1 Compare Mahavaw/sa, pp. 4, 125, 129, 199, 223-225, and Chap. 39, verse 28 ; <7ataka I, 166, 181, 402; II, 6; Dasaratha 6&taka, pp. 1, 21, 22, 26, &c; Dhammapada Commentary, pp. 94, 205, 206, 222, 359; Hatthavana-galla- vihara-vawsa, Chap. IX; Hardy, ' Eastern Monachism,' pp. 322-324.
The words Saddhaw, Uddhadehikazw, and Niv&po, given in Childers, refer to pagan rites.
On funerals among Buddhists in Japan, sec Miss Bird's 'Unbeaten Tracks/ vol. i.
xlvi THE BOOK OF THE GREAT DECEASE.
Gotama's time to the time when the existing chronicles were compiled, we should be able, if we could fix the date of any one of the kings, to calculate the date of the Buddha's death. This last we can do ; for the date of ATandragupta, and the date of his grandson Asoka, can be independently fixed within a few years by the aid of the Greek historians. But unfortunately the earlier parts of the otherwise reliable Ceylon chronicles are, like the earlier parts of Livy's otherwise reliable history of Rome, full of inconsistencies and impossibilities.
According to the Rd^a-parampard, or line of kings, in the Ceylon chronicles, the date of the Great Decease would be 543 B.C., which is arrived at by adding to the date 161 B.C. (from which the reliable portion of the history begins) two periods of 146 and 236 years. The first purports to give the time which elapsed between 161 B. C. and the great Buddhist church Council held under Asoka, and in the eighteenth year of his reign, at Patna ; and the second to give the interval between that Council and the Buddha's death.
It would result from the first calculation that the date of Asoka's coronation would be 325 B.C. (146+161 + 18). But we know that this must contain a blunder or blunders, as the date of Asoka's coronation can be fixed, as above stated, with absolute certainty within a year or two either way of 267 B.C.
Would it then be sound criticism to accept the other, earlier, period of 236 years found in those chronicles— a period which we cannot test by Greek chronology— and by simply adding the Ceylon calculation of 236 years to the European date for the eighteenth year of Asoka (that in circa 249 B.c.) to conclude that the Buddha died in or about 485 B.C. ?
I cannot think so. The further we go back the greater
does the probability of error become, not less. The most
superficial examination of the details of this earlier period
shows too, that they are unreliable ; and what reliance
would it be wise to place upon the total, apart from the
details, when we find it mentioned for the first time in
a work, the Dipavawsa, written eight centuries after the date it is proposed to fix ?
If further proof were needed, we have it in the fact that the Dipavawsa actually contains the details of another calculation — based not on the lists of kings (Rd^a-param- par&), but on a list of Theras (Thera-paramparA) stretching back from Asoka's time to the time of the great Teacher — which contradicts this calculation of 236 years.
The Thera-parampard gives the name of the member
of the Buddhist Order of Mendicants, that is, the Thera,
who ordained Mahinda (the son of Asoka), then the name
of the Thera who ordained that Thera, and so on. There
are only five of them from UpSli, who was ordained six-
teen years after Buddha's death, down to Mahinda in-
clusive. This would account not for 2136, but only for
about 150 years.
For let the reader take the case of any clergyman in the present day. The Bishop who ordains him would have been ordained thirty or forty years before ; and four such intervals would fill out, not 236 years, but about a century and a half ; and a similar argument applies with reasonable certainty to the case in point.
An examination of the details of the List of Theras confirms this conclusion strongly on every essential point. An examination also of the List of Kings shows that the period of 236 years is wrong by being too long. The shorter period of 1 50 years between Asoka and the Great Decease agrees much better with what we know of the literary history of Buddhism during that interval. And it also agrees with the tradition of the northern Bud- dhists as preserved by Hiouen Thsang, and in Kashmir and Tibet 1 . In the 'Questions of Milinda' also — a work of unknown date, preserved only in its P&li form, but
1 Julien's translation of Hiouen Thsang, ' M^moires stir les contrees occi- dentales,' vol. i. p. 172 ; Kahlaaa's Ra^a-taranginl, Book I ; and Csoma Korosi in * Asiatic Researches,' vol. xx. pp. 92, 297. They place the Great Decease 400 years before Kanishka, whose Council was held shortly after the commence- ment of our era.
xlviii THE BOOK OF THE GREAT DECEASE.
possibly derived from a northern Buddhist Sanskrit work — the date of the Buddha's death is fixed at five hundred years before the time of Milinda \ who certainly reigned about a century after Christ. I am, therefore, of opinion that the hitherto accepted date of the Buddha's death should be modified accordingly.
This would make the date of the Great Decease about 420-400 B.C. (very possibly a year or two later), and the date of Gotama's birth therefore eighty years earlier, or in round numbers about 500 B. C.
I have discussed the whole question at full length in my 'Ancient Coins and Measures of Ceylon/ written in ampli- fication of a paper read in 1874 before the Royal Asiatic Society ; and to that work I must refer any reader, who may take interest in these chronological discussions, for ampler details. I have been able here to present only a summary of an argument which is in so far of little im- portance, inasmuch as the rectification which I have ven- tured to propose only differs by a little more than half a century from the earliest date which can in any case be suggested as approximately correct (that is about 485 B.C.). The date 543 B. c, still unfortunately accepted outside the circle of students of Buddhism 2 , is now acknowledged to be too early by all scholars who have seriously considered the subject.
1 Trenckner, p. 3. Mr. Trenckner says in his preface that Buddhaghosa quotes this work, but unfortunately he does not give any reference. See the note below on our Sutta, Chap. VI, § 3.
2 See, for instance, Max Duncker, ' History of Antiquity,* vol. iv. p. 364. On the dated Edict, ascribed by some to Asoka, see my note loc. tit, and Oldenberg, ' Introd. to the Maha-vagga/ p. xxxviii.
The Book
Of the
GREAT DECEASE.
mahA-pabinibbAna-sutta.
Chapter I.
i \ Thus have I heard. The Blessed One was
once dwelling in Ra^agaha, on the hill called the
Vultures Peak. Now at that time A^atasattu, the
son of the queen-consort of Videha origin 2 , the king
of Magadha, was desirous of attacking the Va^ians ;
and he said to himself, * I will root out these Va^*-
1 Sections i-io, inclusive, recur in the Va^gi Vagga of the Sutta Nipata in the Anguttara Nikaya ; and there is a curiously incorrect version of § 3 in the Fa Kheu Pi Hu, translated from the Chinese by Mr. Beal, under the title of ' The Dhammapada from the Buddhist Canon,' pp. 165, 166.
2 A^atasattu Vedehiputto. The first word is not a per- sonal name, but an official epithet, ' he against whom there has arisen no (worthy or equal) foe ; ' the second gives us the maiden family, or tribal (not personal) name of his mother. Persons of distinction are scarcely ever mentioned by name in Indian Buddhist books, a rule applying more especially to kings, but extended n °t unfrequently to private persons. Thus Upatissa, the earnest ai *d thoughtful disciple whom the Buddha himself declared to be ' l he second founder of the kingdom of righteousness/ is referred t0 either as Dhamma-senapati or as Sariputta ; epithets of cor- responding origin to those in the text. By the Gains A^-atasattu ls called Ku«ika or Kowika, which again is probably not the name S lv en to him at the rice-eating (the ceremony corresponding to ln fant baptism), but a nickname acquired in after life.
[Ii] B
The Book of the Great Decease. C
g ians, mighty and powerful 1 though they be, I w
destroy these Va < £fians, I will bring these Va^iai
to utter ruin ! 9
2. So he spake to the Brdhman Vassak&ra, tl prime-minister of Magadha, and said :
' Come now, O Brahman, do you go to the Bless*
One, and bow down in adoration at his feet on n
behalf, and enquire in my name whether he is fr<
from illness and suffering, and in the enjoyment
ease and comfort, and vigorous health. Then t<
him that A^cltasattu, son of the Vedehi, the king
Magadha, in his eagerness to attack the Vaggian
has resolved, " I will root out these Va^ians, migh
and powerful though they be, I will destroy the
Vagfians, I will bring these Va^ians to utter ruin
And bear carefully in mind whatever the Bless*
One may predict, and repeat it to me. For tl
Buddhas speak nothing untrue!'
3. Then the Brahman Vassakdra hearkened to th
words of the king, saying, * Be it as you say/ An
ordering a number of magnificent carriages to b
made ready, he mounted one of them, left R^agah
with his train, and went to the Vulture's Peal
riding as far as the ground was passable for ca
1 Evammahiddhike evammah&nubhave. There is nothii supernatural about the iddhi here referred to. Etena tes$ samagga-bhdvan kathesi says the commentator simply: th referring the former adjective to the power of union, as he do the second to the power derived from practice in military tacti (hatthisippddlhi). The epithets are, indeed, most commor applied to the supernatural powers of Devatas, Nagas, and oth fairy-like beings ; but they are also used, sometimes in the simj sense of this passage, and sometimes in the other sense, of Buddh and of other Arahats. See M. P. S. 12, 43; M. Sud. S. 49-5 Gii. I, 34, 35> 39, 4i.
Wages, and then alighting and proceeding on foot
to the place where the Blessed One was. On
arriving there he exchanged with the Blessed One
the greetings and compliments of friendship and
civility, sat down respectfully by his side [and then
delivered to him the message even as the king had
commanded
4. Now at that time the venerable Ananda was
standing behind the Blessed One, and fanning him.
And the Blessed One said to him : ' Have you
heard, Ananda, that the Varans hold full and
frequent public assemblies ? '
' Lord, so I have heard/ replied he.
' So long, Ananda/ rejoined the Blessed One, ' as
the Va^ians hold these full and frequent public
assemblies ; so long may they be expected not to
decline, but to prosper/
[And in like manner questioning Ananda, and
receiving a similar reply, the Blessed One declared
as follows the other conditions which would ensure
the welfare of the Va^ian confederacy 2 .]
' So long, Ananda, as the Vagfians meet together
in concord, and rise in concord, and carry out
their undertakings in concord — so long as they
enact nothing not already established, abrogate
nothing that has been already enacted, and act in
accordance with the ancient institutions of the
Vaggians as established in former days — so long
as they honour and esteem and revere and support
the Vaggian elders, and hold it a point of duty to
hearken to their words — so long as no women or girls
1 § 2 repeated.
8 In the text there is a question, answer, and reply with each clause.
belonging to their clans are detained among them
by force or abduction — so long as they honour and
esteem and revere and support the Vaggian shrines 1
in town or country, and allow not the proper offerings
and rites, as formerly given and performed, to fall into
desuetude — so long as the rightful protection, defence,
and support shall be fully provided for the Arahats
among them, so that Arahats from a distance may
enter the realm, and the Arahats therein may live at
ease — so long may the Va^^ians be expected not
to decline, but to prosper/
5. Then the Blessed One addressed VassakHra the Brahman, and said :
' When I was once staying, O Brahman, at Vesdli
at the Sfirandada Temple 2 , I taught the Va^ians
these conditions of welfare ; and so long as those
conditions shall continue to exist among the Va^*-
^ians, so long as the Va^fians shall be well instructed
in those conditions, so long may we expect them
not to decline, but to prosper/
* We may expect then/ answered the Brdhman, 'the
welfare and not the decline of the V avians when
they are possessed of any one of these conditions of
welfare, how much more so when they are possessed
of all the $even. So, Gotama, the Vaggians cannot
be overcome by the king of Magadha ; that is, not
in battle, without diplomacy or breaking up their
alliance 3 . And now, Gotama, we must go ; we are
busy, and have much to do/