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Early Monastic Buddhism v1.c13.s3: Study of mental leanings

Early Monastic Buddhism v1.c13.s3

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Study of mental leanings

v1.c13.s3.1

Before delivering a discourse Buddha tried to form an idea of the leaning of the persons by putting to them questions on religious matters or answering the questions that he allowed them to put to himself. In this way he used to select a subject most suited to the occasion and agreeable to the persons composing the audience and delivered a discourse on same. Similes, parables, fables very often drawn from experiences of every day life were interspersed with his speeches along with pithy verses to make his arguments sweet and effective.¹ He attached great importance to the art of preaching and tried to impress upon the minds of his disciples the sense of its importance. The particular features by which his speeches were rendered so very impressive were, first because he utilized his higher knowledge (*abhiññā*), by which he could find out the persons who would benefit by his discourses on a particular day; secondly because the selection of the subjects of his discourses was the result of a correct diagnosis (*sanidāna*) of the mentality of the listeners.²

v1.c13.s3.2

¹ Oldenberg, *Buddha* (Hoey's transl.), pp 185-193.

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² *Divyāvadāna*, pp. 96, 124 “*Āśayānuśayam viditvādhātuṃ prakṛtiṃ ca jñātvā tādṛśī dharmadeśanā kṛtā.*”

v1.c13.s3.4

(iii) *Disputation*

v1.c13.s3.5

Many are of opinion that Buddha himself avoided entering into discussions with others, and discouraged those of his disciples who entered into discussions on religious matters in the course of their preaching and wandering. Such opinion is not wholly correct. There are passages in the Buddhist scriptures which lend colour to the aforesaid view. To cite one or two such passages: He is said to have declared that his dhamma is not to be grasped by mere logic (*atakkāvacara*)³ and he condemned the Śramaṇas and Brāhmaṇas who took to hair-splitting disputations saying, ‘Issue has been joined against you, you are defeated, set to work to clear your views, disentangle yourself if you can’ (*āropito te vādo, niggahīto ’si. Cara vādappamokkhāya, nibbethehi vā sace pahosīti).¹ From such passages, it is not right to draw the conclusion that Buddha condemned or prohibited the holding of all disputations on religious matters.

v1.c13.s3.6

³ *Dīgh Nik*, I, p 12 (*Dial of Buddha*, vol. II, p 26).

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¹ Dīgh Nik, I p 8 (Dial of Buddha, vol. II, p 15)

v1.c13.s3.8

It should also be kept in mind that the state of the country at the time of Buddha was not such as could permit a missionary to keep clear of disputation. One of the essential works of a preacher was to convince his audience, and this was hardly possible if argumentation was not given a wide berth. Of this time, accounts are available of brāhmaṇa and non-brāhmaṇa heads of religions, wandering about over the whole of eastern India, sometimes with a large band of disciples, and holding disputations with the heads of the rival sects to assert their influence and increase their following. There were the paribbājakas who wandered about with their minds open for the reception of religious light wherever available. The lay people also liked to hear disputations as indicated by their setting up of kutūhala-sālās (halls for people in quest of truths) or paribbājakārāmas in different places where the wandering teachers might reside and hold controversies with convenience in the midst of a large gathering. The people of a locality felt proud if a good many religious teachers visited their kutūhalasālās or paribbājakārāmas.² References are available in plenty in the Buddhist works showing that it was often stated at the disputations that the defeated teacher with his followers relinquished his own doctrines and embraced those of the winner. These defeats in disputations were a fruitful source for the enlisting of converts to the many doctrines and religions that prevailed in the country at the time, and the teachers vied and struggled with one another for securing the largest following. The discussions of the rival sects indicate that they had to be well-grounded not only in the rules by which the disputation was guided and the argumentation was rendered free from fallacies, but also in the doctrines of the various opponents who had to be faced, over and above their own school or tenets and practices with their philosophical bases, if any. Buddha is described in several places in the Buddhist works as a master of the tenets and practices of the heretical sects. A large number of his disciples was recruited either as the result of defeats suffered by the opponents or from among the followers of the brāhmaṇic and the heretical teachers convinced of the superiority of the doctrines propounded by him. His discussions with Soṇadaṇḍa, Kūṭadanta, Upāli, Sakuludāyi, Vekhanassa, Assalāyana and a host of others are instances in which he argued out his own views and convinced his adversaries at the end. The victories thus gained in large numbers in disputations elicited the remark from Dīghatapassi, a Jaina monk to the effect that Gautama was a sorcerer who by the force of his art drew the people of other sects into his own net.¹ The lists of his disciples who were convinced and won over to Buddhism from their own beliefs and practices is a large one, from which the names of the following may be mentioned: Mahākoṭṭhita, Piṇḍola Bharadvāja, Mahākaccāyana, for instance, were masters of the three Vedas and perfect in all the accomplishments of a Brāhmaṇa; Sāriputta and Moggallāna were the disciples of Sañjaya; the Kassapas were the leaders of the Jaṭilas; Abhayarājakumāra was a distinguished disciple of Nigaṇṭha Nāṭaputta.

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² Sam Nik, II, p 32; V, p 115, Majjh Nik, II, pp. 1 2, 99 Divyāvadāna, p 143

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¹ Majjh. Nik., I, p. 375; Aṅg. Nik., II, p. 190. (Gotamo māyāvī, āvaṭṭaniṃ māyaṃ jānāti yāya aññatitthiyānaṃ sāvakā āvaṭṭetīti).

v1.c13.s3.11

To be a successful disputant, one had to be equipped with all the outfit of specious arguments (*kūṭatarka*) to meet those opponents who made a free use of them whenever needed. It is clear from Buddha’s injunctions to the bhikkhus, that he wanted them to use their power of argumentation in the service of truth and truth alone, and not to take to sophistry of their own accord. But a preacher ignorant of the wiles of a specious arguer and unable to use counter-wiles for self-defence would certainly be a weak disputant. It was for this reason perhaps that we see Buddha applying such a method with men who came to argue with crooked intention, or took to crooked ways of disputation. This is seen in the *Ambaṭṭha Sutta*¹ where Buddha in order to silence Ambaṭṭha, who claimed the superiority of Brāhmaṇas over all by birth and stated that the Sākyas were of servile origin, related the fictitious account of the origin of the Sākyas and Kaṇhāyanas showing that the latter were the descendants of a *dāsiputta* (son of a slave-girl) of the former. The object of the use of the story was to put it as a stunner to Ambaṭṭha exposing his low origin.

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¹ Digha, I, pp. 92, 95.

Cites (10)