. . . unless, of course, it had already been considered, or if it would not be considered until some time in the future. Scholarship is highly uncertain about 1) when the Sarvastivadin school arose, 2) when it became apparent that their philosophy was different from that of the Sthaviravadins (Theravadins) 3) when the two groups officially split, and 4) when they split geographically. At some time, most likely still in the B.C. era, the Sarvastivadins trekked to North-East India, all the way up to Kashmir, to establish themselves there. Their historical attestations go back to approximately 200 B.C., which is subsequent to the Third Council, but we don't know which phase in the life of a Buddhist school they had attained by that particular point in time. Thus, to return to the thoughts on the previous page, it is likely that they were a serious object of discussion during the Third Council, convened by Ashoka.
Let's face it, if this material is brand new to you, you may find yourself getting pretty confused with terminology, particularly in keeping the Sarvastivadins and the Sthaviravadins separated in your mind. | ||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
On this page--and this page only--I shall present the two names, and the names of schools directly associated with them (viz. their successors or branches), with different colors so that you can keep them apart.)
Sthaviravada . . . . . . . . . . . .Sarvastivada But you won't find such a crutch in too many places, so, if you're serious about studying Buddhism, you do need to learn them. Maybe you can think of some other mnemonic device: Try ST comes alphabetically before SV. |
There were practical differences once again. Unlike the Mahasanghikas, the Sarvastivadins did have a "third basket," the Abidhamma Pitaka, filled to the brim with rules and explanations of the rules. It appears that they were stricter in their monasticism than the Mahasanghikas. They also shared some of the ideas of the Mahasanghikas (or the Mahasanghikas shared some of theirs), including the notion that an arhat (a "holy man," viz. a bikkhu who had attained enlightenments) is fallible. Assuming that the later Mahayana philosophy grew out of the roots of the early Hinayana schools, it is reasonable to infer that Sarvastivadin philosophy contributed to Mahayana thought just as much as Mahasanghika did. In particular, the philosophical branch called "Yogacara" (as opposed to "Madhyamaka") could be considered to be an extension of parts of Sarvastivadin philosophy.
The name "Sarvastivadin" consists of three Sanskrit words brought together:
So, the Sarvastivadins believed in the existence of everything. Does that sound un-Buddhist to you? Aren't Buddhists supposed to believe that nothing exists? Well, we need to make some serious qualifications of what this idea that "everything exists" actually means.
|
Dependent origination in Sautrantika Sarvastivada. There is only the present moment with whatever dharma the mind projects and then treats as object. |
By the way, this is an interesting philosophical question, which is not limited to Buddhism, though the answers will vary drastically. The present exists; sure enough. Most people would agree on that much, though clever people no doubt could find some self-referential conundrums, even in this plain statement. Does the past exist? That question gets more difficult. If we are inclined to answer "yes," we need to qualify that the past exists as the past, and then we would have to be able to explain what "existence as the past" means, but that can be done. The really tricky question is whether the future exists. Can we say that future events already have reality, though only as future occurrences. The Vaibashikas did, but probably more as an assumption than as a conclusion to an argument. I will show my hand here: It seems to me that the only way in which we can argue that the future already exists, even though it has not happened yet, is if it is already foreknown by an omniscient being. The Vaibashikas obviously would not share my opinion.
Since the explanation of human experience as the encounter between a mind and the various dharmas presupposes the existence and duration of the dharmas, the Sautrantikas for whom neither past existence nor duration was viable, could not follow the Vaibashikas with it. Instead, the Sautrantikin position was that there are no dharmas to be encountered "out there," that they are all actually phases of consciousness produced by the mind on its own. Or, to put it another way, the experiences that we have of the external world, are really perceptions within our minds.
Even though the Sautrantika school in its early "Hinayana" phase, was apparently not very large or widely accepted, when Vasubandhu, one of the early Mahayana philosophers, compiled his system, the Yogacara school, it was to a great extent an elaboration of the Sautrantika version of Sarvastivada.
The Sarvastivada school no longer exists, most likely because its teachings became slowly integrated into the great melting pot of Mahayana philosophy. It persisted in India as long as other schools of Buddhism, but when Buddhism dried up in India, there was no place for it to go where its teachings had not been aborbed and expanded within Mahayana thought. In other words--and this is true for most of the Hinayana groups--they could not establish their own identify outside of India in competition with Mahayana Buddhism. Still, together with Mahasanghika, Sarvastivada had a great amount of historical influence.
And then there was one. As we said at the outset of this story, Theravada turned out to be the only one of the early schools, the so-called Hinayana schools, to persevere. --- Or was there? Actually, not for a while yet. There was another large school of Buddhism, contemporary to Hinayana and Mahayana, which is frequently left out of the story. So, in order to do justice to Theravada's beginnings and persistence, we need to look at the Vatsiputriya school and its off-shoot, the Sammitiya school, first.