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Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
1e Great Decease] 2 . . . . Relying on similar authority Bishop Bigandet afterwards himself says : * King Kd/dsoka left Ra^agaha, and removed the seat of his empire to Palibothra [the Greek name for Pi/aliputta], near the place where the modern city of Patna stands 2 .' 1 See below, Chap. I, § 28. I have translated Pu/abhedana/w, 'a centre for the interchange of all kinds of wares,' in accordance with the commentary, which is clearly based on a derivation from pu/a, ' a bag or bundle.* But I see that Trenckner in his P&li Miscellany renders n&n&pu/abhedana/w by 'siuy rounded by a number of dependent towns.' At the end the text has ' from fire or from water or from dissension;' on which Buddhaghosa says that or stands here for and; and the comment is correct enough, not of course philologically, but exegetically. But in either case the last clause is of very little importance for the present argument. ■ Bigandet's * Legend of the Burmese Budha,' third edition, vol. ii. pp. 115, 183. I have altered the spelling only of the proper names. GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xvii It would seem therefore that, according to the tradition followed by this writer, Susunaga first removed the capital to Vesdli, and his successor Kd/dsoka, who died, in the opinion of the writer in question, in 118 after the Great Decease, finally fixed it at Pd/ialiputta. If we therefore apply this date to the prophecy we must come to the conclusion that the Book of the Great Decease was put into its present form at least 100 years after the Buddha's death, and probably a little more. But the authority followed by Bishop Bigandet is very late ; and no mention of these occurrences is found either in the Dipava^sa or in the Mahdva^sa. I think indeed that the whole account of these two kings, as at present accepted in Ceylon and Birma, is open to grave doubt 1 (in which connection it should be noticed that the oldest account of the Council of Ves&li, in the Abulia- vagga, Book XII, makes no mention of K4/ctsoka). We have next to consider the reference to the relics in the concluding sections of Chapter VI as a possible basis for chronological argument These sections are almost certainly older than the time when especial sanctity was claimed for Buddhist d&gabas on the ground that they contained par- ticular relics of the Blessed One (such as a tooth, or the bowl, or the neck bone) ; for if such special relics were accepted as objects of worship when the Book of the Great Decease was put together, they would naturally have been mentioned in the course of Chapter VI. It is even almost certain that when the sections were put into their present form no Buddhist d&gaba was in exist- ence except at the eight places mentioned in them ; and the words are quite consistent with the belief that those eight had themselves then ceased to have any very wide- spread and acknowledged sanctity.
2certain that when the sections were put into their present form no Buddhist d&gaba was in exist- ence except at the eight places mentioned in them ; and the words are quite consistent with the belief that those eight had themselves then ceased to have any very wide- spread and acknowledged sanctity. So in Chapter V, § 13, where four places are spoken of * which the believing man should visit with feelings of reverence and of awe,' there is no mention of d&gabas at all ; and in Chapter V, § 16, it is 1 See my * Ancient Coins and Measures of Ceylon/ p. 50. [»] . b xviii THE BUDDHIST SUTTAS. clearly implied that only one d&gaba, or memorial burial mound, should be erected in honour of a Tath&gata, just as one memorial mound should be erected in honour of a king of kings. When we recollect that in the first and second, and perhaps in the third century before Christ, d&gabas had already been erected in honour of the Buddha in distant parts of the continent of India, and had rapidly become famous as places of pilgrimage, the reasonable conclusion to be drawn from these passages is that the Book of the Great Decease is older than them all; or, at the least, that it was written before any of them had become famous. On the other hand, there is evidently an exaggerated belief as to the respect in which the Buddha was held by his contemporaries underlying the concluding and other sections of the book. It is probable enough that Gotama was held in deep respect by the simple people among whom he lived and moved about as a religious teacher and reformer. It may well be that the inhabitants of the village where he died gave him a sort of public funeral. But that the neighbouring clans should have vied one with the other for the possession of his remains is quite inconsistent with the position that he can reasonably be supposed to have held among them. It must have taken some time for this belief to spring up, and be received without question. In a similar way a considerable interval must have elapsed before the beautiful parable in the last section of Chapter I could have given rise to the belief in the miracle (the soli- tary miracle ascribed to the Buddha, so far as I know, in the Sutta Pi/aka) recorded in the previous section. So also the comparison drawn between the Buddha and a ATakkavatti R^a or King of Kings in Chapter V, § 37, and Chapter VI, § 33, can scarcely have arisen till the rise of a lord paramount in the valley of the Ganges had fami- liarised the people with the idea of a Universal Monarch. Now it was either just before or just after the well-known Councils at Vesdli, of which mention has been made above, that that important revolution took place which raised a GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xix low-caste adventurer to be the first -Sfakkavatti R&ga. *.
3th the idea of a Universal Monarch. Now it was either just before or just after the well-known Councils at Vesdli, of which mention has been made above, that that important revolution took place which raised a GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xix low-caste adventurer to be the first -Sfakkavatti R&ga. *. To the people of that time -STandragupta seemed to be lord of the world, for to them India was the world — just as European writers even now talk complacently of ' the world ' while ignoring three-fourths of the human race. ' Is it surprising,' as I have asked elsewhere, ' that this unity of power in one man made a deep impression upon them? Is it surprising that, like Romans worshipping Augustus, or like Greeks adding the glow of the sun-myth to the glory of Alexander, the Indians should have formed an ideal of their -Sfakkavatti, and have transferred to this new ideal many of the dimly sacred and half-understood traits of the Vedic heroes ? Is it surprising that the Bud- dhists should have found it edifying to recognise in their hero "the ATakkavatti of Righteousness;" and that the story of the Buddha should have become tinged with the colouring of these Afakkavatti myths ? ' In point of fact we know that in later works the attraction of this poetic ideal led to the almost complete disregard of the simpler narrative which seemed so poor and meagre in comparison ; and M. Senart has shown how large a pro- portion of the later poem called the Lalita Vistara is inspired by it. When, in isolated passages of the Book of the Great Decease, we find the earliest germs of this fruitful train of thought, we are I think safe in concluding that it assumed its present form after the notorious career of ATandragupta had made him supreme in the valley of the Ganges. All the above arguments tend in one direction ; namely, that the final redaction of the Book of the Great Decease must be assigned to the latter part of the fourth century before Christ, or to the earlier part of the following century. And so much alike are it and all the other Suttas translated in this volume in their form, in their views of life, and in 1 I have ventured in my 'Ancient Coins and Measures of Ceylon,* p. 51, to point out that the Councils of Vesali were very possibly held just at the time when Nanda was defeated by ATandragupta. Taranatha, the Tibetan histo- rian, while placing the Councils, like all the later authorities, under an As ok a (probably Aandragupta), says (p. 41 of Wassiliefs German translation) that the assembled brethren were fed by Nanda. b 2 XX THE BUDDHIST SUTTAS. the religious doctrines they lay down, that, though it may be possible hereafter to show that some are a little older or a little younger than the others, every one will I think admit that they must all be assigned to about the same period of time.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
1e Great Decease] 2 . . . . Relying on similar authority Bishop Bigandet afterwards himself says : * King Kd/dsoka left Ra^agaha, and removed the seat of his empire to Palibothra [the Greek name for Pi/aliputta], near the place where the modern city of Patna stands 2 .' 1 See below, Chap. I, § 28. I have translated Pu/abhedana/w, 'a centre for the interchange of all kinds of wares,' in accordance with the commentary, which is clearly based on a derivation from pu/a, ' a bag or bundle.* But I see that Trenckner in his P&li Miscellany renders n&n&pu/abhedana/w by 'siuy rounded by a number of dependent towns.' At the end the text has ' from fire or from water or from dissension;' on which Buddhaghosa says that or stands here for and; and the comment is correct enough, not of course philologically, but exegetically. But in either case the last clause is of very little importance for the present argument. ■ Bigandet's * Legend of the Burmese Budha,' third edition, vol. ii. pp. 115, 183. I have altered the spelling only of the proper names. GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xvii It would seem therefore that, according to the tradition followed by this writer, Susunaga first removed the capital to Vesdli, and his successor Kd/dsoka, who died, in the opinion of the writer in question, in 118 after the Great Decease, finally fixed it at Pd/ialiputta. If we therefore apply this date to the prophecy we must come to the conclusion that the Book of the Great Decease was put into its present form at least 100 years after the Buddha's death, and probably a little more. But the authority followed by Bishop Bigandet is very late ; and no mention of these occurrences is found either in the Dipava^sa or in the Mahdva^sa. I think indeed that the whole account of these two kings, as at present accepted in Ceylon and Birma, is open to grave doubt 1 (in which connection it should be noticed that the oldest account of the Council of Ves&li, in the Abulia- vagga, Book XII, makes no mention of K4/ctsoka). We have next to consider the reference to the relics in the concluding sections of Chapter VI as a possible basis for chronological argument These sections are almost certainly older than the time when especial sanctity was claimed for Buddhist d&gabas on the ground that they contained par- ticular relics of the Blessed One (such as a tooth, or the bowl, or the neck bone) ; for if such special relics were accepted as objects of worship when the Book of the Great Decease was put together, they would naturally have been mentioned in the course of Chapter VI. It is even almost certain that when the sections were put into their present form no Buddhist d&gaba was in exist- ence except at the eight places mentioned in them ; and the words are quite consistent with the belief that those eight had themselves then ceased to have any very wide- spread and acknowledged sanctity.
2certain that when the sections were put into their present form no Buddhist d&gaba was in exist- ence except at the eight places mentioned in them ; and the words are quite consistent with the belief that those eight had themselves then ceased to have any very wide- spread and acknowledged sanctity. So in Chapter V, § 13, where four places are spoken of * which the believing man should visit with feelings of reverence and of awe,' there is no mention of d&gabas at all ; and in Chapter V, § 16, it is 1 See my * Ancient Coins and Measures of Ceylon/ p. 50. [»] . b xviii THE BUDDHIST SUTTAS. clearly implied that only one d&gaba, or memorial burial mound, should be erected in honour of a Tath&gata, just as one memorial mound should be erected in honour of a king of kings. When we recollect that in the first and second, and perhaps in the third century before Christ, d&gabas had already been erected in honour of the Buddha in distant parts of the continent of India, and had rapidly become famous as places of pilgrimage, the reasonable conclusion to be drawn from these passages is that the Book of the Great Decease is older than them all; or, at the least, that it was written before any of them had become famous. On the other hand, there is evidently an exaggerated belief as to the respect in which the Buddha was held by his contemporaries underlying the concluding and other sections of the book. It is probable enough that Gotama was held in deep respect by the simple people among whom he lived and moved about as a religious teacher and reformer. It may well be that the inhabitants of the village where he died gave him a sort of public funeral. But that the neighbouring clans should have vied one with the other for the possession of his remains is quite inconsistent with the position that he can reasonably be supposed to have held among them. It must have taken some time for this belief to spring up, and be received without question. In a similar way a considerable interval must have elapsed before the beautiful parable in the last section of Chapter I could have given rise to the belief in the miracle (the soli- tary miracle ascribed to the Buddha, so far as I know, in the Sutta Pi/aka) recorded in the previous section. So also the comparison drawn between the Buddha and a ATakkavatti R^a or King of Kings in Chapter V, § 37, and Chapter VI, § 33, can scarcely have arisen till the rise of a lord paramount in the valley of the Ganges had fami- liarised the people with the idea of a Universal Monarch. Now it was either just before or just after the well-known Councils at Vesdli, of which mention has been made above, that that important revolution took place which raised a GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xix low-caste adventurer to be the first -Sfakkavatti R&ga. *.
3th the idea of a Universal Monarch. Now it was either just before or just after the well-known Councils at Vesdli, of which mention has been made above, that that important revolution took place which raised a GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xix low-caste adventurer to be the first -Sfakkavatti R&ga. *. To the people of that time -STandragupta seemed to be lord of the world, for to them India was the world — just as European writers even now talk complacently of ' the world ' while ignoring three-fourths of the human race. ' Is it surprising,' as I have asked elsewhere, ' that this unity of power in one man made a deep impression upon them? Is it surprising that, like Romans worshipping Augustus, or like Greeks adding the glow of the sun-myth to the glory of Alexander, the Indians should have formed an ideal of their -Sfakkavatti, and have transferred to this new ideal many of the dimly sacred and half-understood traits of the Vedic heroes ? Is it surprising that the Bud- dhists should have found it edifying to recognise in their hero "the ATakkavatti of Righteousness;" and that the story of the Buddha should have become tinged with the colouring of these Afakkavatti myths ? ' In point of fact we know that in later works the attraction of this poetic ideal led to the almost complete disregard of the simpler narrative which seemed so poor and meagre in comparison ; and M. Senart has shown how large a pro- portion of the later poem called the Lalita Vistara is inspired by it. When, in isolated passages of the Book of the Great Decease, we find the earliest germs of this fruitful train of thought, we are I think safe in concluding that it assumed its present form after the notorious career of ATandragupta had made him supreme in the valley of the Ganges. All the above arguments tend in one direction ; namely, that the final redaction of the Book of the Great Decease must be assigned to the latter part of the fourth century before Christ, or to the earlier part of the following century. And so much alike are it and all the other Suttas translated in this volume in their form, in their views of life, and in 1 I have ventured in my 'Ancient Coins and Measures of Ceylon,* p. 51, to point out that the Councils of Vesali were very possibly held just at the time when Nanda was defeated by ATandragupta. Taranatha, the Tibetan histo- rian, while placing the Councils, like all the later authorities, under an As ok a (probably Aandragupta), says (p. 41 of Wassiliefs German translation) that the assembled brethren were fed by Nanda. b 2 XX THE BUDDHIST SUTTAS. the religious doctrines they lay down, that, though it may be possible hereafter to show that some are a little older or a little younger than the others, every one will I think admit that they must all be assigned to about the same period of time.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
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