Miss Buddha (118 page)

The Buddha denied that the aggregates
individually or in combination may be considered a permanent,
independently existing self or soul (atman). Indeed, he regarded it
as a serious mistake to conceive of any lasting unity behind the
elements that constitute an individual.

The Buddha taught that a belief in such a
permanent self is what led to egoism, craving, and suffering. Thus
he taught the doctrine of anatman, the denial of a permanent
soul.

All existences, he held, is characterized by
anatman (no permanent soul), anitya (impermanence), and dukkha
(suffering).

His anatman doctrine
necessitated a reinterpretation of the long-standing Indian
tradition of samsara rebirths. To clarify this, he taught the
doctrine of
dependent
origination
.

With this 12-linked chain of causation he
showed how ignorance in a previous life creates the tendency for a
combination of aggregates to develop. These in turn cause the mind
and senses to operate.

Sensations result, which lead to craving and
a clinging to existence. This condition in turn triggers the
process of becoming once again, producing a renewed cycle of birth,
old age, and death. Through this causal chain a connection is made
between one life and the next.

What the Buddha posits is a stream of
renewed existences, rather than a permanent being that moves from
life to life—in effect a belief in rebirth without
transmigration.

Karma

Karma is part and parcel of the doctrine of
dependent origination, and, consisting of a person’s acts and their
ethical consequences, holds that human actions lead to rebirth,
wherein good deeds are inevitably rewarded and evil deeds, as a
matter of course, punished.

As a consequence, there exists neither
undeserved pleasure nor unwarranted suffering in the world, only
universal, Karmic, justice.

This justice operates through natural moral
law rather than through a humanly contrived system of divine
judgment, and it determines such things as one’s species, beauty,
intelligence, longevity, wealth, and social status.

According to the Buddha, karma of varying
types can lead to rebirth as a human, an animal, a hungry ghost, a
denizen of hell, or even one of the Hindu gods.

Although the Buddha never actually denied
the existence of these gods, he never agreed to any of their
special roles. Rather, he held, their lives in heaven are long and
pleasurable, but they are in the same predicament as other
creatures, being subject eventually to death and further rebirth in
lower states of existence. They are not creators of the universe
nor are they in control of human destiny, and Buddhism flatly
denies any value of prayer and sacrifice to them—as it refutes the
value of any type of mechanistic ritual.

Buddhist tradition also holds that of all
possible modes of rebirth, human existence is to be preferred,
because the lower strata are too painful to afford any thought or
effort toward enlightenment and the deities are so engrossed in
their own pleasures to bother about it.

Hence, some even
hold—though there
are
quoted instances of denizens of the heavenly realms reaching
Nibbana—Enlightenment is possible only for humans.

I am not sure I agree.

Nirvana

The ultimate goal of the
Buddhist path is release from the round of phenomenal existence
(samsara) with its inherent suffering. This goal is named Nirvana
(Pali: Nibbana) which means to
blow
out
; an enlightened state in which the
fires of greed, hatred, and delusion have been forever
stilled.

Not to be confused with
total annihilation—though far too many Western scholars do not make
this distinction—Nirvana is a state of
consciousness beyond definition
.
After attaining Nirvana, the enlightened individual may continue to
live, burning off any remaining karma until a state of final
Nirvana (
pariNirvana
) is attained at body death.

On paper, the goal of Nirvana is attainable
by anyone, although it may only be a realistic goal for members of
the monastic community.

In Theravada Buddhism an
individual who has achieved enlightenment by following the
Eightfold Path is known as an
arhat
(Pali:
arahant
), or worthy one—a solitary
saint.

For those unable (or unwilling, in this
life) to pursue the ultimate goal of Nirvana, the proximate goal of
better rebirth through improved karma is an often pursued option.
This lesser goal is generally aspired to by lay Buddhists in the
hope that it will eventually lead to a life in which they are
capable of pursuing final enlightenment as members of the
sangha.

A life that leads to Nirvana is, as a rule,
detached and inner-oriented, and involves cultivating four virtuous
attitudes, known as the Palaces of Brahma or the Heavenly Abodes:
loving-kindness (or benevolence), compassion, sympathetic joy, and
equanimity.

The ethic that leads to better rebirth,
however, is centered on fulfilling one’s duties to society. It
involves acts of charity, especially support of the sangha, as well
as observance of the five precepts that constitute the basic moral
code of Buddhism. These precepts prohibit killing, stealing,
harmful language, sexual misbehavior, and the use of intoxicants.
By observing these precepts, the three roots of evil—lust, hatred,
and delusion—may be, if not extinguished, at least overcome and
held in check.

Early Development

Shortly before his death, the Buddha was
asked by his disciples to appoint a successor. He refused this
request; instead, he told his followers to work out their own
salvation with diligence.

At the time of his death, the Buddha’s
teachings existed only as oral tradition and it soon grew apparent
that a firmer basis for maintaining the purity of his many lessons
was needed. To solve this, the monastic order met periodically to
reach agreement on matters of both doctrine and practice.

Four such meetings (major councils) have
been recorded.

Major Councils

The first such council was held at Rajagrha
(present-day Rajgir) shortly after the Buddha’s death. Presided
over by a monk named Mahakasyapa, its purpose was to recite and
agree on the Buddha’s actual teachings and on proper monastic
discipline.

About a century later, a second great
council met at Vaishali. According to records, its main purpose was
to confront and decide upon ten now questionable monastic
practices—the use of money, the drinking of palm wine, and other
irregularities—of monks from the Vajjian Confederacy. The council
declared these practices unlawful.

Some Buddhist scholars ascribe the origins
of the first schism within Buddhism to this event, holding that the
accounts of this council refer to a rift between the younger
Mahasanghikas, or Great Assembly, and the stricter, older
Sthaviras, or Elders. Other scholars find it more likely that the
split between these two groups occurred (and was formalized) at a
subsequent meeting held some forty years later as a result of the
continued growth of tensions within the sangha over disciplinary
issues, the role of the laity, and the nature of the arahant.

In time, as the human species is wont to do,
other disagreements arose, and further subdivisions within these
groups resulted in 18 distinct schools that differed not only on
philosophical matters, but on religious questions, and points of
discipline as well. Of these 18 traditional sects, only
Theravada—which some still call the original branch—survives.

A third major Buddhist
council was held at Pataliputra (present-day Patna) in the
3
^rd
century BCE. This council was called by King Ashoka, the
Buddhist emperor of most of India. Convened, at Ashoka’s request,
by the monk Moggaliputta Tissa, it was held in order to purify the
sangha of the large number of false monks and heretics who had
joined the order because of its royal patronage.

This council refuted offending viewpoints
and expelled those who held them. During this council, a full
compilation of the Buddhas extant teachings, the Tipitaka (meaning
three baskets—those holding the stacks of palm leaves containing
the finalized writings), was begun, if not completed. The finished
record (the Pali Canon) survives to this day.

Other scriptures compiled
at, or shortly after, this meeting included the body of subtle
philosophy known as
abhiDharma
, as well as a finalized
version of the monastic code of discipline—known as
vinaya
—that had been
recited at the first council.

This third council also dispatched
missionaries to various countries.

A fourth council, under the patronage of
King Kanishka, emperor of much of Northern India, was held about
100 CE at Jalandhar or in Kashmir. This council aimed at creating
peace among the various feuding sects, including the Mahayana and
Theravada factions; but the Theravada Buddhists refused to
recognize the authenticity of any branch other than their own and
so the schism prevailed.

Buddhist Literature

For several centuries after
the death of the Buddha, the teachings recited, agreed upon, and
finalized at the councils were transmitted orally. These were
finally committed to writing about the 1
^st
century BCE.

Some early schools used Sanskrit for their
scriptural language. Although individual texts are extant, no
complete canon has survived in Sanskrit.

However, the full Theravada canon survives
in Pali, a popular dialect derived from Sanskrit, and most likely
spoken by the Buddha and his immediate followers.

The Tipitaka

The Theravada Buddhist
canon is known in Pali as the
Tipitaka
, meaning “Three Baskets,”
because it consists of three collections of writings: the
Sutra Pitaka
, a
collection of the Buddha’s discourses; the
Vinaya Pitaka
, the code of monastic
discipline; and the
AbhiDharma
Pitaka
, which contains philosophical,
psychological, and doctrinal discussions and
classifications.

The Sutra Pitaka is composed both of
discourses held by the Buddha and of dialogues between the Buddha
and other people.

The Sutra Pitaka consists
of five groups of texts—Nikayas (meaning collections in
Pali):
Digha Nikaya
(Collection of Long Discourses),
Majjhima Nikaya
(Collection of
Medium-Length Discourses),
Samyutta
Nikaya
(Collection of Grouped
Discourses),
Anguttara Nikaya
(Collection of Discourses on Numbered Topics),
and
Khuddaka Nikaya
(Collection of Miscellaneous Texts).

The fifth (and largest)
group, we find the
Jatakas
, comprising stories of former
lives of the Buddha, and the
Dhammapada
(Religious Aphorisms), a
summary of the Buddha’s teachings on mental discipline and
morality—possibly the most translated and read of all Buddhist
texts.

The
Vinaya Pitaka
(the Basket of
Discipline) consists of more than 225 rules governing the conduct
of both Buddhist monks and nuns. Each such rule is accompanied by a
story explaining the original reason for the rule.

The
AbhiDharma Pitaka
(the Higher
Teachings) consists of seven separate works, including a detailed
classification of psychological phenomena, metaphysical analysis,
and a thesaurus of technical vocabulary.

In addition to the
Tipitaka, there are two non-canonical texts that have gained great
authority and influence within Theravada Buddhism: the
Milindapanha
(Questions
of King Milinda) and the
Visuddhimagga
(Path of
Purification).

The Milindapanha dates from
about the 2
^nd
century CE and is in the form of a dialogue
dealing with a series of fundamental problems in Buddhist
thought.

The Visuddhimagga, from the
5
^th
century CE, is nothing short of a masterpiece of commentary by
the most famous of Buddhist commentators, Buddhaghosa. It is a
large compendium summarizing Buddhist thought and (primarily)
meditative practice.

Theravada Buddhists consider the Tipitaka to
be the remembered (and later recorded) words of Siddhartha Gautama.
Mahayana Buddhists, on the other hand, do not limit their
scriptures to the teachings of this historical figure, nor has
Mahayana ever bound itself to a closed canon of sacred
writings.

Thus we find that different
scriptures have held sway over different branches of Mahayana at
various periods of history, including: the
SadDharmapundarika Sutra
(Lotus of
the Good Law Sutta, popularly known as the Lotus Sutta), the
Vimalakirti Sutta
,
the
Avatamsaka Sutta
(Garland Sutta), and the
Lankavatara
Sutta
(The Buddha’s Descent to Sri Lanka
Sutta), as well as a group of writings known as the
Prajnaparamita
(Perfection of Wisdom).