also was compiled the Sutralamkara? of Asvaghoéa, a collection of ninety stories notable for their fine narrative style and for their wide range of interest. All India and Ceylon are mentioned, but the northwest is the chief setting of these anecdotes, and Kanishka is the hero of two of them. | The Sutralamkara gives us a valuable picture of Indian life in its many phases as it was during this epoch. Kings, Brahmins, monks, ascetics, and a whole procession of arti- sans, sweepers, washermen, courtesans, and clowns, pass before us. Sixty-four classical arts are enumerated, and keen religious and intellectual activity is manifest; the author represents Kanishka as punished by a miracle for coquetting with Jainism; he attacks the Brahmins ruth- lessly, and he discusses various heresies; he refutes the Samkhya and Vaisesika philosophies, and claims that the t The Way to Nirvana, pp. 136-37. 2 French translation by Huber. Paris: Leroux, 1908. Translated into Chinese in the fifth century. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA $7 word of the Buddha has spread in writings all over the world! Among the many delightful episodes of this collection we may mention that of the conversion of the sweeper, Niti, who is ashamed to meet the Buddha haloed and glorious as he walks through Rajagriha; but the Master pursues him and bids him be of good cheer: “His body may be foul, but his heart is fragrant with the excellence of the Good Law”: and when Niti still hesitates, reminds him that the Perfect One is not concerned with caste but with actions past and present, and ordains him monk. This is clearly the story of Sunita told in the Theragatha;* and other tales, such as the “Story of King Longshanks,” are taken from the Suftas. Another which shows Maha- yana influence is that of the Sakyamuni’s aunt and foster-mother, the Lady Gotami, who attains Nibbana through his grace. “I am the Mother of the Perfect One,” she says, “but he is my Father; I am reborn in his law. It is I who fed his mortal body (rupakaya) but he has fed my immortal body (dharmakaya); I satisfied his thirst for an instant; he has extinguished mine forever.” The Buddha shows his body with its thirty-two marks, and its eighty secondary perfections, and she enters Nirvana. In this work Asvaghoga shows himself scholar and poet as in his earlier epic, the Buddha Carita, an eloquent biography of Sakyamuni. A convert from Brah- manism first to the Sarvastivadino, then to the Mahayana, Asvaghoga was the sweet singer of this period, and wrote his epic in Sanskrit, which now began to take the place of Pali as the sacred language. Whether or not we believe the legend which tells how Kanishka accepted him in t Ceclxii. 2 B.N., 1351; §.B.£., Vol. XLIX, Part I, translated into Chinese by Dharma- raksha in 420 A.D. 58 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ransom for Patali-putra, capital of Saketa, we can imagine this great poet—“‘one of the greatest of the predecessors of Kalidasa”—leading the Buddhist choirs in antiphonal praise of their Master, now being deified and becoming the type for new divinities in India; “Salutation to the Arhat,” it begins, “unequaled, bestower of happiness, surpassing the Creator; vanquisher of darkness, greater than the sun; dispeller of heat, greater than the beauteous moon.” Though the poem does not itself go much beyond the Pali canon in its Buddhology, it was no doubt understood and recited in some monasteries of Gandhara and Kashmir by those whose conceptions of his person are embodied in the still more famous Sukhavati Vyuha and Saddharma Pundarika, which seem to have been composed about the same time and in the same north- western region. The larger Sukhavati Vyitha, or “Book of the Paradise of Bliss,” was translated into Chinese between 148 and 170 A.D., and belongs to a popular and rather unreflec- tive Buddhism, which allures its followers by elaborate descriptions of the Western Paradise, where reigns Amitabha, one of countless Buddhas, and whither, like Vishnu, he conducts the faithful. This Paradise Ma- hayana we shall study more fully in the following chapter, for it was elaborated in the period which saw the rise of the philosophical schools, as a popular offset no doubt to their intricacies. Of the larger Sukhavati Vyiiha there have been at least twelve Chinese transla- tions, the first possibly by Anshikao 148-70 a.p.; the last by Fa-Hian, 982-1001. None agrees entirely with the Sanskrit text. The book is in essence a dialogue between Ananda and his Master on the Vulture Peak t B.N., 23 (5); 8.B.E., Vol. XLIX, Part II. NOILVATVS HO dIHS S.WHAVLINV GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 59 before a vast audience of Arhats. We hear from the lips of Sakyamuni himself of a long line of eighty-one Buddhas from Dipankara to Lokesvaraja, and of the vow of a monk, Dharmakara, during the era of the latter that he would become a Buddha, “equal the unequalled, and be peer of the peerless.” This pranidhana, or vow, Lokesvaraja accepted" and under his tuition Dharmakara learned the innumerable excellent qualities of the Buddha. Emulating those which seem to him most noble, he shows his own nobility by a famous utterance known as the King of Pranidhanas, or vows: “Oh Blessed One,” he cries to his teacher, “if after I have attained Buddhahood all Bodhisattvas living in these Buddha-lands attain it not as they hear my name and share my merit ....may I not attain to that perfect enlightenment!” This parinamana, or dedica- tion of his merit (an important link between primitive and developed Buddhism), if not quite logical in its expression, is none the less completely successful, and the pious monk becomes Amitabha or Amitayu, Buddha of Endless Light and Life, whose excellences are inexhaustible and whose Western Paradise “lacks no beautiful and pleasant thing”; above all it is free from those hindrances which make attainment of Bodhi so hard to dwellers upon earth. Here, then, we see the Buddhist heart demanding satisfaction and realizing that all things are possible to love; and that love is itself the motive, the method, and the reward of righteous living. The luxuriance and enthusiasm with which the Sukhavatt Vyitha abounds are eloquent too of the hunger * This acceptance, Vyakarana, is called by Anesaki a “‘cosmic response.” Unlike Margaret Fuller, who “accepted the universe,” the Mahayana monk asks the universe to accept him. a 60 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY of Buddhist hearts for a heavenly city, where attainment and satisfaction are not impossible. In this apocalyptic heaven and in the cult of the Maitri Buddha which belongs to the same era we may see evidence that, the attainment of Arhatship having ceased, men were constrained to find satisfaction in contemplating either rebirth in a new era of enthusiasm or in a Paradise beyond this vale of tears. And the divine figures of Amitabha and Avalokitesvara embody no doubt, while they help to inspire, the new ethical ideal of service and compassion which are one of the hallmarks of the new movement; men create God in their own image, but he is also in this very process mold- ing them nearer to his own likeness. Striking and significant as is the Sukhavati Vyitha, it is eclipsed by the amazing book known as the “Lotus of the True Law” (Saddharma Pundarika)* which also has apocalyptic elements. It is nearly as long as the whole New Testament, and like it is addressed in the main not to the wise but to the simple. Yet like the Fourth Gospel it has a message to the philosopher too, and frees Bud- dhism by its bold Buddhology from any dependence upon history. It is found today in every Japanese temple, and has had an immense power of kindling devotion, of inspir- ing art, and of instituting remarkable reform movements like that of Nichiren, the Buddhist prophet of Japan. His biographer, Dr. Anesaki, writes: “The Lotus of Truth” is a rich treasury of religious inspiration and moral precepts, prophetic visions and poetic imagery, philosophical speculation and practical admonition. From this book all ages and every man in Buddhist countries derived some sort of instruction and inspiration, each according to his need and his disposition? 1 B.N., pp. 134, 139; first translated into Chinese in 253 a.v. The original work cannot be placed later than the second century a.p.; S.B.E., Vol. XXI. With the Sukhavati Vyitha and the Gandavyitha it is quoted by Nagarjuna (see chap. iv). 2 Nichiren, p. 31. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 61 Its influence upon the civilization of Japan can only be realized by careful study of that wonderful land. Today, owing chiefly to the “Lotus” scripture, millions think of Sakyamuni as eternally alive and gracious, seated in splendor on an idealized Vulture Peak: A mirage was the smoke of Shaka’s pyre That seemed at Kusinagara to rise; Death could not bind him, nor might fire Destroy the Teacher of such verities. Hark! He yet liveth, and doth speak Eternal Wisdom from the Vulture Peak. Great temple-pictures help the worshiper to visualize the scene, showing the Teacher as he rises triumphant from the bier; and others make real to the Mahayana Buddhist the conception of a glorified Master seated in the midst of his five hundred disciples, and preaching the New Evangel. Though modern Buddhist scholars like D. T. Suzuki may see in these representations “the fictitious creations of an intensely poetic mind,” yet most Buddhists are neither scholars nor critical, and it 1s unquestionably true that they accept the teachings of the “Lotus” as the developed doctrine of the historic Sakyamuni at the end of his long career as a teacher. The book may be said to have three main sections: (1) an Introduction, of which chapter 11 is the core, explaining the cause and object of the appearing of the historic Buddha; (2) the main body of the book, of which chapter xv is the core, revealing the eternity of his being; and (3) the conclusion, of which chapter xx is the core, reveals the efficacy of his teaching and his eternal author- ity. Dr. Anesaki says: In other words, we have in the first place the actual appearance of the Buddha among men as their Father and the Lord of the World; 62 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY then is revealed the original essence (agra) of the Tathagata, existing and acting from eternity (chiram); in the conclusion we have the assurance of the endurance of his personal influence.” The “Lotus” has often been likened to the Johannine writings, and is clearly the product like them of devout meditation upon historical facts; and like the Fourth Gospel it lays great emphasis upon the three central ideas of Eternal Light, Love, and Life. Written apparently first in metrical form, it was also put later into prose and as in the Apocalypse prose passages are relieved by poems. To the critical eye it is no more historical than the Apocalypse itself. Both foretell a new order of the redeemed. In the prelude “of rather monstrous grandeur,” as a Japanese Buddhist has said, “we see the idealized Sakyamuni on a heavenly Vulture Peak and identified with the Eternal Buddha.” As he sits there, surrounded by living creatures from Bodhisattvas to the animal creation, “tense with wondering expectation of what the lord Buddha is going to reveal,” we feel that he is about to give us one of those “admirable exhibitions” which from time to time relieve the monotony of his age- long silence. We are not disappointed; a vast ray of light pours from the urna on his brow, and like some mon- strous searchlight reveals the utmost regions of space—a sign that he is about to speak. Maitri addresses Mafi- jusri, the crown prince, or president of the assembly, who as attendant upon many a Buddha may be expected to understand their habits: Why does this ray sent out by the guide of men shine forth from between his brows? I see the whole universe . . . . with all beings . . the Buddhas, those lions of kings, revealing the essence of the Law, comforting many myriads of creatures, and sending out their t“Docetism,” £.R.E., IV, 839. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 63 sweet voices . .. . announcing to ignorant and fear-laden men the bliss of rest. “This is the end of toil and pain, oh monks.” .... I see bodhisattvas in myriads like the sands of the Ganges producing enlightenment as they are able..... Some are giving away jewels and servants, horses and sheep... . gladly sacrificing these things to buy for themselves a higher stage of enlightenment. .... Some give away wives and children .... yes their own hands and feet, their heads and eyes . . . . and aspire to the knowledge of the Tatha- gata... . and I see here and there some sons of the great conqueror, their own training completed, preaching the Law to myriads with great joy, arousing many bodhisattvas..... Some there are whose strength is in patience and forbearance, and some who through wisdom reach enlightenment. .... Why has the Blessed One emitted this great light? Oh! how great is his power! How holy is his knowledge! . . . - Is he about to show us the eternal laws which he found upon the terrace of Enlightenment? Or is he to prophesy and reveal to the bodhisattvas their future destiny ? To which Mafjusri replies, having first given some details as to the habits of Buddhas, that the Blessed One is about “‘to pour forth the good rain of the Law, to beat its great drum, to raise its great banner, to kindle its great torch, to blow a blast upon its great trumpet... . the Lion of the Sakyas will declare the fixed principles of the Law. He in his affection and mercy will pour out the refreshing rain upon the expectant multitude.” At last he speaks, but it is only to express the difficulty and profundity of the doctrine. Yielding, however, to their importunity, he consents to reveal it, at which five thousand proud monks and nuns salute him and depart. Congratulating the rest upon having thus been winnowed of the chaff, he proceeds to reveal the central object of his mission on earth; it is for one object only: to show all creatures the true Buddha-knowledge, and to open their eyes. Though there is but one road to Nirvana, yet in his skilful tact (upaya) he has opened three gates, one for 64 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY Sravakas, or candidates for Arhatship; one for Pratyéka Buddhas, who are inclined to lonely meditation and solitary achievement; one for Buddhas who are sociable and altruistic. There is but one vehicle, the Buddha- vehicle, and even boys who in their play dedicate their little sand-heaps to the Victorious One, even they reach enlightenment; yea, even such as absent-mindedly have made one single act of homage at a Buddha shrine. Great is the skill of the teacher; “‘Buddhas ye shall all become. Rejoice and be no longer doubting or uncertain!” Such is the new gospel, and several parables in the next three sections bring home the teaching that men in different ways accept what is given to them; plants take each what they need from the impartial rain; the oculist gradually accustoms the eye to the light; a father rescues his children from a burning house by devices suited to their different understanding—so does this Teacher of gods and men, this spiritual Father of all, adapt his lessons with skilful pedagogy. Let them all teach the Sutra, which alone reveals the essence of the faith, enter- ing the abode of the Blessed One which is his strong Love, donning his robe which is Forbearance, and sitting in his seat which is the doctrine of Sinyata or emptiness. So shall all become Buddhas, winning their way to the posi- tive Nirvana, as their leader by great and heroic persever- ance throughout many ages has won through to it. To each by name he gives a word of cheer, and while all are rejoicing in the good news, there comes an apocalyptic vision of a stupa containing the faint and emaciated body of the former Buddha, Prabhutaratna; a seven-fold light shines from it, and a voice comes forth praising the work * As we shall see in the next chapter, this doctrine of Sinyata has two different applications: the phenomenal world is sinya, having only relative reality, but absolute reality is also sinya—transcendent. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 65 of the Tathagata, and expounding the “Lotus.” All present salute, and from the utmost confines of the uni- verse, again lit up by a ray from the Buddha’s brow, come the heavenly hosts in worship; the old Buddha graciously invites the new one to share his throne, and confesses his own desire to hear the “Lotus” gospel. Whereupon Sakyamuni reveals that the time for his departure is at hand, and calls for volunteers to proclaim the gospel to all the universe. Mafijusri now modestly declares that he has already preached it with such effect that the eight-year-old daughter of the Naga king has reached enlightenment, and even false Devadatta has become a Buddha. Many are ready-to preach this good news for babes and sinners, and are taught the qualifica- tions of steadfastness and patient meekness under many trials, of circumspectness in sex and other relationships, of a practical grasp of the Sinyata philosophy leading to detachment, of a quiet and equable mind, and of a life of charity and benevolence. There follows a pause of many million years, and Buddhas from many worlds appear—great multitudes whom no man can number. Who are they? They are disciples whom the Buddha has aroused to perfect enlightenment, his spiritual sons, of whom he is eternal Lord and Father, self-existent, supreme Spirit, Creator, Ruler, and Destroyer of the Universe. The events of his historical life are skilful adaptations, part of his gracious strategy to win men. As a wise physician may feign death in order to move his disobedient children to take the medicine nothing else - will induce them to touch, so by an emptying of himself the eternal Buddha became man for the sake of the erring family of men. And as a father departs to a far country so the great Physician has left the world that his erring 66 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY and ailing children may use the medicines he has prescribed. Such is the Buddhology of the “Lotus,” and it intro- duces us also to figures destined to play a great part in the Mahayana, Avalokitesvara, Mafijusri, Samanta- bhadra, Bhaisajyaraja, and Maitri. To the first especially an eloquent chapter is devoted; he is revealed under whatever form will prove most helpful, as a woman when women are to be helped, and in many a varying guise. This most popular of all Bodhisattvas, known to China as Kwanyin and to Japan as Kwannon, is surely a noble conception of the divine nature. Glorious too is the healing King Bhesajyaraja who sets himself on fire and burns through thousands of years to show respect to Sakyamuni and his new gospel,’ while Mafijusri and Mahasthamaprapta are incarnations of wisdom, and keep their place even in the highly emotional Buddhism which now begins to come to the fore. In what sense is the Buddha Sakyamuni Father? In the sense of spiritual teacher and begetter of men in the truth, with which he is and has ever been one. Even dull and sinful beings may share his eternal life and realize their true nature; for he is Love as well as Light. Supreme Spirit, Creator, Physician, All-knowing, Great Father he appears, another Krishna, whenever unbelief is triumphing. Such in the barest outline is the “Lotus of the True Law,” which has been well called “an undeveloped mystery play”; but which is for the Mahaydanist “the very cream of orthodoxy,” the “crown jewel of the Sutras,” and, as Professor Poussin has pointed out, it is ? §.B.E., XXI, xxi-xxii, deal with Bhaisajyaraja; chaps. xxi-xxvi are probably a third-century addition, e.g., chap. xxi deals with spells and chap. xxii recommends the un-Buddhistic practices of self-torture and suicide. GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 67 so carefully worded that like the Gia it is capable of various interpretations—pantheist, theist, or even atheist.” “The conception of Krishna-Vishnu as the Supreme is adapted to Buddhist conceptions,” says Farquhar.? The “Lotus” is possibly intended to combat certain docetic tendencies of the time. The Sakyamuni of history is its central fact, but he is now related to the Eternal Order, and in this and other ways it resembles the Johan- nine books of the Christian church. It may well serve as a bridge between followers of the two great religions. He who has seen the Buddha of the “Lotus” is not unprepared for the Christ of the Apocalypse, or even of the Fourth Gospel. I had recently the privilege of listening to an exposition of Buddhism by a Japanese monk, and my companion asked: “Is this not a modernized Buddhism ?” The next day, as I was trying to give my version of Christianity to a group of Buddhist professors, one of them exclaimed: “That is exactly what we believe about God. Is it not neo-Christianity ?” I could only give them a copy of the Fourth Gospel, and my revered friend, the Honorable Mrs. E. A. Gordon, whose influence among the Buddhist priests of Japan is very far-reaching, tells me that when she had given a copy of this book to a monk of the sect which makes most of the “Lotus,” he changed entirely in his attitude, which had been offensive, and came back exclaiming: “This is a Buddhist book, or I am reading my own ideas into it.” If it were not tragic it would be comic indeed that the followers of the two greatest religions of the world are still sitting for the most part in opposite camps, ignoring * E.RE., VIL, 145. ? Outlines of the Religious Literature of India, p. 115. 68 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY or misinterpreting one another’s beliefs. I would make a plea not only for an attempt to understand one another, but for resolute co-operation in all idealistic enterprises. The enemies today are materialism and militarism, and Christianity and Buddhism, as it has developed in China and Japan, without trying to prove that one has borrowed from the other—an odious phrase when applied to spiritual things—may humbly confess that each has received the truth as a free gift from the Father of Lights, who is indeed a wise physician of souls, and knows best how the truth may be revealed to each nation as to each individual. Impressed and awed by the solemn and beautiful ritual of Buddhist temples in Japan, the Christian student will be deeply moved as he begins to immerse himself in their teachings, and in the Wasan, or hymns, in common use he will find that ideas and titles of the Buddha which seem to him most Christian can be traced back to the Sukhavaii Vyitha, the “Lotus”’ scripture, and to the later “Awaken- ing of Faith.” From Gandhara there went out not only these early scriptures of the Mahayana but also the famous Graeco- Buddhist art which so clearly links India and the Western World, and both these spread not only south- ward and eastward into India but also up into the lands of Central Asia. Here many of these masterpieces of the new Buddhism have been discovered by the Stein and Pelliot expeditions, which are adding to our knowledge and appreciation of the great influence which Buddhism exerted over these wild lands. They are known by the general name of Chinese Turkestan, and form a long, narrow tract of upland now almost desert; it is about 1,200 miles long and in most parts less than 400 miles GANDHARA AND PURUSAPURA 69 broad, and stretches from the Pamirs on the west to the Chinese frontier on the east. Legend has it that into these lands of Kashgar Khotan and Yarkand the Emperor Asoka banished certain peoples of Taxila, and that they took with them the Indian culture of their day. But it is more likely that these lands were civilized during the time of Kanishka, and it is certain that the recent discoveries show not only Indian and Chinese influence but also that of Greek and Roman mythology. There is little doubt that these lands themselves played a great part in the development of Buddhist art, and in the preparation of Buddhism to fit the peoples of the Far East. Vast, then, has been the influence and benign the teaching that radiated out from the lands over which Kanishka ruled; notable have been the services to human- ity of these anonymous theologians; they are the real fathers of the Mahayana, who did for Sakyamuni what Plato did for Socrates, or, as some critics would say, what the Johannine writers did for Jesus of Nazareth. By their genius they transformed Buddhism into a religion of universal scope, capable of going out and winning lands like China and Japan. Moreover, though they opened a door for the return of Hindu doctrines and gods into the house which Sakyamuni had swept and garnished, they did the great service of meeting certain docetic tendencies which were seeking to explain him away as an apparition, and they put upon a sound basis the Buddhology without which Buddhism might have remained a creed for the monk and the nun. CHAPTER (TV NALANDA AND THE EARLY SCHOOLMEN OF THE MAHAYANA (ca. 150 A.D.) “The doctrine of unreality is the first gate to Mahayana.” —PrRajNA- PARAMITA. “ Everything arises according to causation: we regard it all as void.” — NAGARJUNA. “The Buddha sitteth on his Lion Throne, yet dwelleth in every atom.” — AVATAMSAKA. Between the popular Mahayana of the “Lotus” and the Paradise Sutras and the philosophical schools which we are now to study a link is to be found in the Avatamsaka Sutra. Parts of this great book were already in existence by the second century a.D., for, like the “Lotus” and the Sukhavati Vyiha, it is quoted by Nagarjuna, and his transcendental philosophy seems to owe much to its idealism. The book consists of a series of Gathas in praise of the Buddha Sakyamuni, who is introduced to us at the moment of enlightenment, when he is samadhi, and the “universe and all things in it are serenely reflected in his mind as the starry heavens are mirrored in the calm sea.” Innumerable hosts of Bodhisattvas, Devas, and other spiritual beings praise him as coexistent with the universe, the sustainer of all things, dwelling equally in the smallest atom and upon his Lion Throne. He enlightens all, and all receive his message, each in his 1 First translated into Chinese in the early fourth century a.p. by Buddhabhadra. It has greatly influenced the Buddhism of the Far East; the Chinese versions, which are of varying length, contain sections which seem to be identical with the Gandhavyiiha and Dasabhimika of the Sanskrit text of Nepal. It is possible that part of it was translated into Chinese as early as 170 A.D. and Nagarjuna’s commentary on it in the fourth century. A good abridged translation is appearing in the Eastern Buddhist, Kyoto. 7° NALANDA 71 own way. All worlds are manifested in him, and “his love is boundless as the immensity of space.” He is beyond mortal comprehension, yet for the sake of all beings he takes earthly shape and appears to those who seek him, like the full moon rising over a mountain. Let them but think of him for a moment and they will be forever saved from evil and misery; his for all eternity is the task of enlightening the world. Here too we read praises of the Bodhisattva Samantabhadra who “has practiced all deeds pure and holy, and has bathed all beings in the wide waters of his compassion.” He in turn extols Vairochana, the Sun Buddha, and his Buddha Land. Knowing him, we know the universe anew as one of complete mutual interdependence and interpenetration. All things are in each and each in all. He manifests his nirmanakaya or adapted body universally, and his creative power is present in every particle of dust. In this world he is known as Sakyamuni, Victor, Savior, and by other great names, but in other worlds he is known by other names— Beloved Father, Path-Finder, Compassionate Lord, Brother of All, and Giver of All. Here, then, is a parallel to the later Pauline theology; the historic teacher is dis- covered not only to have cosmic significance but to be the source of cosmic life, through whom, in whom, and unto whom are all things. As to the nature of reality the Avatamsaka teaches that things are unreal because they are always changing, yet real because in each this great Buddha and all other existences are present. From such beginnings the philosophy of the Mahayana proceeds, and it takes many forms. It may perhaps most conveniently be grouped around the monasteries of Rajagaha and Patali-putra, about which there gathered 7 EKPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY during the next two centuries the great University of Nalanda. Here the doctrines of Sunyataé and of the Dharmakaya were developed by Nagarjuna, Aryadeva, and many another subtle thinker. Beginning with the tenet of impermanence, or Sunyata (the anicca, anatta, of Sakyamuni), they develop it variously. The Madhya- maka of Nagarjuna in the second century teaches that all is unreal except the one great Reality, of which we can neither predicate existence nor non-existence; it transcends experience and is unknowable, the Void. This transcendentalism led on by a natural transition to the idealism of the Yogacara or Vijfianavada, which con- ceives this ultimate unknowable and ineffable reality as Mind. Here, then, we see a transition by natural steps from the teachings of Sakyamuni, who was agnostic as to the Absolute, to a doctrine of the Absolute which differs little from that of the monistic Vedanta.* “All is tran- sient,’ Sakyamuni had said, “for all is causally determined and is composed of elements. Nibbana alone is the un- compounded, the abiding.” As to any other absolute, he refused to speak. His followers of the Theravada denied what he had ignored, and some of them went on also to deny any substantial existence either in the mind of man or in the phenomenal world. Against this barren doctrine many schools of the Mahayana protested that thought, at any rate, is real and that however illusory are phenom- ena there is an underlying Reality. Theologically conceived He, or It, is the Dharmakaya, Absolute Truth which manifests itself as the Nirman: akaya incarnate among men in the Buddhas. This doctrine was worked up from the stage at which the Avatamsaka left it by the schoolmen of the University t Hindu critics of Vedanta monism accuse it of being Vijfianavada Buddhism! NALANDA 73 of Nalanda. Of this great university we must gain some impression before making a further study of its schools. Fire and the sword of Islam have long since destroyed the venerable university, and its stones, “‘long buried by myriads of little Indian ploughs,” are today being un- covered by the archaeologist. But for a thousand years it did a noble work and a detailed history of Nalanda “would be the history of Mahayana from the time of Nagarjuna in the second century A.D., or possibly even earlier, until the Muhammadan conquest of Bihar in 1219 A.D., a period well over a millennium. All the most noted scholars of Mahayana seem to have studied at Nalanda.”* A catholic spirit worthy of a great university seems to have reigned, and side by side with the scholars of the new Buddhism worked the “eighteen schools”’ of the old, apparently in great harmony. So we learn from Hiuen- Tsiang, and from his diary and that of I-Tsing we can reconstruct a picture of the university at its zenith. To travel-worn and weary pilgrims, both of them scholars and monks, what a haven of refuge it was! How eagerly they describe its peace and dignity, its intellectual achievements, its devotion to the cause they had at heart. To Hiuen-Tsiang especially it was unspeakably dear, for he had paid a great price toreachit. “Take the Master’s tattered robes, let the winds of Gobi whistle through your sleeve and cut you to the bone; mount his rusty red nag anduset yout face to the West. ... . ” Then after this bitter journey at last “the great ice Mountains loom in front of you and you crawl like an ant and cling like a fly to the roof of the world,” until “‘on the topmost sum- mit still far away from the promised land, you realize * Vincent Smith, “Nalanda,” E.R.E., Vol. IX. 2 Hiuen-Tsiang’s journey was 629-45 a.D.; I-Tsing’s, 671-95 a.D. 74 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY two things—the littleness of human life, and the great- ness of one indomitable soul.” How great a soul it was, “‘dauntless in disaster, unmoved in the hour of triumph, counting the perils of the bone-strewn plain and the -unconquered hills as nothing to the ideal that lay before him, the life-work, the call of the Holy Himalayas and the long toil of his closing years.’”* It is good to think of that long respite in the groves and lecture-halls of Nalanda. How lovingly he lingers on its charms: The whole establishment is surrounded by a brick wall, which encloses the entire convent from without. One gate opens into the great college, from which are separated eight other halls, standing in the middle (of the Sanghaéréma). The richly adorned towers, and the fairy-like turrets, like pointed hill-tops, are congregated together. The observatories seem to be lost in the vapours (of the morning), and the upper rooms tower above the clouds. From the windows one may see how the winds and the clouds (produce new forms); and above the soaring eaves the conjunctions of the sun and moon (may be observed). And then we may add how the deep, translucent ponds, bear on their surface the blue lotus, intermingled with the Kie-ni (Kanaka) flower, of deep red colour, and at intervals the Amra groves spread over all their shade. All the outside courts, in which are the priests’ chambers, are of four stages. The stages have dragon-projections and coloured eaves; the pearl-red pillars, carved and ornamented, the richly adorned balustrades, and the roofs covered with tiles that reflect the light in a thousand shades, these things add to the beauty of the scene. The Sangharamas of India are counted by myriads, but this is the most remarkable for grandeur and height. The priests, belonging to the convent, or strangers (residing therein) always reach to the number of 10,000, who all study the Great Vehicle, and also (the works belonging to) the eighteen sects, and not only so, but even ordinary works, such as the Védas and other books, the Hetuvidy4, SabdavidyA, the Chikit- sAvidya, the works on Magic (Atharvavéda), the Safikhya; besides tL. Cranmer Byng in Beal’s Life of Hiuen-Tsiang, Introduction. NALANDA a6 these they thoroughly investigate the “miscellaneous” works. There are 1,000 men who can explain twenty collections of Sitrds and Sastras; 500 who can explain thirty collections, and perhaps ten men, including the Master of the Law, who can explain fifty collections.* Stlabhadra alone has studied and understood the whole number. His eminent virtue and advanced age have caused him to be regarded as the chief member of the community. Within the Temple they arrange every day about too pulpits for preaching, and the students attend these discourses without any fail, even for a minute (az inch shadow on the dial). The priests dwelling here are, as a body, naturally (or spontaneously) dignified and grave, so that during the 700 years since the foundation of the establishment there has been no single case of guilty rebellion against. the rules. The King of the country respects and honours the priests, and has remitted the revenues of about 100 villages for the endowment of the ONWEN EC. 4 15/057 From I-Tsing’s Buddhist Records of the Western World we get a later, but not less enthusiastic, account: The priests, to the number of several thousands, are men of the highest ability and talent. Their distinction is very great at the present time, and there are many hundreds whose fame has rapidly spread through distant regions. Their conduct is pure and unblamable. They follow in sincerity the precepts of the moral law. The rules of this convent are severe, and all the priests are bound to observe them. The countries of India respect them and follow them. The day is not sufficient for asking and answering profound questions. From morning till night they engage in discussion; the old and the young mutually help one another. Those who cannot discuss questions out of the Tripitaka are little esteemed, and are obliged to hide themselves for shame. Learned men from different cities, on this account, who desire to acquire quickly a renown in discussion, come here in multi- tudes to settle their doubts, and then the streams (of their wisdom) spread far and wide. For this reason some persons usurp the name (of Nalanda students), and in going to and fro receive honour in conse- quence. t I.e., Hiuen-Tsiang himself. 2 Beal, op. cit., pp. 111-12. 76 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY We learn too that heresies had arisen “‘like clouds of ants and bees’’; so it may be imagined that occasional heresy-hunts kept life from stagnation, and gave point to the labors of the orthodox. Such was the University of Nalanda, a very haven of refuge to the pilgrims. How good to find one’s self again in the haunts of learning and to exchange the brandishing of intellectual for that of material swords—to defend the faith instead of one’s own life—to exchange spiritual gifts instead of delivering one’s goods to the footpads of the hills. It was a haven indeed: “Here ten thousand priests sought refuge from the world of passing phe- nomena and the lure of the senses.” No wonder that the Scriptures increased in volume, and that art and sculpture developed; we read of a student painting a picture of the coming Buddha Maitri or Metteyya, whose cult throve in the northwest; and of the worship of Avalokitesvara and of Tara. But these are later developments, and we must return to the early schoolmen of the university. Let us look first at the Prajia-paramita literature which now begins to be edited. Those who enjoy the brandishing of meta- physical swords will perhaps enjoy the endless negations of these books; but their essence is contained in a famous leaflet, the Prajna-paramita-hridaya-Sitra, or ‘‘Essence of Transcendental Wisdom,” which has had an immense influence and is still repeated daily by multitudes in the Far East. A word as to its title: Praja is the Sanskrit form of the Pali pafiia, which early Buddhists used to denote intuitive transcendental knowledge as contrasted with the plodding of the discursive intellect. It is a dis- tinction familiar to Mystics, and therefore of the essence of Buddhism. Paramita means perfection, and the title of NALANDA a these books is a claim that they reveal Bodhi, or final enlightenment. This shortest of them, containing their essence or heart, is a later summary, which runs as follows: Adoration to the All-wise! Thus have I heard. Once the Blessed One was dwelling at the Vulture Peak near Rajagriha, attended by a company of monks and bodhisattvas. Seated thus He became absorbed in a meditation known as Deep Enlightenment. Then, too, the great Bodhisattva Aryavalokitesvara was practicing the deep prajfid-paramita; and he perceived that the five constituents of being are empty, and so was saved from misery and suffering. “O Sariputra,” he cried, “material form is emptiness and emptiness is material form.” So is it with the other skandhas; all are empty, sensation, consciousness, the samkhara allareempty. They are not born nor are they destroyed; they are not tainted nor untainted; they neither increase nor decrease . there is therefore neither ignorance nor wisdom, no birth, nor age nor death, no suffering, no path of escape from suffering, no attainment, nor anything to be attained. The bodhisattva who relies on this prajfia-paramita frees his mind of obstruction; and because he has no obstruction he is freed from fear, and goes beyond perverted and unreal thoughts to final Nirvana. All Buddhas, past, present, and future, reach perfect wisdom depending upon this prajfia-paramita. This famous booklet is used by all Mahayanists, though perhaps not one in a million understands its meaning. This is, however, not very obscure; the essence of the matter being that there is an ultimate Reality compared with which all things are empty. But many Buddhists prefer to use it as a magic charm or formula which is believed to have immense potency. About this Prajid- paramita literature the Madhyamaka school of Nalanda centers. Chief among the new group of Buddhist philosophers is Nagarjuna, its editor and chief exponent. A Brahmin by birth, he was converted after a dissipated youth to the Hinayana and later to the less austere Mahayana, now growing rapidly in power. A native of South India, he 78 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY seems to have found his way to the Himalayas, and to have met there with the cult of Amitabha, for the larger Sukhavati-V yiitha was taken to China about this time, and he quotes it in his writings. Far less probable is the legend of his meeting in the south with an aged teacher dwelling in an iron tower, who revealed to him the supremacy of Vairochana, and gave him the mystic rite of abhisekha, or baptismal ordination. The story sug- gests, however, that he knew the vatamsaka Sitra, and indicates the zeal of heretical schools to claim the authority of the august name of Nagarjuna, who came to be vener- ated as a second Buddha “without marks,” and for whom it is claimed that he is Ananda, reincarnated in fulfilment of a prophecy of Sakyamuni himself. Nagarjuna’s great achievement is an attempt by his Madhyamaka, or Middle Path, to reconcile the doctrines of realism and nihilism—‘being” and “not being.”’ “The phenomenal world,” he teaches, “zs unreal; to realize this is to enter the first gateway to Mahayana,’ yet living in it we can reach Reality. This, itself, is Sunyata or the Void, because it is ineffable and transcends all relativity, and the phenomenal world is sufiya because in it relativity holds sway. The Madhyamaka Sastra begins with the statement of eight negatives, the famous “Eight Noes’’: “No production nor destruction; no annihilation nor persistence; no unity nor plurality; no coming in or going out.” Between these extremes his Middle Path steers its course, just as earlier Buddhism aimed at avoiding alike the extremes that all is and that all is not. Sakyamuni had refused to encourage either the naive realists or the too skeptical nihilists; and even in the t Mahdaprajna-paramita-sastra, B.N., 1169. NALANDA 79 vital matter of the “soul” he steered a middle course; for, on the one hand, were animistic theories, and, on the other, the annihilationists. Nirvana itself is ineffable, beyond the crudities of our every-day speech. Early Buddhism, in fact, contains the germs of most of the chief tenets of the Madhyamaka; and even its distinction between relative and absolute truth is fore- shadowed in the Pali books, where philosophical truth (paramatthasacca) is distinguished from popular or every- day truth (sammiti sacca)." This distinction is developed by Nagarjuna and made the basis of his school, which has the practical aim of taking its followers to Absolute Truth; Paramartha Satya, Bodhi or Sunyata. To do this the school teaches that all things are causally related and have only relative existence. The very notions of “‘being” or “‘not being” are relative: Thy light shines bright, And murky night Is straightway fled! Yet night’s not dead Though light is shed, And drives it far. This lamp of thine Doth dimly shine, Save in the night; So dark and light Unreal quite, And empty are.? In popular jingles of this kind did the wise schoolmen embody their philosophy; and the purpose was the very practical one of calling men from the garish light of day to the serene moonlight of Absolute Truth, to Nirvana. 1 Cf, Sutta i. 263, and C.A.F. Rhys Davids, “Reality,” E.R.Z., Vol. X. 2 Kasyapa Parivarta (B.N., XXIII, 57-58); cf. Suzuki, Outlines, p. 391. 80 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY This is well expressed by the Japanese poet, Akazome Emon: If I that sing am nothing, nothing they That are about me—men and things—then pray, How shall I fail in mind to press To that One Goal of Nothingness ? For Nagarjuna, as for Heracleitus and many another, the conclusion is that since sense-knowledge is relative we must find absolute truth within: and this truth is Bodhi. The phenomenal world is denied, that Nirvana may be realized. The world, Sakyamuni taught, is transient, anicca: it is unreal, unsatisfying, and empty of abiding worth. “Look on it as a mirage,” says the Dhammapada; and the same book opens with an aphorism which has been taken to indicate that the Founder favored subjective idealism: All that we are by mind is wrought Fathered and fashioned by our thought. It is unlikely ‘that Sakyamuni concerned himself with this question; in fact, it is clear that he was a common- sense realist so far as the phenomenal world is concerned; but the Madhyamaka even in its more conservative phases is idealist, and in its more extreme form goes over to sheer nihilism. Which position Nagarjuna himself took is un- certain: some commentators maintain that he admitted the reality of the phenomenal world, but taught that it was unreal from the absolute point of view; in other words, sammiti satya is relative truth, not sheer untruth. This would seem to be the teaching of words attributed to Nagarjuna: All things that are from causes spring, This is the Middle Path we sing: All all unreal save the Void, For all save That with mind’s alloyed. So runs a Karika or couplet of the Madhyamaka karikas. NALANDA 81 The Prajia-paramita has similar passages which seem even truer to the teachings of early Buddhism: Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world A star at dawn, a bubble on a stream, A flash of lightning on a summer cloud, A flickering lamp, a bubble and a dream. All these things are real enough, however transient; but according to Chandrakirti and others, Nagarjuna went much beyond this, and taught that the phenomenal world has no existence whatever; that it is unreal, as a flower in air, a hare with horns, or the child of a virgin carved in stone! An artist once a picture painted Of such a monster that he fainted: Thus endlessly men transmigrate, By false ideas infatuate. The mind, according to this view, not only colors and distorts all we see; it creates it. The phenomenal world is “like hairs that a monk with diseased eyes thinks he sees in his almsbowl.’* They are not there; the way to know them is not to know them. Nay, more; there is no monk, no almsbowl—nothing except the Absolute Void. Silence is the best and only way to attain it. This nihilistic teaching had its effect, of course, in ethical matters, the very citadel of Buddhism; and it has done harm to the Buddhist cause, first, by its insistence on the relativity of every-day truth, and second, by under- mining that altruism which is the essence of the Mahayana. But the conscience of the earnest Buddhist finds a way out of the dilemma. If my neighbor does not exist, to help him is impossible. Yet to.do so is none the less the mark of a true Buddhist. 1 Poussin, “Madhyamaka,” E.R E., Vol. VIII. 82 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY “Let the Bodhisattva, as he offers his gift, realize that it has no existence; limitless shall be his merit.’’* Let him cherish his little blind sister Karuna or Pity, let him realize that she zs blind and his gift will be “‘perfumed.” Moral conduct is “laukika,” mundane, when the agent believes in the reality of agent, act, and object; it is “lokottara,” other-worldly, fragrant with transcendent truth, when he believes in the reality of none! Such other-worldliness seems pale and unreal. Its “perfume” is a little sickly! If neither the monk nor his almsbowl, neither the almsgiver nor the alms, are real—so might the worldling retort—why bring these unrealities together in a fresh entangling relationship? No doubt, however, when it came to daily bread, the doctrine of absolute truth gave place to that of relative or practical truth; man cannot live on pure idealism alone; and even in monastic circles we find the doctrine severely criticized, especially among the practical Chinese; the wise Tsung Mi, for example, asked, as we shall see below: “If mind as well as the objective world be unreal, who is it knows that they are so?” And men of the world may well have asked: “Tf all life be a delusion, why this emphasis on the high calling of the monk?’ “It is true,” Nagarjuna would no doubt reply, “that all is a dream. Yet the dream of the monk is more seemly and less unreal than that of the worldling and ends at last in Reality”; and the laity must needs be content to leave the monk-philosophers to dream, while with dream-coins and fantasmagorial food they kept alive these dreamers of dreams only less empty than their own. That this doctrine of the Madhyamaka held sway in Nalanda for several centuries is clear; we learn from 1 Vajracchedika Sitra. NALANDA 83 Hiuen-Tsiang, through whom it spread to China and Japan, that it was known as the “Three Period Doctrine,” and that he learned it from the great logician, Silabadhra, who maintained that the Buddha had himself taught in three successive periods: (1) that the atman is unreal, but the phenomenal world of dharmas real—this is the Hinayana view; (2) that all phenomena are unreal, but the mind is real—this is the subjective idealism of the Yogacara and other Mahayana schools; (3) that neither is real—this is the nihilism of some followers of the Madhyamaka school, which finds its most characteristic utterance in the paradox, ‘“‘Delusion is wisdom; the flux of Samsara is Nirvana.” These are but different names for the same thing: two aspects of one Absolute. The world of Samsara is the realization of the Ideal, a fleeting expression of the Eternal. This classification is, of course, pure propaganda. The Yogacara is a later development than the Madhyamaka, and, though both are developments of germs in the teach- ing of Sakyamuni, neither was ever formulated by him. Significant as was the philosophy of the school, it made an even more important contribution to Bud- dhology. Applying its doctrine of relative and absolute truth in this sphere, it worked out the Duakaya doctrine of the 4vatamsaka, and put the Amitabha cult on a sounder theological basis. ‘‘The Buddha,” says Nagarjuna, “has two bodies, one is the body of miraculous transformation, and fills the ten regions of space, limitless and immeasur- able, serene, majestic, radiant, infinitely eloquent. The other is his human body, subject to mortal limitations.’”* In other words, the Dharmakdaya, absolute or real existence, empties itself at times, and a Jatakaya, Rup- * Commentary on the Prajida-paramita. 84 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY akaya, or Nirmanakaya, which is relatively real, or unreal, makes its appearance in the phenomenal world. This 1s a concession to the naive realism of ordinary folk. But philosophers know better. The Dharmakaya is the Absolute Truth or Norm behind all its fleeting manifestations, to which there 1s no ~ limit. Amitabha, Vairochana, Sakyamuni, are notable examples of such manifestations, and each in turn, or all side by side, may be the central object of worship. This doctrine opened the door wide to all the pantheons of the new lands into which Buddhism was rapidly penetrating. A polytheistic cult with a basis of panthe- istic idealism, it was now ready to adopt and adapt any deity—a sun-god, or a god of war, or some less repu- table figure—who had a hold upon the allegiance of its converts. Yet this polytheism had in it, like that of the Rig Veda, the germ of a true monotheism; the claims of individual gods fora supreme place in the Pantheon now begin to be urged upon the faithful. And as in the Rig Veda Varuna almost achieves the supremacy, so in the Buddhist Pantheon Amitabha now makes a bold bid for the allegiance of the faithful. Gods many there might be—indeed, Gotama himself seems to have had a bowing acquaintance with them—but was there not one lord whom all should worship, accessible, and indeed seeking to bring multitudes to his Paradise ? Here then were laid the foundations of a pietistic as well as of a philosophic Mahayana: the latter uni- versalizing the Buddha-nature and finding in the Dharmakaya, which is his essence, the true meaning of the universe; the former making of the historic Sakyamuni and of the mythical Amitabha adaptations of the Eternal. NALANDA 85 The cult of Amitabha is studied best in the 4mitayur- dhyana Sitra,, which contains instructions as to the practice of meditation leading to visions, more or less hypnotic, of the Pure Land of the Western Paradise, and a more developed theology than the Sukhdvati Vyitha. The book opens, as is usual in Mahayana sutras, with a Prelude, in which we see the Buddha on the Vulture Peak accompanied by a host of Bodhisattvas with Mafi- jusri at their head. But unlike the Buddha of the “Lotus” it is no glorified being with whom we have to deal but the historic Teacher. He appears to the Queen Mother Vaidehi in despair at the conduct of her unnat- ural son Ajatasattu, who has imprisoned his father, and threatened her with his impious sword. Having in one pregnant sentence raised the problem of suffering, she does not stay for an answer but pours out her plea: “My one prayer,” she cries, “is this: Tell me, I pray thee, of worlds where there is no sorrow, where the wicked cease to trouble and the weary are at rest: where I may be reborn in peace.” The response is immediate and effec- tive: from his brow there flashes forth a light which reveals to the Queen the ten quarters of the pure and admirable Buddha-lands. She chooses that of Amitabha, the Pure Land of Bliss.2. Then, in response to her plea, he shows her how to cultivate “a threefold goodness,” and to be reborn in this land “which is not very far off.”” This good- ness consists in three groups of pure actions, including, besides ordinary Buddhist morality and beliefs, the observance of due ceremonial and the study and recitation of the Mahayana sutras. Works as well as faith are demanded of the candidate for that Pure Land: yet it is 1 B.N., 198; §.B.E., Vol. XLIX, Part II. 2Here we actually see what Max Miller calls Kathenotheism at work—one of many gods is chosen for worship. 86 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY by the power of the Buddha, not by one’s own effort, that one may see it. One must become as a child, and he will reveal it. The Queen is thus brought to a state of calm resignation; and telling her frankly that she is a very ordinary and rather stupid person, the Blessed One pro- ceeds to give her lessons in meditation which form the second main section of the book. ‘All save the blind can see the setting sun. Do thou then with due ceremony and concentrated effort gaze into the western sky, especially at the time when the sun hangs in it like a suspended drum.’* Then follow instructions as to meditation upon water, ice, and Japis lazuli until there shall arise the vision of the golden banner on an azure background, with strains of music and voices cry- ing: “All is suffering, all unreal, all impermanent.” Gradually a dim picture of Sukhavati will be formed, and will free multitudes from sin and suffering. There follow ten other meditations upon the features of that delectable land, upon the bodily marks of its heavenly King and of his spiritual Sons, Avalokitesvara and Mahasthamaprapta. The third section of the book defines the threefold thought as true, deeply believing and full of longing for rebirth in this Paradise, and teaches that there are three classes who will attain it—the com- passionate who follow the precepts, the faithful who recite the sutras (especially the Vaipulya Sutras), and those who practice the sixfold remembrance. If for one or for seven days any man practice one of these, he will be reborn in that Pure Land, and to him will appear the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas of the West, with monks, inquirers, and * Nagarjuna himself is said to have died with his face turned to the Western Para- dise. The first teacher of this cult of Amitabha seems to have been his teacher Saraha. Could he have been a Jew or an early Christian missionary? The name does not sound Indian. NALANDA $47 gods innumerable, and will give him the hand of welcome and a diamond throne. And, as is fitting in a heaven designed in India, the retinue allowed will be proportion- ate to the merit acquired. The book concludes with a vision granted to the Queen in which all this splendid heavenly kingdom is shown to her. “Behold,” she cries, ‘the half was not told me,” and the officious and practical Ananda winds up a book, which would have made his Master gasp, by asking what it is to be called. So amid scenes of ecstatic joy in heaven and upon earth the curtain falls. One very significant passage deserves special comment: If there be any sinner, even of the five deadly sins . . . . and he be about to die and repeat the words, “Praise to Buddha Amitayus,” ten times without interruption and with continued thought fixed upon the Buddha .. . . he will by the merit of this deed expiate at each repetition the sins whose punishment is rebirth for eight millions of ages. Akin to this teaching is that of the larger and smaller Sukhavati Vyiha. But it is noteworthy that though these three books are all equally authoritative, they differ in this point: the two former insisting that while this faith in Amitabha is indeed most potent, yet some merit on the part of the faithful is needed, and the smaller Sukhavati Vyitha denying that rebirth in the western heaven can be achieved by merit. Again the larger of these two Sukhdvati Sutras expressly denies what the Amitayur-dhyana Sitra teaches, that those who have sinned any of the five deadly sins may be reborn in the Western Paradise. In these three books of the Paradise Mahayana, which may well have expressed and molded the devotional life of Nalanda, we may then trace the 1 §.B.E., XLIX, 197-98; Amitayur-dhyana Sitra. 2B.N., 23 (5), 27, 199, 200. 88 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY gradual development of the doctrine of faith at the expense of the old doctrine of merit. Nalanda was the home of theologians as well as philosophers. As we saw above, the Chinese pilgrim found there a great statue of Avalo- kitesvara, and an artist who was busy painting a picture of Metteyya Buddha. From these indications we may reconstruct something of the religious life of the great university, and it will help us to remember that Buddhism is a religion and not merely a philosophy, and to note the inevitable stages by which it was popularized and universalized in prepara- tion for its great achievements as a missionary religion. At Nalanda it was equipped with a philosophy, a principle of pedagogy, and practical methods of devotion, all of which were needed if it were to appeal to the peoples of trans-Himalaya, and yet to keep its self-respect. What are the links between these theistic and poly- theistic schools and the ethical reform instituted by Sakyamuni? Some we have already discussed. Another is to be found in the elaboration of the Bodhisattva ideal. Either at Nalanda or at similar centers of literary activity the parabolic method of Sakyamuni was developed; some Indian Aesop used the current folklore of India and wove into it the Buddhist ideal of the Bodhisattva and the theory of reincarnation, providing a veritable storehouse for the teacher of simple folk. We know from the monu- ments of Asoka that part of this work was done by the second century B.c., and by the first century A.D. we find the legend of Sumedha worked out. In the dim distant past he took a vow in the presence of the reigning Buddha, Dipankara, that he would not enter Nirvana until all creatures were saved; his vow was accepted and it was he who finally became the historical Sakyamuni. In such NALANDA 89 ways was developed the elaborate succession of Bodhi- sattvas, who, by their sacrificial life and often by their death, have made a bank of merit upon which the faith- ful may draw; and by the fifth century a.p. the great Ceylon commentator, Buddhaghosa, is able to exclaim: “More than the ocean has he given of his blood, more.than the stars of his eyes!” Fa-Hian records that when he visited Ceylon in the early fifth century it was the custom at the annual procession of the Tooth Relic for a royal herald, mounted upon a richly caparisoned elephant, to proclaim the sacri- ficial acts of the Blessed One: during untold ages he spared not himself, gave away wife and child, plucked out his eyes, and cut off his head as an alms, until he won to Buddahood, turned the wicked from sin, and gave the weary rest. After this recital the king would exhibit the effigies of the five hundred bodily forms which had lodged this sacrificial spirit, and they were greatly honored by the crowds which then as now gathered for the festival of the Tooth of Gotama. This Bodhisattva ideal, as it was fully developed in the Mahayana, is nobly set forth in the Sukhavati V-yiiha, and may be compared with the Arhat ideal set forth, for example, in the Dhammapada. While there is much that is similar in the two types, they differ in very noticeable ways,? and the transition between them is to be found, as we have seen, in the Milinda Paiha and in these Fataka tales, which are at once fables and popular theology, an attempt to account for *In his famous Visuddhi Magga composed at Anuradhapura. To Buddhaghosa also is attributed the familiar prayer which embodies the longings of millions in Bud- dhist lands: “May I meet Metteyya when he comes to lead multitudes to the haven of salvation. May I see the Lord of Mercy and be wise in the three scriptures.” ? The ideal of the Bodhisattva is higher and more arduous than that of the Arhat; he pledges himself by a solemn vow (pranidhana) to put out every effort and dedicates to others his merit (parinamana). go EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY the historic Sakyamuni. But Amitabha, incorporated into Buddhism about this time, had also to be accounted for. And the new Buddhism had to depict a new and more arresting series, and to pile up even more extrava- gant claims if it was to win its way. Or perhaps the shoe was on the other foot! It may be that the Theravada schools, being put upon their mettle by the winsome figures of the Mahayana, developed such tales as those of Ves- santara and Sumedha, and added them to the growing list of the Fatakas. The Bodhisattva of the Mahayana is certainly an arresting figure: charming, gentle, and compassionate, full of tender and affectionate thought, unbiased, serene; he is zealous, and ever girded for the duties of his high calling; and has no thought that is not pure and wise. He rouses others to good deeds, and stirs them up by his activities to realize that the phenomenal world is “empty.” Himself walking in the highest perfections (paramitas) of knowledge, meditation, strength, patience, and virtue, he rouses others to.a noble emulation, so that in countless multitudes they are established in enlightenment, and provide for innumerable Buddhas the gifts in which they delight." Such is the description of the Bhikshu Dharmakara, whose perfect prayer or vow to save all beings brought him to the Western Paradise as Amitabha, Light infinite in brilliance and power, surpassing that of Sun and Moon, whose Pure Land is prosperous and good to live in, filled with physical delights, like every apocalyptic heaven, but also radiant with spiritual joy and free from sin as well as from pain. In it there mingles with the musical cries of peacocks, parrots, and geese the sweeter music ™Cf. S.B.E., Vol. XLIX, Part II, pp. 25-26. NALANDA gl of Buddhist philosophy, and voices are heard, beloved, sweet, and pleasant alike to ear and heart, like the sound of many waters murmuring “unreal, transient.”" Very interesting too are the ethical notes of this heavenly music; Karuna, pity, Kshanti, patience, Maitri, love, are prominent among them. The ethical system of the Mahayana, as embodied in these popular tales of Dharma- kara and his vow, is clearly almost the same as that of the Hinayana, as embodied in the Fataka tale of Sumedha, who promises to practice the virtues of charity (dana), morality (sila), resignation (nekkhamma), wisdom (pafiia), exertion (viriya), forbearance (khanti), truth- fulness (sacca), persistency (aditthana), love (metta), and equanimity (upekkha), and who by this noble path arrives at Buddahood, and is born as Sakyamuni. We may imagine the two tales being worked out side by side in the viharas of Nalanda. The great difference between the two schools is this: that whereas only lofty souls like Sumedha could tread the lonely path of these perfections, and so long as they followed the way of virtue, the multi- tudes could not attain, all could become Buddhas by following the Mahayana; and a minor but yet noteworthy difference is that in the latter system a more prominent place is given to altruistic virtues. This is, however, a matter of emphasis rather unfairly pressed by Mahayan- ist apologists. But as Dr. Anesaki has pointed out, momentous con- sequences followed from this change of emphasis, and sympathetic benevolence developed into spiritual com- munion as the ideal of the new school, until in Japan and China perhaps the most characteristic note of Buddhism is the sense of the unity of all things and their mutual 97 t Ibid., passim, especially pp. 39-40. g2 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY sympathy. From such a sense springs the practice, now universal in Buddhist lands, known as parinamana, or parivarta, the dedication of one’s spiritual and material gifts to the salvation of others, the “turning over’’ to them of merit. The little mother offering a strand of her hair at the Burmese pagoda, the Sinhalese monk reciting Pirit, the priests of China and Japan saying masses for the dead—all are imbued with this belief. So too for all the ultimate Goal is the same, Nirvana, Bodhi, or enlightenment, though their immediate purpose be the securing of material benefits in this life or in the underworld for themselves, for their clients, and for the dead; and though almost all are more eager for a para- dise than for Nirvana. From the increasing emphasis upon the Bodhisattva ideal sprang this doctrine, and the germs of both are in the Pali books. .For the example of Sakyamuni himself is nearer to the Bodhisattva than to the Arhat ideal, and he himself seems to have found in such devoted sacrifice as that of the saintly Punna as acceptable a type as the rigid self-culture of the recluse; and even in the earliest accounts the two ideals are seen side by side, and the practice of parinamana is adumbrated. But the Maha- yana, by its courageous doctrine of the Buddhahood of all, cut at the roots of the dual morality of Hinayana monasticism, which has undoubtedly put the celibate monk on a much higher plane than the layman. Perhaps the first indication of an attempt to break away is in the Gandhara sculptures of Metteyya as a prince in lay costume, and it is, as we have seen, to Gandhara that we may attribute the “Lotus” teachings which so clearly and boldly assert this truth of the One ™ Cf. “Buddhist Morality,” Z.R.EZ., and other papers by Dr. Anesaki. NALANDA 93 Way for layman and for all sentient beings as well as for monks. But at Nalanda and elsewhere the doctrine was worked out until Buddhism was fitted to capture the allegiance of China, Korea, and Japan. The Amitayur-dhyana Sitra 1s more than a popular treatise on Paradise. Belonging, on the one hand, to the Paradise Mahayana, it is also a link with the Yogacara school which we have now to study, for it is a textbook for the Mystic, instructing him how he may experience the truth of his religion, and escape here and now the sorrows of the world. This is the aim of all Buddhists, but some schools lay special stress upon it. The Yogacara, as its name implies, is one of these; notable for its philosophical distinction, it has won its way because of its practical aim, which is nothing else than the achievement of the Mystic Union, even if it has often contented itself with magic. The metaphysical contributions of this school are great. Under its leaders, Asanga and Vasubandhu, Brahmin converts of Northwest India, it developed at about the beginning of the fourth century of the Christian Era three notable doctrines. 1. It elaborated the doctrine of twofold knowledge as follows: There are, it said, three lakshana, aspects or stages of Truth; first comes the ordinary naive realism (parakalpita lakshana); but things are not what they seem to our deluded sight, and a second stage is reached when we realize the relativity of all things, and come to know that there is no abiding Reality in them; this stage is paratantra lakshana, and from it we must pass on to full and perfect knowledge, parinishpanna lakshana, and realize that the world in which we live and our own minds spring from a Supreme Mind. Having pierced the 94 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY clouds of illusion and scaled the heights of relative knowl- edge, the Mystic soars at last into the pure ether of Bodhi, perfect enlightenment, and has transcended the dualisms of subject and object, Samsara and Nirvana. 2. Of this ultimate reality the new school had its own interpretation. It is more positively conceived than by the Madhyamaka as a Supreme Mind. The school is, in fact, idealist, and its conception of the Alayavijfiana, the nidus, or foundation of all things, and the ground and basis of thought, is a remarkable one. It is called Citta, mind, and is distinguished from Manas, human intel- ligence and will, which arises when Karma acts on the Alaya and calls it into being, or rather to the delusion of being. It is this Manas which sees and apprehends the objec- tive world, and the school has its own elaborate and not very convincing psychology. As in early Buddhism it is “ignorance” which causes the production of a new self or delusion of self; and even the Alaya is itself only rela- tively real. The absolute Reality is Tathata, or “such- ness,’ which seems hardly distinguishable from the Void; this true nature of all things is free from all characteristics. But the name, Tathagata-garbha, or “Buddha-womb,” is given to it as a concession to those who cannot rest satisfied with so barren an absolute. What really matters is to recognize that the self and the world are unreal; that thought—blank and without characteristics—is the fundamental reality; and to have no attachment to this transcendent goal. To this extent all of us may be good Buddhists! But it is expressly stated that only “higher men” can apprehend this teaching, and it may well be that it is here misrepresented. The whole doctrine of the school is condensed in Asanga’s Mahdyanasamparigraha-Sastra, which begins NALANDA 95 with a statement of ten points in which the Mahayana is superior to the Hinayana, and goes on to expound the Alaya as “that which sustains and upholds, deep and subtle, wherein the seeds of being flow eternally.” It is, in other words, the substratum of all things, and holds together the elements of which they are composed. It is also called Adana, or receptacle—a storehouse in which the seeds of Karma are preserved until the time comes for them to sprout and bear fruit. Each conscious being leaves behind him an energy, which remains latent in this receptacle and finally acts and reacts with it, bringing about a new regrouping of Skandhas. The Alaya remains tranquil until it is “perfumed” or contaminated by Manas; till then, though it is in ceaseless motion, it is unconscious. 3. The Yogacara proceeded to systematize the rather undeveloped Buddhology of earlier schools. Some con- cept was needed to link together the two “Bodies” of the Madhyamaka. How was the historic Founder, for example, to be linked with the Dharmakadya? The Yogacara school added the new concept of the glorified body, or Sambhogakaya, who becomes henceforth the object of interest in the Mahayana. This glorious being was the reality incarnate in the accommodated body, or Nirmanakaya. In this way the historic is linked to the eternal, and Indian distrust of history finds a way to substitute eternity for time. Such are the three contributions to theological and philosophical thought made by the Yogacara school. Even more important is its practice, for it met the needs of hungry human hearts for a religion of experience. It is not to be supposed that the arid abstractions of the schoolmen satisfied ordinary humanity, and of the charm- 96 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY ing pictures of other-worldly joys drawn by the theo- logians many must have asked: “Do they correspond to objective fact?’ To such the new school offered the practice of Yoga, long familiar to India and clearly influen- cing Buddhism from its earliest times, but now frankly accepted as the heart and essence of the whole matter. The Supreme Reality is Bodhi, compared with which the Alayavijfiana itself has only relative reality; and to attain to Bodhi all the stages of the Bodhisattva must be practiced. The Lankdvatara Siitra’ is a standard work of this school and teaches that the Bodhisattva will reach his goal if he realizes that all things are mental creations: that they exist only as a mirage, or a nightmare, and are produced by the mental impulse of a former time which operates upon the Alayavijfiana to produce a new illusion of being. This will cease when he goes on to grasp the true nature of ultimate reality; and to help in this quest a series of meditations is laid down for him; beginning with the jhanas of early Buddhism he is to go on and enter farther and farther into the mysteries of unreality. Thus we see the Mahayana conception of the Bodhi- sattva—often so admirable in its altruism—degenerating into what seems as futile and selfish a pursuit as that of any Arhat; and Buddhist scholasticism, whether at Nalanda or in the Viharas of Ceylon, is at work in the fourth and fifth centuries of our era to the undoing of the Buddha’s way of virtue. It is difficult to believe that so negative a mysticism is worth while: to toil upward, step by step, and at last to arrive faint and weary at one last Negation—such seems the idealism of the Vijfanavada no less than the franker negativism of the Madhyamaka. BN. pp. 175-77: NALANDA 97 The seventeen stages of this long ascent Asanga set out in the Yogdcarabhiimi Sdstra, and in a volume of verse with a prose commentary, the Mahdydnasitra- lamkara, the philosophy of the school may be studied.? The former work is ascribed to the Bodhisattva Maitreya, and it is noteworthy that he has largely superseded the historic Gotama in this school; his cult for several centu- ries becomes very prominent, and its traces are widespread today from the sculptures of Gandhara to those of Korea. On Koyasan the saints of the Mantra or Tantric Bud- dhism, a development of Yogacara, await his coming, and his fat and genial smile greets the visitor at the entrance to every Chinese shrine. Clearly influenced by Asanga and Vijfianavada philos- ophy is another famous book, the Mahayana Sraddhot- padasastra, or “Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana.”? Attributed by tradition to the poet-minstrel, Asvaghosa, it is clearly of much later date; its style has nothing in common with the Buddha Carita, and that poem has no hint of its ruling ideas. The “Awakening” centers about the doctrine of Tathata—absolute reality beyond all com- prehension and expression, yet immanent in all. It claims that the Mahaydana is great in essence, for the essence of it is the mind and store of all; great in attribute, for it em- braces endless potentialities of Buddhahood; great in work, for these potentialities develop when duly disciplined. t [bid., pp.1170, 1085, 1190; the latter translated into French by S. Lévi. Paris, 1907. 2 [bid., pp. 1249, 1250. 3Nor has his other epic, the Saundarananda Kavya. Moreover, I-Tsing, who writes about him, makes no mention of the “Awakening,” and other books have been wrongly attributed to him. For able discussion of Asvaghosa see M. Anesaki in £.R.E., Vol. I; Sylvain Lévi in Fournal Asiatique (July and August, 1908). Dr. Anesaki calls him “the Buddhist Origen.” His colleague, Dr. I. Takakusu, supported by Drs. Sylvain Lévi and Winternitz, is opposed to the tradition of Asvaghosa’s authorship of the “Awakening.” D. T. Suzuki now believes that it is a Chinese work (Eastern Buddhist, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 103-4). 98 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY It is a concise and well-compacted treatise, idealist like the Yogacara and practical like it in its purpose, which is to awaken faith in the Mahayana, and to set forth the One Reality as an absolute mind of which individual minds are parts—as the waves on an ocean. This Absolute is more satisfying than that alike of the Yogacara and of the Madhyamaka, which the ‘‘ Awaken- ing” may well intend to reconcile, for it is set forth as a Tathagata-garbha, or “Womb of the Buddhas” from which all things proceed. The term, Alayavijfiana, is applied to it, but it is conceived as less relative and more absolute than the Alaya of the Yogacara. For ordinary folk this concept is set forth as the Bodhi-Citta, one universal, perfect mind, loving as well as wise, who has compassion on all; let them put faith in him. Such faith “is upright, having right thoughts of this Eternal; profound, rejoicing to study and practice whatever is good; greatly compassionate, anxious to deliver all.” For the more philosophical the Bodhi-Citta is described as the essence of all things, alone real, and therefore indescribable, yet known to men under the conditions of their phenomenal life. This, the highest truth (para- martha satya), is ineffable, and beyond definition, neither “empty” nor “not empty”; it alone is the Real, the Eternal, and may be translated either “suchness” with Suzuki, or “the True Model” with Timothy Richard, for Tathata means “that which is,” the “thing in itself.” This under another aspect is the Dharmakaya,’ and under another represents the Nibbana of the Pali books, *From Dharma, “law, teaching,” but also “nature,” “thing,” to Dharmakaya, “the body of law,” but also that which is the essence of nature, the foundation of exist- ence—this is an evolution natural to the human mind. Behind phenomena is the Absolute, behind the norm the Norm. NALANDA 99 that Supreme Truth of which Sakyamunt is alike discoverer and embodiment. For this is still the goal of Buddhism, even if in some Mahayana schools it is almost forgotten in the joys of Paradise. In these two doctrines the ““Awakening”’ is developing the teaching of Sakyamuni; first, that this highest Truth is ineffable; and second, that the Dhamma is the truth underlying all things. The Dharmakaya, it teaches, is this Absolute, which reveals itself either in human form, such as that of Sakyamuni, when it is called the Nir- manakaya or Buddha in Kenosis, or as the Sambhogakaya, or Buddha in bliss. The Christian theologian will at once see the resem- blance between this attempt to account for the historic Gotama and to relate him with the Eternal Order, and the early Christology of the church; the Nirmanakaya may be compared with the historic Jesus, the Sambhogakaya with the glorified Christ, while the Dharmakaya resembles the eternal God-head.t? For the theologians of both religions the problem was to do justice at once to the absolute authority of the Teacher and the contingent cir- cumstances of his human life. Both solved it by a theory of Kenosis, or self-emptying. What then is faith? It is belief in this threefold nature of the Buddha who saves us by his grace, grasping us as the tigress grasps her cub; belief in his Dharma, or teaching, and in his Sangha, and with this belief joy in them all. This faith, however, seems to be about to cling to some Being more personal and less abstract. Whether the “Awakening of Faith” in its early form definitely taught that this faith should center in Amitabha 1 So the absolute Brahman is revealed in the transfigured and in the human Krishna of the Bhagavadgita. 100 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY is not clear; there are passages which seem to imply such a personification of the Dharmakaya, and in the Chinese versions in common use’ the doctrine is explicitly taught in at least one passage at the close of the book, but these versions belong to the sixth and seventh centuries and the passage may bea gloss. It refers to an earlier work called “The Sutra,” possibly the Sukhdvati V-yuha, and exhorts the faithful to think of Amitabha, and to direct their good deeds toward his Western Paradise. They will then be reborn in it and will be confirmed in their faith in the Buddha. Side by side with faith goes enlightenment (for we are still dealing, after all, with Buddhism); this consists in transcending subjectivity, and in realizing that the Absolute is the real, ‘‘that the mortal is with the immortal blent.”” So only is ignorance annihilated, and man’s essential nature realized. In other words, the Bodhi-Citta, or Buddha-mind, latent in all men, awakes when they realize their true nature as parts of the Eternal. All are capable of Buddhahood, and this note is struck with emphasis, for the author realized that men are saved by hope as well as by faith, and that if so many early Bud- dhists had reached Arhatship all men might become Buddhas. Such, in essence, is this remarkable book which has been a gospel of hope and comfort to countless millions, and which helped to lay the foundations for a universal Buddhism. It is accepted, in fact, by all schools of the Mahayana, of which it is in many ways the crowning achievement. How did this notable development of doctrine take place? Itis not sufficient to urge the claims of the human 1 One translated in 553 a.D. by Paramartha, one in 695-700 a.p. by Sikshananda. NALANDA IOI heart, nor even the demands of human reason, though here is the nucleus of a true answer; man needs a concep- tion of the Divine, he wi// argue back to a First Cause, and in it he will always postulate compassion as well as wis- dom; he cannot well get along without belief in a Creator and Savior. But there is also the historic fact that converts, trained in Hindu philosophy, brought back into the main stream of Buddhism doctrines which the Bud- dhist reformation had, for the moment, submerged. The “Awakening of Faith”? may seem unorthodox Buddhism; it is “good Krishnaism,” and in it we may see Hindu philosophy taking a noble revenge. So there appears in Buddhism a formulated pantheistic idealism, and a universalistic note which has made it a gospel for the many. As Mahayanist scholars claim, here was a legitimate development; from the very first the historical Gotama had tended at once to emphasize faith in himself and, paradoxical as it may seem, to remove himself behind the Dharma; how natural that this Dharma, which stood for universal moral law, should itself first tend to take on a cosmic significance, and then be embodied in a personal savior. The Dharma emanates from the Dharmakaya; the Tathagata is the embodiment of Tathata. Like the “Lotus,” the “Awakening of Faith” may serve as a useful link between the Christian and the Buddhist, as let the following incident attest. Dr. Timothy Richard, a veteran missionary in China, has put it on record that when the latter book first came into his hands he sat late into the night reading it, and was again and again constrained to exclaim to his companion: “Listen to this; it is a Christian book,” only to be told 102 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY by that champion of orthodoxy: “Go to sleep. You are reading your own thoughts into it.” Yet the doctrine of an Eternal Being whose nature is love, and whom to trust is to be saved, is common to both, and the great bulk of the worshipers of the two religions are simple folk who do not trouble their heads as to whether this Eternal is personal or not. In the “Awakening of Faith” we see Buddhism becoming a religion whose idea of God has nothing in it which is unworthy, and whose philosophy is closely akin to much Christian idealism. Yet, like other Mahayana books, it lays Buddhism open to the dangers of pantheism, because it does not sufficiently emphasize the transcendence of the Tathata, or Absolute. This was one reason why Buddhism was later reabsorbed into Hinduism, and the great University of Nalanda fell as much through internal degeneration and compromise with Tantric Hinduism as through the iconoclasm of Islam. Yet from the second to the ninth century it remained a great center of learning, and especially of the two great schools of the Madhyamaka and the Vijfianavada, whose textbooks went out from its halls to China and Tibet, many of them in the possession of the great pilgrim with whom we started out on our investigation; it must have been a great university which won the enthusiasm of Hiuen-Tsiang. Other great and notable names on its roll of honor are Chandrakirti and Santideva. To the latter we owe an admirable, if not very original, compendium of doctrine, the Siksha-Sammucaya,* in which the Bodhisattva ideal is set forth as one of real beauty, and here we see the positive side of the vta negativa discussed above. t Rouse and Bendall, Z.T. London: Murray, 1922. NALANDA 103 How shall I seek the goal to gain While others live in fear and pain? Should I this self of mine preserve And fail those other selves to serve ? asks its first Karika, or stanza, and it is answered: O thou that wouldst that goal attain And find for all the end of pain— Make firm the root of faith within, Set thine own mind the Light to win. This is as orthodox as the Dhammapada, and the book goes on to show that the Bodhisattva regards others as himself—nay, above himself: “It is better that I alone should suffer than that others should sink to torment.” More original and full of fine fervor is the Bodhicarya- vatara of the same author, written “‘for his own satisfac- tion,” perhaps as a result of his patient and devout edi- torial work on the “Compendium.” As he muses the fire kindles, and he begins to glorify the Bodhi-Citta, and to implore Bodhisattvas to become servants of all. “May I be medicine to the sick .... their physician and nurse ... . aguide to the lost, a ship to the voyager, a lamp in darkness, a couch to the weary..... The sorrow of the stranger I must destroy as my own. .... I must serve others because they are beings like myself.” Yes, this beautiful dream ends in the stark unreality of nihilism. “Who can be honored, who reproached? Where are joy and sorrow, the loved and the hated, avarice and liberality? Search as ye will ye may not find.” “Tt seems,” says G. K. Nariman, in his excellent account of Sanskrit Buddhism’ (which has reached me 1 Literary History of Sanskrit Buddhism. Bombay, 1923. 104 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY as this goes to press), “‘to be the curse of Indian mentality that whenever it soars too high it lands in absurdity.” Alas! The schoolmen of Nalanda fell into worse depths, and it is one of the tragedies of history that this great university, alike in her too great tolerance and in her oversubtlety, deserted the Middle Path of Sakyamuni. About the sixth century began the penetration of his austere house by Sakta Hinduism, a process which we shall study in a later chapter; and even in the Tantric Buddhism which resulted Nalanda was before long over- shadowed by the new University of Vikramasila on the Ganges, and at last went down before the furious onslaught of Islam, that scourge of degenerate faiths. CHAPTER V MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, AND SUKHOTHAI Fastnesses of the Theravada in Ceylon, Burma, and Siam (250 B.C—rzgoo A.D.) “As is the sowing so is the harvest .... The monks are the harvestfield of merit.” —SAKYAMUNI. Amid a sea of scrubby jungle that shimmers in a perpetual haze of heat rises the rocky knoll of Missaka; it is today known as Mihintale, and on its three peaks are dagobas and viharas, where a few monks of the Theravada keep alive the monastic form into which early Ceylon Buddhism was cast by the great Mahinda, while his father, Asoka, was making it a religion for the masses of the people of India. Here today one may visit the rock- hewn study or cell of the royal missionary from which there went out the emissaries of the Dhamma. Seven miles to the west is the sacred city of Anuradhapura, which more, perhaps, than any relic of Buddhism captures the imagination of the student, and reveals something of the splendid civilization which grew up about the Sangha. Its vast dagobas, its ancient trees and pleasant parks, its slender stone pillars and great carved lintels remain to tell of a noble city, where kings once vied with one another in honoring the Sangha, and where monastic Buddhism, withdrawn yet watchful, overawed the throne and nerved it to fresh devotion. The island chronicles, Dipawamsa (fourth century a.p.) and Mahdwamsa (early fifth), are TO5 106 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY in their main impressions borne out by Fa-Hian, who spent some time in Lanka. He contrasts its triumphant championship of the order and their activity with the shameful neglect of the Buddha’s Holy Land, and he returned to China inspired by the picture of what a Bud- dhist kingdom might be, and thrilled by its gorgeous ceremonial and elaborate worship. Even as early as the Asokan era there is evidence on the great gateway at Sanchi of the coming of Sanghamitta, the sister of Mahinda, bringing with her a branch of the sacred Bo- tree. It stands today in the Meghavana Park, a citadel of the orthodox. It seems to totter, yet life still courses in its ancient veins—at once a relic and a symbol of the amazing vitality of the Dhamma. And the mighty cities of Anuradhapura (third century B.c. to seventh century A.D.) and of Polunaruwa (eighth to thirteenth century A.D.), ruined though they are and half buried by jungle, are equally eloquent of its powers of recovery, and of the close alliance of church and state in the island. Even Kandy, the capital of a later and degenerate era, has its royal palace and its Temple of the Tooth practi- cally under one roof. The history of the kings of Ceylon from Tissa, the friend and ally of Asoka, onward is intimately bound up with that of Buddhism; and sometimes the alliance bene- fited the people, as in the noble instance of Dutthagamini of the house of Tissa, who, leading out his armies to crush Elara, the Tamil usurper, was seized by the truly Buddhist conviction that battles are vain and disastrous. Halting his armies he rode forth alone on his great elephant, challenged Elara to single combat, slew him, and erected a monument to his memory. Dutthagamani is perhaps the Asoka of Ceylon, and eleven chapters of the Mah- MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 107 awamsa tell us of his pious works, among them the Ruanweli Dagoba, greatest of Anuraddhapura’s great pagodas, to the founding of which came Buddhists from lands as far off as Alexandria’ and Kashmir; for the Dhamma was already far flung. Another patron and builder was Vatthagamani, who reigned in the first century B.c. He built the Abhayagiri Dagoba, and in his reign we hear of the first heresies, none of which, however, amounted to a breaking away from Hinayana, though as Huien-Tsiang tells us, Mahayana was also studied in some of the viharas of Ceylon. MHere, especially at Abhayagiri, dwelt the schismatic Vetulyas. They were strong enough to maintain a separate existence for twelve centuries, refusing to be reconciled to the great and orthodox Mahavihara. As we read of the great building activity of the kings, and visit the colossal remains of their ancient cities, we cannot but realize that the Sangha was not an unmixed blessing; by the end of the fourth century Fa-Hian tells us there were over 50,000 monks in the island, and today one-third of its arable land is monastic property. At the head of the thousand steps leading to Mahinda’s retreat are two well-wrought marble slabs which tell of the gifts of various kings, and lay down regulations for the manage- ment of the vast estates belonging to the monastery. Such records are common in the island, and the gradual conquest of it by Indian invaders and by the encroaching jungle suggests a people worn out by the exactions of an aristocratic and austere religion, which throve most when kings smiled upon it. Some of these kings, however, inspired by its true spirit—that of the Bodhisattva—built 1 The “Alasanda” of the chronicle may be an Indo-Greek town, or it may be the Egyptian Alexandria. Asoka sent a mission to Tulamayo or Ptolemy of Egypt. 108 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY roads and irrigation tanks, and the monks for their part have laid upon the world the debt of having transcribed, edited, and preserved the Tipitaka. It is possible that the whole dbhidhamma is their work. This literary activity went on from about 20 B.c. until the fifth century A.D., when the great commentaries were composed. The greatest of these monastic commentators, Bud- dhaghosa, a convert from Hinduism, is said to have proved his fitness for the task by writing the great work, Visuddhi Magga, “Path of Purity or Salvation,” a systematic exposition of the Theravada. After this, with amazing energy and erudition, he produced a series of notable commentaries on the chief Pali books: “In these works, while the life of the Buddha as a monk is still clearly realized, he is also thought of as a sort of divine being exercising cosmic powers as in the Mahayana.’ In this state of indecision as to its Founder’s real nature Ceylon Buddhism has remained to this day, and Buddhaghosa is largely responsible for this crystallization of the religion at a stage of suspended judgment. Insisting that Pali was the language for the canonical books,? he further safeguarded their integrity by his admirable commentaries, of which we may note especially the Visuddhi Magga. It has three main divisions: (1) chapters i and ii, deal- ing with Sila, conduct; (2) chapters iii to xii, dealing with Samadhi, meditation; and (3) chapters xiii to xxiii, deal- ing with Pafifia, intuitive knowledge of religious truth. In other words, it consists of a commentary upon the three great disciplines of meditation and the transcendental knowledge which are based upon right behavior, and it has tJ. N. Farquhar, Outlines of the Religious Literature of India, p. 155. 2 About 400 A.D. Mahadhammakathi had translated the suttas into Sinhalese. There is little evidence for the tradition that Buddhaghosa destroyed the Sinhalese version of any of the books. MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 109 served to keep the monks of Ceylon, Burma, and Siam true to the dictum of early Buddhism, “No pafifia without samadhi, no samadhi without panffia.” It has also kept before them the far-off goal, Nibbana, and though to this day they differ among themselves as to its exact nature, they all agree as to the way of reaching it, and turn austerely and resolutely away from the less stoical devotion of the Mahayana. Hopelessly, yet with dogged endurance, they cling to the forty subjects of meditation, and if none attains to the six High Powers, or abhififia, yet for the most part they abstain from worldliness, and some reach a certain wise and gentle patience which is true to type. With Buddhaghosa Pali became the classic language of the island, and the copying and recopying of the Tipitika on palm-leaf strips has become one of the main activities of the monks. They have remained the champions of Theravada orthodoxy as against the Mahayana, of which some traces are found in the island, and against Hinduism, which has been an ever present rival, between whose cham- pions and the Bhikkhus debate and controversy have been frequent and bitter. Ofone such debate, which took place in the ninth or tenth century, we have a record in the life of Manikka Vachagar, the Tamil poet. With his face veiled so that he should not see their “ill-omened counte- nances,” the poet met a Buddhist delegation which had been summoned to the king’s court at Madura in South India. In the presence of the two kings, their backers, and of innumerable deities who regarded with a jealous indignation the deification of Sakyamuni, the poet is seen challenging the Buddhists to show reason for their pres- ence. They are no whit abashed. “To tell the city are we come that there is no god but him whose worship IIO EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY we celebrate, our lord Buddha.” ‘‘Can a hare become an elephant? Who is this god of yours?’ “Can one reveal the sun to the blind? Yet he is revealed in our books, and has been born in many a loving shape.” The Buddhist champion then went on to expound the Eight- fold Noble Path and the doctrines of Anatta and Anicca. The former the Saivite rejected as having nothing original in it, and the latter called down his scornful indignation: Since all is transient and without substantial entity, where is the knower, the knowledge, the object known? Where is the lawgiver and deliverer himself ? How does he continue to deliver and to teach ? He is by your own showing annihilated; and annihilation is your creed. He went on to taunt the Buddhists with hypocrisy, for with all their special emphasis on ahimsa, or not killing, they naively eat the flesh of that which has been killed; and the Buddhist champion is represented as having retreated, unable to rebut some, at any rate, of these arguments. It seems clear that scholastic Hinayana was at this time largely annihilationist in its doctrine of Nibbana. About this time, driven ignominiously out of South India, defeated both by Hindu and Mahayana polytheism, orthodox monastic Buddhism was gaining a powerful hold in Burma. According to Burmese tradition it was Bud- dhagosa himself who first established it there. Yet it is certain that it waited until the eleventh century to become in any sense a national religion, and as in Asokan India and in the Ceylon of many centuries it was the throne which raised it to this position. The ancient capital, Arimaddana or Pagan, had been for hundreds of years familiar with Buddhism, but it was Anawrata who in the middle of the eleventh century was converted by a wandering monk to the Theravada and became its zealous patron. Send- MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 111 ing to his neighbor the king of Thaton (Sudhammapura), he demanded a complete edition of the Tipitaka, and being refused, sacked the town and carried books, monks, king, and people to Pagan, now a veritable city of pagodas, which he and his successors built. The library was housed in a splendid building, and Pagan became a fastness of Pali scholarship, especially in grammar and syntax.’ As in Ceylon, the 4éhidhamma has especially attracted the attention of the monks of Burma, and in the twelfth century Anuruddha compiled a commentary upon it cover- ing much the same ground as the Visuddhi Magga, but more psychological in character.’ While, however, Burma is now, and has been since the time of Anawrata, a fastness of the Theravada, archaeology is revealing traces of a degenerate Mahayana mingled with magic and tantric practices, and there was also a constant tendency to fuse with the ever present animism, which is still so strong among the Burmese. In spite of the efforts of Anawrata and others to rid Buddhism of both, the religion of the Burmese is by no means free from them today, and the cheerful, sunny temperament of the people and their naive propitiation of the spirit-world contrast strangely with the sad refrain of the monks: “ Dukkha, anatta, anicca.” Burmese Buddhists have, moreover, a vague, pantheistic philosophy of life which is more akin to the Mahayana than to the Hinayana, and their worship of the pagoda and of the images, their sharing of merit, — their prayers for material and other blessings, and their ardent desire to be reborn in a paradise would all seem to indicate that the Buddhism of the Burmese masses is *The Kariké of Dhammasenapati (eleventh century) and the Saddaniti of Ag- gavamsa (twelfth century) are well-known examples of Burmese grammatical works on the Pali language. See M. Bode, The Pali Literature of Burma, chap. ii. 2 The Abhidhammatha Sangaha; see “‘Compendium of Philosophy,” P.T.S., 1910. 112 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY somewhere between the Hinayana and the Mahayana. The great pagoda platform at Rangoon has indeed been likened to “the bazaars of Paradise,” where the people throng for social as well as religious purposes, and the shrines are somewhere between the old chaitya of the Hinayana and the temple of the Mahayana. Lights and incense burn before innumerable images of the Buddha, and here one sees what can only be described as worship. It may well be that in its cheerful seriousness the religion of the lay-people has not changed much since the days of Sakyamuni. Now as then it has made great concessions to human needs, which the more stoical and often rather unsympathetic monk himself has had to tolerate; yet there is much in it, such as its mechanical conception of merit and its magic practices of exorcism, which the Founder strove to banish. It is, however, by such con- cessions, and by seeking to adapt itself to the social life of the people, from festive marriages to no less festive funerals, and from the birth of the child to the welfare of the dead beyond the grave, that Buddhism has made itself a national religion in Burma, and is known as “Burma custom’; and for these the monks are responsible. Yet life within the monastery itself has changed but little; the monks are still monks and not priests, and the more learned of them regard these popular manifestations as sideshows, necessary concessions to human frailty; most honored among them 1s still the austere and ascetic Arhat. The student of conservative monastic Hinayana will find in the monasteries of these lands of Southeastern Asia a Buddhism which has kept true to type since the days of Buddhaghosa and the early champions and formulators of the Theravada. MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 113 In Siam as in Burma Buddhism owes much to the Sangha of Ceylon. Though earlier missions had been at work from the fifth century a.D. onward, some from Burma and some from Camboja, yet it was not until the four- teenth century that Siamese Buddhism took its present form. King Suryavamsa Rama, following the example of Anawrata, sent to Ceylon for a teacher. He received him in great pomp at Sukhothai, appointed him Sangharaja, a title which his successors have kept, dedicated a golden image of the Buddha, and prayed that the merit of this act might bring him to Buddhahood. To hasten this consummation he himself entered the order, and once more we see the age-long struggle of the monastic ideal against the secular. It soon took dramatic form, for the king’s example spread and the affairs of state lan- guished until the people took alarm and insisted that he and his court return to their proper spheres. The Siamese Sangha pulled hard in the opposite direction, but the Ceylonese abbot, who had seen similar conflicts in the history of his own people, wisely bade the king return to his throne, while he himself would remain king of the order. As in Ceylon and Burma, therefore, a division of function was arranged, the king and the laity supporting the monks and winning merit by their gifts of buildings, food, and clothing. The Buddhism of Siam 1s specially worthy of study because it still basks in royal favor and its Sangharat is still a member of the ruling house. Here, in fact, is a Buddhist medieval kingdom with much of the glamor of the days of Dutthagamini and of Anawrata still upon it. Slowly along the river wind splendid barges of state in which the king and his court ride to offer at the principal Wats the gifts of clothing which their women have been busy preparing; this is the old Buddhist prac- 114 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY tice of Kathina, the preparing of robes for the monks, to which the whole country gives itself every October. Within the monasteries also, the spirit of devotion 1s alive. The yearly examination of candidates for degrees in Pali learning has been lately restored, and is making for higher standards. All these lands of Southeastern Asia are indeed fast- nesses of the Hinayana; the yellow robe of the monk and the bizarre roofs of pagodas and monasteries are the most striking features of a tropical landscape. Here Buddhism flourishes; Siam has over fifty thousand monks and ten thousand novices; Burma has nearly sixteen thousand monasteries, and those of Ceylon own a third of the arable land of the island. Though the great strongholds Mihintale, Arimaddana, and Sukhothai lie in ruins, and the jungle struggles to reclaim them, yet the life of the monks goes on unchanged, and the people are well content with Buddhism so long as it tolerates their superstitions and continues to provide religious junketings and elementary education. Its moral code too they know and appreciate, even if, like the rest of us, they select from it those things which are not too high and difficult. The great lesson of compassion, for example, they admire even when they let it peter out to a one-sided emphasis on taking no life; liberality they conceive in a truly liberal spirit as their gifts to monastery and pagoda and their hospitality to strangers bear witness. In these ways sila and dana are observed by most. The third great pillar of the Buddhist system, jhana, or meditation, they leave for the most part to the monks; but in certain old people there are to be seen a wistful striving after this high goal and a conviction that Nibbana, though it is very far off, is an alluring ideal, and that when Metteyya Buddha MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 115 comes their feet will be guided along that steep road. In the meantime they can win merit alike for themselves and for their families, and they aspire to the honorable title of ‘‘pagoda-builder.”’ In all these lands too it is common for one son to become a monk; and in Burma all boys are admitted for a period to the Sangha. To enter the monastic life is easy, and the Pabbajja, or act of leaving the world, is dramatically represented by putting off the rich apparel, shaving the head, and donning the yellow robe; it is followed by the Upasampada, or ordination, a simple ceremony in which the candidate 1s examined and sponsored by his tutor, and then repeats the ancient formula: “I take refuge in Buddha, the Sangha, and the Dhamma.” Undoubtedly many world-weary men and many unsuc- cessful in worldly callings find their way into the order, and the vocation to the monastic life, as in all religions, is a rare one; but criminals and other undesirables are usually kept out. The orders are Samanéra, Novice (Burmese, Shin; Siamese, Samanen), Bhikkhu, Monk (Burmese, Pyit- shin; Siamese, Phikhu), and Thera, Elder (Burmese, Pongyi; Siamese, Phra), and there is in addition in Burma a tendency to a hierarchy, culminating in the Superior, or Thathanabaing, who, under the Burmese kings, wielded a power like that of the great abbots in the palmy days of the Ceylon monarchy. In Siam the king’s brother is head of the order, Sangharat, and under him are four chief abbots nominated by the king and called Somdetchao. The monks of all these countries are on the whole well versed in the scriptures, some of them knowing whole books by heart, and special fame attaches to scholars of 116 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY the dificult and abstruse 4bhidhamma; the inscription at Mihintale referred to above lays down the regulation that a monk who can repeat this Higher Religion is to receive twelve measures of rice as against five for the repeater of the Vinaya, and seven for the repeater of the Sutta. In other words, the third Basket is as valuable and as difficult as the other two put together! The most fruitful and the most arduous of the monkish exercises is the practice of the various forms of meditation prescribed in this collection, and in such commentaries as the Visuddhi Magga we find a description of forty Kam- matthanas which include: (1) ten recollections (anussati) upon the Three Jewels, morality, liberality, the gods, death, the body, the Yoga practice of deep breathing, and calmness; (2) ten Asubhabhavana, or contemplations of unpleasant states of the dead and decaying body, which lead to disgust and detachment; (3) the Brahmavihara, or spiritual abode of the sentiments of benevolence (Mettam), compassion (Karuna), cheerful sympathy (Mudita) and equanimity (Upekkha), which Buddhism took over from the Yoga of ancient India; (4) ten Kasina, practices of concentrated attention upon such objects as earth, water, space, air, primary colors, etc. These practices lead to a unification of consciousness (cittassa ekaggata), and to serene mental states in which the schoolmen distinguished four Jhanas, or stages, and the experience of the austere pleasure of these states of Samadhi is, as we have seen, the kernel of the whole Buddhist religion, interpreted in its highest manifestation as the realization of Nibbana and the cessation of Samsara. It is the attainment of some measure of success in these high exercises which keeps the Sangha alive and expectant; and when any monk shows promise of becoming expert MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 117 in them his fame spreads rapidly, and hope revives that an Arhat is once more to be found among men. He will be recognized by possessing the abhififia, which are the divine ear which can catch all sounds, the divine eye which can see to the utmost confines of space, the power of work- ing miracles and of reading the thoughts of others, and memory of former existences. About this hope, forlorn and precarious as it must seem to us, the life of the Sangha is organized, and in the daily round of the monks of Ceylon, Burma, and Siam we have undoubtedly a picture of Theravada Buddhism as it has been preserved for at least two thousand years. Their Patimokkha (“Cuirass,” or code of discipline) was almost certainly forged in ancient days, and is accepted by all schools of Buddhists. In its shorter form, that of the Pali language, it contains 227 rules, and in the Chinese and Tibetan form 250 and 259, respectively. These rules are recited in Southeastern Asia twice a month. Gathering in one of their central halls, the brethren of the yellow robe sit in solemn assembly, and as each regulation is recited, are admonished to confess if they have broken it. But, as in the Christian church, such public confession is almost always replaced either by secret confession to one another, or by silence. More familiar is the pindapatika, or collection of food from the laity. Solemnly, in the early morning, a file of monks is seen to pass down the village street, stopping without a word at each house with downcast eyes, begging bowls held out; no word of thanks is spoken, for it is the donor who gains the merit; and in most monasteries it is the dogs who benefit in material things, for a more palatable meal is usually prepared for the mendicants by those who remain within doors. The letter of the old 118 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY law is kept also in the practice of the Pamsakulika, or Kathina. The Founder having enjoined upon his monks that they should go clad in rags, new cloth, often specially woven and dyed for the monks, is cut up by the laity into small squares and then sewn together again. A day in a monastery of one of these lands passes leis urely and not unpleasantly, with a reasonable division of function: the younger to attend to the wants of the elder; all to do their share of meditation; while some are set apart for the teaching of the primary school. What do they teach the laity of religious truth? Clearly the 4bhidhamma is too high for them; the Vinaya is for the monks alone; and strangely the Suttas, so rich in biographic material, are not so much used as the Fatakas, or myths, among which that of the Vessantara is most popular. Very well known too is a summary of the ethic for laymen, the Maha Mangala Sutta (Burmese, Mingala thot), and a “Song of the Eight Victories,” which tells how the Blessed One vanquished his foes, physical, intellectual, and spiritual. These runes are used as Pirit, a magic ceremony, which the laity have come to associate most with the monks. If snakes are to be driven out, or a pestilence stayed, the monk is called in, and he often improves the occasion by preaching upon the cardinal tenet of ahimsa (not killing). The villagers may want to drive out a nest of cobras, or the govern- ment may urge the extermination of the rat and the mos- quito, but there stands the monk, an embodied con- science. “Let them not harm their little brothers, but trust to the power of spirit, and give gifts to the Sangha.” The doctrine of merit (kusalam) won by such gifts, or by building shrines, has become the warp and woof of tSee my Heart of Buddhism. MIHINTALE, ARIMADDANA, SUKHOTHAI 119 lay-religion in Ceylon, Siam, and Burma. “The laity to make offerings, the monk to meditate; thus both win merit” is the accepted division of labor. It is perhaps not unfair to say that the former plays the game more honorably than the latter. After all, it is easier to part with a coin than to keep a vigil. The Buddhism of Southeastern Asia is not troubled much by denominations. They are of minor importance, and do not lead to serious friction. In Ceylon, for example, the Siam sect is more aristocratic and exclusive than the others, admitting only members of the upper castes—a course to which it may well have been driven by competition with Hinduism. In Burma again the Sulagandi lay more stress than the Mahagandi upon free will, and in Siam the Dhammayut is a reformed and more rigorous sect. But the hospitality of the monastery is not denied the visitor of other sects, and at great national festivals, such as that of the Buddha’s Tooth at Kandy, cne may see a striking demonstration of the fundamental unity of the Sangha. Here, bowing low before the reputed relic of their great leader, respected by the laity as custodians of his Dhamma, we may leave them, join- ing, before we go, in the cry which goes up from the assembled multitude: “Sadhu—Well done!’ for we too are debtors to the brethren of the yellow robe! CHAPTER VI LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI Buddhism in China (ca. roo—600 A.D.) “Confucian China would never have accepted the Idealism of India had not Lao-tze and Taoism towards the end of the Chow dynasty pre- pared a psychological foundation for the development of both these extremes of Asiatic thought.” —OKAKURA. “The Way of Confucius and the Way of Sakyamuni are two wings; without either China cannot fly.’ —WeEN Lt. While Gotama was preaching in the Ganges Valley, Confucius and Lao-tze were grafting upon the ancient Chinese stock of animism, or naturism, their own distinc- tive teachings. And while in India and adjoining coun- tries the exclusive Hinayana was being transmuted into the universalist Mahayana, this great parent-stem of Chinese religion was being shaped to receive the new graft.* Here is material of vital interest for a philosophy of history which must some day be written, and in it we may note these stages: (1) sixth century B.c.—(a) Sakyamuni in India, Confucius in China, teachers differ- ing radically in purpose, and yet agreeing on certain great fundamentals of morality; (4) Sakyamuni in India, Lao-tze in China giving a general background for such teachings in the idea of a Dhamma, or Tao, a Norm, natural “order,” or “road” following which men attain to righteousness; and both essentially Mystics; (2) the ™Cf. De Groot, “Confucian Religion,” EZ.R.E., Vol. IV, and his “Religion in China,” pp. 2-3; cf. his comment: “It is a remarkable coincidence that this greatest moment in the development of religion in China was synchronous with the birth of Christ and Christianity.” I20 LOYANG, CHANG-AN, T’IEN T’AI 121 leaven at work in both lands, moralizing the ancient faiths, bringing order and harmony to men’s thought, and adding a mystic tinge to moral endeavor; (3) second century B.c. to second century A.D.—the grafting of the new teachings upon the ancient faiths until they become the main branches; and (4) the gradual shaping of the Indian branch and of the Chinese trunk for the grafting of the former upon the latter. Such, in bare outline, are the stages of a long and remarkable process for which the metaphor of grafting is too simple; another from the same science, that of cross-fertilization, would be more appro- priate; but for our purpose that used will suffice to indicate the great event in Chinese history which we have now to study—the introduction of Buddhism. So well was this grafting done that by the sixth century Buddhist monuments show the Buddha attended by Confucian and Taoist gods, and we meet the scholar, Fu Hsi, dressed in a Taoist cap, a Buddhist stole, and Confucian shoes, and pointing to each in turn when the emperor questioned him as to his religious beliefs. It is interesting to reflect that we in the West are nearly two thousand years behind the East in the comparative study of religion, and early in the ninth century the scholar, Tsung Mi of Kwei Féng, published his famous Origin of Man in which the teaching of the three schools are com- pared, criticized in detail, and reconciled.t. The Chinese is not unreasonable nor superficial when he refuses to say that he belongs exclusively to any of the San Chiao, the “three which are one”’; nor is it indeed possible today to divorce Confucian ethics from Buddhist philosophy and religion, with which Taoism is inextricably interwoven. 1B.N., Yuen Fan Lun, 1594. “The teachings of Kung-fu-tsz, Lao-tsz and Shakya are different . . . . each supplementing the other.” For a translation of this important work see K. Nukariya, Religion of the Samurai. 122 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY It is no more possible to say when or how the first Buddhist mission in China began; yet an early chronicle records a mission in 217 B.c. when Li Fang and seventeen others arrived at Hsi-An;* and there is every reason to suppose that the great caravan roads allowed interchange of ideas as well as of merchandise. And the great Han dynasty (202 B.c.—220 A.D.) may well have used such help as Buddhism affords in consolidating its rule. Such may be the meaning of the famous dream of the Emperor Ming-Ti (58-76 a.p.), that a high, shining “golden God” appeared to him and entered his palace; such dreams do not come “‘out of the blue’”’; there must have been some basis for the vision in thoughts already in the emperor’s mind, and in some Buddhist image or Buddhist teachings already circulating in China. Nor could Ming-Ti’s dream be interpreted unless a knowledge of Buddhism already existed in China. Indeed an image is said to have been brought back by an expedition in 121 B.c. And when the emperor obeyed the vision, sending an embassy of eighteen, and summoning the missionaries, She Moteng (or Kasyapa Matanga) and Ku-fa-lan (or Gobharana), in 65 A.D. from Khotan, they succeeded so well that we may believe that they were sowing on soil previously prepared. They both came from Central India, but had worked in the land of the Yuehchi; and now in 67 a.p. they settled at the capital, and the one work assigned to them which has come down to us was a handbook of moral teaching which could give no great alarm either to Confucianists or to Taoists, and which might be claimed equally well by Hinayana and by Mahayana Buddhists. *The legend that they were sent by Asoka if not exact (he died about 231 B.c.) may yet have some truth in it, for the impetus he gave to Buddhist missions lived on. LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN TAI 193 The scene of their labors was the ancient city of Loyang,* now once more the center of a splendid civiliza- tion, for the great dynasty of Eastern Han had chosen this peaceful yet busy capital in the valley of the Hoang-ho, where great trade roads met. And here the missionaries found a cosmopolitan society, and were given a cordial welcome by the emperor.?. Weary with their long journey, they would enjoy the wide prospect over lake and river, and not far away were mountains dear to the Buddhist heart. Here in the Royal Library they worked, and their first apologetic is still an honored classic, a proof of the tact and skill with which they approached the Chinese mind. An early record tells us that they “concealed their deep learning and did not translate many books”; if they did nothing but give to the Chinese this Sitra of Forty-two Sayings, their mission was amply justified. It seems to be a compilation from larger works, intended as a manual for the use of the emperor and other inquirers, and is wisely cast in a Confucian mold. Each paragraph begins after the manner of the Analects, ‘Thus saith the Master,” and most of the more controversial things of Buddhism are omitted. First comes a brief statement of the facts of Sakya- muni’s life, a reference to the two hundred and fifty rules for monks, and then the ten precepts and the four stages of Arhatship. Next is a discourse on compassion and patient meekness which is very Taoist; let the sage re- member that whosoever insults him is like one who spits against the sky, his spittle returns upon his own head! 1 Modern Honan-fu. 2 While Kasyapa and his colleague were being welcomed to the Chinese capital, SS. Peter and Paul were being put to death in Rome. This is an illustration at once of the superiority of Chinese tolerance, and of the less revolutionary character of Buddhism as compared with Christianity. It seems to have supported the imperialism of the Han dynasty at least. x nei } ————— — 124 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY The Way is difficult, yet the pure in heart and single in purpose can understand it, and it is a Way of joy and power—the power of meekness, which is restful and pure. By it ignorance is vanquished, lust is cast out, and freedom , attained. Let all be benevolent but avoid attachment, \which clouds the mind and dulls the keen edge of the spirit. He who is bound to wife and child is more closely a captive than he who lies manacled in prison. Better be thrown to a tiger than submit to such bondage. Here is the usual monastic teaching of Buddhism, which even in so careful an apologia will out, and we can- not wonder that it met with opposition in a land of filial piety like China. But, as if to disarm criticism, the Sutra goes on to suggest a sublimated family life; if the monk meets women he is to treat the young as sisters or daughters, the old as mothers. There follows sane advice upon the discipline of mind and body which should be as a well-tuned lute, and some characteristic questions and answers as to the real nature of the life of man; a passage of especial interest, no doubt, to the Taoists. The Buddha asked his disciples: “What is the life of man?” “It is the span allotted to him on earth,” said one; “Thou knowest not the Way,” said the Master. “It is the (energy of the) food we eat,” said another; “Nor thou,” replied the Master. “‘It is the sequence of many single moments,” ventured a third. “Thou,” exclaimed the Master, “art not far from the true Way!” All this is typical Hinayana Buddhism, with perhaps rather more emphasis on the Bodhisattva than on the Arhat ideal; but there are two passages which suggest that the compilers were looking toward a more developed doctrine of the person of the Buddha, and which at a later date LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 125 helped to transform Buddhism in China from a way of conduct to a way of devotion: “Rely not on thine own will,” and again, ‘You may be far from me, O my chil- dren! Keep my precepts and you will be as in my Presence, The two pioneers did not long survive their arrival at the capital, but they left a tradition of sound ‘scholafship and earnest work, and their monastery of the White Horse, Pai MaSst, became the model for many of its successors. ‘Toil on as the ox plods through deep mire, his eyes fixed on the goal that lies ahead”; in these words of their Sutra we may find perhaps an echo of their resolute endeavor, and their fitting epitaph. Seventy years went by before a second mission arrived to carry on their work. In 148 a.p. came the “Parthian Prince,” Anshikao, whose birth and education had fitted him to develop the work of adaptation they had begun, and who for twenty-two years toiled in Loyang at the task of translation.‘ No less than one hundred and seventy- six works are attributed to him, of which fifty-five remain, the majority being translations of books of the Pali canon, but some being apparently independent works; and to him is due the first introduction into China of the \/ Amitabha sects, which have run so victorious a course. That the historic Sakyamuni survived and was not far from his faithful disciple—such might be the pious infer- ence from the Sura of Forty-two Sayings; that behind him stood the Eternal Father—such was the explicit doctrine of the Amitdyur-dhyana Sitra which Anshikao and his Indo-Scythian colleague, Lokaraksha, known to the Chinese as Leou Kia Tchang, now made accessible ™ Meanwhile Antoninus Pius and M. Aurelius were ruling in Rome, Papias and Polycarp were being martyred, and Justin Martyr was defending Christianity. 126 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY to them. It seems clear that from the first the masses of the people were not attracted by the monastic type ——~ of the new religion; in fact, four centuries passed before Chinese were admitted to the order, and the ideal of a family life in the Paradise of Amitabha Buddha (Omito FS) \ VA attracted those whom the lonely peace of Nirvana left cold. There was, moreover, as we have indicated, a strong and venerable theistic cult which perhaps predisposed the hearts and minds of the Chinese to Omito F6; already for more than two thousand years the emperor had offered prayer and sacrifice for the nation on high places like Tai Shan to Shang Ti, whose name is used by Christian missionaries today as the name of God, and 1s universally revered in China. With Omito F6 came another deity already familiar to us; known in India as Avalokitesvara he is beloved in China as Kwanyin or Koan-cheu-yinn, an attempt to translate his name, “the god who looks down or hears the cry of man.” It is as Avalokitesvara that Amitabha comes to earth. Of these compassionate beings Anshikao, / had no doubt himself become a worshiper, and we may picture him as he turned in worship to the setting sun, filled with poignant memories of home and dear ones, whom he would one day meet in the Western Paradise. Did visions of Omito Fo come to him? Ifso he is one of a great company in China of whom it is believed that their devotion has been rewarded by radiant manifestations of this Lord of Bliss; and at such places as Puto Shan the pilgrim still strives to see the Lady Kwanyin (for she is the most popular form of Avalokitesvara), shining in the spray of sea or waterfall. Nor has this cult lacked devo- tees among the sages; as early as the sixth century we find the great Indian scholar, Bodhiruci, who translated LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 127 the Amitayus-Sutropadesa into Chinese," chiding a Taoist alchemist for his vain search for the elixir of life: How vain these prayers for five-score years Of such poor life as this! When Life is yours in endless stores Of Amitayu’s Bliss. With these two missions at Loyang begins the first great epoch of Chinese Buddhism—an epoch of translation lasting for four centuries, during which leaders from foreign lands were patiently educating a Chinese church and forming a Buddhist mind in China. That there was Opposition is clear, for the Han period was strongly Con- fucian,? and a steady production of polemical and apolo- getic works went on, of which we may cite the defense of Buddhism, by Moutzu, a contemporary of the Christian apologists Tertullian and Clement of Alexandria, and a convert from Confucianism, who with considerable skill uses his knowledge of the three religions to show that the Buddhist doctrine of impermanence is truer than the Taoist attempts to prolong life, and that, on the other hand, the mere morality of Confucius is not enough, though it is a good basis of government. Buddhism faces the facts of life, yet offers a mystical satisfaction to the yearnings of the human heart. It is difficult and austere, yet by no means unnatural, as its critics aver. That Buddhism sometimes descended to the miracle- mongering of the later Taoists is evidenced by the work of Fo-t’u-cheng, who had a vast number of disciples and is credited with the founding of nearly nine hundred monas- teries, and whose pupil, Tao-an, was one of the leading Buddhist thinkers of the fourth century. tT B.N., 1204. 2 China has never ceased to be so, and in 555 a.D. an imperial edict enacted that every provincial city should have its Confucian temple. 128 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY At Loyang also worked Ku Fa Hu or Dharmaraksha (266-313 A.D.), of Chinese Turkestan, translating many of the scriptures, among them two which have played a great part in the popularizing of Buddhism in China—the “Lotus of the Good Law’* and the Ulambana Sitra. The “Lotus,” with its glorified Sakyamuni and its note of universal salvation, was a gospel to satisfy the Chinese, and the Ullambana Sutra gave a place within Buddhism to the Chinese veneration for the dead, providing masses and other ceremonies by’which-filtal piety may further the well-being of the departed. Here was a triumphant answer to Confucian and other critics: “You neglect filial piety”? was their charge; “On the contrary,” the Buddhist could now reply, “we practice it even beyond the grave.” Modern China spends millions yearly on masses for the dead, and it 1s a common sight to see some layman kneeling devoutly before the abbot of a great monastic house while services on behalf of his dead are intoned by choirs of monks. In the tantric and some other sects the Buddhist pantheon is classified as guardians of the soul, each having his appointed period of service, and there are regular festivals of the dead, such as the Bon Matsuri of midsum- mer, so well known to visitors to Japan. In all Buddhist countries the pre-Buddhist animism has been blended in such ways with the cult, and indeed with the philosophy, of the new faith. In the Ullambana Sitra it is recorded that the great Moggallana, having attained the celestial eye of the Arhat, used it to investigate the present condi- tion of his dead parents. Seeing his mother toiling at some penitential task in the dim underworld, he asked the Master how he could help her. The reply was unhesitating: t Chinese Kan fa hwa kin. See B.N., 138. LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 129 Nothing can help thy parents, except my monks. They only can work on her behalf. This must thou do. On the fifteenth day of the seventh month go offer a rich gift of food and drink, of garments and other choice offerings to the Brethern. They are a field of merit, in which if thou sowest thou shalt reap a rich harvest, and shalt help thy dead even to the seventh generation. This is true to the earliest Buddhist teaching; why weep for the dead when you can help them in such a practical way? What boots for them your wailing and your tears? Mourning ye do but plough the desert sand! But offerings to the Brethren surely bring Rich harvests to the hungry Spirit-land. For there’s no farming in the Spirit-world, No tilth, nor herds nor any merchandise; Alms of the faithful are their only hope: Your charity alone the under-world supplies. So teaches the Buddha, or his monkish chronicler,? and perhaps the finest flower of this devotion is seen on the sacred mountain Koyasan, where stands a monument to all who fell in the war with Korea, friend and foe alike. He who would understand the spirit of the East will not pass lightly over these inveterate beliefs, but may, if he will, learn here some lessons which will enrich life: One long deep breath, a sigh from sleeping earth, As though in troubled dreams her spirit stirred, And all is still. No call of wakeful bird, No lift of leaf on trembling wave of air, But soulful silence brooding everywhere; The stars are veiled, and from their heights are heard The noiseless sweep of spirit forces, stirred As at the moment of some wondrous birth. *From The Heart of Buddhism. 2It is interesting to note that offerings to the dead were prohibited in the Deu- teronomic reforms in Israel, and that the priests there too benefited by the practice! einai, 130 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY Before each household shrine the candle gleams; The food is spread for guests that come unseen; And human faith in simple ways is fed. The air is filled with lucent, mystic beams; They come indeed, the loved and lost, I ween; And human hearts by lowly ways to God are led.? Such are the beliefs and practices, childlike perhaps, yet sprung from deep roots of human love, which express themselves most finely in the Bodhisattva; if merit is “reversible,” let me turn it over to all who need it. Such is the resolution of the Bodhisattvas: May these, our deeds of merit, all The universe of life pervade: And may we soon to Bodhi win And with us take the souls we aid. Here then at Loyang by the end of the third century A.D. Buddhism was proving its power to appeal to the masses as well as to the philosopher. With the fall of the great Han dynasty its center now shifts to the capital -of the eastern Chins, Chang-an, where for a hundred years it basked in the favor of the court, until the Tartar invasion drove it south to Shien-yeh, now called Nanking. Situated on the Waiho River, a tributary of the Hoang-ho, Chang-an? was.a wonderful center of intellectual and artistic life. Here six great trade roads converged, thronged then as they are today with an endless and varied stream of traffic. And with the caravans came a steady succession of Buddhist missionaries. As a prisoner from Kharakar came Kumarajiva, in 383, a man of loose life but of profound scholarship, who had been converted from the Theravada to the Mahayana; and we read of t Translated by Dr. Lombard, quoted in The Faith of Fapan by T. Harada. 2 Later called Singan-fu. LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 131 embassies from Persia, of Zoroastrians, and of Manichees, all mingling in the great city. Here later came Nestorian missionaries and received a cordial welcome as teachers of a doctrine at once “pacific, mysterious, and free from verbosity,’ until soon the land was filled with their “Temples of Joy” and it seemed as if a new international bond were to link China with India and the West. In the seventh century also flourished Shan-tao, leader of the Amitabha sects, and he and the Nestorians had much in common. The place and the era alike favored the exchange of ideas. Now in the fourth century began the travels of the Chinese pilgrims to India. While Kum- arajiva was settling at Chang-an, Fa-Hian (399-413 A.D.), first of Chinese Buddhist pilgrims, was making his famous journey to India, and his Record of the Buddha Land is a priceless document,’ and tells of great intellectual activity in Buddhist India and Ceylon. In the Far West Augustine, Chrysostom, and Jerome were doing yeoman service to Christianity. East and West alike, this was an age of devotion as well as of acute speculative thought, and now perhaps for the first time, with Tadan in the south and Kumarajiva and his colleagues at Chang-an, Buddhist philosophy won for itself a firm hold upon the thinkers of China. So excellent too was their rendering of the Sanskrit texts into Chinese that their works are still read as models of classical expression. Kumarajiva gave special attention to Asvaghoga and Nagarjuna, whose biographies he translated, and of the philosophical works he made available to the Chinese we may select three whose influence has been immense. First may be mentioned Nagarjuna’s Commentary on the Avatamsaka * B.N., 1496; Fo-Kwo-Ki, French translation by A. Rémusat (1836), English by S. Beal (1869), H. A. Giles (1877), J. Legge (1886), and T. Watters (1918). 132 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY Siitra (Hua Yen)* which has molded the philosophic thought, and the Fan-Wan-King,? or “Net of Brahma,” which has guided the monastic life of China, Korea, and Japan. The latter is rather strangely called by De Groot, “the most important of the sacred books of the East,” and “‘the principal instrument of the great Buddhist art of salvation.” It opens with an apocalyptic vision of the usual Mahayana type: Seated at the heart of a gigantic lotus is Roshana, a Buddha whose colossal (and very ugly) image is familiar to visitors to Nara, but who plays a minor part in the religion. The lotus on which he is enthroned has a thousand petals, each of them a world, and about the central figure throng the Bodhisattvas of the universe, to whom he preaches the high and difficult way of renunciation, patience, zeal, joyous endeavor, medi- tation, and enthusiasm for the welfare of the world. Let them press forward to the high peaks of achievement, and they will arrive, albeit by steep ways, at the goal of Nirvana. All the worlds are, as it were, beads upon the great net of Brahma, who as Creator has set them in their appointed station. At this point appears Sakyamuni, returning from a visit to Siva, the destroyer of the Hindu pantheon, and declares that he is in communion with the gods as well as with the Buddhas, claiming that authority is given to him in this age, as it was to Roshana in the past, and that the rules and regulations have now been made more detailed and precise. He then sets forth the forty-eight rules of Mahayana, and declares that the Hinayana is a slow and tedious path, and that it is possible by obedience to become without delay a Bod- hisattva or even a Buddha. This is, of course, orthodox Mahayana doctrine, but the situation is made piquant ™B.N., 1180. 2 [bid., 1087. LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 133 by putting it into the mouth of Sakyamuni himself, who, as Father Wieger says, “is made to anathematize his own teachings, and to recommend things to which he had given never a thought.”* Here clearly Hinduism has begun the peaceful penetration of Buddhism, and it is not surprising to find this amazing book, like the Chinese version of the “Lotus,” go on to prescribe the cruel brand- ing of the scalp which is still largely practiced in China— though tapas, or austerity of this sort, is condemned, with murder and butchery, by the Founder. Here, how- ever, we find the usual admirable exhortations to benev- olence toward all living things; but the motive is more Hindu than Buddhist. “Are they not all bound up in the one great bundle of life, in the meshes of the net of Brahma?” “All,” said Gotama, “are your kindred and your fellow-pilgrims”; “All,” adds the Fan-Wan-King, “are children of the same creative Power.” Side by side with this rather popular theology Kumarajiva gave to the Chinese the doctrine of the Void, _ translating the Satyasiddhi Sastra? of Harivarman (of whom we know only from Chinese sources), and his translation is known to the Chinese as the Khang-shih-lun. It is a text of the Sautrantikas, and deals with the nature of the self, maintaining that there are two kinds of “emptiness” which can be predicated of it. It is empty as a basket is empty, it is also unreal or empty as the withes or strands of the basket are empty—an illustration which cannot be said to add very much to our enlighten- ment! But fortunately we are already familiar with this idea, that because the self is compound it is unreal, and because the elements which make up the self are compound ' Histoire des Croyances Religieuses et des Opinions Philosophiques en Chine, p. 450. 9 BING 8294. 134 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY they too have no reality. Yet the Buddha speaks of the “T,” and of the rewards of virtue; if there is no self to be rewarded, why persevere in contemplation and self- sacrifice? The wise will give up philosophy, and be content to leave the dilemma unsolved. So ends the Satya- siddhi Sastra, on a note of faith or suspended judgment. Not so the great Nagarjuna, whose transcendentalism Kumarajiva now proceeded to give to China in the Three Sastras, the authoritative scriptures of the San-Lun sect. With the coming of this Indian scholar then and the rapid multiplication of the scriptures, Chinese Buddhism enters upon a complex stage; a catalogue published in g18 A.D. mentions over 2,000 volumes, and one two centuries later contains 2,278 works in over 7,000 volumes; and, as we have noted, the books do not all agree. Can they be reconciled? What is the essence of the matter? How is it to be made available to ordinary folk? To these questions significant answers were given by three ereat schools: that of the Indian Bodhidharma in §20,* that of Chi-i a little later, and that of the Mantra school in the eighth century. They have made Chi- nese Buddhism the complex and comprehensive thing that it 1s today. The first of these schools was introduced, or at least popularized, in the neighborhood of Loyang by Bod- hidharma, or P’utiTamo, a prince of South India, who was the twenty-eighth patriarch of the Sangha. While the Chinese lay-pilgrim, Sungytin,? was visiting Udyana and Kandahar, Bodhidharma, disgusted perhaps at the course of things in his own land, where Buddhism was becoming t“QOne account has it that at the beginning of the sixth century the number of Indian refuges (sic) in China was more than 6,000.”—A. K. Reischauer. ? Translations of his Travels into English by S. Beal (1869), into German by Neu- mann (1833), into French by Chavannes (1903). BODHIDHARMA (A portrait of the Zen School) LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 135 a tantric Hindu cult, came by the sea-route to Ningpo. He was a picturesque figure, and has laid a strong hold upon the Chinese mind, influencing such original thinkers as Tsung Mi (eighth century) and Wang Yang Ming (1472-1529). His swarthy, bearded face, staring eyes, and gnarled limbs are a popular motive in Japanese art, from the kakemono of temple and teahouse to the sword- hilt of the Samurai; and he is still the beau ideal, if the paradox be allowed, of every monk in China! In Korea I felt that I was really making progress when I was greeted as a ““Tamo” from the West! A Japanese disciple says of Tamo: He was, however, not a missionary to be favourably received by the public... . entirely different in every point from a popular missionary of our age. The latter would smile or try to smile at every face he happened to see, and would talk sociably: the former would not smile at any face, but would stare at it with huge glaring eyes that pierced to the innermost soul. The latter would keep himself scrupu- lously clean, shaving, combing, brushing, polishing, oiling, perfuming; whilst the former would be entirely indifferent as to his apparel, being always clothed in a faded yellow robe. The latter would compose his sermons with great care, making use of rhetorical art, and speak with force and elegance, while the former would sit silent as a bear, and kick off any who approached him with idle questions. We might perhaps more fitly contrast Tamo with Co- lumba, his great contemporary in the Far West, “from whose gentle nest at Iona the doves of peace and good will were soon to wing their flight to all regions,”’ or, indeed, with the gentle Punna and Mahinda and other pioneers of the Sangha. Yet Tamo was not less devoted, and his influence to this day is in many ways unique. His Master, Gotama, embracing poverty, writing no book and trusting in no 1K. Nukariya, The Religion of the Samurai, pp. 5-6. 136 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY organization, has won the enthusiastic admiration of man- kind; Tamo without speaking, except to be rude, has laid a strange spell upon the East. It captured first the Emperor Wu-ti at his capital K’ien-K’ang. Receiving the strange traveler with courtesy, he began to tell of the service he had rendered to the Faith: “We have built temples, multiplied the Scriptures, encouraged many to join the Order: is there not much merit in all this?” “None,” was the blunt reply. “But what say the Holy Books—do they not promise rewards for such deeds ?” “Allis void. There is nothing holy.” “‘But—you your- self—are you not one of the holy ones?” “I don’t know.” “Who then are you?” “I don’t know.” “The elephant can hardly keep company with rabbits,” says Mr. Nukariya. And indeed the books are full of exhortation to the wise to wander lonely as the elephant, and Tamo was of the Arhat rather than the Bodhisattva type; but the Emperor Wu-ti was no rabbit,* and there is surely more than mere rudeness in Tamo’s reply. First he tried to show that merit and truth are within, as Mr. Nukariya has so clearly and forcibly argued, then he goes on to prepare his pupil for the doctrines of anatta and anicca. Unless we are ourselves enlightened, observances and the scriptures themselves are of no avail; and the first step in enlightenment is to realize the unreality of the “ego and of the world.” “To seek aught outside thine own heart and mind ts to grasp the air. Prayers, alms, learning, zeal, what good are they? All are unreal.” That this is the meaning of Tamo’s reply to the emperor seems clear from another very popular story of him. A Confucian inquirer? came to him, and stood silent before t Already a staunch Buddhist he later persisted in taking the vows of a monk. * Shang Kwang or Eka, who succeeded Tamo as second patriarch in China. LOYANG, CHANG-AN, TIEN T’AI 137 him; the sage took no notice and so a week went by, until the seeker, as his tears dropped frozen on his breast, to prove his sincerity drew his sword and cut off an arm. “Well, what is it?” “Master, my soul is sore troubled. Help me pacity it.” Where is ite “°L cannot find it, though I have sought it earnestly for years.” “There, I have pacified it for you,” said the sage, and a flash of in- tuition revealed to the seeker, faint though he was with loss of blood, the truth discovered by Gotama and forgotten by the masses of his followers. Tamo came to call them back to orthodoxy, and the effect of his teaching, or absence of teaching, was profound: “It was the introduction, not of the dead Scriptures . . . . but of a living faith; not of any theoretical doctrine but of practical enlighten- ment, not of the idea of Buddha but of the spirit of Sakyamuni.””” Yet the Buddhism of Tamo was different indeed from , the Buddhism of Gotama, and has been called a kind of | Vedanta. It finds a cosmic significance in the Buddha- | nature, immanent in all men and things. If there is no atman the Atman is Reality itself; it is the sole reality, and gives a meaning to the world, and to men an under- standing of its true nature. By intuitive rather than dis- cursive reason man grasps this truth, and it can only be imparted from mind to mind and from heart to heart by intuition. So it has come down in unbroken succession from Sakyamuni to all the patriarchs, of whom Kasyapa was first, Ananda second, Parsva tenth, Asvaghoga twelfth, Nagarjuna fourteenth, Vasubandhu twenty-first, and Bodhidharma twenty-eighth—to name only those of supreme eminence. The school relates the story of * Nukariya, op. cit., p. 5. Yet the Chan school bases itself on the Prajfapa- ramita books and makes much of the Lankdvatara Sitra, which emphasizes the inner light. 138 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY Kasyapa’s appointment: Master and disciples were seated on the Vulture Peak, when the god Brahma drew . near and offered a flower to the Blessed One, requesting him to preach the Law. He kept silence, and while all looked expectant, Kasyapa alone smiled in understanding. Are not the greatest things ineffable? So began an apostolic succession of which every name is treasured in a school that lays little stress on the scriptures, and there- fore must vindicate the authority of its verbal teachings. That of Tamo is accepted by all, and from his day the patriarchate descended to his Chinese followers. A discourse purporting to be that of Tamo at the court of Wu-ti has been translated into French by Father Wieger,” and though it is most unlikely that he ever delivered so full and rounded an exposition of his doctrine, and quite doubtful if he knew Chinese, it is worth study as a summary of the Dhyana teaching. It says: The heart is Buddha. Outside of it there is no reality. Apart from thought all is unreal. There is neither cause nor effect apart from the mind and heart. Nirvana itself is a state of heart. See in thyself the true Buddha-nature, know that thou art Buddha, and canst not sin. There is neither good nor bad, but only the heart, and this is Buddha and impeccable. ... . One sin only is there, to ignore thine own Buddhahood..... This ignorance it is which makes the wheel of transmigration to rotate: it is enlightenment which destroys the power of Karma. The enlightened can neither sin nor be reborn. O heart of man, so great that thou canst embrace the world, so little that thou canst not be touched by a needle’s point—thou art Buddha. That is my word to China. It might be Vivekananda or any other Vedantist speaking, and it is possible to hold with Father Wieger that Tamo was asked to leave by the Buddhists of South * Tamo Hsu Molun, op. cit., p. §20. It is not known, I am told by Mr. R. F. Johnston, to most Chinese scholars, though it is included in a supplement to the Chinese Tripitaka. LOYANG, CHANG-AN, T’IEN T’AI 139 India; but those who could digest the tantric vagaries of a few decades later were not squeamish, and this Dhyana teaching accords well enough with Mahayana pantheism, on the one hand, and with the mysticism of the Founder, on the other, while the emphasis on enlightenment and of contemplation, as the way to it, is a clarion call to the pietist to “‘leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads,” and to return to the rock from which he was hewn. The odious teaching, however, that good and evil are , alike, is not Sakyamuni’s, nor is it probable that Tamo | pressed his pantheism to this conclusion. His followers, | even where they have held this strange view, have done much to ennoble Chinese and Japanese life by attuning | the mind to Nature in her loveliest moods, and have blent ‘ the quietism of India with the poetic intuitionism of | Southern China, until a Japanese authority can say with conviction: “There is hardly a form of thought or a duty | that Zen has not touched and inspired with its ideal of simple beauty.”’* In the first place, by its pantheism, , ) which finds the Buddha-nature in all things, it brought °/ religion into all life: The golden light upon the sunkist peaks, The water murmuring in the pebbly creeks, Are Buddha. In the stillness, hark, he speaks! This poetic quietism has laid its spell for more than two thousand years upon world-weary men and women; seeking the mountain-tops they have since the time of the Founder possessed their souls amid the beauties of Nature. But the Dhyana school has appealed also to soldier and statesman in the midst of strenuous days. What has been its secret? In the first place, it has developed a joy in ™M. Anesaki, Buddhist Art, p. 54. Zen is the Japanese form of Chan; both= dhyana. 140 EPOCHS IN BUDDHIST HISTORY simple things, and has helped them to retreat, for a time at least, into a quiet kingdom of the mind, and to be free from life’s trammels: Unanchored, riding free On the still clear waters, see In the calm cool air of night Doth float A tiny boat, All bathed in silver light. Here, as it were in a cameo, ts crystallized the coolness of the enlightened mind, calm and serene; like the moonlight beautifying all it touches; free as the little boat that rides unanchored on the waves. Here was a genuine religious experience, an intuition of the unity of all things and often of the presence of the Buddha. There are many stories of sages of this school converted or enlightened by the croaking of a frog in the silence, the ripple of a stream, or the fall of autumn leaves. In all these the Buddha-nature is immanent: A score of years I looked for Light; Passed many a Spring and Fall; But since the peach-bloom came in sight I nothing doubt at all. We find blending in these lovers of Nature something of the delicacy of the blossom and the ruggedness of the mountain. With poetical insight went a Spartan simpli- city and an ascetic rigor of life, and in their hymns there is nothing of the somewhat effeminate pietism of the Amitabha schools. They are thinkers imbued with an idealism which transfigures Nature, and to them images and scriptures are alike unnecessary; Nature is at once their scripture and the embodiment of their God. 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