In what follows I propose to discuss the validity of the reading lokāyata (with or without inflections) and a doubtful word (I would call it a ghost word), lokāyatana occurring in the Śārdūla. (between 200 and 350 CE, included in the Buddhist Sanskrit work, the Divyāvadāna). The readings in the available MSS, Chinese and Tibetan translations, and hence in the three printed editions, are not always the same. The meaning of the word too will depend on the reading adopted.

Let us look at the first two instances:

In (1), Cowell-Neil (C-N) read lokāyatikayajñamantre (619) and in (2), lokāyatayajñatantre (620). Mukhopadhyaya (Mukho.), in both cases, emended the reading to lokāyata yajñamantre and lokāyata yajñamantra (12, 13). He was apparently influenced by the second occurrence of lokāyata along with yajñamantra and mahāpuruṣalakṣaṇa. Although the MSS consulted by him had the word lokāyatana in (2), he preferred to follow C-N, who had emended the reading, as they themselves confessed, ex conjectura, since their MSS had such mislections as lokāyamayajña and laukāyayajña-(620 n5). In the first instance, Mukho.'s MSS have lokāyatika and the Tibetan translation has lokāyataśāstra; so he chose to retain parity of expression by reading lokāyata and yajñamantra (not tantra as in C-N) in both (1) and (2).