Early Jainism

The figure of Prince Vardhamana, who became the Mahavira (‘great hero’) and from whom Jainism takes its historical origin, leads us back into the sixth century âñå. There is evidence to suggest that at that time a religious com­munity associated with the name of Pars va was in existence and that Vardha­mana had some connection with it.

What appears fairly certain is that in the sixth century âñå, in a region of eastern India which corresponds roughly to the modem state of Bihar, a prince called Vardhamana renounced his life as a ksatriya and householder, spent many years as a renouncer in search of liberation by exposing himself to almost impossible physical hardships, obtained the state ofajina (‘conqueror’) and died after many years of preaching, at an age of at least seventy years. From this titlejina are derived ‘Jainism’, for the religion initiated by the Jina, and ‘Jaina’ (or ‘Jain’ in its modem Hindi form), for his followers. The religious movement founded by the Mahavira has evinced a surprising continuity and coherence till the present day. Although it is today by no means as numerous and influential as it was during certain phases of its history and in certain regions of India (though never outside it), unlike Buddhism it survived the onslaught of Islam, and moreover, did not split into the great variety of different school traditions as did Buddhism.

Although both Jainism and Buddhism originated in the same region of India at roughly the same time and reveal amazing similarities of detail, in essence we are dealing with very different religions. It has been suggested that this may be due to the very different personalities of the Buddha and the Mahavira, the latter appearing as austere, authoritarian and interested in philosophical discussion. But it is not the thought of the Upanisads that provides the background for that discussion; it is nature- philosophical speculation.

The Jains assume the existence of only one world system, and the archaism of their teaching reveals itself in the fact that even liberation is still located within it—at the very top of the universe. Below that are found a whole range of heavenly realms, then—as the central disc—the world of human beings, and finally subterranean realms and many layers of increasingly painful hells. This whole structure is filled with an infinite number of jivas, ‘souls’, which except for the liberated ones at the very top are all embodied in some form or other (as deva, human being, animal, denizen of hells.

The outlines of Jain teaching on liberation are clear from this sketch: man (the other classes of embodied beings cannot do so) must attempt to ward off the influx of further karma by controlling all his actions, and to eliminate the karma already present inside the jwa, by burning it up, as it were. A strictly regulated ethical life followed by a check on all one’s senses will weaken one’s passions and desires and thus reduce the amount of karma flowing into the Jtva. Ascetic practices (which in certain circumstances may go as far as starving oneself to death) serve as the fire to consume karma already present. Quite literally, one form of such tapas involves exposing oneself not just to the sun of the Indian summer, but adding to it by keeping fires burning all around oneself.

Such an ideal is obviously designed for the full renouncer only. But in practice, allowances are made for the fact that karma may well prevent a full commitment to the Jain path. Thus Jainism has extended its programme to laymen and nuns, offering spiritual practices in preparation for a rebirth in which liberation becomes possible. But no allowances were made for brahmin ritualism and for the social structure and restrictions associated with it. Vedic rituals were rejected as useless, and the Jaina path was open to all, whatever their social background. With enormous zeal the Jains have from earliest times onwards developed the practical details of their spiritual path, from the moment a being becomes convinced of the truth of the Jain teaching to the achievement of final liberation. Thus for the laymen we find the five anuvratas (minor vows): not to kill, tell lies or steal, and to preserve marital faithfulness and put a restraint on possessions. Guna- vratas may be observed voluntarily: to avoid acts that could be harmful to living beings, impose restraints on one’s travelling and eating, etc. The layman is brought even closer to the monastic life through the siksdvratas which involve often severe forms of fasting and sexual abstinence, all kinds of religious ceremonies and a commitment to supporting the monks.

With the monks, the anuvratas turn into the mahdv- ratas, the ‘great vows’, where marital fidelity is replaced by complete chas­tity. Many further lists of virtues to be cultivated and of spiritual practices are given. Among these, three may be mentioned in particular. The cultivation of samiti, ‘carefulness’, aims at eliminating all forms of unconscious or instinctive activity and producing a conscious awareness of everything one does.

This teaching is contained in the very bulky canon of the Svetambaras. But even they agree that this canon no longer contains the oldest scriptures (pur v as, which by both branches are associated with Parsva). The extant 45 or so works are gathered together in six groups (Angas, Upangas, Prakirnas, Chedasutras, Mulasutras and two individual treatises). Cosmology and cosmography, with lists of the various beings populating this vast universe, are mixed with doctrinal and disciplinary matters. But many of these works illustrate a feature in which Jainism excels in later times: the telling of stories. Time and again abstract matters are given concrete application by showing how for specific individuals (legendary figures, the Mahavira himself, or imaginary persons) karma operates in real life. Most of the texts are in a form of Prakrit called by scholars Ardhamagadhi. Though developed here as a literary language, it probably comes close to the actual language spoken by the Mahavira. For centuries, the Jains cultivated the Prakrits for literary purposes.

Hagiography tells us that the key theme of the Buddha’s first sermon was that of the Four Noble Truths. It is not difficult to regard this schema as central to Buddhist teaching generally. Modelled on ancient Indian medical procedure, it provides a critical analysis of the human situation, investigates the causes of the ‘disease’, states that a cure is possible and prescribes the medicine for it. It does not, however, present any theoreti­cal framework for its pragmatic procedure, no definition of‘what it means to be healthy’ (in terms of the medical model). And whilst it emphasises very strongly that there is an illness, that is, ‘suffering’ (thereby giving rise to an initial appearance of depressing negativism), it regards true happiness (the liberation from this ‘suffering’) as a self-evident phenomenon. We shall return to this attitude at a later stage.

The First Noble Truth states that there is ‘suffering’ (duhkha, Pali: dukkha). Most evidently it reveals itself in the painful events of birth, illness, old age and death. Implied in this is also the assumption of rebirth, the endlessly repeated occurrence of these events. It is further implied that all beings are involved in it, man as much as animals and devas. Yet outside these events life is also characterised by ‘suffering’: to be with what we do not want, not to be with what we want, in short, every wish unfulfilled, isduhkha. To this is added one further component which makes it clear that we are not just dealing with ‘aspects’ of life, but with its essential nature. To be a person is identical with ‘suffering’. Such a person is now analysed in terms of five major layers or interacting components, ‘the ele­ments of grasping’ (upadana-skandhas). On the most superficial level one could say that ‘suffering’ is experienced in all five, or ‘in thought, word and deed’. But more is alluded to through this schema. These five components want to describe the empirical person, and that in terms spelled out more clearly in the Second Noble Truth. With that focus in mind, the picture of the ‘person’ would look like this. There is the physical side, the body (rupa, lit. ‘form’). This body is endowed with the sense-organs, and through these information about the outside world is received. But man is not a computer which mechanically absorbs data. Thus this information ‘affects’ him, namely acquires an affective, emotional colouring. This is vedand, ‘emo­tions’. Since the senses inform us through five different channels, offering us (affectively coloured) visual, aural, etc. data, all this is put together into one composite whole, a single mental image associated with the corresponding sights, sounds and so forth (satnjnd). Moreover, all kinds of additional assumptions are made with regard to such a perceived object, partly due to the influences of past karma. Then the will reacts, by setting in motion an act of reaching out to acquire or enjoy the object, or to reject and destroy, depending on the decision we have made as to the positive or negative qualities of the object. All this is summed up in the term samskdra. Finally, these are not mechanical processes, for we are aware of all this and constantly impose thoughts on to them, associating them with an (autonomous) ‘I’. This is vijndna.

The Second Noble truth mentions the cause of suf­fering: we suffer because we relate to objects in precisely the manner indi­cated above. We ‘thirst’ (the keyword used in this context, trsna, Pali: tanhd) for the enjoyment of objects that appeal to us, and by implication hate those that do not. But there is one further implication here, which alone makes sense of this analysis: no object in human experience can actually provide the happiness we hope for when desiring its enjoyment. Thus even if every wish of ours were kept being fulfilled, we would still continue to desire more. This now implies a form of ignorance, and it is indeed through such a concept (avidya) that the Second Noble Truth is expanded. Again, this ‘ignorance’ can be specified as concerning the understanding a person has of what he is and what he could gain from any object. This means that the acquisition of any desired object would only make sense if it could add something lasting to someone lasting. But, empirically, no such ‘lasting’ entities are found. All five upadana-skandhas are transient (thought, vijndna, appears and disappears most rapidly among them). So the whole way we react to the world and perceive ourselves is mistaken. These three interrelated ideas (desire, ignor­ance, incorrect conception of ‘I’ and ‘mine’) are summarised as the three dsravas. Because of the three dsravas operating in the person, life is suffering.

Now in the context of renoun cer thought, this is not yet a sufficient explanation. For ‘life’ here implies transmigration. Can the analysis of the Second Noble Truth be applied to this idea as well? This appears to be the purpose of another schema, variously known as ‘con­ditioned origination’, ‘dependent co-production’, etc. (pratitya-samutpdda). The title is symptomatic of its abstruseness. We are given a list of twelve concepts, starting with avidyd, ‘ignorance’. The following two, samskdra and vijndna, are already known to us. The fourth, ndma-rupa, denotes the person (and in that sense is synonymous with the five skandhas). The fifth, ‘the six spheres’, concentrates on the sense-organs of such a person, which are in ‘contact’ (spars'a) with the outside world. Due to this, vedand, and in turn trsnd, arise. As the ninth element, upaddna is mentioned. This ‘grasping’ conditions bhava (‘conception of a foetus’), birth, and—as the twelfth—old age, death, grief, lament, suffering, depression and despair. The rationale of the whole list is: if such and such a phenomenon occurs (say, ‘ignorance’), then it follows inevitably that the subsequent phenomenon will also occur (thus, satnskdras). Now we have encountered above a dual interpretation of the cause of suffering: as ‘desire’ and ‘ignorance’; and both terms reappear in the list. Moreover, the list seems to refer twice to the whole person (with ndma-riipa and, indirectly, ‘birth’). In view of this, the following interpreta­tion may be the most original one among the traditional analyses of the list of twelve conditions. It is first shown how rebirth occurs with the concept of ‘ignorance’ as starting-point; then the same processes are once again described, but with ‘desire’ as the focal point and with different subsequent terms. But later Buddhist traditions evolved a whole range of different interpretations. The complexity of such a description ofsamsdra is partly due to the fact that here once again no reference to anything lasting in the ‘person’ (as defined by the fiveskandhas) is made. Transmigration is described merely as a chain of interconnected, transient processes which continuously yield suffering.

The Third Noble Truth simply states that it is pos­sible to get out of this vicious circle of constantly desiring true happiness and yet constantly being thrown back into suffering. Thus, at this point, Buddh­ism turns cheerful and optimistic. The Fourth Noble Truth spells out the method by which liberation can be achieved. In view of what has been said above, the principles can be predicted: the eradication of desire and ignor­ance. This is presented as the Noble Eightfold Path. Various interpretations of it have evolved in Buddhist reflection, but the following might be the most original. The whole is a map of the spiritual path which Buddhism is advocating. We start with that initial moment when someone hears the Buddhist teaching and is struck by how sensible it all appears. Thus he feels inclined to commit himself to it and enter the path laid out in front of him. (This would be the first two stages: correct insight and resolve.) Then follow steps on the path which are basically ethical and ascetic, clearly intended to eradicate desire. A beginning is made with ‘correct speech’, which is fol­lowed by ‘correct conduct’ (sila). Buddhism has formulated four or five primary ethical rules: not to harm any living being, not to steal, not to commit sexual misdemeanour (which in the case of the monk turns into total sexual abstinence) and not to tell lies and insults. To this was added a prohibition of intoxicants. These five make up the pahca-s'ila, ‘fivefold conduct’. At a certain point, the rejection of various professions is en­joined (‘correct livelihood’). For example, to make a living out of hunting or being a soldier would be irreconcilable with the ideal of not harming any creature.

After ‘correct effort’ the path moves out of the life of a layman into that of the fully committed Buddhist, the monk. Ethic is here complemented by meditational exercises, alluded to by ‘correct mindfulness (srnrti, Pah: sati)’ and ‘correct meditation (dhyana, Pali: jhana)’, designed to overcome ignorance. Detailed information on the structure and rationale of Buddhist meditation techniques can be found in the old scriptures. Rather surprisingly perhaps, no major differences appear in a comparison with what Hindu yoga traditions have to offer. After appropriate moral preparation, the first exercises involve the cultivation of positive mental attitudes. Then a radical awareness (srnrti) of all one’s thoughts, words and deeds is aimed at which intends to eradicate unconscious attitudes, instincts and prejudices. In this connection may be mentioned an exercise called ‘application of mindful­ness’ (smrtyupasthana). First the body, then the emotions and the mind (citta), and finally all empirical phenomena are meditated upon as transient and lacking any kind of lasting inner core. This leads over to an increase of the concentrative faculties and mental clarity, and the mind now reaches out into higher states of consciousness (dhyana). Ultimately this allows for the direct perception of the Buddhist teaching as true, of the nature of reality, and of the chain of causes and effects that have resulted, after innumerable rebirths, in the current existence. Alongside these insights, the experience of true happi­ness occurs, for suffering has been overcome and there will be no further return into its realm. Liberation has been achieved. Whether presented to us in the hagiography about the Buddha’s own enlightenment or in the texts talking about Buddhist meditation, this is the content of the culmination of the Buddhist path.

This is, in a nutshell, the teaching implied in the Four Noble Truths and, in a sense, of early Buddhism. But we have to remind ourselves that it appears within the renouncer tradition, and in fact at a rela­tively late stage. Thus we may assume that this teaching comments in a variety of ways on the thought available at the time and defines itself in relation to it. It clearly shares with many of the other renouncers a total rejection of the Vedic religious system. The possibility of achieving enlight­enment and liberation is latent in every man, and thus Buddhism addresses itself to all. To restrict true religious knowledge to a small minority, to have an elite guard the access to it and to claim that it is available only through a revealed corpus of sacred, equally well-guarded scriptures—all this appears to Buddhism as a parody of true religion. Now given the fact that a metaphysical framework of liberation which involved concepts like ‘dtman’ and ‘brahman' inevitably had ideological connotations (as shown above), this is one reason why early Buddhism would find it difficult to adopt a similar framework. Furthermore, it did not want to accept the idea of an individual, permanent ‘soul’ or jtva, as found for instance with Jainism. The observable transience of all phenomena suggested to them the absence of a lasting, inner core in man. Whatever other reasons there may have been, the Buddhists decided to take a strictly empirical and pragmatic line and reject all specula­tion about the nature of a soul, a self, an dtman or ajlva, as unproductive. If it makes sense to assume the all-pervasive presence of suffering, the only logical conclusion to draw from this is the need for a practical course of action. To eradicate suffering by removing desire and ignorance is the only legitimate task; to sit back and speculate would be a fatal waste of time.

The absence of any explicit teaching about metaphysical issues like the existence of a ‘soul’ or some such inner core in man and the nature of the state of liberation has created considerable conster­nation not just among Western scholars, but also among Indian thinkers outside, and indeed inside, the Buddhist tradition. In fact, it could be argued that the subsequent history of Buddhist thought is no more than a struggle to interpret this Buddhist teaching and the nature of the Buddha himself (which implies, the nature of any one ‘enlightened’) more in terms of a philosophical system. But such a turn to metaphysical speculation had very practical implications for the religious life. Given the absence of any centralised authority or initial metaphysical doctrines, there was obviously enormous scope for a great variety of positions to emerge. It is here where Jainism and Buddhism differ radically.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the charge of ‘nihilism’ was levelled against the Buddha’s teaching. But if the Buddhist goal had been to overcome suffering by plunging into a total ‘nothing’, it would have been easy enough for the Buddha to say so. Instead we find frequent statements in which early Buddhism explicitly distances itself from ‘nihilism’ (which was indeed preached by some of the renouncers). An episode is told in which the Buddha was asked directly whether he accepted the existence of a soul or not. He kept silent. Afterwards he explained himself. Had he said yes, his teaching would have been interpreted as similar to those schools of thought that postulated an eternal soul (e.g. thejains). Had he said no, it would have made no sense to the person who had asked the question. In short, neither answer would have served any spiritual purpose. Or here is another illustration of this practical orientation. If a man were hit by a poisoned arrow, he would not waste his time asking who shot the arrow, whether he was fat or slim, what his family background was, what kind of bow was used and so on.

Instead he would try to find a doctor as soon as possible. Vis-à-vis the fundamental fact of suffering, not metaphysical speculation but spiritual practice is urgently required. Then we have an episode where the metaphor of a burning fire is compared to earthly existence. It can be defined in terms of its place and of the time it burns, and also of its material causes (the fuel). But once it has gone out, such qualifications cannot apply any more. By ‘gone out’ the contemporary audience may well have understood that it has merged back into the amorphous, latent state of the cosmological element, fire. This seems to suggest that once the Buddha (and by implication, any enlightened being) has died, all qualifications in terms of space, time, matter, name, etc. do not apply any more. Like the ocean, he has become unfathomable and unchartable. If all this meant simply ‘nothing’, this would be dreadfully roundabout and verbose. After all, enlightenment is a totally fulfilling experience; it implies the happiness of knowing that suffering has been destroyed, or ‘blown out’. The word nirvana, which does mean ‘blowing out’, need not be pressed to refer to annihilation in an ontological or metaphysical sense. It is perfectly sufficient to read it as referring to the annihilation of the three dsravas, that is, ignorance, etc. The very fact that such an experience is possible implies that it takes place somewhere. It can certainly not be in vijndna (as defined above), the most fleeting of the skandhas. Where else it could be is not stated; only when we come to Mahayana Buddhism will attempts at answering this question be found.

By making these ideas available to others and evolv­ing concrete structures within society, the Buddha’s teaching became a religion. He is presented to us as extremely sociable, and adaptable to a great variety of audiences. Here, in his attitude towards ordinary people, the principle of the ‘golden middle’ is applied. He is said to have succeeded in recruiting a large following from a great variety of backgrounds. The pre­dominant lifestyle they adopted seems to have been, at least initially, that of the homeless, itinerant mendicant. What better way of backing up one’s meditations about the transience of all things than by leading such an un­settled life, which brings one in contact with all kinds of people? However, like the Jains, the early Buddhists did not insist on an either/or decision. They accepted that in many cases people would benefit from closer contact with the mendicants without actually joining them. Thus we have the category of lay followers. The most obvious difference between the two groups lies in total sexual abstinence for the mendicant and a strictly regulated sexual life within his marriage for the layman. There seems to have been a certain reluctance to allow women to ‘renounce’, but eventually this became possible, although such ‘nuns’ were always kept in an inferior position. Thus, like the Jain community, the Buddhist one consists of four components: hhiksu and bhiksuni, updsaka and updsika. Whilst the laymen provide the mendicants with their, theoretically meagre, requirements (simple food, an occasional ochre robe, etc.), the mendicants in return preach the Buddha’s Dharma—his teaching—to them, to prepare them for a full commitment to the spiritual path in a later rebirth.

From early times onwards, settled monastic life pro­vided an institutional alternative to homeless mendicancy. This monasticism seems to have started as a result of the Indian weather. Heavy downpours during the three months of the rainy season make travelling on foot almost impossible. Thus for these three months even the mendicants remained in one place. As a result of the laymen’s zeal in showing their appreciation through lavish donations towards the construction of proper edifices for these ‘rain retreats’, and presumably also due to the temptations of a life more comfortable than the homeless wandering, the period expanded, until in the end mendicants remained the whole year in these new homes.

Sedentary monasticism stimulated the development of monastic ethics and of rules governing the communal life. At the very basis of these rules lie the ethical presuppositions of the renouncer tradition gene­rally. But in the emphasis on intention, as opposed to a mechanistic concep­tion of moral behaviour (more typical of the Jains), we may well sense the influence of the Buddha. Such rules were initially formulated as the prdtimoksa, a catalogue or litany of monastic injunctions. It has been sug­gested that the prdtimoksa was originally linked with the fortnightly com­munal meetings in the monasteries, acting as the ‘confessional mirror’ each monk had to confront. Any infringement of the rules had to be confessed, and the appropriate penance be done. Eventually, then, a full system of monastic ethics evolved, in which each rule was elaborately defined in terms of its range of application. This then is the Vinaya. The more than 200 rules are divided into seven groups of graded severity. Four injunctions are essen­tial; a violation of any of them will result in the permanent expulsion from the monastic community. They are: sexual intercourse, theft, killing and the proclamation of superhuman faculties. All remaining injunctions allow for atonement. With group seven the rules are so peripheral to Buddhist spiritual discipline that they are no more than guide-lines for good manners (like not licking the fingers while eating).

Thus the Vinaya inculcates ethical attitudes, while at the same time it lays down precise rules for the monk’s behaviour both inside and outside the monastery. In theory the whole Vinaya is subordinate to two other major responsibilities: to pursue one’s liberation and to preach the Buddha’s Dharma. But given the Vinaya’s complexity, in practice it might well have usurped central importance in the minds of many a monk. To observe the rules would in that case have become the primary spiritual goal. It will be seen below (in the section on the Mahayana) that certain critics at least assumed the existence of such an attitude.

Parallel to the evolution of monasticism and a com­plex monastic rule went another development, namely the formulation of the Buddha’s teaching. What the Buddha taught was not written down, nor was it turned into a literary corpus like the Vedas. It emerged in the context of formal and informal public addresses, to a great variety of audiences and over a long period (traditionally, forty years). It seems reasonable to assume that the Buddha did not ‘compose’ a totally new sermon for each of the thousands of occasions when he preached. Instead, a fair number of‘repertoire pieces’ of teaching must have evolved over the years. Now many of his disciples would have listened to hundreds and thousands of such sermons (sutras, Pali: suttas). Key ideas, recurring patterns, typical structures and such repertoire pieces must have engrained themselves deeply in their memories. Thus there is no need to doubt that even some generations after the Buddha’s death the essence of his teaching, in that form, was still available, though obviously very little of it verbatim. Again, it seems likely that efforts were made at certain stages to co-ordinate and regulate the available store of such memories and weed out the inevitable apocryphal material. Yet it is highly unlikely that the whole of the Buddhist movement could remain involved in such efforts, as the generations since the Buddha passed by; the geographical spread of Buddhism was far too wide for that. What is important here is the fact that we cannot assume the existence of so me ‘original Buddhist canon’. Instead, there is sufficient evidence to suggest that a variety of such Buddhist canons evolved only gradually, in a variety of Buddhist communities belonging to different geographical areas. It seems that the Buddha himself laid the basis for this proliferation, by preventing the creation of a ‘canon’ (in Sanskrit) of his teaching. Just as the teaching was delivered in the vernacular, his disciples conceptualised it and preached it by means of their respective vernaculars. But the fact that Buddhism (and its literatures) disappeared from India around 1200 ce gave rise to a rather different impression of this situation. The only ‘complete’ canon that has come down to us belongs to the Buddhist tradition of Ceylon (Sri Lanka). It appears that during the third or second century bce settlers from central north India brought their Buddhism to this island. Pah was the vernacular in which the Buddhist teaching had been retained by them, and it remained the language of Buddhist learning long after texts began to be written down. But Pali was not the Buddha’s mother tongue. Fragments of other ‘canons’ in other Indian vernaculars testify to the existence of traditions outside the Pali one. None, however, are written in what must be assumed to have been the Buddha’s native language, some form of Magadhi.

Besides the Vinaya and the sermons on Dharma, early Buddhist literature knows of a third component, the Abhidharma. It grew out of reflections on the sermons and did not attempt to present itself as the direct teaching of the Buddha. Thus we are dealing here with a relatively late literary product. Earliest Buddhism refrained from presenting its teaching in any systematic or metaphysical framework. The Abhidharma in a sense attempts to fill this gap. It is difficult to say what its original intentions were. It could have been the need to provide structured guidance for meditation, or to justify Buddhist ideas philosophically, or simply the temptation to draw on fashionable intellectual discussions and provide a Buddhist position in them. Whatever the precise circumstances may have been, the Abhidharma develops a systematic view of the world, man and his destiny. The key concept is that of the dharmas (not to be confused with the Dharma, the Buddhist teaching, or the Hindu concept). The whole of reality is cut up into dharmas, that is the smallest possible units. As far as matter is concerned, we obtain 'form-dharmas’, of different kinds corresponding to the different ele­ments earth, water, fire, etc. These would be the atoms of other schools of Indian thought. But similarly emotions, volition, thinking, etc. are also dissected into 'feeling-dharmas’ etc. Here typically Buddhist ideas are now employed. All dharmas, of whatever kind, are characterised by three interre­lated features: they are transient, lack an inner permanent core or essence and are suffering. These are the tri-laksanas (triple characteristics) anitya, anatman and duhkha. That anything which is transient cannot be regarded as posses­sing some permanent substance, and in turn cannot therefore be approached as providing true happiness—these are old Buddhist ideas. But to have it applied to all dharmas is new. Not only that: ‘transience’ itself is radically redefined. Every dharma lasts but a moment, to be replaced by a similar one the next moment. The three asravas (naturally also made up of dharmas) account for this replacement and thus for continuity in time. Only one dharma is not conditioned in this manner, and that is nirvana. Such ideas were developed in the various treatises which together make up the Abhidharma and in the commentaries on them.

These now are the three basic categories (or ‘bas­kets’, pitaka) of Buddhist ‘canonical’ literature: Vinaya, Sutra (also called Dharma) and Abhidharma. However, as a culture Buddhism produced a variety of further literary works which found their way into the ‘canon’ (in the Pali, as the ‘miscellaneous section’ of the Sutta-pitaka). Here we find among others a collection of ethical maximes (Dharma-pada, Pali: Dhamma- pada), poems by early monks and nuns (Thera- and Theri-gathas), stories about the Buddha’s previous existences (Jatakas) and poems, partly very ancient, on the spiritual path (Suttanipdta).

So far the emphasis has been on ‘learned’ and monas­tic Buddhism. We do, however, possess evidence also for developments outside the monasteries, among the laymen of the Buddhist community. Thus with striking immediacy one of the last Maurya emperors, Asoka, speaks to us through his inscriptions (third century bce). The Buddhist Dharma to him is clearly a humanitarian ethic, a concern for the well-being of people and also of animals. No philosophy, no meditation and no monastic institutions are referred to. Besides these inscriptions, we have from roughly the same period architectural remnants, the stupas (or caityas) of Sanchi, Bharhut, Amaravati, and so on. In origin, astupa is a burial mound for nobles of pre-Buddhist north-eastern India. Its role in Buddhism is not well defined. Legend says that portions of the Buddha’s ashes were kept on top of the hemispherical structure. In terms of normative Buddhism, a visit to these sites could be no more than a reminder of the Buddhist spiritual ideal. But there must have been at work a strong popular cult as well, which approached the stiipa in a different way. It is clear that acts of worship were performed here, very much like what went on in popular village religion, with offerings of flowers and incense, and with music and dance. The Vinaya would prohibit monks participating in these rituals. Since no literary documents about these religious practices are known (though some connection with aspects of Mahayana Buddhist literature has been suggested), it is impossible to say what precisely the religious content could have been. For some people participating, the Buddha may well have been like a deva, but the more sophisticated participants must have envisaged the nature of the Buddha and his relationship with the stupa cult in some other, more typically Buddhist, manner. What is important is to realise that, from an early period onwards, Buddhism expresses itself not merely as a monastic system, but as a religion with decidedly popular aspects.

Buddhism spread over India very rapidly, and by the second or first century âñå we can assume its presence in most Indian regions (including Ceylon/Sri Lanka and what today is Pakistan). Inevitably, regional variations developed. Moreover, we have the variations in terms of monastic versus laymen’s and popular Buddhism. Thirdly, there is the initial absence of a rigid authority. If one takes these three features into account, it is not difficult to envisage earlier Indian Buddhism as an extremely dynamic and multifarious religion. However, there is another side to this. Such a fluid and dynamic scene has the potential for all kinds of tensions and disagreements. Some of these must have been about doctrinal issues, others about details of the monastic discipline; some could involve an ideological struggle between monastic institutions and laymen, and yet others may well be neutral, merely regional variations observable only to the traveller. The evidence available, however fragmented and ambivalent it may be, is sufficient to show that all these dynamic developments cannot be explained merely in terms of a series of‘councils’ and consequent ‘schisms’.

Inevitably such variety is interpreted for us through the eyes of Sri Lankan Buddhism which naturally presents itself as the single ‘orthodox’ tradition. Besides, its relative isolation from Indian developments allowed it to preserve a fairly ‘archaic’ appearance. But it must not be forgotten that the Pah canon began to be written down only around 100 âñå, and that only around 400 ce was a final corpus and its definitive interpretation established. Of the other ‘sects’, we know in most cases little more than their names. Moreover, it is far from clear what the rationale of such nomenclature may have been. In many cases we may be dealing merely with titles used by a regional group of Buddhists (of whatever doctrinal and disciplinary persua­sion). Sometimes such a name itself created the idea ofa ‘heterodox’ position.

One group in central India called itself the Lokottara-vadins. This title has been interpreted to mean ‘transcendentalists’ and became associated with the idea that these Buddhists believed in a supernatural (or quasi-divine) Buddha- figure. However, one of their canonical scriptures, the Mahdvastu, has been preserved, and an unbiased study of the text yields a different picture. This ‘life-story’ of the Buddha presents him indeed as capable of deeds far beyond the potential of ordinary human beings. But then he was indeed special. As the many jdtaka stories included in the Mahdvastu, and the text as a whole, make clear, he was a being who over many past existences accumulated an enormous store ofpunya (positive karma). Inevitably a person who can draw on such a store will be able to do things well ‘beyond what is possible to ordinary people’ (this is an alternative translation of lokottara).

Traditionally, the first schism occurred between the sthaviras, the advocates of‘orthodoxy’, and monks, and the mahdsdrighikas. The latter term has variously been interpreted, for instance as ‘the majority’ or ‘those believing in a wider community’ (that is including laymen). The Pah for sthavira is thera, and thus Sri Lankan Buddhism presents itself as the direct continuation of thztsthavira- or thera-vdda, the ‘teaching of the elders’. It does, however, acknowledge a variety of‘sectarian’ offshoots from its own ‘mainstream’ lineage. From some of these, like the Sarvdsti-vada (the ‘teach­ing that everything exists’), some literature has been preserved. Details on most of the further varieties of the Mahasanghika are not available. But in terms of historical importance, this whole discussion of Indian sectarian developments is relatively insignificant, when compared with a very differ­ent kind of internal argument, which eventually crystallised as the Mahayana and the Hinayana. This will be discussed in a later section.

Obviously, the spread of Buddhism was partly due to direct missionary activity: mendicants travelling far and wide and preach­ing the Dharma. But in addition we must also envisage movements of whole groups of people, on a large scale. In some instances, this may have been due to banishment on account of disputes. But in most cases this was just part of the general spread of‘Aryan’ people over the sub-continent. As new Aryan kingdoms were created in ‘frontier regions’ (like Andhra and Ceylon/Sri Lanka during the third century âñå or the Tamil country somewhat later), they attracted groups of immigrants, and these included Buddhists. But it was relatively rare in India for a king to profess openly to be following Buddhism; Asoka seems to have been very much the exception. This was different in Sri Lanka, where up to the present day Buddhism has been able to enjoy the patronage of the ruling power, in an uninterrupted line.