Abstract

This essay is an exercise in intellectual archaeology in which I seek to show that already in Xiong Shili's first account of Yogācāra, Weishixue Gailun , we are able to find the first indications of a critical attitude to Yogācāra that would grow in intensity over the following two decades. These critiques served the rhetorical purpose of bolstering the authority of Xuanzang . Before long, however, Xiong even rejected that authority