The ''Divyāvadāna'' or Divine narratives is a
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...
anthology of
Buddhist
Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or ...
avadana
Avadāna (Sanskrit; Pali: '' Apadāna'') is the name given to a type of Buddhist literature correlating past lives' virtuous deeds to subsequent lives' events.
Richard Salomon described them as "stories, usually narrated by the Buddha, that ...
tales, many originating in
Mūlasarvāstivādin vinaya
The Vinaya (Pali and Sanskrit: विनय) refers to numerous monastic rules and ethical precepts for fully ordained monks and nuns of Buddhist Sanghas (community of like-minded ''sramanas''). These sets of ethical rules and guidelines devel ...
texts. It may be dated to 2nd century CE. The stories themselves are therefore quite ancient and may be among the first Buddhist texts ever committed to writing, but this particular collection of them is not attested prior to the seventeenth century.
Typically, the stories involve the Buddha explaining to a group of disciples how a particular individual, through actions in a previous life, came to have a particular
karmic result in the present.
A predominant theme is the vast
merit (') accrued from making offerings to enlightened beings or at
stupa
In Buddhism, a stupa (, ) is a domed hemispherical structure containing several types of sacred relics, including images, statues, metals, and '' śarīra''—the remains of Buddhist monks or nuns. It is used as a place of pilgrimage and m ...
s and other
holy sites related to the Buddha.
Contents
The anthology contains 38 avadana stories in all, including the well-known ''
Aśokāvadāna'' "Legend of
Aśoka", which was translated into English by John Strong (Princeton, 1983). The collection has been known since the dawn of Buddhist studies in the West, when it was excerpted in
Eugène Burnouf's history of Indian Buddhism (1844). The first Western edition of the Sanskrit text was published in 1886 by
Edward Byles Cowell and R.A. Neil. The Sanskrit text was again edited by P. L. Vaidya in 1959. The
Aśokāvadāna part of Divyavadana compiled during 4-5th century A.D. by sectarian Mathura's Buddhist monks
''Sahasodgata-avadāna'', in the opening paragraphs, describe the Buddha's instructions for creating the
bhavacakra (wheel of life).
''Rudrāyaṇa-avadāna'' explains how the Buddha gave the first illustration of the Buddha to King Rudrayaṇa. According to this story, at the time of the Buddha, King Rudrayana (a.k.a.
Udayana (king) ) offered a gift of a jeweled robe to King Bimbisara of Magadha. King Bimbisara was concerned that he did not have anything of equivalent value to offer as a gift in return. Bimbisara went to the Buddha for advice, and the Buddha gave instructions to have the first drawing of the Buddha himself send the drawing to Rudrayana. It is said that Rudrayana attained realization through seeing this picture.
List of Stories
This is the list of stories contained in the ''Divyāvadāna'':
Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon, Language: Sanskrit, Script: Devanagari
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Selected English translations
Original Sanskrit
References
{{reflist
External links
The Divyâvadâna: a collection of early Buddhist legends
by E. B. Cowell (English transliteration)
Divyavadana
(1959) by P. L. Vaidya (Sanskrit)
Sanskrit texts
Early Buddhist texts
Indian anthologies
Indian folklore
Indian literature
Indian legends