Thus many of the ideas and categories which they brought with them to their experience of the Buddha gave direction to the development of the existing
tradition and above all assisted in its codification and systematization.5 When the dogmatics applied the
predicate Mahapurusa to the Buddha — as we know, the Mahapurusa is characterized by a number of specific primary and secondary physical and spiritual attributes — or that of Cakravartin — this does not imply, as de la Vallee Poussin has already and very appropriately remarked, that they were «idealizing» or recalling attributes of the
historical Sakyamuni.