Pre-sectarian Buddhism
"[39] In the following decades various scholars continued to produce a series of comparative studies, such as Anesaki, Akanuma (who composed a complete catalogue of parallels), Yin Shun and Thich Minh Chau.
[44][45][46] According to scholars such as Rupert Gethin and Peter Harvey, the oldest recorded teachings are contained in the first four Nikayas of the Sutta Pitaka and their various parallels in other languages,[note 10] together with the main body of monastic rules, which survive in the various versions of the patimokkha.
[68] Likewise, Hajime Nakamura writes in his Indian Buddhism, that "there is no word that can be traced with unquestionable authority to Gotama Sakyamuni as a historical personage, although there must be some sayings or phrases derived from him".
[70] British indologist Rupert Gethin writes that "it is extremely likely" that at least some of the suttas in the four main Nikāyas "are among the oldest surviving Buddhist texts and contain material that goes back directly to the Buddha.
"[49] Gethin agrees with Lamotte that the doctrinal basis of the Pali Nikayas and Chinese Agamas is "remarkably uniform" and "constitute the common ancient heritage of Buddhism.
[72] Peter Harvey affirms that the four older Nikāyas preserve an "early common stock" which "must derive from his [the Buddha’s] teachings" because the overall harmony of the texts suggest a single authorship, even while other parts of the Pali canon clearly originated later.
"[73] Warder adds that when the extant material of the Tipitakas of the early Buddhist schools is examined "we find an agreement which is substantial, though not complete" and that there is a central body of sutras "which is so similar in all known versions that we must accept these as so many recensions of the same original texts.
Rhys Davids, Wynne points out the pali texts depict a pre-Asokan north India and he also cites KR Norman who argues that they show no Sinhalese prakrit additions.
[75] Reviewing the literature by figures such as Frauwallner, Wynne argues that the pali suttas reached Sri Lanka by 250 BCE and that they preserved certain details about fifth century north India (such as that Uddaka Rāmaputta lived near Rajagrha).
[75] Wynne concludes: The corresponding pieces of textual material found in the canons of the different sects – especially the literature of the Pāli school, which was more isolated than the others – probably go back to pre-sectarian times.
It is unlikely that these correspondences could have been produced by the joint endeavour of different Buddhist sects, for such an undertaking would have required organisation on a scale which was simply inconceivable in the ancient world.
"[76] Since we only possess a small fraction of the Buddhist literature that must have circulated during the early period, Conze held that all the scholarly attempts to reconstruct the 'original' teachings were "all mere guesswork" because "that which we have may have been composed at any time during the first 500 years" and "there is no objective criterion which would allow us to single out those elements in the record which go back to the Buddha Himself.
"[78] Japanese Buddhologist Kogen Mizuno argues in his "Buddhist Sutras" (1982) that the material we possess may not contain the actual words of the Buddha because "they were not recorded as he spoke", but compiled after his death and also because they do not survive in the original language (some form of Magadhi Prakrit) but "transmitted in other Indic languages of later periods, and without doubt conscious and unconscious changes in the Buddha's words were made during several centuries of oral transmission.
Given the extraordinary extent of the material passing at any one time under rubric of the “word of the Buddha,” we might simply pause and acknowledge that Indian Buddhists were extraordinarily facile litterateurs.
"[82] Schopen is very critical of modern Buddhist studies because of its preference for literary evidence that "in most cases cannot actually be dated and that survives only in very recent manuscript traditions" that have been "heavily edited" and were intended as normative not historical accounts.
[86] Schopen concludes that it is only "from the end of the fourth century, that some of the doctrinal content of Hinayana canonical literature can finally be definitely dated and actually verified.
According to Constantin Regamey, the view followed by the "Franco-Belgian" school of buddhology (which applies to figures like Jean Przyluski, Louis de la Vallee Poussin, A. Weller, and A.B.
[88] This group of scholars sought to use all available sources to reconstruct the original teachings of the Buddha in a way which diverged from the Pali focused perspective of Anglo-German indologists such as Oldenberg and Frauwallner.
However, in the post-war years, Franco-Belgian scholars like Jean Filliozat mostly stuck to a moderate skepticism which did not hypothesize about what the original Buddhism may have been and merely focused on looking at the sectarian sources which currently exist (and which do not go back to the earliest period).
[91][92] As noted by Alexander Wynne, Schayer drew on passages "in which "consciousness" (viññana) seems to be the ultimate reality or substratum (e.g. A I.10), as well as the Saddhatu Sutra, which is not found in any canonical source but is cited in other Buddhist texts.
"[93] According to Schayer, contrary to popular opinion, the Theravada and Mahayana traditions may be "divergent, but equally reliable records of a pre-canonical Buddhism which is now lost forever.
"[88] As such, one cannot rely on any single one of them to construct the original view of the Buddha, especially since the teachings found in them are mostly composed of "terms, formulas, or bare patterns" that can and have been interpreted in many different ways.
"[105] The Buddha saw death as brought on by an evil force, Mára, "the Killer,"[note 17] "who tempts us away from our true immortal selves and diverts us from the path which could lead us back to freedom.
[116][note 19]According to Eviatar Shulman, the doctrine of the Four Noble Truths is rooted in "a meditative perception regarding the arising and passing away of mental events" which also includes a "detached attitude" to phenomena.
[52][101] One of those longer sequences, from the CulaHatthipadopama-sutta, the "Lesser Discourse on the Simile of the Elephant's Footprints", is as follows:[127] According to Grzegorz Polak, the four upassanā have been misunderstood by the developing Buddhist tradition, including Theravada, to refer to four different foundations.
[139] According to Wynne, words expressing the inculcation of awareness, such as sati, sampajāno, and upekkhā, are mistranslated or understood as particular factors of meditative states,[139] whereas they refer to a particular way of perceiving the sense objects.
"[157] Analayo also refers to Collett Cox, who noted that it is possible that the Buddhist goal of the elimination of the asravas “subsumes knowledge and concentration as equally cooperative means rather than mutually exclusive ends,” and that this view is also reflected in Abhidharma.
"[160] While Pratītyasamutpāda, "dependent origination," and the twelve nidānas, the links of dependent origination, are traditionally interpreted as describing the conditional arising of rebirth in saṃsāra, and the resultant duḥkha (suffering, pain, unsatisfactoriness),[161] an alternate Theravada questions the authenticity of this interpretation, and regards the list as describing the arising of mental formations and the resultant notion of "I" and "mine," which are the source of suffering.
[176][note 27] These factors are summarized in the Maha-parinibbana Sutta,[note 28] which recounts the Buddha's last days, in the Buddha's last address to his bikkhus: Now, O bhikkhus, I say to you that these teachings of which I have direct knowledge and which I have made known to you — these you should thoroughly learn, cultivate, develop, and frequently practice, that the life of purity may be established and may long endure, for the welfare and happiness of the multitude, out of compassion for the world, for the benefit, well being, and happiness of gods and men.
[178] But according to Gethin, the bodhipakkhiyādhammā provide a key to understanding the relationship between calm and insight in early Buddhist meditation theory, bringing together the practice of jhana with the development of wisdom.
