Buddhist philosophy
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Buddhist philosophy is the
Buddhism combines both philosophical reasoning and the
Particular points of Buddhist philosophy have often been the subject of disputes between different schools of Buddhism,
Historical phases of Buddhist philosophy
Edward Conze splits the development of Indian Buddhist philosophy into three phases:[10]
- The phase of the Gautama Buddha, and are common to all later schools of Buddhism.
- The second phase concerns non-Mahāyāna "scholastic" Buddhism, as evident in the Abhidharma texts beginning in the 3rd century BCE, that feature scholastic reworking and schematic classification of material in the early Buddhist texts.[2] The Abhidhamma philosophy of the Theravāda school belongs to this phase.
- The third phase concerns
Various elements of these three phases are incorporated and/or further developed in the philosophy and worldview of the various sects of Buddhism that then emerged.
Philosophical orientation
Philosophy in ancient India was aimed mainly at spiritual liberation and had soteriological goals. In his study of the Mādhyamaka and Sautrāntika schools of Buddhist philosophy in ancient India, Peter Deller Santina writes:[11]
Attention must first of all be drawn to the fact that philosophical systems in India were seldom, if ever, purely speculative or descriptive. Virtually all the great philosophical systems of India: Sāṃkhya, Advaita Vedānta, Mādhyamaka and so forth, were preeminently concerned with providing a means to liberation or salvation. It was a tacit assumption with these systems that if their philosophy were correctly understood and assimilated, an unconditioned state free of suffering and limitation could be achieved. [...] If this fact is overlooked, as often happens as a result of the propensity engendered by formal Occidental philosophy to consider the philosophical enterprise as a purely descriptive one, the real significance of Indian and Buddhist philosophy will be missed.
For the Indian Buddhist philosophers, the teachings of
Some Buddhist thinkers even argued that rational reflection and philosophical analysis was a central practice which was necessary for the attainment of insight in meditation. Thus, Mahayana philosophers like Prajñakaragupta argue that one is not a yogi "merely because of meditation", rather, one must meditate, listen to the teachings and understand them by "reflecting through rational inquiry" (yukti-cintāmaya). Only through this method which combined rational reflection and meditation will the wisdom that leads to enlightenment arise.[13]
The Buddha and early Buddhism
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The Buddha
Scholarly opinion varies as to whether
The Middle Way
The Buddha defined his teaching as "
Another related teaching of the historical Buddha is "the teaching through the middle" (majjhena dhammaṃ desana), which claims to be a metaphysical middle path between the extremes of eternalism and annihilationism, as well as the extremes of existence and non-existence.[17][18] This idea would become central to later Buddhist metaphysics, as all Buddhist philosophies would claim to steer a metaphysical middle course.
Basic teachings
Apart from the middle way, certain basic teachings appear in many places throughout these early Buddhist texts, so older studies by various scholars conclude that the Buddha must at least have taught some of these key teachings:[19]
- The Four Noble Truths, which provide an analysis of the cause of suffering (duḥkha)
- The Noble Eightfold Path, which illustrate the path to spiritual liberation (mokṣa)
- The four dhyānas(meditations)
- The three marks of existence, three characteristics which apply to all phenomena and which are: suffering (duḥkha), impermanence (anicca), and non-self (anattā)
- The five aggregates of clinging (skandhā), which provide an analysis of personal identity and physical existence
- Dependent origination (pratītyasamutpāda), a complex doctrine which analyzes the how living beings come to be and how they are conditioned by various psycho-physical processes
- Karma and rebirth, actions which lead to a new existence after death, in an endless cycle of birth, death, and rebirth (saṃsāra)
- Nirvāṇa, the ultimate soteriological goal which leads to the cessation of all suffering
According to N. Ross Reat, all of these doctrines are shared by the
However, some scholars such as
According to some scholars, the philosophical outlook of earliest Buddhism was primarily negative, in the sense that it focused on what doctrines to reject and let go of more than on what doctrines to accept.[a] Only knowledge that is useful in attaining liberation is valued. According to this theory, the cycle of philosophical upheavals that in part drove the diversification of Buddhism into its many schools and sects only began once Buddhists began attempting to make explicit the implicit philosophy of the Buddha and the early texts.
The Four Noble Truths and dependent causation
The Four Noble Truths or "Truths of the Noble One" are a central feature to the teachings of the historical Buddha and are put forth in the Dharmacakrapravartana Sūtra. The first truth of duḥkha, often translated as "suffering", is the inherent and eternal unsatisfactoriness of life. This unpleasantness is said to be not just physical pain and psychological distress, but also a kind of existential unease caused by the inevitable facts of our mortality and ultimately by the impermanence of all beings and phenomena.[28]
Suffering also arises because of contact with unpleasant events, and due to not getting what one desires. The second truth is that this unease arises out of conditions, mainly craving (taṇhā) and ignorance (avidyā). The third truth is then the fact that whenever sentient beings let go of craving and remove ignorance through insight and knowledge, suffering ceases (nirodhā). The fourth truth is the Noble Eightfold Path, which consists of eight practices that end suffering. They are: right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right samādhi (concentration, mental unification, meditation). The highest good and ultimate goal taught by the historical Buddha, which is the attainment of nirvāṇa, literally means "extinguishing" and signified "the complete extinguishing of greed, hatred, and delusion (i.e. ignorance), the forces which power saṃsāra".[29]
Nirvāṇa also means that after an enlightened being's death, there is no further rebirth. In earliest Buddhism, the concept of dependent origination (pratītya-samutpāda) was most likely limited to processes of mental conditioning and not to all physical phenomena.[30] Gautama Buddha understood the world in procedural terms, not in terms of things or substances.[31] His theory posits a flux of events arising under certain conditions which are interconnected and dependent, such that the processes in question at no time are considered to be static or independent. Craving (taṇhā), for example, is always dependent on, and caused by sensations gained by the sense organs (āyatana). Sensations are always dependent on contact with our surroundings. Buddha's causal theory is simply descriptive: "This existing, that exists; this arising, that arises; this not existing, that does not exist; this ceasing, that ceases." This understanding of causation as "impersonal lawlike causal ordering" is important because it shows how the processes that give rise to suffering work, and also how they can be reversed.[29]
The removal of suffering that stemmed from
Non-self
The Five Aggregates (pañca khandha) according to the Pali Canon. |
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Source: MN 109 (Thanissaro, 2001) | diagram details |
The most widely used argument that the Buddha employed against the idea of an unchanging ego is an empiricist one, based on the observation of the five aggregates of existence (skandhā) that constitute a sentient being, and the fact that these are always changing.[33] This argument can be put in this way:[33]
- All psycho-physical processes (skandhā) are impermanent.
- If there were a self it would be permanent.
- IP [There is no more to the person than the five aggregates of existence.]
- ∴ There is no self.[33]
This argument requires the implied premise that the five aggregates are an exhaustive account of what makes up a person, or else the self could exist outside of these aggregates.[34] This premise is affirmed in other Buddhist texts, such as Saṃyutta Nikāya 22.47, which states: "whatever ascetics and brahmins regard various kinds of things as self, all regard the five grasping aggregates, or one of them."[35]
This argument is famously expounded in the
Another argument supporting the doctrine of non-self, the "argument from lack of control",[37] is based on the fact that we often seek to change certain parts of ourselves, that the "executive function" of the mind is that which finds certain things unsatisfactory and attempts to alter them. Furthermore, it is also based on the "anti-reflexivity principle" of Indian philosophy, which states an entity cannot operate on or control itself (a knife can cut other things but not itself, a finger can point at other things but not at itself, etc.). This means then, that the self could never desire to change itself and could not do so; another reason for this is that, besides Buddhism, in the orthodox schools of Hindu philosophy the unchanging ultimate self (ātman) is perfectly blissful and does not suffer.[38][39] The historical Buddha used this idea to attack the concept of self. This argument could be structured thus:[33]
- If the self existed it would be the part of the person that performs the executive function, the "controller."
- The self could never desire that it be changed (anti-reflexivity principle).
- Each of the five kinds of psycho-physical processes (skandhā) is such that one can desire that it be changed.
- IP [There is no more to the person than the five aggregates of existence.]
- ∴ There is no self.[33]
This argument then denies that there is one permanent "controller" in the person. Instead, it views the person as a set of constantly changing processes which include volitional events seeking change and an awareness of that desire for change. According to Mark Siderits:
"What the Buddhist has in mind is that on one occasion one part of the person might perform the executive function, on another occasion another part might do so. This would make it possible for every part to be subject to control without there being any part that always fills the role of the controller (and so is the self). On some occasions, a given part might fall on the controller side, while on other occasions it might fall on the side of the controlled. This would explain how it's possible for us to seek to change any of the skandhas while there is nothing more to us than just those skandhas."[40]
As noted by K.R. Norman and Richard Gombrich, the Buddha extended his non-self critique to the Brahmanical belief expounded in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad that the unchanging ultimate self (ātman) was indeed the whole world, or identical with Brahman.[38][39][41][42] This concept is illustrated in the Alagaddupama Sūtra, where the Buddha argues that an individual cannot experience the suffering of the entire world. He used the example of someone carrying off and burning grass and sticks from the Jeta grove and how a monk would not sense or consider themselves harmed by that action. In this example, the Buddha is arguing that we do not have direct experience of the entire world, and hence the self cannot be the whole world.[b] In this Buddhist text, as well as in the Soattā Sūtra, the Buddha outlines six wrong views about self:
"There are six wrong views: An unwise, untrained person may think of the body, 'This is mine, this is me, this is my self'; he may think that of feelings; of perceptions; of volitions; or of what has been seen, heard, thought, cognized, reached, sought or considered by the mind. The sixth is to identify the world and self, to believe: 'At death, I shall become permanent, eternal, unchanging, and so remain forever the same; and that is mine, that is me, that is my self.' A wise and well-trained person sees that all these positions are wrong, and so he is not worried about something that does not exist."[41]
Furthermore, Gautama Buddha argued that the world can be observed to be a cause of suffering (
Epistemology
All schools of Indian philosophy recognize various sets of valid justifications for knowledge (pramāṇa) and many see the Vedas as providing access to truth. The historical Buddha denied the authority of the Vedas, though, like his contemporaries, he affirmed the soteriological importance of holding the right view; that is, having a proper understanding of reality.[45] However, this understanding was not conceived primarily as metaphysical and cosmological knowledge, but as a piece of knowledge into the arising and cessation of suffering in human experience.[46] Therefore, the Buddha's epistemic project is different from that of modern philosophy; it is primarily a solution to the fundamental human spiritual/existential problem.
]Furthermore, in the
- "Monks, do you only speak that which is known by yourselves seen by yourselves, found by yourselves?"
- "Yes, we do, sir."
- "Good, monks, That is how you have been instructed by me in this timeless doctrine which can be realized and verified, that leads to the goal and can be understood by those who are intelligent."
Furthermore, the Buddha's standard for personal verification was a
One explanation for this pragmatic suspension of judgment or epistemic Epoché is that such questions contribute nothing to the practical methods of realizing awakeness during one's lifetime[57] and bring about the danger of substituting the experience of liberation by a conceptual understanding of the doctrine or by religious faith. According to the Buddha, the Dharma is not an ultimate end in itself or an explanation of all metaphysical reality, but a pragmatic set of teachings. The Buddha used two parables to clarify this point, the 'Parable of the raft' and the Parable of the Poisoned Arrow.[58] The Dharma is like a raft in the sense that it is only a pragmatic tool for attaining nirvana ("for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto", MN 22); once one has done this, one can discard the raft. It is also like medicine, in that the particulars of how one was injured by a poisoned arrow (i.e. metaphysics, etc.) do not matter in the act of removing and curing the arrow wound itself (removing suffering). In this sense, the Buddha was often called "the great physician" because his goal was to cure the human condition of suffering first and foremost, not to speculate about metaphysics.[59]
Having said this, it is still clear that resisting and even refuting a false or slanted doctrine can be useful to extricate the interlocutor, or oneself, from error; hence, to advance in the way of liberation. Witness the Buddha's confutation of several doctrines by Nigantha Nataputta and other purported sages which sometimes had large followings (e.g., Kula Sutta, Sankha Sutta, Brahmana Sutta). This shows that a virtuous and appropriate use of dialectics can take place. By implication, reasoning and argument shouldn't be disparaged by Buddhists.
After the Buddha's death, some Buddhists such as Dharmakirti went on to use the sayings of the Buddha as sound evidence equal to perception and inference.[c]
Transcendence
Another possible reason why the Buddha refused to engage in
The Buddha of the earliest Buddhists texts describes Dharma (in the sense of "truth") as "beyond reasoning" or "transcending logic", in the sense that reasoning is a subjectively introduced aspect of the way unenlightened humans perceive things, and the conceptual framework which underpins their cognitive process, rather than a feature of things as they really are. Going "beyond reasoning" means in this context penetrating the nature of reasoning from the inside, and removing the causes for experiencing any future stress as a result of it, rather than functioning outside the system as a whole.[61]
Meta-ethics
The Buddha's ethics are based on the
The Buddha outlined five precepts (no killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying, or drinking alcohol) which were to be followed by his disciples, lay and monastic. There are various reasons the Buddha gave as to why someone should be ethical.
First, the universe is structured in such a way that if someone intentionally commits a misdeed, a bad karmic fruit will be the result. Hence, from a pragmatic point of view, it is best to abstain from these negative actions which bring forth negative results. However, the important word here is intentionally: for the Buddha, karma is nothing else but intention/volition, and hence unintentionally harming someone does not create bad karmic results. Unlike the
This idea leads into the second moral justification of the Buddha: intentionally performing negative actions reinforces and propagates mental defilements which keep persons bound to the cycle of rebirth and interfere with the process of liberation, and hence intentionally performing good karmic actions is participating in mental purification which leads to nirvana, the highest happiness. This perspective sees immoral acts as unskillful (akusala) in our quest for happiness, and hence it is pragmatic to do good.[64]
The third meta-ethical consideration takes the view of not-self and our natural desire to end our suffering to its logical conclusion. Since there is no self, there is no reason to prefer our own welfare over that of others because there is no ultimate grounding for the differentiation of "my" suffering and someone else's. Instead, an enlightened person would just work to end suffering tout court, without thinking of the conventional concept of persons.[65] According to this argument, anyone who is selfish does so out of ignorance of the true nature of personal identity and irrationality.
Buddhist schools and Abhidharma
The main Indian Buddhist philosophical schools practiced a form of analysis termed Abhidharma which sought to systematize the teachings of the early Buddhist discourses (sutras). Abhidharma analysis broke down human experience into momentary phenomenal events or occurrences called "dharmas". Dharmas are impermanent and dependent on other causal factors, they arise and pass as part of a web of other interconnected dharmas, and are never found alone. The Abhidharma schools held that the teachings of the Buddha in the sutras were merely conventional, while the Abhidharma analysis was ultimate truth (paramattha sacca), the way things really are when seen by an enlightened being. The Abhidharmic project has been likened as a form of phenomenology or process philosophy.[66][67]
Abhidharma philosophers not only outlined what they believed to be an exhaustive listing of dharmas (Pali: dhammas), which are the ultimate phenomena, events or processes (and include physical and mental phenomena), but also the causal relations between them. In the Abhidharmic analysis, the only thing which is ultimately real is the interplay of dharmas in a causal stream; everything else is merely conceptual (paññatti) and nominal.[68]
This view has been termed "
The Abhidharma schools
An important Abhidhamma work from the
After being brought to
The
Other Buddhist schools such as the
The Theravādins and other schools, such as the
The Theravāda presentation of Abhidharma is also not as concerned with
Another important theory held by some Sarvāstivādins, Theravādins and Sautrāntikas was the theory of "momentariness" (Skt., kṣāṇavāda, Pali, khāṇavāda). This theory held that dhammas only last for a minute moment (ksana) after they arise. The Sarvāstivādins saw these 'moments' in an atomistic way, as the smallest length of time possible (they also developed a material atomism). Reconciling this theory with their eternalism regarding time was a major philosophical project of the
All Abhidharma schools also developed complex theories of causation and conditionality to explain how dharmas interacted with each other. Another major philosophical project of the Abhidharma schools was the explanation of
One major philosophical view which was rejected by all the schools mentioned above was the view held by the
Indian Mahāyāna philosophy
From about the 1st century BCE, a new textual tradition began to arise in Indian Buddhist thought called
The Mahayana also promoted the bodhisattva ideal, which included an attitude of compassion for all sentient beings. The Bodhisattva is someone who chooses to remain in samsara (the cycle of birth and death) to benefit all other beings who are suffering.
Major Mahayana philosophical schools and traditions include the
schools.Prajñāpāramitā and Madhyamaka
The earliest
Thus, the Diamond Sutra (Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra) states:
All conditioned phenomena
Are like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow,
Like dew or a flash of lightning;
Thus we shall perceive them".[89]
The Heart Sutra famously affirms the emptiness (shunyata) of all phenomena:
Oh, Sariputra, form does not differ from emptiness, and emptiness does not differ from form.
Form is emptiness and emptiness is form; the same is true for feelings, perceptions, volitions and consciousness.
The Prajñāpāramitā sources also note that this applies to every single phenomenon, even Buddhahood.[90] The goal of the Buddhist aspirant in the Prajñāpāramitā texts is to awaken to the perfection of wisdom ("prajñāpāramitā"), a non-conceptual transcendent wisdom that knows the emptiness of all things while not being attached to anything (including the very idea of emptiness itself or perfect wisdom).[91][92]
The Prajñāpāramitā teachings are associated with the work of the Buddhist philosopher
Nāgārjuna asserted a direct connection between, even identity of, dependent origination, non-self (
Later philosophers of the Madhyamaka school built upon Nāgārjuna's analysis and defended Madhyamaka against their opponents. These included
The commentator
Influenced by the work of
In China, the Madhyamaka school (known as Sānlùn) was founded by Kumārajīva (344–413 CE), who translated the works of Nagarjuna to Chinese. Other Chinese Madhymakas include Kumārajīva 's pupil Sengzhao, Jizang (549–623), who wrote over 50 works on Madhyamaka, and Hyegwan, a Korean monk who brought Madhyamaka teachings to Japan.
Yogācāra
The
Yogācāra thinkers like Vasubandhu argued against the existence of external objects by pointing out that we only ever have access to our own mental impressions, and hence our inference of the existence of external objects is based on faulty logic. Vasubandhu's Triṃśikā-vijñaptimātratā (The Proof that There Are Only Impressions in Thirty Verses), begins thus:
I. This [world] is nothing but impressions, since it manifests itself as an unreal object, Just like the case of those with cataracts seeing unreal hairs in the moon and the like.[97]
According to
Inter-subjective reality for Vasubandhu is then the causal interaction between various mental streams and their karma, and does not include any external physical objects. The soteriological importance of this theory is that, by removing the concept of an external world, it also weakens the 'internal' sense of self as an observer which is supposed to be separate from the external world. To dissolve the dualism of inner and outer is also to dissolve the sense of self and other. The later Yogacara commentator Sthiramati explains this thus:
There is a grasper if there is something to be grasped, but not in the absence of what is to be grasped. Where there is nothing to be grasped, the absence of a grasper also follows, there is not just the absence of the thing to be grasped. Thus there arises the extra-mundane non-conceptual cognition that is alike without object and without cognizer.[100]
Apart from its defense of an idealistic metaphysics and its attacks on realism, Yogācāra sources also developed a new theory of mind, based on the Eight Consciousnesses, which includes the innovative doctrine of the subliminal storehouse consciousness (Skt: ālayavijñāna).[101]
Yogācāra thinkers also developed a positive account of ultimate reality based on three basic modes or "natures" (svabhāva). This metaphysical doctrine is central to their view of the ultimate and to their understanding of the doctrine of emptiness (śūnyatā).[102]
The Dignāga-Dharmakīrti tradition
Dignāga's influence was profound and led to an "epistemological turn" among all Buddhists and also all Sanskrit language philosophers in India after his death. In the centuries following Dignāga's work, Sanskrit philosophers became much more focused on defending all of their propositions with fully developed
The "School of Dignāga" includes later philosophers and commentators like Santabhadra,
These Buddhist philosophers argued in favor of the theory of momentariness, the Yogācāra "awareness only" view, the reality of particulars (svalakṣaṇa), atomism, nominalism and the self-reflexive nature of consciousness (svasaṃvedana). They attacked Hindu theories of God (Isvara), universals, the authority of the Vedas, and the existence of a permanent soul (atman).
Later Yogācāra developments
After the time of Asanga and Vasubandhu, the Yogācāra school developed in different directions. One branch focused on epistemology (this would become the school of Dignaga). Another branch focused on expanding the Yogācāra's metaphysics and philosophy.[109] This latter tradition includes figures like Dharmapala of Nalanda, Sthiramati, Chandragomin (who was known to have debated the Madhyamaka thinker Candrakirti), and Śīlabhadra (a top scholar at Nalanda). Yogācārins such as Paramartha and Guṇabhadra brought the school to China and translated Yogacara works there, where it is known as Wéishí-zōng or Fǎxiàng-zōng. An important contribution to East Asian Yogācāra is Xuanzang's Cheng Weishi Lun, or "Discourse on the Establishment of Consciousness Only".
A later development is the rise of a syncretic tradition of Yogācāra-tathāgatagarbha thought. This group adopted the doctrine of tathāgatagarbha (the buddha-womb, buddha-source, or "buddha-within") found in various tathāgatagarbha sutras.[110] This hybrid school eventually went on to equate the tathāgatagarbha with the pure aspect of the storehouse consciousness. Some key sources of this school are the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, Ratnagotravibhāga (Uttaratantra), and in China, the influential Mahayana Awakening of Faith treatise.[109] One key figure of this tradition was Paramārtha, an Indian monk who was an important translator in China. He promoted a new theory that said there was a "stainless consciousness" (amala-vijñāna, a pure wisdom within all beings), which he equated with the buddha-nature (tathāgatagarbha).[111] This synthetic tradition also became important in later Indian Buddhism, where the Ratnagotravibhāga became the key text.[112]
Another later development was the synthesis of Yogācāra with Madhyamaka. Jñānagarbha (8th century) and his student Śāntarakṣita (725–788) brought together Yogacara, Madhyamaka and the Dignaga school of epistemology into a philosophical synthesis known as the Yogācāra-Svatantrika-Mādhyamika. Śāntarakṣita was also instrumental in the introduction of Buddhism and the Sarvastivadin monastic ordination lineage to Tibet, which was conducted at Samye. Śāntarakṣita's disciples included Haribhadra and Kamalaśīla. This philosophical tradition is influential in Tibetan Buddhist thought.
Perhaps the most important debate among late Yogācāra philosophers was the debate between alikākāravāda (Tib. rnam rdzun pa, False Aspectarians, also known as Nirākāravāda) and Satyākāravāda (rnam bden pa, True Aspectarians, also known as sākāravāda). The crux of the debate was the question of whether mental appearances, images or “aspects” (ākāra) are true (satya) or false (alika).[113] The Satyākāravāda camp, defended by scholars like Prajñakaragupta (ca. 8th–9th century), and Jñānaśrīmitra (ca. 980–1040), held that images in consciousness have a real existence, since they arise from a real consciousness. Meanwhile, Alikākāravāda defenders like Sthiramati and Ratnākaraśānti (ca. 970–1045) argued that mental appearances do not really exist, and are false (alīka) or illusory. For these thinkers, the only thing which is real is a pure self-aware consciousness which is contentless (nirākāra, “without images”).[114][115]
Buddha-nature thought
The
Prior to the period of these scriptures, Mahāyāna
Perhaps the most influential source in the Indian tradition for this teaching is the Ratnagotravibhāga (5th century CE). This śāstra brought together all the major themes of the tathāgatagārbha theory into a single treatise. The Ratnagotravibhāga sees the tathāgatagarbha as being an inherent nature in all things which is omnipresent, all-pervasive, non-conceptual, free of suffering and inherently blissful.[118] It also describes buddha nature as “the intrinsically stainless nature of the mind” (cittaprakṛtivaimalya).[119] Indeed, in many later Indian sources, the tathāgathagarbha teachings also come to be identified with the similar doctrine of the luminous mind (prabhasvara-citta). This ancient idea holds that the mind is inherently pure, and that defilements are only adventitious. In the Ratnagotravibhāga, this originally pure (prakṛtipariśuddha) nature (i.e. the fully purified buddha-nature) is further described through numerous terms such as: unconditioned (asaṃskṛta), unborn (ajāta), unarisen (anutpanna), eternal (nitya), changeless (dhruva), and permanent (śāśvata).[120]
According to some scholars, tathāgatagarbha does not represent a substantial self; rather, it is a positive language expression of
Vajrayāna Buddhism
While the view of the Vajrayāna was based on the earlier
The Guhyasamāja Tantra, for example, states: "you should kill living beings, speak lying words, take things that are not given and have sex with many women".[125] Other features of tantra included a focus on the physical body as the means to liberation, and a reaffirmation of feminine elements, feminine deities and a positive view of sexuality.[126]
The defense of these tantric practices is based on the theory of transformation which states that negative mental factors and physical actions can be cultivated and transformed in a ritual setting. The
Those things by which evil men are bound, others turn into means and gain thereby release from the bonds of existence. By passion the world is bound, by passion too it is released, but by heretical Buddhists, this practice of reversals is not known.[127]
Another hermeneutic of Buddhist Tantric commentaries such as the
Douglas Duckworth notes that Vajrayāna philosophical outlook is one of embodiment, which sees the physical and cosmological body as already containing wisdom and divinity. Liberation (nirvana) and Buddhahood are not seen as something outside the body, or an event in the future, but as imminently present and accessible right now through unique tantric practices like deity yoga. Hence, Vajrayāna is also called the "resultant vehicle", that is to say, it is the spiritual vehicle that relies on the immanent nature of the result of practice (liberation), which is already present in all beings.[129] Duckworth names the philosophical view of Vajrayāna as a form of pantheism, by which he means the belief that every existing entity is in some sense divine and that all things express some form of unity.[130]
Major Indian Tantric Buddhist philosophers such as Buddhaguhya, Padmavajra (author of the Guhyasiddhi commentary), Nagarjuna (the 7th-century disciple of Saraha), Indrabhuti (author of the Jñānasiddhi), Anangavajra, Dombiheruka, Durjayacandra, Ratnākaraśānti and Abhayakaragupta wrote tantric texts and commentaries systematizing the tradition.[131][132]
Others such as Vajrabodhi and Śubhakarasiṃha brought tantra to Tang China (716 to 720), and tantric philosophy continued to be developed in Chinese and Japanese by thinkers such as Yi Xing (683–727) and Kūkai (774– 835).
In
Tibetan Buddhist philosophy
Tibetan Buddhist philosophy is mainly a continuation and refinement of the Indian Mahayana philosophical traditions. The initial efforts of Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla brought their eclectic scholarly tradition to Tibet.
The initial work of early Tibetan Buddhist philosophers was in the translation of classical Indian philosophical treatises and the writing of commentaries. This initial period is from the 8th to the 10th century. Early Tibetan commentator-philosophers were heavily influenced by the work of Dharmakirti and these include Ngok Loden Sherab (1059-1109) and Chaba Chökyi Senge (1182-1251). Their works are now lost.[133]
The 12th and 13th centuries saw the translation of the works of
Another very influential figure from this early period is Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü (d. 1185), who wrote an important commentary on Nagarjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā. Mabja was studied under the Dharmakirtian Chaba and also the Candrakirti scholar Patsab. His work shows an attempt to steer a middle course between their views, he affirms the conventional usefulness of pramāṇa epistemology, but also accepts Candrakirti's prasangika views.[137] Mabja's Madhyamaka scholarship was very influential on later Tibetan Madhyamikas such as Longchenpa, Tsongkhapa, Gorampa, and Mikyö Dorje.[137]
There are various Tibetan Buddhist schools or monastic orders. According to
Shentong and Buddha nature
The 14th century saw increasing interest in the Buddha nature texts and doctrines. This can be seen in the work of the third Kagyu Karmapa
One of the most important theoriests of buddha-nature in Tibet was the scholar-yogi
According to Dölpopa, all beings are said to have the Buddha nature, the non-dual wisdom which is real, unchanging, permanent, non-conditioned, eternal, blissful and compassionate. This ultimate buddha wisdom is "uncreated and indestructible, unconditioned and beyond the chain of dependent origination" and is the basis for both samsara and nirvana.[142] Dolpopa's shentong view also taught that ultimate reality was truly a "Great Self" or "Supreme Self" referring to works such as the Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra, the Aṅgulimālīya Sūtra and the Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanāda Sūtra.[143]
The shentong view had an influence on philosophers of other schools, such as
Gelug
Tsongkhapa defended Prasangika
), and that true liberation is this realization of emptiness.Sakya scholars such as Rongtön and Gorampa disagreed with Tsongkhapa, and argued that the prasangika svatantrika distinction was merely pedagogical. Gorampa also critiqued Tsongkhapa's realism, arguing that the structures which allow an empty object to be presented as conventionally real eventually dissolve under analysis and are thus unstructured and non-conceptual (spros bral). Tsongkhapa's students Gyel-tsap, Kay-drup, and Ge-dun-drup set forth an epistemological realism against the Sakya scholars' anti-realism.
Sakya
Later Sakyas such as Gorampa (1429–1489) and Sakya Chokden (1428–1507) would develop and defend Sakya anti-realism, and they are seen as the major interpreters and critics of Sakya Pandita's philosophy. Sakya Chokden also critiqued Tsongkhapa's interpretation of Madhyamaka and Dolpopa's Shentong. In his Definite ascertainment of the middle way, Chokden criticized Tsongkhapa's view as being too logo-centric and still caught up in conceptualization about the ultimate reality which is beyond language.[148] Sakya Chokden's philosophy attempted to reconcile the views of the Yogacara and Madhyamaka, seeing them both as valid and complementary perspectives on ultimate truth. Madhyamaka is seen by Chokden as removing the fault of taking the unreal as being real, and Yogacara removes the fault of the denial of Reality.[149] Likewise, the Shentong and Rangtong views are seen as complementary by Sakya Chokden; Rangtong negation is effective in cutting through all clinging to wrong views and conceptual rectification, while Shentong is more amenable for describing and enhancing meditative experience and realization.[150] Therefore, for Sakya Chokden, the same realization of ultimate reality can be accessed and described in two different but compatible ways.
Nyingma
The Nyingma school is strongly influenced by the view of Dzogchen (Great Perfection) and the Dzogchen Tantric literature. Longchenpa (1308–1364) was a major philosopher of the Nyingma school and wrote an extensive number of works on the Tibetan practice of Dzogchen and on Buddhist Tantra. These include the Seven Treasures, the Trilogy of Natural Ease, and his Trilogy of Dispelling Darkness. Longchenpa's works provide a philosophical understanding of Dzogchen, a defense of Dzogchen in light of the sutras, as well as practical instructions.[151] For Longchenpa, the ground of reality is luminous emptiness, rigpa ("knowledge"), or buddha nature, and this ground is also the bridge between sutra and tantra.[152] Longchenpa's philosophy sought to establish the positive aspects of Buddha nature thought against the totally negative theology of Madhyamika without straying into the absolutism of Dolpopa. For Longchenpa, the basis for Dzogchen and Tantric practice in Vajrayana is the "Ground" or "Basis" (gzhi), the immanent Buddha nature, "the primordially luminous reality that is unconditioned and spontaneously present" which is "free from all elaborated extremes".[153]
Rimé movement
The 19th century saw the rise of the
Philosophically,
The later Nyingma scholar Botrul (1894–1959) classified the major Tibetan Madhyamaka positions as shentong (other emptiness), Nyingma rangtong (self emptiness) and Gelug bdentong (emptiness of true existence). The main difference between them is their "object of negation"; shengtong states that inauthentic experience is empty, rangtong negates any conceptual reference and bdentong negates any true existence.[156]
The 14th Dalai Lama was also influenced by this non-sectarian approach. Having studied under teachers from all major Tibetan Buddhist schools, his philosophical position tends to be that the different perspectives on emptiness are complementary:
There is a tradition of making a distinction between two different perspectives on the nature of emptiness: one is when emptiness is presented within a philosophical analysis of the ultimate reality of things, in which case it ought to be understood in terms of a non-affirming negative phenomena. On the other hand, when it is discussed from the point of view of experience, it should be understood more in terms of an affirming negation – 14th Dalai Lama[157]
East Asian Buddhism
Tiantai
The schools of Buddhism that had existed in China prior to the emergence of the Tiantai are generally believed to represent direct transplantations from India, with little modification to their basic doctrines and methods. The Tiantai school, founded by
Tiantai's metaphysics is an immanent holism, which sees every phenomenon (dharma) as conditioned and manifested by the whole of reality (the totality of all other dharmas). Every instant of experience is a reflection of every other, and hence, suffering and nirvana, good and bad, Buddhahood and evildoing, are all "inherently entailed" within each other.[159]
Tiantai metaphysics is entailed in their teaching of the "three truths", which is an extension of the Mādhyamaka
While Zhiyi did write "one thought contains three thousand worlds", this does not entail idealism. According to Zhiyi, "the objects of the [true] aspects of reality are not something produced by Buddhas, gods, or men. They exist inherently on their own and have no beginning" (The Esoteric Meaning, 210). This is then a form of realism, which sees the mind as real as the world, interconnected with and inseparable from it.[158] In Tiantai thought, ultimate reality is simply the very phenomenal world of interconnected events or dharmas.
Other key figures of Tiantai thought are
Huayan
The
While both Tiantai and Huayan hold to the interpenetration and interconnection of all things, their metaphysics have some differences. Huayan metaphysics is influenced by Yogacara thought and is closer to idealism. The Avatamsaka sutra compares the phenomenal world to a dream, an illusion, and a magician's conjuring. The sutra states nothing has true reality, location, beginning and end, or substantial nature. The Avatamsaka also states that "The triple world is illusory – it is only made by one mind", and Fazang echoes this by writing, "outside of mind there is not a single thing that can be apprehended."[158] Furthermore, according to Huayan thought, each mind creates its own world "according to their mental patterns", and "these worlds are infinite in kind" and constantly arising and passing away.[158] However, in Huayan, the mind is not real either, but also empty. The true reality in Huayan, the noumenon, or "Principle", is likened to a mirror, while phenomena are compared to reflections in the mirror. It is also compared to the ocean, and phenomena to waves.[158]
In
Chan and Japanese Buddhism
The philosophy of Chinese Chan Buddhism and Japanese Zen is based on various sources; these include Chinese Madhyamaka (Sānlùn), Yogacara (Wéishí), the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, and the Buddha nature texts. An important issue in Chan is that of subitism or "sudden awakening", the idea that insight happens all at once in a flash of insight. This view was promoted by Shenhui and is a central issue discussed in the Platform Sutra, a key Chan scripture composed in China.
Japanese Buddhism during the 6th and 7th centuries saw an increase in the proliferation of new schools and forms of thought, a period known as the six schools of Nara (Nanto Rokushū). The Kamakura Period (1185–1333) also saw another flurry of intellectual activity. During this period, the influential figure of Nichiren (1222–1282) made the practice and universal message of the Lotus Sutra more readily available to the population. He is of particular importance in the history of thought and religion, as his teachings constitute a separate sect of Buddhism, one of the only major sects to have originated in Japan[163]: xi
Also during the Kamakura period, the founder of
Esoteric Buddhism
Kūkai's philosophy is based on the
According to Kūkai, esoteric Buddhism has the
Dainichi means "Great Sun" and Kūkai uses this as a metaphor for the great primordial Buddha, whose teaching and presence illuminates and pervades all, like the light of the sun. This immanent presence also means that every being already has access to the liberated state (
Kūkai's exposition of what has been called Shingon's "metaphysics" is based on the three aspects of the cosmic truth or Hosshin – body, appearance and function.
Modern philosophy
In Sri Lanka, Buddhist modernists such as Anagarika Dharmapala (1864-1933) and the American convert Henry Steel Olcott sought to show that Buddhism was rational and compatible with modern Scientific ideas such as the theory of evolution.[165] Dharmapala also argued that Buddhism included a strong social element, interpreting it as liberal, altruistic and democratic.
A later Sri Lankan philosopher,
In 20th-century China, the modernist
One of Tibetan Buddhism's most influential modernist thinkers is Gendün Chöphel (1903–1951), who, according to Donald S. Lopez Jr., "was arguably the most important Tibetan intellectual of the twentieth century."[170] Gendün Chöphel travelled throughout India with the Indian Buddhist Rahul Sankrityayan and wrote a wide variety of material, including works promoting the importance of modern science to his Tibetan countrymen and also Buddhist philosophical texts such as Adornment for Nagarjuna's Thought. Another very influential Tibetan Buddhist modernist was Chögyam Trungpa, whose Shambhala Training was meant to be more suitable to modern Western sensitivities by offering a vision of "secular enlightenment".[171]
In
The Japanese Zen Buddhist
Western Buddhist monastics and priests such as
Another area of convergence has been Buddhism and environmentalism, which is explored in the work of Joanna Macy. Another Western Buddhist philosophical trend has been the project to secularize Buddhism, as seen in the works of Stephen Batchelor.
In the West, Comparative philosophy between Buddhist and Western thought began with the work of
Comparison with other philosophies
Scholars such as Thomas McEvilley,[176] Christopher I. Beckwith,[177] and Adrian Kuzminski[178] have identified cross influences between ancient Buddhism and the ancient Greek philosophy of Pyrrhonism. The Greek philosopher Pyrrho spent 18 months in India as part of Alexander the Great's court on Alexander's conquest of western India, where ancient biographers say his contact with the gymnosophists caused him to create his philosophy. Because of the high degree of similarity between Nāgārjuna's philosophy and Pyrrhonism, particularly the surviving works of Sextus Empiricus,[179] Thomas McEvilley suspects that Nāgārjuna was influenced by Greek Pyrrhonist texts imported into India.[180]
An alternative approach to the comparison of Buddhist thought with Western philosophy is to use the concept of the Middle Way in Buddhism as a critical tool for the assessment of Western philosophies. In this way, Western philosophies can be classified in Buddhist terms as eternalist or nihilist. In a Buddhist view, all philosophies are considered non-essential views (ditthis) and not to be clung to.[182]
See also
- Buddhism and science
- Buddhist ethics
- Buddhist logic
- Critical Buddhism
- God in Buddhism
- List of Buddhist terms and concepts
- List of Buddhist topics
- List of sutras
- Madhyamaka
- Mindstream
- Reality in Buddhism
Notes
- ^ See for example Thanissaro Bhikkhu's commentary on the Mulapariyaya Sutta, [1].
- ^ MN 22, Alagaddupama Sutta, "Bhikkhus, what do you think? If people carried off the grass, sticks, branches, and leaves in this Jeta Grove, or burned them, or did what they liked with them, would you think: 'People are carrying us off or burning us or doing what they like with us'?" – "No, venerable sir. Why not? Because that is neither our self nor what belongs to our self." [2].
- Pāli Text Societyedition of the Nettipakaraṇa, 1902, p. xi) which Nanamoli translates as: "for there is no other criterion beyond a text" (The Guide, Pāli Text Society, 1962, p. xi).
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