Kātyāyana
From Tsadra Commons
| PersonType | Category:Classical Indian Authors |
|---|---|
| MainNamePhon | Kātyāyana |
| MainNameTib | कात्यायन |
| bio | Sanskrit name of one of the Buddha's chief disciples and an eminent Arhat deemed foremost among the Buddha's disciples in his ability to elaborate on the Buddha's brief discourses. According to the Pāli accounts, where he is known as Mahākaccāna, he was the son of a brāhmaṇa priest who served King Caṇḍappajjota of Avanti. He was learned in the Vedas and assumed his father's position upon his death. He was called Kaccāna because of the golden hue of his body and because it was the name of his clan. Once, he and seven companions were sent by the king to invite the Buddha to Avanti, the capital city of Ujjenī (S. Ujjayinī). The Buddha preached a sermon to them, whereupon they all attained arhatship and entered the order. Mahākaccāna took up residence in a royal park in Ujjenī, where he was treated with great honor by the king. He was such an able preacher and explicator of doctrine that many persons joined the order, until, it is said, the entire kingdom of Avanti sparkled with yellow robes. He became most renowned for his discourses in the Madhupiṇḍikasutta, Kaccāyanasutta, and Parāyanasutta. In a previous life, Mahākaccāna was a thaumaturge (vijjādhara; S. vidhyādhara) during the time of the buddha Padumuttara. It was then that he first made the vow to win the eminence he eventually did under Gotama (S. Gautama) Buddha. Although living far away in Avanti, Mahākaccāna often went to hear the Buddha preach, and the assembled elders always left a place for him. He is said to have requested the Buddha to allow for special dispensation to ordain new monks in outlying regions without the requisite number of monastic witnesses. Mahākaccāna was noted for his ability to provide detailed exegeses of the Buddha's sometimes laconic instructions and brief verses, and several suttas in the Pāli canon are ascribed to him. According to tradition, he is the author of the Nettippakaraṇa and the Peṭakopadesa, which seek to provide the foundational principles that unify the sometimes variant teachings found in the suttas; these texts are some of the earliest antecedents of commentarial exegesis in the Pāli tradition and are the only commentaries included in the suttapiṭaka proper. He is also said to be the author of the Pāli grammar, the Kaccāyanavyākaraṇa. According to the Sanskrit tradition, Mahākātyāyana was the initiator of the Sthaviranikāya branch of the mainstream Buddhist schools and traditional compiler of the Abhidharma. The Jñānaprasthāna of the Sarvāstivāda Abhidarmapiṭaka is attributed to him, but it was certainly composed several hundred years later by an author of the same name. He is often depicted holding an alm's bowl (pātra) or with his fingers interlaced at his chest. Like many of the great arhats, Mahākātyāyana appears frequently in the Mahāyāna sūtras, sometimes merely as a member of the audience, sometimes playing a more significant role. In the Vimalakīrtinirdeśa, he is one of the srāvaka disciples who is reluctant to visit the lay Bodhisattva Vimalakīrti. In the Saddharmapuṇḍarīkasūtra, he is one of four arhats who understand the parable of the burning house and who rejoices in the teaching of the one vehicle (ekayāna); later in the sūtra, the Buddha prophesies his eventual attainment of buddhahood. (Source: "Mahākātyāyana." In The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, 498. Princeton University Press, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt46n41q.27.) |
| YearBirth | 5th century BCE |
| BornIn | Ujjain, Avanti |
| associatedwebsite | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C4%81ty%C4%81yana_(Buddhist) |
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