History of Buddha’s incarnations in Jinakalamali.

Abstract

Jinakalamali was a scripture written by Phra Rattanapanya in the 21st century B.E. to chronicle the lives of Buddha. Alternated between the use of prose and verse, the scripture aimed to recount the history of Gautama Buddha’s incarnations in chronological order, as well as to present the connections between Lanna royal family and Buddha’s incarnations. Evidently, Jinakalamali contained more stories of Buddha’s incarnations and Bodhisattva than the Pali Canon. Furthermore, the stories could be traced back to those found in Samparavibak, a scripture written in Lanna Kingdom during the late 19th century B.E. based on an earlier scripture, Soddhatthakee Mahanitan, which originated from a Mahayana temple in Sri Lanka during the early 19th century B.E. In addition, several stories from Jinakalamali also appeared as Mahayana Jataka tales. Therefore, it was possible that when Buddhism first came to ancient Lanna Kingdom from Sri Lanka, there was a combination of both Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism.