[quote=“Coemgenu, post:3, topic:6002”]
一乘道
[/quote]Does something like “eka·yāna·marga” appear as a compound in Indic EBTs? It appears semi-frequently in Chinese EBTs.
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No, there’s no term ekayāna (one vehicle) in the EBTs.
The term is sometimes confused with ekāyana (convergence), a brahminical term that was applied to mindfulness meditation. While it doesn’t appear as a compound, the stock phrase Ekāyano ayaṃ, bhikkhave, maggo could easily be contracted into one.
I discussed this in A History of Mindfulness.
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[quote=“sujato, post:2, topic:6013”]
No, there’s no term ekayāna (one vehicle) in the EBTs.
[/quote]I was recently reading a Jan Nattier paper about 一乘道 (not 一乘).
It seems it has 35 occurrences spread throughout the Chinese āgamāḥ.
Jan Nattier is wise though and does not draw anachronistic parallels to the Mahāyāna teaching of 一乘 expounded in the Lotus Sūtra. But 一乘道 as a systematic compound (almost never just 一乘) does seem to be hanging about in the Chinese. They may all well be later texts though.
I will post more once I have finished Nattier’s article and if it seems to have merit.[quote=“sujato, post:2, topic:6013”]
Ekāyano ayaṃ, bhikkhave, maggo
[/quote]I will keep my eyes open for this possibility.
Some preliminary observations about these Chinese āgamāḥ containing 一乘道:
Much like the Chinese texts containing 法身 (dharmakāya), many of these āgamāḥ are substantiated with Pāli parallels, although an easy parallel to 一乘道 cannot be found, much like was the case when looking for dhammakāya parallels to 法身 in the Pāli.
SA 561 (parallel SN 51.15): contains 一乘道. The Pāli recension has the Buddha address Ānanda and/or a Brahmin (we are lacking an English translation). The Chinese has Ānanda speak to the Brahmin as well as the Buddha (Ānanda appears to have no dialogue in the Pāli?).
SA 563 (parallel: AN 3.74): once again 一乘道 is spoken by Ānanda here. I am looking into looking at the English translation of the Pāli.
SA 550 (parallel: AN 6.26): this is almost the same verbatim passage as SA 561. I am surprised it isn’t marked as a parallel. The only difference is that this āgama puts 一乘道 into the mouth of Mahākatyāyana instead of Ānanda, as this recension has Mahākatyāyana give the speech instead.
SA 1189 (parallels: SA-2 102, SA-3 4, SN 47.43)
SA 535 (parallel: SN 52.2* this one is marked with an asterisk by SuttaCentral?)
SA 607 (parallel: SN 47.1)
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That means it was seen as a 'partial" parallel, which basically means it isn’t very close, but has features that are worth looking at.
Establishing parallels for samyutta style suttas is a thankless task. There is a long grey tail of suttas that merge into indistinguishability.
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