On line Study Material for B. A (Part I), Department of Philosophy, A.N.College, Patna .

Buddhist Doctrine of Pratitya Samutpada and Second Noble Truth

Dr. Shailesh Kumar Singh Professor, Deptt. of Philosophy A. N. College, Patna

Dear Students I have already shared a study material related to Buddhism in which we had discussed the Buddhist concept of Substance. In that study material we had compared the Buddhist view with that of the Upanishadic doctrine of Substance. We had pointed out that Early Buddhism that is the teaching of Buddha denies the reality of an eternal substance whether physical or non-physical. In this regard Buddhism denies the reality of eternal soul or Person. We have also referred briefly that for Buddhism change is real.

In the present study material we are going to discuss the very core concept of Buddhism which leads to the formulation of the theory of change and the denial of the existence of the eternal substance. This is the principle of causality as has been taught by Buddha and which is known as doctrine of Pratitya samutapada or the theory of dependent origination.

The principle of causality, which primarily deals with the nature of relation between cause and effect, has always remained a focused area of study and research in Science. The determination of a particular event, on the basis of certain ascertained facts as ‘cause’ and the subsequent event derived from that cause as ‘effect’ is based on inductive scientific reasoning.

Almost all the philosophical systems of India which include the Buddhists, the Jaina and the Brahmanical systems, in their own way, subscribe to the principle of causality as governing all phenomena. All of them (except Madhyamika) took it as ultimately real. The principle of causality as contained in the Buddhist doctrine of Pratitya Samutpada (theory of ‘dependent origination’) constitutes the central thesis for entire Buddhist thought which revolves on pivot of Pratitya Samutpada. According to this doctrine things originate in dependence upon causal conditioning and this emphasis on causality describes the central feature of Buddhist ontology/metaphysics. The Buddhists accepted causality as a universal and objective principle.

In Indian Philosophy the relation between cause and effect has been conceived in four different ways. The Samkhya advocates identity between the cause and effect and its theory is called ‘Satkaryavada’ which leads to the theory of self-becoming. According to this view things are produced out of themselves. The Buddhists do not fully adhere to this view by maintaining the difference between cause and effect. The Jaina philosophy combined the two above said views because it believes in the

1 continuous and also in the emergent aspect of the effect. The materialists and the skeptics have rejected all these alternative views as according to them things are produced by chance.

The Buddha’s search for the real nature of things led him to the discovery of the uniformity of the causal process (dhammata). According to his teaching, there is nothing in this world that does not come within the realm of the causal law. There is a spontaneous, universal and impersonal law of causation which conditions the appearance of all events, mental and physical. The law (Dhamma) works automatically without the help of any conscious guide. In accordance with it, when- ever a particular event appears, it is followed by another particular event. Everything that we perceive possesses an existence but is dependent on something else and that thing in turn does not perish without leaving some effect. Thus this doctrine adopts the middle view between the two extremes of eternalism and nihilism. This is, in fact, the Buddha’s answer to both the eternalist theory of the Substantialist, who posited an unchanging immutable ‘self’, and the annihilationist theory of the non-Substantialists, who denied continuity altogether. The Buddha is said to have expressed his views on this issue: All things are born of activities. Everything is in a state of continual transformation. There is neither creation nor destruction; there is neither beginning nor end. Yet nothing happens without cause and reason.

Hence, causality explains one of the important ontological issues – the arising and passing away of things. According to the natural causal law, that which arises conditioned by causes is sure to pass away when the causes disintegrate. The direct corollaries of the theory of causality are that all things in the world are (1) impermanent (anitya), (2) unsatisfactory (dukkha), and (3) nonsubstantial (anatman). We find some obvious similarity between naturalist theory of ‘inherent nature’ (Svabhava) and the Buddhist theory of ‘dependent origination’. Like the Buddhist’s ‘universal law of causation’ which works as a principle that conditions the appearance of all the events, the naturalist theory holds that the ‘inherent nature’ (svabhava) is a principle which governs the physical and human realm. Both of these determining principles work spontaneously without the help of any conscious guide. Nevertheless the Buddhist theory of causality differs from the naturalist on one important issue. The Buddhist theory is much more comprehensive than the naturalist theory as the former recognizes the causal pattern also in the psychic, moral, social, and spiritual realms, where as in latter everything is subordinate to physical causation. If, according to Buddhism, every change has a cause, and that cause again has a cause then there is no ultimate unchangeable or first cause. Science also knows nothing of first cause.

The Buddha has attached so much importance to the understanding of the theory of ‘dependent origination’ (pratityasamutpada) that he calls this the Dhamma. He says, to quote Chatterjee and Dutta “He who sees the pratityasamutpada sees the Dhamma, and he who sees the Dhamma sees the pratityasamutpada.”(S. C. Chatterjee and D. M. Dutta, p.132) In other words: He who has understood the chain of causation has

2 understood the inner meaning of the Dharma, and he that has grasped the Dharma has perceived the essence of Buddhahood.

Briefly speaking, everything in this universe comes within the framework of causality. Hence to know causality is to know the truth. One’s failure to grasp this ‘truth’ is the cause of misery. Based on the truth of the ‘dependent origination’ the Buddha has introduced important ethical precepts as moral paths for the removal of misery and for the attainment of enlightenment. In fact the Buddha has linked the emergence of suffering to impersonal law like behavior of causation. This impersonal law like nature of causation is well demonstrated in its standard formula found in early Buddhist sources: ‘This existing, that exists; this arising, that arises; this not existing, that does not exist; this ceasing, that ceases’. Thus, for ‘Early Buddhism’ causation is a relationship between events. This relationship can be better explained in terms of ‘dependent origination’ where if ‘X occurs Y follows, and when X does not occur Y does not follow’.

The theory of causality as explained in the ‘Early Buddhism’ implies that dependent co-arising inextricably entailed suffering and stress. Happiness based on causal conditions was inherently unstable and unreliable.

According to Buddhism as the existence of everything depends on some conditions, there must be something which being there our misery comes into existence. Life’s suffering like old age, death despair and grief is there because there is birth. If we were not born, we would not have been subject to any such sufferings. There is cause of birth. It means birth is also conditional and its condition is called bhava that is will born. Bhava is a blind tendency or predisposition to be born, which causes our birth. Again the question arises what is the cause of this blind tendency? The answer is upadana or mental clinging to the objects of the world is the condition responsible for our desire to be born. This clinging again is due to our thirst or craving to enjoy objects like sights, sounds, etc. The cause of this desire for objects lies in our experience or taste of them in the past. Previous sense-experience, tinged with some pleasant feelings (vedana), is, therefore the cause of our thirst or craving. But sense- experience presupposes contact (sparsa) i.e. contact of sense-organs with objects. But this contact was not possible without the six organs of cognitions, the five sense and manas. Again these six cognitions presuppose the existence of mind-body organism (nama-rupa), which constitutes the perceptible human body. But the development of this organism in mother’s womb was not possible without consciousness. So consciousness is the condition or cause of mind-body organism. And the cause of this consciousness that descends down into the embryo in the mother’s womb is only the impression (samskara) of past existence/past life. In the words of Chatterjee and Dutta “The last state of the past life, which initiates our present existence, contains in a concentrated manner the impressions of effects or all our past deeds. The impressions which make for rebirth are due to ignorance (avidya) about truth. If the transitory, painful nature of the worldly existence were perfectly realized, there would not arise in us any karma resulting in rebirth. Ignorance, therefore, is the root cause of impressions or tendencies that cause rebirth.” (Students are advised to visit page no

3 118 and 119 of the book An Introduction to Indian Philosophy by Chatterjee and Dutta. This book had been recommended in the class. The page no may vary depending upon the edition of the book)

Thus the doctrine of Pratityasamutpada or Dependent Origination being the foundation of all the teachings of the Buddha is contained in the Second Noble Truth where we find the elaboration of the twelve links in the chain of causation as the cause of suffering. Now, according to Buddha’s teaching one can use the dynamics of dependent co-arising to follow a path to get freedom from the chain of causality. This release from series of causality leads to the unconditioned sphere, which is beyond suffering altogether. In fact Pratityasamupada is also contained in the Third Noble Truth of the teaching of the Tathagat (the Buddha) which shows the cessation of suffering.

Buddhism to a large extent is all about the mind. Buddha internalized the whole system of ‘significant action’ and in so doing moralized it in terms of the impersonal causal law. The first two links of the process pertain to past lives. It is ignorance in the past, giving rise to morally determinative intentions in the past called Impressions which brings about the third link, consciousness, in the present life. ‘Consciousness’ here is the consciousness that comes about in the mother’s womb as the first stage of the rebirth process. And conditioned by this consciousness is the fourth link, mind- and-body. ‘Mind’ here refers to the other three aggregates alongside consciousness and held to be mental associates that is, feelings, perceptions, and formations. ‘Body’ here is the physical side of the organism, composed of derivatives of the four Great Elements, ‘earth’, ‘water’, ‘fire’, and ‘air’. Thus with this link we have an embodied individual, born in dependence upon previous morally determinative acts, traceable to the fact that he or she was not enlightened – was ignorant – in past lives.

In the words of Dr. Chandradhar Sharma “Out of these twelve links the first two are related to past life, the last two to future life and the rest to present life. This is the cycle of birth-and-death. This is the twelve-spoked wheel of Dependent Origination. This is the vicious circle of causation. It does not end with death. Death is only a beginning of a new life. It is called Bhava-chakra, Samsara-chakra, Janma-marana- chakra, Dharma-chakra, Pratityasamutpada-chakra etc. It can be destroyed only when its root-cause, Ignorance, is destroyed. Otherwise, Ignorance being present, impressions arise; impressions being present, initial consciousness arises and so on. And Ignorance can be destroyed only by knowledge. So knowledge is the sole means of liberation.” (See page no. 74-75, ‘A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy of the author)

The Buddha did not hold that the ‘reborn’ being is the same as the being who died. Thus, strictly speaking this cannot be regarded a case of rebirth. Likewise the ‘reborn’ being is not different from the being that died, at least if by ‘different’ we mean completely different. The reborn being is linked to the being that died by a causal process. Let us call the one who dies A, and the reborn being B. Then B is not the same as A. For example, B is not the same person as A. B occurs in causal

4 dependence on A. Among the relevant causal factors here are morally wholesome, or unwholesome, actions performed by A in the past. Thus at death these factors in complex ways enter into the causal process (‘karmic causality’) which leads to another embodied individual occurring, in direct dependence upon actions performed by A in one or more of his or her lives. Therefore the link between the ‘reborn being’ and the ‘being that died’ is also explained in terms of causal dependence, where karmic causation is held to be central factor in holding the whole process together.

With causation there is absolutely no need for a Self to link A and B. This is why one speaks of causal dependence ‘of the right sort’. At death the psychophysical bundle reconfigures. One figuration breaks down and another figuration takes place. The bundle is a bundle of the aggregates, but each aggregate taken as a whole is a bundle of momentary impermanent components that form members of that aggregate-class. Thus the person is reducible to the temporary bundle of bundles where all constituents are radically impermanent, temporarily held together through causal relationships of the right sort. All this is in accordance with causal laws (notably of the karmic sort). Because there is this right sort of causal dependence, we cannot say of B that he or she is totally different from A either.

Thus instead of identity and difference, and instead of eternalism and annihilationism, the Buddha substitutes dependent origination, in the sense of causal dependence. Thereby dependent origination becomes another meaning of the ‘Middle Way’. But note that while all this has been said specifically of the rebirth process here, the Buddha would consider that all this also holds throughout life. Throughout life there is constant change in accordance with causal laws and processes of the right sort. Between a person at one stage of their life – whatever stage – and at another stage of their life the relationship between the stages is one of neither identity nor difference, but dependent origination. Death is a particular sort of change, with particular modalities of causal relationships coming into play. (For elaborate discussion and understanding students may visit the book Buddhist Thought: A Complete Introduction to the Indian Tradition by Paul William, p.67-70)

For the Early Buddhism, the real as the efficient (arthakriyakari) could not be permanent; only the meomentary (ksanika) is real. Things are different at different times; there is no duration; permanence is a subjective construction put upon discrete momentary entities. There are as many entities as there are distinguishable aspects. Each entity is unique; the universal is an appearance.

Madhyamika, however, interprets Pratitya Samutpada as Sunyata and is confined to the view that causality and other categories are of empirical validity only which constitute the texture of phenomena. Madhyamika’s conclusion is actually based on its doctrine of Sunyavada which shows that all the possible ways in which the categories can be understood under the forms of identity, difference, or both, or neither are riddled with contradiction.

5 As mentioned above the materialist school of India which believes in the chance- origin of things has denied causality and has regarded it as subjective; i.e., as formed through habit and association of ideas, and therefore as merely probable. By denying some obvious relation between cause and effect the materialist school has distanced itself from the possibility of any scientific explanation on this important issue.

The understanding of the causal pattern as contained in Early Buddhism and its application to the human behavior paves the way to put an end to all defiling tendencies and thereby attain freedom. In this context, actually, Buddha developed his ethical doctrine of Karman, where Karman is essentially volition (Intention) which leads to action of body, speech, or mind. The Buddha gave a causal account of Karman which is known as Kamma-niyama. He has also explained how Karman determines the life of an individual. Hence Buddhism, in its ethical formulation, is all about mind where Buddha internalized the whole system of ‘significant action’, and in so doing moralized it in terms of the impersonal causal law which is somehow scientific in its outlook, texture and temperament.

Note: Students if needed you may visit the following books which I have also consulted while preparing the study material. In the past I had prepared a research paper also on the related subject with the help of the following texts. So I have taken the contents also from that research paper. I have mentioned these books also in the interest of students who are in M.A or preparing for various other examinations including NET so that they should know and consult these books related to Buddhism. This study material will also be sent to them on their group. So if required correlate the contents with the following books. Typing error, if any, is regretted. 1- Beyer, S. (1974) The Buddhist Experience Sources and Interpretation, Encino, Calif : Dickenson 2- Chandradhar Sharma, A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy, MLBD, 1991 3- Chattergee, S.C. and Dutta, D.M. (7th edition & First MLBD edition: Delhi, 2016) An Introduction to Indian Philosophy, MLBD, 1968 4- Dasgupta, Surendranath. (1992) A History of Indian Philosophy (vol.1) Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas 5- Gombrich Richard. (1996) How Buddhism began : The Conditioned Geneses The Early Teaching, London and Atlantic Highlands , N.J. Athlone Press 6- Harvey Peter. (1990) Introduction to Buddhism:Teaching History and Practices, New Delhi Munshiram Manoharlal Publisher. Pvt. Ltd. 7- Kalupahana, David J. (1976) Buddhist Philosophy: A Historical Analysis, Honolulu : The University of Hawaii 8- P. Laxmi Narasu. (2002) The Essence of Buddhism (2nd.edit.) Buddha Bhumi Prakashan, Nagpur. 9- Saddhatissa, H. (1970) Buddhist Ethics, London: George Allen & Unwin 10- T. R. V. Murti. (1980) The Central Philosophy of Buddhism, London: George Allen & Unwin 11- Williams, Paul. with Tribe, Anthony. (2000) Buddhist Thought : A Complete Introduction to the Indian Tradition, London and New york: Routledge.

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Students are advised to contact me telephonically or through WhatsApp group if they feel problem in understanding any portion of this study material.

Shailesh Kumar Singh Department of Philosophy, A.N. College, Patna

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