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3. Sometimes Khuddaka-nikaya stands for the whole Vinaya and Abhidhamma- pitaka, with the fifteen divisions here given of Khuddaka-nikaya. In the commentary on the Brahmagala-sutta it is said that the D?ghanikaya professors rehearsed the text of the Gataka, Maha and Kulla Niddesa, Patisambhidamagga, Suttanipata, Dhammapada, Udana, Itivuttaka, Vimana, and Petavatthu, Thera and Ther? Gatha, and called it Khuddakagantha, and made it a canonical text, forming part of the Abhidhamma; while the Magghimanikaya professors assert that, with the addition of the Kariyapitaka, Apadana, and Buddhavamsa, the whole of this Khuddakagantha was included in the Suttapitaka. See Childers, s.v. Nikaya;. See also p. x.
4. Published by Childers, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1869.
5. Published by Fausb?ll, 1855.
6. Thirty translated by Sir Coomara Swamy; the whole by Fausb?ll, in Sacred Books of the East, vol. x.
7. Published by Fausb?ll, translated by Rhys Davids.]
p. xxix
Patisambhidamagga, the road of discrimination, and intuitive insight.
Apadana[1], legends.
Buddhavamsa[1], story of twenty-four preceding Buddhas and of Gotama.
Kariyapitaka[1], basket of conduct, Buddha’s meritorious actions[2].
III. Abhidhamma-pitaka.
Dhammasangani, numeration of conditions of life[3].
Vibhanga, disquisitions (18).
Kathavatthupakarana, book of subjects for discussion (1000 suttas).
Puggalapa??atti or pannatti, declaration on puggala, or personality.
Dhatukatha, account of dhatus or elements.
Yamaka, pairs (ten divisions).
Patthanapakarana, book of causes.
Taking this collection as a whole we may lay it down as self-evident that the canon, in its collected form, cannot be older than any of the events related therein.
There are two important facts for determining the age of the Pali canon, which, as Dr. Oldenberg[4] has been the first to show, should take precedence of all other arguments, viz.
1. That in the Tipitaka, as we now have , , it, no mention is made of the so-called Third Council, which took place at Pataliputta, under King Asoka, about 242 B.C.
2. That in the Tipitaka, as we now have it, the First Council of Ragagaha (477 B.C.) and the Second Council of Vesal? (377 B.C.) are both mentioned.
From these two facts it may safely be concluded that the Buddhist canon, as handed down to us, was finally closed
[1. Buddhaghosa does not say whether these were recited at the First Council.
2. Partly translated by Gogerly, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Ceylon, 1852.
3. Cf. Gogerly, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Ceylon. 1848, p. 7.
4. See Oldenberg’s Vinaya-pitaka, Introduction. p. xxv. The kings Agatasatru (485-453 B.C.), Udayin (453-437 B.C.), and Munda (437-429 B.C.) are all mentioned in the Tipitaka. See Oldenberg, Zeitschrift der D. M. G., XXXIV. pp. 752, 753.]
p. xxx after the Second and before, or possibly at, the Third Council. Nay, the fact that the description of the two Councils stands at the very end of the Kullavagga may be taken, as Dr. Oldenberg remarks, as an indication that it was one of the latest literary contributions which obtained canonical authority, while the great bulk of the canon may probably claim a date anterior to the Second Council.

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This fact, namely, that the collection of the canon, as a whole, must have preceded the Second Council rests on an argument which does great credit to the ingenuity of Dr. Oldenberg. The Second Council was convoked to consider the ten deviations[1] from the strict discipline of the earliest times. That discipline had been laid down first in the Patimokkha rules, then in the commentary now included in the Vibhanga, lastly in the Mahavagga and Kullavagga. The rules as to what was allowed or forbidden to a Bhikkhu were most minute[2], and they were so firmly established that no one could have ventured either to take away or to add anything to them as they stood in the sacred code. In that code itself a distinction is made between the offences which were from the first visited with punishment (paragika and pakittiya) and those misdemeanours and crimes which were put down as punishable at a later time (dukkata and thullakkaya). With these classes the code was considered as closed, and if any doubt arose as to the criminality of certain acts, it could be settled at once by an appeal to the Vinaya-pitaka. Now it so happens that, with one exception, the ten deviations that had to be considered at the Second Council, are not provided for in the Vinaya-pitaka; and I quite agree with Dr. Oldenberg’s argument that, if they had been mentioned in the Vinaya-pitaka, the Second Council would have been objectless. A mere appeal to chapter and verse in the existing Pitaka would then have silenced all dissent. On the other side, if it had been possible to add anything to the canon, as it then existed, the ten, or nine, deviations might have been condemned
[1. Oldenberg, Introduction, p. xxix.
2. Oldenberg, loc. cit. p. xx.]
p. xxxi by a few additional paragraphs of the canon, without convoking a new Council.
I think we may be nearly certain, therefore, that we possess the principal portion of the Vinaya-pitaka as it existed before the Council of Vesal?.
So far I quite agree with Dr. Oldenberg. But if he proceeds to argue[1] that certain portions of the canon must have been finally settled before even the First Council took place, or was believed to have taken place, I do not think his arguments conclusive. He contends that in the Parinibbana-sutta, which tells of the last days of Buddha’s life, of his death, the cremation of his body, and the distribution of his relics, and of Subhadda’s revolt, it would have been impossible to leave out all mention of the First Council, if that Council had then been known. It is true, no doubt, that Subhadda’s disloyalty was the chief cause of the First Council, but there was no necessity to mention that Council. On the contrary, it seems to me that the unity of the Parinibbana-sutta would have been broken if, besides telling of the last days of Buddha, it had also given a full description of the Council. The very title, the Sutta of the Great Decease, would have become inappropriate, if so important a subject as the first Sang?ti had been mixed up with it. However, how little we may trust to such general arguments, is best shown by the fact that in some very early Chinese renderings of the H?nayana text of the Mahaparinibbana-sutta the story is actually carried on to the First Council, two (Nos. 552 and 119) mentioning the rehearsal under Kasyapa, while the third (No. 118) simply states that the Tiptaka was then collected[2].
[1. Loc. cit. pp. xxvi-xxviii.
2. There are several Chinese translations of S?tras on the subject of the Mahaparinirvana. Three belong to the Mahayana school: 1. Mahaparinirvana-s?tra, translated by Dharmaraksha, about 414-423 A.D.; afterwards revised, 424-453 (Nos. 113, 114). 2. Translation by Fa-hian and Buddhabhadra, about 415 A.D.; less complete (No. 120). 3. Translation (vaipulya) by Dharmaraksha I, i.e. Ku Fa-hu, about 261-308 A.D. (No. 116). Three belong to the H?nayana school: 1. Mahiparinirvana-s?tra. translated by Po-fa-tsu, about 290-306 A.D. (No. 552). 2. Translation under the Eastern Tsin dynasty, 317-42O A.D. (No. 119). 3. Translation by Fa-hian, about 415 A.D. (No. 118).]
p. xxxii
We must be satisfied therefore, so far as I can see at present, with fixing the date, and the latest date, of a Buddhist canon at the time of the Second Council, 377 B.C. That some works were added later, we know; that many of the treatises included in the canon existed before that Council, can hardly be doubted. The second chapter of the Dhammapada, for instance, is called the Appamada-vagga, and if the Mahavamsa (p. 25) tells us that at the time when Asoka was converted by Nigrodha, that Buddhist priest explained to him the Appamada-vagga, we can hardly doubt that there existed then a collection (vagga) of verses on Appamada, such as we now possess in the Dhammapada and in the Samyutta-nikaya[1].

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With regard to the Vinaya, I should even feel inclined to admit, with Dr. Oldenberg, that it must have existed in a more or less settled form before that time. What I doubt is whether such terms as Pitaka, basket, or Tipitaka, the three baskets, i.e. the canon, existed at that early time. They have not been met with, as yet, in any of the canonical books; and if the D?pavamsa (IV, 32) uses the word ’Tipitaka,’ when describing the First Council, this is due to its transferring new terms to older times. If Dr. Oldenberg speaks of a Dvi-pitaka[2] as the name of the canon before the third basket, that of the Abhidhamma, was admitted, this seems to me an impossible name, because at the time when the Abhidhamma was not yet recognised as a third part of the canon, the word pitaka had probably no existence as a technical term[3].
We must always, I think, distinguish between the three portions of the canon, called the basket of the Suttas, the
[1. Feer, Revue Critique, 1870, No. 24, p. 377.
2. Introduction. pp. x, xii.
3. Dr. Oldenberg informs me that pitaka occurs in the Kank?suttanta in the Magghima Nikaya (Turnour’s MS., fol. the), but applied to the Veda. He also refers to the tipitakakaryas mentioned in the Western Cave inscriptions as compared with the Pa?kanekayaka in the square Asoka character inscriptions (Cunningham, Bharhut, pl. lvi, No. 52). In the S?trakrid-anga of the Gainas, too, the term pidagam occurs (MS. Berol. fol. 77 a). He admils, however, that pitaka or tipitaka, as the technical name of the Buddhist canon, has not yet been met with in that canon itself, and defends Dvipitaka only as a convenient term.]
p. xxxiii basket of Vinaya, and the basket of Abhidhamma, and the three subjects of Dhamma (sutta), Vinaya, and Abhidhamma, treated in these baskets. The subjects existed and were taught long before the three baskets were definitely arranged. Dhamma had originally a much wider meaning than Sutta-pitaka. It often means the whole teaching of Buddha; and even when it refers more particularly to the Sutta-pitaka, we know that the Dhamma there taught deals largely with Vinaya and Abhidhamma doctrines. Even the fact that at the First Council, according to the description given in the Kullavagga, the Vinaya and Dhamma only were rehearsed, though proving the absence at that time of the Abhidhamma, as a separate Pitaka, by no means excludes the subject of the Abhidhamma having been taught under the head of Dhamma. In the Mahakarunapundar?ka-s?tra the doctrine of Buddha is divided into Dharma and Vinaya; the Abhidharma is not mentioned. But the same text knows of all the twelve Dharmapravakanani[1], the 1. S?tra; 2. Geya; 3. Vyakarana; 4. Gatha; 5. Udana; 6. Nidana; 7. Avadana; 8. Itivrittaka; 9. Gataka; 10. Vaipulya; 11. Adbhutadharma; 12. Upadesa; some of these being decidedly metaphysical.
To my mind nothing shows so well the historical character both of the Kullavagga and of Buddhaghosa in the Introduction to his commentary on the D?gha-nikaya, as that the former, in its account of the First Council, should know only of the Vinaya, as rehearsed by Upali, and the Dhamma, as rehearsed by ?nanda, while the much later Buddhaghosa, in his account of the First Council[2], divides the Dhamma into two parts, and states that the second part, the Abhidhamma, was rehearsed after the first part, the Dhamma. Between the time of the Kullavagga and the time of Buddhaghosa the Abhidhamma must have assumed its recognised position by the side of Vinaya and Sutta. It must be left to further researches to determine, if possible,
[1. See Academy, August 28, 1880, Division of Buddhist Scriptures.
2. Oldenberg, Introduction, p. xii; Turnour, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, vi, p. 510 seq.]
p. xxxiv the time when the name of pitaka was first used, and when Tipitaka was accepted as the title of the whole canon.
Whenever we see such traces of growth, we feel that we are on historical ground, and in that sense Dr. Oldenberg’s researches into the growth of the Vinaya, previous to the Second Council, deserve the highest credit. He shows, in opposition to other scholars, that the earliest elements of Vinaya must be looked for in the short Patimokkha rules, which were afterwards supplemented by explanations, by glosses and commentaries, and in that form answered for some time every practical purpose. Then followed a new generation who, not being satisfied, as it would seem, with these brief rules and comments, wished to know the occasion on which these rules had been originally promulgated. What we now call the Vibhanga, i.e. the first and second divisions of the Vinaya-pitaka, is a collection of the stories, illustrating the origin of each rule, of the rules themselves (the Patimokkha), and of the glosses and comments on these rules.

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The third and fourth books, the Mahavagga and Kullavagga, are looked upon as possibly of a slightly later date. They treat, in a similar manner as the Vibhanga, on the rules not included in that collection, and give a general picture of the outward life of the monks. While the Vibhanga deals chiefly with the original so-called paragika, sanghadisesa, and pakittiya offences, the Khandhaka, i.e. the Mahavagga and Kullavagga, treats of the so-called dukkata and thullakkaya crimes. The arrangement is the same, story, rule, and comment succeeding each other in regular sequence. If we follow the guidance of the Vinaya-pitaka, we should be able to distinguish the following steps in the growth of Buddhism before the Second Council of Vesal?:
Teaching of Buddha and his disciples (543/477 A.D. Buddha’s death).
Collection of Patimokkha rules (first code).
Comment and glosses on these rules.
Stories in illustration of these rules (vibhanga).
Mahavagga and Kullavagga (Khandhaka).
p. xxxv
Council of Vesal? for the repression of ten abuses (443/377 A.D.)
Description of First and Second Councils in Kullavagga.
The Kulavagga ascribes the settlement of the canon to the First Council, and does not even claim a revision of that canon for the Second Council. The D?pavamsa claims a revision of the canon by the 700 Arhats for the Second Council.

CHRONOLOGY.
In order to bring the Council of Vesal? in connection with the chronology of the world, we must follow the Buddhist historians for another century. One hundred and eighteen years after the Council of Vesal? they place the anointment of King Asoka, during whose reign a Third Council, under the presidency of Tissa Moggaliputta, took place at Pataliputta, the new capital adopted by that king, instead of Ragagaha and Vesal?. This Council is chiefly known to us through the writings of the southern Buddhists (D?pavamsa, Mahavamsa, and Buddhaghosa), who belong to the school of Moggaliputta (Theravada or Vibhaggavada), which ruled supreme at Pataliputta, while Upagupta, the chief authority of the northern Buddhists, is altogether ignored in the Pali chronicles.
Now it is well known that Asoka was the grandson of Kandagutta, and Kandagutta the contemporary of Alexander the Great. Here we see land, and I may refer to my History of Sanskrit Literature, published in 1859, for the process by which the storm-tossed ship of Indian chronology has been landed in the harbour of real historical chronology. We are told by the monks of the Mahavihara in Ceylon that Asoka was crowned, according to their computation, 146 + 18 years before the accession of Dutthagamani, 161 B.C., i.e. 325 B.C.; that between his coronation and his father’s death four years had elapsed (329 B.C.); that his father Bindusara had reigned twenty-eight years[1] (357-329 B.C.), and Bindusara’s father, Kandagutta,
[1. Mahavamsa, p. 21.]
p. xxxvi twenty-four years (381-357). As we know that Kandagutta, whom the Ceylonese place 381-357 B.C., was king of India after Alexander’s conquest, it follows that Ceylonese chronology is wrong by more than half a century. For reasons stated in my History of Sanskrit Literature, I fix the exact fault in Ceylonese chronology as sixty-six years, assigning to Kandagutta the dates 315-291, instead of 381-357. This gives us 291-263 for Bindusara, 259 for Asoka’s abhisheka; 259 + 118 = 377 for the Council of Vesal?, and 377 + 100 = 477 for Buddha’s death, instead of 543 B.C.[1]
These dates are, of course, approximate only, and they depend on one or two points on which people may differ. But, with that reservation, I see no ground whatever for modifying the chronological system which I put forward more than twenty years ago. Professor Westergaard and Professor Kern, who have since suggested different dates for the death of Buddha, do not really differ from me in principle, but only in their choice of one or the other alternative, which I readily admit as possible, but not as more certain than my own. Professor Westergaard[2], for instance, fixes Buddha’s death at 368 (370), instead of 477. This seems a wide difference, but it is so in appearance only.
Following Justinus, who says that Sandrokyptos[3] had conquered the empire of India at the time when Seleucus laid the foundations of his own greatness, I had accepted 315[4], half-way between the murder of Porus and the taking of Babylon by Seleucus, as the probable beginning

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[1. According to Bigandet, Life of Gaudama, p. 361, the era of Buddha’s death was introduced by Agatasatru, at the conclusion of the First Council, and began in the year 46 of the older Eetzana era (p. 12). See, however, Rhys Davids, Num. Orient. vi, p. 38. In the Karanda-vy?ha, p. 96, a date is given as 300 after the Nirvana, ’trit?ye varshasate gate mama parinirvritasya.’ In the Asoka-avadana we read, mama nirvritim arabhya satavarshagata Upagupto nama bhikshur utpatsyati.
2. über Buddha’s Todesjahr (1860), 1862.
3. The Greek name Sandrokyptus shows that the Pali corruption Kandagutta was not yet the recognised name of the king.
4. Mr. Rhys Davids accepts 315 B.C. as the date when, after the murder of king Nanda, Kandragupta stept into the vacant throne, though he had begun to count his reign seven or eight years before. Buddhism, p. 22O.]
p. xxxvii of Kandragupta’s reign. Westergaard prefers 320 as a more likely date for Kandragupta, and therefore places the death of the last Nanda and the beginning of Asoka’s royal pretensions 268. Here there is a difference between him and me of five years, which depends chiefly on the view we take as to the time when Seleucus really laid what Justinus calls the foundation of his future greatness. Secondly, Westergaard actually adopts the idea, at which I only hinted as possible, that the southern Buddhists made two Asokas out of one, and two Councils out of one. Trusting in the tradition that 118 years elapsed between Buddha’s death and the Council under Asoka (at Pataliputra), and that the Council took place in the king’s tenth year (as was the case with the imaginary Kalasoka’s Council), he gets 268 - 10 = 258 as the date of the Council, and 368 or 370 as the date of Buddha’s death[1].
The two points on which Westergaard differs from me, seem to me questions which should be kept before our mind in dealing with early Buddhist history, but which, for the present at least, admit of no definite solution.
The same remark seems to me to apply to the calculations of another eminent Sanskrit scholar, Professor Kern[2]. He lays great stress on the general untrustworthiness of Indian chronology, and I am the last to differ from him on that point. He then places the beginning of Kandragupta’s reign in 322 B.C. Allowing twenty-four years to him and twenty-eight to his son Bindusara, he places the beginning of Asoka’s reign in 270. Asoka’s inscriptions would fall about 258. As Asoka reigned thirty-six or thirty-seven years, his death would fall in 234 or 233 B.C. Like Westergaard, Professor Kern too eliminates Kalasoka, as a kind of chronological Asoka, and the Council of Vaisal?, and therefore places Buddha’s death, according to the northern tradition, 100 or 110 years before Dharmasoka, i.e. 270 + 100 or + 110 = 370 or 380[3]; while, according to the southern
[1. Westergaard. loc. cit. p. 128.
2. Jaartelling der Zuidelijke Buddhisten, 1873.
3. See Professor Kern’s remark in Indian Antiquary, 1874, p. 79.]
p. xxxviii tradition, that 118 years elapsed between Asoka’s accession and Buddha’s death, the Ceylonese monks would seem originally to have retained 270 + 118[1] = 388 B.C. as Buddha’s Nirvana, a date which, as Professor Kern holds, happens to coincide with the date assigned to the death of Mahavira, the founder of the Gaina religion.
Here we see again that the moot point is the beginning of Kandragupta’s reign in accordance with the information supplied by Greek historians. Professor Kern places it in 322, Westergaard in 320, I myself in 315. That difference once granted, Dr. Kern’s reasoning is the same as my own. According to the traditions which we follow, Buddha’s death took place 100, 110, 118, or 228 years before Asoka. Hence Professor Westergaard arrives at 368 or 370 B.C., Professor Kern at 370 (380) or 388 B.C., I myself at 477 B.C. Every one of these dates is liable to certain objections, and if I prefer my own date, 477 B. C., it is simply because it seems to me liable to neither more nor less reservations than those of Professor Westergaard and Professor Kern, and because, so long as we always remember the grounds of our differences, namely, the beginning of Kandragupta’s reign, and the additional century, every one of these dates furnishes a good hypothesis to work on, until we can arrive at greater certainty in the ancient chronology of India. To my mind all dates beyond Kandragupta are as yet purely tentative, resting far more on a chronological theory than on actual tradition; and though I do not doubt the historical chatacter of the Council of Vaisal?, I look upon the date assigned to it, on the authority of the D?pavamsa and Mahavamsa, as, for the present, hypothetical only.

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[1. When Professor Kern states that the Mahavamsa (p. 22) places the Third Council 218 years after Buddha’s death, this is not so. Asoka’s abhisheka takes place in that year. The prophecy that a calamity would befall their religion, 118 years after the Second Council (Mahavamsa, p. 28), does not refer to the Council, but to Kandasoka’s accession, 477 - 218 = 259 B.C.]
p. xxxix
B.C.
557.  Buddha born.
552.  Bimbisara born.
537-485.  Bimbisara, 5 years younger than Buddha, was 15 when crowned, 30 or 31 when he met Buddha in 522.
485-453.  Agatasatru (4 × 8 years).
477.  Buddha’s death (485 - 8 = 477).
477.  COUNCIL AT R?GAGRIHA under Kasyapa, ?nanda, and Upali.
453-437.  Udayibhadra (2 × 8 years).
437-429.  {Anuruddhaka (8 years).
Munda (at Pataliputra).
429-405.  Nagadasaka (3 × 8 years).
405-387.  Sisunaga (at Vaisal?).
387-359.  Kalasoka.
377.  COUNCIL AT VAIS?L?, under Yasas and Revata, a disciple of ?nanda (259 + 118 = 377).
359-337.  Ten sons of Kalasoka (22 years).
337-315.  Nine Nandas (22 years); the last, Dhanananda, killed by Kanakya.
315-291.  Kandragupta (477 - 162 = 315; 3 × 8 years)[1].
291-263.  Bindusara.
263-259.  Asoka, sub-king at Uggayin?, as pretender--his brothers killed.
259.  Asoka anointed at Pataliputra (477 - 218 = 259).
256.  Asoka converted by Nigrodha (D. V. VI, 18).
256-253.  Building of Viharas, Sth?pas, &c.
255.  Conversion of Tishya (M. V. p. 34).
253.  Ordination of Mahendra (born 477 - 204 = 273).
251.  Tishya and Sumitra die (D. V. VII, 32).
242.  COUNCIL AT P?TALIPUTRA (259 - 17 = 242; 477 - 236 = 271), under Tishya Maudgal?putra (477 - 236 = 241; D.V. VII, 37).
241.  Mahendra to Ceylon.
222.  Asoka died (259 - 37 = 222).
193.  Mahendra died (D. V. XVII, 93).
161.  Dutthagamani.
88-76.  Vattagamani, canon reduced to writing.
A.D.  
400.  D?pavamsa.
420.  Buddhaghosha, Pali commentaries.
459-477.  Mahavamsa.

[1. Westergaard, 320-296; Kern, 322-298.]
p. xl
Though the preceding table, embodying in the main the results at which I arrived in my History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, still represents what I hold to be true or most probable with respect to Indian chronology, previous to the beginning of our era, yet I suppose I may be expected to say here a few words on the two latest attempts to fix the date of Buddha’s death; the one by Mr. Rhys Davids in the Numismata Orientalia, Part VI, 1877, the other by Dr. Bühler in the Indian Antiquary, 1877 and 1878[1]. Mr. Rhys Davids, to whom we owe so much for the elucidation of the history of Buddha’s religion, accepts Westergaard’s date for the beginning of Kandragupta’s reign, 320 B.C., instead of 322 (Kern), 315 (myself); and as he assigns (p. 41) to Bindusara 25 years instead of 28 (Mahavamsa, p. 21), he arrives at 268 as the year of Asoka’s coronation[2]. He admits that the argument derived from the mention of the five foreign kings in one of Asoka’s inscriptions, dated the twelfth year of his reign, is too precarious to enable us to fix the date of Asoka’s reign more definitely, and though, in a general way, that inscription confirms the date assigned by nearly all scholars to Asoka in the middle of the third century B.C., yet there is nothing in it that Asoka might not have written in 247 quite as well as in 258-261. What chiefly distinguishes Mr. Rhys Davids’ chronology from that of his predecessors is the shortness of the period between Asoka’s coronation and Buddha’s death. On the strength of an examination of the list of kings and the list of the so-called patriarchs, he reduces the traditional 218 years to 140 or 150, and thus arrives at 412 B.C. as the probable beginning of the Buddhist era.
In this, however, I cannot follow him, but have to follow Dr. Bühler. As soon as I saw Dr. Bühler’s first essay on the Three New Edicts of Asoka, I naturally felt delighted at the unexpected confirmation which he furnished of the date which I had assigned to Buddha’s death, 477 B.C. And though I am quite aware of the
[1. Three New Edicts of Asoka, Bombay, 1877; Second Notice, Bombay, 1878.
2. Mr. Rhys Davids on p. 50 assigns the 35 years of Bindusara rightly to the Puranas, the 38 years to the Ceylon Chronicles.]

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p. xli danger of unexpected confirmations of one’s own views, yet, after carefully weighing the objections raised by Mr. Rhys Davids and Professor Pischel against Dr. Bühler’s arguments, I cannot think that they have shaken Dr. Bühler’s position. I fully admit the difficulties in the phraseology of these inscriptions: but I ask, Who could have written these inscriptions, if not Asoka? And how, if written by Asoka, can the date which they contain mean anything but 256 years after Buddha’s Nirvana? These points, however, have been argued in so masterly a manner by Dr. Bühler in his ’Second Notice,’ that I should be afraid of weakening his case by adding anything of my own, and must refer my readers to his ’Second Notice.’ Allowing that latitude which, owing to the doubtful readings of MSS., and the constant neglect of odd months, we must allow in the interpretation of Buddhist chronology, Asoka is the only king we know of who could have spoken of a thirty-fourth year since the beginning of his reign and since his conversion to Buddhism. And if he calls that year, say the very last of his reign (212 B.C.), 256 after the departure of the Master, we have a right to say that as early as Asoka’s time, Buddha was believed to have died about 477 B.C. Whether the inscriptions have been accurately copied and rightly read is, however, a more serious question, and the doubts raised by Dr. Oldenberg (Mahavagga, p. xxxviii) make a new collation of the originals absolutely indispensable, before we can definitely accept Dr. Bühler’s interpretation.
I cannot share Dr. Bühler’s opinion[1] as to the entire worthlessness of the Gaina chronology in confirming the date of Buddha’s death. If the Svetambara Gainas place the death of Mahav?ra 470 before Vikramaditya, i.e. 56 B.C. + 470 = 526 B.C.,and the Digambaras 605, i.e. 78 A.D. deducted from 605 = 527 B.C., this so far confirms Dr. Bühler’s and Dr. Jacobi’s brilliant discovery that Mahav?ra was the same as Nigantha Nataputta, who died at Pava during Buddha’s lifetime[2]. Most likely 527 is too early a date, while another
[1. Three Edicts. p. 21; Second Notice. pp. 9, 10.
2. See Jacobi, Kalpa-s?tra of Bhadrabahu, and Oldenberg, Zeitschrift der D.M.G., XXXIV, p. 749.]
p. xlii tradition fixing Mahavira’s death 155 years before Kandragupta[1], 470 B.C., is too late. Yet they both show that the distance between Asoka (259-222 B.C.), the grandson of Kandragupta (315-291 B.C.), and the contemporaries of Buddha was by the Gainas also believed to be one of two rather than one century.
When I saw that the date of Buddha’s death, 477 B.C., which in my History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature (1859) I had myself tried to support by such arguments as were then accessible, had received so powerful a support by the discovery of the inscriptions of Sahasram, R?pnath, and Bairat, due to General Cunningham, who had himself always been an advocate of the date 477 B.C., and through their careful decipherment by Dr. Bühler, I lost no time in testing that date once more by the D?pavamsa, that Ceylonese chronicle having lately become accessible through Dr. Oldenberg’s edition and translation[2]. And here I am able to say that, before having read Dr. Bühler’s Second Notice, I arrived, though by a somewhat different way, at nearly the same conclusions as those so well worked out by Dr. Bühler in his restoration of the Episcopal Succession (theravali) of the Buddhists, and therefore feel convinced that, making all such allowances as the case requires, we know now as much of early Buddhist chronology as could be known at the time of Asoka’s Council, 242 B.C.
Taking the date of Buddha’s death 477 B.C. for granted, I found that Upali, who rehearsed the Vinaya at the First Council, 477 B.C., had been in orders sixty years in the twenty-fourth year of Agatasatru, i.e. 461 B.C., which was the sixteenth year A.B. He must therefore[3] have been born in 541 B.C., and he died 447 B.C., i.e. thirty years A.D., at the age of 94. This is said to have been the sixth year of Udayi, and so it is, 453 - 6 = 447 B.C.
In the year 461 B.C. Dasaka received orders from Upali, who was then 80 years of age; and when Dasaka had been
[1. Oldenberg, loc. cit. p. 750.
2. The D?pavamsa, an ancient Buddhist historical record. London, 1879.
3. Assuming twenty to be the minimum age at which a man could be ordained.]

续-《●[The Dhammapada and The Sutta Nipata]The Dhammapada》

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p. xliii in orders forty-five years (D?pavamsa IV, 41), he ordained Saunaka. This would give us 461 - 45 = 416 B.C., while the tenth year of Nagadasa, 429 - 10, would give us 419 A.D. Later on the D?pavamsa (V, 78) allows an interval of forty years between the ordinations of Dasaka and Saunaka, which would bring the date of Saunaka’s ordination to 421 B.C., instead of 419 or 416 B.C. Here there is a fault which must be noted. Dasaka died 461 - 64 = 397 A.D., which is called the eighth year of Sisunaga, and so it is 405 - 8 = 397 A.D.
When Saunaka had been in orders forty years, i.e. 416 - 40 = 376, Kalasoka is said to have reigned a little over ten years, i.e. 387 - 11 = 376 A.D., and in that year Saunaka ordained Siggava. He died 416 - 66 = 350 A.D., which is called the sixth year of the Ten, while in reality it is the ninth, 359 - 6 = 353 A.D. If, however, we take 419 as the year of Saunaka’s ordination, his death would fall 419 - 66 = 353 B.C.
Siggava, when he had been in orders sixty-four years, ordained Tishya Maudgal?putra. This date 376 - 64 = 312 B.C. is called more than two years after Kandragupta’s accession, and so it very nearly is, 315 - 2 = 313.
Siggava died when he had been in orders seventy-six years, i.e. 376 - 76 = 300 A.D. This year is called the fourteenth year of Kandragupta, which it very nearly is, 315 - 14 = 301.
When Tishya had been in orders sixty[1] years, he ordained Mahendra, 312 - 60 = 252 B.C. This is called six years after Asoka’s coronation, 259 - 6 = 253, and so it very nearly is. He died 312 - 80 = 232 B.C., which is called the twenty-sixth year of Asoka, and so it very nearly is.
[1. I take 60 (80), as given in D?pavamsa V, 95, 107, instead of 66 (86), given in D?pavamsa V. 94.]
p. xliv

BUDDHIST PATRIARCHS.
{not all of the formatting could be reproduced in this table; all cells with three number are joined with a brace on the right in the original}
Birth.Ordination.Ordination of
successor.Death.Age.Patriarchate.
Upali(Generally
20 years
before
ordination.)527461  44794  30
(60)   
Dasaka461416  
419  
421  39784  50
45
42
40   
Saunaka"416
419
421376  
379  
381  350
35386  44 (47)
(40)   
Siggava"376?312?300?96  50 (52)
(64)   
Tishya"312?253  233100  68
(60)   
Mahendra273253"19380  40
    282 (284)

If we test the dates of this table by the length of time assigned to each patriarchate, we find that Upali ruled thirty years, from Buddha’s death, 477 to 447; Dasaka fifty years. To Saunaka forty-four years are assigned, instead of forty-seven, owing to a fault pointed out before; and to Siggava fifty-two years, or fifty-five[1] instead of fifty. Tishya’s patriarchate is said to have lasted sixty-eight years, which agrees with previous statements.
Lastly, the years of the death of the six patriarchs, as fixed according to the reigns of the kings of Magadha, agree extremely well.
Upali died in the sixth year of Udayi, i.e. 453 - 6 = 447 B.C.
Dasaka died in the eighth year of Sisunaga, i.e. 405 - 8 = 397 B.C.
Saunaka died in the sixth year of the Ten, i.e. 359 - 6 = 353 B.C., showing again the difference of three years.
[1. The combined patriarchates of Saunaka and Siggava are given as 99 by the D?pavamsa.]
p. xlv
Siggava died in the fourteenth year of Kandragupta, i.e. 315 - 14 = 301 B.C.
Tishya died in the twenty-sixth or twenty-seventh year of Asoka, i.e. 259 - 27 = 233 B.C.
This general and more than general agreement between dates taken from the history of the kings and the history of the patriarchs leaves on my mind a decided impression of a tradition which, though not strictly historical, in our sense of the word, represents at all events the result of such enquiries as could be made into the past ages of Buddhism at the time of Asoka. There are difficulties in that tradition which would certainly have been avoided, if the whole chronology had been simply made up: but there is no doubt a certain method too perceptible throughout, which warns us that we must not mistake a smooth chronology for solid history.

THE TITLE OF DHAMMAPADA.
The title of Dhammapada has been interpreted in various ways. It is an ambiguous word, and has been accepted as such by the Buddhists themselves. Dhamma has many meanings. Under one aspect it means religion, particularly the religion taught by Buddha, the law which every Buddhist should accept and observe. Under another aspect dhamma is virtue, or the realisation of the law.
Pada also has many meanings. In the Abhidhanapad?pika it is explained by place, protection, Nirvana, cause, word, thing, portion, foot, footstep.

续-《●[The Dhammapada and The Sutta Nipata]The Dhammapada》

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Hence dhammapada may mean ’footstep of religion,’ and thus the title was first rendered by Gogerly, only that he used the plural instead of the singular, and called it ’The Footsteps of Religion,’ while Spence Hardy still more freely called it ’The Paths of Religion.’ It may be quite true, as pointed out by Childers, that pada by itself never means path. But it means footstep, and the footstep towards a thing is much the same as what we call the path to a thing. Thus we read, verse 21, ’appamado amatapadam,’ earnestness is the step, i.e. the path that leads to immortality. p. xlvi Again, ’pamado makkuno padam’ can hardly mean anything but that thoughtlessness is the path of death, is the path that leads to death. The commentator, too, rightly explains it here by amatasya adhigamupaya, the means of obtaining immortality, i.e. Nirvana, or simply by upayo, and even by maggo, the way. If we compare verses 92 and 93 of our text, and verses 254 and 255, we see that pada is used synonymously with gati, going. In the same manner dhammapada would mean the footstep or the footpath of virtue, i.e. the path that leads to virtue, and supply a very appropriate title for a collection of moral precepts. In verses 44 and 45 ’path of virtue’ seems to be the most appropriate meaning for dhammapada[1], and it is hardly possible to assign any other meaning to it in the following verse (Kundasutta, v. 6):
Yo dhammapade sudesite
Magge g?vati sa??ato satima,
Anavagga-padani sevamano
Tat?yam bhikkhum ahu maggag?vim,


’He who lives restrained and attentive in the way that has been well pointed out, in the path of the law, cultivating blameless words, such a Bhikkhu they call a Maggag?vi (living in the way).’
I therefore think that ’Path of Virtue,’ or ’Footstep of the Law,’ was the idea most prominent in the mind of those who originally framed the title of this collection of verses. It seems to me that Buddhaghosa also took the same view, for the verse which D’Alwis[2] quotes from the introduction of Buddhaghosa’s commentary,--
Sampatta-saddhammapado sattha dhammapadam subham Desesi,
and which he translates, ’The Teacher who had reached the very depths (lit. bottom) of Saddhamma, preached this holy Dhammapada,’--lends itself far better to another translation, viz. ’The Teacher who had gained a firm
[1. Cf. Dhammapada, v. 285, nibbanam sugatena desitam.
2. Buddhist Nirvana, p. 62.]
p. xlvii footing in the Good Law, showed (preached) the holy Path of the Law.’
Gogerly, again, who may generally be taken as a faithful representative of the tradition of the Buddhists still preserved in Ceylon, translates the title by the ’Footsteps of Religion,’ so that there can be little doubt that the priests of that island accept Dhammapada in the sense of ’Vestiges of Religion,’ or, from a different point of view, ’The Path of Virtue.’
M. L. Feer[1] takes a slightly different view, and assigning to pada the meaning of foot or base, he translates Dha, mmapada by Loi fondamentale, or Base de la Religion.
B, ut it cannot be denied that the title of Dhammapada was very soon understood in a different sense also, namely, as ’Sentences of Religion.’ Pada means certainly a foot of a verse, a verse, or a line, and dhammapadam actually occurs in the sense of a ’religious sentence.’ Thus we read in verse 102, ’Though a man recite a hundred Gathas made up of senseless words, one dhammapadam, i.e. one single word or line of the law, is better, which if a man hears, he becomes quiet.’ But here we see at once the difficulty of translating the title of ’dhammapadam’ by ’religious sentences.’ Dhammapadam means one law verse, or wise saw, not many. Professor Fausb?ll, who in his excellent edition of the Dhammapada translated that title by ’a collection of verses on religion,’ appeals to such passages as verses 44 and 102 in support of his interpretation. But in verse 42 dhammapadam sudesitam, even if it does not mean the path of the law, could never mean ’versus legis bene enarratos,’ but only versum legis bene enarratum, as Dr. Fausb?ll himself renders ekam dhammapadam, in verse 102, by unus legis versus. Buddhaghosa, too, when he speaks of many law verses uses the plural, for instance[2], ’Be it known that the Gatha consists of the Dhammapadani, Theragatha, Ther?gatha, and those unmixed (detached) Gatha not comprehended in any of the above-named Suttanta.’
[1. Revue Critique, 1870, p. 378.
2. D’Alwis, Pali Grammar, p. 61.]
p. xlviii

续-《●[The Dhammapada and The Sutta Nipata]The Dhammapada》

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The only way in which Dhammapada could be defended in the sense of ’Collection of Verses of the Law,’ would be if we took it for an aggregate compound. But such aggregate compounds, in Sanskrit at least, are possible with numerals only; for instance, tribhuvanam, the three worlds; katuryugam, the four ages[1]. It might therefore be possible in Pali, too, to form such compounds as dasapadam, a collection of ten padas, a work consisting of ten padas, a decamerone, but it would in no wise follow that we could in that language attempt such a compound as Dhammapadam, in order to express a collection of law verses[2]. Mr. Beal[3] informs us that the Chinese seem to have taken Dhammapada in the sense of ’stanzas of law,’ ’law texts,’ or ’scripture texts.’
It should be remembered, also, that the idea of representing life, and particularly the life of the faithful, as a path of duty or virtue leading to deliverance, (in Sanskrit dharmapatha,) is very familiar to Buddhists. The four great truths of their religion[4] consist in the recognition of the following principles: 1. that there is suffering; 2. that there is a cause of that suffering; 3. that such cause can be removed; 4. that there is a way of deliverance, viz. the doctrine of Buddha. This way is the ashtanga-marga, the eightfold way[5], taught by Buddha, and leading to Nirvana[6]. The faithful advances on that road, padat padam,
[1. See M. M.’s Sanskrit Grammar, § 519.
2. Mr. D’Alwis’ arguments (Buddhist Nirvana, pp. 63-67) in support of this view, viz. the dhammapada may be a collective term, do not seem to me to strengthen my own conjecture.
3. Dhammapada from Chinese, p. 4.
4. Spence Hardy, Manual, p. 496.
5. Burnouf, Lotus, p. 520, ’Ajoutons, pour terminer ce que nous trouvons à dire sur le mot magga, quelque commentaire qu’on en donne d’ailleurs, que suivant une définition rapportée par Turnour, le magga renferme une sous-division que l’on nomme patipada, en sanscrit pratipad. Le magga, dit Tumour, est la voie qui conduit au Nibbana, la patipada, littéralement "la marche pas à pas, ou le degré," est la vie de rectitude qu’on doit suivre, quand on marche dans la voie du magga.’
6. See Spence Hardy, Manual, p. 496. Should not katurvidha-dharmapada, mentioned on p. 497, be translated by ’the fourfold path of the Law?’ It can hardly be the fourfold word of the Law.]
p. xlix step by step, and it is therefore called patipada, lit. the step by step.
If we make allowance for these ambiguities, inherent in the name of Dhammapada, we may well understand how the Buddhists themselves play with the word pada (see v. 45). Thus we read in Mr. Beal’s translation of a Chinese version of the Pratimoksha[1]:
’Let all those who desire such birth,
Who now are living in the world,
Guard and preselve these Precepts, as feet.’


TRANSLATION.
In translating the verses of the Dhammapada, I have followed the edition of the Pali text, published in 1855 by Dr. Fausb?ll, and I have derived great advantage from his Latin translation, his notes, and his copious extracts from Buddhaghosa’s commentary. I have also consulted translations, either of the whole of the Dhammapada, or of portions of it, by Burnouf, Gogerly[2], Upham, Weber, and others. Though it will be seen that in many places my translation differs from those of my predecessors, I can only claim for myself the name of a very humble gleaner in this field of Pali literature. The greatest credit is due to Dr. Fausb?ll, whose editio princeps of the Dhammapada will mark for ever an important epoch in the history of Pali scholarship; and though later critics have been able to point out some mistakes, both in his text and in his translation, the value of their labours is not to be compared with that of the work accomplished single-handed by that eminent Danish scholar.
In revising my translation, first published in 1870[3], for
[1. Catena, p. 207.
2. Several of the chapters have been translated by Mr. Gogerly, and have appeared in The Friend, vol. iv, 1840. (Spence Hardy, Eastern Monachism, p. 169.)
3. Buddhaghosha’s Parables, translated from Burmese by Captain T. Rogers, R. E. With an Introduction, containing Buddha’s Dhammapada, translated from Pali by F. Max Müller. London, 1870.]