Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana  Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna (reconstructed Sanskrit title: "Mahāyāna śraddhotpādaśāstra"; ) is a text of Mahayana Buddhism. Though attributed to the Indian master Aśvaghoṣa, no Sanskrit version of it exists and it is now widely regarded by scholars as a Chinese composition. While the text is traditionally attributed to Aśvaghoṣa, no Sanskrit version of the text is extant. The two earliest existing versions are written in Chinese, and contemporary scholars widely accept the theory that the text is a Chinese composition. However, D.T. Suzuki accepted its Indian Sanskrit origin, while acknowledging that it was unlikely the historical Aśvaghoṣa () was the author, and that it was more likely that the attribution to Aśvaghoṣa was an honorific appellation due to the profundity of the treatise. Suzuki saw the "Awakening of Faith" as being "inspired by the same spirit" as the "Lankavatara" (), "Avatamsaka" (), and the Mahayana "Parinirvana" () Sutras, and regarded its identification as a Chinese text as "not well grounded". Suzuki's views were written before modern computer assisted analysis could be undertaken by scholars. Paramartha (; 499-569) was traditionally thought to have translated the text in the 6th Century CE in 553. However, many modern scholars now opine that it was actually composed by Paramartha or one of his students. King remarks that, although Paramartha undoubtedly was among the most prolific translators of Sanskrit texts into Chinese, he may have originated, not translated, the East Asian Yogācāra () text of the "Buddha-nature Treatise" () as well as the "Awakening of Faith". Other experts dispute that it has anything to do at all with Paramartha. A later translation or reedited version was attributed to the Khotanese monk (; active 695-700). The term Mahayana points not to the Mahayana school, but to tathatā "suchness" or "the Absolute": Charles Muller argues that the terminology "faith in" is misleading:  In other words, the treatise is not discussing "Faith in the Mahayana," rather it is presenting the Mahayana style of faith, which is faith in the true suchness of mind.