Buddhist Critiques of the Veda and Vedic Sacrifice: A Study of Bhāviveka’s Mīmāṃsā Chapter of the Madhyamakahṛdayakārikā and Tarkajvālā

Abstract

This dissertation examines two Buddhist critiques of the Veda and Vedic sacrifice that had long histories in Buddhist India, yet ended around the sixth century CE. The last document to inherit the critiques is the ninth Mīmāṃsā chapter of Bhāviveka’s (500-570 CE) Madhyamakahṛdayakārikā and its commentary, the Tarkajvālā. From the earliest texts of their tradition, Buddhists sought to undermine the authority of the canonical Brahmin texts by questioning the integrity of its putative authors and denouncing the immorality of animal sacrifice. These critiques consistently recur in the subsequent Abhidharma literature and provide the basis for Buddhist criticism of the Mīmāṃsakas beginning in the fifth century CE. The dissertation includes an overview of Bhāviveka’s long chapter on Mīmāṃsā in his Madhyamakahṛdayakārikā and reviews previous scholarly opinion on the identity of opponent of the chapter. It next examines how Bhāviveka employed each of the traditional critiques against the new opponent, demonstrating that he drew heavily on the Abhidharma and Sāṃkhya literature to counter the Mīmāṃsaka defense of the Veda and Vedic sacrifice, while adding new levels of specificity and sophistication. The dissertation goes on to explore how and why Buddhists such as Dharmakīrti and Śāntarakṣita discarded the old strategies and adopted a new one, declaring the authorless Veda to be unintelligible. The dissertation concludes that Bhāviveka’s Mīmāṃsā chapter is a product of a transitional phase when Buddhists began to perceive the Mīmāṃsakas as a serious threat, resulting in a unique confrontation with Vedic orthodoxy and orthopraxy that drew on anti-Vedic sentiment across the boundaries of Buddhism and Brahmanism.