3
The kings who ruled in the fifth century were devout Buddhists and builders of vihâras but the most important event of this period, not merely for the island but for the whole Buddhist church in the south, was the literary activity of Buddhaghosa who is said to have resided in Ceylon during the reign of Mahânâma. The chief authorities for his life are a passage in the continuation of the Mahâvamsa[74] and the Buddhaghosuppatti, a late Burmese text of about 1550, which, while adding many anecdotes, appears not to come from an independent source.[75] The gist of their account is that he was born in a Brahman family near Gaya and early obtained renown as a disputant. He was converted to Buddhism by a monk named Revata and began to write theological treatises.[76] Revata observing his intention to compose a commentary on the Piṭakas, told him that only the text (pâlimattam) of the scriptures was to be found in India, not the ancient commentaries, but that the Sinhalese commentaries were genuine, having been composed in that language by Mahinda. He therefore bade Buddhaghosa repair to Ceylon and translate these Sinhalese works into the idiom of Magadha, by which Pali must be meant. Buddhaghosa took this advice and there is no reason to distrust the statement of the Mahâvamsa that he arrived in the reign of Mahânâma, who ruled according to Geiger from 458 to 480, though the usual reckoning places him about fifty years earlier. The fact that Fa-Hsien, who visited Ceylon about 412, does not mention Buddhaghosa is in favour of Geiger's chronology.[77]
He first studied in the Mahâvihâra and eventually requested permission to translate the Sinhalese commentaries. To prove his competence for the task he composed the celebrated Visuddhi-magga, and, this being considered satisfactory, he took up his residence in the Ganthâkara Vihâra and proceeded to the work of translation. When it was finished he returned to India or according to the Talaing tradition to Thaton. The Buddhaghosuppatti adds two stories of which the truth and meaning are equally doubtful. They are that Buddhaghosa burnt the works written by Mahinda and that his knowledge of Sanskrit was called in question but triumphantly proved. Can there be here any allusion to a Sanskrit canon supported by the opponents of the Mahâvihâra?
Even in its main outline the story is not very coherent for one would imagine that, if a Buddhist from Magadha went to Ceylon to translate the Sinhalese commentaries, his object must have been to introduce them among Indian Buddhists. But there is no evidence that Buddhaghosa did this and he is for us simply a great figure in the literary and religious history of Ceylon. Burmese tradition maintains that he was a native of Thaton and returned thither, when his labours in Ceylon were completed, to spread the scriptures in his native language. This version of his activity is intelligible, though the evidence for it is weak.
He composed a great corpus of exegetical literature which has been preserved, but, since much of it is still unedited, the precise extent of his labours is uncertain. There is however little doubt of the authenticity of his commentaries on the four great Nikâyas, on the Abhidhamma and on the Vinaya (called Samanta-pâsâdikâ) and in them[78] he refers to the Visuddhi-magga as his own work. He says expressly that his explanations are founded on Sinhalese materials, which he frequently cites as the opinion of the ancients (porânâ). By this word he probably means traditions recorded in Sinhalese and attributed to Mahinda, but it is in any case clear that the works which he consulted were considered old in the fifth century A.D. Some of their names are preserved in the Samanta-pâsâdikâ where he mentions the great commentary (Mahâ-Aṭṭhakathâ), the Raft commentary (Paccari, so called because written on a raft), the Kurundi commentary composed at Kurunda-Velu and others[79]. All this literature has disappeared and we can only judge of it by Buddhaghosa's reproduction which is probably not a translation but a selection and rearrangement. Indeed his occasional direct quotations from the ancients or from an Aṭṭhakathâ imply that the rest of the work is merely based on the Sinhalese commentaries.
Buddhaghosa was not an independent thinker but he makes amends for his want of originality not only by his industry and learning but by his power of grasping and expounding the whole of an intricate subject. His Visuddhi-magga has not yet been edited in Europe, but the extracts and copious analysis[80] which have been published indicate that it is a comprehensive restatement of Buddhist doctrine made with as free a hand as orthodoxy permitted. The Mahâvamsa observes that the Theras held his works in the same estimation as the Piṭakas. They are in no way coloured by the Mahayanist tenets which were already prevalent in India, but state in its severest form the Hinayanist creed, of which he is the most authoritative exponent. The Visuddhi-magga is divided into three parts treating of conduct (sîlam), meditation (samâdhi) and knowledge (paññâ), the first being the necessary substratum for the religious life of which the others are the two principal branches. But though he intersperses his exposition with miraculous stories and treats exhaustively of superhuman powers, no trace of the worship of Mahayanist Bodhisattvas is found in his works and, as for literature, he himself is the chief authority for the genuineness and completeness of the Pali Canon as we know it.
When we find it said that his works were esteemed as highly as the Piṭakas, or that the documents which he translated into Pali were the words of the Buddha[81], the suspicion naturally arises that the Pali Canon may be in part his composition and it may be well to review briefly its history in Ceylon. Our knowledge appears to be derived entirely from the traditions of the Mahâvihâra which represent Mahinda as teaching the text of the Piṭakas orally, accompanied by a commentary. If we admit the general truth of the narrative concerning Mahinda's mission, there is nothing improbable in these statements, for it would be natural that an Indian teacher should know by heart his sacred texts and the commentaries on them. We cannot of course assume that the Piṭakas of Mahinda were the Pali Canon as we know it, but the inscriptions of Asoka refer to passages which can be found in that canon and therefore parts of it at any rate must have been accepted as scripture in the third century B.C. But it is probable that considerable variation was permitted in the text, although the sense and a certain terminology were carefully guarded. It was not till the reign of Vaṭṭagâmaṇi, probably about 20 B.C., that the canon was committed to writing and the Parivâra, composed in Ceylon[82], was included in it.
In the reign of Buddhadâsa[83] a learned monk named Mahâdhammakathi is said to have translated the Suttas into Sinhalese, which at this time was esteemed the proper language for letters and theology, but in the next century a contrary tendency, probably initiated by Buddhaghosa, becomes apparent and Sinhalese works are rewritten in Pali.[84] But nothing indicates that any part of what we call the Pali Canon underwent this process. Buddhaghosa distinguishes clearly between text and comment, between Pali and Sinhalese documents. He has a coherent history of the text, beginning with the Council of Râjagaha; he discusses various readings, he explains difficult words. He treated the ancient commentaries with freedom, but there is no reason to think that he allowed himself any discretion or right of selection in dealing with the sacred texts accepted by the Mahâvihâra, though it might be prudent to await the publication of his commentaries on all the Nikâyas before asserting this unreservedly.
To sum up, the available evidence points to the conclusion that in the time of Asoka texts and commentaries preserved orally were brought to Ceylon. The former, though in a somewhat fluid condition, were sufficiently sacred to be kept unchanged in the original Indian language, the latter were translated into the kindred but still distinct vernacular of the island. In the next century and a half some additions to the Pali texts were made and about 20 B.C. the Mahâvihâra, which proved as superior to the other communities in vitality as it was in antiquity, caused written copies to be made of what it considered as the canon, including some recent works. There is no evidence that Buddhaghosa or anyone else enlarged or curtailed the canon, but the curious tradition that he collected and burned all the books written by Mahinda in Sinhalese[85] may allude to the existence of other works which he (presumably in agreement with the Mahâvihâra) considered spurious.
Soon after the departure of Buddhaghosa Dhâtusena came to the throne and "held like Dhammasoka a convocation about the three Piṭakas."[86] This implies that there was still some doubt as to what was scripture and that the canon of the Mahâvihâra was not universally accepted. The Vetulyas, of whom we heard in the third century A.D., reappear in the seventh when they are said to have been supported by a provincial governor but not by the king Aggabodhi[87] and still more explicitly in the reign of Parâkrama Bâhu (c. 1160). He endeavoured to reconcile to the Mahâvihâra "the Abhayagiri brethren who separated themselves from the time of king Vaṭṭagâmaṇi Abhaya and the Jetavana brethren that had parted since the days of Mahâsena and taught the Vetulla Piṭaka and other writings as the words of Buddha, which indeed were not the words of Buddha[88]." So it appears that another recension of the canon was in existence for many centuries.
Dhâtusena, though depicted in the Mahâvaṃsa as a most orthodox monarch, embellished the Abhayagiri monastery and was addicted to sumptuous ceremonies in honour of images and relics. Thus he made an image of Mahinda, dedicated a shrine and statue to Metteyya and ornamented the effigies of Buddha with the royal jewels. In an image chamber (apparently at the Abhayagiri) he set up figures of Bodhisattvas,[89] by which we should perhaps understand the previous births of Gotama. He was killed by his son and Sinhalese history degenerated into a complicated story of crime and discord, in which the weaker faction generally sought the aid of the Tamils. These latter became more and more powerful and with their advance Buddhism tended to give place to Hinduism. In the eighth century the court removed from Anuradhapura to Pollannaruwa, in order to escape from the pressure of the Tamils, but the picture of anarchy and decadence grows more and more gloomy until the accession of Vijaya Bâhu in 1071 who succeeded in making himself king of all Ceylon. Though he recovered Anuradhapura it was not made the royal residence either by himself or by his greater successor, Parâkrama Bâhu.[90] This monarch, the most eminent in the long list of Ceylon's sovereigns, after he had consolidated his power, devoted himself, in the words of Tennent, "to the two grand objects of royal solicitude, religion and agriculture." He was lavish in building monasteries, temples and libraries, but not less generous in constructing or repairing tanks and works of irrigation. In the reign of Vijaya Bâhu hardly any duly ordained monks were to be found,[91] the succession having been interrupted, and the deficiency was supplied by bringing qualified Theras from Burma. But by the time of Parâkrama Bâhu the old quarrels of the monasteries revived, and, as he was anxious to secure unity, he summoned a synod at Anuradhapura. It appears to have attained its object by recognizing the Mahâvihâra as the standard of orthodoxy and dealing summarily with dissentients.[92] The secular side of monastic life also received liberal attention. Lands, revenues and guest-houses were provided for the monasteries as well as hospitals. As in Burma and Siam Brahmans were respected and the king erected a building for their use in the capital. Like Asoka, he forbade the killing of animals.
But the glory of Parâkrama Bâhu stands up in the later history of Ceylon like an isolated peak and thirty years after his death the country had fallen almost to its previous low level of prosperity. The Tamils again occupied many districts and were never entirely dislodged as long as the Sinhalese kingdom lasted. Buddhism tended to decline but was always the religion of the national party and was honoured with as much magnificence as their means allowed. Parâkrama Bâhu II (c. 1240), who recovered the sacred tooth from the Tamils, is said to have celebrated splendid festivals and to have imported learned monks from the country of the Colas.[93] Towards the end of the fifteenth century the inscriptions of Kalyani indicate that Sinhalese religion enjoyed a great reputation in Burma.[94]
A further change adverse to Buddhism was occasioned by the arrival of the Portuguese in 1505. A long and horrible struggle ensued between them and the various kings among whom the distracted island was divided until at the end of the sixteenth century only Kandy remained independent, the whole coast being in the hands of the Portuguese. The singular barbarities which they perpetrated throughout this struggle are vouched for by their own historians,[95] but it does not appear that the Sinhalese degraded themselves by similar atrocities. Since the Portuguese wished to propagate Roman Catholicism as well as to extend their political rule and used for this purpose (according to the Mahâvaṃsa) the persuasions of gold as well as the terrors of torture, it is not surprising if many Sinhalese professed allegiance to Christianity, but when in 1597 the greater part of Ceylon formally accepted Portuguese sovereignty, the chiefs insisted that they should be allowed to retain their own religion and customs.
The Dutch first appeared in 1602 and were welcomed by the Court of Kandy as allies capable of expelling the Portuguese. This they succeeded in doing by a series of victories between 1638 and 1658, and remained masters of a great part of the island until their possessions were taken by the British in 1795. Kandy however continued independent until 1815. At first the Dutch tried to enforce Christianity and to prohibit Buddhism within their territory[96] but ultimately hatred of the Roman Catholic church made them favourable to Buddhism and they were ready to assist those kings who desired to restore the national religion to its former splendour.