I should add, that like with a previous query, this is another case of an earlier and later figure sharing the same name (the later MAHĀ-Tipiṭaka-Cūḷābhaya is 12th c., while the earlier one described by Malalasekera is considered pre-Buddhaghosa). I don’t believe that Jaini, who edited the Milinda-ṭīkā, identified the author of that commentary, but, since it cites Buddhaghosa, it must be by someone post-Buddhaghosa. Cf.
http://enlight.lib.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-AN/an343601.pdf
Barua is quoting Walpola Rahula re: the 12th c Theravādin commentator who wanted to become a Buddha, with the reference: Walpola, R. 1971. L'ideal du Bodhisatta dans le Theravāda et le Mahāyāna. Journal Asiatique: 69.
I don’t have access to that Journal at the moment, so can’t check to see what sources Rahula was drawing on. Perhaps someone else has it on hand.
Dan
G.P. Malalasekera’s Dictionary of Pāli Proper Names offers the following.
3. Cūḷābhaya.– A Thera of Sri Lanka and a well-known commentator; he was known as Tipiṭaka-Cūḷābhaya. He is several times quoted in the Commentaries (e.g., VibhA.11, 16; Vism.69, 394, 397). He had a prodigious memory. Once he shut three of the gates of Anurādhapura, allowing only one door for the use of those leaving the city. As each person went out he asked his name, and each of these names he was able to repeat when the owner returned in the evening to the city (DA.ii.530). He was a contemporary of Cūḷanāga (DhsA.230; SA.iii.206), with whom he held discussions. His description (given at the Lohapāsāda) (DA.ii.442) of the details connected with the first words uttered by the Buddha after his birth, and the manner in which he walked, is accepted as authentic. He once went with a company of monks on a pilgrimage to Nāgadīpa. On the way he stayed in a monastery. One of his followers, who lacked self-control, made friends with another of like temperament in the vihāra, and Cūḷābhaya, seeing them laugh aloud, pointed out how truly the Buddha had said in the Dhātusaṃyutta that like joins with like. VibhA.457 f.
Dan
In an article by Ankur Barua [
http://introductiontoappliedbuddhism.blogspot.com/2009/10/bodhisatta-concept-in-theravada.html], I came across this reference: "
Theravādin author who wished to become a Buddha by following the Bodhisatta-yāna is the `Sri Lankanmonk Mahā-Tipitaka Cūlābhaya. In his subcommentary on the “Questions of King Milinda” during the twelfth-century, he wrote that he wished to become a Buddha at the end of his work." Is this commentary the same as the Milindaṭīkā published by the PTS, or a different commentary? The Milinda-Aṭṭhakathā of U Nārada alias Mingun Zetavun Sayadaw that was written around 1948 and transcribed and published by me [Studia Philologica Buddhica, Monograph Series XIII, Tokyo, The International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1999] refers to the opinion of a Tipiṭaka-Cūl̥ābhayatthera on p.57. I would appreciate any information on this monk and his commentary on Milindapañha. Is it available anywhere? Best,
Madhav M. Deshpande
Professor Emeritus
Sanskrit and Linguistics
University of Michigan
[Residence: Campbell, California]
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