a preliminary study of the meaning of "yoga" in sangharak

7/29/2019 A Preliminary Study of The Meaning of "Yoga" in Sangharak

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UIVERSTY OF CALIFA

Santa Barbara

A Preiminry Study of The Mening of "Yoga in Sagharaka's f and

Its Context

A thesis subied in pil satisfaction of the

reqireents for the degree Master of Ars

in Religious Stdies

by

Gregory ax eton

Comiee i hage:

rofessor esn We, Chir

Professor Jos Cabez6n

Professor Wii Powel

June


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The thesis f Gregry Max Setn is appred

William Pwell

Vesna Cmmittee Chair

June 0


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A Preliary Sd of The Meaning of oga" in S agharaka ' s Yogcrabhmi

Copright 00

b

Gregory ax Seton


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ACNOWLEDGMETS

pcal tas to Profssor Wallac wos nowlg wsom ganc an suppotl m to unrtak tis rsarc to la a at al mor I nw an to wrtabout it Not only i s painstangly ra troug coct an t numrous raftsof ts papr but s also tirlssly ncourag m troughout th procss Wtout rtis tss woul b ntinabl

I am gratl also to Profssor Jos Cabzn wos carl raing an prcisfback as lp m to formlat my as mor clarly an to improv my owngrasp of t matrial an to Profso Willam Powll wos xctmnt about my ownas was contagous

Tas to my ns an collagus Nat Ric Zoran Lazovic Zacary JosonNatan McGov Jol Gbr an Kati Tsuji wo ra or listn to my varousras an gav m usl fback an supot

A gnral ts to Profssor Ruigr Busto wo provi m wt guiancfrinsp an ncouragmnt troghot t procss to Profssor Tom Carlson wholp m improv as a writr an ti cally to Profssor Rogr Frln whocallng to ti outsi t box an to Dav Wit for usng m to tkffrntly abot t job of t istoran

A thr mntion shoul b ma r of t Dpamnt of Rlgous Sts woawar m t Rowny Fllowsip wic as nancally support m uring st yars of stuy an to Sally Lombrozo for r n crl assistanc inamnstratv mattrs

Tanks also to Dzigar Kongtl oc for is ncoragmnt my pnts for tirsuppo an a al spcal tanks to my pnr Mchal McIlmurray wo as carfor an support m toug many manng yars of grauat sis Witout him I

woul not av bn abl to work so ar for so long

V


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ABSTCT

A Prlimina Stuy of Maning of oga in S agarak$a s YogCcCrabhmi

by

Grgory Max Ston

Tis papr xamins Sagarak$as YogCcCrabhmi an its contxt an asks

wthr t s colarly caractrization of t as rvakayna soul not b r-valuat

ligt of rcnt stuis of t protoMayna prio I argu tat t usag of t

trm in Sagarak$as YogCcCabhmi soul b unrstoo as a smantic markr

for a protoMahyna sotriology, bcaus t txtual an contxal vinc suggts

tat Sagarak$a lik otr arly Sarvstivin practitionrs, conciv of as

a protoMayika procss of unication ratr than as a rvakaynika way to

isciplin t min In otr wors pr cnry Sarvstivin practionrs

rgar this procss of unication as a mans for avling to t

uvsa ra orr to attain t quality of a ba

(A suary of Sagarak$a s YogCcCrabhmi is also inclu in t Appnix)

v


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TABLE OF CONENS

Abbreviations vii

Introduction

The Background of the Buddhist Usge of the Term Yoga

1 . T Pl Nya Contxt 5

T Bramanc Contt From as to Upaas

The Yogcrabhmi ofSanghraka

1 T Complaton Hstory of Two Sparat Yograbhmis 1

T arous Fos ofBunus 5

he Practitioners of og 1 Gnral storcal scrpton 29

oga Practtonrs Wo Practc Bns Drct at Matrya 1

Conclusion 7

Appendix

V


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Ab breviations

Yogcrabhmi (Sagharak$a)

Yogcrbhmi (Maitreya)

Yogcrabhmi (Buddhasena)

Bodhisattvabhmi

Maitri Upani$ad

A$/ashasrik-Prjfpramit-stra

Prauannasamdhi-stra

Vll

YBS

YB

YBB

BB

Mari

A$a

PraS


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Introduction

During t last twnty v yars of scolrsip on t origins of Mayn,

many prior prsuppositions av bn qustion an many untnabl toris av

bn bu On of t most impoant qustions tat as bn ask is wtr t

oxograpial classication of tr, clarly sparat, arly Buist scoolsnaml

t Sastivinaibia Scool (spposly rvakaynika) t Sautrntika Scool

(supposly protoMaynika) t ogcra Scoo (supposly arlyMaynika)is istorically coct3 Altoug it woul b ifcult to a

contmporary scolar wo subscribs to suc a simplistic s cm, ts rigi

classications still lingr,4 bcaus scholars av bn unabl to mak s ns of t most

aa o nnc, snc t t os no ppar to av bn

mntion bfor asubanu, many scols v suggst t nam Sautrtikas

was not a rfrnt for an inpnnt scool, but mry a latr signation for an

intrprtiv stran tat xist witin t Sarvstiva aibika scool On t otr

an, itzr as sown tat t Abhdarmakoabhya (wic lays out t Sarvstiva

aibika viws) was bas on passags foun only in t Yogcrabhm

It i s beyon the purvew of this paper to aress all of these theores an emonstrate ther failures an/orsuccesses I wll c aptalizeyogcr only when t specically refers to the philosophcal school nown by thatame, e Yogcra School Robert itzer, Vsubndhu nd th e Yogcrbhmi Yogcr Eements in thebhidhrmkobhy Sta Phlologica Buhca Monograph Series ; 1 8 (Toyo: InteatonalInstite for Buhst Stes ofte Inteational College for Postgrauate Buhst Sties, 200), xi fcourse, in later Inia an Tbet, it has always been obvous at (Mula-) Sarvstiva an so on were termsfor escribing a particular lines of viny transmission, not phlosophcal views Nonetheless, the earlyeste historias have assume at a Nya aflaton meant non-Mahyna even n the early centries

of e common era Ibi Florin Deleanu, The Chpter on the undne Pth ukikmrg in the rvkbhmi Trigudition Snsit Tibetn Ch inese Anotted Trnstion nd noducto S Stua Phlo logcauhca Monograph Series 20 (Toyo Inteatonal Insttte for Buhist S ties of the InteationalCollege for Postgrauate Buhst Sties, 2006), 1 9

1


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Manwl, Sctausn s sown ta arly ogcra Scool txts cntury E

an latr) rl avly uon t (Mla) Sarvstvn gama traton Fnally

Dlanu an amab av suggst tat Sgaot cnty translator of

Sarvstvn mtaton txts nto Cnswas lkly coct wt a mlu of

mtaton practtonrs, call yogcas, wo wr t probabl forrs to t

ogcra Schoo6 Morovr, Dlanu nots tat Abhidharmamahibhastra

( otr arly abka txts) on rfrs to th vws of ogcras n a

rsctl manr as toug ts ogcras wr not a scool apart om abka,

but ratr wr a loosly form oup of mos wo az n sprtual cultvaton

In otr wors, sclars av scovr tat t r sgnatonsSarvstvn,

Satrtka, ogcraall coul av bn appl to a sngl gvn nvual, n orr

to ncat t sparat fv

s t vnaya tat

ractc, t plosocal stran ofabka tat follow, a, raps, t

rlatonsp to formal mtaton ractc t, spt t classcatory rformulaton

rqur by ts nngs, many tracs of t rg classcatons av y to b

rmov

On of t lngrng tracs of rgty n scolarly classcaton s t prsstntscolary ractc of t callng t * Yogcrabhmi (BS) of Sagaraka a

Kritzer, Vasubadhu d the Yogcrbhmi Yogcr Eemets i the Abhidhrmkobhy xi celeanu, The hpter o the ude Pth ukikmrg i the rvkbhmi A riigu EditioSsit Tibet Chiese Aotted Trstio d troducto Study 157-62Few scholars hae attempte to answer the question what type of afliation the name yogcra mighthae originally suggested Hopelly this paper will moe the conersation forwar

cKritzer, Vasubdhu d the Yogcrbhmi Yogcr Eemets i the Abhidhrmkobhy xi.where Kritzer states, "Sti ll traces of the aitional rigi classications linger in our mins. he Chinese title of the YBS is Xixig do dijig Demiille offers a philological argument in supportof anslating the title Yogcrbhmi Furthermoe, due to the great similari beteen this text an thelater text nown as Yogcrbhmi (particularly te rvkbhmi section), the sansrit title of YBSseems een more liely hus, sin ce most scholars of Chinese hae accepte emiille s arguments for


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vania tt. Of cos, I do dispute tt t fct tt t BS s mn

vk" elements . Howv, I would gu tat n outmodd clssicato

scm s led scols to ovloo numb of pott poto-Mna lmns

And, in tis pp, I intnd to min numb of ts poto-Mn lmnts

namel, t usge f t tyoga to indict a notion ofmdittion s unication,

t vision pctic of buddhnusmt (calling buddha to mind"), t sotiological

impotnce of tveling to t Buddas domin, mdittiv mpsis on mptiness ,

nd t mention of gat compssion. Fo, bsd on ts poto-Mna

ttual" elmnts nd t vilabl contl" vidnce I sall dduc (blow), I will

gu tt te BS sould b undestood, not s vni tt, but t as

poto-Mn tet, so tt, toug tis fmng," a nw avenu fo

undstanding of te dvelopmnt of t Ma will be opnd up fo fute

sac.

Acdmic scolsip b Bouc, Haison, Dlnu, nd Dmivill as

ld illumintd t impotnt ole plad b mditating fost dwlls in t

ction of Mn stras Hnc, ttntion as ld ben paid to t poliftion

of nw foms ofsamdh in te n toug t vision pctic of

this title an the philo logical evience of its title I wil l refer to i t in this paper as Yogcrbhmi withoutthe preceing asterisk or by the abbreviation YBS eleanu The hpter on the undne Pth ukikmrg in the rvkbhmi TriinguEdition Snsit Tibetn hinese nnotted Trnstion nd noducto Study 1 5 8 ating i ifficult an notions o f a proto-Mahya e teleological an problmatic onetheles s Iam roughly following De leanu s lal out of to perios a proto-Mahya perio 2d cent-5centryan early Mahya (5 cenry- cenry Sti ll it shoul be unerstoo that the beginng of theProto-Mahya perio is much conteste an I myself suspect it starte starte prior to 2d centry

Richarombrich has also suggeste that the Mahyna stras were literary rather an oral

constrctions . Since the Mahyna stras are structrally complex he argues that they aros e ue to ecompositional avantages of writing (compare to the oral traition of the Pli c anon Thus h e ates thebeginning of the Mahya stras as beig no earlier than the avent of writing in Inia 2d B.C.E?) Histheory oes not convincgly account for the fact that oral versions of stras might have been passe ownprior to this time an only taken on their written form later


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buddhnusmti In ny even, since the conetion between buddnusmti nd the ise

of the Mhyn is well estblished, thee is no need to ehsh nd epove tht

eltionship hee oweve, topic tht hs not been ddessed elsewhee, stisfctoily

at least, is whether theYBS's distinctive proto-Myna usage of the teyoga be

undestood s semntic e of potoMhyn soteiologicl distinctions 3

In this ppe, in ode to dess these questions (nd ise some moe), the

potoMhyn usge of te temyoga will be emined ginst te bcdop of

vious othe usges in Bnic nd nonBmic tets nd contets, so tht the

distnctiveness of the poto Mhyn usge of the tem not only comes to the foe bu

lso evels distinctive notion of Buddhist medittion tht is focused on the pocess of

uniction. " In so doing, I hope to ugest, then, t tis ey notion ofyoga qua

pocess of uniction" plyed signicnt ole in fming the ely hyn gol of

becoming buddh nd the polifetion of Mhy ss with this soteiology

In ode to poblemtize the issues elevnt to such study, this ppe will, st,

sketh out genel hstoy of usge of the temyoga nd identi the contets in whic

it ws used genelly to me medittion" (s opposed to discipline), 5 net lyze the

To my knowlege no one has aresse this specic usage Although Jonathan Sil oes analyze theoccurrence of the term yogca his sy focuses only on the terms textal occurrence noon thecontent a context whch i t occurs cf S ilks articl e inJonathan A Silk Wisom Compassion an theSearch for nerstaning The Buhist Sies egacy of Gajin M Nagao in Studies i the BuddhitTrditios e Gajin Nagao (Honolulu niversi of Hawaii Press 2000There are methoological problems associate with such a broa analysis of what I am cal ling semanticarkers (after Birgit ellner s suggestionespecially since h religious an linguistic Inian lanscapeis me since the surviving evience is mostly in Chinese an sinc e language an usage evolveifferently in ifferent contexts Nonethe less this brief paper is meant primarily to ame the questionsot answer them an hence th e rles of meoology are less pertinent In tis regar I am heartene by

the ictm there are no stpi questions just stpi swers Furthermore it is regretl at Jain anther non-brahmanical contexts can not be covere in this paper but woul nee to be inclue in anymore comprehensive sies ne of the most bas ic buhist path istinctions seems to have been the threefol istinction betweenteachings on iscip line on meitation an on wisom Although these three are sai to work together therecise relationship beteen thm can be explaine in ifferent ways Generally speaking in this paper I


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spcic YBS usg of trmyoga to indic mdittiv procss of uniction nd its

connction to t visionr prctic of buddhnusmti (clling buddha to mind)

Tn, I will prsnt pssgs from t S nd its istoricl contt in ordr to riss

qustions to rgrding t scolrl crctriztion of t BS s so-clld

rvn prctic tt nd to igligt t spcic rol tt rl groups of proto-

Mnyog prctitionrs ogcra) migt v pld in t dvlopmnt of rl

Mn doctrins. 6 In ordr to m bring ts points out, owvr, mc

bcground must b lid out rst

The Background of the Buddhist Usage of te Term Yoga

1 T Pli Contt

Scolrs v csd to dicotomiz t Pli is s t omognous stndrd

ginst wic Mn scripturs cn b msurd for trognous innovtion Still

tndnc mong Pli scolrs to rgrd Pli tinolog s oodo continus

Dspit t fct t mn studis v dbund tis Pli-cntrism, t prlimr

rfrnc to oodo" Pli cnon cn still provid usl sting point for brod

omprisons rgrding t so-clld rv nd Mn.

In is rticl T Concpt of Yoga in t is, " Sozn Kumoi s nlzd

cnonicl usg of t trm yoga nd s concludd tt in cnonicl Pli tts, t

ill use the te medittion here to refer to practices that woul foally (but not exclusively benertaken in seate pos ition while engaging in mental cultivation techniques The emphasis on this

oal practice shoul not be unerstoo as excluing the post-meitative resultant mental psychologicalr spirital states but rather as separating i t from the practice o f iscip line or the realization of the acalisom bo from hearing contemplating or meitatingIt shoul be note that s ince this stuy is merely preliminary base entirely on seconaryscholarship the focus below will be primarily to raise questions for the sake of orienting my own anthers tre research rather than to evelop speculative theories in etail

5


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term yoga was used to mean onl the coolling the senses b means of xing of a

mind uon an object In s std, The Origin of Buddhist Meditation, Alexander

We conrms a similar usage of the term within the Pi kas However,

according to Wnne, the canonical usage of the teyoga referre onl to the work'

or disciline ' of ier concentration and not to the concentration itself, which was

indicate b the term samdhi Desite the subtle distinctions between their

conclusions, both scholars agree that, even in earl non-canonical Pli literatre, the

term yoga was rarel use (if ever) to refer to meitation urthermore, regaring the

4th centur Pli commentator Buhaghosa, who use the term yoga to refer to

meitative concentration, both scholars suggest that it was a late usage adoted from

non-Buddhists that arose due to the direct iuence from earl Bramanic sources

Although we will see (below) that Kumoi and Wnne ignored earl Buddhist usage of

He focuses , in particular, on e well ateste occurrence yogkhem ogkem) Shozen Kumoi,The Concept of oga in the Nikyas in Buddhvidysudhkr Studies in Honour oJHeinz Becherton the Occsion oHis 65th Birthdy e B angwei Wang (Swisttal-Olenorf Inica Et Tibetica Verlag1997, 407 . Alexaner Wynne, The Origin o Buddhist edittion (onon ; New ork Routlege 2007, 8 Wynne also suggests that this meaning was the brahmanical meaning. However, the Maitri meanings(examined below) c learly di scount Wynne' s generalization.

Wynne suggests these usages are extremely rare an peachable. A clo se philo logical analys s woul

be neee to etermine wheher the rare usages of the term yoga qu meitation were inee lateraccretions. Wynne, The Origin o Buddhist edittion 8, 29 . See Katha pania (II 3 1 0, 1 1 a-b,1 2 in S Rahakrishnan The Princ ip Upnids (onon, New ork, Allen & nwin; Humanities Press1 96 9. Wynne an Kumoi a lso mention other passages in Katha Personal communication by r ance Cousins Although both umoi an Wynne also trace the Niky meaning ofyog to the Kh Upnid (anperhaps earlier, the meaning ofyog in the K!h [pnid seems to iffer from their ie a of it asiscipline See Rahakrishnan, The Princip Upn ids 645-8. In Kh pnid (II 3 1 0, 1 1 whereit says When the ve (s enses know leges together with the min cease (om their normal activitiesan the intellect itself oes not st, that they say, is the highes t sate. Thi s, they consier to be oga thesteay control of te senses. Then one becomes unistracte for oga comes an goes . If this alonewere the enition, it woul be unerstanable how Wynne an umoi (an eussen before them coultake the Kh Upnid sense ofyog to mean merely control of the senses an how they coul havecorrelate this to the Pli Nikya sense of the wor nfortnately, the very next set of verses explain howthis yog leas to a kin of oneness where knowlege is gaine of the whole rule of Yoga throughwhich Brhmn" is attaine. Hence Kh Upnid itself was likely not a irec t source


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the term to refer to meitatio it might b worthwhile rst to examine the Brahmanic

contex to which the attribute the usage of oga qua meitation

The Braanic ontext rom Veas to

As a surising cotrast to Wne' s an Kumoi ' s resuositios regarding the

Braanic usage of the te, the well nownyoga historian, David White has suggeste

that, om the earliest Veic times tough the Uaniads, the Brahmanic teyoga was

emloed rimaril in the sense of oking animals" an secicall refeed to the

straing own of animals for sacrice on a stretching evice nown as a "tantra

According to White, it was onl in the later Uaniadic times that the te yoga came to

be use in coection wit the ractice of oking of ersons, where it indicate the

ractice of becoming ossesse b a god, such as Sra Although Whites exlanatio

has et to gain wiesrea scholarl accetance, his research has made it clear that the

Veic usage of the termyga was maril foun i the context of sacrice rituals

urthermore, since yoga qua oking" (the later Uaiadic usage) resuose a Veic

an Brahmanic soteriolog, White has argue thatyoga siml never imlied a form of

meitation in either Brahmanic or non-Brahmanic contexts until much later its storPerhas comlementing ite's theor, however, is the theor resente b

Edwar rangle in his book The Origin and Development Early Indian ontemplative

Practices Here, rangle attemts to trace the li betwee the earl Veic ractice of

Fom a pe-elease copy ofSiister Yogis by David Whte, (Unvesity of Chicago Pess, 2008) indu Tantagiven out in a class offeed at UCSB in fall of2006 Cf David Godon Whte Kiss othe Yogi Tric Sex ts South Asi otexts (Chicago ; ondon: Unvesity of Chicago Pess,2003)


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upsan and later forms of Uiadic qua meditation ractice According to

Crangle, the Vedic ractice of upsan, (re_ century B CE ) , involved a meditative

asect in which the worshier focused his mind on the elements or on

imercetible objects (such as the breath, the sense organs or the utterance of verbal

smbols) and ronounced the names and eithets of a articular Vedic deit (such as

Agni, Sra, or Indra) in order to invoke and seek communion with that deit b means

of exteal offerings ,5 In this wa, rangle suggests, the upsaka attemted to realize

Brahman6 urthermore, rangle suggests that, although usan was racticed in

arallel" to in earl times, b the later Uaniads, that upsan had become

snthesized" with the ractice of

Even though some might argue with rangle s chacterization of this snthesis

This tem liteally means sittig nea but means to attend o seve In this context, it means to attend tothe gods o implies "woship The te had diffeent meanings i the buddhst context whee it was

applied to lay pesons who lved close to the odained monastic c ommunity cEdwad FitpatickCangle, The Oigin nd Deveopmen t oEry ndin ontemptive Pctices Studies in OientalReligions, V 29 (Wiesbaden Haassowit Velag, 19 94), 8 8 Ibid, 76-8 0 White poits to my passages whee this pactice can be undestood as a fom of "(selfpossession (ve) This notion of yoga pactice qu self-possess ion may well have been pevalent inHindu cicles, but I will not delve fa into it hee, since it does no t coelate to the meditational aspectclealy adopted by Buddhist usage of the tem, which as we will s ee below, may pecede the meditationalaspect of the Hidu usage in some egads C Fedeck M Smith, The Se Possessed Dei nd SpiitPossession in South Asin iterre nd ivition (New Yok, NY ; Chicheste Columbia Univesiess, 200 6)

Klemens Kalsson, Face to Face with the Absent Buddha The Fomation of Buddhist Aniconc At(Acta Univesitatis Upsaliensis , 2000, 6 1 Kalsson cites Cangle, The Origin nd Deveopment oErynin ontemptive Pctices 72-82 The aiti has also been efeed to the iy UpnidThough I am not able to discuss the pecise dates fo these names, it would be inteesting to examine thisevolution in egad to the pactiones not ust ofyog ogc) but also the pactitiones o f upsn (i e upsk) Deleanu notes that upsk does not mean laity They wee devoted lay pactitiones, whoengaged in a seious degee of pactice, somewhat akin to semipofess ionals The Ugrdttpipcchsta evolves aod the upsaka Ugadatta in an nteesting way Cangle, The Origin nd Deveopment oEy ndin ontemptive Prctices 87 See also Kalsson,Face to Face with the Absent Buddha The Fomation of Buddhist Aniconc At, 62 Some scho lashave suggested that it was not Bahmanic but Buddhist notions of meditation that inuenced the latepaniadic tought Howeve, thee ae many histoogaphic difficulties in tacng whethe thee wasindeed a buddhist nfluence on the yog descibed in the eithe the ealie and late Upaniads and itshould be noted that some contempoa scholas might ead this nuence diffeently Since the methodsof tansmiss ion and textal histoy make it dicult to d isc en ealy layes and late accetions of thesetexts, a genuine philological and contextal analysis of the iti Upnid would be necessa fogeate peci sion in addessing these i ssues This is beyond the puiew of this pape

8


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as contemlative ractice rangles heor of sthesis makes sense in light of the

descrition of the sixfold yoga ($aaga yoga ractice in the Matr Upana In

aricular three verses from the Yoga Method" chater of the Matr Upanad suggest

that the term yoga and upsan (as described b rangle) might have indeed merged 3

Ths it is said Because in his maer he j oins the breath the sllableaum and all this world in its manifoldness this [rocess of meditation] iscalled Yoga [the roces of unication] The resultant unit of the breaththe mind and likewise of the senses and the abandonment of allconditions of existence his is designated as Yoga 3

The rule for achieving this [the resultant unit] is said to be the sixfold yogacontrol of the breath ranyma) withdrawal of e senses rahra),meditation (dhyna), concentration (dhrana), contemlative inquir (tarka) andabsortion (samdh) hen b his oga), the [ractitioner] beholds the goldcolored maker the lord the erson, the Bram source then the sage shakingoff good and evil makes everhing into the resultant unit in the suremeindestructible3

In these Matr descritions ofyoga, we can distingish three basic meanings of yoga:

( 1 ) the sixfold process whereyoga means the rocess of uniing" the breath the mind

and the senses the resultant nit" of the rst (above) agrah where this sixfold

rocess ofyoga means the unit" that occurs when te breat mind and senses have

been joined and () the meeting" where a ractitioner beholds the gold-colored maker

the lord the erson the Bram source" nd achieves resultant nit in the sureme

Fo Wite , tis yoga pobably does not entail te manings implied in "ontemplative pactice Fo example, see note above on Kth wic bt Kumoi and Wynne attibute wit being te soue ofte nonnikya tem' s usage in te postNikya liteate, wee, Wynne admits, te te evolves and isuse in elation to meditation I ave used Radakisan s anslation, sice it is te mos t eadable an acessible A los epilological ompaison and a citcal eition migt yield s ligt nuanes , but fo te most pat, it s eemsacuate enoug wen ompaed wit te available sanskit editio to waant its usage in tis boadeliminay stdy Te bakets ae not mine Radakisnan, The Princip Upnids 835 Ibid, 83 0 Witout canging wods o meaning, I ave eoganied Radakisnan s pases into aope Englis setence (not Sanskit wod ode fo e sake of claity


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indestrctible33 Tus altoug te asse glosses yoga in tree was, two of tese

glosses are two different tes of unit e rst unit is te unit of breat, bod

and mind and is a relimin art ofte sixfold yoga e second unit indicates e

resultant unit of aer beolding te Bram source is second te of resultt

unit is secied in te Maitri Upani$ad .as a meditation on te sun (sa) and its

ligt,34 and tus aears to be te meditative equivalent of te Vedic upsan ractice

were te sun is worsied troug exteal offegs 35 his tird te ofunit does

not articularl suggest becoming te Bram source, just meeting and beolding it

e ke semantic si to note ere, ten, is tat te term, whic once meant disciline

as in te Pli context, is now coected wit meditative meeting wit an enligtening

resence of some sort

Since te Maitri Upani$ad was not written down until cent man

scolars (suc as David ite) migt discount tese assages as ossessing later

accretions and suggest tat te read ver differentl in earl times 36 However, it must

be noted tat I am not attemting ere to establish te earl date of tis assage or

analze it istoricit so muc as I am using it to sketc out te semantic range of tis

te in te literar context of te Upani$ads Thus, wether or not we accet ranglessggestion tat upsan andyoga were searate racties in Vedic times and became

stesized as contemlative ractice onl in te later Uanias, tese tee related

Thee is no space to examine alteate eadings of this pass age hee, like those moe in line with DavidWite s eadings of simila passages Although I ead though a mode sanskit edition of this text to vei the tanslation, I do not pesently

have access to the sanskit text at this time and egetlly, c annot povide the exact citation o saskitlines S ince it is not a histoicall unimpeachable vesion of the text and since i t is only be ing used hee asa geneal backdop this omiss ion will hopelly be excused Cangle, The Origin nd Deveopment ofEry ndin Contemptive Prctices 1 1 1 , 3 3 In fact, David White s statements in hi s class "Tata is the souce of this 4 centuy date Futheeseach would be equied to deteine whethe this date is indeed widel accepted

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(but distinct) meings ofyoga shoul be ket in mind, since the will info our

examination (below) of a similar, but more daable, eal Budhist usage of yoga qua

meditation3

3 . Budhist Meitation

Although there is some evidence that the te yoga aeared in the Budhist gamas

and even occasionall in Sarvstivd Abhidhaa texts (robabl) dating from at leastthe 2nd centur BE ,3 Sagharaka's Yogcrabhmi (YBS) 3 rovides erhas one

of the earliest datable nonPliika usages of the te oga qua meditation in an

Buddhist context For this reaso, we will focus rimaril on exaning this text and its

context within the remaider of this er4 Interestingl, the YBS, whose title means

On the othe hand the Kh pni$d (suggested by Kumoi and Wynne as the souce ofyog qumeditation) seems to eect a usage o f the temyog that was not epicity connected wi upsn (as itwas in the itri pni$d passage examined above) The Kh pni$d appeas to have involved olyo types ofyoga e "jo ining pocess and the esulting "oeness This pape is not he place foaaling this passae moe caelly Howeve i appeas to me that Wyne and Kumoi have eitheignoed o intepeted away the second pat of the denition which is tanslated (above) a s "Then onebecomes undistacted fo Yoga comes and goes (prmtts td bhvti yogo hi prbhvpyyu) Thecompoundprbhvpyyu tat is tanslated hee as the obscue phase "comes and goes (liteally thatwhich has "coming and going) can mean many othe things including "ceation and diss olution (whichsuggests deityoga notions) o pehaps even the souce ad juctue (which suggests a Maiti

Upaniad-like distinction between jo iing and oneness with the souce) Without a pilological stdy, it ishad to know e povenance and usage hee As mentioned above the vibh$str efes to yogcas Although this text may have beencomposed ealie it is difcult to date it pio to the d o even 4 ceny CE Howeve the oot texti e the hvibh$ itse lf seems to be a vey ol d text with pats stemming om at least the 2d centuyBCE Howeve most of the content and language of the extant text ae not datable until the 5 c entyCE The terminus nte quem fo tis text is 148 CE the date An Shigao came to China ad tanslated it itoChinese Any date befoe that is a matte fo cael philo logical compaison which is beyond the puviewfthis pape It should be noted that the evidence in these YBS ns counte to David White s eseach and offes

vidence divegent fom his moe geneal conclusions about e Indian eligious landscape In myesonal discussion with David White he has mainly agued that the tem yogin was not spec ificallypplied to pesons pio to its appeaance in the Snti Prvn fo which he gives a terminus nte q uem ofthe the 4 centuy Although he is not pimaily conceed with buddhist notions o f the tem, his theo ofthe tems yog and yogin tends to genealie acoss eligious boundaies which he has only cusoilyinvestigated May of he obvious Hindu usages of the temsyog qu meditation o yogi qu meditato

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Stags of Yoga Practitionrs, 4 is ict to scriing th rcis maning ofyoga

in its Sarvstivin contxt4 A analsis of th YBS shows that multil mitation

ractics wr inclu unr th rubric ofyog, suggsting that it was mrl a gnral

trm maning mitation 43 Although this gnral maning ofyoga as mitation is

attst in latr Inian commntaris ,44 th Ugrdattaparpcch-stra suggsts that th

t yoga might hav mant somthing slightl mor scic in arl Mahna. In

articular, list of rsons in th Ugra istinguishs btwn two s of mos,

naml a mitator (dhyn) an a yoga racitionr ogcra) It is rhas saf o

assum that both th dhyn an th yogcra ar oing somthing w can call

mitation howvr a rthr xamination is rqu to s whthryoga as a t can

b rthr istinguish from dhyna in arl contxts

e eted bsed on lck of unimpechble witten evidence of ely times Although hite s sticttextul dting stndds e dmile nd foce histoins to justify thei dting moe pecisely theYogcrabhumi nd the A9ta e to exmples of Chinese nsltions which show stong evidence ofthese medittionl usges nd need to be ddessed by hi in te studies This is not to sy ththite' s conclusions e not ccut with espect to cetin segments of the nonbddhist popultio inncient Indi yogcra is oen glo ssed s n exoteic, bhuvi compound mening "on e fo who thee is pctice ofyog ence yog pcitione Pul Demiville Le Yogchmi De Sghs Bllein de L'Ecole Franaise XLIV, no 1( 1 9 5 1 ) 3 3940 Demiville lso mentions the pos sibil ity tht the title Yogcbhmi could men "l tee

de l ptique (lit "the level of medittion pctice) nd this is ilks povisionl eding of the titleoweve bsed on D emiville s study nd bsed on the o the glosses we get fom the text itselfnotmention ose in the Srvakabhmi ndBodisavabhi which lso clely efe to pctitionesitseems moe likely thtyogra hee efes to pctitione S ilk seems ovely consevtive when hesys we would need n exmple of *yogck (which is unttested nhee) in ode to be cetin thtthis is bhuviEtienne Lmotte Hiso of Indian Bddhis: From he Origins o e Saka ra (LouvinlNeuve:Univesitctholique de Louvin Institt oientliste 1 9 8 8) 2 1 7Lmotte suggest tht yog issynonymous with smdhi In his lok, ibhd (800 CE) sys "yoga is distinctive [kind oamdi, wheesRtnknti ( 1 1 th centy) sys in the opening lines of his Prajprai-Bhvan-padea, lsyo dng sgom p ni ming gi m gngs dg go i e yoga is equivlent to bhvan. Seeshes rab i

pha rol phyn pa bgom pa'i an ngag([pjJApAmibhAvnopde]) [D No] 4545 jo oi choschung gi 1 7321 756 [N gi 1 9621 98 6 [Kinsh 3458 gi 248b6 (p 12 536)

Jonthn Silk notes this list but does not to unpck this ely oc cuence though n nlysis of thecontext in which it occus I will ttempt to do just tht e low

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Below, I will gue tht in the YB, the tem yoga seems to nction s generl

semntic mrker fo () the process of uicion"of te mind, the bret nd the

senses (2) the resultnt uni,6 of body nd mind results through relizing their

eptiness nd () the resultnt meeg" with the oin of the Bud through the

prctice of buddhnusmti (i.e. clling te Budh to mi)47 other words, yoga in

the YBS is multivlent te tht encomsses menigs similr to those described in

e Maitri Upaniad nd explined by Crngle s te synthesis of Vedic upsan nd

yoga prctice.48 Furthemoe, it is tem tht speciclly refers to medittive pctice,

throug whc one meets with he qulity of the Bud49 Althoug I will suggest,

beow, tht this ide ofyoga qua process of uniction led to Mhyn soteriology of

becomng budd, I do not intend eer to rgue here tht the ide of uniction or

unity (t ths erly stge) ment becoming Budh.

Noneteless, given wht is own bout other Buddhst nd on-Buddhist

contexts, one ight s, ow is it tht Srstidin text, rougy contemporneous

wih the Pli-Nikys,50 cme to use te te yoga suc different wy from the P

Niys? And, how is it tht we only see the simr usge in the Pli yogacra

rising in Pli post-cnonic wos such s Buddhgos's Visuddhimagga, fter the

Most scholas would of couse, agee that the late Buddhist Vajaya usage of the te yoga meanthe pocess of "the poces s ofunification with the esult of "the esultant unity Howeve, we aefocused on vey ealy usage of the te hee Hee, I do not intend to suggest that the Vajayna notion of "the esultant unity o that the so -calledMahyna notion of "the esultantunity wee the same as the o ne expessed hee Whethe one ch aacteizes the yoga in Mairi passage as "contemplative pactice (Cangle) o not(White) is not impotant in this egad, since the YBS clealy potays a yoga focused on meditation Pointing out the geneal "similai of to passages i s not being intended as evidence o f any boowin

fom one s ide o othe Rathe, the distictive YBS usage of the tem will be ead below within specicontexts in which they occu Othe stdies might addess issues o f boowing Pli Nikyas ceainly pupot to epot the wod of the budha as it was spoken Howeve, s ince theyhemselves pupot to have been witten down in appoimately 5 0 B C E, they wee witten down aoundthe same tme as the witing down of the gamas, my of which ae pesently being studied by RichadSalomon


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u of te sth century?5 Is yga ua eiation a seantic arer tat necessarly

inicates proto-Mayna soteriology? If so, en i it begin to be use as suc?

In orer to buil towas an answer to tis question in te reainer of tis

pper, I will rst sketc out the textual istory surouning te copilation of te BS,

ten attept to point out a few relevant an signicant passages escribing practice, an

nally, ll in te porit of the counity surroing this usage of te yoga wit

soe of te bioapcal, aneotal, n arceological inforation Noneteless in

orer evelop a sense of te relevnce a signicance of te BS, soe basic

bckgroun inforation regaring te Yogcrabhm (B) igt provie a usel

eans for igligting the storical pecularities of the BS, especially since bot exts

later coe to be coecte wit te practice ofyoga ua eitation

he gcram of Sa.gharaka

The of Two

ccoring to ost scolars,3 te Yogcrabhm ttribute by te Tibetans to

saga an by te Cinese to Mitreyawas actually copile in te sth centu fro

arious pre-existing aterials54 Noneteless, te olest of te B's sections, calle te

rvakabhm, is sai to contin priarily rvaayna aterials tat ate t least to te

Pesonal counicaton with ance Cous ns51 Studyin the compi lation history of YB based on Chinese catalogues of ranslations is problematic andoesnot provide an unimpeachable b ass for surveyng Indian in

tellectal history. Here, however, datesand methods are beng reported for the sake of preliminary reference only and are not a cenral part of thisae' s agument Fo example , Schmthausen, Deleanu, and Kite Not all scholas belive that Asaga was espons ble fo the al compilation, since this would meantat it was com leted in the late fout centy


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d cery CE 55 The YBs ex oldes secio, accordig o Deleau, Scmiause

ad ohers, is he Bodhisatabhmi (BB) Acordig o Daidso, whe e BB was

rs raslaed io Chiese by e yogcra Gaa i E, i was cas i he

form of a idepede stra (by placig e ioducor caper of he

Upliparipcchstra a he beginig)56 Based o is (ad oer facs), Daidso ad

oer scolars hae suggesed a e rakabhmi ad e BB were gradually wrie

ad compiled io he YB alog wih oer idepede exs i e earl ceury I

55 C.E, we e YB i is eirey (as i is o oday) was ally aslaed io

Ciese, he YB ad absorbed he rakabhmi, Bodhisattabhmi , e so-called

*Maulya Bhmi, he Vinicayasagrahan ad oer secios I doig so i was o

loger a ex focused o mediaio; raher, had become a compedium of Maya

iews, episemologies, sories, ad pracices ad was formally aibued o Maireya 58

Te less well ow Yogcrabhmi (YB), meioed aboe was puored o

have bee wriecompiled by Sagharasa (i he early2 cery).59 Delenu saes

a he YBS is ery simil o 's rvakabhmi i erms of co bu er

differe i erms of syle Because of is, Deleau suggess ha e YBS is

coemporaeous wi e

rvakabhmi ad o a direc forerner o i Te early

This theoy equies us to assume that the Srvakabhumi section was initially called e Yogcrabhuibut eceived its name at the time of compilation Ronald M D avidson, Buddhist Systems of Tansfomation ayaPaavttiPavtti among theYogca niesity of Califoia Bekeley, 1 98 5) , 5,9 Though Deleanu mentions that thee i s some evidence of this tem having been used to efe to theseoot sections, it did not seem to be a name established in India, although S chmithausen co ined as such Davidson, Buddhist Systems of Tansfomation : ayaPaavttiPavtti among the Yogca , 23

This asciption tus out to have been the ealiest witten asciption of any text to eithe Maiteya oAsaga S ince it too k centuies fo the famous "e teatises to be attibuted to Maiteya / Asaga, teogcrabhmi, which is consideed at best to be a edaction by Asaga, povides pehaps the mos teliable evidence of Asaga s own Mahya views Deleanu and Demiville both agee with this attibution to Saghaaka and hence, I will fol low temhee

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date of te YBS s attested b ts translaton nto Cnese between 148-70 C 60 In84

C Daara$a (wo was also a translator of ana texts, suc as te

Sddhrmprksta) retranslated te YBS nto Cnese Despte

Darmara$a's own personal ana alaton, s traslaton accuratel

coesponds wt A Sgao's pror translaton of t Accordng to Demlle and

oters, te YBS s clearl a rana medtaton text assocated wt te Dr$nta

ews of te Kasr Sarstdn scool Interestngl, Dmara$a's orgnal

translaton of YBS62 appears to ae been capters ng63 Howeer, n3 84 E

wen Dao-an wrote te preface to te YBS, e noted tat tee addtonal capters a

been aded mang a total of30 capters 64 Tese tree addtonal capters, accordng

to Delle, actuall ncton as a sall aastr on te tree tpes of

practtonersArats, Prateabuddas, and Bodsttasand contan seeral parables

demonstratng te partcular nuence of te Sddhrmpurkstr an ts

Demivile, e ogcrabhmi De Sagharasa, 343 -4 Athough is version appears to have beennly a partial translation f the exact s ame Yograbhui that ould be anslated in its entire intoChinese one hundred fif years later, in 2 84 C E by Dharmaraka, Demiville has presented convincing

rguments for why the later BS translation sh ould be regarded as uncnged In brief, his argument is :the earliest transltion of Sagharaka s text had only seven chapters of he "complete text ofhaarakka In particular, only the contents of chapters 1 -5 , 22, 24 ere translated in ll However,since is early translation also included al chapter titles f Dharmarksas translation in 284 CE andsice the texts correspond it many ther ays, D emiville argues tat the rst seven chapters representmerely an excerpt from the lrger text which must already have been extant in 1 48 C E He argues rther,convincingly, that Dharmaraka' s version of the chapters missing in the 148 CE translation, can be tkens dting from the 2 centry The ain point to understand here is that, depite there being twoanslations thin the period of one hundred and f years, there appears t have been only one originalYBS text (dating from the 2 centry) that was used Ibid 343 Davidson also lis ts Dharmraka s the ne of a translator o f Bo dhisttabhmi in the 5 cenryFurther research is required to determine whether this is another Dharmaraka or an err Demiville , e ogcabhmi De Sagharasa 33 9n2 C Davidson, uddhist Systems ofransformation : raya-Paravtti-Prvtti mong the ogcra , 1 2 -9 D avidson finds other evideceof ndhi Vaibhika inuence Demiville, e ogcrabhmi e S gharasa, 349

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disicive Mhyn soerioogy. Since i ppers h hese ee chpers were

dded only fer Dhrmrks rnslion ws cloged, i is no cler when nd by

whom hese chpers ce o be ppended o he YBS However, ccording o

Demiville, ching Mhyn stras o rvky prcice exs ws no nusl

occence in he centry In fc, he rnslion records of he n cenry show h

rnslios of rvkyn nd Mhyn exs hd ofen een kep sepre However,

sring from Dhrs nslions in he centr onwrd, one ds mny exs

deling speciclly wih rvyn yoga prcices being cs s stras nd ppended

wih sepre Mhyn sas Ths, ccordg o he Chinese rnslions, i ws

only in he begiing of he 5 cenry h he exs trnsled by Kmrjv begn o

presen rvky prcices side by side wih wo Mhyn componens, mely he

odhisv idel (insed of he Arh idel) nd Mhy noion of higher fculies

(abh, insed of he rvky noion of hese). Becse of his, mny scholrs

hve suggesed h he rnslion hisor of he YBS provides n illnig glimpse

f rdiion midwl7 eween rvkyn nd Mhyn 8

However, his brief overview lso rises severl qesions For insnce i is

well kown h cerin Mhyn prcices hd lredy been rnsled io Chese i

bid , 340, 429n 1 Demiville points at only one distinctive Mahyana soteriologi cal element, i e theccrrence of the Mahyna ida of "jumping ahead on the path He explains the Chinese term meaningumping ahead was probably ykrak ca It is interesting to note that the Tibetan anslation ofthe yogcra text known as e abhisaaylakra contains a s imilar notion which it translates as hoalIbid 3 52 -4 Since there is no specific eidence of this practice of appending Mahyna texts India,some have sggested that this practice began China Althogh this is a convenient assumption, theanslation and catologing practices China wold have been overseen (at least in part) by thetanslators from greater India Hence, it may very well have been a practice imported from India

Demiville li calls it aichei

itzer calls i t the text abridge

It might be worthwhile toemphasize here that these scholars did not call the text a "mi-chemin and so on because of its earliestcontent, bt becase o its later translation history Citzer, Vasbadh ad he Yogcrabhi ogcra lees i he Abhidharmakoabhya, xxvii It is only the translation history, not the content of the BS tha makes Demiville and Del ean say this hey both p lace the content of the text squarely in the rvakayna

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the 2 centur Wh, then, would Mhn ppendices e dded specicll onto

rvkn s ogaprctice texts? Demivile notes ther tht, when the Mh

ppendices were mde, the were introduced with sttements like, ht ws for those

with wek fculties, but for those who hve the pst merit nd thepra Were

these coents merel n ttempt to inspire prctitioners to Mn prctice? If so

wh did Dhrmrk not simpl nslte onl Mhn texts nd forget bout the

rvkn ones)? Ws it becuse the Mhyn did not hve serte prctice from

rvkn in generl? If so, wh do we see these penices occurring especilly

with yoga texts? he nswer to this question will e ddresse elow But rst, perhps

it would e good to get bit more cqu it some o o-clled rvkyn

yogaprctices actuay descried in te YBS itsel

2 Sttements in the BS

It is dicult to get n ccurte overview of the entie text without crel tud

onetheless, b glncing t the titles of the 27 chpters, we cn see tht the BS

ossesses reltivel fmilir rvkn strctre ht is to s, none of the

rctices described in the YBS pper to be different from the norml rvk

rctices However, if we look more closely t the wy the te yoga is used in these

soclled rvkn chpters, we d mn hints of Mn prctice nd usges

similr to those in the Maitri Upai9adie the process of uniction" nd the two

For instane, the Prautpannabuddhasammukkh-straDemiville, e ograbhmi De Sgharasa, 3 54-5 Rather than interrupt the o ith a detailed explanation here , the Appendix to this paper inludes smary of BS hapters along ith nslations of other iportant quotes, so that readers might be ablet refer to i t nd get a better fel for ontents in the text

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tpes of resltant ty"

Te smlteos process of cato' of boy a mn" conssts ofte followng: te boy s seate stragt t te mn s not at all slack;

te sese facltes are pace teally tey o ot move exteallyanymore to obey te play of cases an cotos; e boy a sprt arejone estrctbly eqally a etcally; tey are perfectlymal correspoece " I ts way one aves raply to Na73

Beyo te smlarty sage e YBS also explas yoga as te process of

nfyng" boy a m tog tecqes smlar o te sxfol meto" of

yoga escrbe e Matr Upana log te YBS self roves

eale explanatons of w yoga as t" s aceve t mg also be wor

notng ere tat all sx metos of te sxfol yoga te Matr Upanaave

+ 7somesor OJ eqUvalnts1 C It es.

Frteore e YBS lso escrbes ayoga n some ways slar to te upsan

type ofyoga, or te resltant y" wt Sra e lgt maker I partclar says

(Caper 1 0) sol cotemplatng te for sels ntl e recozes nee tat e

mself s capable of obtag e for frts a te qalty of Ba 75 Ten

(Caper 1 5 , Te Dve Eye") at fter persstng beyon obstacles an maserig te

seses te yoga practtoer begs to evelop te exrasesor perceptons (abh) by

og te followg:

[Te yogaprcttoer] metaes olght tl te pot at wc llmnates s m even we s eyes are close I ts way eobtas te Darma-eye" wt eqalze vso rasces all stnces

In this paragraph, the Maii uses forms of the verbal roo tyjfor joining etc and connects this to unity(ka) emiville e ogcabhmi e S agharasa, 404 emiville translates (s iang ying) as

correspondance mutelle The similarity beeen these six methods i s too long and complex to compare and contrast here atlength There is no room for discuss ion of these here emiville, e ogcrabhmi e Sagharasa, 405 The four frits here mean stream enterer pthrough arha The "quali of a buddha is admittedly enigmatic here, but the immediately subsequentsections put this in more context See appendix for a complete sense of the yoga s progression

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ies t the hee of the uddhs gods coes the e biths dthe etie ichiliocosme e relizs the diie eye . 76

Ate descibig the deelopmet of the other e ghe owledges (abh) throgh

anusmti o the beth d o the impue (aubhabhan) i orde to bdo the

coditios of the wold" (s i the aitri Upaniadpssge boe, the medittio

culites whe withi the momt of oe thout, he coes the whole doi of

Buddh bck d foh,7 7

Although the Mai Upanisad d the BS diffe i tes of medittie ethod

d soteiology, it ight be wole here to hghlight the brod similrities here

betwee their ides of the pocess of uictio78 Ely i the BS, the pctitioe

goes tough the ious stges of beth, etc bt is ejoied to big to d the

excellece of the Tthgt's meits, his image, the Dhm d the Sagha The, i

the cotext of this edittio, the pctitioer begs by igiig light" (which is

well kow isulitio tecique.79 The, tough deelopig the Diie Eye d

Ibid 40 Buddhaghosa and Bhikkhu amoli, The Pah ofPraion Vsddhiagga edBuddhist Publication Socie, 5 th ed (Kandy, Sr i anka Buddhist Publication So ciety, 1 99 1) , 3 99

Buddhaghosa, riting on the divne eye four hundred years later, describes lghperception as a specicmeans for reaching brahm s realm Buddhaghosa (3 99-400) Remaining here and extending light, he seesthe vis ible form of Brahm S ee Appendix here, Chapter 22 n te last paragraph states, one goes"through practice, to the heaven of Brahm and the palace of uddhvsa This arrival in the heaven ofthe uddhvsa gods is redescribed severl times in the text Each time it becomes more clear that thepractitioner ofyoga gains unity not ith a god, but is mentally and physically transported to directlyexperience the quality ofthe Buddha Demiville, e ogcrabhmi De S agharasa, 4 1 0 Demiville suggests that this is not a buddhaeld bddhak


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oter abh te prtitioer psses beyond te Br rel8 Finally, te

prtitioer develops te power to re te Bd's doin8 1 And t tis point, e

s onlded te proess set p by reognizing sel to obtin te qlity o te

Bdda." In oter words, like te yoga desribed in te Maiti, tere is yog (qua

visaliztion) prtie involvig ligt rys tt leds to te meeting wit drm

sore, wi in tis se, is bdd.82 Ts, ltoug Deiville does not see to

read te Ciese te ere s inditing spei lly ll blown Myn Bdd

eld" it does not see m o a stret see tese visliztion tehniqes, wi lead

to Budd's domin," s iditing tt te BS sold not sily be lssied s

rvky prtie text (s solrs util ow ve done)

In t, te pters o te BS (i solrs ll rvkyn) possess

itel evidee to suggest tt te utor sel ws oneed prtiulrly

wit eeting wit Bdds d wit te otempltio of eptiness For instne, er

mentioing tt yog prtitioers re d trvel te wole doin o Bdd,,83

te BS ritiqes ordinry prtitioners wo not even penetrte te sio "4 I

noter very telling pssage, te BS sttes tt reolletion of te Bud, D,

nd Saga indeed ostites te priry tor or distinguising te "yoga

prtitioner" o te ordiry prtitioner" wo ppers to do te se prties

A ater passage says that yoga pratoners penetrate "to the heaven of Brahm and the paae ofuddhvsa For the ompete ontext fo ths quote see the Appendx n the ast paragraph beforehapter 2 hs suprasses MaUris "Brahm soure and probaby orreates to the Ream of uddhvsa Fo r omparson wth the stages of unaton n the Mairi, one shoud re-read the Matr passages frompages 9- 1 1 (above)

Demvle Le Yogabhm De Sagharasa 4 1 1 Ibd 410 f Deeanu The Chaper on he Mndane Pah Lakikarga) in he Srvakabhui ATrilingal diion ansi Tibean Chinese) Annoaed Translaion and Inodco dy, 1 5 8 eeanu reads the hnese word forphana as "nove buddhsts rather than nonBuddhsts asemv e d D emvle s expanaton and the ontext wtn the text make t qute ear that thes e arenon-Buddhsts here I w foow Demve s readng


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a Paciiones85

Odinay pactiiones aive at quiscence oug focusing ei mindson ei couned beas Tey desoy e obsacle of e aggegaes(skanda), aive eacen, an ene no e rs Dyna sae,

wee ey sive o obain te ige knowleges (ab) an inpaicula, e magical powes, oug wic ey become te mases ofe fout Dyna sae Tougou ese execises e odiny

paciione's min as no ohe noion besies e beas emselves

[weeas Jb Paciiones

Te yoga paciione as pesen befe is min e noion of e meis

of e Bua, e Dama, an te Saga (budda-darma-saga anusmti) and e meaning of e ou Noble Ts, houg woseblessings e obains e fou oos of ve (kuala mla)

In oe wods, e YBS explains ta te diffeence beween e odina mediaion

paciione an e yoga pactiione lies pecisely in e fac a ayoga paciione as

e abiliy o keep pesen befoe is mind e notion of te meis of e Buda,

Dama, an Saga ogete wi e eing of e Fou Noble Tus ,8 Does is

mean a yoga is coece wi e pactice of ecollecing e Buda, Dama,

Saga8 Since e ex also menions (ealie) a e pacice of ecollecing is o be

one wi e iage" of te Buda, oes is inicae a a saue (o paining) mig

ave been used as a suppo fo a vizalizaion pacice

If so it is paiculaly ineesing ha, ae escibing e accomplisment of e

pacice, e so-called Hnayna secion of YBS also coecs is pacice wi a

escipion of insig ta souns simila o a Mayna ealizaion of empiness Te

Deeanu The Chaper n he Mndane Pah Lakikamrga) in he Srvaabhumi A Trilingaldiin ansi Tibean Chinese) Annaed Tnslain and Indc dy 5 8 Deeanupresents arguments for readng ths as Nove and Yoga master whreas Demve seems to mpythe Non-buddhst and buddhs t dstntonthough I may be wrong In any event I have utzed thephrase "ordna prattoners to aommodate both readngs Demve e Yograbhm De Sagharasa 4 7Ths s not aed amaha n the passage butomes wthn at genera dsusson I am not sure what the merts of the Buddha et are It s possbe that ths was a hnese word tondate marks or sgns but I not nvestgate ths poss bt rther wthout hnese


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S says ha he yogapraconer realzes ha all angble forms" and hs own body"

are dencal" wh empness" lke mk an waer" Lke ceran Mahya

schools, he S also noes ha he praconer's physcal body can dsappear

compleely a hs pon. Is hs ndcang ha ayogapraconer s o be dsngshed

fro ordnary praconers no only hrough hs recollecng he ddha, b also by his

reslan realzaon of he empness of hs own fo? Snce hs s he nal realzaon

descrbed, one ms ask wheher oga does no speccally mean here he ny of form

and empness?

Empess ceainly s emphaszed in he S and, accordng o Demvlle, s

longes chaper s he chaper on empness A he chaper's concluson, reads

Havng realzed ha here s no ! n he elemens skandhs andatanas he yoga praconer rves a he ee mdhis called) heThree Doors of Lberaon: empness, desrelesness, and absence of

prtcular characerscs I have examned he Dharma of he ddha'sstras in searc of lberaon, he eeal peace

The meanng s profond, and he exposon s vas, forhose [praconers] spred by grea compasson 89

In order o shaen he inellgence of praconers, I haveelaboraely explaned hs [chaper on] empness90

Alhogh he concep of he Thee Doors of beraon s well aesed n rvakayna

exs, s he emphass placed on hs opc ha deseves patcular aenon here

Demvlle Le Yograbhm De S aghrasa 4 0- hs dsusson ohe "form and the vod saddued from a later polem moment n the text but readng the text as a whole the wo polems seemto be wo halves of the same d suss on whh I have merely paraphrased here It s not lear n snstane that Demvlle s "Vod s ndeed a dsusson o f the Mahyna noton of emptnes s and n fatt probably s not. However ths seton does ndeed resemble a dsusson one mght see n the $ Not knowng the exat Chnese term I have trans lated Demvlle s "to tale as "great s ne thesemant range of the word "totale n Frenh dffers slghtly from "total n Englsh and sne he term"great s ommonly sed for the "abso lute dea to whh "totale s eems to be pontng Demvlle Le Yograbhm De Sagharasa 409 hs s my rough translaton om Demvlle sFrenh verson


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oe unusual is te fact tt the chapte on eptiness (wich is pat of te ealy so

called akaya section) ends with a ese n geat copassion" anothe Mayna

tee9 1 Finally, as noted aboe, this chapte on eptiness is sandwiced between to

sections discussing wat see to be abbeiated tese desciptions of isualization

pactice stage (entioned boe) Can we conclude fo these ints tat te YBS's

usage of te te yogaad Mahyna conotations? Wy else would it ephasize

eptiness (unyat) li it with copassion and also ention (what sees to be a)

isionay pactice of ecollecting te Buddha, Daa, and Saga(buddhadharma-

saghnusmti)? Does tis ean that what ost ote scolas hae called a

akaynayoga pactice text actually as Mayna eleents? etainly, eptiness,

te Tee Doos, eat copassion, and buddhnusmti ae not unnown in akaya

liteatue, but can te coplex of these tee togee be consideed icatie of Poto

Mahyna?

Befoe oing on to exaine te specic type ofyoga pactice descibed i te

YBS, it igt elp geneally to gain an oeiew of te categoies of buddhnusmti

pactice, and specically, to coect this with the eidence of Mahya isionay

pactice (cobined wit etoic about eptiness) tat was tanslated into Cinese just a

few yeas late

he rst hapter of the text s alled "ssemblage and Dsso lutona term asso ated generally wthMahyna vsualzaton prateseems oddly p laed here at e begnnng of the text Een f t s notpartularly onneted to vsualzaton prate here t seems suggests a noton ofyo as a proes s ofunaton

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The Vaious Foms of Budhnusmti

By the second cent . thee had emeged in e Indian Buddhist landscae

tee distinct oms ofbuddhnusmti, which might be (oughly) chaacteized as

insiational,"92 asiational," and visionay,,93

The insiational fom of buddhCnusmti actice might be exemlied by those

descitions in the anonical Pli souces, whee it is listed as the st of ten

ecollections (P anussati, St ansmti) nde the heading of (St dhyCna) Te

ten ecollectios ae the Buddha the dhamma, the sagha, vite (la), enunciation

(cCga), he devas, in-beathng and out-beathing (CnCpCna), death (maaa), the bodily

costitents (kCyagata), and tanquility(upasama) 94 Although the Pli canon ofes ew

detailed descitions of the mehanics of ecollecting the Buddha" fo the most at,

the Pli buddhCnumsmti atice seems to have consisted of eectig uon amni

Buddha's ten attibutes (adhivacana) fo the sae of otection om fea95 Late non-

canonical Pli souces also conecte this inspiational ofbuddhCnusmti actice

to te accumlation of meit nd to the deeloment of access concentation

Karsson Fae to Fae wth the Absent Buddha he Formaton of Budhst Anon Art 6 2

Karsson states that the Suttanpta and Dhaapada both refer to the bddhnsi prate and areonsdered by many to ome from eary ps of the anon hese foow the nspratona mode hese are my haraterzatons based on what I understand from genera readng and speay fromau Harrson n Lokakema et a The Prapanna aadhi ra (Berkeey CA Numata Center 99 8) 2 In my ontat wth Harrson n 2008 at Asomar he tod me personay that he had revsed hshnkng on some o f these po nts but he dd not expan what he hange So I w ontnue to utze hsod amework ( e nspratona aspratona vsonary) here s ne t s use and mrrors what others sayabout the top C Aan Sponberg ad He en Hardare eds Mareya he Fre Bddha(Cambrdge Cambrdgeshre New York Cambrdge Unversty Press 98 8) Karsson Fae to Fae wth the Absent Buddha he Formaton of Budhst Anon Art 63 Aordng to Karsson the number of reo etons (ansaW vares throughout the Nkyas For areferene to s reoetons see nstane Dgha-nkya (III 25 0 I II 2 80) For ten reo etons s ee for

nstane Aguttara-nkya (30 42) here are ony a few referenes to four or fve reoetns andarsson does not te them Ibd 64 For nstane see Pikasa (DN III5 ) Vahupaasa (M 37) akkasa (SN I 8 1 9) Karsson has found one referene to mentay seeg the Buddha fae to fae but ths was notspeay n reaton to bddhnsi prate and seems more the exepton that proves the rue

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(upacasamdh) ut they so sw it s unle to led prctitioner directly to the

development of tejhna stes9 In oter wods, ts fo of buddhnusmt prctice

clmed the mind nd inspired the prctitioner However, since it did no puort to cuse

nything lie n ctul meetng with the ymuni Buddh, i might e crcterized s

merely inspirtionl" exercise

The aspatonal fo ofbuddhnusmtprcice might e exemplied y

descripons om he lrger nd smller Sukhatha-sta nd the soclled

Amtyudhyna-sa These sas descre he compssionte ction of the foer

Bodhisttv Dhmr nd sow te fthl he wy to rerth in Sht, the

glorious Buddheld of he Buddh i itys,,97 Here, Buddh Ait

is considered o e pesently eistent Buddh, ut in oder for the prctitoner to meet

, he must cll him to nd" (anusmt) nd civelyaspe to e reo in his

Budd eld, Suv9 9 Throgh this prctice, hen Buddh th does pper to

the prctitoner, tis ppernce is depicted s ctul event, ting plce

(necessrily) t the our of deth nd folloed y reirt in Shvti " In other

ords, lthough Amit is presently exisent in Buddheld, he is not presenly

ccessile in the umn world Thus, this fo ofbuddhnusmt cn e clled

spirtionl, ecuse the prctitioer c ctully meet te Buddh t det. Since this

spirtionl buddhnusmt implies specic soteric results different om ose

Davd Donad Drewes Mahyna Sas and her Preahers Rethnng the Natre of a RegousTradton (PhD Unversty of Vrgna 006) , 4 7 Pau Harrson Buddhusmt n the Pratutpana-Buddha-Samuhvasthta-Samdh-Stra

Joal ondian Phlosophy6 (978) Ibd 8 In ths prate the appearane oftbha s not nderstood s beng "produed b y theansiathogh t s dep endent upon the fath perfoane of that at Ibd 3 0 Ibd 8

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connecte with the nspatonal type ofuddhnusm, it cn be distingished from

tht fo

The vsona fo ofbuddhnusmt prtice might be best exemplie by te

escriptions in the Prayuanna-buddha-s!mukha-avasthta-samdhstra ("Sa on

the Medtaton o Drect ncounter wth the Buddhas o the Present) : (PS) In the

introuction to his trnsltion of this stra, Pul Hrrison istinguishes it from the erly

stras often ssocite lter with the Pure n sects syin

The object of this clling to min" or visuliztion my ccorinly bell or ny of the myri Buhs of the present n lthough the text ofthe PraSmentions Amitbh by ne he is merely duce s nexmple s the Buh of the present par excellence The prctitioner ofthe medittion might just s well visulize the Budh of the estAk$obhy in his buheld of Abrti

In other wors Hrison explns tht prctitioner c obtin visions" of ny or ll of

the Buhs of the present" n these re ll considere vli perceptions " Becuse

these visions re explined in conection with the octrine of emptiness (unyat), they

re lso consiered empty" t the sme tme. Hence lthough this te of

buddhnusmt is lso spirtionl," it might be better chrcterize s vsona

becuse it is oriente towrs visionry encounters with emp Buhs (n their

Dh) in both the present n theuture Since this form ofbuddhnusmtrepresents rther soteric shi om the inspirtionl type ofbuddhnusmt, visionry

buddhnusmt is oen unerstoo s Mhyn prctice In fct lthough the PraS

ws trnslte into Chinese in 1 9 CE. ison goes her in syin tht the PrS

description ofbuddhnusmt foreshows oe of the nmentl principles of te

Ibd 3 Aer readng an earer draft of ths paper Jose Cabezon proposed another sheme for assfyng theseprates e ntonay (n terms of what they get you) and metaphysay (n terms of the ontoogastats of the thng you eventuay enounter (rea as opposed to empt buddhas)


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' deiy-yoga egarded as ical of Vaya o Tanic Buddism" 3 In oer wods,

aloug is buddhnusmt is ceainly disinguisable fom Vaaynas deiy-yoga,

bo mig be descibed as a pocess of unicaion n ode o acieve some noion of

esulan uniy " Tus, aloug i is f om clea ow ese ee diffeen os of

buddhnusmt pacice developed and ow a developmen specically mig elae

(o no) o e so-called synesis ofusan andyog in e Matr Upanad o o e

conex of e SB yogapacice, i appeas a only e aspratonal and vsona

foms ofbuddhnusmt involved pocess of nicaion"; weeas e solely

nspratonal e lacked e aspiaion o acally mee a budda or o acieve any so

of uniy" wi im 4 Futeoe, since ee is evidence a ealyyoga paciiones

paciced a similar visionayo f hnt and wee acul called yogcras

(in Pli souces, yogvacra), i Eems a e BS's menion of ecollecing e

s mage" is signic, becase i pons o e soeiological conex in wic

e BS was wrien

Since e buddhnusmt pracice is only menioned n connecton wthe

pacices descibed in e BS, i is quie clear a e BS is no a ex abou"

Harrson Buddhsmt n the Pratyuanna-Buddha-Samukhasthta-Samdh-Stra 3 Cf he nspratonal model o fbuddhnusmt was a subset of the other two In other words thenspratonal aspet was ndeed onneted wth both the aspratonal and vs onary but the v sonary andspratonal were not nluded n e nspratonal See YBS translaton below "If theyocr, n h s hetage or n a solated plae suddenlyoneves a fear tht auses hs body har and lothes to rase up he should brng to mnd the exellene ofthe athgatas merts hs mage the Dharma an the Sagha Although ths mght be taken assuggestng that the YBS s workng wth an nspratonal model of nsmi for the sake of proteton thsnspratonal aspet was ndeed norporated nto the s onary mode l By the 5 entry Buddhaghosaeven makes ths onneton S ee for nstaneBuddhaghosa and amol The h orcionisddhim 22 -2 Also n the Pl anon there s menton of vsualzaton of orpse s n thebhbhvn prate and of the Buddha reatng all the other Buddhas of the past aroundhmsel (Dr Sah Shaw personal ommunaton) And the mst Pl tradton of theyovcr werequte onneted wth smlar Mahyna tpe vsualzaton prate See Deter S hlnglof in

Bddhisisches Yolehrbch 2 vols S anskrttexte Aus Den urfannden 7-7 a (Berln AkademeVerlag 964)

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buddhnusmti Noneeless, bsed on conexul edence (below), I would gue tt

een e bef menon ofbuddhnusmti poides n mpoan clue fo undesndng

e usge o e e yoga n te YBS nd fo e-ccezng s tex s poo-

Myn In oe wods, I no gung yoga mens buddhnusmti o

becomng un" w budd Re, I m suggesng yoga n e BS ws

poces by wc one eneed udds elm (lso clled te domn of e Budda)

n encouneed e qules of bud Stll, one mg s f s ely Ma

pacce ws cully pcced b yogapcones n e cenu, en wy dd

Sgo no nsle y exs on sulzon (o on empnes) nto Cnese long w

i 07 s queson s confounded so nd wll cetnly no be

nsweed decsely ee owee, some lg sd upon e ssue by

consdeng some of e contexl eden uounng e YBS

The Praconers of Yoga

1 . General historical

Accodng o Buddbd's 5 centu C so of te Y ogc, e pcce of

yoga seces bc to Upgup (3 rd cen B.CE) Buddbd sys t, e ege sagha scsm, ognl goup of yoga pcones ogcra) spl no e

06 07 The ter ours n th Ata (see for nstane Mtra 92), sne the PraS s ony avaabe to

e n transaton I annot pont to exat usages of the ter oga wthn that text Sne the hnese termao was use n arha transatons to mean ether oga or bodi or rga an sne Harrson proves afootnote that suggests hs he transate ao ost oen as t seems po ssb e that the termogaght have been nude among the any varous referenes to "Way n Harrson s transaton I hopeto ver ths pont wth hm n te tre f I get a hane See Lokakema et a Te Praaaaadi ra 6 09

9


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diffeent scools, each of whc develope its ownyga ext O Some scolas ae

disinclined to accept tese aspects of Buddabadas istoy And, ceainly, te

attibution of te ygapactice tadition to the seminal gue of Upagupta sould not be

taken too seiously Howeve, it appeas om te catalogue evidence tat

Buddabadas own teace Buddasena compiled a Ygcrbhmi (BB) tat was

tanslated into Cinese in te 3 centuy. 09 Toug we do not ave tis o te ote

texts tat Buddabada mentioned, we do ave nowledge of t BS te BB and

te B, ence te idea of two ote B texts seems at least plausible Altoug te

none of tese Ygcrabhmi texts appeas to ave discussed bddhnmti,

Buddabada is well own to ave been a pactitione ofbddhnmti.

Futemoe, is notion of an ealy split amon ygapactitiones is quite plausible,

esecially if tese textsamely, te SB, B, ae e tee of ve diffeent

(but elated) evolutiona stes ofyga texts

Moeove, tee ae the late legends of Tibetan and Cinese tadition of te YB,

wic geneally asset tat Asaga founded te so-called ogca pilosopical scool

based on texts evealed to by te te Buddha Maiteya in Tuita eaven

ete Asaga o Maiteya had anyting to do wit te founding of te ogca

pilosopical scool, te idea tat Asaga (o auto/compile) eceived tese

texts in a vision fom Maiteya afte a long yga eteat is not tat fa fetced Fom at

0 8 Lamott Hiso ofInian Bddhism: From he Origins o he Saka ra 595.amotte argues thatuddhabhadra s not to be beeved sne the text names he mentons are not a yoga texts Howeverom hs omments t seems that Lamottes dea of ayoga text was too mted. He dd not beeve thatMahvibhsa oud have been a ogcra text. However t mght wel have been onsdered so n eary

tmes , partuary sne the Mahvibhsasra mentons yogas frequenty wth respet Furtherresearh nto these fve texts woud hep ar ths pont0 9 Demve Le Yograbhm De Sagharasa 395 .1 0 Ib 382 Further researh of ths pont s needed to determne the text names and detas ndated nuddhabhadras hstory

3 0


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les e md ceny onwrds e Myn porons of e YB (ued o

Asg) seemed o e ed n nd round Norwes re were Asg led 2

So weer or no e YB s scred o Asg, Mrey or someone else, s lkely

h e compler srg om preexsng Norwes mleu of erly yog

prconers" gcra), wo presered he B d compled 3 I order o

undersnd s mleu eer we wll now exmne e edence for n erly group of

prconers w soerology cenered round prculr yga of e proess of

ucon" nd ceng e esuln uny" w e e Budd Mrey

Aloug s erly noon of resuln un" w Budd Mrey ws no e sme

s of e ler Myn oon of ecomng Budd, does ndeed seem o ve

een prooMhy noon ofmeeting uddh drecly roug medon

2 . Prconers o Pcce Buddusm Dreced

In s 1932 sudyhin hi Fnbet t npn Fnbet itta vna

vikaa and mlavikalpa, Sosen Mymoo sowed , loug ygcra were

monls coeced w rous vinaya, ey were geogrpclly concened mosly n

Ksmr nd n he suroundng orwes regon, wc (s noed oe) were e

res were e YB nd YBS were presered nd pssed down unl e cenry S

Deleanu, The Chaper on he Mndane Pah akikarga in he Srvakabhi A Trilingaldiion ansri Tibean Chinese Annoaed Translaion an Inodco , 5 8 I do not intend to suggest here that Asaga wa the writeropiler of the YB or had anyting to dowith the YBS The point here i that the Northwete Maitreya tadition, in general, produed theYogcrabhi around this tie period Davidon, Buddhist Systes of Transforation rayaParavti/Parvtti aong the Yogra , 23

avidson ites Shsen Miyaoto, Shin, Shiki, Funbetsu to onpon FunbetsuCitta, Via, Vikalpa, and Mla-Vikalpa, h8 Ken 9 no 5 (93 2) Jonathan A. S ilk and adin M Nagao, Fro Mdhyaika to Yoga Joal o/IneionalAssociaion 0/ Bddhis dies 2, no ( 99 ) : 24 S il ites Miyaoto, Shin, Shiki, Funbetsu toonpon Funbetsu

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Deleu h uggete th rtivi were erh the mot ctive ritio" of

yg practitioners in Kashmir.I

Nonetheless, o the basis of numismatic evidence om

he 2 ceury vriou itrey coi from Knik er) o he bi f

Fxi' (39941 4 eyewite ccou of ciet Mirey ttue from the

Ku er i Drin, we ow th their oeriology w wiepre oughout the

ohwet Hece, it eem fe o ume h itrey w welletblihe the

Norhwete cocioue likely i the oeriology evelope there 9

Demiville goe rther to ugget h, begiig erhp erly the eco

ceury , tritio of rvivi rctitioer peciclly coecte

wih YBS h evelope viiory te ofbddhnmti focue o the Buh

Mirey Accori o Dvio, o clr migh uer he my

Citta, V na, Vikalpa, and Mla-Vikalpa, 3 , but notes hat here is a reprinted ersion of the articl ein hsen Miyamoto , Konon Funbtsu o Kenky Mla-Vikalpa in kas gk Ronshukgak No Konpon Mondai ed aigusa Mitsuyoshi and Takasaki Jikid Hirakawa Akira, eds(Tokyo hunjsha, 98 5; rrin, Rrin of Miymoto, h osn, Tokiwa Hakase Kanreki Kinen kkyRons , Tokiwa Hakase Kanrki inn kky Rons 93 3 3 53 -498 es 3 6-409 . 6 Deleanu, Th Chpr on h Mnn Ph Lakikrg in h Srvkbhui A Trilingaldiion nsi Tibn hins Annod Translaion and Inodco dy, 5 8 I ? Jan attier, A F Good Mn Th odhisv Ph According o h Inqi of grgrpripcch A dy and Translion Honolulu Uniersi of Hawaii Press, 2003 ), 44 l i S Faxian and James Legge, A Rcor ofddhisic Kingdoms ing nAccon by h Chins Monk

in ofis Travls in Indi and ylon A 39-) in arch of h ddhis oo ofiscipln(ew York Doer Publications, 99 ), 24-5 Although Faxian ' s account sggests that te saes arancient, there is no way o date hose specic staes to the Kua era For an example of oherorhweste, Kua era Maitrya sates, s eet://w columbia edu/itc/mealac/ritchetrotesdata/ 00_0 99!kushanarmaitreya/maireyah t 9 ilk, Wisom, Comassion, and he earch for Undersanding The ddhis t dies Legacy ofGadin M. agao, 24. Cf Miyamoto, hin, hiki, Funbets to Konon FunbetsuCitta, Vijna, Vikalpa, and Mla-Vikalpa ccording to attier, he numismati eidence shows seeraldifferent sellings of Maitreya 2 0 Daidson , uddhit ys tems of Transformation raya-Paratti-Partti among the Yo gcra 2 Ibid , 2 2 . t the ery leas, it might hae starte out "aspirational in th second cenury and become"isionary by the third cenry Demiille, Le Yogcrabhmi D agharasa, 34 Demiille ' s argment for saying thatagharaka was a Maitreya dotee, inoles a comlex triangulation been s eral distinct sourcesand hinges on repors made about agharaka s c orpse as haing been "unbuableexcept erhaps byi own rewhich is a ost-mortem sign of yoga practice attested in Maitreya orented sections of thedhinirocnasura While his argument is intriging, it is not central to my tesis. Furher research

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reereces o ddhnmi i Mahya as descibig a mediaio ecique

origially direced oward obaiig a isio of kyamui 1 23 or some oer prese

buddha.,,1 24 Howeer, he Kashmiri Ssidi legeds ell of may gcra

masers ig raveled, eiher physically or psycically, o e eae of Tuia o

iew Maireya i order o receive eacigs or spiriual adice from him 1 2 ad i order

o secure a ure rebirh i his domai. Moreoer, e evidece sows ha ese

ygcra o oly ad isios of Mareya hough heir yga, bu also a may3

cery ogcra masers were said o hae miaculously obaied om Maireya

houg heir miaculous powers (ddhi pda) a iey of iscios peraiig o

d 1 26 d 1 2or a, ua s, or octre

Amog he may early legeds a reached Cia i e laer alf of he 4th

ceury C.E (primarily by meas of he Kasii mol Saghabadra),1 28 e legeds

of four asmiri ygapraciioers (who lied i he 1st

oug 3 ceuries C E ) were

recorded by e Ciese maser Dao-a. hese agiographies, he Sasidi

would be required to dec ide whether Demiille is correct about agharaka being a deotee of Maitreya.

For now, I will follow Demiille 3 Daidson, Buddhist ystems of ransformation rayaParatti/Parti among the Y ogca, 0. 4 Ibid, 9 5 Ibid, . Italics for ex are my own and are added for emphasis . C P aul Harrison , Buddhism AReligion of Reelation aer All? , Ne 34, no. ( 9 8) 6-3 Harrison cites Gombrich as obseringhat ere are some Buddhists today who beliee that there hae been no arhats since the time of theBuddha, because it is o nly through direct contact with a Buddha that one can be freed. I would beinteresting to inestigate te lineage histories of these Buddhists (who are deotees of Maitreya) t seewhat connection they might hae, if any, t o the early Yogcras Daidson, Buddhist ystems of ransfoation raya-Parat-Partti among the Yogca, 0 7 Ibid , 3 9 Demiille, Le Yogcrabhmi De agharasa, 364-6. Although ao-ans preface to theYog3crabhi writen in 384 C apparently reports an oral adition that he purorts to hae obtainedfrom the Kashmiri monk anghabhadra, Demiille raises questions conceing this monk' s identi inrelation to other reports of anghabhadra Also , D emiille rightly questions what parts of theagiography of angharaka should be taken as historic.

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masesVasia, Maiey, Sagaasa,1 2 and Daaawee all declaed

as bdhiattva w ad ascended Tuia eaven and wee waiing in line ake

ei bits as ue Buddas1 3 0 Aside m ese ealyygca, e 4 cenuy

Kasi mase Buddabada we f is Yga eace Buddasenas

accmlisen as well as is wn visi Tuia d is ataien f e sage f a

nneue 3 Even Cinese mases w ad aveled Kasmi ld f ei wn

visinay exeiences Daan msel (a cnema f Budabada) claimed

ave esnally saised is dubs abu dcine by ayig" Maieya 1 32 And

Ciyen, ane Cinese discile f Buddasena, ee aving eceived aswe

a quesin e se a Kasii ahat nly ae a ahatad eneed amdhi,

aveled Tuia, and cnsuled wi Maieya 1 33 Is i ssible a e leged abu

Asaga culd ave sng fm is mileu?1 34 Was e Maiti Upaniad (als nwn as

e Maitaa Upania elaed is milieu as well?1 3 5 Hw fa back es e

Maieya cul g?

Demiville esens a nuanced and cnvincing agmen f wy ese legeds

(wen aken wi e cicumsanial evience) indicae a e visinay

bddhnmti wads Maieya seces back (a leas) e Kua mase

Etienne amotte amdhinirmocan r L xpicion Ds Mysrs (Louain iblio thqueational 935) 8506 Demiille 95 #6@34 390-5} Demiille e Yogcrabhmi De agharasa 3 62 8 -8 According to Demiille uddhasenaas the author of another Yogcrbhmi eatise usualy attributed to Dharmasrta Daidson uddhist ystems of Transformation: raya-Parati-Parti among the Yogcra

Ibid We do not need to answer this denitiely as his authorshi is not ar t of the argument of this paper The Y has a long se ction on deelopment of loing kindness practice miri Although this is notnusual for early buddhist ractice or the texts that describe them it might be worth noting the interestingemological connections beteen the words Maii, Mairy, and Miry

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aharaa (he presumed riercmpier f he B 3 wever even i we d n

aree wih Demivle's armen ha aharaa himse praciced a visionary form

f bddhnmti direced a Mareya, Demvlle's evdece suess ha many

similarly earlyyoga masers cnneced wih YB dd ideed enae in his pracice

ince he A{a uses he word yoca (and yin and since even he Pl version of he

Milindapaha cains (207 ccureces o he wrd yogacara 3 Was his ra

relaed y a praconers By he end f e 3 cenury, since acual Mahyna

ra als bean o be appended he YB and her yogapracice exs in Chna, we

mus ask weher or n hs ccued in India as well since hese exs ranslaors were

mainly frm he Norhwes and were cneced wih bddhnmti pracce. 3 his

communy fyogcra ha a n prucn s se very Mahyara?

The answer such a quesn mh be suh hruh Mynatr

hemselves. Fr nsance, m he 1 79 C.E Mahynatra ranslans f

kaema, we see several noable early menins fyoga and varus uressuch

as Mareya, Manjuri, kbhya and mbha I he case f sme tra, like he

Aa, we see mre han ne f hese buddhbdhsaa names menioned. Many

scholars have undersod he occurrence f hese buddhabohisava names as

demnsran a Mahya serilcal shi Can hey also be cneced wih he

pracice f visiaryyoga Can hese ra be cnneced wih he cies f

However, his argument is too c omplex to be recapitulated here Personal communication from Dr ance C ousins I t has been suggested by seeral scho lars thatogvc is the Pli ersion of theogcr. Dr Cousins has also said that many of these reference scome from some from the o ldest parts o f tis sutta uddhasena, the translator of the Y 3 00 C. E was himself a Kashmi who was a famous Yogcrawith a well documented conne ction to buddhnusti It seems quite pos sib le that he, being Indian andwell known, was not the only Indian to s ee is Mahyna appendi practi ce as permissib le . eeDemiille, e Yogcrabhmi De agharasa, 3 96

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earlyyga praiioners? eiille nos ha he Aa tranlaed by Lokakema als

he rs haper Tch an tang ki t, whih (emiille says) ould ranslae

Ygcrara. Alhough Demiille says ha his was merly he onenion for ll

laer Chinese ranslaions of he Aa s rs haper (alled arvkarajat in India), i

seems worh poining ou ha his assoiaion migh no hae been aidenal. In fa,

he A#a iself refers o yga in he onex ofygcra 1 39 And, as menioned aboe, he

PraS (anoher ex anslaed by he Northwese base Lokakema in 1 79 E.)

menios isualiaion of rious Buddhas ough whom one reeies eahings, whih

should be propounded o ohers Alhough i is lear ha he wordyga mean many

hings in many plaes, we migh ask wheher in Kashmir i did no ome o ean

speially meeing wih aireya (or perhaps anoher deiy) an reeiing some

knowledge ha ould e propounded o ohers? If so, i possible ha he praies

desribed in his YBS ex represened yoga in he sense of a proess of uniaion" bu

ha he resulan uni" qa bddhnmtipraie would hae been desribed

elsewhere in some sor of esoeri ex or isualiaionra?

In fa, he mpahnatra whih was ranslaed ino Chinese (in e 4h

enry?), inludes a seion onbddhnmti , ih is ounear, e Pli

Satipatthnatta (50 BC.E)140makes no menion of i a all.141 Sine his tra was

oeed wih he Norhe Sarsidin adiion, i possible ha a he e of

wriing he YBS, he Sarsidin riers onsidered he bddhnmti a relaed

praie o be done side by side bu disussed separaely? Sine YBS merely makes

i lk and agao From dhyamika to Yogca chopen has suggested tat this date be understood as merely a terminus quo for the writing of theli stras Vesna Wallace has informed me that the Chinese ersion of Sups/hn-s matches otherextant sanskrit ersions and is not unusual in this regard

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mention of visionary bddhmti in te context of the mpahna qa yoga it

oes not explin its practie in etail Can we infer that bddhnmti was initially an

important but not central p ofyga qa unication but ony late (perhaps in the 4

century) becae ofcially inclue witn the iet iscssion of the other

h ?142mpa ana l t tra

Wether or not these questions an be answee it oes seem that a lage numbe

of Mayna tra can best be unerstoo as eriving from meitative expeience.

inee the tra see to be a later tempt to so ou te tra otinal

implications into a unie Mhyna soterology Woul it not be worthwile then

pehaps to re-evaluate the notion tat ayna ieas were formulate n sprea

simply troug tra an their statements? In fact oes it not seem likely that

visionary yga (as escibe above n sometimes ning expression n stic

literature like te BS) was a wellspring fro which owe the inspiration fo a nue

of extene (vaiplya) Mahyna tra Shoul ese socalle rvakayna practe

texts tanslte b Shigao be re-eaine fo clues of poto-Mahya an ealy

ahyna octinal evelopments?

Conclusion

any speulative theories coul be formulate in esponse to te many questions pose

bove However s ince this paper ws wrtten in oer to poblematize te usage of the

term yga in YBS an to aise questions about the text ' s haracterization as

It s curous that uddhaghosa who s now seen by l scholars as hang ncorporated many noncanoncal teachngs nto h s Visddhimgg (5 century) ncludes "dety recollecton practce as one ofsx reco lle ctons as he inuence by the yogca tradton The Mahyna of course c lass fes ts own slrs as falng wthn the category of the extended(ipy) and regards anythng well sad (sbhit) as Dharma

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vaana, I will not attet such a seculative naative hee onetheless , based on

the evience esented above, it oes see lil at, although the te was

inee a geneal ter to efe to eitation an although its usage was not esticted to a

specic doctine o eligious actitione, was oe than just a chance te aplie

to eitation in the YBS athe, it sees to have been use to efe to specic

pactitiones in te Nohwest to inicate a paicula notion of eitation, one which

contained potoahya eleents If we povisionall accet Buddhabhada' s

descition o f the oiginal schis into ve ogca counities , scholas ight be

able to explain how so any ogca os cae to be sinle toughout the

Nothwest an China and how so iffeent visionay pactices of bddhmti

(pehaps beginning befoe the coon ea with bddhnmti to aitea) cae to

develop aound so an iffeent budha gres 44

Futheoe, alough scholas have peviosl labeled the YBS, and all othe

actice texts tanslate b Paan A Shigao, as staightfoad vaaa texts, 45

these scholas have not adequatel explaned how e ahna tra, the PaS an the

coul have been translate onl thit eas late by the Scthian Loaea o

how the st chapte of the cae to be calle Y ogcasta (instea of)theeb establishing a eceent fo subsequent tanslatos, ost

I hae not addred here the o repeated idea that guna s omehow

a preliminary study of the meaning of "yoga" in sangharak

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