Devadatta practised in a similar way and with the same books as common Buddhists, but followed the similar tapas and performed rituals to the past three buddhas and not Śākyamuni. In Cullavagga section VII of the Vinayapiṭaka of the Theravādins which deals with schisms, it is told how Devadatta went forth along with a number of the Buddha’s other relatives and clansmen. In the first year he attained psychic power, but made no supermundane achievement. Looking round to see whom he could convince to honour him he decided to approach Prince Ajātasattu, the heir to the Magadhan throne. Having psychic power
Devadatta sleeping under a tree during the rainy season – but he refused to make the rules obligatory. They are among the 13 ascetic practices (dhutanga). His followers (including bhikkhus and bhikkhunis) were new monks from the Vajjī clan. According to Jacqueline Stone and Stephen F. Teiser, Devadatta was "well known to the sutra's early devotees as the Buddhist archetype of an evildoer." In the context of the "promise of buddhahood for everyone, this chapter became widely understood as illustrating the potential for enlightenment even in evil persons." In the Lotus Sūtra, chapter 12, found in the Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition, the