Indian Philosophy v1.c17: Chapter XI
Indian Philosophy v1.c17
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Chapter XI
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Page 611 *n.*—See Aśoka's *Bhābrū* edict and *Divyāvadāna*, p. 272. In *Aṅguttara N.* (iv. 163), Buddha is compared to a granary whence men bring every good word. See Vincent Smith: *Aśoka*, p. 154.
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Page 613.—On Sarvāstivāda or the view that everything exists, see Stcherbatsky's *The Central Conception of Buddhism*. Sarvāstivāda was an ancient school of Buddhism of which the Vaibhāṣika system is a continuation.
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Page 613 *n.*—Dhamatrāta is the author of *Udānavarga* and *Saṃyuktābhidharmahṛdayaśāstra*. M. M. Haraprasād Śāstri says that "Āryadeva hails from Kañci" (*Indian Historical Quarterly*, 1925, p. 111).
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Page 615.—The self or living being is not an ultimate fact, while the real elements (dharmas) are. Nairātmya or soullessness is the negative way of expressing the existence of ultimate reality (dharmatā); only what we call the soul is not that. Cp. Yaśomitra on *Abhidharmakośa*, ix. *Pravacanadharmatā punar atra nairātmyam buddhānuśāsanī vā*. Stcherbatsky says: "Buddhism never denied the existence of a personality or a soul, in the empirical sense; it only maintained that it was no ultimate reality (not a dharma)" (see *The Central Conception of Buddhism*, pp. 25–26).
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"The elements had four salient feaures: (1) they were not substance—this refers to all the seventy-five elements, whether eternal or impermanent; (2) they had no duration—this refers only to the seventy-two impermanent elements of phenomenal existence; (3) they were unrest—this refers only to one part of the latter class, that which roughly corresponds to the ordinary man as opposed to the purified condition of the elements of a saint (ārya); (4) and their unrest had its end in final deliverance. Speaking technically: (1) all dharmas are anātman, (2) all saṃskṛta dharmas are anitya, (3) all sāśrava dharmas are duḥkha, and (4) their nirvāṇa alone is śānta. An element is non-substantial, it is evanescent, it is in a beginningless state of commotion, and its final suppression is the only balm.”
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Regarding the relation of the permanent elements to their manifestations, the Vibhāṣa seems to suggest four different views. Dharmatrāta maintains unity of substance (dravya) along with change in existence (bhāva). The essence remains unchanged while the existence alters as when milk changes into curds. This view seems to be influenced by the Sāṃkhya theory. Ghoṣa assumes that elements, though existent in the past, present and future, change their aspect (lakṣaṇa) at different times. This view is not generally accepted, as it implies the co-existence of the different aspects at the same time. Buddhadeva thinks that the past, the present and the future are contingent on one another, and the same entity may be described as past, present or future in accordance with its relation to the preceding or succeeding moment, even as a woman may be regarded as mother, wife or daughter. This view does not find acceptance, as it is said to involve a confusion of the three periods of time. Vasumitra advocates a change of condition (avasthā), i.e. of efficiency in the present and non-efficiency in the past and the future. When an entity has performed its function and has ceased to act, it is past; when it is producing it, it is present; when it has not yet produced it, it is future. There is real existence in all the three states. The past is real, for were it not so, it could not be the object of knowledge, nor could it determine the present. The Vaibhāṣikas generally accept the view of Vasumitra. The Vibhajyavādins adopt the view that the present elements and those among the past which have not yet produced their function are existent, while the future elements and those of the past which have produced their function are non-existent. See Stcherbatsky: The Central Conception of Buddhism, p. 46, and Appendix 1; Keith: Budd. Phil., pp. 104-5.
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Page 616.—The Sarvāstivāda holds that there are fourteen kinds of atoms answering to the five sense-organs, the five sense-objects and the four mahābhūtas. These atoms are not eternal like those of the Vaiśeṣikas or the Jainas. In consistency with the doctrine of momentariness (kṣaṇikavāda), they are said to spring into being from time to time and lapse into non-being. Even the paramāṇus, which are said to sustain the atoms, are not permanent, since they are subject to the fourfold process of birth, continuance, decay and destruction.
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The Sarvāstivāda admits the existence of what is called the avijñaptirūpa or unmanifested matter. The Buddhist theory requires that every physical act, word or thought should have some corresponding result. Every act modifies the nature and position of the molecules. Even where it does not do so visibly, it must do so invisibly, for it is impossible that an action can have no result. While the Sarvāstivādins admitted the reality of avijñaptirūpa, they were not decided about its nature. Harivarman, in his Sattvasiddhi, makes out that it is neither physical nor mental and belongs to cittaviprayukta dharmas. As the Sarvāstivādins claim that all character is ultimately material, avijñaptirūpa is also a rūpa dharma.
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Page 616, n. 1.—The Caitta dharmas are distinct from citta and not mere phases of it as in the Yogācāra. The later Sthaviravādins gave a relative unity to citta and caitasika dharmas, where citta is compared to a sphere and caitasikas to sections of it. The caitasikas are elements out of which mental complexes are made. " Just as the four mahābhūtas and the five sense-object atoms may combine in an infinite number of ways to form the complex external world around us, so may the various caitasikas be compounded in an infinite number of ways, ranging from the simple thoughts and desires of a child to the most abstruse metaphysical inference " (McGovern: *Buddhist Phil.*, p. 138). The caitasikas are broadly distinguished into (1) general mental properties which are neither meritorious nor demeritorious, (2) meritorious and (3) demeritorious. While the Sthaviravādins have only these three, the Sarvāstivādins and the Yogācāras add a fourth indeterminate.
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Page 617.—See *Abhidharmakośa*, iv. 1b; also Stcherbatsky: *The Conception of Buddhist Nirvāṇa*, pp. 27-29.
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Page 618.—" Pratisamkhyā means conscious deliberation and is a type of intelligence, since it deliberates upon each of the four noble truths. The attainment of cessation or nirodha by means of the power of deliberation is therefore called pratisamkhyānirodha, just as a cart pulled by bullocks is called a bullock-cart by the elimination of the middle term" (*Abhidharmakośa*, i. 3b; McGovern: *Buddhist Phil.*, p. 111).
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The Sarvāstivādins " make a difference between the essence and the manifestations of the dharmas. At the time of nirvāṇa, the manifestations have ceased for ever, and there will be no rebirth, but this essence remains. It is nevertheless a kind of entity where there is no consciousness" (Stcherbatsky: *The Central Conception of Buddhism*, p. 53).
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See *Abhidharmakośa*, iii. 30, where a distinction is made between the perception of " blue " and the judgment " this is blue."
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Page 619.—The *Abhidharmakośa* insists on the importance of volition (see iv). The accidental destruction of a human being when aiming at a pumpkin is no murder. This view is perhaps intended against the Jaina argument that a man who slays, however unwittingly, is guilty of murder, even as one who touches fire, however unknowingly, is burned. The *Abhidharmakośa* distinguishes the psychological from the physical effect of action. A volition leaves only an impression (vāsanā) on the mental series, while the bodily acts produce something quasi-material, called by the scholastics, avijñapti, which persists and develops without any consciousness on the part of the individual. The mechanism of rebirth is more clearly conceived. The last consciousness of life determines the new birth to be achieved. Rebirth or consciousness of conception (pratisamdhivijñāna) is a continuation of the last consciousness before death. The last consciousness of the dying man creates for itself the necessary body out of unorganised matter.
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Page 619, *n.* 1.—The three are one and the same thing, functioning in different ways. “The Buddhists, at least the Sarvāstivādins and the Sthaviravādins, agree that there is only a difference in terminology, and that the thing spoken of is the same” (McGovern: *Buddhist Phil.*, p. 132).
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Page 621.—The Sautrāntikas dispute the Vaibhāṣika belief in the existence of permanent substances persisting through all time. They contend that, if the past is to be regarded as real on the ground that it exercises efficiency, it cannot be distinguished from the present. It is idle to argue that we cannot know non-existent entities. Entities which are actually non-efficient are also known. To distinguish between an entity and its efficiency is untenable, for it is difficult to know why an entity suddenly assumes active efficiency. The Sautrāntikas maintain that all entities are momentary, suddenly come into being, exist for a moment and pass out into non-existence. Their existence and efficiency are one. It follows that “things” are mere names for certain momentary colours, tastes, etc., fictitiously unified under a label. The self is also a designation for a series of momentary psychic happenings which are in causal relation. Memory requires no self but only an earlier experience. It arises when the suitable conditions of attention, freedom from pain and the like are present. The last moment of the consciousness series determines the new life. It is not clear whether the seed of consciousness has any subtle matter accompanying it into a new body or not. See Keith: *Budd. Phil.*, p. 166.
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“The Sautrāntikas are credited with three different views of the nature of the perception of an object. (1) All its characteristics are represented in thought form and so apprehended; (2) thought form is of the total actual presentation only, *e.g.* of variegated colour as such; (3) all aspects of the object are presented in thought, but it synthesises them in one view, *e.g.* the different colours are made one” (ibid., 162 *n.*).
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Page 622.—According to the *Abhidharmakośa*, the phenomenon of knowledge is resolved into a simultaneous appearance of a number of elements. There is no question of contact, influence or interrelation. A movement of colour (rūpa), a movement of the visual sense (cakṣuḥ), a movement of pure consciousness (citta) arise simultaneously in close contiguity and constitute the sensation (sparśa) or colour. The element of consciousness always appears, supported by an object (viṣaya) and a receptive organ (indriya). The consciousness is said to grasp the object, since there is between consciousness and the object a special relation called sārūpya or co-ordination. The consciousness apprehends the colour and not the visual sense. As a matter of fact, what happens is evanescent flashings of consciousness. “Consciousness apprehends in the way in which a light moves. The light of a lamp is a common metaphorical designation for an uninterrupted production of a series of flashing flames. When this production changes its place, we say that the light has moved. Similarly, consciousness is a conventional name for a chain of conscious moments. When it changes its place (i.e. appears in consideration with another objective element), we say that it apprehends that object" (*Abhidharmakośa*, ix; Stcherbatsky, p. 57).
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Page 622 n.—*Abhidhammatthasaṅgaha* gives the four causes as hetu which produces the thing, the ālambana or the support which produces the thought and its sequel, samanantara or the immediately contiguous cause which allows in the stream of thought the new presentation, and the adhipati, that on whose existence the other depends. See Keith: *Budd. Ph.*, b. 177.
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Svalakṣaṇa means the bare particular.
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Page 623.—The Sautrāntikas gave up the idea of self-consciousness, as the consciousness of the preceding moment by the succeeding consciousness not only lights the objects but lights itself, even as the lamp lights not only the room but itself. All consciousness is self-consciousness. For the Sautrāntikas, the perception of external things is only indirect. Things are known because consciousness takes, through the medium of the sense organism, the form of the object and is also conscious of itself. We recognise the externality of objects on account of their temporary and accidental character, which shows that they are not parts of consciousness itself.
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Page 623, n. 1.—See also Ui: *The Vaiśeṣika Philosophy*, pp. 26–28.
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Page 623, n. 4.—*Abhidharmakośavyākhyā*, vii.
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Page 624 n.—Keith assigns Dignāga to about A.D. 400. See his *Budd. Phil.*, p. 305.
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Vasubandhu's *Vijñaptimātratātriṃśat kārikā* had nearly ten commentaries on it. Dharmapāla, the teacher of Śīlabhadra who was the teacher of Yuan Chwang, wrote *Vijñaptimātratāsiddhiśāstra*. He upholds subjective idealism in epistemology and refutes all realism.
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Page 625.—To accept the view of Sarvāstivāda that the world is the result of the changing combination of the seventy-five unchanging elements is to go against the central truth of impermanence.
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Page 631.—Objects arise in our consciousness as the result of our past experience. They seem to be given, while they are the creation of our thought. The external world is the product of our thought to which we give names and ideas (nāmasamjñāvyavahāra). See *Laṅkāvatāra sūtra*, p. 85.
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Even the internal distinctions of subject, object and knowledge are not real. They are the results of the defilement of thought, though we cannot trace the beginning of this defilement. The Ālaya has no origin, duration or destruction. Particular intellectual movements stand to it as the waves to the sea.
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Page 639 n.—The Yogācāras admit eight kinds of vijñāna, the five answering to the five material sense-organs, the sixth manovijñāna of a more general character, exercising the functions of memory and
Cites (6)
- Abhidharmakośa — Vasubandhu, Sanskrit
- Aṅguttaranikāya — Pāli
- Divyāvadāna — Sanskrit
- Abhidhammatthasaṅgaha — Anuruddha, Pāli
- Laṅkāvatārasūtra — Sanskrit
- Udānavarga — Dharmatrāta, Sanskrit