Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) by Charles Eliot

C >> Charles Eliot >> Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3)

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41

The Chinese Tripitaka has been catalogued and we possess some
information respecting the books which it contains, though none of them
have been edited in Europe. Thus we know something[649] of the
Sarvastivadin recension of the Abhidhamma. Like the Pali version it
consists of seven books of which one, the Jnana-prasthana by
Katyayaniputra, is regarded as the principal, the rest being
supplementary. All the books are attributed to human authors, and though
some of these bear the names of the Buddha's immediate disciples,
tradition connects Katyayaniputra with Kanishka's council. This is not a
very certain date, but still the inference is that about the time of the
Christian era the contents of the Abhidhamma-Pitaka were not rigidly
defined and a new recension was possible.

The Sanskrit manuscripts discovered in Central Asia include Sutras from
the Samyukta and Ekottara Agamas (equivalent to the Samyutta and
Anguttara Nikayas), a considerable part of the Dharmapada, fragments of
the Sutta-Nipata and the Pratimoksha of the Sarvastivadin school. These
correspond fairly well with the Pali text but represent another
recension and a somewhat different arrangement. We have therefore here
fragments of a Sanskrit version which must have been imported to Central
Asia from northern India and covers, so far as the fragments permit us
to judge, the same ground as the Vinaya and Suttas of the Pali Canon.
Far from displaying the diffuse and inflated style which characterizes
the Mahayana texts it is sometimes shorter and simpler than our Pali
version[650].

When was this version composed and what is its relation to the Pali? A
definite reply would be premature, for other Sanskrit texts may be
discovered in Central Asia, but two circumstances connect this early
Buddhist literature in Sanskrit with the epoch of Kanishka. Firstly the
Sanskrit Abhidharma of the Sarvastivadins seems to date from his council
and secondly a Buddhist drama by Asvaghosha[651] of about the same time
represents the Buddha as speaking in Sanskrit whereas the inferior
characters speak Prakrit. But these facts do not prove that Sanskrit was
not the language of the canon at an earlier date[652] and it is not safe
to conclude that because Asoka did not employ it for writing edicts it
was not the sacred language of any section of Indian Buddhists. On the
other hand some of the Sanskrit texts contain indications that they are
a translation from Pali or some vernacular[653]. In others are found
historical allusions which suggest that they must have received
additions after our era[654].

I have already raised the question of the relative value attaching to
Pali and Sanskrit texts as authorities for early history. Two instances
will perhaps illustrate this better than a general discussion. As
already mentioned, the Vinaya of the Mulasarvastivadins makes the Buddha
visit north-western India and Kashmir, whereas the Pali texts do not
represent him as travelling further west than the country of the Kurus.
The Sanskrit account is not known to be confirmed by more ancient
evidence, but there is nothing impossible in it, particularly as there
are periods in the Buddha's long life filled by no incidents. The
narrative however contains a prediction about Kanishka and therefore
cannot be earlier than his reign. Now there is no reason why the Pali
texts should be silent about this journey, if the Buddha really made it,
but one can easily imagine reasons for inventing it in the period of the
Kushan kings. North-western India was then full of monasteries and
sacred sites and the same spirit which makes uncritical Buddhists in
Ceylon and Siam assert to-day that the master visited their country
impelled the monks of Peshawar and Kashmir to imagine a not improbable
extension of his wanderings[655].

On the other hand this same Vinaya of the Mulasarvastivadins probably
gives us a fragment of history when it tells us that the Buddha had
three wives, perhaps too when it relates how Rahula's paternity was
called in question and how Devadatta wanted to marry Yasodhara after the
Buddha had abandoned worldly life[656]. The Pali Vinaya and also some
Sanskrit Vinayas[657] mention only one wife or none at all. They do not
attempt to describe Gotama's domestic life and if they make no allusion
to it except to mention the mother of Rahula, this is not equivalent to
an assertion that he had no other wife. But when one Vinaya composed in
the north of India essays to give a biography of the Buddha and states
that he had three wives, there is no reason for doubting that the
compiler was in touch with good local tradition.

CHAPTER XIV

MEDITATION

Indian religions lay stress on meditation. It is not merely commended as
a useful exercise but by common consent it takes rank with sacrifice and
prayer, or above them, as one of the great activities of the religious
life, or even as its only true activity. It has the full approval of
philosophy as well as of theology. In early Buddhism it takes the place
of prayer and worship and though in later times ceremonies multiply, it
still remains the main occupation of a monk. The Jains differ from the
Buddhists chiefly in emphasizing the importance of self-mortification,
which is put on a par with meditation. In Hinduism, as might be expected
in a fluctuating compound of superstition and philosophy, the schools
differ as to the relative efficacy of meditation and ceremonial, but
there is a strong tendency to give meditation the higher place. In all
ages a common characteristic appears in the most divergent Indian
creeds--the belief that by a course of mental and physical training the
soul can attain to a state of bliss which is the prelude to the final
deliverance attained after death.

1

We may begin by examining Brahmanic ideas as to meditation. Many of them
are connected with the word Yoga, which has become familiar to Europe.
It has two meanings. It is applied first to a definite form of Indian
philosophy which is a theistic modification of the Sankhya and secondly
to much older practices sanctioned by that philosophy but anterior to
it.

The idea which inspires these theories and practices is that the
immaterial soul can by various exercises free itself from the fetters of
matter. The soul is distinguished from the mind which, though composed
of the subtlest matter, is still material. This presupposes the duality
of matter and spirit taught by Jainism and the Sankhya philosophy, but
it does not necessarily presuppose the special doctrines of either nor
do Vedantists object to the practice of the Yoga. The systematic
prosecution of mental concentration and the idea that supernatural
powers can be acquired thereby are very old--certainly older than
Buddhism. Such methods had at first only a slight philosophic substratum
and were independent of Sankhya doctrines, though these, being a
speculative elaboration of the same fundamental principles, naturally
commended themselves to those who practised Yoga. The two teachers of
the Buddha, Alara and Uddaka, were Yogis, and held that beatitude or
emancipation consisted in the attainment of certain trances. Gotama,
while regarding their doctrine as insufficient, did not reject their
practices.

Our present Yoga Sutras are certainly much later than this date. They
are ascribed to one Patanjali identified by Hindu tradition with the
author of the Mahabhashya who lived about 150 B.C. Jacobi[658] however
is of opinion that they are the work of an entirely different person who
lived after the rise of the philosophy ascribed to Asanga sometimes
called Yogacara. Jacobi's arguments seem to me suggestive rather than
conclusive but, if they are confirmed, they lead to an interesting
deduction. There is some reason for thinking that Sankara's doctrine of
illusion was derived from the Buddhist Sunyavada. If Patanjali's sutras
are posterior to Asanga, it also seems probable that the codification of
the Yoga by the Brahmans was connected with the rise of the Yogacara
among the Buddhists[659].

The Sutras describe themselves as an exposition of Yoga, which has here
the meaning not of union with God, but rather of effort. The opening
aphorisms state that "Yoga is the suppression of the activities of the
mind, for then the spectator abides in his own form: at other times
there is identity of form with the activities." This dark language means
that the soul in its true nature is merely the spectator of the mind's
activity, consciousness being due, as in the Sankhya, to the union of
the soul with the mind[660] which is its organ. When the mind is active,
the soul appears to experience various emotions, and it is only when the
mind ceases to feel emotions and becomes calm in meditation, that the
soul abides in its own true form. The object of the Yoga, as of the
Sankhya, is Kaivalya or isolation, in which the soul ceases to be united
with the mind and is dissociated from all qualities (gunas) so that the
shadow of the thinking principle no longer falls upon it. This isolation
is produced by performing certain exercises, physical as well as mental,
and, as a prelude to final and complete emancipation, superhuman powers
are acquired. These two ideas, the efficacy of physical discipline and
the acquisition of superhuman powers, have powerfully affected all
schools of religious thought in India, including Buddhism. They are not
peculiar to the Yoga, but still it is in the Yoga Sutras that they find
their most authoritative and methodical exposition.

The practice of Yoga has its roots in the fact that fasting and other
physical mortifications induce a mental state in which the subject
thinks that he has supernatural experiences[661]. Among many savage
tribes, especially in America, such fasts are practised by those who
desire communication with spirits. In the Yoga philosophy these ideas
appear in a refined form and offer many parallels to European mysticism.
The ultimate object is to dissociate the soul from its material
envelopes but in the means prescribed we can trace two orders of ideas.
One is to mortify the body and suppress not only appetite and passion
but also discursive thought: the other is to keep the body in perfect
health and ease, so that the intelligence and ultimately the soul may be
untroubled by physical influences. These two ideas are less incongruous
than they seem. Many examples show that extreme forms of asceticism are
not unhealthy but rather conducive to long life and the Yoga in
endeavouring to secure physical well-being does not aim at pleasure but
at such a purification of the physical part of man that it shall be the
obedient and unnoticed servant of the other parts. The branch of the
system which deals with method and discipline is called Kriya-yoga and
in later works we also find the expression Hatha-yoga, which is
specially used to designate mechanical means (such as postures,
purification, etc.) prescribed for the attainment of various mental
states. In contrast to it is Raja-yoga, which signifies ecstasy and the
method of obtaining it by mental processes. The immediate object of the
Kriya-yoga is to destroy the five evils[662], namely ignorance, egoism,
desire, aversion and love of life: it consists of asceticism,
recitations and resignation to God, explained as meaning that the
devotee fasts, repeats mantras and surrenders to God the fruit of all
his works and, feeling no more concern for them, is at peace. Though the
Yoga Sutras are theistic, theism is accessory rather than essential to
their teaching. They are not a theological treatise but the manual of an
ancient discipline which recognizes devotional feelings as one means to
its end. The method would remain almost intact if the part relating to
the deity were omitted, as in the Sankhya. God is not for the Yoga
Sutras, as he is for many Indian and European mystics, the one reality,
the whence and whither of the soul and world.

Eight branches of practice[663] are enumerated, namely:--

1. Yama or restraint, that is abstinence from killing, lying, stealing,
incontinence, and from receiving gifts. It is almost equivalent to the
five great precepts of Buddhism.

2. Niyama or observance, defined as purification, contentment,
mortification, recitation and devotion to the Lord.

Purification is treated at great length in the later treatises on
Hatha-yoga under the name of Shat-karma or sixfold work. It comprises
not only ordinary ablutions but cleansing of the internal organs by such
methods as taking in water by the nostrils and discharging it by the
mouth. The object of these practices which, though they assume queer
forms, rest on sound therapeutic principles, is to remove adventitious
matter from the system and to reduce the gross elements of the
body[664].

3. Asanam or posture is defined as a continuous and pleasant attitude.
It is difficult to see how the latter adjective applies to many of the
postures recommended, for considerable training is necessary to make
them even tolerable. But the object clearly is to prescribe an attitude
which can be maintained continuously without creating the distracting
feeling of physical discomfort and in this matter European and oriental
limbs feel differently. All the postures contemplated are different ways
of sitting cross-legged. Later works revel in enumerations of them and
also recognize others called Mudra. This word is specially applied to a
gesture of the hand but is sometimes used in a less restricted sense.
Thus there is a celebrated Mudra called Khechari, in which the tongue is
reversed and pressed into the throat while the sight is directed to a
point between the eyebrows. This is said to induce the cataleptic trance
in which Yogis can be buried alive.

4. Pranayama or regulation of the breath. When the Yogi has learnt to
assume a permanent posture, he accustoms himself to regulate the acts of
inspiration and expiration so as to prolong the period of quiescence
between the two. He will thus remove the veils which cover the light
within him. This practice probably depends on the idea which constantly
crops up in the Upanishads that the breath is the life and the soul.
Consequently he who can control and hold his breath keeps his soul at
home, and is better able to concentrate his mind. Apart from such ideas,
the fixing of the attention on the rhythmical succession of inspirations
and expirations conduces to that peaceful and detached frame of mind on
which most Indian sects set great store. The practice was greatly
esteemed by the Brahmans, and is also enjoined among the Taoists in
China and among Buddhists in all countries, but I have found no mention
of its use among European mystics.

5. Pratyahara, the retraction or withdrawing of the senses. They are
naturally directed outwards towards their objects. The Yogi endeavours
to bring them into quiescence by diverting them from those objects and
directing them inwards. From this, say the Sutras, comes complete
subjugation of the senses[665].

6-8. The five kinds of discipline hitherto mentioned constitute the
physical preparation for meditation comprising in succession _(a)_ a
morality of renunciation, _(b)_ mortification and purification, _(c)_
suitable postures, _(d)_ regulation of the breathing, _(e)_ diversion of
the senses from their external objects. Now comes the intellectual part
of the process, consisting of three stages called Dharana, Dhyana and
Samadhi. Dharana means fixing the mind on a particular object, either a
part of the body such as the crown of the head or something external
such as the sky. Dhyana[666] is the continuous intellectual state
arising out of this concentration. It is defined as an even current of
thought undisturbed by other thoughts. Samadhi is a further stage of
Dhyana in which the mind becomes so identified with the thing thought of
that consciousness of its separate existence ceases. The thinking power
is merged in the single thought and ultimately a state of trance is
induced. Several stages are distinguished in this Samadhi. It is divided
into conscious and unconscious[667] and of the conscious kind there are
four grades[668], analogous, though not entirely corresponding to the
four Jhanas of Buddhism. When the feeling of joy passes away and is lost
in a higher sense of equanimity, there comes the state known by the
remarkable name of Dharma-megha[669] in which the isolation of the soul
and its absolute distinctness from matter (which includes what we call
mind) is realized, and Karma is no more. After the state of Dharma-megha
comes that of unconscious Samadhi, in which the Yogi falls into a trance
and attains emancipation which is made permanent by death.

The methods of the Kriya-yoga can be employed for the attainment not
only of salvation but of miraculous powers[670]. This subject is
discussed in the third book of the Yoga Sutras where it is said that
such powers are obstructions in the contemplative and spiritual life,
though they may lead to success in waking or worldly life. This is the
same point of view as we meet in Buddhism, viz. that though the
miraculous powers resulting from meditation are real, they are not
essential to salvation and may become dangerous hindrances[671].

They are attained according to the Yoga Sutras by the exercise of
samyama which is the name given conjointly to the three states of
dharana, dhyana and samadhi when they are applied simultaneously or in
immediate succession to one object of thought[672]. The reader will
remember that this state of contemplation is to be preceded by
pratyahara, or direction of the senses inwards, in which ordinary
external stimuli are not felt. It is analogous to the hypnotic state in
which suggestions made by the hypnotizer have for the subject the
character of reality although he is not conscious of his surroundings,
and auto-suggestions--that is the expectations with which the Yogi begins
his meditation--apparently have the same effect. The trained Yogi is able
to exercise samyama with regard to any idea--that is to say his mind
becomes identified with that idea to the exclusion of all others.
Sometimes this samyama implies simply a thorough comprehension of the
object of meditation. Thus by making samyama on the samskaras or
predispositions existing in the mind, a knowledge of one's previous
births is obtained; by making samyama on sound, the language of animals
is understood. But in other cases a result is considered to be obtained
because the Yogi in his trance thinks it is obtained. Thus if samyama is
made on the throat, hunger and thirst are subdued; if on the strength of
an elephant, that strength is obtained: if on the sun, the knowledge of
all worlds is acquired. Other miraculous attainments are such that they
should be visible to others, but are probably explicable as subjective
fancies. Such are the powers of becoming heavy or light, infinitely
large or infinitely small and of emitting flames. This last phenomenon
is perhaps akin to the luminous visions, called photisms by
psychologists, which not infrequently accompany conversion and other
religious experiences and take the form of flashes or rays proceeding
from material objects[673]. The Yogi can even become many persons
instead of one by calling into existence other bodies by an effort of
his will and animating them all by his own mind[674].

Europeans are unfavourably impressed by the fact that the Yoga devotes
much time to the cultivation of hypnotic states of doubtful value both
for morality and sanity. But the meditation which it teaches is also
akin to aesthetic contemplation, when the mind forgets itself and is
conscious only of the beauty of what is contemplated. Schopenhauer[675]
has well expressed the Indian idea in European language. "When some
sudden cause or inward disposition lifts us out of the endless stream of
willing, the attention is no longer directed to the motives of willing
but comprehends things free from their relation to the will and thus
observes them without subjectivity purely objectively, gives itself
entirely up to them so far as they are ideas, but not in so far as they
are motives. Then all at once the peace which we were always seeking,
but which always fled from us on the former path of the desires, comes
to us of its own accord and it is well with us." And though the Yoga
Sutras represent superhuman faculties as depending chiefly on the
hypnotic condition of samyama, they also say that they are obtainable--at
any rate such of them as consist in superhuman knowledge--by pratibha or
illumination. By this term is meant a state of enlightenment which
suddenly floods the mind prepared by the Yoga discipline. It precedes
emancipation as the morning star precedes the dawn. When this light has
once come, the Yogi possesses all knowledge without the process of
samyama. It may be compared to the Dibba-cakkhu or divine eye and the
knowledge of the truths which according to the Pitakas[676] precede
arhatship. Similar instances of sudden intellectual enlightenment are
recorded in the experiences of mystics in other countries. We may
compare the haplosis or ekstasis of Plotinus and the visions of St
Theresa or St Ignatius in which such mysteries as the Trinity became
clear, as well as the raptures in which various Christian mystics[677]
experienced the feeling of levitation and thought that they were being
literally carried off their feet.

The practices and theories which are systematized in the Yoga Sutras are
known to the Upanishads, particularly those of the Atharva Veda. But
even the earlier Upanishads allude to the special physical and mental
discipline necessary to produce concentration of mind. The Maitrayana
Upanishad says that the sixfold Yoga consists of restraint of the
breath, restraint of the senses, meditation, fixed attention,
investigation, absorption. The Svetasvatara Upanishad speaks of the
proper places and postures for meditation, and the Chandogya[678] of
concentrating all the senses on the self, a process which is much the
same as the pratyahara of the Yoga.

A later and mysterious but most important method of Yoga is known to the
Tantras[679] as Shatcakrabheda or piercing of the six cakras. These are
dynamic or nervous centres distributed through the human body from the
base of the spinal cord to the eyebrows. In the lowest of them resides
the Devi Kundalini, a force identical with Sakti, who is the motive
power of the universe. In ordinary conditions this Kundalini is pictured
as lying asleep and coiled like a serpent. But appropriate exercises
cause her to awake and ascend until she reaches the highest cakra when
she unites with Siva and ineffable bliss and emancipation are attained.
The process, which is said to be painful and even dangerous to health,
is admittedly unintelligible without oral instruction from a Guru and,
as I have not had this advantage, I will say no more on the topic except
this, that strange and fanciful as the descriptions of Shatcakrabheda
may seem, they can hardly be pure inventions but must have a real
counterpart in nervous phenomena which apparently have not been studied
by European physiologists or psychologists[680].

2

When we turn to the treatment of meditation and ecstasy in the earlier
Buddhist writings we are struck by its general resemblance to the
programme laid down in the Yoga Sutras, and by many coincidences of
detail. The exercises, rules of conduct, and the powers to be
incidentally obtained are all similar. The final goal of both systems
also seems similar to the outsider, although a Buddhist and a Yogi might
have much to say about the differences, for the Yoga wishes to isolate a
soul which is complete and happy in its own nature if it can be
disentangled from its trammels, whereas Buddhism teaches that there is
no such soul awaiting release and that religious discipline should
create and foster good mental states. Just as the atmosphere of the
Pitakas is not that of the Brahmanas or Sutras, so are their ideas about
Jhana and Samadhi somewhat different. Though hypnotic and even
cataleptic phases are not wanting, the journey of the religious life, as
described in the Pitakas, is a progress of increasing peace, but also of
increasing intellectual power and activity. Gotama did not hold Jhana or
regulated meditation to be essential to nirvana or arhatship, for that
state was attainable by laymen and apparently through sudden
illumination. But such cases were the exception. His own mental
evolution which culminated in enlightenment comprised the four
Jhanas[681]. Also in the eightfold path which is essential to arhatship
and nirvana the last and highest stage is sammasamadhi, right rapture or
ecstasy.

Jhana is difficult for laymen, but it was the rule of the order to
devote at least the afternoon to it. We might compare this with the
solitary prayer of Christians, and there is real similarity in the
process and the result. It brought peace and strength to the mind and we
hear of the bright clear faces and the radiantly happy expression of
those who returned to their duties after such contemplation. But
Christian prayer involves the idea of self-surrender and throwing open
the doors and windows of the soul to an influence which streams into it.
Buddhist meditation is rather the upsoaring of the mind which rises from
ecstasy to ecstasy until it attains not some sphere where it can live
_in_ bliss but a state which is in itself satisfying and all-comprising.