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The earliest Buddhist texts were not committed to writing until some centuries after the death of Gautama Buddha. [2] The oldest surviving Buddhist manuscripts are the Gandhāran Buddhist texts, found in Pakistan and written in Gāndhārī, [3] [4] they date from the first century BCE to the third century CE. [5]
The manuscripts were written in the Gāndhārī language using the Kharoṣṭhī script and are therefore sometimes also called the Kharoṣṭhī Manuscripts. The collection is composed of a diversity of texts: a Dhammapada, discourses of the Buddha such as the Rhinoceros Sutra, avadanas and Purvayogas, commentaries and abhidharma texts.
The oldest such manuscripts are the numerous Gandhāran Buddhist texts from approximately the 1st century CE, from what is now Afghanistan. They contain among the earliest known versions of significant Buddhist scriptures, including a Dhammapada , discourses of Buddha that include the Rhinoceros Sutra , Avadanas and Abhidharma texts.
The following is a list of the world's oldest surviving physical documents. Each entry is the most ancient of each language or civilization. For example, the Narmer Palette may be the most ancient from Egypt, but there are many other surviving written documents from Egypt later than the Narmer Palette but still more ancient than the Missal of Silos.
Journeys on the Silk Road: a desert explorer, Buddha's secret library, and the unearthing of the world's oldest printed book, Picador Australia, ISBN 978-1-4050-4041-9. Agócs, Tamás (2000). The Diamondness of the Diamond Sutra. Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 53, (1/2), 65–77
The largest proportion of the manuscripts are written in Chinese, both Classical and, to a lesser extent, vernacular Chinese. Most manuscripts, including Buddhist texts, are written in Kaishu or 'regular script', while others are written in the cursive Xingshu or 'running script'. An unusual feature of the Dunhuang manuscripts dating from the ...
The manuscript was found in 1952 at Jabal Abu Mana near Dishna (Egypt). [12] The preservation level of 𝔓 66 surprised scholars because the first 26 leaves were basically fully intact, and even the stitching of the binding remained.
He argues that it also incorporates teachings that precede the Buddha, and that the later teachings were memorized by the Buddha's followers while he was still alive. His thesis is based on study of the processes of the first great council, and the methods for memorization used by the monks, which started during the Buddha's lifetime.