The Canon cuts the knot by ignoring it; denying any intervention of a deity, it could not adopt the system of divine grace which is found in the Katha Upanisad, and it was too honestly convinced of the phenomenality of the individual to ascribe to that transient aggregate of factors a power of directing itself to the desired goal. In the Abhidhamma' we find a negation of the doctrine of predetermination, ascribed to the Andhakas, on the score that thus Nirvana would become impossible of attainment by the exclusion of the possibility of breaking the chain of existence. The later doctrine is equally unable to solve the problem, save by the hint, which cannot be made consistent with the doctrine of impermanency and not-self, that there is an inherent tendency in the individual to attain release. 7. Causation in Nature The chain of causation is essentially an explanation of misery; it tells us nothing regarding physical causes, and, as we have seen, the Abhidhamma expressly denies as heretical the idea of action as determining events in the physical world. How far was the conception attained that there was causation active in the world of nature? The idea of absolute regularity of causation was excluded for the world of human action by the necessity of recog nizing free will and the possibility of release, and in these circumstances it would have been impossible to develop the idea of a natural causality prevailing in the physical sphere. We obtain, therefore, nothing more than the vague general assertion that things as compound come into being under the effect of causes, but we have to put beside this the doctrine that we do not know anything definite as to their operation; we must not inquire whether the world is self-made, made by another, both, or neither, that is, fortuitous, since all these issues belong to the realm of the indeterminates. Indeed, if we were so unkind as to press this doctrine strictly, it would be fatal even to the idea of any material causation at all, as the Madhyamaka readily shows. KV. xi. 7, 8. 4 ? See cit. in Bhāmatī (1891), p. 25; Pathak, JBRAS. xviii. 343. The vagueness of the canonical view is confirmed by the Milindapañha,' where we find the threefold divisions of beings born of action as conscious; of fire and other things growing out of seed, as cause-born, the result, that is, of a previously existing material cause; and the earth, hills, water, wind, as season-born, depending for existence on reasons connected with the weather, while space and Nirvāņa exist independently of all three forms of cause, In the face of this to assign to Buddhism faith in the uniformity of the causal process or of nature is absurd. 8. The Doctrine of the Act The insistence of the Buddha on the doctrine of the act (karman) can clearly be explained as an outcome of his revolt against the pure materialism of teachers like Ajita or the negation of any true human activity as insisted upon by Parana Kassapa, Pakudha Kaccayana, and Makkhali Gosāla, despite their divergent views on other points. It is more difficult to ascertain the degree of originality in this assertion of the doctrine of the rewards and penalties of action, for the references to the doctrine in the Upanisads are scanty, enlightenment being the main object of these treatises. But we know that the Jațilas were authorized to be admitted to the Buddhist order without the normal novitiate of three months because of their belief in the doctrine, and the success of the teaching of the Buddha in this regard is infinitely more probable if it were already a widely accepted doctrine of the ascetics and nobles than if the conception were wholly new. Nor is the presentation of the doctrine in our texts favourable to the view that it was new; the stress laid on the chain of causation rather than on the mere fact of Karman hints at the originality, such as it is, of the chain, not of the fact of Karman. But if we may judge from the case of the Jain doctrine of Karman, which is frankly materialistic and imagines that bodily or verbal action creates a subtle matter to envelop the soul and produce retribution, it was possible for the Buddha to make an important step in advance, and to sever the idea from connexion with the old Vedic conception of sin as a sort of physical contamination which might be removed by fire or water, to whose influence the Jains succumbed. Action for the Buddha seems to have been volition (cetană), and what is done after volition whether in the form of action or of speech. To resolve to kill is one thing, to act another, to approve the act after it has been performed a third, and all three elements must coincide to make an act complete. A gift should be accompanied by intention, and to regret the generosity is to ruin its effect; a sin, on the other hand, is in part counteracted by confession, which is also the accomplishment of the duty of truthfulness, and this fact explains the importance laid by the community on the formal confession of sins.' A further and important result is derived from this rationalizing of the conception of action. The morality of action predominates in the Buddhist view, and ritual practices such as sacrifice' and purification, nay even offerings to the dead, become merely surplusage, superstitious usages (silabbata), which have no value. But it must be admitted that there is no attempt to demonstrate the principles which render an act moral or immoral; it is not until late that we have the suggestion that an act is good or bad according as it benefits one's neighbour or injures him, and even then there is no more far-reaching criterion than the mere idea of goodness as pleasure and evil as pain. Moreover, the true Buddhist essentially seeks release, and that has nothing in itself to do with either goodness or badness. The monk, indeed, is compelled to attain his end to concentrate his interest on himself alone; 3 his actions like those of the sage of the Upanisads are essentially for the sake of the self; and the path of salvation requires that he should lay aside, as did the Buddha, all the human class of duty towards wife or children, since family life is a barrier to the attainment of release. SN. ii. 99; cf. MKV., p. 306; Poussin, Nirvāņa, ch. iii. Yet it is allowed, DN. ii. 88; MV. vi. 28. 11; on ritual bathing soo Therīgāthā, 239, and later Aryadeva's Cittariçuddhiprakarana (JASB. lxvii. 2); Vasubandhu, Gāthāsaṁgraha (Mél. asiat. viii. 559 ff.); on offerings to the dead Petavatthu, (PTS. 1888). 3 Çf. Bṛhadāraṇyaka Up., i. 4. 8; ii. 4; iv. 5. CHAPTER VI THE PATH OF SALVATION, THE SAINT, AND THE BUDDHA 1. The Path of Salvation THE end of man is to free himself, if possible, in this life from the intoxicants, the lust of being born again in this world, or in the world of subtle matter, or the world without matter, and the ignorance of the four noble truths. His aim is to break the chain of causation, to destroy any one of its members and thus end the whole; to free himself from desire or appetite, aversion and dullness. There are, it is clear, two sides involved; there is the extinction of desire, and the extinction of ignorance; true the two are intimately related; there can be no extinction of desire if ignorance prevails, and therefore the extinction of ignorance is fundamental. But it is not surprising that a purely intellectual solution for the removal of ignorance is not accepted by Buddhism; the training of conduct may be, and indeed is, a lower plane of endeavour, but it is essential, and, unlike the sage of the Upanisads, the seeker for liberation must accept the duty of a strict morality. Hence the doctrine that conduct (sila) concentration (samādhi) and wisdom or intuition (paññā) are all essential; that concentration pervaded by conduct is fruitful; that intuition pervaded by concentration is fruitful; and that the self, pervaded by intuition, is freed from the corruption of desire, becoming, false views and ignorance. But concentration is rather a stage in the attainment of intuition than an independent entity, and a Sutta of the Digha Nikāya mentions conduct and intuition as the essential pair, both inseparably united, since neither without the other performs its part.1 1 DN. i. 124. Conduct, it follows, from the end of man,1 must be such as to aid him in his end; it must secure for him either progress to Nirvāņa or rebirth at least in a superior form of life. The action of Karman may not be unbroken or absolutely regular, but it is assumed for practical purposes to have these qualities, and man will profit or suffer according to his own deeds and deserts. Moreover, man has the power to act; strange as it may seem when one ground of the denial of a self is remembered, and the apparent determinism of the chain of causation, the Buddha has no doubt whatever that the determinism of Makkhali Gosāla is the most detestable of all heresies. The position is the more remarkable, because one of the arguments in the Canon and later against the existence of a self is that such a thing must be autonomous, while all in the world is conditional and causally determined. But the issue is solved by the simple process of ignoring it, and Buddhism rejoices in being freed from any error of determinism to menace moral responsibility. There is no attempt to create a reasoned moral system based on a calculus of goods. The main tenets are adopted from Brahmanical tradition; they are, however, extended and deepened; the prohibition to kill is applied to all living things to the inconvenience of the monks in daily life; all forms of illegitimate appropriation are forbidden, and restrictions placed on those allowed; the order not to commit adultery becomes one of celibacy for the monks; the injunction to avoid falsehood is expanded into a eulogy of friendly speech and the bringing about of concord. But monastic orders are nothing if not fond of regulations, and the simple lists are expanded by forbidding all sorts of luxuries harmless and otherwise, as well as the practice of many useful modes of livelihood, a rule which resulted in the monks living a life almost without possibility of useful work other than the duties arising from the necessities of daily life in a simple community, whose members supplied food and clothing and, later, vied in providing monasteries. 1 Including women, admitted reluctantly to the order at the cost of halving the duration of the faith; CV. x. 1 ff. Women played some part in the early history of Buddhist discussion, as also in Brahmanism, but later disappear as serious factors; cf. JRAS. 1893, pp. 517 ff., 763 ff.; and Mrs. Rhys Davids, trs. of the Therīgāthā, PTS, 1909. |