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Buddhisms

Vasubandhu

The Inner Science of Buddhist Practice: Vasubandhu's Summary of the Five Heaps with Commentary by Sthiramati  by Artemus B. Engle (The Tsadra Foundation Series: Snow Lion) "Art Engle's translation of Vasubandhu's Summary of the Five Heaps with Sthiramati's Commentary is a welcome contribution to the growing collection of solid English translations of works from the Indo-Tibetan Tengyur. His closely reasoned introduction shows convincingly how mastery of the analytic psychology of the Abhidharma is essential to the understanding and practice of the Mahayana path. This book is essential reading for practitioners and scholars alike." --Robert Thurman, Jey Tsong Khapa Professor of Indo-Tibetan Studies, Columbia

It is a lucid explanation of the Buddhist concepts of mind and mental factors, especially the skandhas that cohere to create a sense of permanence and a sense of self.. The introduction explains how a better understanding of Buddhist terminology and concepts can enhance spiritual practice, especially that of the teaching system known as the Stages of the Path. This book expertly delineates the system of classical Buddhist psychology.

Excerpt: AT ITS HEART, Buddhism is a system of spiritual practice that teaches individuals how to transform themselves from a condition of unhappiness and confusion to progressively higher states of virtue and knowledge. Potentially, at least, it has the ability to lead them to the attainment of enlightenment itself. Indeed, the path that the Buddha revealed to his followers is understood to be the very one that he himself traversed. The challenge for those who seek to follow this path is first to learn what it consists of and then to integrate it into their lives. Put another way, study and practice are the main tools by which every Buddhist should endeavor to bring about his or her spiritual development.

When someone first turns his or her attention to Buddhism, it is usually prompted by a sense of disquiet or lack of personal fulfillment. This can stem from such factors as a realization that material prosperity and the pursuit of ordinary pleasures do not provide genuine or lasting satisfaction. From the perspective of the Dharma this kind of reaction is not only understandable, it is essential; without it we would never feel any need to escape from the bewilderment of samsaric life.

The first teaching that the Buddha made following his enlightenment was to a group of five religious ascetics just outside the ancient city of Varanasi. These individuals had been companions of the Buddha during a period before his enlightenment in which they had all engaged in severe forms of physical hardship and privation. The Blessed One began his famous discourse on the Four Noble Truths' by observing that a religious ascetic should avoid these two extremes: devotion to indulgence in sense pleasures and devotion to self-mortification. Clearly, the Buddha was telling these spiritual seekers that it was fruitless to engage in the kind of self-inflicted physical torment that they had been practicing.

The modern Westerner, man or woman, cannot easily identify with the austere life that is typically followed by homeless ascetics. However, not all of the Buddha's disciples were individuals who had renounced the householder's life and were embarked upon a search for spiritual salvation. In fact, the Buddha's very next convert was the young son of a wealthy merchant in Varanasi who simply woke up one night and found himself overcome by a deep sense of despair. Having set out from his home not knowing where he was headed or what he would do, he happened upon the Buddha, presumably within days of when he had turned the wheel of the Dharma for the first time. This incident is described in the Vinaya scriptures' and although it took place more than two thousand years ago, one can easily imagine how similar circumstances might befall any of us today. It reveals how the Blessed One dealt skillfully with a troubled youth, first calming his mind and uplifting his spirits, and then guiding him to a point where he was ready to comprehend the Four Noble Truths. At the end of the encounter, Yasha attains the status of an Arhat. The passage concludes with the assertion, expressed in verse,' that even someone clothed in the finery of worldly society—that is, even a layperson—can and should develop virtuous qualities and follow the basic principles of a spiritual life.

From the very earliest days, Lord Buddha welcomed and gave Dharma instruction to persons who were living the ordinary life of a householder. After giving Yasha the instruction that brought about his liberation, the Blessed One accepted an invitation to receive a meal at the home of his family. While there, he gave a discourse on the Dharma to Yasha's mother and his former wife that inspired the two to become the first women to take refuge in the Three Jewels. Soon, four of Yasha's close friends and then some fifty more young men from well-to-do families in the region followed him into the Sangha, or religious community of monks.

These novices would certainly have been introduced to the Buddha's teachings in a gradual manner. Only when their understanding had developed sufficiently would they have been taught the more profound elements of instruction that are meant to bring complete liberation from any further samsaric rebirth. Here is the description from the Vinaya scriptures of how the Tathagata instructed Yasha:

Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, then went to the Komitra River. At this time, the Blessed One was on the far side of the Komitra River, out in the open outside a hall, at times sitting and at other times walking about. From a distance, Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, saw the Blessed One walking by the edge of the Komitra River, and cried out in anguish, "0 ascetic, I am tormented; 0 ascetic, I am in distress." Then the Blessed One said to Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, "Come here, son. This is a place where you can be freed of torment and distress."

So Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, removed his jewel slippers worth a vast sum by the bank of the Komitra River and, after crossing the river, approached the Blessed One. He bowed his head to the feet of the Blessed One and sat down nearby. The Blessed One brought Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, to a sheltered area and, once there, the two seated themselves. After taking a seat, the Blessed One rightly taught and instructed Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, with conversation relating to Dharma, and rightly uplifted his spirits and caused him to feel happy.

The Buddhas give as their first Dharma instruction a discussion on generosity, morality, and the celestial realms. They explain at length the meager value and disadvantages of sensory pleasures, the nature of affliction and purification, renunciation, the benefits of living in solitude, and those qualities that are conducive to purification.

When the Blessed One realized that Yasha had become happy in mind, virtuous in mind, satisfied in mind, that his mind was free of obstacles, that he had become pious and was able to understand the most excellent Dharma if it were taught to him, the Blessed One then taught him at length the Buddhas' most excellent teaching on the Four Noble Truths—that is, suffering, origination, cessation and the path. And just as a clean and dirt-free cloth that has been rendered suitable for dyeing is able to properly hold fast the dye, Yasha, son of Kula Shresthi, was able to realize the Four Noble Truths of suffering, origination, cessation and the path.

In Tibetan Buddhism, such a step-by-step approach underlies the teaching system known as Lamrim, or "Stages of the Path." The nature of this process of transformation from an ordinary secular person to a disciplined spiritual practitioner capable of pursuing liberation and even supreme enlightenment is the main topic explored in Part One of this book.

The teacher who introduced the Lamrim teaching in Tibet, Atha Dipamkara Srijnana, was born into a prosperous, royal family of East Bengal around the year 982. C.E. A lay practitioner during his early years, he received ordination as a bhiksu or monk, at the age of twenty-nine. His dedication to Buddhist learning and practice led him to travel to what many believe was the island of Sumatra, where he studied for some twelve years with a teacher known popularly as Suvarnadvipa Guru, or Master from the Golden Isles. Lord Atha revered this guru more than any of his one hundred and fifty-two spiritual teachers, because it was under his tutelage that Atha was able to develop genuine enlightenment mind. After returning to India, he successfully defended the faith on a number of occasions in debates with followers of non-Buddhist traditions. With the growth of his reputation as an erudite and authoritative scholar, he was offered a teaching position under the royal patronage of King Mahipala (c. 995-1043 C.E.) at Vikramasila Monastery, an important center of Buddhist learning that was situated about so kilometers east of the present-day city of Bhagalpur in the state of Bihar.

Aspiring Tibetans scholars had been traveling to Vikramasila to pursue their studies for some time. It was while Lord Atisa was in residence here that Jangchub WO, a king from the Ngari region of western Tibet, invited him to come to Tibet to spread the Buddha's teaching. He was officially welcomed by the king at Toding Temple around the year 1037. Although he originally planned to teach only a few years and then return to India, Lord Atisa remained in Tibet for the rest of his life, passing away in the town of Nyetang near Lhasa at the age of seventy-two in the fall of the Horse Year (1054), according to his earliest and most authoritative biography.

It was while in residence at Toding Temple that Lord Atha composed the sixty-eight-verse poem entitled Lamp of the Path to Enlightenment, which is considered the root text of the widely influential Lamrim tradition. Almost a thousand years have gone by since Lord Atisa began teaching this instruction in Tibet. Over the centuries the tradition has not merely survived, it has thrived greatly and spawned a prodigious body of native Tibetan religious literature devoted to its propagation. Of this literature, no work has been more important than the Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment, which was composed by the great Tibetan lama Tsongkapa Losang Drakpa (1357-1419) at the age of forty-six in the Water Horse Year (1402). The life-long spiritual activities of this illustrious figure led to the formation of the Gelukpa tradition, one of the four major schools of Tibetan Buddhism. Je Tsongkapa was already an accomplished scholar by the time that he first received several lineages of instruction on the Lamrim teachings. Nevertheless, in a letter to one of his own lamas he described why he felt this teaching system was so important:

It is clear that this instruction [introduced] by Dipamkara on the stages of the path to enlightenment . . . teaches [the meanings contained in] all the canonical scriptures, their commentaries, and related instruction by combining them into a single graded path. One can see that when taught by a capable teacher and put into practice by able listeners it brings order, not just to some minor instruction, but to the entire [body of ] canonical scriptures. Therefore, I have not taught a wide variety of [other] instructions.

Thus, a key point to recognize about the Lamrim teaching is that at its heart it is a systematic collection of oral instructions that make use of the entire range of Buddhist literature to present a comprehensive program for spiritual transformation. In addition to copious citations from traditional Indian Buddhist literature, Je Tsongkapa's Great Treatise includes many pithy and insightful sayings of the early Tibetan teachers known as followers of the Kadampa School. The instructions begin with the most fundamental elements of Buddhist doctrine and then gradually introduce the student to the requisite meditation practices that will enable him or her eventually to become fully engaged in the vast and profound tradition that is Mahayana Buddhism.

The Translations

Two translations are presented in Part Two: Vasubandhu's Summary of the Five Heaps and Sthiramati's Detailed Commentary on the Summary of the Five Heaps. Sthiramati states in the opening portion of his commentary that the purpose of the root text is "to make known the general and specific characteristics of entities." He then offers several reasons for composing such an abbreviated treatment of this material. The one that is most relevant for the modern Western reader states: "Because householders are involved in a great many activities, they are unable to apply themselves to the study of a large work," such as Asanga's Levels of Spiritual Practice. In short, Vasubandhu's root text is an introduction to the fundamental elements of Buddhistphilosophical thought, with some attention given to the unique tenets of the Mind Only School. Thus, it provides a concise overview for those who have only a limited opportunity to learn about the Abhidharma. However, it can also be seen as a starting point for those who intend to pursue a more extensive and wide-ranging study of Buddhist philosophy.

The great Indian scholar and teacher Vasubandhu is believed to have been born in the early part of the fourth century in the city that is now called Peshawar, the capital of the North-West Frontier Province in Pakistan. What little is known about his life is based mainly on differing accounts found in several Chinese and Tibetan sources.' One thing that can be said with confidence is that, aside from his elder brother Asanga, he is the most important proponent of the Buddhist Mind Only School. Tibetans refer to him as a "second Buddha" and count him as one of six "ornaments" among Indian Buddhist scholars.

Of his many writings, the Treasury of Higher Learning (S: Abhidharma-kosah, T: Chos mngon pa'i mdzod), a work that is written in verse, along with its autocommentary have exerted a great influence on Tibetan Buddhism. Considered one of his earlier works, the root text is essentially a compendium of the Abhidharma views formulated by proponents of an early Buddhist realist tradition known as the Vaibhasika School. Vasubandhu's works on the Mind Only School include commentaries to three of Maitreya's Five Dharma Teachings: The Ornament of Mahayana Sutras (S: Mahayanasutralamkarah), The Treatise That Distinguishes the Middle Way from Extreme Views (S: Madhyantavibhagah), and The Treatise That Distinguishes Phenomena and Their Ultimate Nature (S: Dharmadharmatavibhagah gab). In addition to the Summary of the Five Heaps and a number of other original works, he also wrote commentaries to Asanga's Summary of the Mahayana Tradition (S: Mahayanasamgrahah) and to such Mahayana sutras as the Diamond-cutter (S: Vajracchedika), the Teachings ofAksayamati (S:Aksayamatinirdesah), and the Ten Levels [of an Arya Bodhisattva] (S: Dasabhumika).

Even less is known about the life of Sthiramati than that of Vasubandhu. The Tibetan scholars Butön Rinchen Drup and Taranatha give more or less similar accounts; however, even Butön expresses some reservations about their authenticity. Both writers cite the legend that in his previous life he was a dove who listened to Vasubandhu recite the hundred-thousand-line version of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutra, and indicate that he studied with the Master at an early age. Other sources identify him as having mainly been a disciple of Gunamati. Modern scholars generally believe that he flourished in the mid-sixth century.

Tibetan tradition describes Sthiramati as having surpassed Vasubandhu in his knowledge of the Abhidharma. The Tengyur collection contains a commentary by him on Vasubandhu's Treasury of Higher Learning. He wrote a number of commentaries on other works by Vasubandhu, and is recognized principally for this effort. Writing in a style that is both lucid and straightforward, his subcommentaries on the Ornament of Mahayana Sutras and the Treatise That Distinguishes the Middle Way from Extreme Views are especially valuable resources that provide extensive explanations of Buddhist doctrine. I consider his Detailed Commentary on the Summary of the Five Heaps to be one of the most informative works on the topic of mind and mental factors.

It is true that the form in which the Lamrim instructions are usually taught does not rely heavily on the complex explanations that are the province of Abhidharma literature. One benefit of this fact is that the teachings are for the most part quite accessible even to the layperson with limited exposure to Buddhist philosophy. At the same time, it is also stated a number of times in Pabongka Rinpoche's Liberation in Our Hands that certain points are assumed to be familiar to those who have studied the "great treatises"' but too difficult to explain to the unschooled listener. Tibetan lamas can be heard to make similar remarks today when they are giving a teaching on the Lamrim instruction.

Perhaps the simplicity and directness of the language used in this teaching system is a reflection of the devotional aspect of the practice, which places the greatest emphasis on bringing about spiritual transformation. Commentaries typically use such expressions as "develop a mental change" (T: yid 'gyur Skye ba) or "elicit an experiential awareness" (T: myong ba thon pa) to describe the immediate goal of any given meditation topic. Everyone knows that scholarship alone, untempered by such virtues as faith and humility, can easily lead to the very antithesis of spirituality. On the other hand, the discussions that follow attempt to make the case that gaining at least some knowledge of the closely reasoned explanations found in Buddhist philosophical literature has the very real potential of enabling one's spiritual endeavors to achieve a depth and strength that might not otherwise be possible.

 

 

 

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