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Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon c17.s4: 4. The Perfections of the Saint

Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon c17.s4

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4. The Perfections of the Saint

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Especial stress was laid in the schools on the development of the view of the character of the Arhant, which assumed in the opinion of the Vibhajyavādins a rigidity, excluding human weaknesses and imperfections. Thus they deny strenuously the possibility of the falling away of an emancipated one, even in the case of one who attains only occasionally in meditation full emancipation, against the view of the Sammitiya, Vajjiputtiyas, Sabbatthivādins and some Mahāsaṅghikas that the Arhant is liable to fall away. They deny also the doctrine of the Pubba- and Apara-seliyas that the gods of the Māra group can impose physical impurities on saints.¹ As against the Andhakas it is maintained that the saint has complete knowledge, that he cannot doubt, and that he cannot be surpassed in knowledge by others, while against Mahāsaṅghika and Andhaka views it is claimed that he casts aside every fetter of ignorance and doubt in attaining his end.² But the saint is human; the Uttarāpathakas, who hold that he is entirely free in every regard from any connexion with the four intoxicants, desire, lust for rebirth, false opinion, and ignorance, are reminded that his body and his sense organs cannot be deemed uncontaminated by these intoxicants, and that only the path, its fruits, Nirvāṇa, and the factors leading to insight are really free from connexion with the intoxicants. Similarly, though the saint is indifferent as to sense impressions as part of his character, his indifference is manifested under human conditions; he cannot attend to more than one sense impression or idea at the same time, for his consciousness is essentially momentary, as also is that of a god.¹ The gods also are forced into human mould; it is a mistake to hold, as the Sammitiyas do, that there is no self culture among the gods of the higher heavens of the worlds of desire and matter, save, of course, in the realm of the unconscious gods, for the Andhaka doctrine that consciousness really exists there is absolutely rejected.² Again, the progress to sainthood must be carried out in strict accordance with the stages marked out; the Andhakas are wrong in defining saintship, so as to cover the simultaneous putting aside of all the fetters; in the first three stages five of the fetters are removed; in the last the aspirant rids himself of the desire for rebirth either in the world of matter or of non-matter (rūpa-, arūpa-, rāga), conceit, distraction, and ignorance. The Uttarāpathakas are also wrong in ascribing to a learner the insight of a saint.³

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¹ KV. i. 2; ii. 2; possibly one of Mahādeva’s five points, JRAS. 1910, p. 418; Wassilieff, *Bouddhisme*, pp. 223 ff.

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² KV. ii, 2-4; iv. 10; xxii. 1.

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¹ KV. iv. 3, 5; doubt and ignorance of Arhatship are two of Mahādeva's points; contrast MN. iii. 110; AN. v. 155, 162; ERE. i. 744.

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² KV. i. 3; iii. 11; they do not practise moral control, iii. 10.

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³ KV. iv. 10; v. 2.

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The saint by his actions, gifts to the order, saluting shrines and so forth does not accumulate any action to continue to bear fruit; if he could win merit he could also win demerit, which is impossible.⁴ Nor is it necessary that he should experience the results of all his former action before his death, so that he cannot die an untimely death, as asserted by the Rājagirikas and the Siddhatthikas, in accordance with their general doctrine that all is derived from action. Still less can a saint fall away from sainthood because, as held by the Pubbaseliyas and the Sammitiyas, in a previous birth he has calumniated a saint.

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⁴ KV. xvii. 1; 2; viii. 11. The Prajñaptivādins deny untimely death; Wassilieff, p. 244.

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The state of the saint in passing away raises difficulty; it is denied that he possesses an ethical consciousness at such a moment, which is contrary to the extinction of ethical considerations for the sage, though asserted by the Andhakas. Nor is the Uttarāpathaka doctrine right, under which the saint attains the completion of existence in imperturbable absorption of meditation; on the contrary in accordance with the Canon we must recognize that he passes out of meditation before death, and that therefore he dies with possession of that sub-consciousness (*bhavanga-citta*) which is the normal characteristic of life, and which is non-ethical and purely resultant.¹

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¹ KV. xxii. 2, 3.

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No person may become a saint unless he has laid aside the life of a layman, canonical texts to the contrary and the views of the Uttarāpathakas notwithstanding; it is impossible also for any embryo to become a saint at the moment of rebirth nor can a dreamer attain this state.²

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² KV. iv. 1, 2; xxii. 5; xxiii. 1 may sanction married life according to the Andhakas and Vetulyakas.

Cites (4)