CEYLON BRANCH— ROY At, ASIATIC' SOCIETY. 1 1 I 



ON BUDHXSM. 

 Br the Rev. D. J. Gogerly. 

 (Bead 6th November, 184)7. J 



The book named Pansiya panas jataka, or five hundred and 

 fifty births, has, by many writers, been represented as one of 

 the sacred books of the Budhists : it is not, however, properly- 

 entitled to that character, not being included in either of the 

 three Pitakas, but being a comment on a poetical book called 

 Jataka, or births, which is one of the fifteen books contained 

 in the fifth grand division of the Sutra Pitaka. It probably 

 received the name of Jataka after the comment had been written., 

 for a very large portion of it has no reference either to Budhc 

 or to his births, but consists of moral aphorisms, proverbs, si- 

 militudes and tales ; some of the latter, indeed, professing to be 

 accounts of the previous transmigrations of Goutama. 



The sacred book called Jataka is in a poetical form,, without 

 any mixture of prose, the verses consisting of four or six lines, 

 It is divided into chapters called Nipata, according to the num- 

 ber of verses contained in each Jataka ; the first, or Eka-nipata ? 

 containing about 150 Jatakas, each consisting of a single verse 3 

 The comment gives a critical explanation of the verses, either 

 defining the meaning of each word, or selecting for exposition 

 those which are obscure ; and, in addition to these critical re- 

 marks, appends to each Jataka a legend, explanatory of its ge- 

 neral intention, and containing an account of circumstances con- 

 nected with a supposed previous existence of Goutama during 

 the time he was a Bodhi-satwayo, or candidate for becoming 

 a Budha. The sacred text is scarce, but the legendary part of 

 the comment is in the hands of multitudes, it having been very 

 well translated from Pali into Singhalese, and the tales form a 



