,
described
in 90-93, are "the four asankheyya of the [maha]kappa", Anguttara, ii.
Abhidharmakosabhasyam-Vol-2-Vasubandhu-Poussin-Pruden-1991
See iii.
101c.
463. Anguttara, i. 227, CuUaniddesa, 235. 2b (sahassiculanikdlokadhdtu); Dhgha, TD 1, p. Il4b20, c7, quoted by Beal, Catena, 102, who quotes many Sutras. The term "chiliocosm" was invented by
? Remusat.
Mahdvyutpatti, 153 and 15. 15. In the Mahdvyutpatti, it appears that sdhasracudika forms only
one word; by this fact, a lokadhatu, a universe, is called sdhasra because it is composed of one thousand four-continent universes, (cdturdvtpaka lokadhatu), and cUdika because it is the cuda (cudabbmatvat) of a great universe. [Without doubt we have here ksuUa, ksudra - culla, cula].
464. This point will be elucidated iii93a-b (Vydkbyd). Rather: "Creation and destruction [of the universes of one group] take place at the same time. "
Vivarta is explained as vividhavartana or rather vividhd vartante'smmn iti. Samvarta - samvartana, or rather samvartante'sminn iti: this is the period when beings "come together" (samvartante - samgacchanti) in the higher dhydnas; see below, note 493.
465. There is an Ayusparyantasutra, Csoma-Feer, p. 278, Mdo, 26,217.
466. Vibhanga, 422: manussdnam kittakam dyuppamdnam / vassasatam appam vd bhiyyo vd.
According to the canonical formula: yo ciramjivati so vassasatam . . .
467. This is based on a Sutra very dose to Anguttara, iv. 256-7 (eulogy of the Upasatha), Vibhanga,
422. Lokaprajifdpti in Cosmologie, 301.
468. The year of 360 days and the year of the "middlere Periode" (=the middle period) of Thibaut,
Astronomie, 1899, p. 28. Below iii. 90.
469. Very close to the source of Vasubandhu, Divya, 279: katham rdtrir jndyate divaso vd /
devapuspdndm samkocavikdsdn manindm Jvalandjvalandc chakunindm ca kujandkujandt.
470. Doctrine of the Koia in Beal, Catena, 83.
Anguttara, i. 267: life of 20,000,40,000,60,000 kappas for the gods of the first three Arupyas;
the Fourth Arupya is ignored
Vibhanga, 424; Brahmaparisajjas, life of 1/3 of a kappa (or A); Brahmapurohitas, Yi\
Mahabrahmas, 1; Parittabhas, 2; Appamanabhas, 4 . . . We have 64 kappas for the Subhakinhas, higher gods of the Third Dhyana. For the Fourth Dhyana, six divisions, namely the Asannasattas with the Vehappalas, 5Q0kappas, and the five types of Suddhavasikas, 1,000,2,000,4,000,8,000 and 16,000 kappas (Akanitthas). The Arupyas, as in the Koia.
Buddhaghosa interprets the formula: "The duration of the life of the Brahmakayikas is a kappa" in the sense of "part of a kappa", Kathavatthu, commentary to xi. 5.
471. The Pali sources (bivuttaka, p. 11, Anguttara, etc. ) are quoted iv. 99c, note 449.
472. The Vydkhya quotes the Sutra.
This list is quoted in the Lokaprajndpti (with Tejasvin in place of Manasvin) iii. l, Cosmologie
bouddhique, p. 298. M. W. De Visser has assured us that it does not figure in the Dirgha (16 Nagas who escape from Garuda), in Saddharmapundarika (eight: Nanda, Upananda,Sagara. . . Manasvin . . . ).
The Sutra quoted by Beal, Catena, 419; Mahdvyutpatti, 167. 14, 51, 66, 58, 44. Mucilinda, Mabdvagga, i. 3. There is no Pali reference to the Nagas who, like Sesa, hold up the earth. Above, p. 382.
473. Suttanipdta, p. 126, Samyutta, i. 152, Anguttara, v. 173: seyyathdpi bbikkhu visatikbdriko kosalako tilavdbo / tatopuriso vassasatassa vassasatassa accayena. . . Suttanipdta, 677, says that the "learned" have calculated the vdbas of sesame for Paduma hell, and that they have a figure of 512,000,000,000 (Fausboll).
474. According to the Lotsava; in Paramartha and Hsiian-tsang, as in the Pali sources, vim/atikbdrika.
Tibetan, rdzan = vdha; kbal - khdri; on the dimensions of vdha, Burnett, Antiquities, 208, Ganitasarasamgraha (Madras, 1912), 5. On the other hand, tilavdha = tilasakafa, thus "cart-load" (Rhys Davids and Stede).
l
Footnotes 539
? 540 Chapter Three
475. Full all the way to the top = ciidikabaddha (dvabaddba, Mahavyutpatti, 244. 92).
476. Antardmrtyu=antarena kdlakriya=akdlamarana. See u45, trans, p. 235, and Vasumitra on the
sects.
477. Persons in Uttarakuru are free from premature death because they do not say, 'This is mine"
(Lokaprajndpti).
478. Divya, 174. 1: asthdnam anavakdio yac caramabhavikaJj sattvo'samprdpte vifesddhigame so'ntard kdlam kurydt.
479. Jinoddiffa, jmadMa, see ii. trans, p. 236 and notes.
480. Beings who have entered into the absorptions of nirodha, of unconsciousness, of maitri, etc, do
not die before they have left these absorptions.
481. The paramdnu as distinct from the anu, "atom", see ii. 22. On name, ndman, iL47. On time, kola,
adhvan, iv. 27a. 482. BhojarajaadYogasutra,iii. 52:ksanaisthesmallestdivisionoftime,whichcannotbefurther
reduced in quantity. $addarlana, p. 28.
483. These two definitions belong to the Sautrantikas. We have seen iL46a, trans, p. 245, a Vaibhasika definition: kdryaparisamdptilaksana efa nap ksanafrWe should note the remark of the Atthasdlim, p. 60 at the bottom, that sixteen thoughts arise and perish during the time that a r&pa
The second definition recalls that which the Jains [Tattvdrthddhigama, iv. 15 (see S. C Vidyabhusan, JAs. 1910, L161) trans, of Jacobi, Journal of the Germany Oriental Society, vol 40, 1906] give of samaya (which is their ksana): paramasuksmakriyasya sarvajaghanyagatiparinatasya paramdnoh svdvagdbanaksePravyatikramakdlab samaya &#. According to Jacobi, "die Zeit, die ein Atom in langsamster Bewegung bebraucht, urn sich urn seine eigene Korperlange weiter- zuhewegen. " One needs an "incalculable" (asamkhyeya) number of samayas in order to make one
avalikd; a "calculable" (samkhyeya) number of these in order to make one prana (Jprdnas = 1 stoka, s
1 stokas = 1 lava; 38VS lavas = ndlikd [ gbaft\t 2 ndlikds = 1 muh&rta).
Compare Ganitasdrasamgraha, i. 32 (a mathematical treatise of Mariaviracarya, published and
translated by M. Rangacarya, Madras, 1912).
anur anvantararh kale vyatikrdmatiydvati /
sa kdlah samayo 'samkhyaih samayair dvalir bhavet //
The time in which an atom (moving) goes beyond another atom (immediately next to it) is a
samaya; innumerable samayas make an dvali.
484. Quoted in Madbyamakavrtti, 547: bahvatpurusdcchafdmdtrena patkasaspib hand ati- kramantUi pdphdt. Mahavyutpatti, 253-10, acchapdsamgbdtamdtra; Divya, 142; Pali, acchard. The Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 701b2, has five opinions on the ksana. (Tbe first four assign it a duration
more and more reduced: Vasubandhu quotes here the second (Note of Saeki). The fifth is the best (but Saeki does not reproduce it): the first four solely indicate the duration of the ksana in a general manner; the Bhagavat did not tell the true duration of a ksana . . . because no one is capable of understandingit) TheSamyuktahrdaya(? ),TD28,p. 886cll,isinteresting.
485. This is the series in Mahavyutpatti, 251 (with vdtdyanacchidrarajas andyuka = Uksodbhava). Dhanus = danda; hasta - the purusahasta of the Abhidharma according to which the stature of
the inhabitants of the Dvlpas is calculated.
The series of Sdrdulakarna {Divya, 645, where the text is altered) differs in certain details.
In Lalita, 149 (rgya cher rolpa, 142), truti is placed between anu and vdtdyanarajas; yuka is
replaced by sarsapa. Ckher Buddhist sources, Lokaprajndpti, foL 12a (Cosmologie, p. 262); Watters, i. 141 (Vibhdsd, TD 27,p. 701b2); Saddharmasmrti, Levi, Rdmdyana, 153; Kalpadruma (Calcutta, 1908), 9. Ganitasdrasamgraha, 3; Vardhamihira (in Alberuni, i. 162); VleetJRAS, 1912,229,1913, 153; Hopkins, JAOS. 33. 150; Barnett, Antiquities, 208.
Ukkd in the Pali commentaries = 36 rattarenus, 1/7 Ukd.
? 486. Same omission in the HH-yU-cbi, ii.
487. Eitel (p. 98) observes that a cemetary ascetic should not approach a village closer than the limit
of a krofa.
488. According to Lokaprajnapti, foL 55b, Cosmologie, 309; figures reproduced in the Hsi-yU-chi, ii. (Watters, L143,Julien, i. 6l, Beal, 171; vaksana, error for tatksana, in numerical Dictionary quoted by Chavannes, Religieus Eminents, 152). Source of the Mahavyutpatti, 253, differs.
In Divya, 643-644, the order ksana and tatksana is reversed. On ksana above p. 474
Tatksana defined in Divya: tadyathd strtyd ndtidirghandtihrasvakartinydh s&rodyama eva- mdirghas tatksanah; Saeki quotes the Prajnapti: "When a women of medium age is about to spin, the stroke, the movement of a thread neither long nor short, its duration is the tatksana. " That is to say: the normal time that it takes the thread to touch the finger is the/a&fc/^. [According to a note
of P. Louis van Hee].
489. In Scripture {pravacana), there are three seasons {rtu) and not six as in the world. $itira is cold and is thus hemanta; vasanta is hot and is thusgrisma, farad is rainy and is thus varsas (Vydkhya). [Three seasons in the Kdthydvdr, Alberuni, L 357]. For all the B'lddhas, hemanta is the first season (Vydkhyd). {Burnooijntroduction, 569). On the Buddhist seasons, I-tsmg,Takakusu, 101,219,220, Hsi-yU-chi, chap, ii, Watters, 1144. Thibaut, Astronomie. . . , p. 11.
490. The "learned" are the Buddhists who, in the fourteenth and fifteenth fortnight of each of the
three seasons omit a day which is called unardtra or ksaydha (Thibaut, Astronomie, 1899, 26,
Barnett, Antiquities, 195) and, in this way, hold posadha after fourteen days and not after fifteen: f
cdturdaiiko tra bhiksubhih posadhah kriyate.
"Worldly" {laukika) computation has months of 30 days. The lunar month has 29 days, 12
hours, and 44 minutes. The ceremony of posadha is regulated according to the moon. One must thus omit a day {Unardtra) from the worldly computation every two months. Thus each ecclesiastical seasonofeighthalf-monthswillbe15days+15+15+14+15+15+15+ 14.
In order to pass from the ecclesiastical (cdndra) year to the worldly year, one adds six days; in order to catch up to the solar year (of 366 days) one adds an intercalary month (adhimdsa) after two years and seven months (Alberuni, ii. 21).
We should study the Mdtangasutra, TD 21, number 1300, analyzed in Divya 657, part of the Sdrdulakarna (mdsapariksa) omitted by Gowell-NeiL
491. A good study by FleetJJWS. 1911,479, on the kalpas and theyugasJBteet recalls the formulas of A/oka: dva kapam, ova samvafakapdAccatdkig to Buddhaghosa, Makkhali admits 62 antarakappas instead of 64, Sumangala, 1162 {Digha, 154). The kalpas of the Jains, for example, SBE. 22.
The four periods, disappearance, etc.
, described in 90-93, are "the four asankheyya of the [maha]kappa", Anguttara, ii. 142.
492. We customarily translate antarakalpa, antahkalpa, as "intermediate Kalpa", and others, by "der Kalpa der Zwischenzeit" or "Zwischen-Kalpa. " (Schmidt, Geschkhte der Ost-Mongolen, 304). But Remusat has correctly seen that "these expressions do not make sense" {Melanges posthumes, 103, note). The antarakdpas or antahkalpas are, rather, kalpas which are within, inside of greater periods. The translation of ReWisat "petit kalpa" ("small kalpa") is, if not literal, at least useful.
493. We translate samvarta, samvartanias "disappearance. " Such is indeed the meaning of the word when one speaks of bhdjanasamvartani, "disappearance of the receptacles," yadd bhdjandni samvartante vinaiyantityarthah = "when the receptacles disappear, that is to say, perish. " But in the expressions gatisamvartani, etc, samvart signifies "to go together, to be found together with. " There is samvartamoi the realms of rebirth {gati) when hellish beings, animals, etc, are found to be together {samvartante, ekasthibhavantt) in one part of the heavenly realm of rebirth; samvartamoi beings {sattva), when beings are found together in a single DhySna heaven (Rupadhaatu).
Footnotes 541
? 542 Chapter Three
494. Ekottara, TD, p. 736cl7; Beal, Catena, 113. Sp. Hardy, Manual, 472, says that, at the end of the kalpa, beings guilty of the five dnantaryas (iv. 96) get out of hell, but that "the doubter, the skeptic" (the man in Dtgha, L5%Samyutta, iii. 207) is transported to the hell of another universe (see iv. 99c).
495. A being whose aaions should be punished by an animal rebirth will be reborn into another universe. Hsiian-tsang: "The animals who live with humans and with the gods disappear at the same time as do these. "
On the animals in heaven, Kathdvatthu, xx. 4. Manusyasahacarisnava its manusyasahacaranaiUa gomahisddayah.
496. He obtains the first dhydna dharmatdpratilambhika. By dharmatd one should understand "the particular transformation which the good dharmas then undergo" (kusaldndm dharmdndm taddnim parindmavitesah). This point is elucidated viii. 38.
497. Madhyama, TD 1, p. 429al9; Ekottara, TD 2, p. 736c20; Mahdparinirvdna, TD 12, p. 753cl4: Seven suns come out at the same time from behind the mountain Yugandhara; Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 690al5: Four opinions, 1. that the suns are hidden behind Yugandhara (? ); 2. that one sun divides into seven; 3. that one sun takes on a seven times greater force; 4. that seven suns, at first hidden, then manifest themselves by reason of the aaions of beings.
Saptas&ryavydkarana, above p. 376 , quoted in Lokaprajndpti, Mdo 62, foL 66 (Cosmologie, 314); Pitdputrasamdgama (=Ratnakuta, xvi) in Siksdsamuccaya, 247. Pali sources, bibliographic of Minaiev, Zapiski, ix. 323; Sattasurtyuggamana in Anguttara, iv. 3000, Visuddhi, 416 (Warren, 321).
Alberuni, i. 326; Hastings, Ages of the World; Hopkins, Epic Mythology, 1915,84,99, Great Epic, 475; Dictionary of St. Petersburg, s. voc sarhvarta.
Mesopotamian origin of this theory (? ), Carpenter, Studies in the History of Religion, 79.
498. See above p. 376.
499. Below 100c. When the receptacle world is empty, water (abdhdtu) is produced which dissolves, like salt, the receptacle world This water, which is of Kamadhatu, "binds" (sambadhndti) a water of the First Dhyana and the Second Dhyana. This water, which is thus of three spheres (Kamadhatu and two Dhyanas) disappears with the receptacle to which it corresponds.
Disappearance through wind: the wind disperses (vikirati, vidhvarhsayati) the receptacles of the first three Dhyanas like a pile of dust (pdmsurds'i).
On that which remains, note 504.
500. Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 691b8, quoted by Saeki ad iii. 45.
501. According to the rule enunciated below: yat pascat samvartate tat pUrvarh vivartate. 502. According to other sources, 84,000.
503. According to the Mahayana, the 20 kalpas are of augmentation and diminution
504. It has been explained, i. 7, that the skandhas are time.
What does a kalpa consist of? Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 700b23: Some say that it is by its nature
rupdyatana, etc; the days-and-nights, etc. , are totally the arising and the destruaion of the skandhas; as a kalpa is made up of days-and-nights, etc. , it is of the same nature. But a kalpa is the time of the Three Dhatus: thus it is five or four skandhasMui-hm: "kalpa, with respea to Kamadhatu (and Rupadhatu), is five skandhas; with respea to Arupyadhatu, it is four skandhas. The 'empty' kalpa ('the period when the world stays destroyed') is two skandhas [namely, says the gloss, samskdraskandha and rupaskandha (for dkafa is rupa)\ since the days-and-nights, etc, do not exist separate from the skandhas. " A commentary on the Ko/a observes that, according to the Mahayana, time (kola) is a viprayukta samskdra. [The 90th samskdra of the list of the 100 dharmas, Vijnaptimdtra, Museon, 1906,178-194, R. Kimura, Original and developed doctrines, 1920, p. 55].
505. i. Asamkhyeya kalpas, "numberless kalpas" are the time an asamkhyeya number (10 to the 59th power) of mahdkalpas last.
? [asamkhya - asamkhyeya, incalculable, samkhydnendsamkhyeyd asamkhya iti. ]
Hsiian-tsang: Among the four types of kalpas which have been named, which should one multiply in order to make "three numberles kalpas"? One should multiply the great kalpas, 10,100, 1,000, and thus following until this multiplication gives "three numberless kalpas. " That which is termed "without number, numberless" {wu-shu 'j&$L) does not signify "incalculable" (pu k'o shu^ nJffc)? Achieh-tuofflffitSutrasaysthattheword"numberless"(asamkhyeya)isanumber among the sixteen numbers. What are these sixteen? As this Sutra says, "One and not t w o . . . "
ii. The first asamkhyeya of the career of Sakyamuni begins under the former Sakya- tnuni(Mahdvastu, LI) and terminates under Ratnasikhin. During this asamkhyeya there appeared 75,000 Buddhas (Kofa, iv. 110; Remusat, Melanges posthumes, 116; numerical Diet, in Chavannes, Religieux eminents, reads 5,000 in place of 75,000).
The second asamkhyeya ends with Dlpamkara. Buddhas: 76,000.
The third asamkhyeya ends with Vipasyin. Buddhas: 77,000.
There then follow 91 mahdkalpas (in place of 100, as the Ko/a explains, iv. ll2a).
VipaSyin is the first of the seven "historic" Buddhas (celebrated in the Saptabuddhastotra); then
there are Sikhin, Visvabhuj, Krakutsanda, Konakamuni, Kaiyapa, Sakyamuni. (References, Kern, Manual, 64).
iii. In the Pali sources (Cariydpitaka, i. 1. 1, etc), the career of the Bodhisattva is four asamkheyyas in length plus a hundred thousand kappas. Some later works, like the Sdrasamgraha, have Bodhisattvas of four, eight, and sixteen asamkheyyas, plus each time one hundred thousand kappas.
506. A muktaka Sutra, that is to say a Sutra which does not form part of the Agamas: na caturdgamdntargatam sty arthahMsewhere a muktaka Sutra is a non-authentic Sutra.
Paramarthatranslates:yu^ =remaining,other;Hsiian-tsang:chieh-tuoj? |)]g;=[vijmuktaka.
507. Our list is that of the Mahavyutpatti, 249 (which, according to Wogihara, is excerpted from the Kola). The numbers 14 and 15, in the MSS of the Mahavyutpatti, areprasuta, mahdprasuta, but the Chinese versions giveprayuta, mahaprayuta: the Tibetan (rob bkram) gives prakirna or prasrtaJBor 36, 37, Wogihara corrects samdptah, mahdsamdptah to samdptam, mahdsamdptam.
Our list, as Vasubandhu remarks below p. 480, has 52 terms: "Eight members, in the middle, have been forgotten": aspakam madhydd vismrtam. . . see below, note 508.
On the great numbers, Georgy, Alphahetum Tibetanum, 640; Schiefner, Melanges Asiatiques, 629; Remusat, Melanges posthumes, 67; Beal, Catena, 122; other sources and calculations in Hastings, art. Ages of the world, 188b.
The Mahavyutpatti presents four types of calculation 246-249, excerpted from the Buddhd- vatamsaka and the Prajfidpdramitdfdstra, Skandhavyuha, Lalita, Abhidharma; then "worldly" calculation (from 1 to 100).
The Buddhdvatamsaka, quoted by Remusat, teaches that "in the higher system, the numbers are
multiplied by themselves": there are ten numbers thus calculated beginning with asamkhya: 24
asamkhya, asamkhya , asamkhya . . . [I think that the Tibetan version (Kandjour, 36, foL 36) invites 24
ustoapplythisprogressionfromkopi(=10,000,000):kopi,kopi,kopi andthusfollowingupto anabhildpya-anabhildpya-parivartanirdesa which should be the 122nd term of this series]. "Nothing is certainly more unreasonable that all this numerical apparel. . . and yet one is obliged to admit that the Buddhists have sometimes made use of it, either in order to sustain their imagination in the contemplation of the infinity of time and space, or in order to make this idea nearer to those rude spirits incapable of conceiving of this". (Remusat).
The Brahmanical numbers are also very large. The lives of Brahma, Narayana, Rudra, Isvara, Sadasiva, Sakti keep increasing. Sakti lives 10,782,449,978,758,523,781,120 plus 27 zeros of kalpas,. This life is only one trupi or second of a day in the life of Siva, which is represented in kalpas by 37,264,147,126,589,458,187,550,720 plus 30 zeros. Concerning this, Alberuni (i. 363) says: "If those dreamers had more assiduously studied arithmetic, they would not have invented such outrageous numbers. God takes care that their trees do not grow into heaven. "
Footnotes 543
? 544 Chapter Three
508. Vydkhyd: aspau sthanani kvdpi pradefe pramusitatvdn na paphitdni / tendtra dvapaficas'at sthanani bhavanti / saspyd ca samkhydsthdnair bhavitavyam / tony aspakdni svayarh kdni tin ndmdni krtvd paphitavydm yena saspih samkhyasthdndni paripurndni bhaveyuhSame doctrine in Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 891bl0.
For Ya? omitra the number asamkhya is the sixteenth of the series 1,10,100,1000. . . We should place in this list, in an undetermined place, the eight numbers which are lacking, by giving them some name.
The editor of Mahdvyutpatti, 249, does not understand it thus; he adds, 53-60, apramdnam, aprameyam . . . anabhildpyam.
&arad Chandra Das gives our list as coming from the Kola, 1-52: "Up to this number there are Sanscrit equivalents; from 53 to 60, there are no Sanscrit equivalents, the Tibetan having introduced new names to replace the lost originals. " These new names (which one can translate as tnaitra, mahdmaitra, karuna, mahdkaruna . . . ) do not have, in fact, any resemblance to 53-60 of the Mahdvyutpatti.
509. According to Paramartha. The Lotsava, certainly less clear: de kar na gnas gzhan drug cur phyin pa de dag tu phyin pa'i bskalpa ni bskalpa grans med pa ces bya'o.
510. Opinion expressedin Ekottara, TD2,p. 562b2,b2% Parinirvdna, TD 12, p. 624b21, TD31,p. 518al8 (Saeki). Altruism of the Bodhisattva, Kos'a, iv. llla. That persons of little virtue cannot believe in the Bodhisattva, vii. 34. How the Bodhisattva considers others as his "self," Bodhicarydvatdra, viii.
511. We can thus understand: the excellent desire, for others, of temporal happiness (dbhyudayika) and bliss (naifafreyasika) (^nirvana, cessation of suffering), and, for himself the cessation of suffering, that is to say, the quality of Buddha, because he is useful to others.
According to Saeki, the PrajHdpdramitds'dstra, 29. 18, quotes some stanzas of the Samyukta presenting the same doctrine.
Compare the four categories of Digha, iii. 233, Anguttara, ii. 95.
512. Different theory in the Pali sources, for example Sdrasamgraha.
Sources are not in agreementon the date of the appearanceof the last Buddhas; Vibhdsd, TD 27,
p. 700c29, Dtrghdgama, etc (Remusat, Melanges posthumes, 116; Notes of the Foe koue ki, 189). The Dirgha places, in the course of the ninth antarakalpa of our great kalpa, four Buddhas:
Krakucchanda (period when life is 40,000 years long), Kanakamuni (life of 30,000 years), Kafyapa (life of 20,000 years), Sakyamuni (life of 100 years) [same figures in Digha, iL3, A/okdvaddna, Avaddnas'ataka, etc]; elsewhere we have 60,000,40,000,20,000 and 100.
Others say: No Buddhas during the first five antarakalpas; Krakucchanda in the sixth, Kanakamuni in the seventh, Kafyapa in the eighth, Sakyamuni in the ninth, Maitreya in the tenth. The other Buddhas of the present Bhadrakalpa in the other antarakalpas.
According to the Mahayana, we are in the first antarakalpa of our great kalpa: four Buddhas in the period of diminution; one Buddha (Maitreya) in the period of augmentation. In fact, in the comment of TD 14, number 452 ("The Birth Above of Maitreya"): "Why does Sakyamuni appear in a period of diminution, Maitreya in a period of augmentation? By reason of their vows. . . "
PrajHaparamitas'astra, TD 25, p. 89cl2, p. 93al3.
463. Anguttara, i. 227, CuUaniddesa, 235. 2b (sahassiculanikdlokadhdtu); Dhgha, TD 1, p. Il4b20, c7, quoted by Beal, Catena, 102, who quotes many Sutras. The term "chiliocosm" was invented by
? Remusat.
Mahdvyutpatti, 153 and 15. 15. In the Mahdvyutpatti, it appears that sdhasracudika forms only
one word; by this fact, a lokadhatu, a universe, is called sdhasra because it is composed of one thousand four-continent universes, (cdturdvtpaka lokadhatu), and cUdika because it is the cuda (cudabbmatvat) of a great universe. [Without doubt we have here ksuUa, ksudra - culla, cula].
464. This point will be elucidated iii93a-b (Vydkbyd). Rather: "Creation and destruction [of the universes of one group] take place at the same time. "
Vivarta is explained as vividhavartana or rather vividhd vartante'smmn iti. Samvarta - samvartana, or rather samvartante'sminn iti: this is the period when beings "come together" (samvartante - samgacchanti) in the higher dhydnas; see below, note 493.
465. There is an Ayusparyantasutra, Csoma-Feer, p. 278, Mdo, 26,217.
466. Vibhanga, 422: manussdnam kittakam dyuppamdnam / vassasatam appam vd bhiyyo vd.
According to the canonical formula: yo ciramjivati so vassasatam . . .
467. This is based on a Sutra very dose to Anguttara, iv. 256-7 (eulogy of the Upasatha), Vibhanga,
422. Lokaprajifdpti in Cosmologie, 301.
468. The year of 360 days and the year of the "middlere Periode" (=the middle period) of Thibaut,
Astronomie, 1899, p. 28. Below iii. 90.
469. Very close to the source of Vasubandhu, Divya, 279: katham rdtrir jndyate divaso vd /
devapuspdndm samkocavikdsdn manindm Jvalandjvalandc chakunindm ca kujandkujandt.
470. Doctrine of the Koia in Beal, Catena, 83.
Anguttara, i. 267: life of 20,000,40,000,60,000 kappas for the gods of the first three Arupyas;
the Fourth Arupya is ignored
Vibhanga, 424; Brahmaparisajjas, life of 1/3 of a kappa (or A); Brahmapurohitas, Yi\
Mahabrahmas, 1; Parittabhas, 2; Appamanabhas, 4 . . . We have 64 kappas for the Subhakinhas, higher gods of the Third Dhyana. For the Fourth Dhyana, six divisions, namely the Asannasattas with the Vehappalas, 5Q0kappas, and the five types of Suddhavasikas, 1,000,2,000,4,000,8,000 and 16,000 kappas (Akanitthas). The Arupyas, as in the Koia.
Buddhaghosa interprets the formula: "The duration of the life of the Brahmakayikas is a kappa" in the sense of "part of a kappa", Kathavatthu, commentary to xi. 5.
471. The Pali sources (bivuttaka, p. 11, Anguttara, etc. ) are quoted iv. 99c, note 449.
472. The Vydkhya quotes the Sutra.
This list is quoted in the Lokaprajndpti (with Tejasvin in place of Manasvin) iii. l, Cosmologie
bouddhique, p. 298. M. W. De Visser has assured us that it does not figure in the Dirgha (16 Nagas who escape from Garuda), in Saddharmapundarika (eight: Nanda, Upananda,Sagara. . . Manasvin . . . ).
The Sutra quoted by Beal, Catena, 419; Mahdvyutpatti, 167. 14, 51, 66, 58, 44. Mucilinda, Mabdvagga, i. 3. There is no Pali reference to the Nagas who, like Sesa, hold up the earth. Above, p. 382.
473. Suttanipdta, p. 126, Samyutta, i. 152, Anguttara, v. 173: seyyathdpi bbikkhu visatikbdriko kosalako tilavdbo / tatopuriso vassasatassa vassasatassa accayena. . . Suttanipdta, 677, says that the "learned" have calculated the vdbas of sesame for Paduma hell, and that they have a figure of 512,000,000,000 (Fausboll).
474. According to the Lotsava; in Paramartha and Hsiian-tsang, as in the Pali sources, vim/atikbdrika.
Tibetan, rdzan = vdha; kbal - khdri; on the dimensions of vdha, Burnett, Antiquities, 208, Ganitasarasamgraha (Madras, 1912), 5. On the other hand, tilavdha = tilasakafa, thus "cart-load" (Rhys Davids and Stede).
l
Footnotes 539
? 540 Chapter Three
475. Full all the way to the top = ciidikabaddha (dvabaddba, Mahavyutpatti, 244. 92).
476. Antardmrtyu=antarena kdlakriya=akdlamarana. See u45, trans, p. 235, and Vasumitra on the
sects.
477. Persons in Uttarakuru are free from premature death because they do not say, 'This is mine"
(Lokaprajndpti).
478. Divya, 174. 1: asthdnam anavakdio yac caramabhavikaJj sattvo'samprdpte vifesddhigame so'ntard kdlam kurydt.
479. Jinoddiffa, jmadMa, see ii. trans, p. 236 and notes.
480. Beings who have entered into the absorptions of nirodha, of unconsciousness, of maitri, etc, do
not die before they have left these absorptions.
481. The paramdnu as distinct from the anu, "atom", see ii. 22. On name, ndman, iL47. On time, kola,
adhvan, iv. 27a. 482. BhojarajaadYogasutra,iii. 52:ksanaisthesmallestdivisionoftime,whichcannotbefurther
reduced in quantity. $addarlana, p. 28.
483. These two definitions belong to the Sautrantikas. We have seen iL46a, trans, p. 245, a Vaibhasika definition: kdryaparisamdptilaksana efa nap ksanafrWe should note the remark of the Atthasdlim, p. 60 at the bottom, that sixteen thoughts arise and perish during the time that a r&pa
The second definition recalls that which the Jains [Tattvdrthddhigama, iv. 15 (see S. C Vidyabhusan, JAs. 1910, L161) trans, of Jacobi, Journal of the Germany Oriental Society, vol 40, 1906] give of samaya (which is their ksana): paramasuksmakriyasya sarvajaghanyagatiparinatasya paramdnoh svdvagdbanaksePravyatikramakdlab samaya &#. According to Jacobi, "die Zeit, die ein Atom in langsamster Bewegung bebraucht, urn sich urn seine eigene Korperlange weiter- zuhewegen. " One needs an "incalculable" (asamkhyeya) number of samayas in order to make one
avalikd; a "calculable" (samkhyeya) number of these in order to make one prana (Jprdnas = 1 stoka, s
1 stokas = 1 lava; 38VS lavas = ndlikd [ gbaft\t 2 ndlikds = 1 muh&rta).
Compare Ganitasdrasamgraha, i. 32 (a mathematical treatise of Mariaviracarya, published and
translated by M. Rangacarya, Madras, 1912).
anur anvantararh kale vyatikrdmatiydvati /
sa kdlah samayo 'samkhyaih samayair dvalir bhavet //
The time in which an atom (moving) goes beyond another atom (immediately next to it) is a
samaya; innumerable samayas make an dvali.
484. Quoted in Madbyamakavrtti, 547: bahvatpurusdcchafdmdtrena patkasaspib hand ati- kramantUi pdphdt. Mahavyutpatti, 253-10, acchapdsamgbdtamdtra; Divya, 142; Pali, acchard. The Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 701b2, has five opinions on the ksana. (Tbe first four assign it a duration
more and more reduced: Vasubandhu quotes here the second (Note of Saeki). The fifth is the best (but Saeki does not reproduce it): the first four solely indicate the duration of the ksana in a general manner; the Bhagavat did not tell the true duration of a ksana . . . because no one is capable of understandingit) TheSamyuktahrdaya(? ),TD28,p. 886cll,isinteresting.
485. This is the series in Mahavyutpatti, 251 (with vdtdyanacchidrarajas andyuka = Uksodbhava). Dhanus = danda; hasta - the purusahasta of the Abhidharma according to which the stature of
the inhabitants of the Dvlpas is calculated.
The series of Sdrdulakarna {Divya, 645, where the text is altered) differs in certain details.
In Lalita, 149 (rgya cher rolpa, 142), truti is placed between anu and vdtdyanarajas; yuka is
replaced by sarsapa. Ckher Buddhist sources, Lokaprajndpti, foL 12a (Cosmologie, p. 262); Watters, i. 141 (Vibhdsd, TD 27,p. 701b2); Saddharmasmrti, Levi, Rdmdyana, 153; Kalpadruma (Calcutta, 1908), 9. Ganitasdrasamgraha, 3; Vardhamihira (in Alberuni, i. 162); VleetJRAS, 1912,229,1913, 153; Hopkins, JAOS. 33. 150; Barnett, Antiquities, 208.
Ukkd in the Pali commentaries = 36 rattarenus, 1/7 Ukd.
? 486. Same omission in the HH-yU-cbi, ii.
487. Eitel (p. 98) observes that a cemetary ascetic should not approach a village closer than the limit
of a krofa.
488. According to Lokaprajnapti, foL 55b, Cosmologie, 309; figures reproduced in the Hsi-yU-chi, ii. (Watters, L143,Julien, i. 6l, Beal, 171; vaksana, error for tatksana, in numerical Dictionary quoted by Chavannes, Religieus Eminents, 152). Source of the Mahavyutpatti, 253, differs.
In Divya, 643-644, the order ksana and tatksana is reversed. On ksana above p. 474
Tatksana defined in Divya: tadyathd strtyd ndtidirghandtihrasvakartinydh s&rodyama eva- mdirghas tatksanah; Saeki quotes the Prajnapti: "When a women of medium age is about to spin, the stroke, the movement of a thread neither long nor short, its duration is the tatksana. " That is to say: the normal time that it takes the thread to touch the finger is the/a&fc/^. [According to a note
of P. Louis van Hee].
489. In Scripture {pravacana), there are three seasons {rtu) and not six as in the world. $itira is cold and is thus hemanta; vasanta is hot and is thusgrisma, farad is rainy and is thus varsas (Vydkhya). [Three seasons in the Kdthydvdr, Alberuni, L 357]. For all the B'lddhas, hemanta is the first season (Vydkhyd). {Burnooijntroduction, 569). On the Buddhist seasons, I-tsmg,Takakusu, 101,219,220, Hsi-yU-chi, chap, ii, Watters, 1144. Thibaut, Astronomie. . . , p. 11.
490. The "learned" are the Buddhists who, in the fourteenth and fifteenth fortnight of each of the
three seasons omit a day which is called unardtra or ksaydha (Thibaut, Astronomie, 1899, 26,
Barnett, Antiquities, 195) and, in this way, hold posadha after fourteen days and not after fifteen: f
cdturdaiiko tra bhiksubhih posadhah kriyate.
"Worldly" {laukika) computation has months of 30 days. The lunar month has 29 days, 12
hours, and 44 minutes. The ceremony of posadha is regulated according to the moon. One must thus omit a day {Unardtra) from the worldly computation every two months. Thus each ecclesiastical seasonofeighthalf-monthswillbe15days+15+15+14+15+15+15+ 14.
In order to pass from the ecclesiastical (cdndra) year to the worldly year, one adds six days; in order to catch up to the solar year (of 366 days) one adds an intercalary month (adhimdsa) after two years and seven months (Alberuni, ii. 21).
We should study the Mdtangasutra, TD 21, number 1300, analyzed in Divya 657, part of the Sdrdulakarna (mdsapariksa) omitted by Gowell-NeiL
491. A good study by FleetJJWS. 1911,479, on the kalpas and theyugasJBteet recalls the formulas of A/oka: dva kapam, ova samvafakapdAccatdkig to Buddhaghosa, Makkhali admits 62 antarakappas instead of 64, Sumangala, 1162 {Digha, 154). The kalpas of the Jains, for example, SBE. 22.
The four periods, disappearance, etc.
, described in 90-93, are "the four asankheyya of the [maha]kappa", Anguttara, ii. 142.
492. We customarily translate antarakalpa, antahkalpa, as "intermediate Kalpa", and others, by "der Kalpa der Zwischenzeit" or "Zwischen-Kalpa. " (Schmidt, Geschkhte der Ost-Mongolen, 304). But Remusat has correctly seen that "these expressions do not make sense" {Melanges posthumes, 103, note). The antarakdpas or antahkalpas are, rather, kalpas which are within, inside of greater periods. The translation of ReWisat "petit kalpa" ("small kalpa") is, if not literal, at least useful.
493. We translate samvarta, samvartanias "disappearance. " Such is indeed the meaning of the word when one speaks of bhdjanasamvartani, "disappearance of the receptacles," yadd bhdjandni samvartante vinaiyantityarthah = "when the receptacles disappear, that is to say, perish. " But in the expressions gatisamvartani, etc, samvart signifies "to go together, to be found together with. " There is samvartamoi the realms of rebirth {gati) when hellish beings, animals, etc, are found to be together {samvartante, ekasthibhavantt) in one part of the heavenly realm of rebirth; samvartamoi beings {sattva), when beings are found together in a single DhySna heaven (Rupadhaatu).
Footnotes 541
? 542 Chapter Three
494. Ekottara, TD, p. 736cl7; Beal, Catena, 113. Sp. Hardy, Manual, 472, says that, at the end of the kalpa, beings guilty of the five dnantaryas (iv. 96) get out of hell, but that "the doubter, the skeptic" (the man in Dtgha, L5%Samyutta, iii. 207) is transported to the hell of another universe (see iv. 99c).
495. A being whose aaions should be punished by an animal rebirth will be reborn into another universe. Hsiian-tsang: "The animals who live with humans and with the gods disappear at the same time as do these. "
On the animals in heaven, Kathdvatthu, xx. 4. Manusyasahacarisnava its manusyasahacaranaiUa gomahisddayah.
496. He obtains the first dhydna dharmatdpratilambhika. By dharmatd one should understand "the particular transformation which the good dharmas then undergo" (kusaldndm dharmdndm taddnim parindmavitesah). This point is elucidated viii. 38.
497. Madhyama, TD 1, p. 429al9; Ekottara, TD 2, p. 736c20; Mahdparinirvdna, TD 12, p. 753cl4: Seven suns come out at the same time from behind the mountain Yugandhara; Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 690al5: Four opinions, 1. that the suns are hidden behind Yugandhara (? ); 2. that one sun divides into seven; 3. that one sun takes on a seven times greater force; 4. that seven suns, at first hidden, then manifest themselves by reason of the aaions of beings.
Saptas&ryavydkarana, above p. 376 , quoted in Lokaprajndpti, Mdo 62, foL 66 (Cosmologie, 314); Pitdputrasamdgama (=Ratnakuta, xvi) in Siksdsamuccaya, 247. Pali sources, bibliographic of Minaiev, Zapiski, ix. 323; Sattasurtyuggamana in Anguttara, iv. 3000, Visuddhi, 416 (Warren, 321).
Alberuni, i. 326; Hastings, Ages of the World; Hopkins, Epic Mythology, 1915,84,99, Great Epic, 475; Dictionary of St. Petersburg, s. voc sarhvarta.
Mesopotamian origin of this theory (? ), Carpenter, Studies in the History of Religion, 79.
498. See above p. 376.
499. Below 100c. When the receptacle world is empty, water (abdhdtu) is produced which dissolves, like salt, the receptacle world This water, which is of Kamadhatu, "binds" (sambadhndti) a water of the First Dhyana and the Second Dhyana. This water, which is thus of three spheres (Kamadhatu and two Dhyanas) disappears with the receptacle to which it corresponds.
Disappearance through wind: the wind disperses (vikirati, vidhvarhsayati) the receptacles of the first three Dhyanas like a pile of dust (pdmsurds'i).
On that which remains, note 504.
500. Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 691b8, quoted by Saeki ad iii. 45.
501. According to the rule enunciated below: yat pascat samvartate tat pUrvarh vivartate. 502. According to other sources, 84,000.
503. According to the Mahayana, the 20 kalpas are of augmentation and diminution
504. It has been explained, i. 7, that the skandhas are time.
What does a kalpa consist of? Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 700b23: Some say that it is by its nature
rupdyatana, etc; the days-and-nights, etc. , are totally the arising and the destruaion of the skandhas; as a kalpa is made up of days-and-nights, etc. , it is of the same nature. But a kalpa is the time of the Three Dhatus: thus it is five or four skandhasMui-hm: "kalpa, with respea to Kamadhatu (and Rupadhatu), is five skandhas; with respea to Arupyadhatu, it is four skandhas. The 'empty' kalpa ('the period when the world stays destroyed') is two skandhas [namely, says the gloss, samskdraskandha and rupaskandha (for dkafa is rupa)\ since the days-and-nights, etc, do not exist separate from the skandhas. " A commentary on the Ko/a observes that, according to the Mahayana, time (kola) is a viprayukta samskdra. [The 90th samskdra of the list of the 100 dharmas, Vijnaptimdtra, Museon, 1906,178-194, R. Kimura, Original and developed doctrines, 1920, p. 55].
505. i. Asamkhyeya kalpas, "numberless kalpas" are the time an asamkhyeya number (10 to the 59th power) of mahdkalpas last.
? [asamkhya - asamkhyeya, incalculable, samkhydnendsamkhyeyd asamkhya iti. ]
Hsiian-tsang: Among the four types of kalpas which have been named, which should one multiply in order to make "three numberles kalpas"? One should multiply the great kalpas, 10,100, 1,000, and thus following until this multiplication gives "three numberless kalpas. " That which is termed "without number, numberless" {wu-shu 'j&$L) does not signify "incalculable" (pu k'o shu^ nJffc)? Achieh-tuofflffitSutrasaysthattheword"numberless"(asamkhyeya)isanumber among the sixteen numbers. What are these sixteen? As this Sutra says, "One and not t w o . . . "
ii. The first asamkhyeya of the career of Sakyamuni begins under the former Sakya- tnuni(Mahdvastu, LI) and terminates under Ratnasikhin. During this asamkhyeya there appeared 75,000 Buddhas (Kofa, iv. 110; Remusat, Melanges posthumes, 116; numerical Diet, in Chavannes, Religieux eminents, reads 5,000 in place of 75,000).
The second asamkhyeya ends with Dlpamkara. Buddhas: 76,000.
The third asamkhyeya ends with Vipasyin. Buddhas: 77,000.
There then follow 91 mahdkalpas (in place of 100, as the Ko/a explains, iv. ll2a).
VipaSyin is the first of the seven "historic" Buddhas (celebrated in the Saptabuddhastotra); then
there are Sikhin, Visvabhuj, Krakutsanda, Konakamuni, Kaiyapa, Sakyamuni. (References, Kern, Manual, 64).
iii. In the Pali sources (Cariydpitaka, i. 1. 1, etc), the career of the Bodhisattva is four asamkheyyas in length plus a hundred thousand kappas. Some later works, like the Sdrasamgraha, have Bodhisattvas of four, eight, and sixteen asamkheyyas, plus each time one hundred thousand kappas.
506. A muktaka Sutra, that is to say a Sutra which does not form part of the Agamas: na caturdgamdntargatam sty arthahMsewhere a muktaka Sutra is a non-authentic Sutra.
Paramarthatranslates:yu^ =remaining,other;Hsiian-tsang:chieh-tuoj? |)]g;=[vijmuktaka.
507. Our list is that of the Mahavyutpatti, 249 (which, according to Wogihara, is excerpted from the Kola). The numbers 14 and 15, in the MSS of the Mahavyutpatti, areprasuta, mahdprasuta, but the Chinese versions giveprayuta, mahaprayuta: the Tibetan (rob bkram) gives prakirna or prasrtaJBor 36, 37, Wogihara corrects samdptah, mahdsamdptah to samdptam, mahdsamdptam.
Our list, as Vasubandhu remarks below p. 480, has 52 terms: "Eight members, in the middle, have been forgotten": aspakam madhydd vismrtam. . . see below, note 508.
On the great numbers, Georgy, Alphahetum Tibetanum, 640; Schiefner, Melanges Asiatiques, 629; Remusat, Melanges posthumes, 67; Beal, Catena, 122; other sources and calculations in Hastings, art. Ages of the world, 188b.
The Mahavyutpatti presents four types of calculation 246-249, excerpted from the Buddhd- vatamsaka and the Prajfidpdramitdfdstra, Skandhavyuha, Lalita, Abhidharma; then "worldly" calculation (from 1 to 100).
The Buddhdvatamsaka, quoted by Remusat, teaches that "in the higher system, the numbers are
multiplied by themselves": there are ten numbers thus calculated beginning with asamkhya: 24
asamkhya, asamkhya , asamkhya . . . [I think that the Tibetan version (Kandjour, 36, foL 36) invites 24
ustoapplythisprogressionfromkopi(=10,000,000):kopi,kopi,kopi andthusfollowingupto anabhildpya-anabhildpya-parivartanirdesa which should be the 122nd term of this series]. "Nothing is certainly more unreasonable that all this numerical apparel. . . and yet one is obliged to admit that the Buddhists have sometimes made use of it, either in order to sustain their imagination in the contemplation of the infinity of time and space, or in order to make this idea nearer to those rude spirits incapable of conceiving of this". (Remusat).
The Brahmanical numbers are also very large. The lives of Brahma, Narayana, Rudra, Isvara, Sadasiva, Sakti keep increasing. Sakti lives 10,782,449,978,758,523,781,120 plus 27 zeros of kalpas,. This life is only one trupi or second of a day in the life of Siva, which is represented in kalpas by 37,264,147,126,589,458,187,550,720 plus 30 zeros. Concerning this, Alberuni (i. 363) says: "If those dreamers had more assiduously studied arithmetic, they would not have invented such outrageous numbers. God takes care that their trees do not grow into heaven. "
Footnotes 543
? 544 Chapter Three
508. Vydkhyd: aspau sthanani kvdpi pradefe pramusitatvdn na paphitdni / tendtra dvapaficas'at sthanani bhavanti / saspyd ca samkhydsthdnair bhavitavyam / tony aspakdni svayarh kdni tin ndmdni krtvd paphitavydm yena saspih samkhyasthdndni paripurndni bhaveyuhSame doctrine in Vibhdsd, TD 27, p. 891bl0.
For Ya? omitra the number asamkhya is the sixteenth of the series 1,10,100,1000. . . We should place in this list, in an undetermined place, the eight numbers which are lacking, by giving them some name.
The editor of Mahdvyutpatti, 249, does not understand it thus; he adds, 53-60, apramdnam, aprameyam . . . anabhildpyam.
&arad Chandra Das gives our list as coming from the Kola, 1-52: "Up to this number there are Sanscrit equivalents; from 53 to 60, there are no Sanscrit equivalents, the Tibetan having introduced new names to replace the lost originals. " These new names (which one can translate as tnaitra, mahdmaitra, karuna, mahdkaruna . . . ) do not have, in fact, any resemblance to 53-60 of the Mahdvyutpatti.
509. According to Paramartha. The Lotsava, certainly less clear: de kar na gnas gzhan drug cur phyin pa de dag tu phyin pa'i bskalpa ni bskalpa grans med pa ces bya'o.
510. Opinion expressedin Ekottara, TD2,p. 562b2,b2% Parinirvdna, TD 12, p. 624b21, TD31,p. 518al8 (Saeki). Altruism of the Bodhisattva, Kos'a, iv. llla. That persons of little virtue cannot believe in the Bodhisattva, vii. 34. How the Bodhisattva considers others as his "self," Bodhicarydvatdra, viii.
511. We can thus understand: the excellent desire, for others, of temporal happiness (dbhyudayika) and bliss (naifafreyasika) (^nirvana, cessation of suffering), and, for himself the cessation of suffering, that is to say, the quality of Buddha, because he is useful to others.
According to Saeki, the PrajHdpdramitds'dstra, 29. 18, quotes some stanzas of the Samyukta presenting the same doctrine.
Compare the four categories of Digha, iii. 233, Anguttara, ii. 95.
512. Different theory in the Pali sources, for example Sdrasamgraha.
Sources are not in agreementon the date of the appearanceof the last Buddhas; Vibhdsd, TD 27,
p. 700c29, Dtrghdgama, etc (Remusat, Melanges posthumes, 116; Notes of the Foe koue ki, 189). The Dirgha places, in the course of the ninth antarakalpa of our great kalpa, four Buddhas:
Krakucchanda (period when life is 40,000 years long), Kanakamuni (life of 30,000 years), Kafyapa (life of 20,000 years), Sakyamuni (life of 100 years) [same figures in Digha, iL3, A/okdvaddna, Avaddnas'ataka, etc]; elsewhere we have 60,000,40,000,20,000 and 100.
Others say: No Buddhas during the first five antarakalpas; Krakucchanda in the sixth, Kanakamuni in the seventh, Kafyapa in the eighth, Sakyamuni in the ninth, Maitreya in the tenth. The other Buddhas of the present Bhadrakalpa in the other antarakalpas.
According to the Mahayana, we are in the first antarakalpa of our great kalpa: four Buddhas in the period of diminution; one Buddha (Maitreya) in the period of augmentation. In fact, in the comment of TD 14, number 452 ("The Birth Above of Maitreya"): "Why does Sakyamuni appear in a period of diminution, Maitreya in a period of augmentation? By reason of their vows. . . "
PrajHaparamitas'astra, TD 25, p. 89cl2, p. 93al3.
