Dear all,

Just to comment quickly, though I haven’t studied the Vajrasūcī in any depth, the same passage that Vincent highlighted, naming the Vedas, Grammarians, et al. is also the one that caught my attention, especially the mention of Mīmāṃsikas. As far as I can tell, while the others do get mentioned in Chinese translations of Buddhist texts, the only text preserved in Chinese that mentions Mīmāṃsikas is Xuanzang’s translation of Bhāviveka’s Prajñāpradīpa, which mentions them twice in close proximity:

《般若燈論釋》卷13〈22 觀如來品〉：「復有彌息伽外道言。佛家所說十二部經[1]者。非一切智人所說。有作者故。譬如鞞世師等論。」(CBETA, T30, no. 1566, p. 119, b15-17)
[1]者＝有【宮】。
[1]者＝有【宮】。
“Again there are the non-Buddhist (tīrthika) Mīmāmsikas who say: ‘What is said by Buddhists In the twelve divisions of the their sūtras (canon), is that no person is omniscient, because they are conditioned (saṃskṭra), just as is stated in treatises by the Vaiśeṣikas, and so on.”

《般若燈論釋》卷13〈22 觀如來品〉：「如彌息伽外道所計韋陀聲是常者」(CBETA, T30, no. 1566, p. 119, c5-6)
“This like the non-Buddhist Mīmāmsikas who imagine that the Word of the Vedas is eternal.”

I have found no other mention of Mīmāṃsā in any other Chinese sources (if anyone has information on discussions I might have missed, please let me know). Bhāviveka, of course, devoted an entire chapter in his Madhyamakahṛdaya to Mīmāṃsā, but his description of their doctrines suggests they differed in several ways from the versions we are more familiar with post Prābhākara and Kumārila. It is the latter’s Ślokavarttika, of course, that made Mīmāṃsā hard to ignore for subsequent Buddhists.

Harivarman’s Tattvasiddhi (translated by Kumārajīva at the beginning of the 5th c) identifies (among others) Vaiśeṣika, Sāṃkhya, Nyāya, and Jains as pūrvapakṣins. More generally in Buddhist literature preserved in Chinese prior to the middle of the seventh century, the most commonly cited opponents are Vaiśeṣika and Sāṃkhya. Nyāya is mentioned infrequently, as are Jains.

As for the pramāṇa issue mentioned by Matthew, the Vajrasūrī verse identifies what serve as authorities for non-Buddhists (the following verse turns to lineage):

vedāḥ pramāṇaṃ smṛtayaḥ pramāṇaṃ dharmārthayuktaṃ vacanaṃ pramāṇam |
yasya pramāṇaṃ na bhavetpramāṇaṃ kastasya kuryādvacanaṃ pramāṇam || 2 ||

Which are more or less equivalent to śruti, smṛti, and āpti-pramāṇa, and analogous to “scripture and reason” (āgama, yukti) that was the established criteria for validity for Buddhists, even into the pramāṇavāda era. And, as I wrote elsewhere:

"Pramāṇa-theory rst appears in the eleventh chapter of the first part (Sūtra-sthāna) of the CS [Caraka-saṃhitā]. Here the CS intriguingly proposes, along with the three pramāṇas one would expect (perception, inference, and authori- tative testimony), a fourth not found anywhere else: synthetic inductive reasoning (yukta-pramāṇa). Discussion of pramāṇa occurs in two other parts of the CS: part 3, Vimāna-sthāna, chap. 4 and chap. 8, but the unique yukta-pramāṇa is absent from those discussions, a sign of the strati ed nature of the text.”

So a yukta pramāṇa suggest to me a possibly early date for that category.

Has anyone considered whether it is possible that the verses may have been written by Aśvaghoṣa or someone relatively early while the prose exposition may have been added by a later hand?

Dan

On Jan 25, 2020, at 4:35 PM, Eltschinger, Vincent via INDOLOGY <indology@list.indology.info> wrote:

Dear Matthew,
I was referring to most of the elements of the list I quoted, of course, not to the entire Vajrasūcī. But you are right, Matthew: the Mahābhārata plays an important role in the Vajrasūcī, as does… Manu – which may be the reason for Patrick’s query. It is well known that the Vajrasūcī attributes several verses to Manu that cannot be traced in the extant Mānavadharmaśāstra (if I remember well, this is the reason why some scholars tentatively attributed them to a lost Mānava Dharmasūtra). Whatever the case may be, we might perhaps agree that the Vajrasūcī is unlikely to have been composed before the 3rd-4th century CE. I am inclined to believe that it is even younger.
Very best,
Vincent


Vincent Eltschinger, korrespondierendes Mitglied der OeAW
Directeur d'études 
École Pratique des Hautes Études, Section des sciences religieuses
Patios Saint-Jacques, 4-14 rue Ferrus - 75014 Paris
vincent.eltschinger@ephe.sorbonne.fr
0033 1 56 61 17 34 / 0033 7 85 86 84 05
Von: Matthew Kapstein <mkapstei@uchicago.edu>
Gesendet: Samstag, 25. Januar 2020 22:13:42
An: Eltschinger, Vincent; Olivelle, J P; indology@list.indology.info
Betreff: Re: Vajrasūcī
 
Not wishing to differ with my learned colleague Vincent Eltschinger's remarks (which are surely based on a deeper engagement with this corpus than my own), I tend nevertheless to think it not quite plausible that "most of its individual elements could have been known around 100 CE."
My sense is that the several epic and puranic parallels point to a somewhat later period.

Matthew


Matthew Kapstein
Directeur d'études, 
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes

Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies,
The University of Chicago
From: Eltschinger, Vincent <Vincent.Eltschinger@oeaw.ac.at>
Sent: Saturday, January 25, 2020 10:00 AM
To: Olivelle, J P <jpo@austin.utexas.edu>; Matthew Kapstein <mkapstei@uchicago.edu>; indology@list.indology.info <indology@list.indology.info>
Subject: AW: Vajrasūcī
 

Dear Patrick,
As you know, Aśvaghoṣa directed some arguments against the Brahmanical understanding of the caste-classes in one of his dramas, the Śāriputraprakaraṇa/Śaradvatīputraprakaraṇa, several fragments of which have been preserved in Central Asian manuscripts and edited by Heinrich Lüders around 1910. It is thus plausible that Aśvaghoṣa dedicated an individual treatise to this topic. The style, the method and the philosophical ressources of the Vajrasūcī, however, are very different from the ones we know from Aśvaghoṣa’s genuine works, and may presuppose Buddhist works such as the Śārdūlakarṇāvadāna if not Kumāralāta’s Kalpanāmaṇḍitikā Dṛṣṭāntapaṅktiḥ. Even if I am not aware of any convincing argument against the attribution of the Vajrasūcī to Aśvaghoṣa, I have always regarded the following statement as anachronistic: dṛśyante ca kvacic chūdrā api vedavyākaraṇamīmāṃsāsāṃkhyavaiśeṣikanagnā*jīvikādisarvaśāstrārthavidaḥ /. “And one observes in some cases that even śūdras know the meaning of all śāstras such as the Veda, Grammar, Mīmāṃsā, Sāṃkhya, Vaiśeṣika as well as [those of] the Jainas and the Ājīvikas.” (*-nagnā- em. : lagnā- Ed.) Although such a list is not per se impossible in Aśvaghoṣa’s time, i.e., although most of its individual elements could have been known around 100 CE, I do not believe that such an enumeration would have been possible, as a doxographic statement, at that time, and even less so under Aśvaghoṣa's "pen." (The absence of the Nyāya from the list is intriguing.)
Another element possibly deserving some consideration is the Sanskrit colophon in which Aśvaghoṣa is characterized as siddhācārya (kṛtir iyaṃ siddhācāryāśvaghoṣapādānām iti), an expression the exact meaning of which remains somewhat unclear to me.
I am looking forward to reading other opinions on this interesting topic.
Very best,
Vincent


Vincent Eltschinger, korrespondierendes Mitglied der OeAW
Directeur d'études 
École Pratique des Hautes Études, Section des sciences religieuses
Patios Saint-Jacques, 4-14 rue Ferrus - 75014 Paris
vincent.eltschinger@ephe.sorbonne.fr
0033 1 56 61 17 34 / 0033 7 85 86 84 05
Von: INDOLOGY <indology-bounces@list.indology.info> im Auftrag von Matthew Kapstein via INDOLOGY <indology@list.indology.info>
Gesendet: Samstag, 25. Januar 2020 15:09:59
An: Indology List; Olivelle, J P
Betreff: Re: [INDOLOGY] Vajrasūcī
 
Dear Patrick,

You'll find some discussion of it, inter alia, in Vincent Eltschinger, "Caste" et Philosophie Bouddhique WSTB 47 (2000). As you no doubt know, the Chinese translation is late - 10th c. if I recall correctly - and is attributed to DharmakIrti. I rather doubt that the true authorship can be established, given the available evidence. The emphasis on pramANa seems to suggest that it was written during the second half of the first millennium, not much before. But the way in which pramANa is used there does not resonate closely with the Buddhist pramANa school. The precise milieu in which it was composed remains a puzzle (at least to me!).

all best,
Matthew

Matthew Kapstein
Directeur d'études, 
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes

Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies,
The University of Chicago
From: INDOLOGY <indology-bounces@list.indology.info> on behalf of Olivelle, J P via INDOLOGY <indology@list.indology.info>
Sent: Saturday, January 25, 2020 6:59 AM
To: Indology List <indology@list.indology.info>
Subject: [INDOLOGY] Vajrasūcī
 
Does anyone know of newer work on the identity and date of the author of Vajrasūcī, often ascribed to Aśvaghoṣa? Any new ideas on its possible date? With thanks and best wishes,

Patrick Olivelle
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