..续本文上一页rose as to the criminality of certain acts, it could be settled at once by an appeal to the Vinaya-pitaka. Now it so happens that, with one exception, the ten deviations that had to be considered at the Second Council, are not provided for in the Vinaya-pitaka; and I quite agree with Dr. Oldenberg”s argument that, if they had been mentioned in the Vinaya-pitaka, the Second Council would have been objectless. A mere appeal to chapter and verse in the existing Pitaka would then have silenced all dissent. On the other side, if it had been possible to add anything to the canon, as it then existed, the ten, or nine, deviations might have been condemned

　　[1. Oldenberg, Introduction, p. xxix.

　　2. Oldenberg, loc. cit. p. xx.]

　　p. xxxi by a few additional paragraphs of the canon, without convoking a new Council.

　　 I think we may be nearly certain, therefore, that we possess the principal portion of the Vinaya-pitaka as it existed before the Council of Vesâlî.

　　 So far I quite agree with Dr. Oldenberg. But if he proceeds to argue^[1] that certain portions of the canon must have been finally settled before even the First Council took place, or was believed to have taken place, I do not think his arguments conclusive. He contends that in the Parinibbâna-sutta, which tells of the last days of Buddha”s life, of his death, the cremation of his body, and the distribution of his relics, and of Subhadda”s revolt, it would have been impossible to leave out all mention of the First Council, if that Council had then been known. It is true, no doubt, that Subhadda”s disloyalty was the chief cause of the First Council, but there was no necessity to mention that Council. On the contrary, it seems to me that the unity of the Parinibbâna-sutta would have been broken if, besides telling of the last days of Buddha, it had also given a full description of the Council. The very title, the Sutta of the Great Decease, would have become inappropriate, if so important a subject as the first Sangîti had been mixed up with it. However, how little we may trust to such general arguments, is best shown by the fact that in some very early Chinese renderings of the Hînayâna text of the Mahâparinibbâna-sutta the story is actually carried on to the First Council, two (Nos. 552 and 119) mentioning the rehearsal under Kasyapa, while the third (No. 118) simply states that the Tiptaka was then collected^[2].

　　[1. Loc. cit. pp. xxvi-xxviii.

　　2. There are several Chinese translations of Sûtras on the subject of the Mahâparinirvâna. Three belong to the Mahâyâna school: 1. Mahâparinirvâna-sûtra, translated by Dharmaraksha, about 414-423 A.D.; afterwards revised, 424-453 (Nos. 113, 114). 2. Translation by Fa-hian and Buddhabhadra, about 415 A.D.; less complete (No. 120). 3. Translation (vaipulya) by Dharmaraksha I, i.e. Ku Fa-hu, about 261-308 A.D. (No. 116). Three belong to the Hînayâna school: 1. Mahiparinirvâna-sûtra. translated by Po-fa-tsu, about 290-306 A.D. (No. 552). 2. Translation under the Eastern Tsin dynasty, 317-42O A.D. (No. 119). 3. Translation by Fa-hian, about 415 A.D. (No. 118).]

　　p. xxxii

　　 We must be satisfied therefore, so far as I can see at present, with fixing the date, and the latest date, of a Buddhist canon at the time of the Second Council, 377 B.C. That some works were added later, we know; that many of the treatises included in the canon existed before that Council, can hardly be doubted. The second chapter of the Dhammapada, for instance, is called the Appamâda-vagga, and if the Mahâvam《The Dhammapada - Introduction》全文未完，请进入下页继续阅读…