Ngakpas - The Mahasiddha Tradition in Tibet

"Scholars such as E. Lamotte and E. Conze have speculated that the tension between the saffron robbed Elders of the monastic community and the white garbed leaders of the Buddhist lay community, was one factor in the historical development of the Mahayana. Only a century after the passing away of the Lord Buddha, at or around the council at Vaishali there was a schism between the Sthaviras or Elders and the Mahasanghikas or adherents of the Greater Assembly, which included many leaders who were not monks. Whereas the traditions preserved among the Sthaviras or elder monks evolved into the eighteen schools of Hinayana Buddhism, which asserted that in order to attain liberation from the cycle of rebirth one must first be reborn as a male and second become a monk, the Mahasanghikas held the enlightenment was open to everyone, male or female, monk or lay-person, because each individual possessed an inner disposition to enlightenment"

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