[Buddha-l] Non-Arising

[Dan Lusthaus]

> But what is the actual date of the Mahāvibhāṣā
> ? I tend to assume that the version that Hsüan-tang brought back
> contains much material added after the time of the Abhidharma-kośa.

Hard to say. There were several redactions, apparently each a bit larger 
than its predecessor; some of the earlier ones are also preserved in 
Chinese, and some other texts with the same name but somewhat different 
contents are also found in the Chinese canon. So the general opinion is that 
some of the additional material found only in Xuanzang's version either 
reflects a later recension, possibly close to his own time (ca. 6th), or his 
own glosses, or both. That his version represents an early version that had 
not been fully translated before can not be ruled out, however. There also 
seem to be different lineage versions (Kashmiri, etc.), so Xuanzang's 
version may simply derive from a different lineage, and still be quite old. 
The earlier versions were also quite huge. It started as a commentary on 
Jnanaprasthana, and grew...

Dan