Early Buddhism |
| Scriptures |
| Councils |
| Schools |
|
First Sangha |
Sthaviravāda (Sanskrit: स्थविरवाद; traditional Chinese: 上座部; pinyin: shàngzuò-bù) literally "Teaching Of The Elders", was one of the early Buddhist schools. It was one of the two main movements in early Buddhism that arose from the Great Schism in pre-sectarian Buddhism, the other being that of the Mahāsāṃghika school.
Contents |
The schism dividing the Sthaviravāda and Mahāsāṃghika schools happened between the Second (350 BCE) and Third (250 BCE) Buddhist Councils.
One suggested cause of the Great Schism were the disagreements in the five theories about an Arhat supposedly put forward by Mahādeva, who later founded the Mahāsāṃghika. The monks who rejected the five theories named themselves as "Sthaviravāda" to differentiate from the Mahāsāṃghika.[1] However, this account relies on a later text, the Mahavamsa. Vasumitra, an earlier source whose writing probably dates from around 100 CE, and which is preserved in Chinese and Tibetan, there is no mention of any such person named Mahādeva. Instead, it lists the names of the well-known figures who accepted or rejected the five theories. Étienne Lamotte has also demonstrated that the existence of the "Mahādeva" character was a later sectarian interpolation.[2](p. 42)
The Sthaviras later divided into other schools such as the Sarvāstivāda school and the Vibhajjavāda (Sanskrit: Vibhajyavāda) school. The resultant Vibhajjavāda branch gave rise to a number of schools such as the Mahāvihāravāsins (later called Theravada), the Dharmaguptaka school, the Mahīśāsaka school, and the Kāśyapīya school.[2](p. 61)
The Theravāda school of Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia has identified itself exclusively with the Sthaviravāda, as the Pali word thera is equivalent to the Sanskrit sthavira.[3] This has led early Western historians to assume that the two parties are identical.[3] However, this is not the case, and by the time of Ashoka, the Sthaviravāda school had split into the Sammitīya, Sarvāstivāda, and the Vibhajyavāda schools.[3] The Vibhajyavāda school is believed to have split into other schools as well, such as the Mahīśāsaka school and the ancestor of the Theravāda school.[3]
According to Damien Keown, there is no historical evidence that the Theravāda school arose until around two centuries after the Great Schism which occurred at the Third Council.[4]
According to the Mahāvaṃsa, a Theravādin source, after the Second Council was closed those taking the side of junior monks did not accept the verdict but held an assembly of their own attended by ten thousand calling it a Mahasangiti (Great Convocation) from which the school derived its name Mahāsāṃghika. However, such popular explanations of Sthaviravāda and Mahāsāṃghika are generally considered folk etymologies.[5] The Theravādin Dīpavaṃsa clarifies that the name Theravāda refers to the "old" teachings, making no indication that it refers to the Second Council.[5] Similarly, the name Mahāsāṃghika is in reference to those who follow the original Vinaya of the undivided Saṃgha.[5]