I picked up a copy of Paticcasamuppada - Practical
Dependent Origination by Ven. Buddhadasa Bhikkhu (of Thailand)
I had read the book many years ago and have
now reread it.
I think it has many useful points and I certainly
appreciate any book on this most profound teaching of
Paticcasamuppada. However, I remain convinced that the
Buddha taught rebirth and that it is indeed a
necessary corrollary of anatta and conditionality.
I’d like to begin with these comments from the
venerable Buddhadasa’s book. He writes that p6
“therefore teaching Paticcasamupada in such a way that
there is a self persisting over a series of lives is
contrary to the principle of dependent origination .”
This is, of course, evident to anyone who has had even
a cursory look at the Tipitaka; anatta is really the
bedrock of Dhamma.
However, in the next sentence he says that “dependent
origination is on no way concerned with morality which
must depend upon a theory of Eternalism” . This I don’t
follow. Kamma is simply a conditioned phenomenon - and
it is just natural law that certain types of action
lead to certain results. We can think of this as a
moral law without evoking any self.
In the following paragraph p.6 he says that an
incorrectly explained theory has been taught for a
thousand years. On p8 he explains with regard to this
that "during the time the commentaries were
composed there arose a widespread tendency to explain
matters of ultimate truths in terms of the Eternalist
theory. " He lays the blame for all this on Buddhaghosa (ancient
composer of the Visuddhimagga and many important commentaries)
p8.“the same person who collected all the commentaries
together so that total blind acceptance…will allow
only one voice to be heard.”
He is not sure how this wrongview arose but he
speculates that it either happened because of lack of
insight OR he thinks that it was a deliberate plot to
destroy Buddhism for Brahmins who believed in atta
(self)see page 51-52. He notes that there is no
written evidence before the time of the Visuddhimagga
[written by Buddhaghosa]where Paticcasamupada was
explained wrongly. And that at the time of the third
council (long before Buddhaghosa ) if one had “said
there was a self that spun around in the cycle of
birth and death and rebirth as in the case of Bhikkhu
Sati he was held to be holding wrong views in the
sense of Eternalism and was made to leave the order” .
He equates such wrong views with the Visuddhimagga.
He does kindly note that Buddhaghosa p60 “is a man of
great knowledge .” He then says .“BUT I don’t agree
with him at all regarding Dependent Origination
because he spoke of it in terms of a soul and so it
became Brahministic .” And he carries on (p63) to note
that he “is not going to defile of defame or villify
Buddhaghosa…I only want to make some observations.
Buddhaghosa was born a Brahmin…and he completed a
study of the three vedas like any other Brahmin. His
spirit was that of a Brahmin…if he later came to
explain the Buddhist theory of Dependent Origination
as a form of Brahminism it is most reasonable to
suspect that he was careless and forgetful so that he
cannot be considered to be an Arahat .”"
So to sum up venerable Buddhadasa is suggesting that Buddhaghosa
taught an Eternalistic (self, atta) version of the
Paticcasamuppada.
Is that true?
I think it is best to
let the ancient texts speak for themselves.
From the relevant section of the Visuddhimagga Chapter
XV11 Dependent origination
113 "
but how does a man who is confused about these
things perform these three kinds of formations?
Firstly, when he is confused about death, instead of
taking death thus ‘death in every case is break up of
aggregates(khandas, not-self)’ he figures that it is
lasting being’s transmigration to another incarnation
and so on".
115 “when he is confused about the round of rebirths,
instead of taking the round of rebirths as pictured
thus: 'an endless chain of aggregates(khandas) of
elements(dhatus) bases(ayatanas) that carries on
unbrokenly is what is called ‘the round or rebirths’
he figures that it is a lasting being that goes from
this world to another world, that comes from another
world to this world"endquote
1
17"when he is cofused about independently-arisen
states, instead of taking the occurence of formations
to be due to ignorance etc., he figures that it is a
self that knows or does not know, that acts and causes
action…”
16
1 “a mere state that has got its conditions ushers
in the ensuing existence; While it does not migrate
from the past, with no cause in the past it is not.
So a mere material and immaterial state, arisen when
it has obtained its conditions, that is spoken of,
saying that it comes into the next becoming; it is not
a lasting being, not a soul. And it has neither
transmigrated from the past nor yet is it manifested
here without cause from that”… "
273 “Becomings wheel reveals no known beginning; no
maker, no experiencer there; Void with a twelvefold
voidness,”"
313 “one who sees this rightly abandons the self view
by understanding the absence of a maker. One who sees
it wrongly clings to the moral -inefficacy of action
view because he does not perceive that the causative
function of ignorance etc us established as a law…”
314 “[and so] let a wise man with mindfulness so
practice that he may begin to find a footing in the
deeps of the dependent origination”
Now another point about the book.
On page 62 Venerable Buddhadasa says that by
explaining Paticcasamuppada as happening over several
lives and suggesting that "kamma in this life gives
rise to results in some far off future life it as if
there are no kammic results(vipaka) at all which we
receive in the birth in which the deed was done…to
suggest that defilements and kamma from a past life
become effective in this, a later life, is
impossible “”
Firstly, I’d like to say that truly there is no one
who receives results but that results arise by
conditions (just to be pedantic). From the
Visuddhimagga 172"Experiencer is a convention for mere
arising of fruit (vipaka) ;"
Secondly he doesn’t acknowledge that the commentaries
(and tipitaka) say that the results of
kamma can indeed arise in this life,…(or at the time
of death or in future lives). They say it is pretty
much unpredictable (except to the Buddha) when the
results will arise because of the many other
conditions that support or impede kamma. Here is a
quote from the Tipitaka:
" > <em
Threefold, however, is the fruit of karma: ripening during the life-time (dittha-dhamma-vedaníya-kamma), ripening in the next birth (upapajja-vedaníya-kamma)
,
ripening in later births (aparápariya-vedaníya kamma)
…" (A.VI, 63).
.
