The Spread of Buddhism

the spread of buddhism in serindia 83

It is all the more dif cult to speak of Bactrian or Iranian peculiarities

of Buddhism. Most schools attested in Gndhra have also left manu-

scripts in Bactria.^24 It was once surmi sed^25 that Mahyna emerged  rst

in Gandhra, and especially among, or in contact with Iranians, albeit

the Mahynists themselves rather claimed to issue from the Gangetic

Mahsghika. It is true that all “Yuezhi” early translators of Buddhist

works in Chinese, such as Zhi Loujiachan (Lokak ema),^26

Zhi Qian , Zhi Liang , Zhu Fahu (Dharmarak a),

translated as early as 170 AD Mahyna works. But 170 AD is already

ca. two centuries after the emergence of Mahyna: provided these

translators brought these works from Bactria, they prove at best that

Mahyna had by then reached Bactria. The general move towards

personal devotion (bhakti), often seen as a de ning characteristic of

Mahyna, constituted at the eve of the Christian era a general trend

in the whole of India, and was by no means restricted to Buddhism

since it can also be found in Kaism and ivaism. If Mahyna is

but the crystallisation of tendencies incipient from the very beginning

of Buddhism,^27 such ideas were in the air everywhere without the help

of Iranians.^28 To ascribe it to foreign in uences one needs not only

vague similarities, but real “smoking guns”, that is precise parallelisms

or borrowings. In an indubitable case of a Mazdean in uenced text

such as the (much later) Sogdian Vessantara Jtaka, Mazdean gods with

their local names are quoted (see further). Such proofs are wanting in

the case of the Mahyna.^29

Kua epoch, named Dharmamitra, who is said to be the author of a lost Sanskrit

treatise translated in Tibetan. Cf. Rerix 1963, p. 122 [non uidi]. 24

To the Mahsghika school belong all Kharo

h inscriptions which mention a

Buddhist school so far found in Bactria—all from the vicinity of Termez. See Vorob’eva-

Desjatovskaja 1983, p. 35 n. 14, p. 42 n. 11 (from Fajaz-tepe); cf. also p. 31 n. 2,

p. 39 nn. 23, 25, p. 40 n. 30 (from Kara-Tepe), as well as Brhm inscriptions from Fajaz

Tepe (Vorob’eva-Desjatovskaja 1974, p. 117) and Bactrian graf ti from one temple in

Kara-Tepe (5th century?). The later Brhm manuscripts (5th–7th century) on birch-

bark from Zang-Tepe and Bairam-Ali seem to be Prtimokastras of the Sarvstivdins.

The Qunduz vase (3rd century?, cf. Fussman 1974, pp. 58–61) is Dharmaguptaka. The

Bactrian manuscript Schøyen 2419/1–2 (5th century?), found probably in Bamiyan,

belongs to the Mahyna, whereas the fragments 5 and 7 of Bamiyan found by Hackin

in 1928 were Mahsghika. See Roth 1980, p. 83; von Hinüber 1989a, p. 343.

(^25) Pelliot 1912, p. 107; Lamotte 1954; 1958, pp. 550f. (with bibliography).
(^26) He is credited with the introduction of Mahyna in China. Cf. Zürcher 1959,
vol. 1, p. 35. 27
Fussman 1994, p. 18.
(^28) See also Scott 1990.
(^29) Fussman 1994, pp. 36–38 for the detailed demonstration.
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