Quotes from Walpola Rahula, ‘What the Buddha Taught’
On the Buddhist Attitude of Mind
One is one’s own refuge, who else could be the refuge? said the Buddha. (Dhp. XII 4.)
Buddha taught, encouraged and stimulated each
person to develop themselves and work out their own emancipation, for
humans have the power to liberate themselves from all bondage through
their own personal effort and intelligence.
The Buddha says, You should do the work, for the Tathagatas
only teach the way. (Dhp. XX 4.)
(Tathagata means ‘One who has come to Truth’. This is the term
usually used by the Buddha referring to himself and to the Buddhas in
general.)
Almost all religions are based on faith- rather
‘blind’ faith it would seem. But in Buddhism emphasis is laid on
‘seeing’, knowing, understanding, and not on faith, or belief. (p8)
The question of belief arises when there is no
seeing - seeing in every sense of the word. The moment you see, the
question of belief disappears. If I tell you that I have a gem hidden in
the folded palm of my hand, the question of belief arises because you
do not see it yourself. But if I unclench my fist and show you the gem,
then you see it for yourself, and the question of belief does not arise.
So the phrase in ancient Buddhist texts reads: ‘Realising, as one sees a
gem (or a myrobalan fruit) in the palm’. (p8-9)
It is always a question of knowing and seeing, and
not that of believing. The teaching of the Buddha is qualified as
ehi-passika, inviting you to ‘come and see’, but not to come and
believe. (p9)
The expressions used everywhere in Buddhist texts referring to persons who realised the Truth are:
The dustless and stainless Eye of Truth (Dhamma-cakkhu) has
arisen.
He has seen Truth, has attained Truth, has known Truth, has penetrated into
Truth, has crossed over doubt, is without wavering.
Thus with right wisdom he sees it as it is (yatha bhutam). (E.g. S
V, (PTS), p.423; III, p.103; M III (PTS), p.19)(Rahula, p.9)
With reference to his own Enlightenment the Buddha
said: ‘The eye was born, knowledge was born, wisdom was born, science
was born, light was born.’ (S V (PTS), p.422)
It is through knowledge or wisdom (nana-dassana), and not believing through faith. (Rahula, p9)
This was more and more appreciated at a time when
Brahmanic orthodoxy intolerantly insisted on believing and accepting
their tradition and authority as the only Truth without question. Once a
group of learned and well-known Brahmins went to see the Buddha and had
a long discussion with him. One of the group, a Brahmin youth of
16years of age, named Kapathika, considered by them all to be an
exceptionally brilliant mind, put a question to the Buddha (Canki-sutta,
no 95 of M.):
‘Venerable Gotama, there are the ancient holy scriptures
of the Brahmins handed down along the line by unbroken oral tradition of
texts. With regard to them, Brahmins come to the absolute conclusion: “This
alone is Truth and everything else is false”. Now, what does the venerable
Gotama say about this?’
The Buddha inquired: ‘Among Brahmins is there any one single Brahmin
who claims that he personally knows and sees that “This alone is Truth
and everything else is false.”?’
The young man was frank and said : ‘No’.
‘Then, it is like a line of blind men, each holding on to the preceding
one; the first one does not see, the middle one also does not see, the last
one also does not see. Thus, it seems to me that the state of the Brahmins
is like that of a line of blind men.’
Then the Buddha gave advice of extreme importance to the group of Brahmins:
‘It is not proper for a wise man who maintains (lit. protects) truth
to come to the conclusion : “This alone is Truth, and everything else
is false”.’
Asked by the young Brahmin to explain the idea of maintaining or
protecting the truth, the Buddha said: ‘A man has a faith. If he says
“This is my faith”, so far as he maintains truth. But by that he cannot
proceed to the absolute conclusion: “This alone is Truth, and everything
else is false”.’ In other words a man may believe what he likes, and he
may say ‘I believe this’. So far as he respects truth. But because of
his belief or faith, he should not say that what he believes is alone
the Truth, and everything is false. The Buddha says: “To be attached to
one thing (to a certain view) and to look down upon other things (views)
as inferior- this the wise men call a fetter.” (Sn (PTS), p. 151
(v.798). (Rahula, p10)
++ disagree with Buddha’s last quotation.
Once the Buddha explained the doctrine of cause and effect
to his disciples, and they said they saw it and understood it clearly. (In
the Mahatanhasankhaya-sutta, no. 38 of M)
Then the Buddha said: ‘Oh Bhikkhus, even this view, which is so
pure and so clear, if you cling to it, if you fondle it, if you treasure
it, if you are attached to it, then you don’t understand that teaching
is similar to a raft, which is for crossing over, and not for getting
hold of.’ (M I (PTS), p.260) (Rahula, p11)
The Buddha was not interested in discussing unnecessary metaphysical
questions which are purely speculative and which create imaginary problems.
He considered them as a ‘wilderness of opinions’. It seems that
there were some among his own disciples who did not appreciate this attitude
of his. For, we have the example of one of them, Malunkyaputta by name,
who put to the Buddha ten well-known classical questions on metaphysical
problems and demanded answers.
(Cula-Malunkya- sutta, no. 63 of M.)
One day Malunkyaputta got up from his afternoon meditation,
went to the Buddha, saluted him, sat on one side and said:
‘Sir, when I was all alone meditating, this thought occurred to me:
There are these problems unexplained, put aside and rejected by the
Blessed One. Namely,
(1) is the universe eternal
(2) is it not eternal
(3) is the universe finite
(4) is it infinite
(5) is soul the same as body
(6) is soul one thing and body another thing
(7) does the Tathagata exist after death
(8) does he not exist after death
(9) does he both (at the same time) exist and not exist after death
(10) does he both at the same time not exist and not not-exist.
These problems the Blessed One does not explain to
me. This (attitude) does not please me, I do not appreciate it. I will
go to the Blessed One and ask him about this matter. If the Blessed One
explains them to me, then I will continue to follow the holy life under
him. If he does not explain them, I will leave the Order and go away. If
the Blessed One knows that the universe is eternal, let him explain it
to me so. If the Blessed One knows that the Universe is not eternal, let
him say so. If the Blessed One does not know whether the Universe is
eternal or not, etc., then for a person who does not know, it is
straightfoward to say “I do not know, I do not see”.’
The Buddha’s reply to Malunkyaputta should do good
to many millions in the world today who are wasting valuable time on such
metaphysical questions and unnecessarily disturbing their peace of mind:
‘Did I ever tell you, Malunkyaputta, “Come, Malunkyaputta, lead
the holy life under me, I will explain these questions to you?”
‘No sir.’
‘Then, Malunkyaputta, even you, did you tell me: “Sir, I will
lead the holy life under the Blessed One, and the Blessed One will explain
these questions to me?”
‘No sir.’
‘Even now, Malunkyaputta, I do not tell you: “Come and lead
the holy life under me, I will explain these questions to you”. And
you do not tell me either: “Sir, I will lead the holy life under the
Blessed One, and he will explain these questions to me”. Under these
circumstances, you foolish one, who refuses whom? (i.e. both are free and
neither is under obligation to the other.)
‘Malunkyaputta, if anyone says: “I will not lead the holy life
under the Blessed One until he explains these questions,” he may die
with these questions unanswered by the Tathagata …
Then the Buddha explains to Malunkyaputta that the holy life does not depend
upon these views. Whatever opinion one may have about these problems, there
is birth, old age, decay, death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, distress,
‘ the Cessation of which (i.e. Nirvana) I declare in this very life.”
“Therefore, Malunkyaputta, bear in mind what I have explained as explained,
and what I have not explained as unexplained. What are the things that I
have not explained? Whether the universe is eternal or not, etc, (those
10 opinions) I have not explained. Why, Malunkyaputta, have I not explained
them? Because it is not useful, it is not fundamentally connected with the
spiritual holy life, is not conducive to aversion, detachment, cessation,
tranquility, deep penetration, full realisation, Nirvana. That is why I
have not told you about them.
Then, what, Malunkyaputta, have I explained? I have explained
dukkha, the arising of dukkha, the cessation of dukkha, and the way
leading to the cessation of dukkha. Why, Malunkyaputta, have I explained
them? Because it is useful, is fundamentally connected with the
spiritual holy life, is conducive to aversion, detachment, cessation,
tranquility, deep penetration, full realisation, Nirvana. Therefore I
have explained them.’ (p14-5)
(It seems that this advice had the desired effect
on Malunkyaputta, because elsewhere he is reported to have approached
the Buddha again for instruction, following which he became an Arahant.)
** This is the fundamental mistake of Buddhism.
Reality can now be known, and it is extremely useful to all beings and
to the future survival of this planet. As all Truth comes from Reality,
we cannot be wise without knowing the Truth. Humanity can now understand
what they are and how they are connected to the universe, thus
destroying the separate notion of particles and self. The
interconnection and impermanence of the Buddhist doctrine can now be
explained with the Wave Structure of Matter and the Metaphysics of Space
and Motion.
The Four Noble Truths
1. Dukkha
2. Samudaya, the arising or origin of dukkha
3. Nirodha, the cessation of dukkha
4. Magga, the way leading to the cessation of dukkha.
The First Noble Truth: Dukkha
..is generally translated by most scholars as the
“Noble Truth of Suffering”, and is interpreted to mean that
life according to Buddhism is nothing but suffering and pain. Both translation
and interpretation are misleading.
Buddhism is neither pessimistic nor optimistic. If anything at
all, it is realistic, for it takes a realistic view of life and of the
world. It looks at things objectively (yathabhutam). It does not falsely
lull you into living in a fool’s paradise, nor does it frighten and
agonise you with all kinds of imaginary fears and sins. It tells you
exactly and objectively what you are and what the world is around you,
and shows you the way to perfect freedom, peace, tranquility and
happiness. (p16-7)
It is true that the Pali word dukkha (or Sanskrit
duhkha) in ordinary usage means ‘suffering’, ‘pain’, ‘sorrow’, or
‘misery’ as opposed to the word sukha meaning ‘happiness’, ‘comfort’ or
‘ease’. But the term dukkha as the First Noble Truth, which represents
the Buddha’s view of life and the world, has a deeper philosophical
meaning and connotes enormously wider senses. It includes deeper ideas
such as ‘imperfection’, ‘impermanence’, ‘emptiness’, ‘insubstantiality’.
It is difficult therefore to find one word to embrace the whole
conception of the term dukkha as the First Noble Truth, and so it is
better to leave it untranslated, than to give an inadequate and wrong
idea of it by conveniently translating it as ‘suffering’ or ‘pain’.
(p17)
The Buddha does not deny happiness in life when he
says there is suffering. On the contrary he admits different forms of
happiness, both the material and the spiritual, for laymen as well as
monks. In the Anguttara-nikaya, one of the five original Collections of
Pali containing the Buddha’s discourses, there is a list of happinesses
(sukhani), such as the happiness of family life and the happiness of a
recluse, of sense pleasures and renunciation, of attachment and
deattachment, physical and mental happiness. But all these are included
in dukkha.
Even the very pure spiritual states of dhyana
(recueillement or trance) attained by the practice of higher meditation,
free from even a shadow of suffering in the accepted sense of the
world, states which may be described as unmixed happiness, as well as
the state of dhyana which is free from sensations both pleasant (sukha)
and unpleasant (dukkha) and is only pure equanimity and awareness- even
these very high spiritual states are included in dukkha. In one of the
suttas of the Majjhima-nikaya (again one of the five original
Collections), after praising the spiritual happiness of these dhyanas,
the Buddha says that they are ‘impermanent, dukkha, and subject to
change’ (anicca dukkha viparinamadhamma)(Mahadukkhakhandha-sutta, MI
(PTS), p.90).
Notice the word dukkha is explicitly used. It is
dukkha, not because there is ‘suffering’ in the ordinary sense of the
word, but because ‘whatever impermanent is dukkha’ (yad aniccam tam
dukkham). (Rahula, p17-18)
The Buddha says with regard to life and the enjoyment of sense-pleasures, that one should clearly understand three things:
(1) attraction or enjoyment (assada)
(2) evil consequence or danger or unsatisfactoriness (adinava)
(3) freedom or liberation (nissarana).
When you see a pleasant, charming and beautiful
person, you like them, you are attracted, you enjoy seeing that person
again and again, you derive pleasure and satisfaction from that person.
This is enjoyment (assada). It is a fact of experience. But this
enjoyment is not permanent, just as that person and all his (or her)
attractions are not permanent either. When the situation changes, when
you cannot see that person, when you are deprived of this enjoyment, you
become sad, you may become unbalanced and unreasonable, even behave
foolishly. This is the evil, unsatisfactory and dangerous side of the
picture (adinava). This, too, is a fact of experience. Now if you have
no attachment to the person, if you are completely detached, that is
freedom, liberation (nissarana). These three things are true with regard
to all enjoyment in life.
From this it is evident that it is no question of
pessimism or optimism, but that we must take account of the pleasures of
life as well as of its pains and sorrows, and also of freedom from
them, in order to understand life completely and objectively. Only then
is true liberation possible. (p19)
The conception of dukkha may be viewed from three aspects:
(1) dukkha as ordinary suffering (dukkha-dukkha)
(2) dukkha as produced by change (viparinama-dukkha)
(3) dukkha as conditioned states (samkhara-dukkha) (Vism (PTS), p.499; Abhisamuc, p.38) (Rahula, p.19)
(1) All kinds of suffering in life like birth, old
age, sickness, death, association with unpleasant people and conditions
…– all such forms of mental and physical suffering or pain, are
included in dukkha as ordinary suffering. (Rahula, p19)
(2) A happy feeling, a happy condition in life, is
not permanent, not everlasting. It changes sooner or later. When it
changes it produces pain, suffering, unhappiness. This vicissitude is
included in dukkha as suffering produced by change. (p20)
(3) The third form of dukkha as conditioned states is the
most important philosophical aspect of the First Noble Truth, and it requires
some analytical explanation of what we consider as a ‘being’,
as an ‘individual’ or as ‘I’.
What we call a ‘being’, or an ‘individual’, or ‘I’, according to
Buddhist philosophy, is only a combination of ever-changing physical and
mental forces or energies, which may be divided into five groups of
aggregates (pancakkhandha). The Buddha says: ‘In short these five
aggregates of attachment are dukkha’. (Samkhittena pancupadanakkhandha
dukkha. S V (PTS), p.42) Elsewhere he defines dukkha as the five
aggregates: ‘Oh Bhikkhus, what is dukkha? It should be said it is the
five aggregates of attachment.’ (S III (PTS), p.158) (Rahula, p20)
The Five Aggregates
1. Aggregate of Matter (Rupakkhandha)
2. Aggregate of Sensation (Vedanakkhandha)
3. Aggregate of Perceptions (Sannakkhandha)
4. Aggregate of Mental Formations (Samkharakkhandha)
5. Aggregate of Consciousness
1. Aggregate of Matter (Rupakkhandha)
.. included are the Four Great Elements (cattari mahabhutani),
namely, solidity, fluidity, heat and motion, and also the Derivatives
(upadaya-rupa) of the Four Great Elements. In the term ‘Derivatives of
Four Great Elements’ are included our five material sense-organs, i.e.
the faculties of eye, ear, nose, tongue and body, and their
corresponding objects in the world, i.e. visible form, sound, odour,
taste and tangible things, and also some thoughts or ideas or
conceptions which are in the sphere of mind-objects (dharmayatana).
(Rahula, p20-21)
2. Aggregate of Sensation (Vedanakkhandha)
..all our sensations, pleasant or unpleasant or neutral,
experienced through the contact of physical and mental organs with the
external world. They are six of kinds: the sensations experienced
through the contact of the eyes with visible forms, ear with sounds,
nose with odour, tongue with taste, body with tangible objects and mind
(the sixth faculty in Buddhist philosophy) with mind-objects or thoughts
or ideas. (Rahula, p.21)
Mind is only a faculty or organ (indriya) like the
ear or eye. It can be controlled and developed like any other faculty,
and the Buddha speaks quite often of the value of controlling and
disciplining these six faculties. Ideas and thoughts are not independent
of the world experienced by these five physical sense faculties. In
fact they depend on, and are conditioned by, physical experiences. Hence
a person born blind cannot have ideas of colour, except through the
analogy of sounds or some other things experienced through his other
faculties. Ideas and thoughts which form part of the world are thus
produced and conditioned by physical experiences and are conceived by
the mind. (Rahula, p21-22)
3. Aggregate of Perceptions (Sannakkhandha)
Like sensations, perceptions are also of six kinds, in relation to
six internal faculties and the corresponding six eternal objects. It is
the perceptions that recognise objects as physical or mental. (Rahula,
p22)
4. Aggregate of Mental Formations (Samkharakkhandha)
In this group are included all volitional activities both good and bad.
What is generally known as karma comes under this group. The Buddha’s
own definition of karma should be remembered here:
‘ O bhikkhus, it is volition (cetana) that I call karma. Having willed,
one acts through body, speech and mind.’
Volition is ‘mental construction, mental activity. Its function is
to direct the mind in the sphere of good, bad or neutral activities.’
(Abhisamuc, p6.)(Rahula, p.22)
Sensations and perceptions are not volitional
actions. They do not produce karmic effects. It is only volitional
actions- such as attention (manasikara), will (chanda), determination
(adhimokkha), confidence (saddha), concentration (samadhi), wisdom
(panna), energy (viriya), desire (raga), repugnance or hate (paatigha),
ignorance (avijja), conceit (mana), idea of self (sakkaya-ditthi) etc. –
that can produce karmic effects. There are 52 such mental activities
which constitute the Aggregate of Mental Formations. (Rahula, p22)
5. Aggregate of Consciousness (Vinnanakkhandha)
Consciousness is a reaction or response which has one of the six
faculties as its basis, and one of the six corresponding external
phenomena (visible form, sound, odour, taste, tangible things and mind
objects) as its object. (p23)
According to Buddhist philosophy there is no
permanent, unchanging spirit which can be considered ‘Self’ or ‘Soul’ or
‘Ego’, as opposed to matter, and that consciousness (vinnana) should
not be taken as ‘spirit’ in opposition to matter. This point has to be
emphasised, because a wrong notion that consciousness is a sort of Self
or Soul that continues as a permanent substance through life, has
persisted from the earliest time to the present day. (Rahula, p24)
The Buddha said, “There is no arising of
consciousness without conditions,” and “..Consciousness is named
according to whatever condition through which it arises: on account of
the eye and visible forms arises a consciousness, called visual
consciousness …” (Mahatanhasamkhaya-sutta, M I (PTS), p. 256) (Rahula,
p.24)
What we call a ‘being’ or an ‘individual’ or ‘I’ is
only a convenient name or a label given to a combination of these five
groups. They are all impermanent, all constantly changing. ‘Whatever is
impermanent is dukkha (yad aniccam tam dukkham). This is the true
meaning of the Buddha’s words : ‘In brief the five Aggregates of
Attachment are dukkha.’ They are not the same for two consecutive
moments. Here A is not equal to A. They are in a flux of momentary
arising and disappearing. (Rahula, p25)