Table Of ContentUNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
PUBLICATIONS IN
CLASSICAL PHILOLOGY
VOLUME XVII
EDITORS
W. C. HELMBOLD
D. A. AMYX
J. K. ANDERSON
J. E. FONTENROSE
ANALYSIS OF THE
" - -
SRAVAKABHUMI
MANUSCRIPT
BY
ALEX WAYMAN
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
BERKELEY AND LOS ANGELES
1961
UNIVERSITY OF CAUFORNIA PUBUCATIONS IN CLASSICAL PHILOLOGY
EDITORS: W. C. HELMBOLD, D. A. AMYX, J. K. ANDERSON, J. E. FONTENROSE
Volume 17
Submitted by editors March 2, 1960
Issued September 20,1961
Price $5.00
UNIVERSITY OF CAUFORNIA PRESS
BERKELEY AND Los ANGELES
CALIFORNIA
-<>
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
LONDON, ENGLAND
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To My Teachers
MURRAY B. EMENEAU
and
FERDINAND D. LESSING
In Token of Gratitude and Esteem
PREFACE
THIS WORK is substantially the same as that submitted in partial satis
faction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in
Sanskrit at the University of California in June, 1959. It is an attempt
to describe the photographically reproduced manuscript of a Buddhist
text called the Sravakabhumi devoted to Buddhist meditation; to set
forth the literary history and the known facts about its author, AsaIiga;
to discuss the Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit language of the text; to analyze
the work to show the leading ideas; and finally to exhibit continuous
sections in edition and translation so as to indicate AsaIiga's way of
writing as well as his religious and philosophical position.
The arduous task could never have been completed without the good
fortune of excellent teachers and favorable circumstances. It is a pleasure
to express my gratitude to Professor Murray B. Emeneau, who guided
my steps in the Sanskrit language and made many helpful suggestions
for correcting and improving the present work. Professor F. D. Lessing,
now Emeritus, initiated me into Tibetan scholarship, and this language
has been indispensable for editing the Sravakabhumi manuscript. But he
has been more than a teacher to me: in fact, my father in Buddhist
research. Professor Peter A. Boodberg, who kindly perused the draft,
honored me by his interest in my studies. I deeply appreciate the courtesy
of Dr. Elizabeth Huff, chief of the East Asiatic Library, University of
California, in making the uncatalogued Tibetan collection easily acces
sible to me. My wife, Hideko, gave valuable aid by reading the Sino
Japanese translation of the text and provided continuous inspiration and
encouragement. Miss Genevieve Rogers, of the University of California
Press, has my gratitude for her numerous editorial improvements and
kindly patience.
ALEX WAYMAN
CONTENTS
I. Paleography 1
II. Literary History 19
III. Language of the Sravakabhilmi Manuscript 47
IV. Analysis of the Sravakabhilmi 58
V. Asanga's Views on Food . 135
VI. The Paramartha-gatha according to Asanga 163
CHAPTER I
PALEOGRAPHY
IN THE eleventh through the thirteenth centuries, many Indian pa1)q,its
came to Tibet and worked with Tibetan translators in the second period
of Buddhist diffusion in Tibet. Their numbers were swollen by refugees
from Moslem iconoclastic attacks on Buddhist monasteries in north
ern India. Many Sanskrit manuscripts brought by these pa1)rJ,its re
main preserved to this day in the cold dry climate of Tibet. In the 1930's
a courageous, indefatigable Indian of no mean linguistic attainment,
Rahula Sankptyayana, at that time a bhik§u, made a number of trips
into Tibet in search of Sanskrit palmleaf manuscripts. Usually he was
not allowed to remove these; in fact, their condition after intervening
centuries was often quite delicate. He took photographs of these texts,
and the photographic collection is held by the Bihar Research Society.l
A relatively small number of these manuscripts have since been edited.
SaIikrityayana himself specialized in editing manuscripts of Buddhist
logic. The ordinary difficulties involved in such editing are augmented
by the decreased definition of letters due to the photographic process.
Johnston, who edited one of the texts of this collection, wrote, "No
Buddhist text in Sanskrit can be satisfactorily edited without detailed
comparison with such Chinese and Tibetan versions as exist."2 This was
especially true of the work he edited. Of the two manuscripts in the Bihar
collection, Johnston identified one as in an early Sarada script, "dating
perhaps to somewhere about the X century," and the other as in "a
Nepali script of the XI century." A third manuscript mentioned turned
out not to be the Ratnagotravibhaga. It was older than the others, "VIII
century perhaps or even earlier."
My interest in the SravakabhUmi manuscript, presumably palmleaf,3
of that collection was due primarily to the great number of quotations
from this work in Tson-kha-pa's Lam rim chen mo, which I was trans
lating from Tibetan. My urge to ascertain the original Sanskrit of the
quoted passages led me to apply to the Bihar Research Society for en-
i Rahula Sailkrityayana, "Sanskrit Palm-Leaf Mss. in Tibet," Journal of the Bihar
and Oris8a Re8earch Society, 21 (1935), 21-43; "Second Search of Sanskrit Palm-leaf
Mss. in Tibet," ibid., 23 (1937), 1-57; "Search for Sanskrit Mss. in Tibet," ibid., 24
(1938), 137-163. .
2 E. H. Johnston, ed., The Ratnagotravibhaga MahayanottaratantrasiiBtra (Patna,
1950), vii.
3 Listed p. 138 in the 1938 volume of the Bihar Society's Journal (see note 1). Since
I do not have the original MS but only a photograph, I can only assume it is palm
leaf. The pattern of breakage or partial separation at the ends of a number of folios
suggests that the MS is indeed palmleaf.
[1]
2 The 8ravakabhUmi Manuscript
largements of that manuscript, and some years ago the society graciously
acceded to my request. I must admit that when I first obtained the
manuscript I was as unaware of the magnitude of the task of satisfac
torily utilizing it or editing it as I was unaware of the great difficulty of
properly translating the Lam rim chen mo.
The enlargements are on thirty plates, marked IA through 15A and
IB through 15B. The A and B plates represent the top and bottom sides
of the folios, with approximately nine folio sides on each plate. My nota
tion for referring to the plates follows those markings. Thus the first
folio side on IA is designated IA.I. The first line on that folio side is
designated IA.I-I. Since the folio. writing is divided into three parts,
with margins between, I have further designated these as a, b, and c.
Thus the first segment of that first line is designated IA.I-Ia. The three
segments of a line read continuously.
In learning to read the script it was not possible to start at the be
ginning of the manuscript. The reason, as it later turned out, is that the
beginning of the SravakabhUmi is not extant in the manuscript, but what
is the first folio of the manuscript is not from the SravakabhUmi at all,
but is one of a number of intruded folios, written in the same hand, from
an earlier part of the Y ogacarabhumi, of which the SravakabhUmi is a
portion (see my chap. ii). Using my knowledge of the Devanagari script,
I could make out only a few letters. However, going to major divisions,
places which turned out to be the endings of the four yogasthanas, and
collating with the major text divisions in the Tibetan translation, I
gradually came to read much of the script by utilizing the well-estab
lished Sanskrit-Tibetan word equivalences. The ligatures were the most
difficult aspects, because their component parts, normally written smaller
than when those letters appear by themselves, became still smaller and
more indistinct in photographic reproduction. Still, as time went on, and
various sections were undertaken for editing, these ligature problems
were gradually solved. However, no matter how many hours I have
spent, wearying my eyes, on this manuscript, there remain certain possi
bilities of going wrong in interpretation; so I have always felt it necessary
to look at the Tibetan translation while editing any part. This bears out
the remark of Johnston quoted above. But now I know that those possi
bilities of misinterpretation are the key to identification of the script.
The composition of the manuscript.-The manuscript contains almost
the complete text of the 8ravakabhUmi portion of the Y ogacarabhUmi,
the brief PratyekabuddhabhUmi, a folio in another handwriting of the
brief Sacittika BhUmi and Acittika BhUmi, and a large number of folios
representing the latter part of the 8rutamay'i Bhumi and about three
fourths of the Cintamay'i BhUmi. (For these bhumi names see chap. ii.)
Sample of script in the Bihar InltllllS('ript of the Sriivakabhumi, sections a, b, and c
of 15A.2, constituting the first folio, top side, of AsaIiga's commentary on the Para
murtha-guthii. 15A.2-la is transcribed: pudgala-nairatmyarrt paramurthalas ladadhi
karr"it paramartharrt glUha / 8amarop{jpa1'iiduntadvaya-pratipak~er:ta / tatra. 15A.3-7b
is transcribed: ity ukta1?~ / tiirrt ni~ve?!a/{jrrt ~arJ (read sapia) vidharrt darSayati / karitra
ni.~!le.~lat{j1?~ cak.51l~ pa'~!I(lli / Acc'ording to Tibetan and Chinese, the commentary
comes immediately after the vel""Cs. However, the scribe placed a crosslike mark
immediately after the last verse, 3A.5-8a, end, and continued with the A.bhipriiyika
guthii. The crosslike mark at the outset here means that this is the continuation.
Paleography 3
As written by the scribe, the Sravakabhumi fitted onto all or part of
exactly one hundred folios. However, there was one folio missing in the
manuscript from which the scribe himself copied. Thus, at the end of
6B.9-2b he inserts a mark surrounded by a circle set off from the text by
two sets of verticals: 11011. By comparison with the Tibetan, beginning
50b-6 in the Derge edition, it is plain that he indicates an omission which
in fact amounted to one folio. Besides the great number of intruded
folios near the beginning of the manuscript, the first extant folios of the
Sravakabhumi are themselves rather mixed up. To depict the situation
and show the transition to orderly succession of folios, I shall list here,
by comparison with the Tibetan, what would have been theoretically
the first twenty Sanskrit folios, S 1, S 2, ... S 20 of the SravakabhUmi
with the corresponding folios of the manuscript. Here the notation 1.6
means the sixth folio of lA-IB.
S I-missing S 11-1.9
S 2-missing S 12-1.10
S 3-1.6 S 13-1.7
S 4-1.2 S 14-1.S
S 5-1.3 S 15-1.5
S 6-missing S 16-1.4
S 7-2.3 S 17-most of 5.7
S S-most of 2.4 S IS-5.S
S 9-2.1 S 19-5.9
S 10-2.2 S 20-6.1
Besides the disorder, there are certain other irregularities. For example,
a phrase at 2B.2-7b ending 2B.2 really belongs just prior to 2.3. Of course,
this is what we should expect, because 2.2 should directly precede 2.3;
but, as we see, most of 2.2 belongs later.
The picture is filled in by setting forth the intrusive folios. Here we
must omit the PratyekabuddhabhUmi because this properly follows the
SravakabhUmi in the order of bhumis. It occupies most of 15.1 after the
conclusion of the Sravakabhumi. We must also separate off the Sacittika
Bhumi and the Acittika Bhumi, both on 15.7, because these are in anether
hand. The intrusive folios proper are: 1.1; the last part of 204, beginning
2BA-6a (mid) to end of folio, 2.5, 2.6, 2.7, 2.8, 2.9; all the nine folios of
plate 3A-3B; all the nine folios of plate 4A-4B; 5.1,5.2,5.3,504,5.5,5.6,
and the first part of 5.7 down to plate 5A.7-5b; 15.2, 15.3, 1504, 15.5,
15.6.
The rest of the Sravakabhumi manuscript after S 20-6.1 is quite
regular, with these exceptions: 13.1 in proper order belongs just before
12.1; 15.8, just before 15.1; 1.3 and 13.1 have their top and bottom
sides reversed on the A and B plates. Beyond this, no more ftllios are
