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भिक्षुप्रकीर्णक
Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka
Miscellaneous Matters Concerning Monks
Text
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Description
The Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka ("Miscellany Concerning Monks") is a lost Mahāsāṃghika-Lokottaravādin Vinaya text, known directly only through a fragmentary Sanskrit citation preserved in Śāntideva's Śikṣāsamuccaya (Ch. 7, ed. Bendall 154.17–155.3). The cited passage recounts the Buddha instructing Ānanda to wash the soiled robes of a sick monk, illustrating the duty of monks to care for one another. Parallel accounts of the same episode survive independently in the Chinese Mahāsāṃghika-Vinaya (Taishō 1425) and the Pāli Mahāvagga (VIII.26.2), though neither is a direct witness to the Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka itself. A companion text for nuns, the Bhikṣuṇīprakīrṇaka, survives in abridged form (headings only) within a Sanskrit manuscript of the Bhikṣuṇī-Vinaya recovered from Tibet, edited by Gustav Roth (1970); no comparably abridged or complete witness of the Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka itself has been identified. Rāhula Sāṅkṛtyāyana reported deciphering a fuller manuscript of the Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka among materials he photographed in Tibet (c. 1954), but this has not been traced or published since.
Quoted in the aligned translations
Reference
bhikṣuprakīrṇaka [भिक्षुप्रकीर्णक]. [Miscellaneous Matters Concerning Monks].
Interconnections
3 Scholarship
The present manuscript Bhikṣuṇī-Vinaya is a part of the Code of Disciplines of the Mahāsāṁghika-Lokottaravādin. Mahāsāṁghika-Lokottaravādin were an ancient Buddhist school which originated either in the reign of Kālāśoka in the first half of the 4th Century B.C. or in that of Aśoka in the 3rd Century B.C. Dr. Roth thinks that the Vinaya of the Mahāsāṁghika-Lokottaravādins may have been composed in the 3rd or 2nd Century B.C. What is more significant is that our manuscript is the only surviving purely Indian version of it. (Sinha, introduction)
This article examines the canonical Buddhist texts cited by prominent Madhyamaka masters, particularly focusing on the textual-critical importance of their quotations. The author emphasizes that citations by masters such as Candrakīrti, Śāntideva, Kamalaśīla, and Prajñākaramati are invaluable for reconstructing and understanding canonical texts, especially when original manuscripts have been corrupted through transmission or are no longer extant. The paper outlines several research projects examining specific texts: the Prajñāpāramitāratnaguṇasaṃcayagāthā as cited by Candrakīrti in his Prasannapadā; the Pitāputrasamāgamasūtra quoted by multiple masters; fragments of the Suvarṇaprabhāsottamasūtra; and the Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka preserved in Śāntideva's Śikṣāsamuccaya. Through detailed philological analysis comparing Sanskrit manuscripts with Tibetan and Chinese versions, the author demonstrates how these citations reveal textual evolution and transmission patterns. The study particularly highlights Candrakīrti's faithful citation method and shows how comparing corrupted manuscript traditions with quoted passages enables scholars to reconstruct more authentic readings, serving both textual criticism and the history of Buddhist philosophical ideas.
In this paper I would like to make some philological remarks on a fragmentary citation in the Śikṣāsamuccaya by Śāntideva (around 700 CE).[1] It is a matter of great significance for the history of ideas in Indian Buddhism, for the celebrated Madhyamaka master has cited it.[2] It is also of great importance from the viewpoints of Buddhist Sanskrit textual transmission. This is not just for the recovery of the missing literature but for linguistic peculiarities of the extant texts belonging to the Mahāsāṃghika-Lokottaravādins (cf. infra §1.0.0-1.0.2).
3 A topic of
The present manuscript Bhikṣuṇī-Vinaya is a part of the Code of Disciplines of the Mahāsāṁghika-Lokottaravādin. Mahāsāṁghika-Lokottaravādin were an ancient Buddhist school which originated either in the reign of Kālāśoka in the first half of the 4th Century B.C. or in that of Aśoka in the 3rd Century B.C. Dr. Roth thinks that the Vinaya of the Mahāsāṁghika-Lokottaravādins may have been composed in the 3rd or 2nd Century B.C. What is more significant is that our manuscript is the only surviving purely Indian version of it. (Sinha, introduction)
This article examines the canonical Buddhist texts cited by prominent Madhyamaka masters, particularly focusing on the textual-critical importance of their quotations. The author emphasizes that citations by masters such as Candrakīrti, Śāntideva, Kamalaśīla, and Prajñākaramati are invaluable for reconstructing and understanding canonical texts, especially when original manuscripts have been corrupted through transmission or are no longer extant. The paper outlines several research projects examining specific texts: the Prajñāpāramitāratnaguṇasaṃcayagāthā as cited by Candrakīrti in his Prasannapadā; the Pitāputrasamāgamasūtra quoted by multiple masters; fragments of the Suvarṇaprabhāsottamasūtra; and the Bhikṣuprakīrṇaka preserved in Śāntideva's Śikṣāsamuccaya. Through detailed philological analysis comparing Sanskrit manuscripts with Tibetan and Chinese versions, the author demonstrates how these citations reveal textual evolution and transmission patterns. The study particularly highlights Candrakīrti's faithful citation method and shows how comparing corrupted manuscript traditions with quoted passages enables scholars to reconstruct more authentic readings, serving both textual criticism and the history of Buddhist philosophical ideas.
In this paper I would like to make some philological remarks on a fragmentary citation in the Śikṣāsamuccaya by Śāntideva (around 700 CE).[1] It is a matter of great significance for the history of ideas in Indian Buddhism, for the celebrated Madhyamaka master has cited it.[2] It is also of great importance from the viewpoints of Buddhist Sanskrit textual transmission. This is not just for the recovery of the missing literature but for linguistic peculiarities of the extant texts belonging to the Mahāsāṃghika-Lokottaravādins (cf. infra §1.0.0-1.0.2).
