MAHAYANIST METAPHYSICS
Thus the theory of the three bodies, especially of the Dharma-kaya, is
bound up with a theory of ontology. Metaphysics became a passion among
the travellers of the Great Vehicle as psychology had been in earlier
times. They may indeed be reproached with being bad Buddhists since
they insisted on speculating on those questions which Gotama had
declared to be unprofitable and incapable of an answer in human
language. He refused to pronounce on the whence, the whither and the
nature of things, but bade his disciples walk in the eightfold path
and analyse the human mind, because such analysis conduces to
spiritual progress. India was the last country in the world where such
restrictions were likely to be observed. Much Mahayanist literature is
not religious at all but simply metaphysics treated in an
authoritative and ecclesiastical manner. The nature and origin of the
world are discussed as freely as in the Vedanta and with similar
results: the old ethics and psychology receive scant attention. Yet
the difference is less than might be supposed. Anyone who reads these
treatises and notices the number of apparently eternal beings and the
talk about the universal mind is likely to think the old doctrine that
nothing has an atman or soul, has been forgotten. But this impression
is not correct; the doctrine of _Nairatmyam_ is asserted so
uncompromisingly that from one point of view it may be said that even
Buddhas do not exist. The meaning of this doctrine is that no being or
object contains an unchangeable permanent self, which lives unaltered
in the same or in different bodies. On the contrary individual
existences consist of nothing but a collection of skandhas or a
_santana_, a succession or series of mental phenomena. In the Pali
books this doctrine is applied chiefly to the soul and psychological
enquiries. The Mahayana applied it to the external world and proved by
ingenious arguments that nothing at all exists. Similarly the doctrine
of Karma is maintained, though it is seriously modified by the
admission that merit can be transferred from one personality to
another. The Mahayana continued to teach that an act once performed
affects a particular series of mental states until its effect is
exhausted, or in popular language that an individual enjoys or suffers
through a series of births the consequences of previous acts. Even the
instance of Amitabha's paradise, though it strains the doctrine of
Karma to the utmost, does not repudiate it. For the believer performs
an act--to wit, the invocation of Amitabha--to which has been attached
the wonderful result that the performer is reborn in a blessed state.
This is not essentially different from the idea found in the Pali
Canon that attentions paid to a Buddha may be rewarded by a happy
rebirth in heaven.[100]
Mahayanist metaphysics, like all other departments of this theology,
are beset by the difficulty that the authorities who treat of them are
not always in accord and do not pretend to be in accord. The idea that
variety is permissible in belief and conduct is deeply rooted in later
Buddhism: there are many vehicles, some better than others no doubt
and some very ramshackle, but all are capable of conveying their
passengers to salvation. Nominally the Mahayana was divided into only
two schools of philosophy: practically every important treatise
propounds a system with features of its own. The two schools are the
Yogacaras and Madhyamikas.[101] Both are idealists and deny the
reality of the external world, but whereas the Yogacaras (also called
Vijnanavadins) admit that Vijnana or consciousness and the series of
states of which it consists are real, the Madhyamikas refuse the title
of reality to both the subjective and the objective world and hence
gained a reputation of being complete nihilists. Probably the
Madhyamikas are the older school.
Both schools attach importance to the distinction between relative and
absolute knowledge. Relative knowledge is true for human beings living
in the world: that is to say it is not more false than the world of
appearance in which they live. The Hinayanist doctrines are true in
this sense. Absolute knowledge rises above the world of appearance and
is altogether true but difficult to express in words. The Yogacara
makes three divisions, dividing the inferior knowledge into two. It
distinguishes first illusory knowledge (_parikalpita_) such as
mistaking a piece of rope for a snake or belief in the existence of
individual souls. Secondly knowledge which depends on the relations of
things (_paratantra_) and which though not absolutely wrong is
necessarily limited, such as belief in the real existence of ropes and
snakes. And thirdly absolute knowledge (_parinishpanna_), which
understands all things as the manifestation of an underlying
principle. The Madhyamikas more simply divide knowledge into
_samvriti-satya_ and _paramartha-satya_, that is the truth of
every-day life and transcendental truth. The world and ordinary
religion with its doctrines and injunctions about good works are real
and true as _samvriti_ but in absolute truth (_paramartham_) we
attain Nirvana and then the world with its human Buddhas and its gods
exists no more. The word _sunyam_ or _sunyata_, that is _void_, is
often used as the equivalent of _paramartham_. Void must be understood
as meaning not an abyss of nothingness but that which is found to be
devoid of all the attributes which we try to ascribe to it. The world
of ordinary experience is not void, for a great number of statements
can be made about it, but absolute truth is void, because nothing
whatever can be predicated of it. Yet even this colourless designation
is not perfectly accurate,[102] because neither being nor not-being
can be predicated of absolute truth. It is for this reason, namely
that they admit neither being nor not-being but something between the
two, that the followers of Nagarjuna are known as the Madhyamikas or
school of the middle doctrine, though the European reader is tempted
to say that their theories are extreme to the point of being a
_reductio ad absurdum_ of the whole system. Yet though much of their
logic seems late and useless sophistry, its affinity to early Buddhism
cannot be denied. The fourfold proposition that the answer to certain
questions cannot be any of the statements "is," "is not," "both is and
is not," "neither is nor is not," is part of the earliest known
stratum of Buddhism. The Buddha himself is represented as saying[103]
that most people hold either to a belief in being or to a belief in
not being. But neither belief is possible for one who considers the
question with full knowledge. "That things have being is one extreme:
that things have no being is the other extreme. These extremes have
been avoided by the Tathagata and it is a middle doctrine that he
teaches," namely, dependent origination as explained in the chain of
twelve links. The Madhyamika theory that objects have no absolute and
independent existence but appear to exist in virtue of their relations
is a restatement of this ancient dictum.
The Mahayanist doctors find an ethical meaning in their negations. If
things possessed _svabhava_, real, absolute, self-determined
existence, then the four truths and especially the cessation of
suffering and attainment of sanctity would be impossible. For if
things were due not to causation but to their own self-determining
nature (and the Hindus always seem to understand real existence in
this sense) cessation of evil and attainment of the good would be
alike impossible: the four Noble Truths imply a world which is in a
state of constant becoming, that is a world which is not really
existent.
But for all that the doctrine of _sunyata_ as stated in the Madhyamika
aphorisms ascribed to Nagarjuna leaves an impression of audacious and
ingenious sophistry. After laying down that every object in the world
exists only in relation to every other object and has no
self-existence, the treatise proceeds to prove that rest and motion
are alike impossible. We speak about the path along which we are
passing but there is really no such thing, for if we divide the path
accurately, it always proves separable into the part which has been
passed over and the part which will be passed over. There is no part
which is being passed over. This of course amounts to a denial of the
existence of present time. Time consists of past and future separated
by an indivisible and immeasurable instant. The minimum of time which
has any meaning for us implies a change, and two elements, a former
and a subsequent. The present minute or the present hour are
fallacious expressions.[104]
Therefore no one ever _is passing_ along a path. Again you cannot
logically say that the passer is passing, for the sentence is
redundant: the verb adds nothing to the noun and _vice versa_: but on
the other hand you clearly cannot say that the non-passer is passing.
Again if you say that the passer and the passing are identical, you
overlook the distinction between the agent and the act and both become
unreal. But you cannot maintain that the passer is different from the
passing, for a passer as distinct from passing and passing as
distinct from a passer have no meaning. "But how can two entities
exist at all, if they exist neither as identical with one another nor
as different from one another?"
The above, though much abridged, gives an idea of the logic of these
sutras. They proceed to show that all manner of things, such as the
five skandhas, the elements, contact, attachment, fire and fuel,
origination, continuation and extinction have no real existence.
Similar reasoning is then applied to religious topics: the world of
transmigration as well as bondage and liberation are declared
non-existent. In reality no soul is in bondage and none is
released.[105] Similarly Karma, the Buddha himself, the four truths,
Nirvana and the twelve links in the chain of causation are all unreal.
This is not a declaration of scepticism. It means that the Buddha as a
human or celestial being and Nirvana as a state attainable in this
world are conceivable only in connection with this world and
therefore, like the world, unreal. No religious idea can enter into
the unreal (that is the practical) life of the world unless it is
itself unreal. This sounds a topsy turvy argument but it is really the
same as the Advaita doctrine. The Vedanta is on the one hand a scheme
of salvation for liberating souls which transmigrate unceasingly in a
world ruled by a personal God. But when true knowledge is attained,
the soul sees that it is identical with the Highest Brahman and that
souls which are in bondage and God who rules the world are illusions
like the world itself. But the Advaita has at least a verbal
superiority over the Madhyamika philosophy, for in its terminology
Brahman is the real and the existent contrasted with the world of
illusion. The result of giving to what the Advaita calls the real and
existent the name of sunyata or void is disconcerting. To say that
everything without distinction is non-existent is much the same as
saying that everything is existent. It only means that a wrong sense
is habitually given to the word exist, as if it meant to be
self-contained and without relation to other objects. Unless we can
make a verbal contrast and assert that there is something which does
exist, it seems futile to insist on the unreality of the world. Yet
this mode of thought is not confined to text-books on logic. It
invades the scriptures, and appears (for instance) in the Diamond
Cutter[106] which is still one of the most venerated books of devotion
in China and Japan. In this work the Buddha explains that a
Bodhisattva must resolve to deliver all living beings and yet must
understand that after he has thus delivered innumerable beings, no one
has been delivered. And why? Because no one is to be called a
Bodhisattva for whom there exists the idea of a being, or person.
Similarly a saint does not think that he is a saint, for if he did so
think, he would believe in a self, and a person. There occur
continually in this work phrases cast in the following form: "what was
preached as a store of merit, that was preached as no store of
merit[107] by the Tathagata and therefore it is called a store of
merit. If there existed a store of merit, the Tathagata would not have
preached a store of merit." That is to say, if I understand this dark
language rightly, accumulated merit is part of the world of illusion
which we live in and by speaking of it as he did the Buddha implied
that it, like everything else in the world, is really non-existent.
Did it belong to the sphere of absolute truth, he would not have
spoken of it as if it were one of the things commonly but erroneously
supposed to exist. Finally we are told of the highest knowledge "Even
the smallest thing is not known or perceived there; therefore it is
called the highest perfect knowledge." That is to say perfect
knowledge transcends all distinctions; it recognises the illusory
nature of all individuality and the truth of sameness, the
never-changing one behind the ever-changing many. In this sense it is
said to perceive nothing and know nothing.
One might expect that a philosophy thus prone to use the language of
extreme nihilism would slip into a destructive, or at least negative
system. But Mahayanism was pulled equally strongly in the opposite
direction by the popular and mythological elements which it contained
and was on the whole inclined to theism and even polytheism quite as
much as to atheism and acosmism. A modern Japanese writer[108] says
that Dharma-kaya "may be considered to be equivalent to the Christian
conception of the Godhead." This is excessive as a historical
statement of the view current in India during the early centuries of
our era, but it does seem true that Dharma-kaya was made the
equivalent of the Hindu conception of Param Brahma and also that it is
very nearly equivalent to the Chinese Tao.[109]
The work called _Awakening of Faith_[110] and ascribed to Asvaghosha
is not extant in Sanskrit but was translated into Chinese in 553 A.D.
Its doctrine is practically that of the Yogacara school and this makes
the ascription doubtful, but it is a most important treatise. It is
regarded as authoritative in China and Japan at the present day and it
illustrates the triple tendency of the Mahayana towards metaphysics,
mythology, and devotional piety. It declares that faith has four
aspects. Three of these are the three Jewels, or Buddha, the Law and
the Church, and cover between them the whole field of religion and
morality as generally understood. The exposition is tinged with a fine
unselfish emotion and tells the believer that though he should strive
not for his own emancipation but for the salvation of others yet he
himself receives unselfish and supernatural assistance. He is
remembered and guarded by Buddhas and Bodhisattvas in all quarters of
the Universe who are eternally trying to liberate mankind by various
expedients (upaya). By expedient is meant a modified presentment of
the truth, which is easier of comprehension and, if not the goal, at
least on the road to it, such as the Paradise of Amitabha.[111]
But the remaining aspect of faith, which is the one that the author
puts first in his enumeration, and treats at great length, is "to
believe in the fundamental truth, that is to think joyfully of
suchness." By suchness (in Sanskrit _bhuta-tathata_, in Chinese _Chen
ju_) is meant absolute truth as contrasted with the relative truth of
ordinary experience.[112] The word is not illuminating nor likely to
excite religious emotion and the most that can be said for it is that
it is less dreary than the void of Nagarjuna. Another and more
positive synonym is _dharma-dhatu_, the all-embracing totality of
things. It is only through our ignorance and subjectivity that things
appear distinct and individuate. Could we transcend this
subjectivity, isolated objects would cease to exist. Things in their
fundamental nature cannot be named or explained: they are beyond the
range of language and perception: they have no signs of distinction
but possess absolute sameness (samata). From this totality of things
nothing can be excluded and to it nothing can be added. Yet it is also
sunyata, negation or the void, because it cannot be said to possess
any of the attributes of the world we live in: neither existence nor
non-existence, nor unity nor plurality can be predicted of it.
According to the celebrated formula of Nagarjuna known as the eight
Nos there is in it "neither production (_utpada_) nor destruction
(_uccheda_) nor annihilation (_nirodha_) nor persistence (_sasvata_)
nor unity (_ekartha_) nor plurality (_nanartha_) nor coming in
(_agamana_) nor going out (_nirgama_)." But when we perceive that both
subject and object are unreal we also see that suchness is the one
reality and from that point of view it may be regarded as the
Dharma-kaya of all Buddhas. It is also called Tathagatagarbha, the
womb or store-house of the Buddha, from which all individual
existences are evolved under the law of causation, but this aspect of
it is already affected by ignorance, for in Bhuta-tathata as known in
the light of the highest truth there is neither causation nor
production. The Yogacara employs the word _sunyata_ (void), though not
so much as its sister school, but it makes special use of the term
_alaya-vijnana_, the receptacle or store of consciousness. This in so
far as it is superindividual is an aspect of suchness, but when it
affirms and particularises itself it becomes _citta_, that is the
human mind, or to be more accurate the substratum of the human mind
from which is developed _manas_, or the principle of will,
self-consciousness and self-affirmation. Similarly the Vedanta
philosophy, though it has no term corresponding to _alaya-vijnana_, is
familiar with the idea that Brahman is in one aspect immeasurable and
all-embracing but in another is infinitesimal and dwells in the human
heart: or that Brahman after creating the world entered into it. Again
another aspect of suchness is enlightenment (_bodhi_), that is
absolute knowledge free from the limitations of subject and object.
This "is the universal Dharma-kaya of the Tathagatas" and on account
of this all Tathagatas are spoken of as abiding in enlightenment _a
priori_. This enlightenment may be negative (as _sunyata_) in the
sense that it transcends all relations but it may also be affirmative
and then "it transforms and unfolds itself, whenever conditions are
favourable, in the form of a Tathagata or some other form in order
that all beings may be induced to bring their store of merit to
maturity."[113]
It will be seen from the above that the absolute truth of the
Mahayanists varies from a severely metaphysical conception, the
indescribable thing in itself, to something very like an all-pervading
benevolent essence which from time to time takes shape in a Buddha.
And here we see how easy is the transition from the old Buddhism to a
form of pantheism. For if we admit that the Buddha is a superhuman
intelligence appearing from time to time according to a certain law,
we add little to this statement by saying that the essence or spirit
of the cosmos manifests itself from time to time as a Buddha. Only,
such words as essence or spirit are not really correct. The world of
individuals is the same as the highest truth, the same as the
Dharma-kaya, the same as Nirvana. It is only through ignorance that it
appears to be different and particularized. Ignorance, the essence of
which consists in believing in the distinction between subject and
object, is also called defilement and the highest truth passes through
various stages of defilement ending with that where under the
influence of egoism and passion the external world of particulars is
believed to be everything. But the various stages may influence one
another[114] so that under a higher influence the mind which is
involved in subjectivity begins to long for Nirvana. Yet Nirvana is
not something different from or beyond the world of experience; it
does not really involve annihilation of the skandhas. Just as in the
Advaita he who has the true knowledge sees that he himself and
everything else is Brahman, so for the Mahayanist all things are seen
_to be_ Nirvana, _to be_ the Dharma-kaya. It is sometimes[115] said
that there are four kinds of Nirvana (_a_) absolute Nirvana, which is
a synonym of the Dharma-kaya and in that sense universally present in
all beings, (_b_) upadhisesha-nirvana, the state of enlightenment
which can be attained during life, while the body with its limitations
still remains, (_c_) anupadhisesha-nirvana, a higher degree of the
same state attained after death when the hindrances of the body are
removed, (_d_) Nirvana without abode or apratishthita-nirvana. Those
who attain to this understand that there is no real antithesis between
Samsara and Nirvana:[116] they do not seek for rest or emancipation
but devote themselves to beneficent activity and to leading their
fellows to salvation. Although these statements that Nirvana and
Samsara are the same are not at all in the manner of the older
Buddhism, yet this ideal of disinterested activity combined with
Nirvana is not inconsistent with the portrait of Gotama preserved in
the Pali Canon.
The Mahayanist Buddhism of the Far East makes free use of such phrases
as the Buddha in the heart, the Buddha mind and the Buddha nature.
These seem to represent such Sanskrit terms as Buddhatva and
Bodhicitta which can receive either an ethical or a metaphysical
emphasis. The former line of thought is well shown in Santideva[117]
who treats Bodhicitta as the initial impulse and motive power of the
religious life, combining intellectual illumination and unselfish
devotion to the good of others. Thus regarded it is a guiding and
stimulating principle somewhat analogous to the Holy Spirit in
Christianity. But the Bodhicitta is also the essential quality of a
Buddha (and the Holy Spirit too is a member of the Trinity) and in so
far as a man has the Bodhicitta he is one with all Buddhas.
This conception is perhaps secondary in Buddhism but it is also as old
as the Upanishads and only another form of the doctrine that the
spirit in every man (antaryamin) is identical with the Supreme Spirit.
It is developed in many works still popular in the Far East[118] and
was the fundamental thesis of Bodhidharma, the founder of the Zen
school. But the practical character of the Chinese and Japanese has
led them to attach more importance to the moral and intellectual side
of this doctrine than to the metaphysical and pantheistic side.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 100: _E.g._ in Mahaparinib. Sut. IV. 57, the Buddha says
"There has been laid up by Cunda the smith (who had given him his last
meal) a karma, redounding to length of life, to good fortune, to good
fame, _to the inheritance of heaven_, and of sovereign power."]
[Footnote 101: Strictly speaking Madhyamaka is the name of the school
Madhyamika of its adherents. Both forms are used, _e.g._
Madhyamakakarikas and Madhyamikasutra.]
[Footnote 102: Nagarjuna says Sunyam iti na vaktavyam asunyam iti va
bhavet Ubhayam nobhayam ceti prajnaptyartham tu kathyate, "It cannot
be called void or not void or both or neither but in order to somehow
indicate it, it is called Sunyata."]
[Footnote 103: Sam. Nik. XXII. 90. 16.]
[Footnote 104: Gotama, the founder of the Nyaya philosophy, also
admitted the force of the arguments against the existence of present
time but regarded them as a _reductio ad absurdum_. Shadworth Hodgson
in his _Philosophy of Reflection_, vol. I. p. 253 also treats of the
question.]
[Footnote 105: The Sankhya philosophy makes a similar statement,
though for different reasons.]
[Footnote 106: Vajracchedika. See _S.B.E._ vol. XLIX. It was
translated into Chinese by Kumarajiva (384-417 A.D.).]
[Footnote 107: Or in other repetitions of the same formula, beings,
ideas, good things, signs, etc., etc.]
[Footnote 108: Soyen Shaku, _Sermons of a Buddhist Abbot_, p. 47.]
[Footnote 109: See for a simple and persuasive statement of these
abstruse doctrines a charming little book called _Wu-Wei_ by H.
Borel.]
[Footnote 110: Translated from the Chinese by Teitaro Suzuki, 1900.
The translation must be used with care, as its frequent use of the
word _soul_ may lead to misunderstanding.]
[Footnote 111: Asanga's work _Mahayana-sutralankara_ (edited and
translated by S. Levi) which covers much of the same ground is extant
in Sanskrit as well as in Chinese and Tibetan translations. It is a
lucid and authoritative treatise but does not appear to have ever been
popular, or to be read now in the Far East. For Yogacara see also
_Museon_, 1904, p. 370.]
[Footnote 112: The discussion of _tathata_ in Kathavatthu, XIX. 5
seems to record an early phase of these speculations.]
[Footnote 113: _Awakening of Faith_, Teitaro Suzuki, pp. 62 and 70.]
[Footnote 114: The process is generally called Vasana or perfuming.]
[Footnote 115: Vijnanamatra Sastra. Chinese version quoted by Teitaro
Suzuki, _Outlines of Mahayana Buddhism_, p. 343. Apparently both
upadhi and upadhi are used in Buddhist Sanskrit. Upadi is the Pali
form.]
[Footnote 116: So the Madhyamika Sastra (XXV. 19) states that there is
no difference between Samsara and Nirvana. Cf. Rabindranath Tagore,
_Sadhana_, pp. 160-164.]
[Footnote 117: _E.g._ Bodhicaryavatara, chap. I, called praise of the
Bodhicitta.]
[Footnote 118: _E.g._ the Pu-ti-hsin-li-hsiang-lun (Nanjio, 1304),
translated from Nagarjuna, and the Ta-Ch'eng-fa-chieh-wu-cha-pieh-lun,
translated from Sthiramati (Nanjio, 1258).]