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The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c10.s5: Śākyan Positivism

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c10.s5

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Śākyan Positivism

c10.s5.1

Interest in the immediate present as contrasted with the past and the future is a dominant element in Śākya the Buddha’s positivism. This finds expression in such *Suttas* as the *Bhaddekaratta*, the *Ānanda-Bhaddekaratta*, the *Mahākaccana-Bhaddekaratta*, the *Lomasakangiya-Bhaddekaratta*, etc. of the *Majjhima Nikāya* of the *Sutta Piṭaka*.

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The following is to be found in the *Bhaddekaratta-Sutta*:⁸

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⁸ *Majjhima Nikaya* ed. by R. Chalmers, Vol. III (London 1899), p. 187 (No. 131).

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*Atītaṁ nānvāgameyya, nappaṭikaṅkhe anāgataṁ;*
*Yad atītam pahinan taṁ, appattañca anāgataṁ.*
*Paccuppannañ ca yo dhammaṁ tattha tattha vipassati,*
*Asaṁhīraṁ asaṁkuppaṁ taṁ vidvā manubrūhaye.*

c10.s5.5

*Ajj’ eva kiccam ātappaṁ; ko jaññā maraṇaṁ suve?*
*Na hi no saṁgaran tena mahāsenena maccunā*
*Evaṁ vihāriṁ ātāpiṁ ahorattam atanditaṁ*
*Taṁ ve bhaddekaratto ti santo ācikkhate munīti.*

c10.s5.6

Don't pursue the past
Long not for the future,
The past is dead,
Not yet realized is the future.

c10.s5.7

Whoever examines the present conditions
exactly as they really are
Should ascertain the invincible and unshakable
strive after it.

c10.s5.8

Exertions are then to be made today ;
Who knows death may come to-morrow ?
Not possible any pact with Death and his army.

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Who exerts thus night and day ceaselessly,
He is called *bhaddekaratta* (devoted to the good)
He is the real saint.

c10.s5.10

The woman with her joys and woes forms the subject-mater of the *Mātugāma-Saṃyutta* of the *Saṃyutta Nikāya*. The definition of *Nibbāna*⁹ as the destruction of lust, hatred and illusion and its attainment by the eightfold path are described in the *Jambukhadaka Saṃyutta*, the *Samandaka Saṃyutta* and the *Asaṅkhata Saṃyutta*. The eightfold path as consisting in right view, right aim, right speech, right action, right living, right exertion, right mindfulness and right concentration is the special topic of the *Magga-Saṁyutta*. The four truths, namely, suffering, its origin, its destruction, and the path leading to its destruction have been described in the *Sacca Saṁyutta*.

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⁹ On the latest controversies in the interpretation of Nibbana (Nirvana) see Suzuki : *Outlines of Mahayana Buddhism*; Yamakami : *Systems of Buddhistic Thought* (Calcutta 1912); De la Vallée Poussin : *Nirvana* (Paris 1925); H. von Glasenapp : *Brahma und Buddha* (Berlin 1926); T. Stcherbatsky : *The Central Conception of Buddhism* (London 1923); *The Conception of Buddhist Nirvana* (Leningrad 1927); Keith : *The Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon* (Oxford 1923); N. Dutt : *Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism in its Relation to Hinayana* (London 1930); J. Przyluski : *Le Bouddhisme* (Paris 1932); P. Masson-Oursel : *L'Inde Antique et la Civilisation Indienne* (Paris 1933).

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The *Dhammapada*¹⁰ and the *Suttanipāta*, two of the twenty treatises in verse belonging to the *Khuddaka Nikāya* of the *Sutta Piṭaka* introduce us further to the essentially activistic atmosphere (*appamāda*) of Śākya's fundamental tenets. Every verse in these two noble collections is an admonition to the human spirit to "energize" and to "behave." Most of the teachings are suited to monks and householders alike.

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¹⁰ Translation of *Dhammapada* in the Sacred Books of the East (Oxford) Vol. X.

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The books are two of the world's profoundest treatises on meliorism or humanism in morals with reference to the remaking of personality and the reconstruction of society. And the shortest catechism of Śākyan ethics is to be found in the *Khuddakapāṭha* of the same *Nikāya*.¹¹

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¹¹ B. C. Law: *A History of Pali Literature*, Vol. I (Calcutta 1933), pp. 153, 177-179, 222, 232.

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