In this way Buddhism itself, as a culture, may sometimes obstruct the attempts of an Enlightened being to
spread the Dharma. Buddhism eventually gets so weighed down by its different cultural forms that even
the most heroic attempts of the most gifted teachers cannot make headway on behalf of the Dharma against
what passes as Buddhism.38

Eventually the existing crystallisation must be shattered and a new and more spiritually dynamic patternestablished. Sangharakshita sees that the preservation of the basic forms of the original teaching, evenafter their spirit has been lost, plays its part in helping to revitalise Buddhism. Spiritually giftedindividuals, trying to function within Buddhist schools and cultures in their decay, can reconnect withthe original spiritual impetus through the words of the Buddha and his Enlightened successors. This is,
of course, a point of great relevance to those, like Sangharakshita, trying to rediscover the spark of theDharma in what are largely the dead embers of oriental Buddhism.

For the purposes of the present discussion, the Mahayana’s criticisms of the Hinayana can just as easilybe levelled at the Mahayana itself in certain aspects and phases of its history - as well as at the Vajrayana.

The Unity of Buddhism Page 10
Extracted from Sangharakshita: A New Voice in the Buddhist Tradition by Dharmachari Subhuti


The Mahayana’s main criticism of the Hinayana was that it was spiritually individualistic. Hinayanistswere supposed to be solely concerned with gaining personal freedom from suffering rather than helpingothers to liberation. This accusation provides the main polemical usage of the term ‘Hinayana’.
Hinayanists allegedly followed the ‘Arahant Ideal’, aiming at personal liberation alone. Mahayanists, onthe other hand, pursued the ‘Bodhisattva Ideal’, aiming at the Enlightenment of all sentient beings. Butagain, this characterisation has no basis in history. We should be very careful to distinguish the yanasused to represent the attitudes of certain individuals from the yanas as historical phenomena.

I have met bhikkhus who are technically Hinayanists [in the historical sense] but who are spending their

whole lives in propagating the Dharma just as though they were Bodhisattvas. I’ve met Tibetan Buddhist

monks who didn’t care at all about propagating the Dharma. Though technically they were following the

three yanas, their attitude was ‘Hinayanistic’ [in the polemical sense].39

Sangharakshita has pointed out that, until forced out of their country by the Chinese invasion, the‘Mahayanists’ of Tibet showed little concern for those in the West who had not heard the Dharma.
Meanwhile, several ‘Hinayanists’ of South-east Asia began to establish missionary activities in someEuropean and American cities, from quite early in the twentieth century.

THE YANAS AS STAGES OF THE SPIRITUAL PATH

The third usage of the yana model is the one that presents most problems for readers of Sangharakshita’swritings. His later thought here is definitely at odds with his earlier. Once he had encountered Tibetantriyana Buddhism he adopted its perspective. It was, after all, far more inclusive than the commonTheravadin perception of all other teachings and schools as degenerate. Tibetan Buddhism generally seesthe three yanas as representing the three principal stages of the spiritual path. All three phases of thehistorical development of Indian Buddhism were transplanted into Tibet and were made sense of in theseterms. The scriptures of the Hinayana and Mahayana, and many of those of the Vajrayana, were all seenas preserving the actual words of the historical Buddha. Each set of scriptures was said to embody histeachings to beings at a different level of spiritual experience or capacity. The Hinayana teaches the pathof individual salvation to those of limited capacity. Average disciples learn the path of the Bodhisattvafrom the Mahayana. By means of the Vajrayana superior beings may gain liberation in a single lifetime.
Sangharakshita characterises the yanas from this perspective rather succinctly:

If one wanted to summarize those three yanas seen as the three great main stages of the spiritual path, one

could say that the keynote of the Hinayana is renunciation, of the Mahayana is altruism, and of the

Vajrayana is transformation. Renunciation in the sense of Going Forth: going forth from the world, going

forth from the group. And altruism because for oneself the distinction between self and others has lost at

least something of its significance. And then transformation because one sees that spiritual life doesn’t

involve disowning anything or separating oneself from anything, but simply of transforming one’s natural

energies of body, speech, and mind into more and more refined forms. This is really the essence of it.40

During any individual’s spiritual career, taking place over many lifetimes, all three stages must betraversed. Since these stages in spiritual life were identified with the historical phases of Buddhistdevelopment, as Sangharakshita puts it in an early work,