Korea Journal of Buddhist Studies ISSN:1598-0642(Print) 불교학연구

Dārṣṭāntika is traditionally regarded as a heresy of Kaśmir’s Sarvāstivāda orthodox in the Mahāvibhāṣāśāstra ; it is also reputed to have been a pioneer of Sautrāntika. Kato Junsho asserted that it was in the Abhidharmakośabhāṣya that the term ‘Sautrāntika’ first appeared among existing materials, and that all its theories therein were Vasubandhu’s own views. Since then, the hypothesis that Sautrāntika, the fictitious name for hiding Yogācāra, is a completely separate group from the previous Dārsṭāntika was advanced by Harada Waso and Robert Kritzer. This thesis attempts to clarify the related meaning and themes in Dārṣṭāntika and Sautrāntika by implementing Saṃghabhadra’s critique of two concepts. According to the Nyāyānusāraśāstra , Sautrāntika (including Dārṣṭāntika, Śrīlāta and Vasubandhu) called themselves ‘those who take the sūtra as a valid means of cognition;’ crucially, however, they rejected the sūtra argument, submitted by Sarvāstivāda, believing it to be imperfect sūtra. Dārṣṭāntika was so named not only because it used many metaphors but because it also denied tripiṭaka of the holy truth and took the worldly metaphors as a valid means of cognition, which is also confirmed through Saṃghabhadra’s testimony. According to Saṃghabhadra, they are ‘destroyers of holy truth and hide and extinguish sūtra.’ Thus, in a positive sense, they called themselves ‘those who take the sūtra as a valid means of cognition’, namely Sautrāntika. But, in a negative sense, Ābhidārmikas castigated these followers as ‘those who take the shallow conventional knowledge (metaphors) as a means of cognition,’ qua Dārṣṭāntika. However, despite the difference, Sautrāntika and Dārṣṭāntika can be regarded as names for the same; and both are criticized in the same fashion in the Nyāyānusāraśāstra .