Von Hinüber claims in his recent article, “Early Scripture Commentary,” which is included in Brill’s Encyclopedia of Buddhism, that: (1) Buddhaghosa is the author of the commentaries on four nikāyas, but (2) not of other commentaries traditionally attributed to him. I agree with (1) but not with (2). On the contrary, I believe it is highly probable that the Vinaya and Abhidhamma commentaries have come from Buddhaghosa. I will give in this article the reasons for this belief.
目次
Introduction 272 Preliminaries 274 The definition of Buddhaghosa’s authorship 274 The “Buddhaghosa Colophons” 278 The initiators 282 Was Buddhaghosa a critical editor? 293 Von Hinüber’s Theory: Evidence and Counter-evidence 298 The identical introductory verses in the nikāya commentaries 308 The differences in presentation and content 311 Buddhaghosa the initiator 316 The parallel evidence of the Chinese Samantapāsādikā 317 The Case of the Kaṅkhāvitaraṇī 319 Conclusion 323 Appendices 324 1. Five Thousand Years of Buddhism 324 2. Seven Stages of the Decline of Buddhism 326 Works Cited 328 Primary Sources 328 Secondary Sources 330
