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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.orgAcharya Shri Kailashsagarsuri Gyanmandir
( xlvi)
canon on the ground that in the Chinese version of one of the books of the Sūtra Pitaka, riz., the Ekottaragama or Auguttara Nikāya, there is mention of king Puşyamitra. Rightly or wrongly, Pusyamitra figures in the Savåstivāda literature, notably in the Divya vadīva, as a persecutor of the followers of Buddhism. The date of Puşyamitra's accession to the throne of Magadha is, according to Vincent Smith, 184 B.C. The Chinese version of the Sarvåstivāda canon contains the translation of only four Agamas which are in many respects the same as the first four Nikāyas of the Pali Sutta Pitaka. The Divyâvadāna, too, does not refer to more than four Agamas." Prof. Sylavan Lévi has, on the contrary, shown that there was a Kşudraka Nikāya or Lesser Collection consisting of some books similar to tbe Pāli.: That there were five Nikāyas and persons who got them by heart in the time of Puşyamitra is conclusively proved by the votive inscriptions at Bharhut and Sanchi containing such personal epithets as Pancavekayika, and Petaki. As regards the proof of a close resemblance between the Sarvåstivāda works of the Ksudraka Nikāya and the Pali, one can profitably compare the Fa-kheu. king original with the Pāli Dhammapada and see how much agreement there is between them. All this may suffice to show that the Fa-kheu-king original with 500 verses and written in Mixed Sanskrit belonged to an older redaction of the Sarvåstivāda canon, prepared probably during the reigos of Pusyamitra and Menander. This is not to deny that a new redaction of the Sarvastivāda canon was made during the reign of Kanişka along with the compilation of three Vibhāsā Šāstras or extensive commentaries which subsequently gave rise to the name Vaibhāşika replacing the older name Sautrāntika. The new redaction was no more than a later Sanskrit recast of the Sautrântika
· Divyávadāna, p. 1434. • Idid, p. 333.
• Toung Pao, p. +16 f., Wintorpitz's 'listory of Indian Literatare' in German, Pt. II. p. 187.
• Buddbjøt India, pp. 167.8.
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