Guest guest Posted September 19, 2002 Report Share Posted September 19, 2002 Thanking Lance Cousins who wrote: In response to my query, <<Is there any significance in the published assertion that the vast majority of the textual evidence for the Pali Canon comes from manuscripts less than three hundred years old?>> > I think it is exceptionally silly. It was Boden Professor of Sanskrit (Oxford) Richard F. Gombrich who published the remark. _How Buddhism Began (The Conditioned Genesis of the Early Teachings)_ (1997), 15. > Major parts of the contents of the texts are confirmed by > commentaries and subcommentaries. Gombrich remarks that "the commentators only quote or comment on a minority of the words in the texts." (Ibid.) Also, Is it generally correct to assert that the commentators themselves lived 8 or 9 centuries after the texts were allegedly spoken, and about 500 yrs after the majority of these memorized discourses were first committed to writing? Troy Harris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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