A ́soka’s missions to Suvan:n:abhu ̄ mi (CE, Southeast Asia) and
Tambapan:n:i (CE, Sri Lanka), respectively. A ́soka’s Pillar
Edicts corroborate only that he sponsored the mission to
Tambapan:n:i. Other inscriptional evidence, however, sup-
ports the chronicles’ accounts about a mission to Himavanta
(typically identified with the Himalayan areas), whereas
again the Pillar Edicts are silent. Therefore, the chronicles’
accounts about a mission to Suvan:n:abhu ̄ mi may well be ac-
curate.
There is no substantial reason to doubt that by A ́soka’s
time the Therava ̄dins formed a distinctive group within the
Buddhist sangha. They preserved the teachings of the Bud-
dha in Pali through their oral tradition; by the Third Bud-
dhist Council or shortly thereafter, the Therava ̄dins held
their own positions on specific points of doctrine and prac-
tice. They also actively contributed to the Buddhist mission-
ary activity during the third and second centuries BCE. It may
nevertheless be premature to speak of Therava ̄da’s influence
as having achieved civilizational scale apart from its role
within the Indian sangha as a whole. During the centuries
that followed A ́soka’s death, the Therava ̄da tradition contin-
ued to spread its influence in India, but as one school among
many (eighteen is the traditional number given). Specific in-
formation remains scanty.
Sri Lanka and the Dhammad ̄ıpa tradition. In Sri
Lanka, however, the situation was quite different. Within
this distinctive provincial area, Therava ̄da traditions became
firmly established and prospered. The Pali chronicles com-
piled and preserved by the Sinhala monks, inscriptions, and
extensive archaeological remains make it possible to recon-
struct a comparatively full picture of Therava ̄da Buddhism
in the Sri Lanka of the first century BCE.
For example, the Pali chronicle written in fifth-century
Sri Lanka and known as the Maha ̄vam:sa (Great Chronicle)
records the momentous decision to commit the Therava ̄da
canon, preserved and transmitted for centuries by oral tradi-
tion, to writing. According to the Maha ̄vam:sa, between the
years 29 and 17 BCE Sri Lanka was threatened by foreign in-
vasion and famine, and the Therava ̄da monks feared that the
monastic community would be dispersed and the oral tradi-
tion broken and lost. In an effort to prevent this, they gath-
ered together and committed to writing the Tipit:aka (Skt.,
Tripit:aka; “three baskets”), that is, the Buddhist canon. As
a result, this aspect of the tradition was solidified in a basic
form that has remained largely intact through Therava ̄da
history.
The first two Pit:akas, or “baskets,” are the Sutta Pit:aka,
which contains sermons, discourses, and sayings attributed
to the Buddha, and the Vinaya Pit:aka, which contains stories
about the Buddha that introduce rules concerning the con-
duct for monks and nuns and the proper functioning of the
monastic order. These two baskets comprise many strata of
traditions ranging in dates from the time of the Buddha him-
self up to at least the time of A ́soka. Most of the material
that they contain is present also in the traditions preserved
by other Buddhist schools in various forms of Prakrit and
Sanskrit, sometimes in slightly different form and often
much embellished.
However, in the case of the third Pit:aka, called the Ab-
hidhamma, or “Higher Teaching,” the situation is quite dif-
ferent. Here we have a collection of seven compositions, each
unique to the Therava ̄da school. These seven compositions
represent a relatively late scholastic formulation, compiled
possibly during the A ́sokan or early post-A ́sokan period. To-
gether they present and summarize Buddhist teachings in a
systematic form that differentiates Therava ̄da scholasticism
from that of the other schools that were developing during
the same period. This Therava ̄da distinctiveness is perhaps
most explicitly expressed in the Katha ̄vatthu, an Abhidham-
ma text attributed to Moggaliputtatissa and associated with
the Third Council. In this forensic and polemic text over two
hundred Therava ̄da positions are defended against opposing
doctrines. For example, the doctrine of anatta (“no-self”) is
defended against an opponent who asserts the existence of
some kind of continuing personal entity (a view usually asso-
ciated with the Pudgalava ̄da school); the doctrine of anicca
(momentariness) is defended against an opponent who af-
firms the existence of past, present, and future times (a view
usually associated with the Sarva ̄stiva ̄da school); and the at-
tainments of the arahants (Skt., arhats; fully perfected saints)
are defended against opponents who questioned their perfec-
tion (a view associated most often, but not exclusively, with
the Maha ̄sa ̄m:ghikas).
There is strong evidence to suggest that before the be-
ginning of the common era an extensive tradition of com-
mentaries on many portions of the Pali Tipit:aka already ex-
isted in the Sinhala vernacular. To what extent the original
forms of these commentaries were brought to Sri Lanka by
the legendary missionaries of A ́sokan times is unclear. Nor
can we be sure to what extent these commentaries were com-
posed in India in Pali and subsequently translated into Sin-
hala and to what extent they were actually composed or
adapted in Sri Lanka. Since none of these commentaries has
survived in its early Sinhala form, the contents cannot be de-
termined with certainty. We know only that before the be-
ginning of the common era a significant corpus of Tipit:aka
commentaries, preserved in Sinhala, formed an integral com-
ponent of the Therava ̄da tradition in Sri Lanka.By this time, too, Therava ̄da Buddhism in Sri Lanka
had become a civilizational religion. It may be, as the later
chronicles maintain, that the civilizational character dates to
the time of the A ́sokan missionaries to Sri Lanka. Said to
have been the son of A ́soka, the monk named Mahinda (Skt.,
Mahendra) supposedly succeeded in his missionary goal of
establishing the Therava ̄da lineage in Sri Lanka and convert-
ing the Sinhala king, Deva ̄nam:piyatissa. Shortly thereafter,
according to the texts, A ́soka’s daughter, the nun
Sanghamitta ̄, brought to Sri Lanka the ordination lineage for
women. King Deva ̄nam:piyatissa is credited with founding
the famous Maha ̄viha ̄ra monastery, which not only encom-9146 THERAVA ̄DA