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Assessing the different viows of scholars regarding the authenticity of the First Buddhist Council of Rājagaba, we find that no reliable evidence is available to reject its validity. The Gavāmpati and Purana accounts contain the parts of the Buddha's teaching which they accepted. We cannot therefore think of it as a pure invention. Thus all accounts favour the acceptance of the First Council as a historical event.
As regards its cotribution to the evolution of the Pāli. Canon, it is, however, difficult to accept the traditional conception, which asserts that the whole Dhamma and Vinaya were recited in the First Council. The Sumaganlavilasini19 further adds that not only Dhamma and Vinaya, but also the Abhidhamma was finalised in this very Council. How was it possible to. compile the whole of tbe Sutta and Vinaya along with the Abhidhamma within about two months ?
Poussin is inclined to thihk that the Council could not but be regarded as an enlarged Patimokkha assembly 20
Minayeff asserts that the accounts of the Council contain two clearly distinguishable parts, of which the one that speaks. of the compilation of the Canon must belong to a period posterior to the rise of the sects.21 Nalinaksa Dutt is of opinion that the Council was summoned to decide the less important rules of discipline ( khuddakānukhuddakāni sikkhåpadani which were sanctioned by the Buddha himself.22
The Disarāmsa presents a more probable aocount : "The Bhikkhus composed the collection of Dhamma and Vinaya, by asking the Thera called Ananda regarding the Dhamma. There Mahākassapa and the great teacher Anurudha, Thera Upāli. of powerful memory, and learned Anauda, as well as many other distinguished disciples who had been praised by the Buddha....made this council.” Here the Dhamma and Vinaya.. mean selected groups of the original Suttas and doctrines, not the whole present Pali Tipitaka. (b) The Second Council
Hundred years after the death of the Buddha (vassasataparinibbute Bhagavati), the Second Council was held in
