Pāli Literature: Including the Canonical Literature in Prakrit And
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A HISTORY OF INDIAN LITERATURE K. R. NORMAN PALI LITERATURE INCLUDING THE CANONICAL LITERATURE IN PRAKRIT AND SANSKRIT OF ALL THE HINAYANA SCHOOLS OF BUDDHISM OTTO HARRASSOWITZ • WIESBADEN A HISTORY OF INDIAN LITERATURE EDITED BY JAN GONDA VOLUME VII Fasc. 2 1983 OTTO HARRASSOWITZ . WIESBADEN K. R. NORMAN PALI LITERATURE INCLUDING THE CANONICAL LITERATURE IN PRAKRIT AND SANSKRIT OF ALL THE HINAYANA SCHOOLS OF BUDDHISM 1983 OTTO HARRASSOWITZ • WIESBADEN A HISTORY OF INDIAN LITERATURE Contents of Vol. VII Vol. VII: Buddhist and Jaina Literature Fasc. 1: D. Seyfort Ruegg The Literature of the Madhyamaka School of Philosophy in India Fasc. 2: K. R. Norman Pali Literature •CIP-Kurztit'elaufnahme der Deutschen Bibliothek A history of Indian literature / ed. by Jan Gonda. - "Wiesbaden : Harrassowitz. NB: Gonda, Jan [Hrsg.] Vol. 7. Buddhist and Jaina literature. Fasc. 2. ->• Norman, Kenneth Roy : Pali literature Norman, Kenneth Roy: Pali literature : incl. the canon, literature in Prakrit and Sanskrit of all the Hinayana schools of Buddhism/ Xenneth Roy Norman. - Wiesbaden : Harrassowitz, 1983. (A history of Indian literature ; Vol. 7, Fasc. 2) ISBN 3-447-02285-X © Otto Harrassowitz, "Wiesbaden 1983. Alle Bechte vorbehalten. Photographische und photomechanische Wiedergabe nur mit ausdrlicklicher Genehmigung des Verlages. Gesamtherstellung: Allgfiuer Zeitungsverlag •GmbH. Kempten. Printed in Germany. Sigel: HIL CONTENTS FOREWORD IX CHAPTER I The Pali language and the Theravddin tradition 1. The name 'Tali" 1 2. The history and development of the Pali language .. 2 3. The history of the Theravadin tradition 7 CHAPTER II The Pali Canon 1. The divisions of the canon 15 2. The Vinaya-pitaka 18 2.1. The Suttavibhanga 18 2.2. The Khandhaka 22 2.3. The Parivara 26 3. The Sutta-pitaka 30 3.1. The Digha-nikaya 32 3.1.1. The Silakkhandhavagga .. .. 32 3.1.2. The Mahavagga 36 3.1.3. The Patikavagga 41 3.2. The Majjhima-nikaya 44 3.2.1. The Mulapannasa 45 3.2.2. The Majjhimapannasa 46 3.2.3. The Uparipannasa 48 3.3. The Samyutta-nikaya 49 3.3.1. The Sagathavagga 50 3.3.2. The Nidanavagga .. 52 3.3.3. The Khandhavagga 52 3.3.4. The Salayatanavagga 53 3.3.5. The Mahavagga 53 3.4. The Anguttara-nikaya 54 3.5. The Khuddaka-nikaya 57 3.5.1. Khuddakapatha 57 3.5.2. Dhammapada 58 VI Contents 3.5.3. Udana 60 3.5.4. Itivuttaka 62 3.5.5. Suttanipata 63 3.5.6. Vimanavatthu 70 3.5.7. Petavatthu 71 3.5.8. Theragatha 72 3.5.9. Therigatha 75 3.5.10. Jataka 77 3.5.11. Niddesa 84 3.5.12. Patisambhidamagga 87 3.5.13. Apadana 89 3.5.14. Buddhavamsa 92 3.5.15. Cariyapitaka 94 4. The Abhidhamma-pitaka 96 4.1. Dham masangani 99 4.2. Vibhanga 100 4.3. Dhatukatha 101 4.4. Puggalapafmatti 102 4.5. Kathavatthu 103 4.6. Yamaka 105 4.7. Patthana 106 4.8. The Abhidharma in Sanskrit 107 CHAPTER III Early post-canonical texts 1. Early prose texts .. 108 2. The early chronicles 114 3. The early commentators 118 3.1. Buddhaghosa 120 3.2. Buddhadatta 130 3.3. Mahanama 132 3.4. Upasena 133 3.5. Dhammapala 133 CHAPTER IV Later post-canonical texts 1. The later chronicles 138 2. The later commentators 145 2.1. Atthakathas 145 2.2. Tikas 148 3. Later Abhidhamma texts 151 4. Collections of edifying tales 153 Contents VII 5. Kavya works 156 6. Prophetic texts 160 7. Medical texts 162 8. Grammatical and lexicographical works 163 9. Poetics and prosody 167 10. Books on discipline 168 11. Boundary texts 171 12. Anthologies 172 13. Cosmology 174 14. Wisdom texts 175 15. Jataka collections 177 16. Bibliographical works 179 Abbreviations 185 Glossary 190 Index of Authors 198 Index of Works 199 General Index 206 FOREWORD Despite the attempts made by A. K. Warder in his survey of Indian kdvya literature, and by various editors and translators in the introductions to their books, to assess the literary merit of certain Pali works, it is nevertheless still true to say that for the Indologist Pali literature means everything that is written in Pali, irrespective of literary value in the accepted European sense of the word. In the space and time at my disposal, however, it was not practi- cable to include a mention of everything that has been published, much less include unpublished works which are at present only names in library cata- logues and similar reference books. I have therefore omitted references to much of the later commentarial literature, but the biggest deficiency is in the field of South-East Asian Pali literature. Comparatively little work has been done in this field, and although it would have been possible to extract names of works and authors secondhand from the studies that have been made, I have in general refrained from doing so. The resultant gaps in my work will need to be filled by specialist publications in due course. Except where there is good reason to the contrary, I have dealt only with those texts which have been edited in the Roman script or been translated into a European language. I was asked to include Hinayana Buddhist canonical texts in Sanskrit and Prakrit, and here too I have dealt only with the works which have been published. Rather than deal with them separately, I have mentioned them under the relevant Pali headings, since the Hinayana canons follow closely the pattern of the Theravadin canon, with the exception of the Abhidharma. The bibliographical material included in the footnotes is intended only as a sample of the editions and translations which are available. With very few exceptions there is no mention of oriental editions, and it is sufficient to state here that all the Pali canonical texts and some para-canonical ones, together with the atthalcathas and most of the tlkds, have been published in the Chattha- sangayana series which began to appear in Burma from 1956 onwards, while most of the same texts have also been published in Ceylon. The complete canon and most of the commentaries have been published in Thailand, and editions in the ndgarl script have appeared in India from Nalanda and elsewhere. The bibliographical information I have given can be augmented by reference to the other sources mentioned in the notes, and especially to the Epilegomena to Vol. I of the Critical Pali Dictionary (Copenhagen 1948). Additional and up-to- date information will be available in the new bibliography which is planned for the Epilegomena to Vol. II of that dictionary. My debt to all others who have worked in this field will be obvious to readers of this book. When Geiger, Winternitz and Law have dealt so ably with the X K. R. Norman • Pali Literature whole field of Pah literature, and Malalasekera and Bode with Sinhalese and Bur- mese Pali literature respectively, it is very difficult to write about the subject with- out repeating what one or other of these authorities has already said. Rather than do so, and to save space, I have on many occasions referred the reader to their books. In particular, Winternitz is to be recommended for the many quotations he includes, while Law gives lengthy summaries of the contents of many texts. Although I have occasionally given information about the formation of in- dividual texts, I have not done this consistently throughout, nor have I dealt with any one text at great length. Those who are interested in this aspect of Pali literature will find references in the footnotes to Pande's book, in which he deals with the first four nikdyas and some of the Khuddaka-nikaya. The discussion of chronological stratification is a complicated matter, and needs more space than I have at my disposal. It is also, in the absence of better criteria than we have at present, a very subjective matter, and while I would agree with much that Pande says, I cannot agree with him in everything. Cambridge, 1 February 1982 K. R. Norman CHAPTER I THE PALI LANGUAGE AND THE THERAVADIN TRADITION 1. THE NAME "PALI" The dialect of Middle Indo-Aryan which is found in the texts of the Thera- vadin Buddhists and usually called "Pali" by European scholars1 is nowhere so called in the Theravadin canon. The word pdli is found in the chronicles and the commentaries upon the canon, but there it has the meaning "canon" and is used in the sense of a canonical text or phrase as opposed to the commentary (atthakathd) upon it.2 This usage is made clear by the fact that the word pdli sometimes alternates with tanti.3 It would seem that the name "Pali" is based upon a misunderstanding of the compound pdli-bhdsd "language of the canon," where the word pdli was taken to stand for the name of a particular bhdsd, as a result of which the word was applied to the language of both canon and commentaries. There is evidence that this misunderstanding occurred several centuries ago. CHILDERS stated* that the English usage was taken from the Sinhalese,5 who used the word in the same way. This probably accounts for CLOUGH'S adoption of the name 6 when he published his grammar in 1824. BURNOUF and LASSEN also used the name "Pali" in their essay on Pali grammar which was published in 1826,7 but in the survey of Pali studies up to that year included in that work BFRNOUF pointed out that the first person to mention Pali was SIMON DE LA LOUBERE 1 For a survey of earlier views about the name "Pali," see O.