Doing business for the Lord: lending on interest and Written Loan
Contracts
in the Mulasarvastivada-Vinaya
by Schopen, Gregory
The Journal of the American Oriental Society
Vol.114 No.4
P.p.527-554
Oct-Dec 1994
COPYRIGHT 1994 American Oriental Society
It is probably fair to say that there has been very little
discussion in Western scholarship about how Indian Buddhist
monasteries paid their bills. It is possible, of course, that this
is in part because money and monks have had, to be sure, an unhappy
history in the West - at least as that history has often been
written - and the topic may, therefore, be considered somehow
unedifying.(1) It may also be true, as Peter Levi's "Study of Monks
and Monasteries" suggests, that we like our monasteries in "ruins,"
as "landscape decorations and garden ornaments." "That," Levi says,
"is because the ruins of monasteries speak more clearly than the
real inhabited places."(2)
However this be eventually settled, it appears that this reticence
or romanticism has worked less forcefully in regard to the study of
China. Why this was so is again uncertain, but one effect of it is
not: much that a student of Indian monastic Buddhism might find
surprising in the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya, for example, will be old
hat to economic and legal historians of China. A particularly good
instance of this sort of thing occurs in the Civara-vastu of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya where we find the following passage: tatra
bhagavan bhiksun amantrayate sma. bhajayata yuyam bhiksava
upanandasya bhiksor mrtapariskaram iti. bhiksubhih samghamadhye
avatarya vikriya bhajitam. On one level the meaning of this passage
is straightforward: "In this case the Blessed One said to the monks:
You, monks, must divide the estate of the dead monk Upananda!' The
monks, having brought it and having sold it in the midst of the
community, divided (the proceeds)."(3) It looks here like there was
a kind of public' sale or auction of the belongings of a dead monk
that was held by the monks, and that what was realized from this
sale was then distributed to the monks in attendance.
Although there is, in fact, a second reference to "selling"
the goods of a deceased monk in this same passage, this procedure,
seen through the eyes of an Indianist, will almost certainly appear
unusual. But readers of J. Gernet's remarkable Les Aspects
economiques du bouddhisme dans la societe chinoise du [v.sup.e] au
[x.sup.e] siecle will already be familiar with it. In discussing the
"partage entre les moines des vetements du defunt" Gernet said -
almost forty years ago - that "les documents de Touen-houang nous
montrent les religieux d'une meme paroisse ... reunis pour la vente
aux encheres des vetements et des pieces de tissu. Les benefices
sont ensuite partages entre les moines ..."(4)
Professor Gernet, who for good reason paid less attention to the
Vinaya of the Mulasarvastivadins, seems to have thought that "il
n'est pas question cependant dans les Vinaya de la vente des
vetements des moines morts," and that "seul le Vinaya des
Mahasamghika fait une allusion, fort discrete, a ce mode de partage
...," although he himself then quotes short passages from both the
Vinaya of the Sarvastivadins and "la Matrka [des Mulasarvastivadin]"
which refer to the sale of monastic robes,(5) and Lien-sheng Yang
had already some years before noted that "a [Mulasarvastivadin]
vinaya text translated in the early T'ang period, however, indicates
that in India sale by auction was used to dispose of such personal
belongings" of deceased monks.(6) Yang's assertion seems now, in
part at least, to be confirmed by the passage from the Civaravastu
cited above. that passage does not actually contain a word for
auction', but clearly refers to the sale "in the midst of the
community" of a dead monk's possessions, and - although it cannot
establish that this was actually practiced in India - it does
confirm that Mulasarvastivadin vinaya masters thought it should, or
hoped it would.
Such confirmation from an extant Sanskrit text is, of course,
welcome, but perhaps a more important point is that without the work
of sinologists the significance of the Civara-vastu passage might
very easily be missed. Scholars working on China have in fact very
often been the first to introduce and make available important
Indian material bearing on the institutional and economic history of
Buddhism, but this material rarely, or never, makes it into Indian
studies. References to Gernet's Les Aspects economiques du
bouddhisme, for example, are extremely rare in works on Indian
cultural and economic history. D. D. Kosambi long ago referred to
Gernet when he raised the "fundamental question" of the extent to
which Buddhist monks and monasteries in India participated directly
in trade. "The documentary evidence" for such participation, Kosambi
said, "exists at the other end of the Buddhist world, in Chinese
records and translations," of the sort presented by Gernet.(7) But
few have followed this up. Andre Bareau, too, relied heavily on
Gernet in a short piece he published on certain forms of monastic
endowments in India and China.(8) Apart from these papers I know of
little else.(9)
There are of course problems in using Chinese sources in studying
India. No one, I think, would accept without serious qualifications,
for example, Kosambi's assertion that "not only the art but the
organization and economic management of Chinese Buddhist
monasteries, especially the cave-monasteries ... were initially
copied from Indian models, so that their records can be utilized for
our purpose," that is to say, to study directly Indian
monasteries.(10) The use of Chinese translations of Indian texts is
sometimes less problematic, but here too there are still serious
difficulties. The process of translation often conceals, for
example, the Indian vocabulary, and this is often especially the
case with realia or financial matters. The sinologists, too, who
present such Indian texts are, justifiably, often unable to
recognize their broader Indian significance. Here I would like to
deal with just one example which might illustrate at least some of
these points.
In his survey of what the Chinese translations of the various
vinayas have to say in regard to monks participating in "commerce"
or trade or business, Professor Gernet partly paraphrases and partly
translates a text from the Vinaya-vibhanga of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya which - unless I am very much mistaken - is
of unique importance. (11) It is important first for what it can
tell us about the kinds of legal and economic ideas that were
developed by at least some Indian vinaya writers; it is important
for what it can contribute to our understanding of the laws of
contract and debt in early and classical India, and because it
provides another good example of Buddhist vinaya interacting with
Indian law, it is also important for what it can contribute to the
discussion concerning the uses of writing and written documents and
legal instruments in India.
A Sanskrit text for this passage has not yet - as far as I know -
come to light But in addition to the Chinese version presented by
Gernet, the text is also available in a Tibetan translation. This
Tibetan translation has at least one advantage over the Chinese
text: it is often, though not always, easier to see the Sanskrit
that underlies a Tibetan translation, and therefore to get at the
original Indian vocabulary. Since the text has not yet been fully
translated, I first give a complete translation. This will be
followed by an attempt to establish the technical Indian vocabulary
that, the Tibetan appears to be translating, and then further
discussion directed toward situating this piece of vinaya in the
larger context of similar discussions in Indian dharmasastra, with
some reference to actual legal records presented in Indian
inscriptions. In the end, too, there will have to be some attempt
made to get at the religious and institutional needs which might lie
behind our text and the legal instruments it is concerned with.
* * *
Vinaya-vibhanga
(Derge, 'dul ba, Cha 154b.3-155b.2)
The Buddha, the Blessed One, was staying in Vaisali, in the hall of
the lofty pavilion on the bank of the monkey's pool. At that time
the Licchavis of Vaisali built houses with six or seven upper
chambers (pura).(12) As the Licchavis of Vaisali built their houses,
so too did they build viharas with six or seven upper chambers. As a
consequence, because of their great height, having been built and
built, they fell apart.(13) When that occurred the donors thought:
"If even the viharas of those who are still living, abiding,
continuing and alive fall thus into ruin, how will it be for the
viharas of those who are dead@ We should give a perpetuity (aksaya)
to the monastic community for building purposes."
Having thought thus, and taking a perpetuity, they went to the
monks. Having arrived they said this to them: "Noble Ones, please
accept these perpetuities for building purposes"
The monks said: "Gentlemen, since the Blessed One has promulgated a
rule of training in this regard, we do not accept them."
The monks reported this matter to the Blessed One.
The Blessed One said. For the sake of the community a perpetuity for
building purposes is to be accepted. Moreover, (155a) a vihara for a
community of monks should be made with three upper chambers. A
retreat house (varsaka) for a community of nuns should be made with
two upper chambers."
The monks, having heard the Blessed One, having accepted the
perpetuity, put it into the community's depository (kosthika) and
left it there.
The donors came along and said: "Noble Ones, why is there no
building being done on the vihara?"
"There is no money (karsapana)."
"But did we not give you perpetuities?"
The monks said: "Did you think we would consume the perpetuities?
They remain in the community's depository."
"But of course, Noble Ones, they would not be perpetuities if they
could be exhausted, but why do you think we did not keep them in our
own houses?(14) Why do you not have them lent out on interest
(prayojayati)?"
The monks said: "Since the Blessed One has promulgated a rule of
training in this regard we do not have them lent on interest."
The monks reported the matter to the Blessed One.
The Blessed One said@ For the sake of the community a perpetuity for
building purposes is to be lent on interest."
Devout brahmins and householders having in the same way given
perpetuities for the sake of the Buddha and the Dharma and the
Community, the Blessed One said: "Perpetuities for the sake of the
Buddha and the Dharma and the Community are to be lent on interest.
What is generated from that, with that accrued revenue (siddha),
worship is to be performed to the Buddha and the Dharma and the
Community."
The monks placed the perpetuities among those same donors. But when
they came due that caused disputes among them. "Noble Ones," they
said, "How is it that disputes have arisen from our own wealth?"
The monks reported the matter to the Blessed One.
The Blessed One said: "Perpetuities should not be placed among
them."
The monks placed them among wealthy persons. But when they came due,
relying on those possessed of power, those wealthy persons did not
repay them. When, by virtue of their high status, they did not repay
them(15) the Blessed One said: "They should not be placed among
them."
The monks (155b) placed them among poor people. But they were unable
to pay them back as well.
The Blessed One said. "Taking a pledge (adhi/ bandhaka) of twice the
value (dviguna), and writing out a contract (likhita) which has a
seal and is witnessed (saksimat), the perpetuity is to be placed. In
the contract the year, the month, the day, the name of the Elder of
the Community (samgha-sthavira), the Provost of the monastery
(upadhivarika), the borrower, the property, and the interest
(vrddhi) should be recorded. When the perpetuity is to be placed
that pledge of twice the value is also to be placed with a devout
lay-brother who has undertaken the five rules of training.
* * *
The vocabulary of bur passage is not always transparent and
requires some discussion. We might start with two architectural
terms. The Tibetan text says the Licchavis built both houses and
viharas. of six or seven rtseg. Rtseg almost certainly translates
Sanskrit pura here, as it does in the Sayanasana-vastu several
times.(16) But the exact nature of a pura is not clear: Edgerton
defines it as an "upper chamber" (BHSD, 347(2)). In Gernet, net,
however, where the beginning of the text seems to be omitted, the
rule corresponding to "a vihara for a community of monks should be
made with three upper chambers, etc." is rendered as "le vihara des
bhiksu sera reconstruit avec trois etages," which would seem to
suggest that I-ching understood the term to refer to additional
"stories" or "floors" of a building. Unfortunately, yet another
reference to a pura suggests that it was something that monks fell
off of. The Posadhavastu, in referring to the construction of "halls
for religious exertion" (prahana-sala), says: te tatra na yapayanti.
bhagavan aha. uparisthad dvitiyah purah [but ms: puram] kartavyah.
na arohati. bhagavan aha. sopanam kartavyam. prapatitam bhavati.
bhagavan aha. vedika parikseptavya: "The monks had no room there (in
the hall). The Blessed One said: A second upper chamber (or story)
is to be built above'. They could not get up to it. The Blessed One
said: A staircase is to be made'. They fell off it. The Blessed One
said: It should be enclosed with a railing.'"(17) Here, of course,
neither upper chamber' nor story' does very well. Finally it is
worth noting that the rule given in our text concerning the number
of pura for viharas of monks and nuns does not correspond to that
given elsewhere in the same Vinaya. In a passage in the
Sayanasana-vastu already referred to which recounts the origin of
the vihara the Buddha is made to say: bhiksunam pancapura viharah
kartavyah ... bhiksuninam tu tripura viharah kartavyah: "for monks
viharas are to be made with five upper chambers ... but for nuns
viharas are to be made with three upper chambers."(18)
Our Tibetan text says that when monks first started accepting
perpetuities they simply put them in the community's mdzod, and this
is the second architectural term requiring comment. Chandra's
Tibetan-Sanskrit Dictionary (1992) gives kosa as the most commonly
attested equivalent for mdzod, but a reference in a context much
closer to ours than any Chandra cites suggests something more
specific. The passage in question is another piece of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya, which is of interest for the history of
Indian law, since it refers to a written will. In stipulating what
should be done with the various sorts of things which make up an
estate inherited by the monastic community, the text says that
"books containing the word of the Buddha" - unlike "books containing
the treatises of outsiders" (bahih-sastra-pustaka) which are to be
sold - are, in Dutt's edition, caturdisaya bhiksusamghaya
dharanakosthikayam prakseptavyah.(19) This, as it stands, might be
translated as, "are to be deposited in the place for storing (sacred
books) for the community of monks from the four quarters." But Dutt
almost certainly has only reproduced a mistake in the manuscript and
thereby created a ghost word' - dharana-kosthika - which quickly
found its way into Edgerton's dictionary (s.v. kosthika), whose
definition, "a place for storing and keeping (sacred books)'" I have
used in the preceding translation. What is, however, almost
certainly the intended form is first of all clear from the Tibetan
translation of this passage: phyogs bzhi'i dge slong gi dge 'dun gyi
ched du spyir mdzod du gzhug par bya'o.(20) The important word here
is spyi, a well attested equivalent for which is sadharana, "in
common," and the Tibetan is easily rendered as: "to be placed in the
depository as common property for the monastic community from the
four quarters." Oddly enough, further confirmation that dharana is a
scribal error for sadharana is found almost immediately in the same
vinaya passage.
After stipulating what should be done with the two sorts of books
the passage moves on to discuss two sorts of what the Sanskrit text
calls patra-lekhya, which were also included in the estate. The
Sanskrit term would mean something like "written document," but both
the Tibetan translation and the context indicate that the term
refers to some kind of written lien or contract of debt. The Tibetan
renders it by chags rgya, a term not found in the standard
dictionaries, but cited in the Bod rgya tshig mdzod chen mo (p.
779(1)) as "archaic" (rnying) and defined there as bu lon bda' ba'i
dpang rgya, "a witnessed marker that calls in a debt," and in
Roerich's Tibetsko ... Slovar' (3.70) as a "promissory note." The
context too points in this direction when it indicates that there
are two kinds of patralekhya, one that can be realized or liquidated
quickly (patra-lekhyam) yacchighram sakyate sadhayitum) and one that
cannot. The former are to be called in immediately and what is
realized is to be divided among the monks. In regard to one that
cannot be realized quickly the text says - again in Dutt's edition -
tac caturdisaya bhiksusamghaya dharana / kosthikayam prakseptavyam.
Here Dutt emends against both the manuscript and the Tibetan only to
produce a text whose sense is not immediately clear. The manuscript
has, of course, tac caturdisaya bhiksusamghaya sadharanam
kosthikayam prakseptavyah, "that is to be placed in the depository
as common property for the monastic community from the four
quarters."(21) The Tibetan corresponds exactly to the manuscript
reading and is virtually the same here as in the passage dealing
with books: de ni phyogs bzhi'i dge slong gi dge dun gyi ched du
spyir mdzod du gzhag par bya'o.
It would appear, then, that the term dharana-kosthika is not yet
attested - certainly not in the vinaya passage Edgerton cites for it
- and is, rather, a ghost word based on an unnoticed scribal error.
For our more immediate purposes, however, it can now be said that
the term mdzod, which occurs in our text from the Vinaya-vibhanga as
the word for the place or thing in which the perpetuities were
initially deposited, is, elsewhere in the same Vinaya, used to
translate the Sanskrit kosthika, and that a kosthika in a Buddhist
monastery was a place, probably a room, in which not only books, but
legal documents and money, as well, were kept. Incidentally this may
give us some indirect indication of both the value and rarity of
books at the time these texts were written - they certainly did not
circulate!
When we move from architectural terms to the legal vocabulary
of our text, we move as well to a somewhat different set of problems
and, significantly, to a different class of literature. For the
architectural terms in our Tibetan text we had at least established
Sanskrit equivalents or other vinaya texts in Sanskrit which would
allow us to establish such equivalents. For the legal vocabulary
there is often neither. Several of the technical terms that occur in
our text are not listed in Chandra's Tibetan-Sanskrit Dictionary,
for example; and most of those that are - and for which there are,
therefore, at least attested Sanskrit equivalents - are cited from
passages in which those terms are not used with the technical
meanings that they appear to have in our text. Moreover, I know of
only a single Buddhist text which deals with some of the same matter
as our Vinaya passage and it is itself not free of problems. If,
then, the vocabulary of our passage was peculiar to known Buddhist
literature, the situation would be decidedly grim. But - unless I am
much mistaken - this vocabulary is by no means Buddhist, and is, in
fact, widely attested and fully discussed in Sanskrit legal
literature. This dharmasastra literature will, I think, allow us to
reconstruct much - though not all - of the Sanskrit vocabulary which
underlies our Tibetan text, and the partial Buddhist parallel will
allow us to confirm - at least in part - these reconstructions. The
linkage of our text with Hindu legal literature, moreover, may also
tell us something important about both the nature and history of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya, if not about Buddhist vinaya as a whole.
Having said this much it must be immediately noted that the first
term we might deal with is not, as such, attested in dharmasastra.
The term is that which I have translated as "perpetuity." Gernet
translates the Chinese corresponding to this as "des biens
inepuisables," but is not able to cite a Sanskrit equivalent. In our
Tibetan text, however, the Sanskrit original is virtually certain.
The Tibetan term is mi zad pa. This is a well-known and widely
attested translation of Sanskrit aksaya, "exempt from decay,"
"undecaying," hence "permanent." The problem, of course, is that
aksaya is in both form and function an adjective and yet was almost
certainly being used in the Sanskrit underlying our Tibetan as a
substantive - it referred to a thing'. What that thing' was,
moreover, is unusually clear from our text itself It was, first of
all, a kind of donation that the donors expected to continue to work
long after they themselves were dead; it was the gift of,
apparently, a certain sum of money, but that sum was not itself - as
the donors remarks, in our text make clear - ever to be spent. It
was to be lent out on interest and the interest alone was to be used
for specific purposes. It was, in short, a conditioned endowment the
principal of which must remain intact and was, therefore,
"permanent." Sanskrit lexicography, moreover, knows a word for
exactly the kind of donation our text presents, and it is a term
which is too close to aksaya to be unrelated. That term is
aksaya-nivi and there are a number of interesting things about it.
A number of our Sanskrit dictionaries, Monier-Williams and Apte, for
example, are able to cite only a single source for the term - which
they define as "a permanent endowment" - namely, Buddhist
inscriptions. And, while it is true that inscriptional evidence for
aksaya-nivi or variants of it is - as Derrett says - "rich," in fact
far richer than he himself indicated, it is by no means exclusively
Buddhist. One of the earliest occurrences of the term does indeed
come from a Buddhist record from Alluru in Andhra which has been
dated to the end of the first century C.E., or to the second
century;(22) and there are, for example, as many as nine
inscriptions from the Satavahana period from the Buddhist site at
Kanheri which refer to aksaya-nivis.(23) But yet another of the
earliest inscriptional references to this sort of endowment comes
from Kusan Mathura, and there the endowment was intended to feed a
hundred brahmanas and the destitute.(24) In fact, references to
aksaya-nivis continue to occur through the Gupta period and beyond
in both Hindu and Jain inscriptions, as well as Buddhist.(25)
That the type of donation called an aksaya-nivi in inscriptions is
the same type of donation that our Vinaya text calls an aksaya will,
I think, be clear from even a single well-preserved example of such
an inscription. This example is a fifth-century Buddhist record from
Sanci written in good Sanskrit, and it details, in fact, several
separate endowments;(26)
Success. The wife of the lay-brother (upasaka) Sanasiddha, the
lay-sister (upasika) Harisvimini has, after designating her mother
and father beneficiaries (matapitaram) uddisya), given twelve
dinaras as a permanent endowment (aksaya-nivi) to the Noble
Community of Monks from the Four Directions in the Illustrious
Mahavihara of Kakanadabota [i.e., Sanci]. With the interest (vrddhi)
that is produced from these dinaras one monk who has entered into
the community is to be fed every day. Moreover, three dinaras were
given to the House of the Precious One (ratna-grha). With the
interest (vrddhi) from those three dinaras three lamps are to be
lighted every day for the Blessed One, the Buddha, who is in the
House of the Precious One.(27) Moreover, one dinara was given to the
Seat of the Four Buddhas. With the interest from that a lamp is to
be lighted every day for the Blessed One, the Buddha, who is on the
Seat of the Four Buddhas.(28) Thus was this permanent endowment
(aksaya-nivi) created with a document in stone to last as long as
the moon and sun (acandrarkka-sila-lekhya) by the lady, the wife of
Sanasiddha, the lay-sister Harisvamini.
The year 131 - the month Asvayuj - day 5.
What we see here in this fifth-century record of an actual
transaction is straightforward, is typical of both earlier and later
inscriptional records recording aksaya-nivis, and records what is
obviously the same sort of donation that our Vinaya text describes.
Sums of money are given to the monastic community, but the sums
themselves are not to be spent. They are to remain intact and be
used as permanent sources for generating spendable income in the
form of interest. Though this particular record does not explicitly
say so, such sums could only generate interest if they were lent out
or invested.
We gather, then, from inscriptional evidence that endowments
of the kind described in our text were in actual practice called
aksaya-nivi, aksaya-nivi-dharmena, etc.; that - beginning at least
in the first/second centuries C.E. - such endowments or donations
were, in actual practice, frequently made, and that Buddhist, Hindu
and Jain communities or establishments all, in actual practice,
benefited from such endowments. Such endowments were, it seems,
important legal instruments used in widely separated geographical
areas - from Andhra to Mathura to Kanheri - over a very long period
of time. In light of its widespread use in actual practice, it is
curious - Derrett says it is "odd," "puzzling" and "enlightening" -
that there are no references to this legal device "in the
fundamental materials of the dharmasastra."(29) Derrett draws from
this situation a "lesson" which applies as well to Buddhist vinaya
where it has so often been assumed that "the Vinaya Pitaka ...
enters at so great length into all details of the daily life of the
recluses," and that if something was not mentioned in the vinaya it
was of no importance or did not occur. He says:
"... it struck me as odd that a word which plays so important a role
in the legal practice of ancient and mediaeval India [i.e., nivi]
should not appear, in its legal sense, in the fundamental materials
of the dharmasastra. There is a lesson to be leant from this ...
viz. that the sastra, though strong on the jurisprudence of the
ancient pre-Islamic legal system, did not aim to be comprehensive
when it came to its incidents. This instance is worth pondering
over. The more we discover about the utility of the sastra in
practice in ancient times the more puzzling it remains that
technical terms which had great currency should be missing from the
literature.
He ends by adding:
"The absence of the term from the abundant and versatile
dharmasastra literature in these technical senses is most
enlightening on the nature of that sastra."(30)
The "absence" in the dharmasastra that Derrett refers to may now,
however, have to be seen in yet another light, because even if we
bracket, for the moment, the seemingly obvious identity between the
inscriptional aksaya-nivi and the aksaya of our Vinaya text, there
is at least one other certain reference to an aksaya-nivi in the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya, and this same Vinaya also gives other
evidence of monastic property or wealth intended for loan. The
reference occurs in the Sanskrit text of the Civara-vastu recovered
from Gilgit, and forms a part of a passage dealing with the monks,
obligation to attend to, and perform acts of worship for the benefit
of, a sick and dying fellow monk. The text lists a series of
possible ways to fund these activities-donors might be solicited,
but if that does not work then what belongs to the Community
(samghika) might be used. If that also does not work, the text says,
"That which belongs to the permanent endowment for the Buddha is to
be given" (buddhaksaya-nivi-santakam deyam).(31)
Though welcome, there are two unfortunate things about this explicit
reference to an aksaya-nivi. One is that this passage does not
appear in the Tibetan translation of the Civara-vastu and therefore
does not give us an established Tibetan equivalent for the term. The
other is that it gives us no information about this aksaya-nivi,
apart from the fact that such endowments were known. But this, in
itself, may allow one further observation. This passage not only
suggests that aksaya-nivi were known to the compilers of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya, but that they were so well known that no
description or explanation of them was felt necessary. Moreover, the
Civara-vastu passage also seems to indicate that the compilers of
this vinaya knew of "permanent endowments" that were set up for more
than one purpose - otherwise the qualification "for the Buddha"
would appear to have been unnecessary.
All of what we have seen so far would seem to show that the
compilers of the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya recognized a category of
donations meant for loan; that they were familiar with endowments,
the principal of which was to be lent out at interest, which they
called aksayas; and that, in fact, they - unlike the authors of the
dharmasastra - both knew and, at least on one occasion, used the
term aksaya-nivi. But this last especially leaves us with the
question of why, when they referred to a financial instrument which
clearly corresponds to what epigraphical sources called an
aksaya-nivi, they did not use this term, even though it must have
been known in their circle. The question, in other words, is what is
the relationship between aksaya used as a substantive and the
compound aksaya-nivi? The answer - or an answer - may turn on how
common such endowments were, and may lead us to conclude that aksaya
by itself is, paradoxically, a particular kind of Sanskrit compound.
Some years ago J. Gonda, to whom we owe so many close studies
bearing on issues of Sanskrit syntax, published a paper on what he
called abbreviated nominal compounds." In his usual style he gives
copious examples of such compounds: kalpa for kalpanta, "the end of
a kalpa,"; chada for dantacchada, "lip"; sakya for sakya-bhiksu, "a
Buddhist monk"; aksa for aksamala, "a rosary"; bhadra for
bhadrasana, "a particular posture of meditation"; and kriya for
kriyapada, "the third division of a suit at law," etc. In all but
one of these cases the first element of a two part compound has come
to be used by itself with the same meaning that was originally
expressed by the whole compound. Gonda suggests that this is the
more common pattern of such abbreviated compounds, that the omission
of the former member probably is less common than that of the
latter." He also noted that in such compounds, an adjective is, as a
consequence of abbreviation, sometimes used as a substantive: sveta-
for svetacchatra- a white sun-shade.'" Finally, he suggested that
such abbreviation "is also in Sanskrit less rare than those scholars
who do not mention it at all seem to assume."(32)
Given what little that can be ascertained, it does not seem
unreasonable to suggest that aksaya in our Vinaya text is yet
another example of such an abbreviated nominal compound: aksaya is
the first part of an attested two part compound, the first element
of that compound is used by itself with the same meaning that the
compound itself has - both are used to refer to exactly the same
sort of financial instrument, aksaya is - like sveta - clearly an
adjective, but, like sveta as an abbreviated compound, is just as
clearly used as a substantive in our text. This explanation may be
as good as we can get without further data. But even if only
tentatively accepted, this explanation has at least some further
implications.
Any attempt to explain the sorts of linguistic changes that produce
things like abbreviation must, of course, skate very near
speculation. Gonda, however, suggests that
Whenever the speakers of a language need an expression which
contains more information and applies to fewer objects than any
simple words in their language, they are compelled to use several
words or, - if the structure of their language allows it - to form a
compound pound. If however the longer expression becomes in general,
or within a definite group of speakers, more frequently used than is
necessary or convenient they are often abbreviated ...
He then cites from English the use of the word "bulb" for what was
originally called the "electric light bulb."(33)
If we were to grant that something like this process worked on the
compound aksaya-nivi, then this in turn would imply that among
Buddhist groups the "longer expression" became "more frequently used
than is necessary or convenient" and therefore could be - though it
was not always - abbreviated. This would account for the fact that
both aksaya-nivi and aksaya could continue to be used, but suggests
as well that this particular form of endowment - as inscriptions
prove - was particularly well known among Buddhists, and, while not
exclusive to them, may have been considered as largely theirs. If,
moreover, the aksaya-nivi retained a Buddhist smell this may account
for the fact that "orthodox" dharmasastra authors were reluctant to
deal with it.(34)
Though much here remains uncertain, two related things do not. It
is, I hope, already clear that the study of dharmasastra might
profitably be expanded to include Buddhist vinaya, and that the
study of Buddhist vinaya must most assuredly include the study of
dharmasastra. One might even begin to suspect that much that is
found in Buddhist vinaya - sleeping on low beds, not evading tolls,
etc. - is there because similar concerns are addressed in
dharmasastra. But apart from this question, which cannot be pursued
here, it will hopefully become clear from what follows that vinaya
and dharmasastra often speak the same language.
Fortunately, most of the legal vocabulary of our Vinaya text is
far less complicated, and for some of it we have at least one
Buddhist work extant in both Sanskrit and Tibetan that will provide
attested equivalents and, as already noted, confirm what can be
reconstructed from Hindu dharmasastra. Our text, for example, has
the Buddha himself declare that "for the sake of the community a
perpetuity for building purposes is to be lent on interest" (dge
'dun gyi phyir mkhar len gyi rgyu mi zad pa rab tu sbyor bar bya'o).
The Tibetan I have translated as "lent on interest" is rab tu sbyor
ba. The Tibetan, of course, does not normally have this meaning but
here the underlying Sanskrit cannot easily be doubted. Several
equivalents are attested and they are all forms from pravyuj:
prayukta, prayukti, prayoga.(35) Monier-Williams gives, as the
technical meaning for pravyuj in dharmasastra literature, "to lend
(for use or interest)"; for prayukta, "lent (on interest)." The
glossary in Dharmakosa I.3 has the following: prayukta, "invested
(sum)," prayoga, "lending money at interest," prayojya "money lent
at interest: investment," etc. Kangle's glossary to the Arthasastra
also gives prayoga as "giving a loan," prayojaka as "a lender of
money." Our Vinaya text is, therefore, not using Buddhist vocabulary
here, but a vocabulary well established and current in dharmasastra
and other Sanskrit texts dealing with legal and financial matters.
Both the equivalence rab tu sbyor bar = pravyuj and the sense "lend
on interest" are, moreover, confirmed by the one Buddhist partial
parallel that has already been referred to: Gunaprabha uses a form
of pravyuj several times in the sense of "to lend" in his
Vinaya-sutra, and this is most often rendered into Tibetan by rab tu
sbyor ba.(36) But here too, the parallel between dharmasastra and
Buddhist vinaya goes beyond items of vocabulary.
The compiler of our Vinaya text represents his monks as being aware
of "rules of training" that would make lending on interest
inadmissible. The declaration he attributes to the Buddha also does
not negate the general principle involved, but rather allows for
specific purposes to which the inadmissibility does not apply.
First, such activity is not only allowed, but to be pursued - the
Tibetan is translating a future passive participle - for building
purposes for the benefit of the community. Then admissibility is
extended to any purpose which is for the benefit of the Buddha, the
Dharma and the Community. Here our Tibetan text allows us to correct
an observation made by Gernet in regard to the Chinese text. The
latter has a passage corresponding to the Tibetan I translate above
as.. "The Blessed One said.. Perpetuities for the sake of the Buddha
and the Dharma and the Community are to be lent on interest. What is
generated from that, with that accrued revenue (siddha), worship is
to be performed to the Buddha and the Dharma and the Community.'"
But Gernet excludes it from his text and puts it in a footnote
saying, "il y a ici deux phrases qui constituent sans doute une
note."(37) Our Tibetan text, however, indicates that it is an
integral and important part of the text. it explicitly and
categorically extends the admissibility of lending on interest to
purposes beyond building activities that will benefit the community,
and allows it for what we might call, categorically, religious
purposes,. Significantly, we find in Manu, for example, the same
kind of dispensation and extension expressed in simpler, if rather
curious, terms.
Manu X.117 is a good example of the one must not, but...' pattern of
promulgation typical of both dharmasastra and Buddhist vinaya. It
starts by declaring absolutely that "a brahmana and even a ksatriya
should not, indeed, lend on interest" (vrddhim naiva prayojayet).
Our vinaya text, as noted above, presented Buddhist monks as knowing
that their rules of training, placed the same restrictions on them.
But, again like the vinaya text, Manu too - though in somewhat
different terms - then lifts the restriction in regard to loans made
for a certain and essentially similar purpose. "But, however, he may
on his own accord place sums at low interest with a vile man for
religious purposes" (kamam tu khalu dharmartham dadyat papiyase
'lpikam).(38) Here we appear to have not only another instance of
shared vocabulary (prayojayet), but an instance of parallel
provisions for parallel purposes ("religious purposes"). And there
are further examples of both.
As in the case of Tibetan rab tu sbyor ba where the technical
meaning "lend on interest" is not easily available in Tibetan
itself,. so too in the case of what I have translated as "accrued
revenue." The Tibetan is grub pa and the standard dictionaries give
little or no indication that this term can carry such a meaning. But
a well-attested Sanskrit equivalent for grub pa in other contexts is
siddha, and siddha occurs several times in, for example, the
Arthasastra in exactly this meaning.(39)
Although, as we will see, the route to the technical meanings of the
Tibetan terms in our passage, or oven to their Sanskrit equivalents,
is not always the same or so straightforward, it invariably seems to
involve going, to dharmasastra. When, for example, our Vinaya text
gets to its final instructions in regard to making a loan it says
first that one should take "a pledge of twice the value" of the
loan. The Tibetan is gta' nyi ri and at least the first element of
this expression, gta', is cited in the standard dictionaries in the
meaning "pawn" or "pledge," and it occurs a couple of times in this
sense in the Tibetan documents "concerning Chinese Turkestan"
treated long ago by Thomas. In one of the latter we find exactly the
same expression that occurs in our vinaya text, gta' nyi ri, but
Thomas in his glossary queries his own translation, "of twice the
value."(40) It is, in fact, almost certainly correct. Gernet
translates the corresponding Chinese as "gages qui aient deux fois
la valeur du pret," and the Bod rgya tshig mdzod chen mo (p. 101)
defines gta' nyis ri ba as bu lon gyi dmigs rten rin thang ldab ri
ba. Here, then, there is little doubt about the meaning of the
Tibetan. But without a Sanskrit equivalent and some reference to
dharmasastra much might be missed.
Once again, neither gta' nor nyi ri occur in Chandra's
Dictionary, nor are Sanskrit equivalents easily available in known
Buddhist Sanskrit sources. We do know now, however, that our Vinaya
text shares several lexical items, not with Buddhist texts, but with
Indian dharmasastra sources, so that we might expect that the same
might hold in this case as well. And our expectations appear to be
justified. If we consider our text an Indian text dealing with legal
matters and laws of contract then our sought-for equivalents can
hardly be in doubt: Tibetan gta', which means "pawn" or "pledge," is
likely to be a translation of one or another of two Sanskrit terms.
In his study of the "law of debt" in ancient India H. Chatterjee
says, "to convey the sense of pledge, two terms are used in the
dharmasastra - one is adhi and the other is bandhaka." He goes on to
note that "it may be supposed that the use of the word bandhaka is
of late origin," and that "it appears that the exact difference
between the two words might have been lost long before the period of
the digest writers."(41) Such considerations would suggest that the
Sanskrit original of our Vinaya text probably read either adhi or
bandhaka, although we cannot be absolutely certain which of these
two actually occurred. In Gunaprabha's text, in fact, gta' is twice
used to render bandhaka. Gunaprabha, however, is also relatively "
late," so again we cannot be certain that this was also the term
that occurred in our Vibhanga passage. But as in the case of
pravyuj, here too it is not just a single vocabulary item that is
shared or similar between our text and dharmasastra, but an entire
procedure. Brhaspati X.5, for example, stipulates - like the Buddha
of our Vinaya text - that one should make a loan after having taken
a pledge or deposit of full value (paripurnam grhitvadhim bandhakam
va ...). He also says - and, again, as we will see he is not alone -
to get it in writing. But before we move to that point we still have
to account for our Tibetan nyi ri. Its significance too is clarified
by dharmasastra.
Chatterjee, for example, indicates that the general understanding of
a pledge of "full value" was that it was "sufficient to meet the
capital with interest."(42) Our text, however, stipulates that the
pledge be "of twice the value." In spite of appearance to the
contrary, these two positions are almost certainly the same, their
identity turning on a "general rule" of dharmasastra in regard to
the allowable amount of interest that can be charged on a loan. This
rule may not only explain how these two positions are essentially
the same, it also almost certainly provides us with the Sanskrit
term that was translated by nyi ri. In dharmasastra this rule is
known as the rule of dvaigunya or "doubling." Arthasastra 3.11.6,
for example, clearly recognizes this principle when it says that
even in cases where a debt is long outstanding the debtor still only
pays double the principal (... mulya-dvigunam dadyat). Manu VIII.151
is even more explicit when it says that interest from loans of money
should, when taken at one time, not exceed double the amount of the
loan (kusida-vrddhir dvaigunyam natyeti sakrdahrta). This principle
- that "at one investment the interest and capital taken together
should not be more than twice the capital" - is widely attested,
even if, in time, a number of ways of, getting around it were
developed.(43) For our purposes, however, we need only note two
things. First, although our Vinaya text does not explicitly refer to
the rule of dvaigunya, the instructions put in the mouth of the
Buddha implicitly acknowledge it. Tb take a pledge of twice the
value of the loan is to take a pledge of the value of the loan plus
the value of the maximum interest allowed by dharmasastra rule. no
more, no less. Secondly, if one were to translate Tibetan nyi ri
into Sanskrit one could easily go with mulya-dviguna (Arthasastra)
or simply dvaigunya (Manu). In Gunaprabha, again, nyi ri translates
dviguna - almost exactly as we would expect.
After taking the pledge, our text refers to "writing out a contract
which has a seal and is witnessed." The Tibetan here is dpang po
dang bcas pa'i dam rgya'i glegs bu bris te and is not entirely clear
to me. I-ching may also have had some trouble with his text at this
point as well. In Gernet, at least, what appears to be the
corresponding clause is rendered simply as . . . qu'on ecrive un
contrat. De plus, on etablira des cautions (pao-tcheng). . . " We
might begin with what is clear.
Glegs bu, the term I translate by "contract," is once again not
listed in Chandra's dictionary, but a passage in the Civara-vastu
that we have already referred to provides use with an attested
Sanskrit equivalent. Our term, in fact, occurs four times in this
one passage. glegs bu la bris te = patrabhilekhyam krtva; glegs bu
la bris nas = patrabhilikhitam krtva, glegs bu la ma bris ba =
apatrabhilikhitam; and glegs bu la bris pa = patrabhilikhitam.(44)
Since 'bri ba, bris ba is the usual Tibetan word for "to write," or
likhati, glegs bu, strictly speaking, is here translating patra
(pattra), "document," and patrabhilikhita, as a noun, would mean
"written document." Context alone would determine that in these
Civara-vastu passages it means "will," whereas in our passage what
was very likely the same form almost certainly means "contract."
This time when we look to dharmasastra for clarification it
proves to be - at least on one level - less useful. This in large
part may only be a reflection of the fact that the use of writing
and the place of written documents in the dharmasastra has yet to be
as systematically studied as many other topics, and the vocabulary
of both is, as a consequence, not yet fully fixed.(45) What can be
surmised at the moment is this. the terms abhilikhita and abhilekhya
- both in the sense of "a document" - occur in dharmasastra, but
very rarely; patra in the senses of "written document," "letter,"
"paper," a leaf for writing on," etc., occurs more commonly; but
dharmasastra appears to overwhelmingly prefer likhita or lekhya when
referring to documents. It should be noted, however, that though it
might prefer a slightly different expression, dharmasastra - like
Buddhist vinaya - uses the same terms to refer to a wide range of
what we would consider different kinds of documents. likhita and
lekhya are used indiscriminately to designate mortgages, deeds,
contracts and bills-of-sale. Here too, the partial parallel in
Gunaprabha is much less useful.. the Sanskrit text - which appears
to be faulty at this point - has aropya patre, "having recorded in a
document," and this is translated into Tibetan by dpang rgyar bris
nas so, "having written in a sealed bond." It would appear that
Gunaprabha's text was not using the same vocabulary as our Vibhanga
passage. But lest it be lost sight of, the most general point that
needs to be noted here - though we will come back to it - is this.
although the reference to written contracts in our Vinaya text may -
as a piece of vinaya - appear unusual, even odd, when seen in light
of dharmasastra of a certain period it looks quite normal. Normal,
too, it seems, is at least one of the two further qualifications of
the "contract" found in our text.
The Tibetan expression I have rendered into English as "is
witnessed" is dpang po dang bcas pa and - although absent from
Chandra - there can, again, be little doubt about the Sanskrit
underlying it. dpang or dpang po is a common translation for saksin,
"witness," and dang bcas pa - like can - is a good translation for
the Sanskrit suffix -mat, "having," "possessing." Although
Gunaprabha is here again of little use, having - as we will see -
constructed his text differently, still saksimat, "having a
witness," "witnessed," or "attested," is itself widely attested in
dharmasastra in connection with documents. Yajnavalkya says that for
any contract entered into by mutual consent there should be "a
witnessed document" (lekhyam ... saksimat).(46) Narada I.115 says of
documents (lekhya) that they can be both "witnessed and unwitnessed"
(asaksimat saksimac ca), etc. But if we are on firm ground here we
are less so in regard to the second expression applied to
"contracts" ia our Vinaya text, and that is unfortunate.
"What I have translated as "has a seal" is dam rgya in Tibetan.
Jaschke says that dam rgya = dam ka. which he defines as "a seal,
stamp." The Bod rgya tshig mdzod chen mo (p. 1244) defines dam rgya
first as thel rtse, a variant of thel se, which also means "a seal,
stamp." It then says it is "old" for dpang rgya (which Thomas takes
to mean "witness signature"), "attestation seal," khrims rgya,
"legal seal," and dam tshig gi phyag rgya, "a seal of promise."
Thomas, finally, takes it as "a signed bond,"(47) and in Gunaprabha
dpang rgya can only be translating patra if - and this is far from
certain - it is translating a text similar to the Sanskrit that we
have. Obviously the precise meaning of the Tibetan expression in our
Vibhanga passage has yet to be determined, though its general sense
of "seal" is relatively certain. The problem for us, however, is
that whereas all meanings adduced for dam rgya would make it a noun,
in our Vinaya text it appears to be by position and function an
adjective - the construction remains, for me at least, obscure. It
may be, of course, that the Tibetan dpang po dang bcas pa'i dam
rgya'i glegs bu is translating some sort of possessive compound.
The significance of all this is that there is almost certainly
lurking behind the Tibetan some form of mudra or mudrita and that we
may have in our passage, therefore, a rare reference to the use of a
kind of object, which frequently is found at Buddhist monastic sites
in India. Monastic seals - more commonly sealings - have been
recovered from a wide variety of monastic sites, Vaisali, Kasia,
Kausambi, Nalanda, etc., sometimes in considerable numbers.(48)
Since they almost always bear the name of a monastery, they could
be, and have been, used to identify the site from which they come.
But there is a problem here recognized long ago by Vogel.
Cunningham early on had identified Kasia with. Kusinara, the site of
the Buddha's death. When Vogel actually excavated Kasia he recovered
a number of sealings, typical of which is one bearing the legend
Mahaparinirvane caturdiso bhiksu-sanghah, "The community of monks
from the four directions at (the site) of the Mahaparinirvana."
Vogel assessed this new evidence in the following way:
As long as the use of these documents [i.e., the sealings] has not
been ascertained it is impossible to decide whether their evidence
tends to prove or to disprove Cunningham's theory. If they belong to
the spot where they were found - and the variety of their dates and
uniformity of their legends seem to point to that conclusion - they
would vindicate Cunningham's identification. If, on the other hand,
they were attached to letters and parcels - and this seems to be the
most likely use they were put to - they would place beyond doubt
that the Convent of the Great Decease is to be sought elsewhere.(49)
Formulated in this way it is not difficult to see how our Vinaya
passage may bear on the issue. If - as seems likely - our passage is
referring to the use of such sealings on written contracts for loans
made from permanent endowments held by a monastic community, and if,
therefore, such sealings were used for this purpose and not for
"letters and parcels," then - since we know that such documents were
placed in the monasteries "depository" - our passage would support
the view that such sealings "belong to the spot where they were
found." Moreover, if our passage is referring to the use of sealings
of this sort - and again this seems likely - then those sealings in
turn could have considerable evidential value for the use of the
legal instruments described in our text. if they were used to seal,
loan contracts, then their presence at Buddhist sites will allow us
to date the use of such contracts in actual practice, at least at
certain sites, and they will provide at least some indication of the
frequency of their use, at least at certain times. They could, in
short, be extremely valuable.(50)
In regard to what was to fie included in such written
contracts of loan, Buddhist vinaya and Hindu dharmasastra, beginning
with Yajnavalkya, are again in close basic agreement, although
Yajnavalkya is already fuller than our Vinaya passage. Yajnavalkya
(II: 5.86-89) says:
For whatever business (artha) is freely and mutually agreed upon, a
witnessed document should be made (lekhyam va saksimat karyam). The
creditor (dhanika) should be put first. With the year, the month,
the fortnight, the day, place of residence, caste and gotra, With
the name of a fellow student, his own, and his father's it is marked
(cihnita). When the business (artha) is concluded the debtor (rnin)
should enter his name with his own hand (Adding) "what is written
above concerning this matter is approved by me, the son of
so-and-so." And the witnesses, in their own hand and with their
father's name first, Should write: "In this matter I, named
so-and-so, am a witness"...
Then a number of other details and conditions of validity follow,
but what is cited above is surely enough to establish the
fundamental similarity between the contract described in our Vinaya
passage and the contract described by Yajnavalkya. The differences,
in so far as they exist, reflect, in part, the concern of
Yajnavalkya with greater detail and technicality, and, in part, the
fact that our Vinaya passage is describing a contract of loan not
between individuals, but between an individual and an institution.
As a consequence, it is not the creditor's name, for example, that
should be registered, but the names, for two representatives of the
institution - the Elder of the Community and the Provost of the
monastery - that is making the loan.(51)
But one final textual problem remains. The final sentence of our
passage, in its Chinese version reads, as Gernet has translated it.
"Meme s'il s'agit dun upasaka croyant, d'un homme qui a recu les
cinq instructions, il faut egalement recevoir de lui des gages."
Gernet sees here "un sentiment tres net" on the part of the redactor
that business is business ("les affaires sont les affaires"), and
that even a devout lay-brother must give a pledge when borrowing
from the community.(52) The Tibetan text reads gang la sbyin par bya
ba dge bsnyen dad pa can bslab pa'i gzhi lnga bzung ba la yang gta'
nyi ri kho nas sbyin par bya'o, and - while it is not impossible to
interpret it in a similar way - there are several things that appear
to make such an interpretation difficult.
First, the verb used in the Tibetan to express the action undertaken
in regard to the lay-brother - sbyin ba - cannot mean "recevoir de."
It is, in fact, the same verb our passage uses more than a half a
dozen times to express the "giving" or "placing" of the loan, e.g.,
bcom ldan 'das kyis bka' stsal pa / de dag la sbyin par mi bya'o.
"The Blessed One said: (perpetuities) should not be placed among
them." That it could mean anything else in this one instance, after
being consistently used in all the previous instances, seems very
unlikely.
The careful characterization in our passage of the kind of
lay-brother involved must also be considered. That lay-brother is
not just any lay-brother, but is explicitly said to be "a devout
lay-brother who has undertaken the five rules of training" (dge
bsnyen dad pa can bslab pa'i gzhi lnga bzung ba), and elsewhere in
our Vinaya this kind of characterization marks a particularly
trustworthy individual. In a passage in the Vinaya-vibhanga which
comes only a few folios before our text, for example, it is said
that when viharas were built in "border regions" (mtha' 'khob) monks
frequently abandoned them in times of trouble. As a consequence they
were also frequently looted. In response to this situation the
Buddha is made to say.. "The treasure and gold belonging to the
Community or the stupa (dge 'dun bye [rd. gyi] 'am mchod rten gyi
dbyig dang gser) should be hidden. Only then should you leave." But
the monks did not know who should do the hiding. Then, the text
says:.
The Blessed One said. "It should be hidden by an attendant of the
vihara (kun dga' ra ba pa) or a lay-brother."
But then those that hide it stole it themselves.
Then the Blessed One said. "It should be hidden by a devout
lay-brother (dge bsnyen dad pa can)."(53)
From this and similar passages it would appear that "devout" - as
opposed to ordinary - lay-brothers were considered worthy of trust,
especially in regard to matters involving valuable property. The
chances seem very good that our text should be taken as supplying
another instance of the same sort of thing.
Finally, "pledges" - at least according to dharmasastra - were, or
came to be, fairly complex affairs. Two basic kinds were referred
to: gopya, or "pledges for custody," and bhogya "usufructuary
pledges." The first was to be kept, the second was to be used, that
is to say, to generate profit. Pledges could be anything from a
copper pan or cloth to female slaves, or fields, gardens, cows or
camels. There were other refinements and complexities as well.(54)
How much of this was known to the redactor of our Vinaya is, of
course, impossible to say. Our passage says nothing that would
indicate his awareness. It is, however, safe to assume that, even
before the stage of complexity had been reached that we see in some
dharmasastra, the taking of pledges would have created some awkward
problems for monastic communities. And it is, again, reasonable to
assume that such monastic communities would have solved such
problems by one of their favorite devices - recourse to lay
middle-men. This, I think, is what our text is saying.
Having come this far, all that remains is the hard part. We
must at least try to determine several interrelated things. We must
make some attempt to determine how important the perpetuities or
permanent endowments mentioned in our text were, and what - if any -
further history our text or similar vinaya rulings on written
contracts had. We must make some attempt to determine what the
religious mind institutional situations were that stimulated
Mulasarvastivadin vinaya masters to create or borrow these legal
instruments. And we must make some attempt to place our Vinaya text
in the still uncertain history of dharmasastra. In none of these
endeavors can we expect complete success.
It of course goes without saying that we have at our disposal almost
no means of determining what was and what was not particularly
important in the enormous Mulasarvastivada-vinaya. But there is at
least one rough indicator of what in this Vinaya was thought
important in the early medieval period. we are able to determine
what Gunaprabha, who has been dated to a period between the fifth
and seventh centuries, and who may have been from Mathura, chose to
include in his Vinaya-sutra. Gunaprabha's Vinaya-sutra appears to
have been the most authoritative epitome or summary of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya and Bu-ston, at least, cites it as a model
of the type of treatise that condenses "excessively large (portions
of) scripture."(55) Since, in fact, Gunaprabha has reduced or
condensed what takes up more than 4000 folios in the Derge edition
to no more than 100, it is obvious that he had to make some austere
choices. He would have been able, presumably, to include only what
would have been considered - or what he considered - essential to an
understanding of the whole. His choices, therefore, can be revealing
and at times - at least to some - may appear surprising. Professor
Schmithausen, for example, in his fascinating paper on the
"sentience of plants," has several times referred to a text in the
Vinaya-vibhanga of the Mulasarvastivadins which describes a monastic
ritual that must be performed before cutting down a tree.(56) The
ritual contains several significant elements which also form a part
of the funeral ritual for dead monks, but the text looks like a
minor appendix of no great importance. Gunaprabha, however, includes
an almost complete description of the ritual in his epitome.(57) It
is much the same for our rules.
Although our text, where it is now found, may also look like an
appendix, and although it appears to have no known parallels in
other vinayas, the continuing importance of at least the subject
that it treats for the Mulasarvastivadin order would appear to be
indicated by what we find in Gunaprabha's Sutra. But there is also
something of a surprise here. As our discussion of the vocabulary of
our Vibhanga passage undoubtedly indicated, Gunaprabha does, indeed
include lending on interest and written contracts in his Sutra. And
they are presented - as one would expect - in very much the same
terms as in our canonical text: Gunaprabha, like all good
epitomizers, appears to be neither creative nor original. The
surprise, however, is that although Gunaprabha presents in his Sutra
what can, in part, easily be taken as a condensation of our text, he
himself in his auto-commentary - the
Svavyakhyanabhidhana-vinaya-sutra-vrtti - actually cites another
source when he comments on that material, and he gives there a frame
story that would seem to indicate that our material was, indeed,
found, as well, in a second source.
There is much to be learned both about and from Gunaprabha's Sutra
and Vrtti, but to date it has received very little attention. In the
Vrtti, for example, Gunaprabha frequently cites or quotes his
authorities and therefore gives us some indication of where he got
his material. Most commonly, however, his references are given under
a general rubric like tatha ca granthah, "and thus is the text,"(58)
or ity atra granthah, "it is said in this case in the text" (Su.
177, 181, 183 etc.), or grantho 'tra, "the text here is" (Su.193).
In these general references "the text" appears to refer to the
canonical Vinaya. In fact sometimes he uses the phrase vinaye uktam,
"it is said in the Vinaya" (Su 82). Such references can sometimes be
particularly frustrating since, though commenting on his summary of
one section of the Vinaya, he sometimes quotes from a completely
different section. At one place in the Vrtti dealing with the
Pravrajya-vastu, for example, he quotes a passage under the rubric
ity atra granthah which does indeed come from the canonical Vinaya,
but not from the Pravrajya-vastu; it comes instead from the
Civara-vastu.(59) Sometimes, happily, he is more specific.
Occasionally, he says something like vibhangad etad
saya-nasana-siksapadat, "this is from the Vibhanga, from the rules
of training in regard to beds and seats" (Su. 389), or grantho 'tra
bhiksunivibhange "here is the text in the Bhiksunivibhanga" (Su.
591), or posadha-vastu atra granthah, "the text here is the
Posadha-vastu (Su. 646). Citations of this sort - because they can
considerably reduce the range - are, of course, more suited to our
needs. But even some of these more specific references can be
problematic. Several times, for example, Gunaprabha cites material
under a rubric referring to a or the "introduction": iti nidanam
(Su. 327), "the Nidana says," or atra granthah nidanat (Su. 384),
"here is the text from the Nidana," or nidane yad uktam (Su. 422),
"what was said in the Nidana." In cases such as these it is not
always clear whether the reference is to a part of a work or a work
entitled Nidana. The material Gunaprabha cites in commenting on
lending on interest and written contracts is, in fact, also cited
under such a rubric.
In his auto-commentary Gunaprabha introduces the passage of
most direct interest to us with the following phrase: 'dir gzhung ni
ma mo las 'di lta ste. The translation of this seems
straight-forward: "here the text is from the Matrka, namely...."
There is, as well, at least one similar reference in the first
chapter of the Vrtti, the only part of the Sanskrit text of the
Commentary which has been published so far: matrkayam atra granthah
(Su. 165), "the text here is found in the Matrka." Although the
Tibetan translation of this second reference differs slightly from
that of the first - 'dir ma mo'i gzhung las - there can be very
little doubt that both are referring to the same work. The problem,
of course, is that we do not - at least I do not - actually know
what work this is. The Tibetan tradition does not appear to preserve
a canonical vinaya text with this title; the Chinese canon has one
text - Taisho 1441 - whose reconstructed title is
Sarvastivadavinaya-matrka, but this reconstruction is marked as
doubtful by the Hobogirin catalog; equally doubtful apparently are
the titles of two other texts - Taisho 1452 and 1463 - which are
given as "[Mulasarvastivada]nidanamatrka?" and "Vinayamatrka?"(60)
Fortunately, this does not have to be sorted out here. For our
purposes we need only note that Gunaprabha cites technical material
bearing on lending on interest and written contracts which is, in
the main, quite close to that found in our text in the
Vinaya-vibhanga, but he cites at least a part of it from a
different, second source. Any doubt that he got this material from -
or at least knew as well - a source different from our
Vinaya-vibhanga passage is quickly dissipated by looking at what he
actually said.
The Sutra itself gives the first indication that Gunaprabha is not
necessarily dependent on our Vibhanga passage for his material. In
speaking about a certain kind of chattel (upakarana) Gunaprabha
says:
It should be lent on interest for the sake of the (three) Jewel(s).
When there is a monastery attendant or lay-brother he should be
used.
(It should be loaned) after taking a pledge of twice the value (of
the loan and) after recording in a document the witness, the year,
the month, the day, the Elder of the Community, the Provost of the
monastery, the borrower, the capital, and the chattel.
prayunjita ratnartham /
aramikopasakayoh sattve niyogeta /
bandhakam dvigunam adaya saksi-samvatsara-
masa-divasa-samghasthaviro(?)varika [rd:opadhi-
varika]-grhitr-dhana-labhan aropya patre /
kun dga' ra ba pa 'am dg[e] bsnyen dag yod na bsko bas dkon mchog gi
don du bskyed par bya'o /
gta' nyi rir blang par bya'o / dpang po dang / lo dang / zla ba dang
/ nyi ma dang / dge 'dun gyi gnas brtan dang / dge skos dang / len
pa po dang / rdzas dang bskyed rnams dpang rgyar bris nas so /(61)
It is, of course, immediately obvious that what Gunaprabha says
about taking, a "pledge" and the contents of the contract are very
close - though not fully identical - to what our Vibhanga passage
says. But what precedes this is not. The references to the monastery
attendant and lay-brother must, at least, come from what Gunaprabha
calls in his auto-commentary the Matrka. The auto-commentary says,
in fact:
Here the text is from the Matrka, namely: "When, after having had
both a stupa of the Blessed One and a domed chamber (gtsang khang
byur bu)(62) made, the merchants of Vaisali consigned chattels (yo
byad) to the monks for the maintenance (zhig ral du mi'gyur ba) of
stupas and domed chambers, the monks, being scrupulous, did not
accept them.
The monks reported the matter to the Blessed One.
The Blessed One said: I authorize that chattels for the maintenance
of a stupa should be accepted by a monastery's attendant (kun dga'
ra ba = aramika) or a lay-brother (upasaka). Having accepted them,
they should be used to generate interest (bskyed par bya ste). As
much profit as is produced in that case should be used for worship
of the stupa."
In regard to the words "a pledge of twice the value should be taken"
(gta' nyis rir blang bar bya'o), so that there should be no loss,
this - by its force - should be considered as "a means which avoids
a default" ('di spang ba mi skyed pa'i yan lag ces bya ba shugs kyis
rtogs par bya).
It might be asked how, after having accepted it, the chattel is to
be lent on interest (sbyar bar bya). For that reason it is said:
After having written with a witnessed seal the witness, the year,
the month, the day, the Elder of the Community, the Provost of the
monastery, the borrower, the property, and the interest (dpang po
dang lo dang zla ba dang nyi ma dang dge 'dun gyi gnas brtan dang
dge skos dang len pa po dang rdzas dang skyed rnams dpang rgyar bris
nas so), etc.(63)
The Tibetan text of Gunaprabha's commentary is here - as it
frequently is elsewhere - difficult, and I am not sure that I have
always correctly understood it. It is, moreover, not entirely clear
where the boundaries of his quotation or paraphrase of the Matrka
are. Given this, the following appear to be firm. Gunaprabha knew
where in the Vibhanga the topics of lending on interest and written
contracts occurred since in his Sutra he treats these topics under
the nineteenth nihsargika-patayantika offence, and this is precisely
where they are treated in our Vibhanga. But he also knew another
passage - this one in the Matrka - which dealt at least with lending
on interest. The Matrka passage dealt with chattels, not
perpetuities; it also had the Buddha authorize lending activities
undertaken by a monastery's attendant or a lay-brother - it did not
authorize monks to do so. For lending on interest Gunaprabha chose
to follow the Matrka text, and this is explicitly confirmed in his
auto-commentary. In regard to written contracts it would appear
either that he reverted to our Vibhanga text, or that the Matrka
text had itself almost the same material as our text in the
Vibhanga. There are, for example, some differences in what our
Vibhanga text indicates should be included in the contract, and what
is indicated in Gunaprabha. It is, however, difficult to know what -
or how much - to make of this. There are also a number of textual
problems in all the sources which have to be worked out.
But even if our discussion leaves a number of points and problems
hanging, it does allow some observations on the importance of
lending on interest and written contracts of debt in, at least,
Mulasarvastivadin vinaya literature. The canonical Vinaya of the
Mulasarvastivadins had at least two texts or sets of rules
concerning lending on interest, and both were associated with the
need to maintain durable architectural forms and finance ritual.
There were as well - probably - two sets of rules regarding written
contracts of debt. Both lending on interest and contracts of debt
continued, moreover, to be of interest to Mulasarvastivadin vinaya
masters, at least up until the 7th century - though he was working
with severe space limitations, Gunaprabha chose to include a fairly
detailed discussion of both in his Vinaya-sutra. It will have been
noticed that Gunaprabha does not specifically mention aksayas or
aksaya-nivis. We might surmise that lending on interest might have
at first been particularly associated with such endowments, but by
his time had come to be associated with all sorts of chattels or
property. This, in turn, might explain his preference for the
Matrka. We simply do not know. It is also notable that both
Gunaprabha's presentation and apparent preference for the Matrka
appear to shift the financial activities involved away from monks
and - if possible - into the hands of lay monastic functionaries.
The reasons for such a shift, or any historical situation it may
reflect, remain, however, undetermined.
Although questions of this sort must for now remain open,
Gunaprabha's Vinaya-sutra may still allow us in a general way, at
least, to extend the history of interest in - or at least knowledge
of - Mulasarvastivadin monastic rules governing lending on interest
and written contracts of debt. These rules, as indeed the Sanskrit
text of the Vinaya-sutra that has comedown to us, were, to judge by
the colophon of the text, known at the Vikramasila monastery in
Eastern India. Although the colophon as it is printed is difficult
to make sense of, one important statement seems clear. That colophon
says in part:
Sakyabhiksu-Dharmakirttina sattvarthe likhitam Srimad-vikramasilam
[sic] asritya phalgunamase(64)
Copied by the Sakyabhiksu Dharmakirti, for the benefit of living
beings, when residing at Vikramasila, in the month of Phalguna.
What information we have suggests that Vikramasila was founded
either in the eighth or ninth century, and probably destroyed in the
twelfth,(65) so our copy of the Vinaya-sutra can be assigned to
somewhere during this period.
We can, in sum, track our Mulasarvastivadin rules starting from the
Vinaya-vibhanga in - as we shall see - about the first century C.E.
They also occurred, with at least a different frame-story, in a text
called the Matrka. They were known and repeated by Gunaprabha who
lived, perhaps, at Mathura sometime between the fifth and seventh
century. And Gunaprabha's summary was itself known and copied
sometime after the ninth century at the Vikramasila monastery.
Though such a trail is not much, it is far more than we usually
have, and it testifies to the continuing currency of our rules
through both time and space.
The redactor of our Vinaya-vibhanga text appears to have thought, or
to have wanted others to think, that the Buddhist monastic community
began to accept endowments, to lend on interest, and to use written
contracts, not on its own initiative, but in response to the
concerns of lay donors about what would happen, after they were
dead, to the establishments they had founded and were themselves
able to maintain while they were alive. Confronted with the visible
deterioration of their viharas in their life time, lay donors are
made to say - in effect - if this happens while we are still alive,
it obviously will occur even more so when we are dead.' It is this
concern that - according to our text - gives immediate rise to the
resolve on the part of lay donors to provide the monastic community
with permanent or perpetual endowments, and to insure, in effect,
that their viharas remain inhabitable. For the redactor of our text
all else - lending on interest, written contracts of debt - follows
directly from this concern and forms an integral and necessary part
of the monastic communities response to it. Our text, however, is
not the only text in the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya where such concerns
are voiced. Nor are they only about maintenance - they are, as well,
inextricably about merit. A glance at two related texts from the
Sayanasana-vastu must here suffice: they are in fact sufficient to
establish something of the range of ideas connected with our
Vibhanga text.
The first passage we might look at forms a part of a larger
discussion about various rights and obligations in regard to
viharas. It starts rather abruptly with what appears to be a
reference to what the Buddha had already said on some other
occasion; and the passage is more narrative than formally
promulgatory:
It had been said by the Blessed One; "The reward should be assigned
in the name of the dead donors" (abhyatitakalagatanam danapatinam
namna daksina adestavya iti)
The Elder of the Community recites the verse for the sake of
deceased donors.
And a certain householder had come to a vihara. He heard the
assigning of the reward. He approached the Elder and said: "Noble
One, if I have a vihara built will you assign a reward in my name
also?"
The Elder said: "Have one built! I will duly make the assignment"
When that householder had had a vihara built he had not given
anything to it. It remained thus empty. When that householder saw
that, he went to the first vihara and said to the Elder: "Noble One,
my vihara remains empty. Not a single monk lives there."
The Elder of the Community said: "Sir, it should be made productive
(utsvedya, snum pas so)."
The householder said: "But Noble One, it has been built on sterile
saline soil (usare jamgale karitah). How is it to be made
productive?"
"Householder, I did not mean it in that sense (naham etat samdhaya
kathayami). But rather that there is no acquisition (labha) there."
The householder said: "Noble One, whoever now lives in my vihara, to
him I present cloth" (patennacchadayami).(66)
This is an interesting fragment for a number of reasons - it
uses, for example, a term to describe the "dead" donors,
abhyatitakalagata, which also occurs in inscriptions.(67) But for
our immediate purposes it is important above all for what it can
contribute to our understanding of how monks understood, or
expressed, the concerns of lay donors.
The text is - as is the Sanskrit Mulasarvastivada-vinaya as a whole
- clipped and elliptical. It is, as already noted, a narrative text,
not a promulgatory one. What it assumes is as revealing as what it
says. It starts by explicitly stating that the Buddha had ruled that
"the reward should be assigned in the name of the dead donors" of a
vihara. This clearly is obligatory for the monastic community. The
narrative then seems to suggest that the redactor of the text
assumed that this obligatory activity was a "public" ritual which
took place on a recurring basis - it is otherwise hard to account
for the narrative facts that it was "heard" by a householder on a
random visit. The redactor also indicates that this recurring public
ritual was performed by the Elder of the Community
(samgha-sthavira), and involved the recitation of verses.
We have, in fact, a fairly good idea of what - narratively -
"assigning the reward" was: it was a ritualized recitation of a
verse or verses which formally designated the beneficiaries of the
merit produced from a specific donation or gift. Such designation
could be made to both the dead - as in our passage from the
Sayanasana-vastu - or the living. In the Bhaiyajya-vastu, for
example, at the end of a meal given by brahmins and householders,
the Buddha himself "assigns the reward" to their deceased kin who
had become "hungry ghosts" (preta).
Then the Blessed One, with a voice having five qualities, commenced
to assign the reward to the name of those hungry ghosts (tesam namna
daksinam adestum pravrttah):
"The merit from this gift, may that go to the hungry ghosts! (ito
danad dhi yat punyam tat pretan upagacchatu)
May they quickly rise from the dreadful world of hungry ghosts!"(68)
In the Sanghabheda-vastu, on the other hand, we find at the end of
the account of the gift of the Nyagrodha Park:
... Suddhodana took up a golden water pot and presented the
Nyagrodha Park to the Blessed One, and the Blessed One, with a voice
having five qualities, assigned the reward (bhagavata...daksina
adista):
"The merit from this gift (ito danad dhi yat punyam), may that go to
the Sakyas! May they always attain the station (pada) desired or
wished!"(69)
Whereas, in the first case, the assignment is explicitly to deceased
kin, in the second it is to all members of the lineage, and this
could have included both living and dead. In any case, it is
virtually certain that a reader of the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya would
have seen in the Sayanasana-vastu a reference to a performance very
much of this sort.
It was a ritual performance for the sake of dead donors which the
Sayanasana passage narratively isolates as the motive behind its
householder's construction of a vihara - this is what he hopes to
gain: a, presumably, recurring or on-going assignment of merit in
his name after his death. But the point of the text is, of course,
that the construction of a vihara is not in itself sufficient to
achieve this. To achieve the intended goal requires in addition that
the vihara be in use and inhabited, and continue to be so. It
requires, in short, the presence of an Elder who will continue to
perform the assignment. This, in turn, requires further donation.
The requirements, however, do not foal only on the donor. While he
must further endow the monastery, the monks are obligated to perform
the assignment. The monks, as well, have a further obligation, which
is only implied here but explicitly stated in another passage in the
same vastu.
The second passage makes it clear that if donors have obligations,
so too do the monks:
The devout bad had many viharas built, but very few monks entered
into the retreat in Sravasti. Those viharas stood empty. For the
donors there was no merit resulting from use (danapatinam
paribhoganvayam punyam na bhavati,... longs spyod las byung ba'i
bsod nams med cing). And ne'er-do-wells began to inhabit them.
The Blessed One said: All viharas must be allotted, two, three or
four to each one individually, depending on how many there are. All
must be used (sarve paribhoktavyah).(70)
Here the rule is presented as firm: no presumably inhabitable vihara
is to be allowed to stand empty. All must be used. In fact, the text
here, in regard to viharas, refers to a specific category of merit:
"merit resulting from use." Since a vihara must be used to generate
such merit, it would seem to follow that continuous use would
generate continuous merit.
There are, in both these passages from the Sayanasana-vastu,
in the web of mutual obligations they seem to envision between
monastery and donor, some striking parallels with what is known
about the relationships between donor and monastery in medieval
Europe. But these cannot here be pursued.(71) What we can do here is
to note that the concern of the lay donors in our Vinaya-vibhanga
passage, the concern that gives rise to the use of endowments,
lending on interest and written contracts of debt, is - when seen in
the light of the Sayanasana passages - almost certainly not about
maintenance only. It is as much about merit. Our endowments, and the
legal instruments required to make them work, begin, in fact, to
appear as devices intended to insure not just the perpetual
inhabitability of the vihara, but an equally perpetual, a permanent
source of on-going merit for its donor that would continue long
after he or she were dead. Maintenance and merit are in fact closely
and causally linked. without maintenance there will not be
continuing use; without continuing use there will not be for the
donor the "merit resulting from use." Without provisions for the
maintenance of the vihara and its residents there will be no
officiating Elder; without an officiating Elder the assignment of
merit to the donor will not continue after his death. Both our
Vibhanga text and the first passage from the Sayanasana explicitly
identify the interests or anxieties of lay donors concerning what
will occur after they are dead as the religious problem that
endowments and "acquisitions" are meant to solve. Endowments were
obviously seen by the monks - perhaps also by lay donors - as a
permanent solution to the problem. They are, after all, called
"perpetuities," or "permanent endowments." They were intended to
insure not long term, but perpetual benefits to lay donors by
insuring a permanent source of merit.
* * *
There is, of course, at least some appreciable irony in the fact
that a monastic community whose official doctrine declared that all
things are impermanent was devising or adopting legal and economic
instruments explicitly intended to insure permanent benefits to lay
donors. But endowments and lending on interest were not - at least
as far as they are presented in the vinaya - intended only to meet
the religious needs of the more prominent supporters of the monastic
community. They were intended as well to meet certain institutional
needs, institutional needs which, indeed, might be approximately
dated.
It is, I think, fairly obvious that the problem for our Vibhanga
text, and for the Sayanasana passages, was not getting viharas built
or funding their initial construction. The existence of permanent,
durable viharas is, in fact, taken very much for granted. Our texts
too take it for granted that these durable viharas were already both
architecturally and institutionally well organized. They assume that
such viharas were already considerably beyond mere shelters and were
already, for example, multi-storied, were already provided with
separate "depositories" (kosthika). They take for granted that
Buddhist monasteries were, significantly, already sufficiently well
organized to administer the kinds of endowments they are
recommending. They already know a community with a recognized
administrative and ritual division of labor. They know both the
office of Elder and of Provost. They presuppose an established
ritual of "assigning the reward" to dead donors performed by the
Elder. They presuppose that both, Elder and Provost were already
legally recognized representatives who could enter into binding
contracts on behalf of the community. In short, our texts - like all
of the vinayas as we know them - presuppose a stage of development
of the vihara as both an architectural form and an institution that
should be at least partially visible in the archaeological record.
But here we butt directly up against an increasingly awkward
problem: the stage of architectural and institutional development of
the Buddhist monastery reflected in the vinayas as we have them can
be detected in the archaeological record only at a period which is
far later than that to which the composition of the vinayas is
assigned by most scholars. This is a large problem and - as already
noted - an awkward one: it seems to present us with enormous
collections of rules that were composed to govern conditions that
did not exist. Here of course we can only offer a sketch of the
conflicting data.
Etienne Lamotte - without necessarily wanting to follow out the
implications of what he said - noted some years ago that
[i]f remarkable similarities can be discerned in the outlines of the
latter [i.e., the various vinayas] - and we are thinking
particularly of the Pali, Mahisa[sa]ka and Dharmagupta Vinayas -
this fact can be explained by a parallel development. The Buddhist
communities did not live in complete isolation but were interested
in the work carried out by their neighbors. It is therefore not
surprising that they worked with the same methods and followed
practically the same plan. If nothing is more like one Buddhist
vihara than another Buddhist vihara, it is normal that the various
known vinayas should reveal the close link which connected them.(72)
Lamotte's last sentence would seem to suggest that the various
vinayas are alike because they they all reflect the existence of a
uniform, standardized and well-organized vihara. In fact, all our
vinayas as we have them appear to presuppose such a uniform and
developed monastery: they speak, for example, about doors and
keys(73) and elaborate divisions of labor,(74) about bathrooms(75)
and slaves or permanent labor forces,(76) about the acquisition of
land, ownership rights, share-cropping,(77) social obligations(78)
and the problems of inheritance.(79) These are the concerns of a
landed institution with durable goods and well-organized durable
domiciles - the kind of institution for which maintenance could have
been an important concern, and which could have administered
permanent monetary endowments. But there is virtually no evidence in
the archaeological record for this kind of monastic institution
until very late, and it is beginning to appear that both the degree
and the rate of growth of Indian Buddhist monasticism has been
grossly exaggerated. The history of the physical monastery, at
least, points very much in this direction.
We know, for example, in at least some important areas, when
the standard vihara started to emerge - and it is not much before
the beginning of the Common Era. Sir John Marshall, among others,
has noted "the fact that even on such important sites as Sarnath,
Bodhgaya, Rajagrha, and Kasia, which were some of the earliest to be
occupied by the Buddhists, no remains of any of these structures
[i.e., those mentioned in the vinaya] have been found which can be
referred to pre-Mauryan times."(80) He was, however, so sure that
such structures simply must have existed that he then goes to some
trouble to account for their absence, and his account will have a
familiar ring to those who while away their time reading Indian art
history: it is the old perishable materials argument. This argument
says that no trace of such structures survive because they were made
of perishable materials and, while essentially the same argument has
been used in regard to Buddhist cult images, in neither case does it
appear to be overwhelmingly convincing. When, in fact, the
perishable material hypothesis is applied to Buddhist cult images
the evidence frequently appears to interfere with the argument,(81)
and much the same thing appears to happen when it is applied to
monastic architecture.
It should be noted without fudging that the evidence for early
viharas is limited, but this itself may be significant. This
observation holds especially for structural sites, very few of which
have been fully excavated. But one of the best preserved examples of
an early vihara occurs at Taxila. It is a "range" of irregularly
sized rooms strung out in a line west of the main stupa. This type
of vihara is, according to Marshall, characterized by its "haphazard
methods of planning and its lack of security and privacy for its
inmates."(82) It is, significantly, unwalled and unprotected. This
sorry little structure was very near the prosperous and already
architecturally sophisticated settlement of Sirkap, and is not later
than the first century C.E. Equally unimpressive, though better
preserved, are die early excavations in western India. Bhaja,
"probably one of the oldest Buddhist religious centers in the
Deccan," although it continued to be added to until the first
century C.E., is, for example, characterized by an almost complete
lack of order or standardization, which suggests its makers had
little experience in planning a community whether in wood or stone -
no two caves or viharas are organized the same way.(83) Likewise,
the monastic complex at Junnar-Tuljalena in its early phases shows
the same lack of order. Until about the beginning of the Common Era
it is little more than a string of irregularly shaped and placed
single cells, not really very far removed from natural caves.(84) It
could, of course, be argued that some of what we see at Junnar and
Bhaja can be explained by lack of experience with working in live
rock, but this can hardly account for the lack of planning, nor can
accumulated experience in cutting rock alone account for the fact
that organized, planned viharas approaching the standardized vihara
begin to appear at both sites at almost exactly the same time that
the same organized plan begins to appear at a large number of other
sites. Planned and ordered space implies a planned, ordered and
settled community-the kind of community that could have composed our
vinayas in the full and final forms in which we have them and could
have used and administered "permanent endowments."
But what needs to be noted above all else is this: the earliest
extant remains of monastic residential architecture, like the
earliest cult images in stone, show again a tradition still
struggling, in this case toward order, still lacking a sense of
functional organization and structured use of space. Such a
tradition - again like that which produced the early extant cult
images - does not suggest a long period of development or directed
experimentation in wood or other perishable materials preceding it.
Moreover, even if, against the evidence, we grant earlier viharas in
perishable materials, the implications of this may have been
overlooked: such viharas by definition could not have been durable
or in any significant sense permanent. They would suggest a poor and
probably little organized - both socially and economically -
community, a community that had little access to, or ability to
exploit, any economic surplus, This seems especially so in light of
the fact that we have traces of substantial works in such perishable
materials, which have some chance of being Mauryan - the cyclopean
city-wall of Rajagrha and the curious elliptical structures there;
the "stupendous timber palisade" at Pataliputra and the massive teak
wood platforms there; or the hypostyle hall found at Kumhrar - but
none of these are Buddhist, all appear to have been produced by
ruling powers.(85) In order words, enduring monumental architecture
in perishable materials was available, but apparently out of reach
of Buddhist monastic communities.(86)
Though, again, the evidence is far from full there is other data
pointing to the lack of early permanent Buddhist dwellings. The
evidence, for example, in the main body of Asoka's inscriptions for
viharas is very thin. In the controversial eighth Rock Edict Asoka
uses the term vihara, in fact, in a decidedly curious way - if the
term had then any Buddhist sense. He there con@ trasts his "tours
for dharma," dhamma-yatta, with the activity of earlier kings which
he calls "tours for pleasure," vihara-yatta, where vihara is used in
the sense of "diversion, enjoyment," etc.(87) In his so-called
"Schism Edict," he does not again refer to viharas when he talks
about the expulsion of troublesome monks, but to anavasa and by
implication to avasa. Although much discussed, the facts remain that
avasa literally means only an inhabited, or inhabitable' place, that
Asoka himself does not use the term vihara, and that avasa does not
certainly refer to an architectural form.(88) Equally curious and
still difficult to understand are Asoka's directions as to what
should be done with this edict. Asoka says, in Hultzsch's
translation:
Thus this edict must be submitted [vimnapayitaviye - Bloch,
probably more correctly: "Il faut faire connaitre ... a] both to the
Samgha of monks and to the Samgha of nuns.
Thus speaks Devanampriya:
Let one copy of the (edict) remain with you [i.e., the
administrative officials - mahamata-?] deposited in (your) office
[samsalana]; and deposit ye another copy of the very (edict) with
the lay worshippers.(89)
Here again, where one might expect a reference to monasteries, there
is none. There is no indication that a "copy" of this edict was
deposited in the office,, of the group it most concerned - no
indication that there was such an "office" where they were located.
Likewise, in even more difficult Rummindei Pillar inscription, Asoka
seems to imply - especially as Hultzsch understands the text - that
he was the first to mark the spot Buddha's birth: "(He) ... caused a
stone pillar to be set up, (in order to show) that the Blessed One
was born here." But contrary to what we might have expected, if
there had been a permanent community at the site, he then extends
his largesse not to a monastery there, but to the village of Lummini
itself: "(He) made the village of Lummini free of taxes, and paying
(only) an eighth share (of the produce)."(90)
The only possible reference in the Asokan material to a vihara is
problematic. It may occur in the "cover letter" attached to the
recently discovered version of Minor Rock Edict I found at
Panguraria in Madhya Pradesh. Sircar translates the lines in
question: "The king named Priyadarsin [speaks] to Kumara Samva from
[his] march [of pilgrimage] to the U(O?)punitha-vihara in
Manema-desa (... manema-des[e] [u]punitha-vihara-[ya]tay[e]). [91]
As the bristle of brackets shows readings are uncertain; the
published facsimiles are extremely difficult to read; this statement
has no parallels in the fifteen or so other versions of this edict -
it is, in short, profoundly problematic. But whether or not the term
vihara occurs in the inscription, or whether the possible vihara
mentioned can be identified with the site at which the record was
recovered, that site itself is interest. It represents, at least a
part of it, the remains another Mauryan monastic site, and although
it has far only been partially published it appears, again, to have
been a poor and unimpressive complex; many of the small stupas,
revetments, enclosing walls, and small monastic cells appear to have
been crudely made of "rubble." These contrast with the main stupa
and its chatra, which, however, are clearly later - the nun donors
of the latter may in fact be linked with Sanci. What has been taken
to be the main monastic complex - on the walls of which the Asokan
record occurs - as well as most of the residential cells, are little
more than natural caves or rock shelters with slight improvements.
To judge by the primitive rock art in some of them, these were
probably old, abandoned cave-dwellings.(92) This - rather than a
romantic vision of Nalanda - appears to be what a Buddhist
"monastery" looked like as late as' the time of Asoka.
Even considerably after Asoka, however, there are no references to
viharas. In none of the hundreds of donative records from Bharhut,
Sanci and Pauni does the term occur. The scores of monk and nun
donors at these sites never identify themselves as from or residents
of any vihara, but rather - exactly like lay donors - by their natal
or residential villages.(93) Even more curious is the fact that the
only expression even vaguely like vihara that occurs at early Sanci
is not even a Buddhist word, but rather a common upanisadic term.
On several of the gateways of the rail surrounding the main stupa at
Sanci, variant versions of the following imprecation occurs:
He shall have the fate of the perpetrators of five sins
(pamc-anamtarya), who dismantles, or causes to be dismantled, the
stone work from this Kakanava [i.e., the old name for Sanci], or
causes it to be transferred to another church... (94)
The phrase here translated by Majumdar "to another church" is anam
... acariya-kulam. The use of "another" clearly implies that
Kakanava or Sanci - the whole complex - was thought of as belonging
to the same category. It was not called a monastery or vihara, then,
but a "church" or, more accurately, "a house of the teacher." But
although it occurs at least 500 years later in a sectional colophon
to the Mahavamsa, the term acarya-kula has a much closer and more
significant context. It is in fact an established usage in the
Upanisads. Chandogya 2.23.1 says, for example:
There are three branches of duty. Sacrifice, study of the Vedas,
alms-giving - that is the first. Austerity, indeed, is the second. A
student of sacred knowledge dwelling in the house of a teacher,
settling himself permanently in the house of a teacher, is the third
(brahmacaryacarya-kula-vasi trtiyo 'tyantam atmanam acaryakule
'vasadayan).(95)
All of this would seem to suggest the need for a considerable review
of our notions of the degree of development of pre-Kusan Buddhist
monasticism. But that, I submit, is exactly what we might have
expected to emerge when Buddhist institutional history was treated
with the same methods and criteria of evidence that pertain to every
other kind of history, and when all types of sources were taken into
account, without privileging the literary or canonical. Happily,
however, such a review is not here our responsibility. Here we had
only to make a case - however sketchy - for the unlikelihood that
monastic communities like those at early Taxila or Bhaja or Junnar
or Panguraria could have compiled the monastic codes that we have,
or could have even conceived of permanent endowments for purposes of
maintenance, let alone written contracts of debt. It seems to me, in
fact, very unlikely that monastic communities housed in poorly made
and disorganized, impermanent structures, or in open, crudely cut
caves or abandoned rock-shelters, could have had either the need or
the means to redact elaborate codes containing rules against, for
example, monks "building a fire to smoke out those who take too long
in the latrine,"(96) or stipulating, for another example, that "when
seeds belonging to an individual are sown on ground belonging to an
Order, having given back a portion, (the rest) may be made use of"
by the monks.(97)
But if, then, the early Buddhist monastic communities which
are visible in the archeological record appear to have been utterly
incapable of compiling our vinayas, and completely unsuited to
administering elaborate endowments, the question still remains as to
when they did achieve a level of material and institutional
development which would have allowed both - when, in fact, did it
become true that "nothing is more like one Buddhist vihara than
another Buddhist vihara." A reasonably clear and closely approximate
answer to this question has, oddly enough, been available for some
time.
Marshall, again, noted some time ago that the vihara Lamotte seems
to have had in mind, the ordered "quadrangular, high-walled
monastery or vihara ... seems to have made its first appearance in
the sangharamas of the northwest during the first century A.D., and
thence to have found its way southward and eastward to the rest of
India." He also said: "... before the close of the first century the
old type of sangharama, with its hap-hazard methods of planning and
its lack of security and privacy for its inmates had disappeared ...
the living quarters of the monks ... are now securely enclosed in a
walled-in quadrangle...."(98) The standardized, ordered vihara,
then, began to appear almost everywhere in the archaeological record
just before and just after the beginning of the Common Era. It was
then, too, that Buddhist monastic communities appear to have had
access to the economic resources that would have allowed them for
the first time to build on a wide scale in durable materials like
stone and baked-brick.
Marshall explained the observable change in type and construction of
the vihara by saying, in part, that the wide acceptance of the
standard form "was probably due in large measure to the changing
character of the [Buddhist] church, which was everywhere tending to
substitute regular, settled monasticism for the wandering life, and
to relax its rules pertaining to strict asceticism and the
possession of property."(99) The precise wording here might need
some readjustment, but not, probably, the basic point. What,
however, Marshall did not say needs to be stated: the development of
the standard vihara, the emergence of this form is clearly visible
in the archeological record beginning around the Common Era, but
that form - and all that it implies - is the type of vihara which
our vinayas, as we have them, are intended to govern. Unless one
wants to assume that rules are written to govern behavior that does
not occur, or that elaborate procedures are developed to meet needs
that do not exist, then one is forced to conclude that our vinayas
could not have been compiled in the form that we know them until
after the beginning of the Common Era. It is, for example, hardly
likely that a monastic code like the Pali Vinaya, which contains
rules in regard to planting seeds in land owned by the Community,
could have been compiled before the Community owned land, and the
first actual evidence for this too comes from the first century
C.E.(100) It is, again, hardly likely that the rules in the Pali
Vinaya which have the Buddha say, "Monks, I allow them [i.e.,
viharas] to be enclosed in three kinds of walls (pakara): walls of
burnt brick (itthaka-pakara), walls of stone (sila-), walls of wood
(dahu-),"(101) could have been redacted before such walls were
known, and they were not, until the beginning of the Common Era.
Considerations of this sort, and determining the period at which
durable ordered viharas were first built, allows us more
specifically to determine the period before which it is very
unlikely that our Vibhanga text on perpetuities could have been
written. Though ironic, it is almost certainly true that only the
emergence of durable architecture could have created the idea and
need of perpetual maintenance. Buildings in flimsy or perishable
materials would have had a life-expectancy considerably short of
perpetual, and could hardly have given rise to the notion or felt
need for perpetual endowments to maintain them. Such endowments
pre-suppose a justifiable expectation that what they were intended
to support would endure. Moreover, as has already been noted, such
endowments also presuppose an equally permanent and ordered
institutional structure that could administer them. Our text, then,
was almost certainly not written until both things were in place,
and the archeological record would seem to suggest that this could
not have been the case much before the beginning of the Common Era.
But if it is unlikely that our Vibhanga text could have been written
much before the Common Era, it is also unlikely that it was written
much after the second century, when we know that such perpetual
endowments were already in use. Their effective use would seem to
require rules governing both them and written or legal contracts of
the sort found so far in the Vinaya only in our text.
A date in the first or second century of the Common Era for
our Vibhanga text would seem to fit well with, and in fact confirm -
or be confirmed by - what has been said about written contracts in
Hindu dharmasastra. Manu, for example, is generally assigned a date
"between 200 B.C. and A.D. 100,"(102) and while it knows of written
contracts and deeds (VIII.168; 255), they receive little attention.
Yajnavalkya, on the other hand, which is assigned to the first or
second century, "gives preference to documentary evidence" and - as
we have seen - "gives very detailed rules about the drawing up of
legal documents."(103) Though it would be easy here to over-extended
what little evidence there is, it does seem that Yajnavalkya has a
more developed - certainly a more detailed - treatment of written
contracts,(104) and it is at least possible to suggest that our
Vibhanga text falls somewhere between Manu and Yajnavalkya, but how
close to the latter is not clear. Yajnavalkya may, in fact, also be
the first dharmasastra to explicitly refer to Buddhist monks.(105)
One sometimes has the impression in reading works on dharmasastra
that it is assumed that developments occurred within a closed system
of ideas, or between texts, without reference to what occurred or
was occurring in the world. The change from Manu to Yajnavalkya in
regard to written contracts, for example, is often presented as if
it were only a further refinement or sophistication in legal
technique or theory which had no connection with changes in the
social or economic world that that technique or theory was intended
to govern. But it is possible, if not altogether more reasonable, to
assume that changes in a legal system are responding to changes in
the social or economic systems to which they are connected. Seen
from this angle - the angle I have here taken in regard to the
vinaya - what may well lie between Manu and Yajnavalkya is not
merely our Vibhanga text, but, more importantly, the emergence, in
India of a new type of social institution with considerable economic
clout: the fully institutionalized, permanently housed, landed
monastery. It is perhaps too easy to forget how remarkable and - in
significant ways - unprecedented such an institution was in the
social history of early India. Its cumulative impact must have been
felt in many areas, and it is not unlikely that fully
institutionalized Buddhist monasticism in India - like its
counterpart in early medieval Europe - produced or stimulated the
development of a whole range of bureaucratic and legal devices.(106)
A good case could be made, for example, for suggesting that the
concept of tile juristic personality arose first in India in regard
to the Buddhist sangha and stupa, not in regard to the Hindu
"Idol."(107) It is also likely that such an institution would have
provided a strong impulse towards the depersonalization and
formalizing of the economy in the areas in which it operated, and
would have required first such things as written contracts.
But having said this much, it must be said as well that the
chronological boundaries suggested above are, of course, not firm
enough on either side to rule out the distinct possibilities that
our Vibhanga text and Yajnavalkya are, rather, close contemporaries,
or even that the Vibhanga text is later than, and dependent on
Yajnavalkya in its rules for written contracts. Against this
possibility is only the noticeable - though not great - differences
in the degree of their detail. But if the Vibhanga text is later, it
probably cannot be much later, since - as already noted - Buddhist
monastic communities were already dealing with perpetual endowments
in the first or second century. Moreover, the Vinaya text explicitly
and directly links the use of written contracts with such
endowments, and these, at least, could not have been derived from
Yajnavalkya since he knows nothing of them. These and other
possibilities must remain unsure.(108) What is less unsure, however,
is that what Yajnavalkya says, for example, in regard to written
contracts, or, indeed, what dharmasastra says in regard to a whole
host of topics, may now have to be seen in light of similar
discussions in Buddhist vinaya, and certainly Buddhist vinaya -
specially, it seems, the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya - can no longer be
studied in isolation from dharmasastra. Finally, it is becoming ever
clearer that the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya may have particularly close
ties to brahmanical concerns, and this, in turn, may again suggest
that it was redacted by a community deeply embedded in the larger
Indian, brahmanical world. It may in fact turn out to be the
mainstream Indian vinaya. Time will tell.
(1) For two important positions on monks and monasticism in
Western scholarship see L. W. Barnard, "Two Eighteenth Century Views
of Monasticism: Joseph Bingham and Edward Gibbon," in Monastic
Studies: The Continuity of Tradition, ed. J. Loades (Bangor, 1990),
283-91. Gibbon's overwhelmingly negative view has been, of course,
by far the most influential. However, as a first rate example of
what more recent scholarship has been able to do on the question of
monks and money, see L. K. Little, Religious Poverty and the Profit
Economy in Medieval Europe (Ithaca, 1987). There has been, as well,
a promising start made towards determining indigenous South Asian
attitudes towards monastic wealth (see S. Kemper, "Wealth and
Reformation in Sinhalese Buddhist Monasticism" in Ethics, Wealth,
and Salvation: A Study in Buddhist Social Ethics, ed. R. F. Sizemore
and D. K. Swearer [Columbia, S.C., 1990], 152-69), and towards
acknowledging the significance of economic concerns in religious
developments in South Asia. See H. Stietencron, "Orthodox Attitudes
towards Temple Service and Image Worship in Ancient India," Central
Asiatic Journal 21 (1971): 126-38, and G. W. Spencer, "Temple
Money-lending and Livestock Redistribution in Early Tanjore," The
indian Economic and Social History Review 5.3 (1968): 277-93, for
two interesting examples. (2) P. Levi, The Frontiers of Paradise: A
Study of Monks and Monasteries (London, 1987), 29ff.; for a more
scholarly study of the theme see M. Aston, "English Ruins and
English History: The Dissolution and the Sense of the Past," Journal
of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 36 (1973): 231-55. (3) Dutt,
Gilgit Manuscripts, iii.2:119.13. (4) J. Gernet, Les Aspects
economiques du bouddhisme dans la societe chinoise du [v.sup.e] au
[x.sup.e] siecle (Paris, 1956), 82. (5) Gernet, Les Aspects
economiques du bouddhisme, 83, 84. (6) L.-S. Yang, "Buddhist
Monasteries and Four Money-Raising Institutions in Chinese History,"
Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 13 (1950): 174-91; esp. p.
182.The text in question is Taisho 1452, the reconstructed title of
which is given in P. Demieville, H. Durt and A. Seidel, Repertoire
du canon bouddhique sino-japonais, 2nd ed. (Paris-Tokyo, 1978), as
"[Mulasarvastivada]nidanamatrka?"; see below pp. 542-43 and n. 60.
Yang's paper is reprinted in L.-S. Yang, Studies in Chinese
Institutional History (Cambridge, 1961), 198-215. (7) D. D. Kosambi,
"Dhenukakata," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bombay 30.2 (1955):
50-71; esp pp. 52-53. (8) A. Bareau, "Indian and Ancient Chinese
Buddhism: Institutions Analogous to the Jisa," Comparative Studies
in Society and History 3 (1961): 443-51. (9) For some idea of
sinological work on the economic and institutional aspects of
Buddhism, see the equally rich book of Stanley Weinstein, Buddhism
Under the T'ang (Cambridge, 1987), and the sources cited there. (10)
Kosambi, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bombay 30.2 (1955): 53.
(11) Gernet, Les Aspects economiques du bouddhisme, 156. (12) Most
of the Sanskrit equivalents inserted into the translation will be
discussed below. (13) yangs pa can gyi li tstsha bi rnams kyi khang
pa ji lta ba de bzhin du gtsug lag khang dag kyang drug rtseg dang
bdun rtseg tu byed pas de dag mtho ches pas brtsigs shing brtsigs
shing rdib nas.... I am not quite sure how to take the reduplicative
construction brtsigs shing brtsigs shing. I cite the Tibetan here
and in ns. 14 and 15, where I am not sure of my translation. (14)
'phags pa dag de lta na mi zad par mi gyur gyi 'di ltar zad par gyur
te ci bdag cag gi sdum pa na gnas ma mchis snyam 'am. (15) de dag
gis phyug po dag la byin nas / de dag la das pa na mthu dang ldan pa
la rten cing mi ster ba dang / bla'i grva'i mthus mi ster nas ...
(16) Gnoli, Sayanasana- and Adhikarana-vastus, 11.2-.5 = Tog, dul
ba, Ga 260a.3. (17) Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts, iii.4:77.1. (18)
Gnoli, Sayanasana- and Adhikarana-vastus, 11.2. (19) Dutt, Gilgit
Manuscripts, iii.2:143.6. (20) Tog, 'dul ba, Ga 149a.5. (21) R. Vira
and L. Chandra, Gilgit Buddhist Manuscripts (Facsimile Edition),
part 6 (New Delhi, 1974), fol. 861.5. (22) S. Sankaranarayanan, "A
Brahmi Inscription from Alluru," Sri Venkateswara University
Oriental Journal 20.1-2 (1977): 75-89; cf D. C. Sircar, Successors
of the Satavahanas nas in Lower Deccan (Calcutta, 1939), 228-30.
(23) J. Burgess, Report on the Elura Cave Temples and the
Brahmanical and Jaina Caves in Western India (London, 1883), 74-89,
nos. 5, 15, 16, 17, 18, 21, 22, 26, 28. (24) S. Konow, "Mathura
Brahmi Inscription of the Year 28," Epigraphia Indica 21 (1931-32):
55-61. (25) There are considerably more inscriptional references to
aksaya-nivis than are cited or signalled in J. D. M. Derrett, "The
Development of the Concept of Property in India C. A .D. 800-1800,"
Zeitschrift fur vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft 64 (1962): 46 n.
117, 68-72 [= Derrett, Essays in Classical and Modern Hindu Law
(Leiden, 1977), 2: 39 n.117, 61-65] or Derrett, "Nivi,"
Vishveshvaranand Indological Journal 12.1-2 (1974)L 89-95. In the
first of these papers especially, Derrett might leave the impression
that inscriptional references to aksaya-nivis are largely Gupta and
later, but this, of course, is definitely not the case. To the
secondary sources he gives, at least the following should be added:
R. G. Basak, "The Words nivi and vinita used in Indian Epigraphs,"
The Indian Antiquary 48 (1919): 13-15; M. Njammasch,
"Akhaya-nivi-Schenkungen an Kloser und Tempel im Dekhan unter de
Satavahanas," Acta Orientalia (Hungaricae) 24.2 (1971): 203-15. (26)
The translation that follows is made from the edition of the
inscription in J. F. Fleet, Inscriptions of the Early Gupta Kings
and Their Successors, Corpus Inscriptionium Indicarum, vol. III
(Calcutta, 1888), 260-62, no. 62. (27) The term ratna-grha - the
referent of which is not entirely clear - also occurs in another
fifth-century inscription from Sanci (Fleet, Insriptions of the
Early Gupta Kings, 29-34, no. 5), and, in what may be a considerably
earlier inscription from Mathura, see H. Luders, Bharhut
Inscriptions, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum, vol. II, part II, rev.
E. Waldschmidt and M.A. Mehendale (Ootacamund, 1963), 12-14. (28) It
is likely that the reference here is to a spot or seat that local
tradition said had been used by a series of former Buddhas and by
Sakyamuni as well. References to such spots are very frequent in the
Chinese pilgrims' accounts of early medieval India, but very rare in
inscriptions. Presumably there was on a spot of this sort at Sanci
what we call an "image," but the inscription itself calls "The
Buddha." On the concept lying behind such language see G. Schopen,
"The Buddha as an Owner of Property and Permanent Resident in
Medieval Indian Monasteries," Journal of Indian Philosophy 18
(1990): 181-217. (29) Derrett, Vishveshvaranand Indological Journal
12.1-2 (1974): 89-90. (30) Derrett, Vishveshvaranand Indological
Journal 12.1-2 (1974): 89-90, 95. (31) Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts,
iii.2:125.3. (32) J. Gonda, "Abbreviated and Inverted Nominal
Compounds in Sanskrit," in Pratidanam: Indian, Iranian and
Indo-European Studies Presented to Franciscus Bernardus Jacobus
Kuiper on His Sixtieth Birthday, ed. J. C. Heesterman et al. (The
Hague, 1968), 3221-46. (33) Gonda, in Pratidanam, 223-24. (34)
Although it seems to have no connection with endowments, it is worth
noting that the term aksayya does occur in dharmasastra in
connection with interest, as at Narada I.94, but as Lariviere notes,
even this is not common (R. W. Lariviere, The Naradasmrti
[Philadelphia, 1989], 2:60). (35) Chandra, Tibetan-Sanskrit
Dictionary, 1752. (36) Gunaprabha and his Vinaya-sutra will be
treated below in some detail. (37) Gernet, Les Aspects economiques
du bouddhisme, 156, n. 2. (38) See, however, R. S. Sharma, "Usury in
Early Mediaeval India (A.D. 400-1200)," Comparative Studies in
Society and History 8 (1965-66): 56ff.; esp. p. 58, for example, who
understands the passage differently: "...
the brahmana or the ksatriya should not takeinterest even in
times of distress, but should pay interest to people of mean
avocations (papiyase) out of legal necessity." (39) Arthasastra
2.6.13, 15. (40) F. W. Thomas, Tibetan Literary Texts and Documents
Concerning Chinese Turkestan, part 3 (London, 1955), 136, 134, and
the references cited there. (41) H. Chatterjee, The Law of Debt in
Ancient India (Calcutta, 1971), 211ff.; see also L. Sternbach,
Juridical Studies in Ancient Indian Law (Delhi, 1965) 1:109ff. (42)
Chatterjee, The Law of Debt, 226. (43) Chatterjee, The Law of Debt,
48ff. (44) Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts, iii.2:140.16, 20; 141.1 = Tog,
'dul ba, Ga 147b.6, 7; 148a.1, 2. (45) Much of the material for such
a study has, however, already been gathered and is conveniently
available in Joshi, Dharmakosa, i.1:348-80. The following
observations are based on it. (46) For a fuller citation of the
passage see below, p. 540. (47) Thomas, Tibetan Literary Texts and
Documents, 3:143. (48) For a sampling of such seals and sealings see
B. Ch. Chhabra, "Intwa Clay Sealing," Epigraphia India 28 (1949-50):
174-75; V. A. Smith, "Vaisali: Seals of the Gupta Period," Journal
of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1905):
152; J. Ph. Vogel, "Seals of the Buddhist Monasteries in Ancient
India," Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society,
n.s., 1 (1950): 27-32; G. R. Sharma, "Excavations at Kausambi,
1949-1955," Annual Bibliography of Indian Archaeology 16 (Leyden,
1958): xliv-xlv; D. Schlingloff, "Stamp Seal of a Buddhist
Monastery," The Journal of the Numismatic Society of India 31
(1969): 69-70; H. Sastri, Nalanda and Its Epigraphical Material
(Delhi, 1942), 36ff.; D.C. Sircar, "Inscribed Clay Seal from
Raktamrittika," Epigraphia Indica 37 (1967): 25-28; etc. (49) J. Ph.
Vogel, "Some Seals from Kasia," Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society
of Great Britain and Ireland (1907): 366. (50) In the case of Kasia
there is, of course, other material that confirms the identity of
the site - see F. E. Pargiter, "The Kasia Copper-plate," Annual
Report of the Archaeological Survey of India [= ARASI] for 1910-11
(Calcutta, 1914), 73-77, esp. p. 77, n. 10. One further point in
regard to at least some of these sealings can I think also be
quickly clarified, and such a clarification will establish an even
more specific linkage between what has been found at some Buddhist
sites and the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya. Vogel found at Kasia a number
of sealings which he described as showing a "skeleton seated in
meditation" or a "skeleton standing. On both sides a bird perched on
a skull." Sastri, in later work at the site, also found such
sealings. See J. Ph. Vogel, "Excavations at Kasia," ARASI 1905-06
(Calcutta, 1909), 85, Vogel, "Excavations at Kasia," ARASI 1906-07
(Calcutta, 1909) 66, H. Sastri, "Excavations at Kasia," ARASI
1910-11 (Calcutta, 1914), 72. In the second of the reports cited
Vogel surmised that "such figures possibly are meant to represent
the corporeal relics of some Buddhist saint" (p. 59, n.1). There is,
however, a passage in the Ksudraka-vastu of the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya which makes this unlikely. Vogel knew this
passage, but, presumably, only from the truncated summary in Csoma
or Feer. In the latter it appears as: "Un membre de l'ordre
religieux doit avoir sur son sceau ou cachet un cercle avec deux
daims se, faisant vis-a-vis et au-dessous le nom du fondateur du
Vihara" (L. Feer, Analyse du kandjour [Lyon, 1881], 191). The
Tibetan text itself says, however: bcom ldan 'das kyis bka' stsal pa
/ rgya ni gnyis te / dge 'dun gyi dang / gang zag gi'o / de la dge
'dun gyi ni dbus su 'khor lo bris na / glo gnyis su ri dags / 'og tu
gtsug lag khang gi bdag po'i ming bri bar bya'o / gang zag gi ni rus
pa'i keng rus sam / mgo'i thod pa bri bar bya'o (Tog, 'dul ba, Ta
11b.4): "The Blessed One said: "There are two kinds of seals:
(seals) of a Community, and (seals) of individual monks. In regard
to them, that of a Community is to have a wheel engraved in the
middle with a deer on both sides; below it the name of the
*Viharasvamin. That of an individual monk is to have a skeleton or a
skull engraved on it." Vogel identified a considerable number of the
seals he found at Kasia with the first type mentioned in this
passage, but because he had access only to an incomplete summary of
the passage he was unable to recognize seals of the second type for
what they were: those seals or sealings bearing skeletons or skulls
almost certainly had nothing to do with "the corporeal relics of
some Buddhist saint," but were rather simply seals of individual
monks. It is worth noting too that the association between things
connected with the individual and skeletons and skulls is also found
elsewhere in this Vinaya. In a well-known passage which describes
what paintings are allowed in a vihara, the text says, in Lalou's
translation, "dans les [individual] cellules, un squelette, des os
et un crane" are to be painted (M. Lalou, "Notes sur le decoration
des monasteres bouddhiques," Revue des arts asiatiques 5.3 [1930]:
183-85). Certain individual cells at some Buddhist monastic sites
have been identified as "meditation caves" because they have
skeletons and skulls painted on their walls (cf. L. Feugere, "A
Meditation Cave in Kyzil," in South Asian Archaeology 1985, ed. K.
Frifelt and P. Sorensn [London, 1989], 380-86). Obviously, these
vinaya passages render such identifications doubtful. (51)
Karunatilaka has noted what he calls an "obvious gap in the
information found in the law-books": "The law-books of the early
medieval times and the preceding period contain various laws
pertaining to money-lending and interest payments between
individuals but they pay little or no attention at all to similar
transactions between individuals and institutions...," P. V. B.
Karunatilaka, "Hindu Temples in Bihar and Orissa: Some Aspects of
the Management of Their Monetary Endowments in Early Medieval
Times," The Sri Lanka Journal of Humanities 13.1-2 (1987): 154. (52)
Gernet, Les aspects economiques du bouddhisme, 156, n. 3. (53)
Derge, 'dul ba, Cha 149b. 1 ff. (54) Sternbach, Juridical Studies,
1:111ff. (55) For the sources on the life and date of Gunaprabha,
and for work on his Vinaya-sutra and its auto-commentary, see G.
Schopen, "Ritual Rights and Bones of Contention: More on Monastic
Funerals in the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya," Journal of Indian
Philosophy 22 (1994): 63-64 and ns. 63-64. When I wrote this paper I
was unaware of the fact that an edition of the whole of the Sanskrit
text of the Sutra had been published. P. V. Bapat and V. V. Gokhale
had said in their introduction to their edition of the first chapter
of both the Vinaya-sutra and its auto-commentary that they had seen
and used an edition of the Sutra by R. Sankrityayana. But they also
said that it was only "provisionally printed ... not formally
published." I therefore assumed, wrongly, that it was never made
available. Mr. Jonathan Silk - already known for his keen
bibliographic nose - was kind enough not only to point out to me
that it had indeed been published (as no. 74 of the Singhi Jain
Sastra Siksapitha, Singhi Jain Series!), but also to send me a copy.
I would like to thank him very much. Unfortunately, Bapat and
Gokhale may have understated the case when they referred to this
edition as (very unsatisfactory." It does, however, make it possible
to improve on some points in my treatment of the Tibetan translation
of the Sutra in the above paper, but that will have to wait. (56) L.
Schmithausen, The Problem of the Sentience of Plants in Earliest
Buddhism (Tokyo, 1991), 74. The text occurs at Derge, 'dul ba, Cha
279b.3-280b.7. (57) Vinaya-sutra (Sankrityayana ed.) 38.11ff.; 'dul
ba'i mdo, Derge, bstang 'gyur, Wu 30a.4ff.; note in particular:
tridandakam bhasana-daksinadesanam krtva, translated - oddly enough
- by rgyun chags gsum pa gdon pa dang sbyin pa bshad pa byas nas.
(58) All the examples that follow are cited from the
edition of the Sanskrittext of the first chapter of the Sutra and
its commentary found in P. V. Bapat and V. V. Gokhale, eds.,
Vinaya-sutra and Auto-commentary on the Same (Patna, 1982);
references are to the Sutra-numbers inserted into the text. (59) Su.
506 is citing the text of the Civara-vastu now found at Dutt, Gilgit
Manuscripts, iii.2:131.13-15. (60) Demieville, Durt and Seidel,
Repertoire du canon bouddhique sino-japonais, 123, 124, 125. (61)
Vinaya-sutra (Sankrityayana ed.) 33.12-14; 'dul ba'i mdo, Derge,
bstan'gyur, Wu 26.b.5. (62) I am not at all sure what gtsang khang
byur bu means. gtsang khang in dri gtsang khang seems to translate
kuti; and byur bu is usually said to mean "heaped, a heaped measure
of corn or meal," or "full, brim-full." (63) Derge, bstan 'gyur, Zhu
165b.1-4. (64) Vinaya-sutra (Sankrityayana ed.) 124.3. (65) See S.
L. Huntington, The "Pala-sena" Schools of Sculpture (Leiden, 1984),
125-26 and ns. 120-25, and the sources cited there. (66) Gnoli,
Sayanasana- and Adhikarana-vastus, 37.6-19 = Tog, 'dul ba, Ga
286a.6-b.5. (67) E.g., H. Luders, Mathura Inscriptions, ed. K. L.
Janert (Gottingen, 1961), no. 44, and 81 n. 1. (68) Dutt, Gilgit
Manuscripts, iii.1:220.20. (69) Gnoli, Sanghabheda-vastu, i:199:25.
For additional references to daksinam adis- in the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya and elsewhere see G. Schopen, "On Avoiding
Ghosts and Social Censure: Monastic Funerals in the
Mulasarvastivada-vinaya," Journal of Indian Philosophy 20 (1992):
12; 30, n 43; Schopen, "The Ritual Obligations and Donor Roles of
Monks in the Pali Vinaya," Journal of the Pali Text Society 16
(1992): 101-2. (70) Gnoli, Sayanasana- and Adhikarana-vastus, 35.1 =
Tog, 'dul ba, Ga 284b.4. (71) Here it will be sufficient to cite -
as one of many possible examples - Lawrence's remarks given under
the heading, "The Religious Motives for Endowment": "The merit that
accrued to an individual [monk] through prayer and good works could
be applied to other people, and not only to living people, but also
to the dead. This concept played a crucial role in Medieval
religious practice. To found and endow a community of monks was to
ensure for the donor an unceasing fund of intercession and sacrifice
which would avail him and his relatives both in life and after
death" (C. H. Lawrence, Medieval Monasticism: Forms of Religious
Life in Western Europe in the Middle Ages, 2nd ed. [London and New
York, 1989], 69; see also the very rich study of M. McLaughlin,
Consorting with Saints: Prayer for the Dead in Early Medieval France
[Ithaca, N.Y., 1994]). For what appears to be a much later (16th
cent.?) Indian legal instrument intended in part to assure the
post-mortem well-being of an individual, see J. D. M. Derrett,
"Kutta: A Class of Land-tenures in South India," Bulletin of the
School of Oriental and African Studies 21 (1958): 61-81 [= Essays in
Classical and Modern Hindu Law (Leiden, 1976), I:280-302]. (72) Et.
Lamotte, History of Indian Buddhism: From the Origins to the Saka
Era, tr. S. Webb-Boin (Louvain-la-neuve, 1988), 179. (73) It will
perhaps be sufficient, even representative, to cite here examples
from the Pali Vinaya, which is still commonly held to be the
"oldest" of the Vinayas, and from the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya, which
is still commonly held to be the most recent (ct. O.v. Hinuber, "The
Arising of an Offence, apattisamutthana: A Note on the Structure and
History of the Theravada-Vinaya," Journal of the Pali Text Society
16 [1992]: 68 n. 13): Pali Vinaya ii 148.7ff (on doors and the three
kinds of keys): Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts, iii.4:80.15 (reference to
hiding the key to the "ahll for religious exertion"). (74) See, for
convenience, the Pali material discussed in M. Njammasch,
"Heirarchische Strukturen in den buddhistischen Klostern Indiens in
der ersten Halfte des ersten Jahrtausends unserer Zeitrechnung:
Untersuchungen zur Genesis des indischen Feudalismus,"
Ethnographische-archaologische Zeitschrift 11 (1970): 515-39,
esp.pp.529ff. (75) Pali Vinaya 119.9ff.; Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts,
iii.4:79.3. (76) Perhaps the most striking example here is the story
of the monk Pilindavaccha, which occurs in two separate places in
the Pali Vinaya (i:206.34ff. and iii:248.11ff.). Bimbisara gave five
hundren monastery attendants (aramika) to the monk Pilindavaccha
and, the text says, "a distinct village established itself. They
called it The Village of the Monastery Attendants' and they also
called it Pilinda Village'" (...patiyekko gamo nivisi.
aramika-gamako 'ti pi nam ahamsu pilindagamako 'ti pi nam ahamsu -
the translation is from I. B Horner, The Book of the Discipline,
vol. IV [London, 1951], 282). Note that Jaworski calls this story a
"legende locale" and syas it "n'a pas d'equivalent en chinois," J.
Jaworski, "Le section des remedes dans le vinaya des mahisasaka et
dans le vinaya pali," Rocznik Orjentalistyczny 5 (1927): 100 n. 14;
for the Mulasarvastivadin version of the story, see G. Schopen, "The
Monastic Ownership of Servants or Slaves: Local and Legal Factors in
the Redactional History of Two Vinayas," Journal of the
International Association of Buddhist Studies 17 (1994). (77) Pali
Vinaya i 250.14: "Now at that time seeds belonging to an Order were
sown on grounds belonging to an individual, and seeds belonging to
an individual were sown on ground belonging to an Order. They told
this matter to the Lord. He said: When, monks, seeds belonging to an
Order are sown on ground belonging to an individual, having given
back a portion, (the rest) may be made use of. When seeds belonging
to an individual are sown on ground belonging to an Order, having
given back a portion, (the rest) may be made use of" - so Horner,
The Book of the Discipline, iv 347. (78) See Schopen, Journal of the
Pali Text Society 16 (1992): 87-107. (79) The inheritance of lay
estates: Pali Vinaya ii 169.24; Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts,
iii.2:139.6-143.14; inheritance of a dead monks property: Pali
Vinaya i 304ff.; Dutt, Gilgit Manuscripts, iii.2:113ff. (cf.
Schopen, Journal of Indian Philosophy 20 [1992]: 3ff.). (80) J.
Marshall et al., The Monuments of Sanchi (Delhi, 1940), 1:63; ct. J.
Marshall, Taxila: An Illustrated Account of Archaeological
Excavations (Cambridge, 1951), 1:274, where he says, for example,
"At the Dharmarajika at Taxila...there is not a vestige of any
residential quarters which can be assigned to a date much earlier
than the beginning of the Christian Era." (81) Cf. G. Schopen, "On
Monks, Nuns and Vulgar' Practices: The Introduction of the Image
Cult into Indian Buddhism," (82) Marshall, Taxila, 1:320. (83) See
S. Nagaraju, Buddhist Architecture of Western India (c. 250 B.C.-C.
A.D. 300) (Delhi, 1981), 113-30, and the ground plans given in figs.
23-25. (84) Nagaraju, Buddhist Architecture of Western India,
133-40, and plans in fig. 27. Nagaraju says, "...here are the
earliest Buddhist excavations among the inland group of caves in
Western Deccan." (85) For the sake of convenience, see B. Kumar, The
Archaeology of Pataliputra and Nalanda (Delhi, 1987), 164ff., and
the sources cited there. (86) Though it would lead too far afield to
pursue it here, it is - I think - safe to say that a careful study
of extant, as opposed to conjectured, early stupas would arrive at
the same point. Those stupas which have some chance of being really
early, and in regard to which we have some actual knowledge, are all
very small, unimpressive affairs. This is the case with the stupas
at Bairat (R. B. D. R. Sahni, Archaeological Remains and Excavations
at Bairat [Jaipur, 1937], 28ff.; S. Piggott, "The Earliest Buddhist
Shrines," Antiquity 17 [1943]: 1-10), at Laurigya-Nandangarh (J. E.
van Lohuizen-De Leeuw, "South-East Asian Architecture and the Stupa
of Nandangarh," Artibus Asiae 19 [1956]: 282ff. and fig. 2), at
Junnar-Tuljalena (Nagaraju, Buddhist Architecture of Western India,
133-34), etc. (87) E. Hultzsch, Inscriptions of Asoka, Corpus
Inscriptionum Indicarum, vol. I (Oxford, 1925), 14, 36, 60, etc. J.
Bloch, Les Inscriptions d'Asoka (Paris, 1950), 111. (88) For a
recent discussion see K. R. Norman, "Asoka's Schism' Edict,"
Bukkyogaku semina 46 (1987): 1-33, esp. pp. 9-10, 25-26 and ns.
4,19. (89) Hultzsch, Inscriptions of Asoka, 163; Bloch, Les
Inscriptions d'Asoka, 152-53; cf. Norman, Bukkyogaku semina 46
(1987): 101-2. (90) Hultzsch, Inscriptions of Asoka, 164; Bloch, Les
Inscriptions d'Asoka, 157. (91) D.C. Sircar, Asokan Studies
(Calcutta, 1979), 94-103, esp.pp. 101-2; Sircar, "Panguaria
Inscription of Asoka," Epigraphia Indica 39 (1971, but 1981): 1-8.
(92) For the site see B.K. Thapar, ed., Indian Archaeology 1975-76:
A Review (New Delhi, 1979), 28-30, and pls. xxxix-xli; H. Sarkar, "A
Post-Asokan Inscription from Pangoraria in the Vindhayan Range," in
Sri Dinesacandrika: Studies in Indology, Shri D.C. Sircar
Festshrift, ed. B.N. Mukherjee et al. (Delhi, 1983), 403-5, and pls.
73-75. (This contains a note on the site by K.D. Banerjee and an
edition of the later "chatra inscription" - the latter is also
treated in S.S. Iyer, "Panguraria Brahmi Inscription," Epigraphia
Indica 40 [1973, but 1986]: 119-20 and p1.). (93) See, for example,
all the inscriptions listed under "Donations by Inhabitants of
Certain Places" in Luders, Bharhut Inscriptions, A5-54. Note what
might be traces of the same sort of situation, of "monks" living in
villages, in what are considered the oldest parts of the Pali Canon;
e.g., Suttanipata 971:...yatacari game, which K.R. Norman translates
"...living in a restrained way in a village" (K.R. Norman, The
Rhinoceros Horn and Other Early Buddhist Poems [London and Boston,
1985], 157). (94) Marshall et al., The Monuments of Sanchi, 1: no.
404; cf. 298. (95) S. Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanisads
(London, 1953), 374; R. E. Hume, The Thirteen Principal Upanishads,
2nd rev. ed. (Oxford, 1931), 200-201. (96) See C. Hallisey, "Apropos
the Pali Vinaya as a Historical Document: A Reply to Gregory
Schopen," Journal of the Pali Text Society 15 (1991): 207. (97) See
n. 77 above. (98) Marshall, Taxila, 1:233; 320; cf. Marshall et al.,
The Monuments of Sanchi, 1:63-64: "As a fact, it was not until the
Kushan period that the self-contained monastery, which we are wont
particularly to associate with the Buddhist sangharama, made its
appearance in the Northwest of India, and not until the early Gupta
Age that it found its way into Hindustan and Central India" - last
part of which is in need of revision. (99) Marshall, Taxila, 1:324.
(100) See the Alluru inscription cited above in n. 22 and the well
known Mathura Lion Capital Inscription (S. Konow, Kharoshthi
Inscriptions, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum, vol. 2, pt. 1
[Calcutta: 1929], 48-49) for two of the earliest inscriptional
references to donation of land to Buddhist communities. (101) Pali
Vinaya ii 121.2. (102) J. D. M. Derrett, Dharmasastra and Juridical
Literature, A History of Indian Literature, ed. J. Gonda, part of
vol. IV (Wiesbaden, 1973), 31. (103) R. Lingat, The Classical Law of
India, tr. J. D. M. Derrett (Berkeley, 1973), 99-100. (104) There is
at least one significant difference. Yajnavalkya (II.5.96-97) gives
detailed procedures for recording partial repayments and for - when
the debt is repaid - nullifying the written contract or writing a
"receipt" (cf. Chatterjee, The Law of Debt in Ancient India,
345-48). But our Vinaya passage knows nothing of this. (105) But see
J. Filliozat, "La valeur des connaissances greco-romaines sur
l'Inde," Journal des savants, avril-juin (1981): 113 n. 32. (106)
See, for example, J. A. Raftis, "Western Monasticism and Economic
Organization," Comparative Studies in Society and History 3 (1961):
452-69; K. J. Conant, "Observations on the Practical Talents and
Technology of the Medieval Benedictines," in Cluniac Monasticism in
the Central Middle Ages, ed. N. Hunt (London, 1971): 77-84; etc.
(107) See G. Schopen, "Burial Ad Sanctos' and the Physical Presence
of the Buddha in Early Indian Buddhism: A Study in the Archaeology
of Religions," Religion 17 (1987): 206-9; Schopen, Journal of Indian
Philosophy 18 (1990): 197-200. (108) A large part of the problem
has, of course, to do with what Lariviere has so gracefully called
the "chronological house of cards" that has been built up for
dharmasastra (Lariviere, Narada, 2:xix ff.). Dates for Yajnavalkya
in particular have varied widely - it has been assigned to the 4th
or even 6th century C.E. (Lingat, The Classical Law of India,
99-100). Should such later dates turn out to be correct, then
Yajnavalkya would be considerably later than our Vinaya text.
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