Author Affiliations: Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna, Austria
關鍵詞
Aśvaghoṣa; Buddhacarita; Bimbasāra; Self; Selflessness; Indian philosophy; (Mūla)sarvāstivāda; Sectarian affiliation
摘要
Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacarita contains two sharply argumented critiques of the non-Buddhists’ self: one against Arāḍa Kālāma’s (proto-)Sāṅkhya version of the ātman in Canto 12, and one of a more general import in Canto 16. Close scrutiny of the latters narrative environment reveals Aśvaghoṣa’s indebtedness, in both contents and wording, to either a Mahāsāṅghika(/Lokottaravādin) or—much more plausibly—a (Mūla)sarvāstivāda account of the events that saw the Buddha preach selflessness to King Bimbasāra and his Magadhan subjects. Besides hinting at this genetic relationship, the present essay aims at exhibiting the structure and contents of Aśvaghoṣa’s arguments against the self, some of which can pride themselves of a long posterity in the controversy over the self.
