Book Title: Remarks On Religious Predominance In Kashmir Hindu Or Buddhist
Author(s): Toru Funayama
Publisher: Toru Funayama
Catalog link: https://jainqq.org/explore/269553/1
JAIN EDUCATION INTERNATIONAL FOR PRIVATE AND PERSONAL USE ONLY
Page #1
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________ Remarks on Religious Predominance in Kashmir; Hindu or Buddhist? Toru FUNAYAMA The aim of this paper is to make a preliminary survey of the historical interactions between the orthodox religions (Brahmanism/Hinduism) and. Buddhism in Kashmir. According to Buddhist materials, Kashmir was a sacred place for Buddhists: The Pali, Tibetan, and Chinese sources more or less unanimously state that Buddhism in Kashmir began with its propagation by arhat "Madhyantika (Majjhantika), a disciple of Ananda. Later it became a stronghold of the Sarvastivada school of Buddhism. This was supported by a story of Mahadeva and King Asoka and also generated an undemonstrable legend of the Fourth Buddhist Congress called by King Kaniska, a story absent from the Pali transmission. In any case it is certain that Kashmir was at least a doctrinal center of the Sarvastivada school,2 even if one omits the legendary elements. Moreover, the place produced eminent Buddhist logicians at later periods. These cases may give us the impression that the land of Kashmir was occupied only by Buddhism. However, this is not the case: the impression is just the opposite when one surveys Brahmanic/Hinduistic materials. In reality, Kashmir was a somewhat special place where the orthodox power and Buddhism coexisted side by side, as is often pointed out by modern scholars." Assuming that this is true, however, it is not yet clear how they actually stood in relation to each other. Did they exist peacefully side by side for hundreds of years? Did they not try to exclude each other on the basis of doctrinal discrepancies? In order to examine these questions, I would like to survey the description of Buddhism in the Nilamata-purana (abbrev. as NM, hereafter), then compare it with some descriptions in Kalhana's Rajatarangini (abbrev. as RT, hereafter), and finally try to fill in a gap between these texts, making use of reports by Chinese pilgrims in the 7th and 8th centuries A.D. I It is or difficult to ascertain what idea the NM held about Buddhism because the text hardly refers to it. The only exception is the section on festivals for Buddha's birthday which begins from v. 684 as a part of the long description of -367
Page #2
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________ A Study of the Nilamata-Aspects of Hinduism in Ancient Kashmir rituals in Kashmir. The section starts as follows: "Obrahman, when the twenty-eighth kali-yuga arrives, Visnu, the protector of the world, shall become a preceptor of the world named Buddha." (v. 684). After this, the text explains in minute detail how and when the people should celebrate the Buddha. The reason why they worship Him lies in the very Hinduistic belief that Sakyamuni the Buddha is none other than an incarnation (avatara) of Visnu himself: through the former, they indirectly worship the latter. Hence the Buddha is treated as one of the innumerable deities in Hinduism. It is certain that in this context Buddhism was not a menace to the orthodox religion. That is, the NM suggests that Buddhism and the orthodox power of that time got along together. On the whole it is plausible to assume that this kind of peaceful coexistence continued as a relationship of the two religious powers for the following centuries. As seen below, however, it is certain that this amity between them continued not uniformly but only intermittently through the history of Kashmir. First, let us pick up an account of the RT (i, 177-184) to show the antagonism of the orthodox side to Buddhism in the reign of Abhimanyu I. It is summarized as follows: Buddhists who were under the protection of bodhisattva Nagarjuna defeated their opponents and became prosperous for a while. However, as they did not keep the rituals taught by Nila in the NM, nagas were stoppped from receiving offerings from the people. The nagas got angry and caused a heavy snowfall in the country in order to afflict the Buddhists, as a result of which the Buddhists perished at last. Meanwhile, brahmins who kept offering to the nagas survived. Then a brahmin named Candradeva appeared and did penance to please naga Nila, so that Nila, transforming himself into Candradeva, stopped the snow and restored the rituals which were once prescribed by Nila himself. Thus thanks to this second Candradeva, intolerable damages owing to the Buddhists were finally stopped. It is interesting that, though this story is composed in relation to the NM, which is named, the attitudes toward Buddhism are quite different from the descriptions of the NM. The story is indeed of a legendary character, but it does not necessarily undermine its importance; it is probable that, in some period before Kalhana, people on the orthodox side felt hostile toward Buddhism to the degree that they inspired such a sequal to the NM. p Buddhism, it seems, found opposition from the preceding orthodox power in Kashmir from the beginning. As referred to above, Buddhism in Kashmir -- 368 -
Page #3
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________ Remarks on Religious Predominance in Kashmir; Hindu or Buddhist? originated from Madhyantika's missionary work. According to the oldest Chinese version of the legend, there lived a great nagas who resisted Madhyantika. It was only after they competed for over a week, each by means of his own supernatural powers, that the defeated naga finally conceded to the propagation of Buddhism. This suggests that Buddhists who composed this story held the feeling that at first Buddhism had not been warmly welcomed by orthodox Kashmirians. More evidences of antagonism in later periods are found in the Datang Xiyuji (tig tot az, abbrev. as Xiyuji, hereafter) by Xuanzang (**; 600/602-664 A.D.) who probably visited Kashmir in the reign of King Durlabhavardhana. Xuanzang reports: After Madhyantika died, a group of *kritas (? REFU; people who had been traded from outside) put up their own king. After King Kaniska died, too, they put up a new king and dispelled the Buddhist monks in an attempt to destroy Buddhism. Then the king of *Himatala (? P/10 ) of Tokhara came to this land, dispelled the ministers of the anti-Buddhist government, restored Kashmirian Buddhism as before, and then went back to his country. And thus, having described some historical/legendary events before his time, Xuanzang states the contemporary state of religion in the following way: As Buddhists had overturned their religion and exterminated traditional rituals, the kritas for generations increasingly felt a grudge against and hatred for the Law of Buddha. Long time passed, they now again state that they have their own king. This is the reason why the people of this country at present do not make much of (Buddhism) and devote themselves to anti-Buddhism and deva-temples. It is difficult to trace accurately all these descriptions as long as we have neither evidence of kritas nor the king of Himatala. As for the latter, Xuanzang states elsewhere that Kaniska ascended the throne in the 400th year after Buddha's nirvana, on the one hand, and that the king of Himatala flourished in the 600th year, on the other. That is, according to the Xiyuji, the king of Himatala restored Kashmirian Buddhism about two hundred years after King Kaniska. The above stated report suggests that the orthodox religion was predominant over Buddhism in ca. 630 A.D. when Xuanzang visited Kashmir. Comparing these descriptions in the Xiyuji with those in the RT, we get the table (next page). It is of course dangerous to correlate each event in the two texts, believing all the descriptions in the written order, because the sources for their chronological sequences are completely different. However, several events in the texts seem to correspond to each other as indicated with lines in the table. According to the -- 369 --
Page #4
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________ A Study of the Nilamata - Aspects of Hinduism in Ancient Kashmir