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INTRODUCTION
not educated under Sīlabhadra. Even at the age of 24, 25, Dharmakirti's genius could not have escaped the notice of scholars. He is the greatest of Buddhist logicians, nay, of even all Indian logicians. The whole Indian Nyāyaśāstra after his time preserves the echo of his marvellous reasoning power, clear sight and deep knowledge. It is a wonder why Hiuen-Tsang could not make himself acquainted with such a personality who was the co-disciple of his teacher. .
Hiuen-Tsang's silence in regard to Dharmakīrti can be accounted for in three ways—(1) At the time of Hiuen-Tsang's stay in Nālanda (635 A.C.) Dharmakirti was already dead. (2) Hiuen-Tsang was well-versed in Buddhist Philosophy, there is no doubt about it, but his knowledge of Buddhist logic was not so deep, which is proved by his not making any attempt to translate any big work on Buddhist logic, like the Pramāṇasamuchchaya of Dinnāga. He translated two or three treatises on Buddhist logic but they are small manuals. Since Hiuen-Tsang was not much interested in that subject he could have easily overlooked the contributions of Dharmakīrti. (3) If at all Dharmakirti was living at the time of Hiuen-Tsang and as I have shown, he could not have been very young at the time, Hiuen-Tsang was bound to know this brilliant young logician of Nālandā. In that case the compilers of the life of Hiuen-Tsang had some reason for not mentioning the name of Dharmakirti. In fact often we find them qulogizing too much the ability of their hero. When in Orissa a heretical scholar challenged Buddhists for a debate, they sought the assistance of Nālandā and Hiuen-Tsang was selected as a representative scholar
