Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c7.s3.t9.15

c7.s3.t9.15

In commenting on this passage Buddhaghosa further says that an arhat never has any maññanā (thought-construction)¹ in regard to the four elements or Nibbāna or anything whatsoever, which a puthujjana or a khīṇāsava² (but not yet an arhat) has. Buddhaghosa thus tries to show that Nibbāna is inexpressible, infinite and that any attempt to establish a relation between it and a being is a delusion of the mind. He is also constrained to say that such a description of Nibbāna had to be given as a set-off to the arguments of Brahmā,³ hinting thereby that even such statements are not permissible as Nibbāna is inexpressible. From such interpretations of the Nikāya passages as well as from his exposition of Nibbāna in the Visuddhimagga, treated later on,⁴ it will be apparent that he, far from supporting nihilism, held that Nibbāna is a transcendental, indescribable state. In fact, there was hardly any school of Buddhism, which favoured the view of annihilation, and so it seems that the opinions of scholars who supported annihilation do not rest on very sure foundations. Prof. La Vallée Poussin has criticised in detail the views of these scholars. He has given the gist of their views, showing the weak points in them along with his learned dissertation on the interpretation of Nirvāṇa (Études sur l'histoire de religions, 1925). As in his work he has reviewed most of the writings of his predecessors on Nirvāṇa, we need not deal with them again. For the present purpose, it is sufficient to state his opinion and those of Profs. Berriedale Keith and Stcherbatsky, the three latest exponents of the subject.