________________
Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.orgAcharya Shri Kailashsagarsuri Gyanmandir
( xliv
)
author of the Samyuktábhidharma Sastra. His opinion is mainly based upon Hiuen Thsang's account of the Buddhist Council in Kanişka's time which is no less open to dispute. Iu the Chinese traveller's list of the Buddhist celebrities of Gandhāra! Dharmatrata, the author of the Samyuktabhidharma Săstra, is associated with Pārsva, Manoratha, Asauga, Vasubandhu and Nārāyaṇadeva, most of whom flourished in the 4th and 5th centuries A.D., while in another list of Vaibhāşika teachers, quoted by Beal (supra), Dharmatrāta enjoys the company of Ašvaghosa and Vasumitra. If the tradition in the Chuh-yauking deserves any credence, Dharmatrīta, the compiler of the Fa-kheu-king, was the maternal uncle of Vasumitra. According to Hiuen Thsang, Vasumitra, a native of Mid-India and & contemporary of Päráva presided over the delaberations of the Vaibhāșika Council which was convened in Kashmir under the auspices of king Kanişka” and he was the compiler of the Abbidharmaprakaranapada Sāstra.s How can we believe that one and the same Vasumitra was the compiler of the Abhidharma treatise and the president of the Vaibhāșika Council in Kanişka's time? The three standard commentaries in Classical Sanskrit, compiled at the above council, presuppose an older redaction of the Sarvástivāda canon consisting of three Pitakas, viz., the Upadesa or Sūtra, the Vinaya and the Abhidharma. Of the seven Prakaraņas or treatises composing the Abhidharma Pitaka, one is said to have been compiled 100 years and four 300 years after Buddba's demise. It is the four treatises attributed to Kātyāyana and · Vasumitra that are placed by tradition in the Chinese three centuries after the demise of the Buddha. Prof. Takakusu finds reasons to think that Kätyäyana's
i Beal's 'Records of the Westorn World,' I. p. 98 f, • Ibid, I. p. 151 f. . Ibid, 1, p. 109. • Abhidharma VijManakayapada Sustra by Dovašarman.
• Abhidharma Jamnprasthana Sastra and Prajitapatipado Sastra by Kütyäynnn (Boal's Records. I. p. 195) and Vagimitra's Abhidharma Pra. karanapada Sastra and Dh&tukaya pada Sastru.
For Private And Personal
