The Three Natures and the Path to Liberation in Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda Thought Joy Brennan, Kenyon College

Kenyon College From the SelectedWorks of Joy Brennan Spring May 9, 2018 The Three Natures and the Path to Liberation in Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda Thought Joy Brennan, Kenyon College Available at: https://works.bepress.com/joy-brennan/8/ 1 The Three Natures and the Path to Liberation in Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda Thought1 Joy Cecile Brennan Abstract This paper provides a new interpretation of the three natures theory of Yogācāra- Vijñānavāda thought by means of an examination of the path theory associated with it, which has not been previously examined in scholarly literature. The paper first examines this path theory in a number of foundational texts to show that the widely accepted pivotal model is not in fact the three natures model that predominates in foundational Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda literature. Second, the paper offers a new interpretation of the three natures theory as providing a new causal model of the arising of suffering, and a corresponding theory of its cessation. This new causal model both makes possible the continued use of the kind of dharma analysis that Abhidharma thought employs to provide a causal analysis of the arising of suffering, and also couches such dharma analysis within the Mahāyāna framework of the emptiness of dharmas. Key Terms: Buddhism, three natures, Yogācāra, Vijñānavāda, Mahāyāna, emptiness, path. Introduction Buddhist philosophy as a discursive tradition is rooted in a motivating set of problems: the fact of suffering and the causes of its arising. These problems are first articulated, so the story goes, in the historical Buddha’s first teaching moment, when he describes the four noble’s truths to his former ascetic companions and first students. Anchored in these truths, the central task of this discursive tradition is to analyze to the fullest extent the nature of suffering, its arising, and the path to its cessation. For its central role in this set of concerns, causation becomes an essential problematic for Buddhist thought. The range of questions found within the purview of this problematic is extensive: not just ‘whence suffering’, but also what categories of causes are there; what kinds of phenomena (dharmas) give rise to which other kinds; what conditions are associated with a given cause; where does causal power lie; how can the causes of suffering be extinguished; and, finally, in the Mahāyāna schools, how can causation, usually described through the method of dharma analysis characteristic of Abhidharma literature, be squared with the emptiness of dharmas? A number of these questions are elegantly answered within the Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda school by the three natures theory, in particular by its associated path theory. But the possibility of discerning these answers remains obscured by the standard interpretation of the 1 “This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in the Journal of Indian Philosophy. The final authenticated version is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10781-018-9356-4. 2 theory upon Anglophone scholarship of the past few decades has settled. The commonly embraced name for that standard interpretation is the “pivotal model”, according to which the dependent nature is understood to be a basic ontological reality, itself morally neutral, underlying two distinct cognitive orientations towards it, one defiled (the constructed nature) and one purified (the perfected nature). Ever since Alan Sponberg coined this name for the model and deemed it the classical Indian presentation of the three natures by distinguishing it from the “progressive model”, identified as a later conceptual innovation, the pivotal model has been taken as the standard three natures theory model from which later models are thought to deviate (Sponberg 1983, pp. 97-119).2 But in fact a survey of the primary source materials shows that the predominant three natures model as represented in foundational Yogācāra- Vijñānavāda literature is more like the progressive than the pivotal. Taking up this progressive model – indeed it is more appropriately called a path model, for reasons discussed below – we may then pose the fundamental interpretive question: what is the three natures theory for? This paper has two goals: first, to use an exegetical method to show that the pivotal model is not in fact the three natures model that predominates in early and foundational Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda literature, and second, to offer an interpretation of the three natures theory that answers the fundamental question of the theory’s purport. To answer the latter question, this paper shows that the three natures theory offers a new causal model of the arising of suffering, and a corresponding theory of its cessation. The basic insight of this new causal model is that causation itself is characterized as the false attribution of causal powers to the identifying characteristics (svalakṣaṇa) of dharmas, where it is this very activity of false attribution, rather than the identifying characteristics of dharmas, that possesses causal efficacy. This false attribution is the essence of delusion, for its very nature is to serve as the cause of the arising of suffering through a mis-identification of the cause of its arising. This new causal model both makes possible the continued use of the kind of dharma analysis that had previously been understood as providing a causal analysis of the arising of suffering and also couches such dharma analysis within the Mahāyāna framework of the emptiness of dharmas. In short, this paper puts new textual discoveries about the three natures theory to work in interpreting the theory as proffering a novel causal model of the arising of suffering and its cessation, one that reconciles dharma analysis with the principle of the emptiness of dharmas. The path towards these two goals moves through a consideration of the path theory associated with the three natures. An unrecognized but crucial feature of the three natures theory as presented in early and foundational Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda source texts is that it is invariably accompanied by a path theory. That path theory, moreover, directly parallels the path theory traditionally taught with regard to the first three noble’s truths. The canonical narration of the historical Buddha’s statement of the four noble’s truths has it that the truth of suffering should be thoroughly known, the arising of suffering abandoned, and the truth of cessation directly realized. These three processes serve as a ballast to the traditionally recognized path theory formulated in the fourth noble truth, for they provide the meta-ethical framework – the ontology of delusion and liberation – within which the prescriptions of the fourth noble truth may unfold. The three natures path theory repurposes those three processes, 2 For interpretations that present this viewpoint see for example: Nagao 1991, p. 64; Boquist 1993, p. 17; Williams 2009, 90-91; and Hamilton 2001, p. 102-103. 3 describing the constructed nature (parikalpita-svabhāva) as the object of thorough knowledge, the dependent nature (paratantra-svabhāva) as the object of abandonment, and the perfected nature (pariniṣpanna-svabhāva) as that of direct realization. Just as the first two noble truths describe the chief characteristic of the constructed world, suffering, and the causes of its arising, so too does the constructed nature describe the chief characteristic of the constructed world and the dependent nature describe the cause of its arising. And in both cases, cessation or perfection is the absence of that arising. From this three natures path theory emerges a new interpretation of the purpose of the three natures theory: it is a novel causal description of the arising of suffering and the possibility of its cessation, but one that accords with the view that dharmas are empty. The commonly held view that the pivotal model best represents the predominant three natures theory is therefore both inaccurate and obfuscatory. It wrongly identifies the dependent nature as the basic ontological reality rather than the causal description of the arising of delusion and suffering. And it wrongly identifies the constructed nature as the source or activity of delusion, thereby misunderstanding its ontological status as non-existent and its relationship to the dependent nature. Finally, it obscures the way that the three natures theory serves as re-formulation of the realities represented by the first three noble’s truths – and the processes to be undertaken with regard to those realities – that is Mahāyānic in its careful delineation of the emptiness of dharmas. Before proceeding, let me offer two notes, one about texts and one about terminology. About texts: the ideas here will draw upon a swath of Mahāyāna Buddhist scholastic literature, in particular a set of texts that are generally agreed upon to form the foundation of Yogācāra- Vijñānavāda thought.3 This paper draws upon this set, rather than focus on one or two texts or one or two thinkers’ presentations of the theory, for two reasons. First, the three natures path theory was neither peculiar to a given text or author nor a mere footnote to the three natures theory. Every single one of the texts examined here discusses the three natures path theory as a central facet of the discussion of the three natures.4 The path theory is then an essential 3 The Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda texts examined here include: those that were first composed in Sanskrit and of which there exists a Sanskrit version (the Mahāyāna-sūtra-ālaṃkāra and its commentary, the Madhyānta-vibhāga and its commentary and sub-commentary, and two treatises generally attributed to Vasubandhu, the Triṃśikā and the Trisvabhāva-nirdeśa, as well as the commentary on the former by Sthiramati); those that were composed in Sanskrit but are preserved in their entireties only in other languages, namely Tibetan and/or Chinese (the Saṃdhnirmocana-sūtra and the Mahāyāna-saṃgraha); and those that were composed in Chinese while clearly in conversation with the Sanskritic textual corpus of the Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda school (the San wuxing lun of Paramārtha and the Cheng weishi lun of Xuanzang).

Load more