page_title: Mahākāśyapa
section_title: Patriarch
hierarchical_section_title: Mahākāśyapa / In post-canonical texts / Patriarch
caption_attribution_description: This is a photo of a monument in Thailand identified by the ID 0005387 (Thai Fine Art Department's link)
context_page_description: Mahā Kāśyapa or Mahākāśyapa was one of the principal disciples of Gautama Buddha. He is regarded in Buddhism as an enlightened disciple, being foremost in ascetic practice. Mahākāśyapa assumed leadership of the monastic community following the paranirvāṇa of the Buddha, presiding over the First Buddhist Council. He was considered to be the first patriarch in a number of early Buddhist schools and continued to have an important role as patriarch in the Chan and Zen traditions. In Buddhist texts, he assumed many identities, that of a renunciant saint, a lawgiver, an anti-establishment figure, but also a "guarantor of future justice" in the time of Maitreya, the future Buddha—he has been described as "both the anchorite and the friend of mankind, even of the outcast".
  In canonical Buddhist texts in several traditions, Mahākāśyapa was born as Pippali in a brahmin caste family, and entered an arranged marriage with a woman named Bhadra-Kapilānī. Both of them aspired to lead a celibate life, however, and they decided not to consummate their marriage. Having grown weary of the agricultural profession and the damage it did, they both left the lay life behind to become mendicants.
context_section_description: In many Indian Sanskrit and East Asian texts, from as early as the second century CE, Mahākāśyapa is considered the first patriarch of the lineage which transmitted the teaching of the Buddha, with Ānanda being the second. One of the earliest motifs of a tradition of patriarchs is that of the Five Masters of the Dharma (Sanskrit: dharmācārya), found in Sanskrit texts from the second century CE, including the Aśokāvadāna and the Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra, and many archaeological findings. This tradition may in itself be based on early Buddhist accounts about the First Council, but further expanded on the idea of the preservation of the teachings. The accounts about the Five Masters seems to derive not so much from a concern about the transmission of the teaching though, but rather a concern regarding the absence of the Buddha himself. The texts gave the Masters of the Dharma each a similar role and charisma as the Buddha, or, as Buddhist studies scholar John S. Strong puts it, "all, in a sense, Buddhas in their own time". This fit in with the concept of inheritance in ancient India, in which a son would not only inherit his father's possessions, but also his position and identity. Several early Buddhist schools would expand on the idea of the Five Masters of the Dharma, including the Sarvāstivadins, the Mūlasarvāstivādins and the Sthāviras, each of which extended the list to include their own masters as patriarchs.
  There is an account dating back from the Sarvāstivāda and Mūlasarvāstivāda textual traditions which states that before Mahākāśyapa died, he bestowed the Buddha's teaching on Ānanda as a formal passing on of authority, telling Ānanda to pass the teaching on to his pupil Śāṇakavāsī (Pali: Saṇavāsī; a.k.a. Śāṇakavāsin or Śāṇāvasika). Mahākāśyapa made a prediction that later would come true that a lay person called Śāṇakavāsī would make many gifts to the saṅgha during a feast. After this event, Ānanda would successfully persuade him to become ordained and be his pupil. Later, just before Ānanda died, he passed the teaching on to his pupil as Mahākāśyapa had told him to. Ray notes that Mahākāśyapa is depicted here as choosing not only his successor, but also the successor of his successor, which emphasizes the preeminent position that Mahākāśyapa was seen to have.
  Buddhist studies scholars Akira Hirakawa (1915–2002) and Bibhuti Baruah have expressed skepticism about the teacher–student relationship between Mahākāśyapa and Ānanda. They have argued that there was discord between the two, as indicated in the early texts. Hirakawa has further hypothesized that Mahākāśyapa and Ānanda were co-disciples, with the same teacher being Gautama Buddha, so there would be no need for a transmission between the two. East Asian religion scholar Elizabeth Morrison cites a tract by the Zen scholar Qisong (1007–1072) about the tradition of patriarchs in Buddhism. He noted the problem of a transmission between co-disciples who are not master and student. He resolved the problem by comparing Mahākāśyapa and Ānanda to siblings who inherit according to birth order. Responding to Hirakawa's arguments, Silk further argues that the unilinear nature of the transmission made it impossible for both Mahākāśyapa and Ānanda to receive the transmission from the Buddha, so Ānanda had to receive the transmission from Mahākāśyapa instead.
caption: Thai statue of Mahākāśyapa, Wat Traimit [de]
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