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Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon c17.s1: 1. The Mechanism of the Act

Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon c17.s1

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1. The Mechanism of the Act

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To the *Abhidharmakoça* we are indebted for a full development of the theory of the mechanism of the act and its fruition, which unites into a more or less coherent whole the vaguer hints of the earlier texts. Insistence is laid on the necessity of volition for action; the accidental destruction of a human being when aiming at a pumpkin is no murder, and issue on this point is taken with the Jain view, which curiously enough is repeated in the *Milindapañha*. The Jain argument is that the man who slays, however unwittingly, is guilty of murder, just as the man who touches fire, however unknowingly, is burned. But this is rejected as absurd; the mother and the embryo would each be guilty of injuring the other; a murdered man would be guilty as the cause and origin of the slaying; if the analogy of fire is pressed, it results in holding that a man who induces another to kill is no murderer, since he did not strike the blow, while unconscious sin would be graver than conscious sin, just as the man who incautiously touches fire suffers more than he who does so knowingly.¹

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¹ MKV., pp. 306 f. ; AK. iv ; Poussin, *Nirvāṇa*, p. 69 ; cf. Mil., p. 158.

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The element of intention is differentiated from bodily or verbal action by its effects; it leaves only an impression (*vāsanā*) on the mental series, while bodily and verbal actions as material create something also quasi-material styled by the scholastics Avijñapti, which persists and develops without consciousness on the part of the individual. This curious doctrine contains in itself the recognition of a real fact; the taking of a religious vow impresses on a man's character a peculiar bent, which is not consciously present but none the less must definitely affect the trend of his actions.¹

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¹ Poussin, op. cit., pp. 71 f. The gift does not, however, exist in intention alone, as the Rājagirikas and Siddhatthikas hold; KV. vii. 4.

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The criterion of action remains dubious, for the doctrine that a good act is one that benefits a neighbour is incidental only, and the general rule is merely that a good act is one which matures into a pleasurable existence in future, while a bad act leads to pain. Or again, an act is good if it aims at pleasure in a future existence, but not if it seeks happiness in this, a doctrine which has obvious limitations, since it may lead, as in the case of Nanda, a kinsman of Çākyamuni, to acceptance of the tonsure and separation from his wife, merely to gain the delights of celestial brides in the world of heaven.² The system allows also excessive room to the inculcation of the virtue of generosity; even if a man sins not, and thus secures rebirth as a man, he will be poor if he has failed in generosity; if he sins, but is generous, he will pay for the sin by rebirth in hell or as an animal or ghost, but thereafter he will reap the reward of birth on earth as a rich man or as a god in heaven. It accords with this that the casuistry of the gift is elaborated. A gift depends for its value on such factors as the faith, learning, morality, and intention of the giver; the manner and moment of donation; the qualities of the object given; and, last not least, the qualities of the recipient or field (kṣetra) of donation. A man, however wicked, is a more worthy object of favour than an animal; gifts to the poor and sick are especially fruitful; gifts in return for services are laudable, and gifts to a virtuous and enlightened saint are best of all. In every case of course desire of immediate reward in this life is excluded.

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² Poussin, op. cit., p. 76, n. 2; Saundarananda Kāvya (JA. 1912, i. 79): aihikasukhārtham karmāpunyam, AKV. (Paris MS.) f. 236b. That Buddhism is hedonistic is admitted in Psych. Ethics, pp. lxxxiii ff.; the attainment, or even the seeking after, enlightenment is pleasant beyond other pleasures; Buddhism, pp. 230 ff.

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The mechanism of transmigration, vaguely conceived earlier, is now brought into effective connexion with action. Normally a being, god, man or animal, lives its life without essential physical change, though occasionally punishment for crime may change a man into a woman or transfer him into a hell being without the intervention of death. But death is normally the portal to the next existence and the last consciousness of life is determined in form by appropriateness to the new birth to be achieved, which in its turn depends on the action to be rewarded or punished. If the fate of the man on death is to be hell, he hears the cries of the tormented, and his rebirth or conception consciousness (*pratisamdhi-vijñāna*) is a continuation of this last consciousness before death. An animal is incapable of action proper; but an ancient deed may reward it with rebirth as a man, and its dying consciousness takes the form of ideas, desires or images which are continued in an infant birth. The process is complex, since each individual series extends indefinitely into the past, and the future rebirth cannot be predicted, though a meritorious person may often secure the kind of rebirth he desires by intense thought of it before death.¹

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¹ Poussin, *Nirvāna*, pp. 85 ff. Cf. the mediaeval Ceylonese doctrine, *Compendium*, pp. 73 ff.

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The process of rebirth may be immediate; thus gods and beings of hell are not conceived, but the last consciousness of the dying man creates in some fashion for itself the necessary divine or infernal body out of unorganized matter. In the case of men, animals or ghosts there may be delays in rebirth if circumstances are not propitious, and in the meantime it may exist as a Gandharva, for seven or forty-nine days, before it finds its way to fashion with the aid of the conceptional elements the necessary embryo, and errors are possible in detail at least; the consciousness may be born in jackal, not dog shape.

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There is obviously a difficulty in determining the time of the reward or punishment of action, which the scholastic states without explaining. We must distinguish between acts which are supernatural (*lokottara*), leading to release, neither born of desire nor leading to it, and destructive of the reward of earlier deeds, and those acts which, born of desire, lead to rebirth or reward. Some of those acts need not be rewarded; a saint may obtain release without the tedium of enjoying in heaven the reward of his good deeds, and he who has won the position of a non-returner (*anāgāmin*) has not to suffer in hell or on earth or in an inferior heaven the fruits of past deeds. Of those deeds that bear reward some may be requited in this life; a good man if he commits some minor sin will pay the penalty ere his death, while a bad man who committed the same fault would suffer torment in hell. On the other hand such grave crimes as parricide receive inevitably punishment in the next life. But most serious sins may be punished then or their retribution may be delayed to permit the retribution of other acts, or in rare cases by the attainment of sanctity they are turned into deeds to be requited in this life.

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Artificial as the theory is, it serves to explain the whole nature of existence of sentient beings. An evil deed results in birth as a hell being, and if wicked enough the sin may compel long periods of rebirth in such a state. The birth and the sufferings undergone are the fruit of ripening of the sin (*vipākaphala*). But at last the force of birth projection by the sin is lessened; an animal existence or existences follows, whose sufferings are again the fruit of ripening, while the character of the birth is the fruit similar to the action (*niṣyanda-phala*) as when the murderer is reborn as a tiger. The power of birth projection is at last exhausted, and the way is open for some deed done in a former birth which had merit, and which now projects a human birth, but the life that follows will be coloured by a fruit similar to the ancient sin; the murderer will be crushed to death,¹ the thief poor. Moreover, he will have a character tinged by the nature of his son; the murderer will be evil disposed.²

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¹ A thorn which pricks the Buddha's foot is the fruit of a slaying of a man in the 91st Aeon hence; TRD., p. 26.

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² Can one in hell do good? KV. xiii. 2 does not deal with this, but with good done by one who has already committed a crime dooming him for a Kappa.

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But it is not merely each organism which is brought into being by the effect of action. The world in which the organism is to exist owes its existence to the same cause; it is material indeed, but its actual condition is not due to any nature of its own; it is the fruit of mastery (*adhipati-phala*) of the acts of beings. This is seen most clearly at the beginning of a cosmic age;³ the whole material universe is the fruit of mastery of all the deeds of the world of living beings. The rule is universal, and applies to the divine sphere with a completeness and boldness unknown to Brahmanical thought. In the cosmic evolution the acts of the being whose merits are to secure his appearance as the Brahmā of the age produce his divine palace, in which the god comes into being, to delude himself into the belief that he is self created (*svayam-bhū*). By a similar delusion he imagines that the other beings who come into existence as his companions in his heaven are creatures of his desire for companionship, instead of being produced by the merits of ancient days, and hence is derived the worship of Brahmā as creator and overlord, ideas merely idle;¹ Brahmā in truth like gods of inferior rank has come into being as the reward of noble actions and deep meditations, the Brahma-vihāras, in previous existences, but power he has none, and he differs from the monk set on release in that his acts in the past have aimed at wordly motives.

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³ On this topic, see AKB., pp. 99 ff.

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¹ DN. i. 17 ff., 220 ff.

Cites (8)