Commentaries on the Canonical Sutras?

[Nalanda]

Do we have a collection of sutra commentaries from ancient times (as early as Early Buddhism) to present of every part of the sutra?

For example, if we are reading MA190, and we want to know what the ancient Buddhists think or say about this agama, we could then learn it from their perspective.

Is there something like that I could check whenever I read the agamas?

[Malcolm]

Do we have a collection of sutra commentaries from ancient times (as early as Early Buddhism) to present of every part of the sutra?

For example, if we are reading MA190, and we want to know what the ancient Buddhists think or say about this agama, we could then learn it from their perspective.

Is there something like that I could check whenever I read the agamas?

You are asking this on the wrong website. Go to dhammawheel.

[Nalanda]

I'm hoping not to do that. Meaning I'm hoping to learn only the works of our tradition. Mahayana and Vajrayana. For example, I would like to know what the Mahasanghika, Nagarjuna, Je Tsongkapa would say about a certain passage in the Agamas, etc.

[Malcolm]

I'm hoping not to do that. Meaning I'm hoping to learn only the works of our tradition. Mahayana and Vajrayana. For example, I would like to know what the Mahasanghika, Nagarjuna, Je Tsongkapa would say about a certain passage in the Agamas, etc.

They discuss the agamas very little.

[Astus]

Is there something like that I could check whenever I read the agamas?

According to Bhikkhu Analayo there are fragments in Sanskrit and almost none in Chinese except a brief one (5 fascicles) on parts of the Ekottarikagama (51 fascicles) called 分別功德論 of what there's a study and synopsis in English by Antonello Palumbo (An Early Chinese Commentary on the Ekottarika-agama). Otherwise you can search abhidharma works and treatises like the Dazhidulun and Yogacarabhumisastra for some references.

[Kim O'Hara]

I'm hoping not to do that. Meaning I'm hoping to learn only the works of our tradition. Mahayana and Vajrayana.

The further back you go, the less clearly defined the traditions are. If you go all the way back, all of your guides are equally incomplete and unreliable so the idea of looking at the Theravada is not unreasonable.

For example, I would like to know what the Mahasanghika, Nagarjuna, Je Tsongkapa would say about a certain passage in the Agamas, etc.

You have picked examples with a spread of about 1800 years - roughly 400 BCE, 200 CE and 1400 CE. A lot happened to the traditions over that span!


Kim

[Nalanda]

Yeah and I don't mind late. It can be from the 1990s even as long as the commentaries are actually done. For example, if the Dalai Lama commented on each Agama teachings, if he has a body of work, then that's something I'm looking for.

Heck, it can even be as recent as right now. If you for instance would give me your comment on any teachings in the Agama, then that is what I'm looking for.

I'm not really curious what those outside our tradition has to say about our own understanding of our own Canonical texts.

[Kim O'Hara]

I'm not really curious what those outside our tradition has to say about our own understanding of our own Canonical texts.

One of my points was that none of the early commentators can really be regarded as "outside our tradition". You appear to have missed it.


Kim

[Nalanda]

Got it. Thank you.

I'll be more clear.

Mahayana commentators only. At any point in Mahayana history up to our present time.

Do you know of any Mahayana commentaries on the Agama contents?

[Malcolm]

Do you know of any Mahayana commentaries on the Agama contents?

Doesn’t exist.

[PadmaVonSamba]

I checked “Agama” with Venerable Guru Wikipedia which contains this nugget and cites source material:

“In the 4th century Mahāyāna abhidharma work Abhidharmasamuccaya, Āsaṅga refers to the collection which contains the Prakrit/Sanskrit āgamas as the Śrāvakapiṭaka, and associates it with the śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas.”

So, perhaps this Asanga fellow had a few words to say about the early texts.

[Aemilius]

Vasubandhu quotes several times in AKB sutras that are in the Sarvastivada Tripitaka. There is also the Arya Salistamba sutra, which is said to be a sutra to which more commentaries were written than any other sutra, some of these commentaries have been translated into english. Another Sarvastivada sutra is Arthaviniscaya sutra (Gathering the Meanings), which has been translated along with a classical Indian commentary called Nibandhana.



Reat, N. Ross. The Śālistamba sūtra : Tibetan original, Sanskrit reconstruction, English translation, critical notes (including Pali parallels, Chinese version, and ancient Tibetan fragments). Delhi : Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 1993.

Schoening, Jeffrey D. The Śālistamba Sūtra and Its Indian Commentaries

N. H. Samtani. The Arthaviniścaya-Sūtra, and its commentary, Nibandhana written by Bhiksu Vīryaśridatta (around 700 CE), Jayaswal Research Institute, 1971

N. H. Samtani, Ānandajoti Bhikkhu. Artha-Viniścaya-Sūtram, The Discourse giving the Analysis of the Topics with additions, corrections and translation. (2016)

Gathering the Meanings: The Arthavinishchaya Sutra & its Commentary, Paperback – January 1, 2002
by N. H. Samtani

[Zhen Li]

There's a lot of what might be considered standard śrāvakayāna in the Mahāprajñāpāramitāśāstra. For instance, I recall a section on the bodhisattva according to the "abhidharma" system as opposed to the Mahāyāna sūtra system. But you won't find Mahāyāna commentaries on specific āgama sūtras.

They just are not of interest or worth the time if you are focusing on Prajñāpāramitā, for instance. But they are referred to in the compilations, like Sūtrasamuccaya, of course, as part of the building blocks to Mahāyāna thought and practice.

By the way, the question of "canonical" is entirely a matter of perspective. Even the idea that average Buddhists in any temple in premodern (or even modern) Thailand or Burma might accept the "Pali Canon" as it exists today (and as edited by the PTS) in its current form as an inalienable and unexpandable closed canon is contestable. Justin McDaniel from UPenn has written a lot on this topic, for instance.

[Kim O'Hara]

...By the way, the question of "canonical" is entirely a matter of perspective. Even the idea that average Buddhists in any temple in premodern (or even modern) Thailand or Burma might accept the "Pali Canon" as it exists today (and as edited by the PTS) in its current form as an inalienable and unexpandable closed canon is contestable. Justin McDaniel from UPenn has written a lot on this topic, for instance.

Yes. It's a matter of perspective if you turn around and look the other way, too. Various Buddhist traditions notionally accept A, B, C, D ... K, L and M as 'canonical' but don't actually study or reference most of them, choosing to focus their practice wholly on C, or only on J and K, or whatever. If texts are never studied, are they truly canonical?


Kim

[Aemilius]

In the tibetan collection of sutras there is the Udanavarga, which is a much longer version of the same materials as the Dhammapada. Udanavarga seems to have a commentary in tibetan. There are two chinese translations of the Udanavarga.

Udânavarga: a collection of verses from the Buddhist canon
Bkah-hgyur; Dharmatrata. comp; Vidyaprabhakara, tr; Rockhill, William Woodville, 1854-1914.
transl. from the Tibetan of the Bkah-hgyur, with notes and extracts from the commentary of Pradjnāvarman. London, Trübner 1883.


The Six important treatises of the early Kadampa school are:

The Bodhisattva Stages (Skt. Bodhisattvabhumi) by Asanga
An Ornament of the Mahayana Sutras (Skt. Mahayanasutraalamkara) by Maitreya/Asanga
A Compendium of Bodhisattva Trainings (Skt. Shikshasamucchaya) by Shantideva
A Guide to the Bodhisattva Way (Skt. Bodhisattvacharyavatara) by Shantideva
A Garland of Birth Stories (Skt. Jatakamala) by Aryasura, and
The Collected Sayings of the Buddha (Skt. Udanavarga) – the Tibetan Dhammapada by Dharmatrata.

It seems very unlikely that there should be no commentaries to the last two treatises of this list.
Indeed it is said that,
"It is the tradition to read at the Great Prayer Festival (Monlam) the fifth of these, A Garland of Birth Stories, during the morning session. It was also the tradition of the Kadampas to teach the two texts Jatakamala and Udanavarga together."

[Caoimhghín]

Zhen Li already mentioned the Wisdom Treatise, Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa (his romanization had "-śāstra" at the end -- no functional difference). It comments on everything from sūtras of the Śrāvakas in-common with the Theravāda sect to Dhyānasūtras that Theravādins have never traditionally read. It isn't a systematic treatise that goes through the āgamas one by one or treats all of them. The material is dispersed throughout. Generally speaking, like Zhen Li mentioned, it gives a Śrāvaka exegesis of a passage followed by a Mahāyāna exegesis. For its Śrāvaka material, it often favours the Buddhism of the Vaibhāṣikas, apparently, but it isn't a straight Vaibhāṣika treatise with Mahāyāna elements in it. I'm dealing with secondhand analaysis when I say that it favours Vaibhāṣika over Sautrāntika when it gives the "Śrāvaka perspective," because I can't gauge how true that is. I'm not an expert at the two main Sarvāstivādin tenet systems. The two perspectives are woven together and, when the Mahāyāna disagrees with the Vaibhāṣika exegesis, generally differing most in its material to do with emptiness, the Mahāyāna is favoured. You can't actually learn "pure" historical Vaibhāṣika from it. Abhidharmakośa and the sadly-untranslated Mahāvibhāṣa are the best for that.

[Zhen Li]

Zhen Li already mentioned the Wisdom Treatise, Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa (his romanization had "-śāstra" at the end -- no functional difference). It comments on everything from sūtras of the Śrāvakas in-common with the Theravāda sect to Dhyānasūtras that Theravādins have never traditionally read. It isn't a systematic treatise that goes through the āgamas one by one or treats all of them. The material is dispersed throughout. Generally speaking, like Zhen Li mentioned, it gives a Śrāvaka exegesis of a passage followed by a Mahāyāna exegesis. For its Śrāvaka material, it often favours the Buddhism of the Vaibhāṣikas, apparently, but it isn't a straight Vaibhāṣika treatise with Mahāyāna elements in it. I'm dealing with secondhand analaysis when I say that it favours Vaibhāṣika over Sautrāntika when it gives the "Śrāvaka perspective," because I can't gauge how true that is. I'm not an expert at the two main Sarvāstivādin tenet systems. The two perspectives are woven together and, when the Mahāyāna disagrees with the Vaibhāṣika exegesis, generally differing most in its material to do with emptiness, the Mahāyāna is favoured. You can't actually learn "pure" historical Vaibhāṣika from it. Abhidharmakośa and the sadly-untranslated Mahāvibhāṣa are the best for that.

Thanks for the clarification Caoimhghín, I've not made a systematic study of it, so it's helpful to hear your thoughts. I just noticed when going through it that it might jump back and forward like that.

Maybe a more controversial claim, but one that has been made by Conze (if I recall correctly) is that we might be able to actually think of the early Mahāyāna texts (more specifically the Prajñāpāramitā literature) as commentary and critique of claims of abhidharma schools. Walser also identifies some precedent passages in the āgama literature upon which it might be building.

[Malcolm]

Maybe a more controversial claim,

It’s not at all controversial, it’s obvious.

[Zhen Li]

Maybe a more controversial claim,

It’s not at all controversial, it’s obvious.

I am just putting it forth as a possible area of commentary on the āgamas, but personally, I would challenge such a claim on various counts (I'm not going to do that on a forum).

[Aemilius]

Zhen Li already mentioned the Wisdom Treatise, Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa (his romanization had "-śāstra" at the end -- no functional difference). It comments on everything from sūtras of the Śrāvakas in-common with the Theravāda sect to Dhyānasūtras that Theravādins have never traditionally read. It isn't a systematic treatise that goes through the āgamas one by one or treats all of them. The material is dispersed throughout. Generally speaking, like Zhen Li mentioned, it gives a Śrāvaka exegesis of a passage followed by a Mahāyāna exegesis. For its Śrāvaka material, it often favours the Buddhism of the Vaibhāṣikas, apparently, but it isn't a straight Vaibhāṣika treatise with Mahāyāna elements in it. I'm dealing with secondhand analaysis when I say that it favours Vaibhāṣika over Sautrāntika when it gives the "Śrāvaka perspective," because I can't gauge how true that is. I'm not an expert at the two main Sarvāstivādin tenet systems. The two perspectives are woven together and, when the Mahāyāna disagrees with the Vaibhāṣika exegesis, generally differing most in its material to do with emptiness, the Mahāyāna is favoured. You can't actually learn "pure" historical Vaibhāṣika from it. Abhidharmakośa and the sadly-untranslated Mahāvibhāṣa are the best for that.

Thanks for the clarification Caoimhghín, I've not made a systematic study of it, so it's helpful to hear your thoughts. I just noticed when going through it that it might jump back and forward like that.

Maybe a more controversial claim, but one that has been made by Conze (if I recall correctly) is that we might be able to actually think of the early Mahāyāna texts (more specifically the Prajñāpāramitā literature) as commentary and critique of claims of abhidharma schools. Walser also identifies some precedent passages in the āgama literature upon which it might be building.

Walser would do much better if he accepted the buddhist methods for obtaining knowledge, i.e. attaining the dhyanas and attaining the resultant supranormal powers of vision and knowledge of the three times. Now he is on an obvious wrong track.