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130-626: Jīvaka ( Pali : Jīvaka Komārabhacca ; Sanskrit : Jīvaka Kaumārabhṛtya ) was the personal physician ( Sanskrit : vaidya ) of the Buddha and the Indian King Bimbisāra . He lived in Rājagṛha, present-day Rajgir , in the 5th century BCE. Sometimes described as the "Medicine King" and( pinyin : yi wang ) and "Thrice Crowned physician" he figures prominently in legendary accounts in Asia as

260-576: A bodhisattva , a Buddha-to-be, focused on healing. The Tibetan and Sanskrit version, however, relates that there was a gem hidden between the sticks which was the source of the miracles. Regardless, the miraculous object enables him to see through a patient's body and diagnose his illness, as the object "illuminates his inside as a lamp lights up a house". These accounts may have led to a myth about an ancient "ultrasound probe", as imagined in medieval Buddhist kingdoms of Asia. "Jivaka remarked, 'Those are footprints of an elephant, not male but female, blind of

390-415: A Middle Indo-Aryan language , is different from Classical Sanskrit more with regard to its dialectal base than the time of its origin. A number of its morphological and lexical features show that it is not a direct continuation of Ṛgvedic Sanskrit. Instead it descends from one or more dialects that were, despite many similarities, different from Ṛgvedic . The Theravada commentaries refer to

520-515: A before doubled consonants: The vowels ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩ are lengthened in the flexional endings including: -īhi, -ūhi and -īsu A sound called anusvāra (Skt.; Pali: niggahīta ), represented by the letter ṁ (ISO 15919) or ṃ (ALA-LC) in romanization, and by a raised dot in most traditional alphabets, originally marked the fact that the preceding vowel was nasalized. That is, aṁ , iṁ and uṁ represented [ã] , [ĩ] and [ũ] . In many traditional pronunciations, however,

650-491: A cesarean section on patients under some form of anaesthesia . This and some other descriptions of Jīvaka's medical procedures follow the protocol of the Suśruta and Charaka Saṃhitās closely. The Jīvaka Sūtras describe that he also performed acupuncture, but this must have been a Chinese interpolation in the narrative, since this was a Chinese practice. In a more psychological case, Jīvaka treated another seṭṭhī , this time with

780-453: A gaṇikā (Sanskrit: gaṇikā ; in the Pāli and Dharmaguptaka canons this was not Āmrapālī, but Salāvatī), who had him discarded on a trash heap by a slave. He was later seen by a prince called Abhaya, son of King Bimbisāra, who asked whether the child was still alive. When the people responded that it was, he decided to raise him and named him "he who is alive" (Pali: jīvati ), for having survived

910-531: A lingua franca or common language of culture among people who used differing dialects in North India, used at the time of the Buddha and employed by him. Another scholar states that at that time it was "a refined and elegant vernacular of all Aryan-speaking people". Modern scholarship has not arrived at a consensus on the issue; there are a variety of conflicting theories with supporters and detractors. After

1040-447: A voiced retroflex lateral approximant [ɭ] or non-retroflex [l] "l" sound. Both the long ā and retroflex ḷ are seen in the ISO 15919 / ALA-LC rendering, Pāḷi ; however, to this day there is no single, standard spelling of the term, and all four possible spellings can be found in textbooks. R. C. Childers translates the word as "series" and states that the language "bears

1170-423: A Buddhist lay person. The Tibetan tradition has another version of Jīvaka's conversion: Jīvaka's pride that he thought he was the best physician in the world obstructed him from accepting the Buddha. The Buddha sent Jīvaka to legendary places to find ingredients, and finally Jīvaka discovered there is still a lot he did not know yet about medicine, and it turned out that the Buddha knew a lot more. When Jīvaka accepted

1300-455: A brain condition. After having performed brain surgery, he told the patient to lie still on the right side for seven years, on the left side for another seven years and on his back for yet another seven years. The patient lied on each side for seven days and could not lie still for longer, standing up from his sleeping place. He confessed this to Jīvaka, who revealed to him that he ordered him seven years on each side just to persuade him to complete

1430-570: A child to heal the tumour. As Ajatashatru was planning to eat a child, he remembered that he killed his father. When he thought about the killing of his father, the tumour disappeared. Ajatashatru became ashamed of what he had done. Eventually, Jīvaka managed to bring Ajatashatru to see the Buddha to repent his misdeeds. In the Mūlasarvastivāda texts, this happened after Jīvaka raised examples of other evil people that could still be saved despite their misdeeds, and after Jīvaka reminded Ajatashatru that

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1560-611: A continuation of a language spoken in the area of Magadha in the time of the Buddha. Nearly every word in Pāḷi has cognates in the other Middle Indo-Aryan languages, the Prakrits . The relationship to Vedic Sanskrit is less direct and more complicated; the Prakrits were descended from Old Indo-Aryan vernaculars . Historically, influence between Pali and Sanskrit has been felt in both directions. The Pali language's resemblance to Sanskrit

1690-552: A degraded form of Pali, But Masefield states that further examination of a very considerable corpus of texts will probably show that this is an internally consistent Pali dialect. The reason for the changes is that some combinations of characters are difficult to write in those scripts. Masefield further states that upon the third re-introduction of Theravada Buddhism into Sri Lanka (The Siyamese Sect), records in Thailand state that large number of texts were also taken. It seems that when

1820-575: A few loan-words from local languages where Pali was used (e.g. Sri Lankans adding Sinhala words to Pali). These usages differentiate the Pali found in the Suttapiṭaka from later compositions such as the Pali commentaries on the canon and folklore (e.g., commentaries on the Jataka tales ), and comparative study (and dating) of texts on the basis of such loan-words is now a specialized field unto itself. Pali

1950-409: A foundling discarded by a courtesan with no royal blood, and was later found and raised in the court by Prince Abhaya. In later versions, the story has been embellished to appeal to a wider audience, as Jīvaka's mother is identified with the courtesan of divine origin and Buddhist disciple Āmrapālī , and the previously unnamed father becomes none other than King Bimbisāra . Furthermore, some versions of

2080-665: A high degree of mutual intelligibility. Theravada tradition, as recorded in chronicles like the Mahavamsa , states that the Tipitaka was first committed to writing during the first century BCE. This move away from the previous tradition of oral preservation is described as being motivated by threats to the Sangha from famine, war, and the growing influence of the rival tradition of the Abhayagiri Vihara . This account

2210-417: A mango grove close to Rājagṛha and built a monastery there. The monastery was used by monks during the yearly rains retreat . Later on, Jīvaka was the first layman recorded to offer robes to Buddhist monks. It was probably out of health considerations that Jīvaka offered the robes, since before that time, Buddhist monks would usually sew their robes together from pieces of rag left behind, or from corpses, which

2340-495: A mix of several Prakrit languages from around the 3rd century BCE, combined and partially Sanskritized. There is no attested dialect of Middle Indo-Aryan with all the features of Pali. In the modern era, it has been possible to compare Pali with inscriptions known to be in Magadhi Prakrit, as well as other texts and grammars of that language. While none of the existing sources specifically document pre-Ashokan Magadhi,

2470-566: A model healer, and is honoured as such by traditional healers in several Asian countries. Accounts about Jīvaka can be found in Early Buddhist Texts in many textual traditions such as the Pāli and Mūlasarvāstivāda traditions, as well as later Buddhist discourses and devotional Avadāna texts. Textual traditions agree that Jīvaka was born as a foundling of a courtesan( gaṇikā ), but not who his parents were exactly. Regardless, Jīvaka

2600-415: A number of additional texts that may be attributed to An Shigao. Paul Harrison has provided evidence that An Shigao translated the previously anonymous collection of saṃyuktāgama sutras , Za ahan jing 雜阿含經 (Taishō 101). Stefano Zacchetti has suggested that, though initially considered inauthentic according to Zürcher's conservative criteria, Taishō 1557, Apitan wu fa xing jing 阿毘曇五法行經 , may indeed be

2730-415: A number of similarities between surviving fragments and Pali morphology. Ardhamagadhi Prakrit was a Middle Indo-Aryan language and a Dramatic Prakrit thought to have been spoken in modern-day Bihar & Eastern Uttar Pradesh and used in some early Buddhist and Jain drama. It was originally thought to be a predecessor of the vernacular Magadhi Prakrit, hence the name (literally "half-Magadhi"). Ardhamāgadhī

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2860-476: A park called Maddakucchi, where Devadatta hurled a rock at the Buddha from a cliff. Although the rock was stopped by another rock midway, a splinter hit the Buddha's foot and caused him to bleed, but Jīvaka healed the Buddha. Jīvaka sometimes forgot to finish certain treatments, however. In such cases, the Buddha knew the healer's mind and finished the treatment himself. Jīvaka tried to heal the Buddha using only objects that are regarded as reverential, such as parts of

2990-521: A personal physician to the Buddha. Jīvaka was depicted healing a misplacement of intestines, performing an operation of trepanning on a patient, removing an intracranial mass and performing nose surgery. In T. 553, as well as in the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya, he healed a "disease of the head" by treating the patient with ghee through the nose, and he is depicted in Pāli texts as performing laparotomy , removing post-traumatic volvulus and

3120-408: A viewpoint of scientific medical practice. Salguero is more skeptical, however, and argues that "[m]edical legends simply cannot be considered evidence of medical practice". Pāli texts often describe Jīvaka giving treatments to the Buddha for several ailments, such as when the Buddha had a cold, and when he was hurt after an attempt on his life by the rebellious monk Devadatta . The latter happened at

3250-687: Is a classical Middle Indo-Aryan language on the Indian subcontinent . It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist Pāli Canon or Tipiṭaka as well as the sacred language of Theravāda Buddhism . Pali is designated as a classical language by the Government of India . The word 'Pali' is used as a name for the language of the Theravada canon. The word seems to have its origins in commentarial traditions, wherein

3380-748: Is an abbreviation of Anxi , the Chinese name given to the regions ruled by the Parthian Empire . Most visitors from that country who took a Chinese name received the An prefix to indicate their origin in Anxi . Nothing more is known about his life; the stories about his peregrinations in Southern China recorded in his biographies in CSZJJ ( Chu sanzang jiji ) and GSZ ( Gaoseng Zhuan ) must be relegated to

3510-577: Is currently relatively little known, particularly in the Thai tradition, with many manuscripts never catalogued or published. Paiśācī is a largely unattested literary language of classical India that is mentioned in Prakrit and Sanskrit grammars of antiquity. It is found grouped with the Prakrit languages, with which it shares some linguistic similarities, but was not considered a spoken language by

3640-536: Is frequently chanted in a ritual context. The secular literature of Pali historical chronicles, medical texts, and inscriptions is also of great historical importance. The great centres of Pali learning remain in Sri Lanka and other Theravada nations of Southeast Asia: Myanmar , Thailand , Laos and Cambodia . Since the 19th century, various societies for the revival of Pali studies in India have promoted awareness of

3770-502: Is generally accepted by scholars, though there are indications that Pali had already begun to be recorded in writing by this date. By this point in its history, scholars consider it likely that Pali had already undergone some initial assimilation with Sanskrit , such as the conversion of the Middle-Indic bahmana to the more familiar Sanskrit brāhmana that contemporary brahmans used to identify themselves. In Sri Lanka, Pali

3900-540: Is honoured throughout Asian history by Buddhists, and to some extent by healers outside of Buddhism, as a model physician and Buddhist saint. Several medieval medical texts and procedures in India and China are attributed to him. Up until the present day, Jīvaka is honoured by Indians and Thai as a patron of traditional medicine, and he has a central role in all ceremonies involving Thai traditional medicine . Furthermore, Jīvaka's legendary persona has had an important role in helping to proselytise and legitimise Buddhism. Some of

4030-630: Is most likely based on the T. 554, but has been expanded using material from the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya. Besides these sources, several Avadāna texts also contain accounts about Jīvaka. There are also numerous references to him in Indian literature that is not Buddhist, such as the Māṭharavṛtti, a commentary to the Sāṃkhyasūtra , and the satirical poems of Kṣemendra , the 11th-century Kashmiri poet. Salguero and fellow historian Kenneth Zysk have compared

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4160-589: Is named after Jīvaka: the Jīvaka Sutta . In this discourse, Jīvaka inquired about how to be a good lay devotee. He also specifically asked why the Buddha ate meat. The Buddha responded that a monk is only allowed to eat meat if the animal is not killed especially for him—apart from that, meat is allowed. He continued by saying that a monk cannot be choosy about the food he is consuming, but should receive and eat food dispassionately, just to sustain his health. The discourse inspired Jīvaka, who decided to dedicate himself as

4290-677: Is often exaggerated by comparing it to later Sanskrit compositions—which were written centuries after Sanskrit ceased to be a living language, and are influenced by developments in Middle Indic , including the direct borrowing of a portion of the Middle Indic lexicon; whereas, a good deal of later Pali technical terminology has been borrowed from the vocabulary of equivalent disciplines in Sanskrit, either directly or with certain phonological adaptations. Post-canonical Pali also possesses

4420-491: Is referred to in numerous medical texts from at least the 4th century CE onward. In 6th-century texts of Chinese pharmacology, the adage "Everything on earth is nothing but medicine" [ sic ] is attributed to him. In 10th-century Chinese medicine, many treatises were associated with or attributed to Jīvaka. There is also evidence that shows Jīvaka was regarded as an important figure for Indian Āyurvedic medicine: for example, Ḍalhaṇa , an Indian scholar who lived between

4550-643: Is regularly referred to as a " bodhisattva " in early Chinese sources. Scholarly studies of his translations have shown that they are most closely affiliated with the Sarvāstivāda school. In Erik Zürcher's pioneering studies of the works attributed to An Shigao, he uses both the information provided by later Chinese catalogues and internal stylistic evidence to conclude that only sixteen of the nearly two hundred translations attributed to him by later Chinese catalogues may be regarded as authentic. Stefano Zacchetti has proposed, in light of recent research, that thirteen of

4680-479: Is seen by Indians as a patriarch of traditional healing, and is regarded by Thai people as the creator of traditional Thai massage and medicine . Thai people still venerate him to ask for assistance in healing ailments, and he plays a central role in nearly all ceremony that is part of traditional Thai medicine. Stories exist about Jīvaka's purported travels to Thailand. In the Sanskrit textual traditions , Jīvaka

4810-436: Is sometimes substituted with tanti , meaning a string or lineage. This name seems to have emerged in Sri Lanka early in the second millennium CE during a resurgence in the use of Pali as a courtly and literary language. As such, the name of the language has caused some debate among scholars of all ages; the spelling of the name also varies, being found with both long "ā" [ɑː] and short "a" [a] , and also with either

4940-936: Is that literature in Paiśācī is fragmentary and extremely rare but may once have been common. The 13th-century Tibetan historian Buton Rinchen Drub wrote that the early Buddhist schools were separated by choice of sacred language : the Mahāsāṃghikas used Prakrit, the Sarvāstivādins used Sanskrit, the Sthaviravādins used Paiśācī, and the Saṃmitīya used Apabhraṃśa . This observation has led some scholars to theorize connections between Pali and Paiśācī; Sten Konow concluded that it may have been an Indo-Aryan language spoken by Dravidian people in South India, and Alfred Master noted

5070-591: Is the ninth of the Sixteen Arhats , disciples that are entrusted to protect the Buddha's teaching until the arising of the next Buddha . He is therefore described in Buddhist texts as still being alive on a mountain peak called Gandhamādana , between India and Sri Lanka. The monastery Jīvaka presented to the Buddhist community came to be known as the Jīvakarāma Vihāra , Jīvakāmravaṇa or Jīvakambavana, and

5200-461: Is thought to have entered into a period of decline ending around the 4th or 5th century (as Sanskrit rose in prominence, and simultaneously, as Buddhism's adherents became a smaller portion of the subcontinent), but ultimately survived. The work of Buddhaghosa was largely responsible for its reemergence as an important scholarly language in Buddhist thought. The Visuddhimagga , and the other commentaries that Buddhaghosa compiled, codified and condensed

5330-785: Is usually divided into canonical and non-canonical or extra-canonical texts. Canonical texts include the whole of the Pali Canon or Tipitaka . With the exception of three books placed in the Khuddaka Nikaya by only the Burmese tradition, these texts (consisting of the five Nikayas of the Sutta Pitaka , the Vinaya Pitaka , and the books of the Abhidhamma Pitaka ) are traditionally accepted as containing

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5460-480: The Pāli (in the sense of the line of original text quoted) was distinguished from the commentary or vernacular translation that followed it in the manuscript. K. R. Norman suggests that its emergence was based on a misunderstanding of the compound pāli-bhāsa , with pāli being interpreted as the name of a particular language. The name Pali does not appear in the canonical literature, and in commentary literature

5590-635: The Achaemenid conquest of the Indus Valley circa 515 BCE. Texts in the Chinese tradition relate that Jīvaka was a crown prince in a kingdom in Central India. When the king died, his younger brother prepared an army to battle Jīvaka. But Jīvaka said to his brother that he had not much interest in the throne, because his mind was focused on the Buddha instead. He exposed his chest, showing a Buddha image engraved on his heart. The younger brother

5720-732: The Mahāsāṃghika branch became influential in Central and East India . Akira Hirakawa and Paul Groner also associate Pali with Western India and the Sthavira nikāya, citing the Saurashtran inscriptions, which are linguistically closest to the Pali language. Although Sanskrit was said in the Brahmanical tradition to be the unchanging language spoken by the gods in which each word had an inherent significance, such views for any language

5850-783: The Milindapanha ) may have been composed in India before being transmitted to Sri Lanka, but the surviving versions of the texts are those preserved by the Mahavihara in Ceylon and shared with monasteries in Theravada Southeast Asia. The earliest inscriptions in Pali found in mainland Southeast Asia are from the first millennium CE, some possibly dating to as early as the 4th century. Inscriptions are found in what are now Burma, Laos, Thailand and Cambodia and may have spread from southern India rather than Sri Lanka. By

5980-625: The Pali Canon and non-canonical texts, and include several examples of the Ye dhamma hetu verse. The oldest surviving Pali manuscript was discovered in Nepal dating to the 9th century. It is in the form of four palm-leaf folios, using a transitional script deriving from the Gupta script to scribe a fragment of the Cullavagga . The oldest known manuscripts from Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia date to

6110-526: The Pāli language , Chinese (from the Dharmaguptaka , Mahīśāsaka and Sarvāstivāda traditions, all translated from Indic texts in the 5th century CE), Tibetan ( Mūlasarvāstivāda ) and Sanskrit texts. Jīvaka's story can be found in the texts of monastic discipline (Pāli and Sanskrit: Vinaya ) of which the oldest stratum can be dated back to the first half of the 4th century BCE. This stratum includes rules and regulations about medicine, also relating

6240-480: The Six Dynasties period (early medieval), Jīvaka figures most prominently of all physicians, and his stories influenced the stories about other legendary physicians, as well as being influenced by their narratives. In East Asia, Jīvaka was associated with gynaecology , and the name Jīvaka is related to ancient female pathology and paediatrics . Several medieval medical formulas were named after him, and he

6370-547: The textbook called the Sarvabhūtaruta , which may refer to a book about magical chants and dharanis . After that, he traveled further and came in possession of a miraculous object that helped him to see through the human body and discover any ailments. In this account, which could also be found in the Jīvaka Sūtras , Jīvaka came across a man carrying wooden sticks. In some accounts, the man seemed to suffer terribly because of

6500-550: The 11th and 13th centuries, wrote in a commentary on the Suśruta Saṃhitā that "Jīvaka's compendium" was regarded as an authoritative text on children's diseases, though this text has now been lost. This does not mean that Jīvaka was revered unanimously by all of Asia; several medieval Indian texts such as the Māṭharavṛtti, and the poems of Kṣemedra, depict him, as well as other physicians, as impostors. Among Indian texts, Buddhist texts tend to stand out in that they give much honour to

6630-490: The 11th century, a so-called "Pali renaissance" began in the vicinity of Pagan , gradually spreading to the rest of mainland Southeast Asia as royal dynasties sponsored monastic lineages derived from the Mahavihara of Anuradhapura . This era was also characterized by the adoption of Sanskrit conventions and poetic forms (such as kavya ) that had not been features of earlier Pali literature. This process began as early as

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6760-804: The 13th–15th century, with few surviving examples. Very few manuscripts older than 400 years have survived, and complete manuscripts of the four Nikayas are only available in examples from the 17th century and later. Pali was first mentioned in Western literature in Simon de la Loubère 's descriptions of his travels in the kingdom of Siam. An early grammar and dictionary was published by Methodist missionary Benjamin Clough in 1824, and an initial study published by Eugène Burnouf and Christian Lassen in 1826 ( Essai sur le Pali, ou Langue sacrée de la presqu'île au-delà du Gange ). The first modern Pali-English dictionary

6890-473: The 5th century CE and between 7th and 10th century respectively, both translated from a Sanskrit or Central Asian source. Traditionally, the two translations were attributed to An Shigao (148–180 CE), but this was probably an attempt to make them look more ancient and legitimate. Historian C. Pierce Salguero argues that they were probably based on a translation made by Zhu Fahu (233–±308 CE), as well as early Vinaya and 5th-century apocryphal material. Whereas

7020-627: The 5th century, but intensified early in the second millennium as Pali texts on poetics and composition modeled on Sanskrit forms began to grow in popularity. One milestone of this period was the publication of the Subodhalankara during the 14th century, a work attributed to Sangharakkhita Mahāsāmi and modeled on the Sanskrit Kavyadarsa . Peter Masefield devoted considerable research to a form of Pali known as Indochinese Pali or 'Kham Pali'. Up until now, this has been considered

7150-431: The Buddha as "the supreme of physicians", he was more receptive to the Buddha's teachings and the Buddha started teaching him. Jīvaka took upon himself the five moral precepts . Pāli texts relate that Jīvaka later attained the state of śrotāpanna , a state preceding enlightenment . Having accomplished this, he started to visit the Buddha twice a week. Since he had to travel quite far for that often, he decided to donate

7280-414: The Buddha eventually did for five diseases. Although Jīvaka was depicted as showing great respect for the Buddha and concern and help for the monastic community, there was at least one case in which he failed to show respect. This is the case of Paṇṭhaka , a monk who was considered stupid by many. Jīvaka also shared this opinion, and when he invited the Buddha and the monastic community for a meal, Paṇṭhaka

7410-523: The Buddha used during his life. In the 19th century, the British Orientalist Robert Caesar Childers argued that the true or geographical name of the Pali language was Magadhi Prakrit , and that because pāḷi means "line, row, series", the early Buddhists extended the meaning of the term to mean "a series of books", so pāḷibhāsā means "language of the texts". However, modern scholarship has regarded Pali as

7540-456: The Buddha was at the end of his life. In the Mahāsaṃghika texts, however, Ajatashatru consulted his ministers about who he should go to look for counsel. Although his ministers recommended to see several other non-Buddhist teachers, eventually Jīvaka suggested the new king to see the Buddha. In Buddhist texts, the Buddha declared Jīvaka foremost among laypeople in being beloved by people, and

7670-459: The Buddha's alms bowl for him. Jīvaka bowed at the monk's feet to request his forgiveness. Medieval Chinese accounts about Jīvaka tend be hagiographic in nature, and were used more in the proselytising of Buddhism than regarded as medical biography. Since healing knowledge and the proselytising of Buddhism were closely connected, praise for Jīvaka's medical prowess also meant praise and legitimisation of Buddhism. In Chinese texts about medicine from

7800-651: The Buddha. As Jīvaka came more into contact with the Buddha, he became an important supporter of the religion and eventually founded the Jīvakarāma monastery . Later, Bimbisāra was killed by his son Ajatashatru , who usurped the throne. Eventually, Jīvaka was instrumental in bringing him to see the Buddha, to whom the new king repented the deeds he had done. In the texts, Jīvaka is depicted performing complicated medical procedures, including those that could be interpreted as brain surgery. Scholars are in debate to which extent these depictions have historical value. Regardless, Jīvaka

7930-579: The Greeks called Taxila) , presently identified with a city near Islamabad , Pakistan. Sanskrit texts and early Tibetan translations in the Mūlasarvāstivāda tradition state that Jīvaka was born as an illegitimate child of King Bimbisāra and a merchant's wife, who in the Chinese Jīvaka Sūtras is identified with the courtesan Āmrapālī. In the Sanskrit and Tibetan recension, however, the wife of

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8060-399: The Mūlasarvāstivāda texts, Ajatashatru nearly killed his mother out of anger, but was stopped by Jīvaka and a minister, who warned him that he would be considered a casteless outcast (Sanskrit: caṇḍala ) if he killed his own mother. Later on, Bimbisāra did starve and died. Ajatashatru developed a tumour after his father's death, and asked Jīvaka to heal it. Jīvaka said he needed the meat of

8190-512: The Pali language as " Magadhan " or the "language of Magadha". This identification first appears in the commentaries, and may have been an attempt by Buddhists to associate themselves more closely with the Maurya Empire . However, only some of the Buddha's teachings were delivered in the historical territory of Magadha kingdom . Scholars consider it likely that he taught in several closely related dialects of Middle Indo-Aryan, which had

8320-445: The Prakrits." According to K. R. Norman , differences between different texts within the canon suggest that it contains material from more than a single dialect. He also suggests it is likely that the viharas in North India had separate collections of material, preserved in the local dialect. In the early period it is likely that no degree of translation was necessary in communicating this material to other areas. Around

8450-442: The Pāli texts name him as example of someone with unwavering faith in Buddhism . Jīvaka was that widely known for his healing skills, that he could not respond to all the people that want his help. Since Jīvaka gave priority to the Buddhist monastic community, some people needing medical help sought ordination as monks to get it. Jīvaka became aware of this and recommended the Buddha to screen people for diseases before ordaining, which

8580-532: The Pāli texts, on his way back to Rājagṛha, Jīvaka needed money for his travelling expenses, so he was forced to start working in Sāketa . A rich merchant (Pali: seṭṭhī ) asked for help for his wife, but since many physicians had failed to heal her, Jīvaka was reluctant and stated that he would ask for no fee if his treatment was unsuccessful. He successfully treated her though and was rewarded generously. After his return in Rājagṛha, he gave his first earnings to Prince Abhaya, who refused these but had Jīvaka work in

8710-415: The Pāli version, he rewarded him by giving him an expensive cloth, which Jīvaka then offered to the Buddha; in the Mūlasarvāstivāda version, the king rewarded Jīvaka by listening to the teaching of the Buddha, the only payment Jīvaka accepted. Accounts in medieval Japanese and Chinese literature depict Jīvaka offering baths to the Buddha and dedicating the religious merit to all sentient beings . The story

8840-409: The Sanskrit and Tibetan version, Jīvaka is recognised and named the "Medicine King" by the court on three occasion, each time after a medical miracle. He is therefore also described as the "Thrice-crowned Physician" . Texts from the earliest, Pāli tradition, as well as the Chinese Dharmaguptaka Vinaya and the T. 553 sūtra , describe that Jīvaka was born in Rājagṛha (present-day Rajgir ) as a child of

8970-467: The Sinhala commentarial tradition that had been preserved and expanded in Sri Lanka since the 3rd century BCE. With only a few possible exceptions, the entire corpus of Pali texts known today is believed to derive from the Anuradhapura Maha Viharaya in Sri Lanka. While literary evidence exists of Theravadins in mainland India surviving into the 13th century, no Pali texts specifically attributable to this tradition have been recovered. Some texts (such as

9100-399: The Sri Lankan tradition and then spread to other Theravada regions, some texts may have other origins. The Milinda Panha may have originated in northern India before being translated from Sanskrit or Gandhari Prakrit . There are also a number of texts that are believed to have been composed in Pali in Sri Lanka, Thailand and Burma but were not widely circulated. This regional Pali literature

9230-422: The UK; incongruously, the citizens of the UK were not nearly so robust in Sanskrit and Prakrit language studies as Germany, Russia, and even Denmark . Even without the inspiration of colonial holdings such as the former British occupation of Sri Lanka and Burma, institutions such as the Danish Royal Library have built up major collections of Pali manuscripts, and major traditions of Pali studies. Pali literature

9360-549: The Vinaya accounts are intended for a monastic audience, the two Jīvaka Sūtras appear to be more popular versions of the account, meant for a wider lay audience. The T. 554 sūtra most likely incorporated and sometimes replaced the early Vinaya accounts in the Mahīśāsaka and Sarvāstivāda canons, some of which have hardly been passed down as part of the Vinaya, and can therefore only be found within that sūtra . The other T. 553 sūtra

9490-533: The academic work of Antonino Forte. An Shigao migrated eastward into China, settling at the Han capital of Luoyang in 148 CE, where he produced a substantial number of translations of Indian Buddhist texts and attracted a devoted community of followers. More than a dozen works by An Shigao are currently extant, including texts dealing with meditation, abhidharma , and basic Buddhist doctrines. An Shigao's corpus does not contain any Mahāyāna scriptures, though he himself

9620-639: The anusvāra is pronounced more strongly, like the velar nasal [ŋ] , so that these sounds are pronounced instead [ãŋ] , [ĩŋ] and [ũŋ] . However pronounced, ṁ never follows a long vowel; ā, ī and ū are converted to the corresponding short vowels when ṁ is added to a stem ending in a long vowel, e.g. kathā + ṁ becomes kathaṁ , not *kathāṁ , devī + ṁ becomes deviṁ , not * devīṁ . An Shigao The prefix An in An Shigao's name has raised many questions and hypotheses as to his origin and story. Some believe that it

9750-696: The available sources suggest that Pali is not equatable with that language. Modern scholars generally regard Pali to have originated from a western dialect, rather than an eastern one. Pali has some commonalities with both the western Ashokan Edicts at Girnar in Saurashtra , and the Central-Western Prakrit found in the eastern Hathigumpha inscription . These similarities lead scholars to associate Pali with this region of western India. Nonetheless, Pali does retain some eastern features that have been referred to as Māgadhisms . Pāḷi, as

9880-530: The bite of snakes. Many people in Theravada cultures still believe that taking a vow in Pali has a special significance, and, as one example of the supernatural power assigned to chanting in the language, the recitation of the vows of Aṅgulimāla are believed to alleviate the pain of childbirth in Sri Lanka. In Thailand, the chanting of a portion of the Abhidhammapiṭaka is believed to be beneficial to

10010-423: The death of the Buddha, Pali may have evolved among Buddhists out of the language of the Buddha as a new artificial language. R. C. Childers, who held to the theory that Pali was Old Magadhi, wrote: "Had Gautama never preached, it is unlikely that Magadhese would have been distinguished from the many other vernaculars of Hindustan, except perhaps by an inherent grace and strength which make it a sort of Tuscan among

10140-436: The details of Jīvaka's accounts were adjusted to fit the local milieus in which they were passed on. The Jīvakarāma monastery was identified by the Chinese pilgrim Xuan Zang in the 7th century, and it was excavated in the 19th century. Presently, it is one of the oldest Buddhist monasteries with archaeological remains still in existence. The life of Jīvaka is described in several early Buddhist textual traditions , that is, in

10270-411: The different recensions of the story and have argued that none of them are the original text, and thus the original narrative cannot be known. Instead, they argue that the different narratives were adjusted to fit with local traditions. For example, Salguero argues that the medieval Jīvaka Sūtras that are not part of the Vinaya were written based on much indigenous knowledge of Chinese medicine: some of

10400-408: The diseases and having Jīvaka heal them, although there are also many similarities. Jīvaka is described in Buddhist texts as a contemporary of the Buddha, who most scholars date to the 5th century BCE. There are significant differences in how Jīvaka's early life is rendered according to the different textual traditions. In what appears to be the earliest version of the narrative, Jīvaka is described as

10530-525: The early Buddhist texts which were translated in Chinese, Jīvaka was deified and described in similar terminology as used for Buddhas and bodhisattvas . He came to be called the "Medicine King", a term used for several legendary Chinese physicians. There is evidence that during the Tang dynasty (7th–10th century), Jīvaka was worshipped along the Silk Road as a patron deity of children's health. Today, Jīvaka

10660-441: The early grammarians because it was understood to have been purely a literary language. In works of Sanskrit poetics such as Daṇḍin 's Kavyadarsha , it is also known by the name of Bhūtabhāṣā , an epithet which can be interpreted as 'dead language' (i.e., with no surviving speakers), or bhūta means past and bhāṣā means language i.e. 'a language spoken in the past'. Evidence which lends support to this interpretation

10790-439: The effect of the wooden sticks, being emaciated and sweating; in other accounts, the wooden sticks which the man carried allowed any by-passers to see through his back. Regardless, Jīvaka bought the sticks and found that, according to most of the Chinese texts, one of the sticks originated from a miraculous " Medicine King Tree " ( pinyin : yao wang shu ): the tree of Bhaiṣajrayājan , who later Mahāyāna texts would describe as

10920-410: The epithet in consequence of the perfection of its grammatical structure". There is persistent confusion as to the relation of Pāḷi to the vernacular spoken in the ancient kingdom of Magadha , which was located in modern-day Bihar . Beginning in the Theravada commentaries, Pali was identified with ' Magadhi ', the language of the kingdom of Magadha, and this was taken to also be the language that

11050-413: The footprint of an elephant and was able to describe the rider of the elephant in great detail, just basing himself on the elephants' footprint. Tibetan texts do state that Jīvaka suffered from jealous fellow-students, however, who accused Ātreya of favouring him, because he was from the court. In the Pāli and Chinese version of the story, Ātreya then sent Jīvaka and his fellow pupils to look for any plant in

11180-509: The forest is done before accepting Jīvaka in Takṣaśila, as opposed to the exam at the end of his studies. After Jīvaka passed the test, was admitted and learnt at the centre for several years, he started to demonstrate his medical superiority and was recognised as such by Ātreya. He finished his studies with Ātreya and continued his studies at the city of Bhadraṅkara in Vidarbha , where he studied

11310-409: The forest that did not have medicinal qualities. Jīvaka returned disappointed, however, telling Ātreya that he could not find a single plant of which he did not recognise its medicinal qualities. When Ātreya was satisfied with this progress, he gave Jīvaka a bit of money and sent him off, but not before acknowledging him as his next successor. In the Sanskrit and Tibetan recensions, however, the test of

11440-452: The full seven days on each side. In another case described in the Mūlasarvāstivāda texts, King Bimbisāra lent Jīvaka to King Pradyota (Pali: Candappajjoti ), the King of Ujjeni , to heal his jaundice . Jīvaka knew through the power of his magical wood that Pradyota was poisoned by a snake and could only be healed by using ghee, which Pradyota hated. Praydyota was prone to anger and Jīvaka

11570-611: The healing methods Jīvaka uses, both in the Jīvaka Sūtras and the Vinaya texts, are more Chinese than Indian, and many motifs in his biography are drawn from legends of other famous Chinese physicians. Zysk notes that the Pāli recension is more practical, whereas the traditions influenced by Mahāyāna teachings deploy more magical and miraculous motifs. He also observes that the Tibetan and Sanskrit accounts depict more treatments that appear traditional Indian ( Āyurveda ) in nature. Each recension has its own regional character in understanding

11700-607: The language and its literature, including the Maha Bodhi Society founded by Anagarika Dhammapala . In Europe, the Pali Text Society has been a major force in promoting the study of Pali by Western scholars since its founding in 1881. Based in the United Kingdom, the society publishes romanized Pali editions, along with many English translations of these sources. In 1869, the first Pali Dictionary

11830-454: The language underwent a small degree of Sanskritisation (i.e., MIA bamhana > brahmana, tta > tva in some cases). Bhikkhu Bodhi , summarizing the current state of scholarship, states that the language is "closely related to the language (or, more likely, the various regional dialects) that the Buddha himself spoke". He goes on to write: Scholars regard this language as a hybrid showing features of several Prakrit dialects used around

11960-535: The left side of the road, and that she was pressing hardest towards the right side, suggesting that the foal would be a male'. Lastly, he explained, 'the woman riding the elephant was blind in the right eye because she picked flowers that grew on the left side upon descending, and the heels of her feet made deeper than usual impressions, the backward lean suggested that she was pregnant.'" Quoted in Singh, J.; Desai, M. S.; Pandav, C. S.; Desai, S. P., 2011 According to

12090-464: The life and work of Jīvaka, and can be found in various textual traditions. Furthermore, in the Chinese canon of Buddhist scriptures , two separate discourses (Sanskrit: sūtra ) can be found that are not part of the Vinaya, titled the Āmrapālī and Jīvaka Sūtra (known as T. 554) and the similarly titled Āmrapālī and Jīvaka Avadāna Sūtra (T. 553). The latter two discourses originate from before

12220-421: The lotus flower instead of herbs from trees. Tibetan texts stated that Jīvaka very often checked up on the Buddha, up to three times a day. Jīvaka not only cared for the Buddha, but also expressed concern for the monastic community, at one point suggesting the Buddha that he had the monks exercise more often. Apart from his role as a healer, Jīvaka also developed an interest in the Buddha's teachings. One Pāli text

12350-404: The merchant remains unnamed, whereas Āmrapālī is considered to be the mother of Prince Abhaya instead of Jīvaka. The Sanskrit and Tibetan texts, as well the T. 554 sūtra , explain that the king had an illicit affair with the wife and later she informed him that she was pregnant. The king told the mother that if the child should turn out male, she should bring it to him to be raised in court. When it

12480-666: The monastic ordination died out in Sri Lanka, many texts were lost also. Therefore the Sri Lankan Pali canon had been translated first into Indo-Chinese Pali, and then back again into Pali. Despite an expansion of the number and influence of Mahavihara-derived monastics, this resurgence of Pali study resulted in no production of any new surviving literary works in Pali. During this era, correspondences between royal courts in Sri Lanka and mainland Southeast Asia were conducted in Pali, and grammars aimed at speakers of Sinhala, Burmese, and other languages were produced. The emergence of

12610-516: The natural language, the root language of all beings. Comparable to Ancient Egyptian , Latin or Hebrew in the mystic traditions of the West , Pali recitations were often thought to have a supernatural power (which could be attributed to their meaning, the character of the reciter, or the qualities of the language itself), and in the early strata of Buddhist literature we can already see Pali dhāraṇī s used as charms, as, for example, against

12740-401: The occupation of the physician, and medical knowledge was highly respected. The former may be related to the doctrine of salvation of Buddhism, in which the Buddha is often described as a doctor that cures the ills of the human race. Jīvaka was and is for many Buddhists and traditional healers an icon and a source of inspiration. The figure of Jīvaka is presented in ancient texts as evidence for

12870-640: The ordeal. The Pāli, Tibetan and Sanskrit traditions explain that his second name became Komārabhacca , because he is raised by a prince (Pali: kumāra ), but scholars have suggested the name is more likely related to the Kaumārabhṛtya: ancient Indian obstetrics and pediatrics , one of the eight branches of the Āyurveda. As he grew up, Jīvaka learnt about his humble origins, and determined to find himself good education to compensate for his background. Without Prince Abhaya's awareness, he went to learn medicine at an ancient place of learning called Takṣaśilā (what

13000-408: The palace on one of the king's elephants. When King Pradyota became furious as Jīvaka expected, he sent one of his servants to catch and bring back Jīvaka. The servant caught up with Jīvaka, but as they were eating, Jīvaka secretly served him a strong purgative. By the time they manage to get back to the palace, King Pradyota was healed and no longer angry, rewarding Jīvaka generously for healing him. In

13130-423: The palace. He quickly became wealthy because of his service to influential patients, including King Bimbisāra. Although he received good payments from his wealthy customers, the texts state he also treated poor patients for free. When King Bimibisāra suffered from an anal fistula , he called upon the help of Jīvaka. After curing the king of his fistula, Jīvaka was appointed by the king as his personal physician and as

13260-560: The physician of Bimbisāra's father. Jīvaka learned the classical Āyurvedic medical treatises of the time, such as the Caraka Saṃhitā (attributed to Ātreya) and the Suśruta Saṃhitā , although some later treatments of Jīvaka also point at other medieval traditions of knowledge. Ātreya helped Jīvaka build up his observation skills. Jīvaka became known for his powers of observation, as depicted in many stories. In one account, Jīvaka looked at

13390-408: The realm of hagiography. An Shigao has never been successfully identified with any Parthian prince figuring in occidental sources It is still unknown whether he was a monk or layperson or whether he should be considered a follower of the Sarvāstivāda or Mahāyāna, though affiliation with these two groups need not be viewed as mutually exclusive. The unresolved mystery of who An Shigao was is studied in

13520-401: The recently departed, and this ceremony routinely occupies as much as seven working days. There is nothing in the latter text that relates to this subject, and the origins of the custom are unclear. Pali died out as a literary language in mainland India in the fourteenth century but survived elsewhere until the eighteenth. Today Pali is studied mainly to gain access to Buddhist scriptures, and

13650-413: The right eye, and about to bring forth young today. On it a woman was riding. She too is blind of the right eye, and she will bear a son today.' Asked by Atreya and his astonished students to explain, Jivaka mentioned, 'being brought up in a royal family, I know that footprints of male elephants are round, whereas those of female elephants are oblong'. He explained further that, 'she had eaten grass only from

13780-466: The short variants occur only in closed syllables, the long variants occur only in open syllables. Short and long e and o are therefore not distinct phonemes. e and o are long in an open syllable: at the end of a syllable as in [ne-tum̩] เนตุํ 'to lead' or [so-tum̩] โสตุํ 'to hear'. They are short in a closed syllable: when followed by a consonant with which they make a syllable as in [upek-khā] 'indifference' or [sot-thi] 'safety'. e appears for

13910-818: The sixteen texts originally listed by Zürcher can be reliably ascribed to An Shigao. These thirteen are (listed by Taishō number): T 13 Chang Ahan shi bao fa jing 長阿含十報法經 T 14 Ren ben yu sheng jing 人本欲生經 T 31 Yiqie liu sheshou yin jing 一切流攝守因經 T 32 Si di jing 四諦經 T 36 Ben xiang yi zhi jing 本相猗致經 T 48 Shi fa fei fa jing 是法非法經 T 57 Lou fenbu jing 漏分佈經 T 98 Pu fa yi jing 普法義經 T 112 Ba zheng dao jing 八正道經 T 150a Qi chu san guan jing 七處三觀經 T 603 Yin chi ru jing 陰持入經 T 607 Dao di jing 道地經 T 1508 Ahan koujie shi'er yinyuan jing 阿含口解十二因緣經 The remaining three translations enumerated by Zürcher that (according to Zacchetti) should be reconsidered are: T 602 Da anban shouyi jing 大安般守意經 T 605 Chan xing fa xiang jing 禪行法想經 T 792 Fa shou chen jing 法受塵經 Recent scholarship has proposed

14040-400: The story attempt to show that Jīvaka is the real "Medicine King", a title used for other legendary healers such as the Chinese healers Bian Que and Hua Tuo . Many motifs in these accounts point in this direction: for example, the Jīvaka Sūtras state that Jīvaka was born with acupuncture needles and herbs in his hand, which is used as proof that Jīvaka is superior to other Chinese healers. In

14170-516: The subtle nuances of that thought-world. According to A. K. Warder , the Pali language is a Prakrit language used in a region of Western India . Warder associates Pali with the Indian realm ( janapada ) of Avanti , where the Sthavira nikāya was centered. Following the initial split in the Buddhist community , the Sthavira nikāya became influential in Western and South India while

14300-466: The superiority of Buddhism in both the realm of the spiritual as well as the medical. The Jīvaka Sūtras and the Mūlasarvāstivāda version describe that when Jīvaka meets the Buddha, the latter makes a statement that "I treat internal diseases; you treat external diseases", the word treat ( pinyin : zhi ) in this context also meaning 'to reign over'. Throughout the medieval period, the accounts about Jīvaka were used to legitimate medical practices. In

14430-479: The term 'Pali' as the name of the language of the Theravada canon also occurred during this era. While Pali is generally recognized as an ancient language, no epigraphical or manuscript evidence has survived from the earliest eras. The earliest samples of Pali discovered are inscriptions believed to date from 5th to 8th century located in mainland Southeast Asia, specifically central Siam and lower Burma . These inscriptions typically consist of short excerpts from

14560-429: The third century BCE, subjected to a partial process of Sanskritization. While the language is not identical to what Buddha himself would have spoken, it belongs to the same broad language family as those he might have used and originates from the same conceptual matrix. This language thus reflects the thought-world that the Buddha inherited from the wider Indian culture into which he was born, so that its words capture

14690-425: The time of Ashoka there had been more linguistic divergence, and an attempt was made to assemble all the material. It is possible that a language quite close to the Pali of the canon emerged as a result of this process as a compromise of the various dialects in which the earliest material had been preserved, and this language functioned as a lingua franca among Eastern Buddhists from then on. Following this period,

14820-446: The words of the Buddha and his immediate disciples by the Theravada tradition. Extra-canonical texts can be divided into several categories: Other types of texts present in Pali literature include works on grammar and poetics, medical texts, astrological and divination texts, cosmologies, and anthologies or collections of material from the canonical literature. While the majority of works in Pali are believed to have originated with

14950-540: The work of An Shigao. Two manuscripts discovered by Kajiura Susumu in 1999 in the collection of the Kongōji in Osaka Prefecture , Japan , present four heretofore unknown works which, based on their apparent antiquity, may be attributable to An Shigao. The first three of these texts are related to meditation practices such as ānāpānasmṛti ("mindfulness of breathing") and the "twelve gates". The fourth appears to be

15080-416: Was born, she had the child placed in front of the palace in a chest. The king had the chest brought in and asked whether the child was still alive. When his servants responded that it was, he called it "he who is alive" (Sanskrit and Pali: jīvaka ). The king had the child raised in the court by a person called Zho-nu Jigmed in the Tibetan version of the story, and in the court the child's interest in medicine

15210-416: Was found and raised by people from the royal court of King Bimbisāra . As he grew up, Jīvaka decided to travel to Takṣaśilā , to learn traditional medicine from a well-respected teacher. He turned out to be a promising student, and after seven years, started his healing profession in Rājagṛha. His medical feats gained him a reputation and he was quickly appointed as the personal physician of King Bimbisāra and

15340-521: Was identified by the Chinese pilgrim Xuan Zang ( c. 602–64) with a monastery in Rajgir. The remains were discovered and excavated in the period from 1803 to 1857. The monastery is described by archaeologists as "... one of the earliest monasteries of India dating from the Buddha's time". [REDACTED] Media related to Jivaka Komarabhacca at Wikimedia Commons Pali language Pāli ( / ˈ p ɑː l i / ), also known as Pali-Magadhi ,

15470-512: Was impressed and called off his army. Because of this story, Jīvaka is called the 'Heart-exposing Arhat ' ( pinyin : Kaixin Luohan ). In all versions of the story, Jīvaka gave up his claim to the throne to study in Takṣaśilā. He was probably sixteen when he went there. He was trained for seven years in Takṣaśilā by a ṛṣi (seer) called Ātreya Punarvasu , which Tibetan texts say used to be

15600-422: Was in doubt whether he should try to heal him. Consulting the Buddha, the Buddha said that Jīvaka had taken a vow in a previous life that he would heal people's bodies, whereas the Buddha had taken a vow that he would heal people's minds—Jīvaka then decided to attempt to heal the king. Therefore, Jīvaka gave a decoction to the king containing ghee, without him being aware. Anticipating the king's response, Jīvaka fled

15730-489: Was less hygienic. At the time of Jīvaka's gift of robes, the Buddha was ill and this illness could be related to lack of hygiene. On a similar note, Jīvaka is described to donate robes made of woollen material, to be used in the winter. At the end period of the Buddha's ministry, King Bimbisāra was imprisoned by his son Ajatashatru , who usurped the throne. Attempting to starve his own father, Ajatashatru heard that his mother tried to prevent Bimbisāra from starving. According to

15860-600: Was not exclusively used to convey the teachings of the Buddha, as can be deduced from the existence of a number of secular texts, such as books of medical science/instruction, in Pali. However, scholarly interest in the language has been focused upon religious and philosophical literature, because of the unique window it opens on one phase in the development of Buddhism . Vowels may be divided in two different ways: Long and short vowels are only contrastive in open syllables; in closed syllables, all vowels are always short. Short and long e and o are in complementary distribution:

15990-421: Was not shared in the early Buddhist traditions, in which words were only conventional and mutable signs. This view of language naturally extended to Pali and may have contributed to its usage (as an approximation or standardization of local Middle Indic dialects) in place of Sanskrit. However, by the time of the compilation of the Pali commentaries (4th or 5th century), Pali was described by the anonymous authors as

16120-576: Was prominently used by Jain scholars and is preserved in the Jain Agamas. Ardhamagadhi Prakrit differs from later Magadhi Prakrit in similar ways to Pali, and was often believed to be connected with Pali on the basis of the belief that Pali recorded the speech of the Buddha in an early Magadhi dialect. Magadhi Prakrit was a Middle Indic language spoken in present-day Bihar, and eastern Uttar Pradesh. Its use later expanded southeast to include some regions of modern-day Bengal, Odisha, and Assam, and it

16250-506: Was published by Robert Childers in 1872 and 1875. Following the foundation of the Pali Text Society , English Pali studies grew rapidly and Childer's dictionary became outdated. Planning for a new dictionary began in the early 1900s, but delays (including the outbreak of World War I) meant that work was not completed until 1925. T. W. Rhys Davids in his book Buddhist India , and Wilhelm Geiger in his book Pāli Literature and Language , suggested that Pali may have originated as

16380-593: Was published using the research of Robert Caesar Childers, one of the founding members of the Pali Text Society. It was the first Pali translated text in English and was published in 1872. Childers' dictionary later received the Volney Prize in 1876. The Pali Text Society was founded in part to compensate for the very low level of funds allocated to Indology in late 19th-century England and the rest of

16510-415: Was sparked when he saw some vaidyas (physicians) visit. He therefore decided to train as a physician in Takṣaśilā. In the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya and the Chinese Jīvaka Sūtras , Jīvaka considered his medical teachers in the court inferior and demonstrated his superior medical knowledge, after which he decided to further his studies in Takṣaśilā. During that time, Takṣaśilā was under Achaemenid rule, following

16640-551: Was the only monk he left out. The Buddha, arriving for the meal, refused to start eating, insisting that someone fetched Paṇṭhaka. Jīvaka sent a servant to get Paṇṭhaka, but this servant was surprised to find 1,250 Paṇṭhakas walking around the monastery, as Paṇṭhaka brings about a supernatural accomplishment . Eventually, the real Paṇṭhaka joined the meal, but Jīvaka still did not acknowledge the monk's mental prowess. Jīvaka only changed his mind as Paṇṭhaka showed another supernatural accomplishment, stretching his arm very long to help take

16770-545: Was used in East Asian societies to promote the medicinal and ritual value of bathing, emphasizing the benefits of offering such baths to the monastic community as a form of "medical karma". Some scholars have pointed to accounts about Jīvaka as evidence of ancient medical practices, with medical historians Thomas and Peter Chen stating that "[i]t is likely that the salient events of Jivaka's life and his medical feats are authentic" and analysing some of Jīvaka's procedures from

16900-431: Was used in some Prakrit dramas to represent vernacular dialogue. Preserved examples of Magadhi Prakrit are from several centuries after the theorized lifetime of the Buddha, and include inscriptions attributed to Asoka Maurya . Differences observed between preserved examples of Magadhi Prakrit and Pali lead scholars to conclude that Pali represented a development of a northwestern dialect of Middle Indic, rather than being

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