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INTRODUCTION
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flourished and Kumāra Bālāditya whether he be identified with Kumaragupta I, Govindagupta, Narasimhagupta I or any other Gupta kingmight have been taught by Vasubandhu in his youth age. Hence, Vasubandhu's date may be correctly arrived at c. 360-440 A.D. and consequently his brother Asanga who was about twenty years older might have flourished about c. 350415 A.D.3.
This date also fits in with the date of Dinnāga, who is regarded by the Indian Buddhist tradition as a disciple of Vasubandhuo. He is said to have flourished some time in the end of the fourth and the first half of the fifth century A.D. He was the younger contemporary of Vasubandhu and hence Vasubandhu's above date cannot be regarded as completely implausible.
On the other hand, some parts of Asanga's YBS
1. Vide, Goyal, pp. 215-16 for these views. 2. Prof. Agrawala suggests the date of Vasubandhu to be 320-400
(ibid., p. 9). He also refers to a citation of Kosa along with Dinnāga in Bāna's Harşacarita (p. 73) and Megbadūta, I. 14 (Com. of Mallinātha), but Mallinätha's evidence is not conclusive and indicates only to ancient tradition. Even Kālidāsa's evidence is inconclusive. Bāna's evidence simply refers to the identity of two Vasubandhus', the Vaibhāșika and the Vijñānāva
din, vide, Agrawala, op. cit., pp. 10-1. 3. Kern, Manual of Indian Buddhism, p. 129, f.n. 1. 4. JMN, p. 506. 5. Vide, Rāhula Sāṁkrtyāyana, Intro. to Pramāņavārttikam, 1,
Allahabad, 1943, ; Conze, Buddhism, p. 164 (440 A.D.), Stcherbatsky, Buddhist Logic, I.31-2.
