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The Paṭiccasamuppāda: A developed formula

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

D. M. Williams
D. M. Williams
Affiliation:
Head of Religious Education, Bungay High School, Suffolk
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Extract

The purpose of this article should become plain during the reading of it, but perhaps some prior explanation is needed. Almost from the beginning of my study of the paṭiccasamuppāda I have had the notion that it could not have come into existence in the form the usual twelvefold formulation takes. For reasons which I try to make clear this twelvefold formulation is not a satisfactory statement of what it is supposed to explain, namely the reasons for each individual's continued rebirths. I feel - and sadly I have to emphasize, before someone else does it for me, that in the final analysis I am relying more or less on intuition for my attitude towards the twelvefold formulation - that if one person alone had been responsible for the usually referred to formulation, and especially if that one person had been the Buddha, then those anomalies that now prevail would never have existed.

Type
Articles
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , March 1978 , pp. 35 - 56
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1978

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References

page 35 note 1 Numen (1974), vol. XXI, pp. 35–63.Google Scholar

page 35 note 2 A Survey of Buddhism, Bangalore, 1966.Google Scholar

page 36 note 1 His preferred ‘translation’ of paticcasamuppāda, following Dr Edward Conze.

page 36 note 2 This ‘general formula’, which can otherwise be known as the abstract formula, is as follows: Iti imasmim sati idam hoti, imassuppadā idam uppajjati; imasmim asati idam nå hoti, imassa nirodha idam nirujjhati. (This being, that becomes, with the arising of this, that arises. This not being, that does not become, with the cessation of this, that does not arise.)

page 36 note 3 The Sanskrit form of paticcasamuppāda.

page 36 note 4 Op. cit. pp. 87–8.Google Scholar

page 37 note 1 Op. cit. p. 101.Google Scholar

page 37 note 2 Literally, ‘spoken by the Buddha’, not ‘spoken by the bhikkhus’.

page 37 note 3 The Buddha (London, 1973).Google Scholar

page 37 note 4 Op. cit. p. 108. My emphasis.Google Scholar

page 38 note 1 Buddhist Thought in India (London, 1962).Google Scholar

page 38 note 2 Here he makes reference to Suttanipāta 727–753, 862 ff.Google Scholar, D.II.62, M.I.48. He also refers to Silburn's, LilianInstant et Cause (Paris, 1955), pp. 197–9Google Scholar, Oltramere's, P.La formule bouddhique des douze causes (Geneva, 1909), pp. 27–36Google Scholar, and the Abhidharmakośa III.70–72, ‘etc.’.Google Scholar

page 38 note 3 Op. cit. p. 157.Google Scholar

page 39 note 1 S.II.10.

page 39 note 2 Pubbe va me bhikkhave sambodhā anabhisambuddhassa bodhisattasseva sato (S.II.10).

page 39 note 3 Ud.I.

page 39 note 4 Vin.I.1.

page 39 note 5 S.II.104.

page 39 note 6 S.II.104.

page 39 note 7 D.II.30–2.

page 39 note 8 M.I.163.

page 39 note 9 M.I.167.

page 40 note 1 A.IV.176–9.

page 40 note 2 A.IV.439–48.

page 40 note 3 M.I.21–2.

page 40 note 4 I would prefer to leave sankhāra untranslated. In my previous article on the P-s. (see footnote 1 on p. 35)Google Scholar I eventually ‘translated’ this term as ‘volitional sustenance’. At least one Buddhist scholar rejects this, but another equally reputable scholar has stated that there is something to be said for it. (Since both the comments were made in private correspondence, I do not feel at liberty to name names.) Given time and resources, I might reconsider the matter of translation, but only to the degree of refining the one just given. In the final analysis, however, the word remains virtually untranslatable, though a study of the various texts will provide the reader with some understanding of its meaning within the context of the P-s.

page 41 note 1 See Kindred Sayings, vol. 11 (London, 1952), p. 79 n. 1.Google Scholar

page 41 note 2 For a discussion of these theories see Karunaratne, W. S., ‘Concepts of Freedom and Responsibility in Theravăda Buddhism’ in University of Ceylon Review, vol. 17 (1959), pp. 77 ff.Google Scholar; and Kalupahana, D. J., ‘A Prolegomena to the Philosophy of Relations’ in University of Ceylon Review, vol. 19 (1961), pp. 177 ff.Google Scholar

page 41 note 3 Kindred Sayings, vol. 11, p. 81. My emphasis.Google Scholar

page 42 note 1 S.II.18.

page 42 note 1 D.II.56.

page 43 note 1 For a further discussion on this matter, see my article, op. cit. pp. 44–7.Google Scholar

page 44 note 1 See Warder, A. K., Indian Buddhism (Delhi, 1970), p. 44, for a suggestion that the Buddha's life-span was somewhat less than 80 years.Google Scholar

page 44 note 2 A Dictionary of Comparative Religion, Brandon, S. G. F. (ed.) (London, 1970), p. 610, s.v. ‘Theology’.Google Scholar

page 44 note 3 Nyanatiloka's translation. See Buddhist Dictionary (Colombo, 1956), s.v. ‘upadhi’.Google Scholar

page 45 note 1 Vol. 11, pp. 76 f.Google Scholar

page 45 note 2 Pali-English Dictionary (London, 1966), s.v. ‘sammasati’.Google Scholar

page 45 note 3 ‘The sutta is thus clearly a composite of early and late strata.’ Studies in the Origins of Buddhism, Pande, G. C. (Allahabad, 1974), p. 151.Google Scholar

page 45 note 4 Interpreted by Lord Chalmers as being the ‘deity of generation’, Further Dialogues of the Buddha, vol. 1 (Sacred Books of the Buddhists, vol. 5) (London, 1926), p. 189Google Scholar; and by Thomas, E. J. as ‘the disembodied individual to be reincarnated’ (sic), The Life of the Buddha (London, 1930), p. 36.Google Scholar

Miss I. B. Horner's footnote to this text is worth quoting: ‘MA.ii.310 explains gandhabba as the being who is coming into the womb... the being about to enter the womb (tatrûpakasatta) … about to come into that situation, being driven on by the mechanism of kamma. See Wijesekera, O. H. de A., Vedic Gandharva and Pali Gandhabba, Ceylon University Review, vol. III, no. 1 (April, 1945)Google Scholar, who suggests that gandhabba means a “samsaric being in the intermediate stage (between death and birth)”.’ [Horner, I. B., The Middle Length Sayings vol. 1 (London, 1967), pp. 321–2, n. 6.]Google Scholar

page 47 note 1 See my article, op. cit. p. 44.Google Scholar

page 47 note 2 See Pali-English Dictionary, s.v. ‘āgati’.

page 47 note 3 Note that these are not separated in the text.

page 48 note 1 Tasmim patitthite viññāne virūlhe nāmarūpassa avakkanti hoti.

page 49 note 1 Phassa is usually translated to mean ‘contact’. However, within the context of the P-s. I insist upon translating it by ‘reaction’. See my article, op. cit. pp. 50–3.Google Scholar

page 50 note 1 See note 3 on p. 45.Google Scholar

page 50 note 2 See Barham, A. L., The Wonder that was India (London, 1967), pp. 320, 407–9Google Scholar; Brhadaranyaka Upanisad III.6.1, Taittiriya Upanisad II.8.

page 50 note 3 The connecting term, so to speak, in the usual twelvefold formulation between one nidāna and the one preceding. Paccaya's literal meaning is ‘support’, but when used in the P-s. it needs to be understood in terms of ‘cause’, ‘reason’, ‘dependence’, which are, of course, complementary to, and not exclusive of, the more literal meaning.

page 50 note 4 S.II.96–7.

page 50 note 5 S.II.101.

page 51 note 1 M.I.54–5.

page 52 note 1 See S.II.4 for a definition of avijjā within the specific context of the P-s.

page 52 note 2 See note 4 on p. 40.Google Scholar

page 52 note 3 Hiriyana, M., Outlines of Indian Philosophy (London, 1967), pp. 146–7.Google Scholar

page 53 note 1 M.I.423 (= M.III.24I–2).

page 55 note 1 See note 1 on p. 49.Google Scholar

page 55 note 2 Thera, Piyadassi, The Buddha's Ancient Path (London, 1964), p. 184.Google Scholar

page 56 note 1 Atha kho n'atthi jatiyā, jarāmaranasmā, sokaparidevadukkhadomanassupāyāsehi nissaranam. N'atthi dukkhasmā nissaranam vadāmi.