Upasampada-kammava/£a, being separately preserved at all, is the same as the cause which led to their exclusion from the lists of the Pi/aka texts — the fact, that is, of their being liturgical compositions.
We turn now to the consideration of the question how a
series of further literary productions were gradually de-
veloped out of, or added to the Patimokkha1.
Whoever reads through the Mahavagga will at once be struck by one section of it which differs completely both in contents and in form from the rest of the work. This is the section in the Second Book, Chapter III, paragraphs 4-8.
This passage is preceded by the opening words of the Patimokkha ; and in the passage itself those words are separately paraphrased or explained. But the explanation does not appear to be put into the mouth of the Buddha ; it bears rather, without any historical or conversational form, the impersonal shape of a simple commentary: and it only differs from the later commentaries by peculiar solemn dififuseness and rhetorical tautology.
If we were to consider the Mahavagga only, the sudden and unexplained appearance in this connection, and in this connection only, of an isolated passage of this kind, would have to remain an insoluble puzzle. But when we look further into the other parts of the Vinaya Pi/faka, an answer immediately suggests itself. In the portion of that Pi/aka which is better called the Sutta-vibhanga, but is divided in the MSS. into two divisions, under the somewhat misleading titles of Para^ika and Pa^ittiya, we find, at regularly recur- ring intervals, passages of an exactly similar character, and without any doubt of the same origin, as the isolated passage in the Mahavagga.
The Sutta-vibhahga is occupied with laying down and
explaining all the Rules which are contained in the Pati-
mokkha. Now, immediately after the text of each of these
Rules, there is found a word for word commentary upon
1 With the following paragraphs should be compared H. Oldenberg in the Introduction to his edition of the Pali text of the Vinaya, vol. i. pp. xvi and following.
XVI VINAYA TEXTS FROM THE PALI.
them — precisely as a word for word commentary follows, in the passage above cited in the Mahavagga, upon the quoted words of the Introductory Formular of the Pati- mokkha service. Here then lies the explanation. This Introductory Formular is the only passage contained in the Patimokkha which is not found also in the Sutta-vibhanga. And with the explanation of the curiously isolated passage in the Mahavagga we have also a new fact of very great im- portance. Not only does the Vinaya Pifeka contain, word for word, the whole of the Patimokkha, but it contains also, and again word for word, the whole of an ancient Commentary on the Patimokkha.
This commentary no longer exists as a separate work, and it would indeed be strange if it did. It was not re- quired in the simple liturgical services of Ordination and Confession in use in the Order : and if any one wished to refer to it, in order to refresh his memory as to the ex- planation of any passage in the Patimokkha, he had only to repeat, or to get repeated over to him, the corresponding passage from the Sutta-vibhanga. There he would find the Old Commentary (as we shall hereafter call it) word for word, together with the additional commentary by which it had been supplemented in later times.
A question may then possibly occur to the reader whether we can be really sure that the Old Commentary has been preserved complete, or whether what we have is a frag- ment only. We think there can be but little doubt as to the right answer. The Patimokkha, which the Old Com- mentary deals with word by word, has been separately preserved to us, and we know that no one phrase of it remains uncommented upon. And further it is clear from several passages that the words of the old commentator were considered so sacred or authoritative that they have been kept intact even in cases where they are in contra- diction to the later parts of the Vinaya Pi/aka \ It should however be noted that this Old Commentary is philological
1 See, for instance, the comparison made by Oldenberg in the Introduction to his edition of the text, vol. i. p. xviii. The Old Commentary follows of course the passage there referred to in the Patimokkha.
Introduction. Xv11
and exegetical throughout, containing nothing of a le- gendary or quasi-historical nature. It is just possible to suggest that it may have originally contained not only such an explanation of the meaning of each Rule, but an account also of the occasion on which the Rule was laid down. But it is difficult to see why greater sacredness should have been attached to one part of the work than to another ; or to explain how it was that, if any part was changed, the contradictory passages above referred to were not also altered. Every probability therefore points to the conclusion that we have the complete work still before us, and not fragments of it only.
It seems to us to have been precisely the absence of any
such historical account in the older Commentary which
probably led to the formation of what was practically
the new edition of the Patimokkha which now lies before
us in the first part of the Vinaya Pi/aka.
In the earliest books of the Sutta Pi/aka, which contains the statement of Buddhist belief, we find — just as in the Gospels and in the Socratic dialogues — that that belief is not stated directly. The books profess to give, not simply the belief itself, but the belief as the Buddha uttered it, with an account of the time when, and the place at which, he uttered it. The Buddha's new method of salvation, his new doctrine of what salvation was, did not present itself to the consciousness of the early Buddhist community as an idea, a doctrine, standing alone, and merely on its own merits. In their minds it was indissolubly bound up with the memory of the revered and striking personality of him who had proclaimed it. So in the Sutta Pi/aka the actor and speaker is almost throughout the Buddha himself : (occa- sionally, but very seldom, one of his disciples.) Introduc- tions— often indeed short and tending in later times to disappear — give a full account of where, and when, he spoke ; what was the occasion which led to his uttering that particular speech ; and to whom he uttered it. But, throughout, the principal thing is what the Buddha said.
It is only natural that this distinguishing mark of the [13] b
XV111 VINAYA TEXTS FROM THE PALI.
literature of the Buddhist Dhamma — much of which was no doubt in existence at a very early date — should have reacted upon the literature of the Buddhist Vinaya. The members of the Order were no longer contented to learn, and to understand the meaning of, the various Rules of the Patimokkha. A desire sprang up to have, for each one of them also, a kind of historical basis ; to know the story of how the Buddha himself came to lay down the Rule to his disciples. And it was only the Brother who was properly acquainted with all this who was accounted a real ' Doctor of the Law.5
So it is said in the iTullavagga (IX, 5, i): — 'If a Brother, Upali, has not received gladly both the Patimokkhas in their full extent, has not well divided them, well established them, well investigated them, both sutta by sutta, and in every detail; if when asked, "Where was this spoken by the Blessed One?" he fail to solve the question: then there will be some who will say to him, " But then, let the venerable one still devote himself to learning the Vinaya ! " thus will they say1.'
It is evident from this passage that, at the time when it was written, such a tradition regarding each Rule was in existence ; and that the knowledge of these traditions was held in high esteem. It is therefore a reasonable con- jecture that steps were taken to amalgamate these tradi- tions with the Text and the Old Commentary in a complete work, which should also contain what we may call Notes on the Rules — that is, decisions on points of Law involved, though not expressed in so many words, in the Rules ; discussions on what cases were really included and what were not, in particular regulations ; enumeration of excep- tions to the Rules ; and so on.
Whether this conjecture be right or not, it is precisely
such a work that we have now before us in that part of the
Vinaya Pi/aka called the Sutta-vibhanga, and divided
1 No ke Upali bhikkhuno ubhayani Patimokkhani vittharena svagat&ni honti suvibhattani suppavattini suvini&Mitani suttato anuvyawg*anaso, idam pan' avuso kattha vuttara Bhagavata 'ti iti iputtko na sampayati, tassa bhavanti vattaro : Ingha tava ayasma Vinayam pariyapimassu 'ti : iti 'ssa bhavanti vattaro.
Introduction. Xix
in the present MSS.5 as above pointed out, into two books called respectively — after the class of Rules with which they begin — Para^ika and Pa^ittiya. And it is possible through- out, without the possibility of mistake, to distinguish between the three portions of which the present work is built up. The historical basis comes first, leading up to the extract from the Patimokkha, which is always placed in the Buddha's own mouth ; then comes the Old Commentary, with its verbal explanations ; and then, finally, the Notes giving the exceptions to, and the extensions of, the Rule in the Patimokkha.
The foregoing paragraphs show the way in which the Sutta-vibhanga grew up on the basis of the Patimokkha. The following books — the Khandhakas — give a detailed and connected account of the admission into the Sa//*gha ; of the ceremony of the Uposatha ; of the annually recurring observances connected with the beginning and the end of the rainy season ; of the principal disciplinary proceedings ; and of miscellaneous details regarding the medicine, food, dwelling-places, and daily life of the members of the Order (Bhikkhus). As in the Sutta-vibhanga, so here also, the outward form is arranged in such a way that in the case of every regulation a history was given of the occasion upon which the Buddha was supposed to have made it. These histories again lead up, in most cases, to a liturgical formu- lary by which the regulation was to be carried out.
While, however, in the case of the Sutta-vibhanga the liturgy on which it has been founded has been preserved in a separate shape, the formularies in the Khandhakas have not as yet, except in some instances, been found in exist- ence apart from the Khandhakas. The principal exception is the Upasampada-kammava/£a (The Words of the Act of Ordination), which recurs in its entirety in the First Khandhaka of the Mahavagga (I, 76, 3 to I, 78, 5). It is impossible therefore as yet to trace the history of the gra- dual formation of the Khandhakas as we think it already possible to do in the case of the Sutta-vibhanga.
In the Khandhakas too, no doubt, the introductory
XX VINAYA TEXTS FROM THE PALI.
histories are the latest part. But while some of the formu- laries and regulations to which they lead up may well be very old, others are probably additions to, or modifications of, those older ones; and it is difficult to attempt to show, even with regard to the exceptions above mentioned, which are the older and which are the later. The misfortune that these forms are not all now separately extant1 is probably simply due to the fact that the formularies separately pre- served (including the Patimokkha) are the only ones which continued to be used in actual services among the mem- bers of the Order.
Such being the nature and contents, and such — so far as it can be traced — being the origin of the Sutta-vibhanga and of the Khandhakas respectively, it follows that in all probability they were composed, or put into their present shape, at about the same period in the development of early Buddhism — it is even possible that both works arose in immediate connection.
The kind of narrative setting with which, in both cases, the older material has been surrounded is alike in both. Here and there in both works are included real fragments of ancient legend or tradition — as, for instance, the account of the events from the attainment of Buddhahood down to the conversion of Sariputta and Moggallana (Mahavagga I, 1-24), the story of Devadatta (Zullavagga VII), the story of the conversion and the sin of Sudinna (Vibhanga, First Para^ika). But the greater number of these narratives are of the most meagre description, and have altogether the appearance of being mere inventions.