The Foundations of Buddhism

206 The Abhidharma

who are often simply referred to as the Vaibha~ikas (exponents

of the Vibha~a). In the early centuries of the Christian era the

Sarvastivadins also produced a number of summary Abhidharma

manuals such as the * Abhidharma-hrdaya ('The Heart of Abhid-

harma') of Dharmasri and the * Abhidharmiimrtarasa ('The Taste

of the Deathless') of Gho$aka.^3 But by far the most influential

manual for later Chinese and Tibetan Buddhism is Vasubandhu's

Abhidharmakosa ('Treasury of Abhidharma'). The influence of

this work is to be explained in part by the fact that for the

Chinese and Tibetans its author is none other than Vasubandhu,

brother of Asailga and author of some of the seminal treatises

of the Y ogacara, · one of the ·principal schools of Mahayana

Buddhist thought. This traditional view has been disputed by mod-

ern scholarship, notably by Frauwallner, who has argued that the

Mahayanist Vasubandhu, author of Y ogacarin treatises, lived in

the fourth century CE and must be distinguished from the

Vasubandhu who is author of the Abhidharmakosa and lived in

the early part of the fifth century. The question is unresolved.^4

Whoever he was, Vasubandhu's Kosa gives a masterly survey of

Sarvastivada-Vaibha~ika Abhidharma supplemented by his own

critique of certain positions, which often betrays a Sautrantika

sympathy. Such was the authority of the Abhidharmakosa that

Paramartha's and Hsfian-tsang's Chinese translations (in the

sixth and seventh centuries respectively) led to the formation of

a significant, if relatively short-lived, schqol of Sino-Japanese

Buddhism named, after the text, the Kosa or, in Chinese and

Japanese, the Chti-she/Kusha school. Vasubandhu's criticism

of certain Vaibha~ika positions prompted further works that

attempted to address his points of criticism, such as Sailghabhadra's

* Abhidharma-samaya-pradipika ('Illumination of Abhidharma')

and * Nyiiyiinusiira ('In Accordance with Method'), and the an-

onymous Abhidharma-dipa ('The Lamp of Abhidharma').
A number of Indian Abhidharma texts that belong neither to the
Theravadin nor to the Sarvastivadin Abhidharma also survive in
Chinese translation, principally the Siiriputriibhidharma-siistra
('Treatise on the Abhidharma of Sariputra') and Harivarman's

• Satya-siddhi-siistra ('Treatise on the Demonstration of Truth'),