accepted. It included the Parivâra, which was apparently a recent manual
composed in Ceylon. The Mahâvaṃsa says no more about this schism, but
the Nikâya-Sangrahawa[43] says that the monks of the Abhayagiri
monastery now embraced the doctrines of the Vajjiputta school (one of
the seventeen branches of the Mahâsanghikas) which was known in Ceylon
as the Dhammaruci school from an eminent teacher of that name. Many
pious kings followed who built or repaired sacred edifices and Buddhism
evidently flourished, but we also hear of heresy. In the third century
A.D.[44] King Voharaka Tissa suppressed[45] the Vetulyas. This sect was
connected with the Abhayagiri monastery, but, though it lasted until the
twelfth century, I have found no Sinhalese account of its tenets. It is
represented as the worst of heresies, which was suppressed by all
orthodox kings but again and again revived, or was reintroduced from
India. Though it always found a footing at the Abhayagiri it was not
officially recognized as the creed of that Monastery which since the
time of Vaṭṭagâmaṇi seems to have professed the relatively orthodox
doctrine called Dhammaruci.

Mention is made in the Kathâ-vatthu of heretics who held that the
Buddha remained in the Tusita heaven and that the law was preached on
earth not by him but by Ananda and the commentary[46] ascribes these
views to the Vetulyakas. The reticence of the Sinhalese chronicles
makes it doubtful whether the Vetulyakas of Ceylon and these heretics
are identical but probably the monks of the Abhayagiri, if not
strictly speaking Mahayanist, were an off-shoot of an ancient sect
which contained some germs of the Mahayana. Hsüan Chuang in his
narrative[47] states (probably from hearsay) that the monks of the
Mahâvihâra were Hinayanists but that both vehicles were studied at the
Abhayagiri. I-Ching on the contrary says expressly that all the
Sinhalese belonged to the Âryasthavira Nikâya. Fa-Hsien describes the