In light of the scenario outlined above it is no longer surprising that explicit references to a three-period system first appear not in sūtra and śāstra literature translated from Indian originals, but in 6th-century Chinese scholastic texts. For if the developed notion of three periods in the history of the Dharma indeed arose in the context of reflection on the meaning of the term mo-fa —itself a Chinese “apocryphal word” —we should expect this notion to have emerged well after the first appearances of this expression in Chinese Buddhist literature, which took place around the beginning of the 5th century CE. And this is precisely what we find, for it is Nan-yüeh Hui-ssu (515-577), best known as the teacher of T’ien-t’ai Chih-i, who is credited with having been the first to set forth in writing a three-period system based on eras of cheng-fa, hsiang-fa, and mo-fa, respectively, in a work completed in 558 CE.

But the absence of any direct evidence for the existence of a three-period system in the literature of Indian Buddhism has not stifled attempts by modern scholars (in particular, by modern Japanese scholars, in whose own religious traditions this system continues to hold a central place) to find evidence for its origins in India.