A Note on Mahāyāna Buddhism and the Bodhicaryāvatāra

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A Note on Mahāyāna Buddhism and the Bodhicaryāvatāra
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The Indians rightly speak of Darsana as the foundation of all the sciences of learning (sarvavidyāpratiṣṭhā) or as the lamp of all the Śāstras (pradīpaḥ sarvaśāstrāṇām). It is of interest to note that no religious movement in India has ever come to existence without developing as its support a philosophical context. Religion and philosophy have supplemented each other to a considerable extent. India is fortunate that several religious teachers made their appearance on this soil ultimately enriching philosophical speculations. The holy Gītā lends support to the concept that at the junctures of calamitious states of society, when Dharma tends to be polluted and vitiated, the need of a religious reformer is strongly felt.[1] The practical application of this prophesy is marked in the religious history of India. The Indian history testifies to the fact that in different periods of history, when the traditionally accepted beliefs were deemed inadequate, sometimes false and could not be adjusted with the changed states of the society, ages grew out of patience with them, the insight of a new teacher—Buddha, Vyāsa or Śaṁkara supervened stirring the depths of spiritual life. The speculative tendency of the Indian mind also was convinced of the fact that truth is many-sided and that different views contained different aspects of truth which none could express fully. The Indian philosophers where therefore tolerant and receptive of other's views and sometimes they were fearless of accepting even opposite and dangerous doctrines so long as they were backed by sufficient reasoning. They did not allow any tradition to die if they could help it, one jot or title of the tradition, but would try to accomodate it all. Buddhism represents such a case of tolerated treatment specially in its aspect of the development of its Mahāyanic character. . . .
      In this background of Mahāyānism it will be the task of this paper to point out some of the Mahāyānic concepts as recorded in the Bodhicaryāvatāra[6] of Śāntideva. (Śāstri, "A Note on Mahāyāna Buddhism," 112–15)

Notes

1. Yadā yadā hi dharmasya glānir bhavati bhārata /
Abhyutthāṇam adharmasya tadātmānam srjāmy aham//
6. Minayef, Russian scholar, first published the text in the Russian Oriental Journal Zapiski, IV, 1889. Louis de la Vallee Poussin utilised more manuscripts in his text: Bouddhisme, Etudes et Materiaux, Vol. 1, Bruxelles, Academie, and Luzac, London, 1898; he published also text and Pañjikā in Devanāgari script of the first nine chapters in the Bibliothec Indica, Calcutta, 1902–14. The latest and the best edition of the Bodhicaryāvatāra is by Prof. P. L. Vaidya, published by the Mithila Institute of Post-Graduate Studies and Sanskrit Learning, Darbhanga (1960). It also contains the Pañjikā commentary of Prajñākaramati.

Citation
Chatterjee Śāstri, Heramba. "A Note on Mahāyāna Buddhism and the Bodhicaryāvatāra." Journal of the Department of Pali, University of Calcutta 1 (1982–83): 112-18. https://www.culibrary.ac.in/digital-lib-dev/ebook/pdf_view.php?pdflink=https://s3.ap-south-1.amazonaws.com/calcutta-university/departmental-journals/H00271.pdf&cat_type=A.
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Classical WorksAbout this item
An "Introduction to Bodhisattva Practice," the Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra is a poem about the path of a bodhisattva, in ten chapters, written by the Indian Buddhist Śāntideva (fl. c. 685–763). One of the masterpieces of world literature, it is a core text of Mahāyāna Buddhism and continues to be taught, studied, and commented upon in many languages and by many traditions around the world. The main subject of the text is bodhicitta, the altruistic aspiration for enlightenment, and the path and practices of the bodhisattva, the six perfections (pāramitās). The text forms the basis of many contemporary discussions of Buddhist ethics and philosophy.