Touching the Essence

- Six Lectures on Buddhism

by Bhikkhu Dhammapala

Wheel No. 132 / 133 / 134

Copyright © Kandy, Buddhist Publication Society, (1944,1969,1986)
BPS Online Edition © (2007)
Digital Transcription Source: Buddhist Publication Society

For free distribution. This work may be republished, reformatted, reprinted and redistributed in any medium. However, any such republication and redistribution is to be made available to the public on a free and unrestricted basis and translations and other derivative works are to be clearly marked as such.

 First Edition: 1944 (YMBA, Colombo)

Second Edition: 1969

Third Edition: 1986

First two editions published under the title: Broadcasts on Buddhism.

From the Foreword to the First Edition

The nature of the radio lectures delivered by me was such that a more careful study of them was thought to be useful not only for the many who listened in at the time, but especi­ally for all who were not in the same position.

The lectures, which form a series, touch upon the most essential parts of the Buddha’s teaching, the Four Noble Truths, the three characteristics of anicca, dukkha and anattaa, the doctrine of kamma, the pa.ticca samuppaada and the deliverance of Nibbaana. The second part of the lecture on Soullessness, being of a more polemic nature, could not be broadcast for obvious reasons, but was delivered at the Y.M.B.A., Colombo, the original publishers of this series, under the caption: “Can the soul-idea be vindicated?”

The many questions that followed this and similar lectures are a proof of the great interest taken in Buddhism by the intellectual classes, if only the Norm is presented to them in a normal way which will satisfy their hunger for truth.

May this publication bring about, if not satisfaction, at least a whetting of their appetite!

Bhikkhu Dhammapaala
Udawatte Temple,
Kandy.
March 15^th, 2487–1944.

Contents

The Evolution of Truth.

Soullessness.

Joy and Sorrow.

The Process of Life.

Dependent Origination.

Nibbaana.

 

The Evolution of Truth

Aparutaa tesa.m amatassa dvaaraa
Ye sotavanto pamu.tcantu saddhaa.m.
Open are the doors to the Deathless state;
You that have ears, send forth true faith!

Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta

With those solemn words the Buddha declared his intention to preach his noble teaching, “deep as a lake, hard to perceive, difficult to grasp, tranquil, sublime, beyond sophistry, abstruse, comprehensible (only) by the wise” (MN 26).

After having attained that “unsurpassable supreme Enlightenment,” while the Master was seated at the foot of the goatherd’s banyan-tree at Uruvelaa, he hesitated wondering whether it would be of any use to make his newly found truth known to the world. For “to mankind devoted to, intent on, and delighting in its attachments it is hard to understand this condition of things, their causal connection, their dependent origination, the cessation of all conditioned things, the rejection of every basis of rebirth, the waste of craving, dispassionateness, cessation, deliverance” (Mv 5).

But then also the thought came to him that there would be beings only slightly covered with the dust of worldliness, who not hearing the Norm would go to ruin, but hearing it might become knowers of the truth.

It was for the sake of those few that the Lord Buddha established at Benares in the Deer park at Isipatana his Teaching supreme, “which cannot be overthrown either by monk or priest, by god or devil, or by anyone in the world” (MN 141).

It is in this first discourse that the Lord Buddha points out that Middle Path which alone can lead to Deliverance by the avoidance of both extremes.

Now, after more than 2,500 years, that same discourse is still applicable, word for word, because only a few have understood and seen, whose ears and eyes were only slightly covered with the dust of ignorance and lust.

The doors to the Deathless are opened wide still for everyone who cares to see.

But also the two extremes are there, more attractive than ever. One extreme is “being intent upon luxurious living in sensuous pleasures, which is despicable, vulgar, ordinary, base, leading to no good.” It is the extreme of materialism, which sees but one origin, matter; and which strives but for one end, material well-being.

The other extreme is “being intent upon self-mortifica­tion which is painful, ignoble, leading to no good.” It is the extreme of idealism, which sees but one reality, that of thought; and strives but for one end, the liberation of that thinking “self.”

It was again at the end of the last century that scientific materialism and idealistic monism confronted one another as two independent modes of thought. Theoretically opposed like two extremes, they practically converge both in their starting point and in their goal. “Self” is their beginning and satisfaction is their end.

There is very little difference between the materialists, condemned by the Lord Buddha, the-Epicureans of 300 B.C. denying an external agency as the cause of matter and hence concluding that the highest good was pleasure, and the later materialists like Hobbes, or the Positivists like Comté and Stuart Mill, holding that only the sensuous can be an object of knowledge.

Though cautious thinkers have abandoned the attempt to explain the entire universe in terms of matter and motion—though the frank materialism of Moleschott (1852), relegating all the phenomena of life and mind to the changes of matter, is dead to all appearances—yet this scientific thinking had deep repercussions, the effects of which will long still be felt.

As soon as science became applied, human craving monopolized it for the sake of its own satisfaction. Inven­tions have been utilized for the increase of comfort. But increase of comfort has only led to desire for still more; and the desire for more has led and will always lead to conflict and conquest. “Over-civilization has brought us to a point where the work of getting food is so strenuous that we lose our appetite for food in the process of getting it” (Lin Yutang).

Life has become unnatural because it has become mech­anized; man is reduced to the position of a cogwheel in a machine. Like a cogwheel is moved on and on by other, sometimes smaller, wheels, and thus by turning round and round merely passes on that movement to the next, thus man, to find his place in society must move on with society, and in his whirling round gets hold also of others, whom he drags along with him in the vortex of materialism.

Surely, that is “despicable, vulgar, ordinary, base, leading to no good.”

The other extreme is idealism, which expresses itself in different ways. Yet at bottom they are outgrowths from one root—self.

Fichte in his subjective idealism held that it is the “I” alone who exists; all the rest is a modification of my mind. Schelling and Berkeley tell us in their objective idealism that all, including the “I,” are mere manifestations of the Absolute. Finally Hegel informs us in his absolute idealism that only the relation between subject and object is real.

Has all this anything to do with the extreme against which the Buddha warned us when showing his Middle Path?

Addiction to self-mortification is merely the practical side of the speculation of idealism. In idealism the “self” is sublimated, with the natural consequence that the “self” must be liberated from matter; soul must be delivered from the bonds of the body. The passions of the body must be subdued even by force; body becomes the eternal enemy of the spirit which can only be overcome “by prayer and fasting” (Mt. 17: 21).

This kind of idealism will easily lead to pretension, simulation, deceit, hypocrisy; it is much more dangerous than materialism; for materialism may make a man bad and that is the end of it; but idealism will sublimate the evil and call it good; egoism becomes an eternal soul; killing becomes justice; nations are suppressed for the sake of freedom, and God in heaven is thanked for a victory here on earth.

Thus idealism becomes fanaticism. Surely, that is “painful, ignoble, leading to no good.” Between the two, not as a meeting-place, not as a compromise of the two extremes of materialistic self-indul­gence and idealistic self-denial but “avoiding both” the Blessed One has found the Middle Path, a path not of mediocrity, but of the highest truth and attainment, “giving knowledge and wisdom,” not in the wavering of speculation, not in the excitement of discussion, but “in tranquillity of mind and penetrative insight, leading to Enlightenment and Deliverance,” enlightenment with regard to the real nature of things, deliverance from all suffering and its cause.

Thus the Noble Eightfold Path, though a path of earnest striving, unremitting endeavour, and perseverance till the end, can only be entered upon by right under­standing of the Truth.

With this we arrive again at the old question, which remained unanswered 1900 years ago: “What is truth?” (John 18:38).

Truth is usually defined as the correspondence between the intellect and the object. The intellect, however, being the act of understanding, can increase. But increase and growth involve change. Thus even truth is subject to change. This is called subjective truth.

Of a purely objective truth we can know nothing, because any experience of it would make it subjective. Truth, therefore, is not something existing in itself, but is a mental experience. Now, that experience will not be the same in all.

No one expects a child of four to have the same reli­gious notions as a college-student; and an adult’s experience will be quite different again. There is growth in truth, and for that very reason it cannot be proved, but only be experienced. Proved can only be that which is static, has the nature of an entity.

Therefore, to understand that truth is a process, that truth is actuality, that is Right Understanding.

And what is actual? That all component things are sorrow-fraught. This is the First Noble Truth.

Birth is called Suffering, because becoming itself is the manifestation of the aggregates, the condition sine qua non of all misery, and also the evil result of past dissatisfaction.

Decay is called suffering as the dwindling of vitality.

Death is called suffering as the dissolution of the aggregates.

Thus the arising as well as the passing away of the aggregates is a source of woe, the first as potential, the later as actual.

Sorrow is called suffering which results from loss of relations, wealth, health, virtue or right understanding.

Lamentation is the suffering that finds expression in weeping and crying.

Pain is the suffering of bodily discomfort.

Grief is the suffering of mental disagreement.

Despair is the suffering of worry and mental unrest.

“To be associated with things one dislikes, to be sepa­rated from things one likes, not to get what one wishes—­that also is suffering.”

This together with the last two, viz. grief and despair represent the mental characteristic of suffering.

Finally and summarily “the five aggregates of clinging (pa.tcupadaanakkhandhaa) are suffering,” by which in one word are indicated the root and cause of all suffering, namely clinging (upaadaana).

This is the Second Noble Truth:

The source of all suffering is attachment, craving, clinging.

This craving takes one of three forms: craving for sense-pleasures, craving for permanent existence or eternal­ism, craving for no more existence or annihilationism.

The truth of this statement will at once become clear when it is considered (and this is the Third Noble Truth) that with the utter cessation of craving also suffering will come to an end. For, he who has no desires is always content. Contentment cannot be obtained in any other way, for desires are ”unsatisfiable”, likened unto a bare bone with which a dog cannot still its hunger, decaying flesh which is poisonous, a torch of straw borne against the wind which thus burns the hand of the bearer, borrowed goods which cannot be kept in possession.

Is it pessimism to consider pleasures as suffering? No, it is actuality! But to consider the satisfaction of the senses as real pleasure—that is sheer folly. In order to cure that folly, the fact of suffering is raised to the rank of a noble truth; for folly can only be cured by wisdom.

This shows again how Buddhist ethics or moral prin­ciples, like everything else in Buddhism, are based on a foundation quite different from morality in other religions.

Mental development is exactly what is needed for the development of morality. For, “when religion ceases to be wisdom, it becomes superstition overlaid with reasoning” (George Santayana).

In other religions good conduct is enough to become a saint: “If you have love, you have perfected the law,” said St. Paul to the Ephesians.

According to later reformers like Luther, faith alone is enough for salvation.

But in Buddhism real virtue is impossible, without the foundation of reason. The truth must both be experienced and understood.

To experience suffering surely can be done by any being endowed with feeling; that, however, does not prevent a possible return. Understanding therefore is necessary of the real nature of the evil and of its cause. When properly understood suffering will be seen as an effect of action which must have been evil to produce such a bad effect. When thus understood in connection with action, it becomes living like actuality itself. No longer passive fate but active “kamma,” which means self-responsibility.

Action is not finished with action and it is just that which makes life so terribly actual.

At every moment I am reaping the fruit of the past; at every moment I am sowing the seed for the future.

Is there then no escape possible, no salvation? There is! And the escape lies along the Noble Eightfold Path of which Right Understanding is the first step. Like know­ledge of a disease is the chance for a cure, thus understand­ing the cause-and-action of suffering is the beginning of Deliverance.

This understanding should be accompanied by the right intention. It should express itself in word and deed, in practical daily life, in perseverance and in mind control.

Thus should suffering be comprehended, the cause of suffering eradicated, the cessation of suffering realized and the path leading to the cessation of suffering developed. For, the knowledge of the truths must be translated into function, if ever the task will be accomplished.

This is the Noble Path that avoids the two extremes of materialism under all its disguises and of idealism with all its false decorations.

It is the Path of Actuality that leads to Reality. Only having realized this Path with knowledge and insight, the deliverance of mind is steadfast, the last life is reached, rebirth no more waits.

And how did the five monks to whom this first sermon was preached receive it? What was their reaction? “All received it with joy.”

Yet, only of one it is said that his eyes opened to the truth; and he reflected: “Whatsoever is of the nature of arising that is also subject to cessation.”

No rapt enthusiasm, no utterance of admiration, but the deep tranquillity of a lake without ripple, reflecting the pure light of the sun.

Cessation—that is it where the Path leads to Cessation, not of being, for there is no permanent soul to cease, but cessation of arising (bhava-nirodha = Nibbaana). Thus cessation is not a doctrine of rationalized suicide, not of annihilation, and hence it does not lead to asceticism. Only in one sense does the Buddha admit to be an annihilationist, namely in so far as he teaches the annihilation of the passions, of evil inclinations, of craving.

To reach this sublime state of perfection there is only one way, the way of renunciation. To renounce is to give up, to let go, to abandon, to discard. And its object is all that has the appearance of being. To be is an affirmation of self, of permanency. Hence all morality which strives to perpetuate self or soul is a subtle kind of selfishness, hence immorality. And the more subtle and sublimated, rationalized and idealized it is, the more dangerous and the more difficult also to escape from it.

Here no rectification of thought will suffice, but only the stilling of thought. No argument can solve this problem; for the more words we use, the greater the chances for misunderstanding. Only one thing is to be done: just ceasing.

And in ceasing we will cease. In letting go we shall arrive. In giving up we shall obtain. For, that which we abandon is the burden of sorrow; that which we discard is the fetter of self. And thus renunciation becomes freedom, relief, deliverance, a foretaste of Nirvaana.

This doctrine of cessation, so characteristic in the Buddha’s teaching, is the natural outcome of his discovery that all our suffering is due to our own craving. If craving is suffering, then renunciation must be happiness.

In the renunciation of self the clouds of ignorance clear up, for in the light of non-self (anattaa) things are seen in their true impermanent nature. In the renunciation of self all distinction between self and others disappears and love becomes truly universal. In the renunciation of self all fear becomes impossible, for fear is the child of delusion and attachment. “When pleasures vanish of their own accord they end in keen anguish for the mind; but when relin­quished by one’s own will they produce infinite happiness proceeding from tranquility” (Vairaagya Sataka).

While leading his ascetic life Prince Siddhartha had to leave his five companions to find enlightenment all by himself. Only after having purified himself from this attach­ment he was able to attain what he had sought up to now in vain. Perfect in renunciation, pure in detachment, with insight in truth, he could return to his former companions without running risks of being defiled by their ignorance and craving, “unaffected by good and bad alike, even as a lotus fair to water gives no lodgement” (Sn 6).

Thus also the mind has to detach itself from the five senses of the body. Purified in detachment, enlightened by the truth, the mind can give guidance to the impressions in the five senses, and thus lead experience up to full realization.

Then all feelings and perceptions will be conceived as impermanent, then they will lead to dispassion (viraaga), to cessation of craving (ta.nhaa-nirodha). Thus forsaking them one will cling to nothing in the world, and without worry one will attain Deliverance for oneself. Then one will know: “Destroyed is the possibility of rebirth, led is the holy life, done is what had to be done, nothing more for this life.”

Then truly it may be said: “Oh death! Where is thy sting? Oh grave, where is thy victory?” Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory” (1 Cor. xv 55). Not because this corruptible shall have put on incorruptibility, not because this mortal shall have put on immortality, but because no death can sadden, where no more birth occurs.

Thus set the Master rolling the Wheel of Righteousness “excellent in the beginning through its foundation on morality, excellent in the middle through its development of calm and insight, excellent in the end through its termination in Nibbaana” (Vism II 7–2).

“Well-proclaimed is the Teaching of the Blessed One to be realized in this life, yielding fruit immediately, inviting investigation, leading up to Nibbaana, to be attained to by the wise, each one for himself.”

(svaakkhaato bhagavataa dhammo, sandi.t.thiko, akaaliko, ehipassiko, opanayiko, paccatta.m veditabbo vi.t.tuuhii).

As one with might
could set aright
what had been overturned,
As one has shown
what was unknown,
(what still had to be learned)
To men astray
he told the way,
(to truth he gave the key;)
Into the night
he brought a light,
so that all men could see.

Seyyathaapi bho Gotamo nikkujjita.m vaa ukkujjeyya,
pa.ticchanna.m vaa vivareyya,
muu.lhassa vaa magga.m aacikkheyya,
andhakaare vaa telapajjota.m dhaareyya
cakkhumanto ruupaani dakkhinti

Like these waves of sound spread and roll on and contact you all, may thus the thoughts of loving-kindness which permeated these words reach you too and set vibrating in your hearts and minds similar thoughts, so that there may be peace even in war, love amidst hate, freedom from lust in a world of craving, freedom from suffering in an ocean of misery!

May all living beings be happy!

Soullessness

“Neta.m mama, nesoha.m asmi, na meso attaa”

“This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.”

Anattalakkha.na Sutta (Mv I 6, 38–47)

There are some great primary questions that lie at the bottom of every religious system and which form the seed of religious development, upon the answer to which, depends the nature of any religious philosophy. These questions have been puzzling mankind from time immemorial and they will be troubling him for ever more to come, because, though the answers to those weighty questions have been as numerous as there are different religions, they have been unable to satisfy the thinking mind.

The reason for the ‘unsatisfactoriness’ of all these answers—and we may safely predict that any future trial to find a new solution to those problems will be equally unsuccessful—lies in the fact of the intrinsic impossibility to formulate an answer. Any answer is beside the point because those “weighty” questions are based upon misun­derstanding. All of them begin to assume the existence of the very thing they want to prove; in other words they beg the question, or in more philosophical terminology they are guilty of the sophism called “petitio principii.”

Some of those questions are: Whence am I? Whither do I go? How do I know myself? What happens to me after death? How came I (or life) into this world? How does this world enter into me, into my con­sciousness? Is the soul the same as the body or not?

These and similar questions are sometimes said to be of vital importance, but then only to those who choose to enquire into them, like children will make a vital problem of the discovery, that a round peg does not go into a square hole. But a person with reason and insight will see at once that it does not fit. Not the peg or the hole, but the child is wrong here. So also not the play of world-events, but only those who put such questions are to blame.

It will be seen that there should be one question prior to all those enquiries, upon which depends the very possibility of further questioning, namely: Is there anything at all which deserves the designation of “I”?

The method followed by the Buddha in solving this question is the most scientific. He does not base his doctrine on logic, for by doing so one ought to presuppose the reality of the thinking subject as standing outside the process of thinking, as a witness or rather as a judge.

That which is not logic in reasoning will be either illogical or a-logical.

Illogical is that which is contrary to logic. Such is faith, belief, acceptance on the authority of someone else without being able even to ascertain the existence of such an authority.

Logic in reasoning, as is said, cannot solve the difficulty, because it presupposes that which it is out to prove; hence it becomes a sophism: petitio principii.

Only one kind of logic can help here, the logic of events; only this kind of logic is beyond sophistry and on this a-logical basis the Buddha has grounded his teaching of ”soullessness.”

The logic of events, of facts, the doctrine of actuality can be understood not by argumentation but by actual analysis.

Whatever we know of the body is known in its parts and in its entirety as subject to change. Within seven years even the smallest particle has been replaced. Composed of the four elementary qualities of extension, cohesion, caloricity and vibration, the ultimate insubstantiality of all so-called solid matter is evident.

The relative qualities of hardness and softness, the occupation in and of space, are due to the elementary duality of extension (pa.thavi). It is the element of cohesion (aapo) which makes the many parts adhere intrinsically and to one another, and thus prevents an aimless scattering about or disintegration, thus giving rise to the idea of a “body.” Caloricity (tejo) depends on vibration (vaayo) for by increased vibration the temperature rises and when the temperature is lowered, the vibration too is reduced in speed so that gases liquefy, and liquids solidify.

Matter being thus reduced to mere qualities and forces which are in a constant state of flux, there certainly no permanent entity can be discerned.

Is not there, however, present a something which sup­ports the qualities, which is the possessor of the attributes, which as a substance stands under them all, upholds them all and unites all phenomena?

Dimensions, form, place, colour, action, even material might change, yet is not there a something which remains unaltered?

A table may be round or square, have three or four legs, have any colour and be made of wood or iron—yet for all that, it remains a table. Is there then not a something independent from the phenomena?

Independent from all attributes there is naught, no substance, no substratum, no entity, not even the idea or concept! For it is impossible even to think of an object without any qualities. The qualities together form the object. The qualities, the phenomena may change, but then the object also changes.

A carpenter can make a round table from a square one, still it remains a table. But that is not the entity that has persisted, but only the idea thereof, namely the concept of an object suitable to lay out meals, to keep smaller articles on, to do writing work, to play games, etc. Yet that idea is dependent on certain conditions, e.g. a flat top; for if that would be removed even the idea of table cannot remain connected with the remainder. Substance therefore is a mere concept, has no existence except in a worldling’s imagination. When science bends more and more to the opinion that all so-called solid matter is merely a form of energy, advocated by scientific materialism or as some prefer to call it, Energism, that is only admitting in different words the ultimate insubstantiality of all so-called solid matter.

The view that matter or the body is the real self, or ego-entity must lead to the doctrine of annihilationism (uccheda-di.t.thi), the perishing of that “self” at the disin­tegration of the body.

The view of the persistence of a self after the breaking up of the body (sassata-di.t.thi) will therefore find another more permanent seat for that self, namely the mind.

The biologist Haeckel and the chemist Ostwald were the real pioneers of this modern revolt against traditional metaphysics. Yet in the anattaa-doctrine of the Buddha a substance-like entity either in matter or mind, underlying and supporting the phenomena was most categorically denied twenty-five centuries ago.

Yet matter shows more permanency than thought. If thus the body cannot be held to be a permanent entity, still less so can the mind be said to be an everlasting soul or self.

“Better were it, O monks,” said the Lord Buddha (S II 94), “that the untrained average man should conceive this body composed of the four primary elementary qualities as soul, rather than the mind. And why? The body is seen to persist for a year or two … for a gener^­ation or even for a hundred years … while that which is called consciousness, that is mind, that is intelligence, arises as one thing, ceases as another, both by night and by day.”

Feelings (vedanaa) are of three kinds, pleasant, unplea­sant or neutral. Now feeling is mental, for if contact is not mentally perceived, no concept of feeling will be formed. Can this mental action of sensation be said to be the self? Or is (sa.t.taa) the perception of this sensation the self? But then if a pleasant sensation makes place for an unpleasant feeling one would have to admit that the “self” has changed.

There is, however, an experience which gives the im­pression that there is something which remains the same even though sensations, impressions, perceptions, concepts change. That remaining, unchanging entity is called the soul. Now it is clearly not our duty to disprove any state­ment which is made without sufficient ground. On him who puts the thesis rests also the burden of the proof. Otherwise: “quod gratis asseritur, gratis negator”—“What is gratuitously asserted, may be gratuitously rejected.

“A so-called direct proof for the existence of a soul as a permanent entity to be distinguished from changing modes of action is the firm conviction that, though thoughts and actions change, yet the thinker and the doer remain the same.

In refutation it must be said that often the most firm and universal conviction cannot prove a fact. For, conviction is feeling, sentiment, emotion, but proof requires reason. The general conviction of many centuries that this earth was the centre of the universe, even the ecclesiastical con­demnation of Copernican astronomy, for upholding which Galileo had to undergo dire penalties and Giordano Bruno was burnt at the stake, could never change the fact that this earth is a minor planet turning round the sun which is only a star not of the first brilliancy. Conviction is no proof.

But even if we let this pass for argument’s sake, we cannot admit that the thinker and doer remain the same, for it is exactly by thoughts that we change our mind, by actions that we change our habits.

If that change does not always come all of a sudden and for that reason is less conspicuous, yet the change is not less real for that. Actions cannot be separated from the doer, cannot exist purely as such. There cannot be walking without a body that walks. If therefore the action changes, the so-called actor must change at the same instant. Thus the “I” is identified with the action. It is only that “I,” which can walk, and sit, and think, and eat, and sleep. But that “I” is not a permanent, unchanging entity; it is identified with the action, is the action itself, and thus changes with the action. “I” cannot stay at home, while “I” go out for a walk.

It is the conventional language which has spoilt the purity of conception, though in some cases even the language has remained pure enough, as e.g. in the intransitive form of impersonal verbs; e.g. it rains. Who rains? What rains? Simply: it rains, meaning rain rains. Likewise the concept should not be: I think, but thought thinks.

The fact that conventional language uses the terms “I” and “mine” may be advanced in support of the human conviction; but that does not make that conviction any truer than our way of speaking of sunrise and sunset.

The individual, conventionally called “I” or “self,” is a mass of physical and psychical elements without a soul behind them, without a soul inherent in them, the elements themselves being a mere flux (santaana), a continuity of changes without identity.

The Saa.nkhyas too believed in constant change, but a change of the same substratum, eternal matter.

The assemblage of impermanent elements, however, does not require a permanent entity to keep them together. The very presence of an unchanging substance would pre­vent any change in the phenomena dependent on it.

In postulating a mythical, permanent, unchanging entity, as the possessor of changing qualities, one merely assumes that the existence of which had to be proved. A single moment of existence has no qualities, but it is those qualities.

Matter does not have extension, cohesion, temperature, vibration, but it merely is all that, and without that it is not. Mind, likewise, is not an entity, but a function, con­sciousness is thought, and it arises when certain conditions are present: the object, the sense-organ, the proper attention. Thus a thought arises not as the action of a thinking sub­ject, but conditioned by, originating from, dependent on other states. And as such it will be again the condition to, the origin of, the raison d’etre of further states—in ceasing passing on its movement, thus giving the impulse to new arising.

“Mind arises from a cause; and without assignable conditions consciousness does not come about” (MN 8). Then the Lord Buddha further explains in the Mahaata.nhaasa.nkhaya Sutta, that consciousness is conditioned by the objects, i.e. thought arises in dependence on objects presented to the sense organs. If the object is a visible shape and is presented to the eye, then dependent on those conditions, a thought may arise which is called in this case eye-con­sciousness, as fire derives its name, wood-fire, grass-fire, from the fuel applied.

Without fuel, however, no fire, without objects and organs, no thought can arise. Becoming is according to the stimulus (lit. food) and when that stimulus ceases, that which has become also ceases.

“Void is this of self, or aught of the nature soul.”

(MN 43, Mahaa Vedalla Sutta)

The teaching of anattaa does not proclaim that there is no individuality, no self, but only that there is no per­manent individuality, no unchanging self.

Personality or individuality is according to Buddhism not an entity, but a process of arising and passing away, a process of nutrition, a process of combustion, a process of grasping.

This individuality has no permanent existence, as a wave in the ocean is only existent as a process, and in rolling on makes itself, and destroys itself.

Yet the individuality of consciousness, though not a permanent entity or soul, is neither a merely physical process. It is a process of grasping. Like fire can only burn as long as it lays hold of new fuel, thus the process of individu­ality is a constant arising, an ever-renewed laying hold of the objects of its craving, a process of grasping.

It is craving which causes the friction between sense­-objects and sense-organs; and from that friction leaps up the flame of new “kamma” which in ignorance will not be extinguished, but in grasping lays hold of fresh material thus keeping alive the process of burning.

“All is a burning, O monks! The eye is burning, form is burning, eye consciousness is burning, eye-contact is burn­ing. And whatever feeling arises dependent on that contact, that also is burning, burning with the fire of lust, the fire of hate, the fire of delusion” (Mahaa Vagga, 1 20.2).

As long as that fire is kept aflame, there will be the delusion of “self,” there will be the craving to perpetuate that individual self, so that it becomes a something rather than a function, an entity rather than a condition, a soul which sharply separates man from the animals, which have no souls worth saving.

Thus in the ultimate sense this deluded affirmation of self as a permanent soul, is craving which says: “This is mine” (eta.m mama); it is pride which says: “This am I” (eso aha.m asmi); it is the erroneous view which says: “This is my soul” (meso attaa).

The error is rooted in craving and pride—craving for happiness and bliss, pride which cannot acknowledge defeat. Where the wrong view of an everlasting soul is thus con­nected with craving for permanency and bliss, there the teaching of soullessness must necessarily follow from the teaching that all things are impermanent and unsatisfactory.

If there were in this body a soul, if feeling or per­ception, mental differentiations or consciousness were the real self, then the body would not be subject to ill, the mind would not be subject to distress; for if they were the real self, they would be in a position to order: “Let this be so, let this not be so!” If then the body and the mind are impermanent and for that reason sorrow fraught, one is not justified in thinking: “This is mine; this am I; this is my soul!”

Few there are in the world who identify this perish­able body with a permanent entity or soul. On the other hand there are many who maintain that the mind or one of its functions, like sensation, perception, mental differen­tiations or consciousness are identical with an individual, permanent soul, or that those functions possess such a soul-entity, or that they contain in their action such a per­manent self, or, finally, that they are contained by or in a soul.

There are many who even now try to prove the existence of a soul. It is maintained by them that the changing mind and character are supported by an unchanging soul. This supposed soul escapes all observation, even though there may be some awareness of thought and action. A direct proof of this existence of a permanent soul is universally admitted to be impossible; it cannot be known directly in itself. What, however, cannot be known directly in itself, might be known sometimes indirectly from its working. If an effect can be observed, we may legitimately conclude to the existence of a cause. And the nature of the effect proves to some extent the nature of the cause. There is no need to put one’s finger in the fire to find out whether the fire is hot. One can readily conclude to the heat of the fire, if the temperature of the water increases, while being placed over the fire.

Similarly, a permanent soul, if it would be existent, must produce effects according to its nature. Now a being in order to be permanent, as the soul is supposed to be, cannot be material, because matter is composed, and what is composed is also decomposable, that is impermanent. Hence the permanent soul should be immaterial. This is fully admitted even by the strongest adherers to the soul theory. Indeed they claim the soul to be spiritual.

But if the soul is immaterial, its working must be im­material also, and its existence and functioning should be independent from matter.

Around this turns the whole argument in favour of or in disproof of the existence of a soul. This independence from matter is attempted to be proved in various ways. We shall consider and refute them one by one.

The first alleged proof is taken from external evidence, namely the opinion of all men. If all people agree upon one point, it is said to be the voice of nature, which cannot err. It is said that all people at all times were convinced of a continued existence after death. Now this argument loses its very foundation, because not all men believe in a soul. One sixth of the world’s population is Buddhist and denies the existence and the very idea of a soul; further there are millions of atheists and scientific men who have lost all faith in God, soul and religion, who have turned completely materialists, who, even if some of them accept the existence of a substance underlying the phenomena, will consider this to be of a purely material substance depen­dent on, and perishing together with, the co-existing form; further still, even the majority of the so-called believers are so only in name, for they contradict their faith by their deeds whenever they commit a mortal sin, thus condemning their souls to eternal damnation for the sake of a short-­lived satisfaction, which they certainly never would do, if they really believed in an eternal soul.

Thus there remains only a very small minority who really and actually believe in their soul. And they can certainly not claim to echo the voice of nature. For their conviction is not even a natural growth of mental develop­ment, but rather a remnant of the childish submission in their youth to the dogmatic interpretation by ecclesiastical authorities. This kind of blind faith, which, enforced upon the child, remains sometimes a habit in uneducated adults, is in reality the crudest form of religion, hardly to be distinguished in degree from the superstitious practices of primitive tribes.

But, moreover, what is this voice of nature? It is nothing else but the collection of individual opinions, as a nation is the collection of persons, born and living in the same country. If one individual can err, so can two or three, or a thousand, or a million, and even all.

The fact of general opinion, even of the whole human race, should never be overestimated. In the past we have seen how the strongest convictions have finally crumbled so that they now seem ridiculous to us.

Yet in their days people have made even the sacrifice of their lives for convictions, generally disbelieved then, but now equally generally accepted; which is only another way or saying that general opinion has changed.

Only 400 years ago the mass of civilized humanity laboured under the delusion that the sun goes daily round the earth; that this earth forms the centre of the universe. Copernicus stood practically alone opposing not only what was then said to be common sense, but also divine reve­lation and the authority of the Bible. Galileo was jailed and by threat of torture compelled to disavow his former opinions, because his telescope contradicted the Bible. Because Giordano Bruno dared to draw some inferences from the Copernican theory contrary to the Scholastic Phil­osophy of the church based on Aristotle, he was excom­municated and handed over to the secular authorities with a recommendation of a “punishment as merciful as possible and without shedding of blood,” the atrocious formula for burning alive. He perished in the flames, turning his eyes away from the crucifix that was held up to him, the victim of theological stupidity and self-applauding intoler­ance—the martyr for freedom of thought.

It was and still is the common daily testimony of the sense of sight of every being that the sun does move round the earth. And yet, that sense of sight, that common sense, that general opinion, that divine revelation, that biblical authority, were clearly mistaken and false.

The same happens even nowadays and might happen ever and ever again. What was only yesterday proved by science and tested in practice, is overthrown today by some newer theories equally proved and tested and universally accepted … till tomorrow some more advanced theories are brought forward, explaining the same facts quite differ­ently, but more logically and more according to the truth.

Does truth change? If by truth is meant (as it is defined in philosophy) the harmony between consciousness and the known object, then truth will change with any increase or decrease of knowledge; then there will be degrees of truth, of objective truth in which the object becomes better known, or of subjective truth in which knowledge becomes clearer. If truth, on the other hand, is taken in itself, it must be said to have no existence at all; for if an object is not related to any knowing mind, in which would then exist its truth?

Moreover, we usually call a thing true, if it corresponds with the idea we have formed of it; but our ideas them­selves, according to which we judge the truth of things, are formed from impressions of those selfsame objects.

Thus it will be seen that a general or even universal agreement of opinion is no sign of proof of the truth.

To say then that the voice of nature, if there would be any such thing, cannot err is neither induction, i.e., a conclusion from individual experience to a general truth or principle, nor deduction, i.e., an application of a universal characteristic to individual cases. It is merely bad logic based on sentiment rather than on reason.

In this way we have disposed of external evidence in favour of the soul-idea in two ways, namely in so far as we have shown that the existence of a soul is not the universal opinion, and even if it were so, it would prove nothing.

It may be true that all people at all times believe in existence after death; even we Buddhists accept this doctrine; but existence after death does not involve a permanent exist­ence after death, nor the existence of a permanent soul. Even the Hindus, who believe in transmigration of soul as opposed to the soulless rebirth in Buddhism, do not really believe in individual, permanent souls; for according to Vedaanta the soul after transmigration through many lives in sa.msaara will be re-united, re-absorbed in Brahman from where it was emanated in the beginning of its wandering. There its individual existence will have come to an end.

External evidence thus having failed,            we come to a whole series of arguments alleged to be proofs from internal evidence.

Internal evidence means evidence that manifests itself not directly in its existence, but only indirectly through the manifestation of action. Thus, e.g. when a car-tyre goes flat we may safely conclude that there must be a hole somewhere in the tube, even if we cannot discern it with the eye. For, if there were no hole, the air could not have escaped.

Similarly from the working of the intellect we may draw some conclusions with regard to the nature of the intellect.

Everything is received according to the nature of the receiver. Water, e.g., takes the shape of the glass tumbler in which it is contained. Colours can only be perceived by the sense organ of sight; sound only by the ear etc.

Now the mind is said to have universal or general ideas. Though John Locke, the English philosopher of the 17^th century, in his doctrine of ideas, maintained that universal ideas stand for individual objects that are real in the context of experience, this would be a proof for the materiality of universals rather than for anything else. There will be, however, very few supporters of the soul-theory if any, to support this opinion, for, if universal ideas stand for individual objects, they would cease to be universal. And that is exactly our point of view. Berkeley, though a Bishop of the Church of England, and an Idealist in the fullest sense, thought rightly that all ideas are particular; things or objects as presented are individual; they are given together with the relations, each of which may be described by concrete reference to the presented object or event. There is no such thing as shape apart from objects pos­sessing shape, nor colour apart from things having colour, or any idea of motion except as bodies moving (Principles of Human Knowledge). The idea of a triangle is depen­dent on the knowledge of various types of triangle. The idea of colour has no reality, cannot be thought of except as red, or blue, or white, etc. Universality has no meaning apart from the relationship of particulars. An idea is general only in so far as it stands for particulars of the same kind. We speak about humanity. It is true this idea maintains even though individuals die and are born, even though after a hundred years the whole human race has been renewed. But still the idea is only possible as a collective noun through knowledge of individuals. Thus the idea is based on, and derived from, material experience and therefore cannot be said to be immaterial. A proof that the so-called universal or general ideas are based on a material foundation can be obtained from the fact that, if the material experience is insufficient or wrong, the so-called general ideas will suffer from the same deficiency. The first Europeans e.g. who landed in Africa created a panic by their mere appearance, because they were not considered to be human beings. Clearly the idea of a particular colour had crept into the idea of a human. Only when experience grows, ideas become enlarged, so that the most general or universal idea is dependent on the largest amount of individual, particular experience which is always material

If therefore universal ideas do not contain anything immaterial, the intellect itself cannot be said to be imma­terial. Thus even if there would be a soul, we might conclude from its material action that it too would be material. But material is composed; hence it is also decomposable or impermanent.

A second refutation can be drawn up from the major premise that everything is received according to the nature of the receiver. Now it is beyond doubt and everyone will have to admit it for himself, that the mind has many times very material and materialistic ideas, thoughts of lust and hate, of profit and comfort.

Those thoughts must come from a material source. Now, if the soul is said to be that source, then it is a very material soul, indeed; decomposable also, because material, and hence impermanent, and no soul at all.

Another argument from internal evidence to prove the existence of an immaterial, permanent soul is taken from the fact that the mind seems to have immaterial concepts like unity, truth, virtue, justice. Those concepts, however, are not truly immaterial, as they have been derived from material experience. The idea of unity arose only when, after counting for a long time with beads or beans, we were able to substitute units for those objects. Unity is nothing but uniformity from a certain point of view, while the differences are intentionally overlooked. Even unity and order in nature, on which science has built its laws and axioms, have no real existence, but are based on experi­ment and observation, hence thoroughly material, and can be overturned by new observation and experiment.

Even thousand scientific experiments do not definitely prove a fact, and make it a law, but one single experiment can upset the law and prove its invalidity.

As physical phenomena do not follow an absolutely rigorous necessity, but permit a contingency, incalculable like chance, so the mind does not follow any fixed law. Though conditioned and influenced, its choice cannot be predicted; thus the alleged perfect regularity, uniformity, necessity of things is a mental fiction, a proof of the possi­bility of mental aberration in its lack in actuality rather than of immateriality.

Likewise truth, virtue, justice etc. are only ideas resulting from associating different experiences; they are dependent on education, and that is not even a sign of reason, still less of immateriality. For even a dog can learn to do many things and finally come to “understand” that putting up his right paw means a piece of cake. Edu­cation, which is nothing but mental training, brings ideas together; and once they are associated, the point of con­nection might become hidden in the subconscious mind. The real connection being forgotten or suppressed, the mind will try to establish an artificial link, which is called ration­alization. If ideas like virtue and justice were really immaterial and permanent they ought to remain the same and unaltered in different times and climes. But the asso­ciation of ideas depends on acquired learning and cannot be therefore an inherent natural action of a permanent soul. Thus a Christian who keeps two wives is guilty of bigamy and considered as very immoral. But a Muslim can be very virtuous in the legal possession of many more then two. That morality changes is a truism. Not so very long ago slavery was deemed right, encouraged by the State, sanctioned by the church, but that way of thinking has given place to a morality which judges slavery to be wrong, because it assigns higher values to human personality. A few hundred years ago any father had the absolute right of life and death over his own children; nowadays we have laws even for the prevention of cruelty against animals. The moral laws which prevail here in Kaamaloka, do not hold good in Brahmaloka. Thus these few examples show that abstract ideas like virtue, justice, and morality are very much impermanent and can therefore not be the expressions of a permanent soul.

But then, the mind can conceive essential ideas, it is said, expressing the intrinsic nature of things, such as defi­nitions comprising the common genus and the specifying difference. These are said to be unchangeable and can therefore only be conceived by an unchangeable, permanent entity or soul. Definitions are said to originate from Socrates, while Plato built up a system of eternal ideas. But defini­tions have as little reality about them as a mathematical problem. They may be useful or even necessary for logical distinctions, but they cannot be said to be either permanent or impermanent, because they are mere mental fiction.

Definitions, essential ideas, so-called eternal principles are all based on material experience and exist only in parti­culars. It is the very nature of essence to be particularized. It is true that we try to separate the idea of man from this or that individual. But at once we find it impossible for the essential idea to exist separately, and equally impossible to unite it with the individual, as we do not see any relation. This unnatural and illogical position arises from the mistake that we tried to separate the two: essence only exists in particulars. Thus they are not unchangeable in this sense that the objects to which they refer and on which they depend, are changeable and impermanent. The particulars are material; so are therefore definitions and essences, abstractions and universals.

The last arrow on the bow of internal evidence from the intellectual powers is the reflex idea. In reflection thought becomes the object of thought. And here certainly, say the upholders of the soul-idea, is nothing material. Accord­ing to Buddhism the mind is classed as a sense, the internal sense, and thus we have two sources of ideas: sensations which have come through the external sense-doors, eye for sight, ear for sound, nose for odour, tongue for taste and the whole body for touch—and sensations furnished by the mind of its own operations, reflections. Thus reflection is the knowledge of perceived sensations. When sensations are material and are perceived in material sense organs, how then can the knowledge thereof become at once im­material? Reflex ideas are also experienced in animals; they too show to have memory, attachment, and revenge. Yet nobody will maintain that animals have an immortal soul, for never yet has a dog been baptized to save his soul from eternal damnation. But if animals can have reflections without a permanent soul, why should a soul be postulated in the case of humans?

There is separate from the intellect another power in man which is the subject of much controversy, and that is the will.

The supporters of the soul-theory try to make the working of the powers of the will dependent on the soul they imagine, and like for the intellectual powers they claim the will-power to be immaterial, because it strives, they say, not only after material and particular good things, but for the absolute good. This is not true, because the absolute good cannot be known; would it be known, it would cease to be absolute and become relative. What cannot be known cannot be desired or willed for, and such a general object cannot have any attractive power. No man can love the most beautiful woman in the world without knowing her, though this is still rather material. One always strives for some particular good which is always material. “‘Immaterial objects’ do not exist”; this is a mere phrase containing a contradiction in terms.

It is maintained, however, that some will-objects are unchangeable, e.g. it is always good to respect one’s parents. But if that respect would include even obedience with regard to evil, it would no longer be good, and thus no fitting will-object.

Whatever is good or bad is only so with respect to its good or bad effect. “Kamma” is only “kusala’ if there is a “kusala vipaaka.” And as the effect or the re­sult is always particular, a concrete instance, the action and volition must be of the same kind.

From this follows a last objection, namely the freedom of the will. In inorganic matter we see an absolutely rigid determinism towards a certain end, but in similar circum­stances man remains free and master over his actions, which clearly show his superiority over and independence from matter. Thus if the will is free, that is independent, it must be immaterial and then also permanent.

The discussion on the freedom of will is usually opened from the wrong perspective. For, whether one accepts the freedom of the will or rejects its independence, in both cases the will is taken as an entity, as something existent, be it free or be it bound.

Will, however, can neither be said to be free, nor bound, because it is non-existent. It merely arises whenever there is the possibility of a choice. If there is nothing to choose from, there can be no question of willing. On the other hand, the possibility of choosing shows the presence of two opposites or more. The possibility to choose what is evil shows that the action is conditioned and influenced, and therefore not free.

Even if one chooses to do what one knows to be harmful to oneself there will still be some motives that brought about that choice. E.g. knowing that association with certain people will bring one to excessive drinking and gambling and other actions that bring about financial difficulties, deterioration of health, and the ruin of family-happiness, yet one might seek that company because one lacks the moral strength to break with them.

To show one’s courage, to imagine one’s independ­ence, are sufficient subconscious motives to influence and determine one’s choice against the better dictates of reason and common sense. Even one’s pride might not allow one to go back on a previous decision, even if it is perceived as harmful.

If there were no attraction, no inducement, no motive, equilibrium would have been established already and no choice would take place.

Thus volition arises only when a choice becomes possi­ble. If there is a choice possible, there will be attraction and repulsion that influence the choice and make it not free. If there is no choice, then, of course, there is no will at all, but determinism and no freedom whatever. When we, therefore, must admit that this inducement and coercion is never absent, we must also conclude that will is never free.

As we can only strive for one end which we see and understand as best according to our limited capacities, so we can only choose those means which seem to us the best under given circumstances. The reasons that induce us to choose a certain means may differ in different people according to their understanding; but, though the line we follow may differ, we all follow the line of least resistance.

To speak about “free will” contains really a contra­diction, which is carefully avoided in our Buddhist psy­chology. For “free will” would indicate the existence of a will prior to, and independent from, a choice, while “will,” which is but another and milder word for “craving,” does not exist separately, but only arises in dependence on contact and feeling: “phassa paccayaa vedanaa—vedanaa paccayaa ta.nhaa.” Where contact and feeling cease; no craving can arise.

This teaching is not the same as the Psychological Determinism of Leibniz and Herbart, in so far that the doctrine of kamma is not fatalism. Kamma is volition (cetanaa) said the Lord Buddha; but volition itself is based on consciousness that is con­tinually arising and passing. It is this consciousness fettered by craving which is ignorance; but freed from the fetters (sa.myojana) and defilements (kilesa) it is Deliverance or Nibbaana. Freed from craving there is pure insight, and no more volition, no more kamma. Thus our real freedom lies not in the will, but to be without will.

Thus we have then disposed of all the so-called proofs in favour of a permanent soul.

Some Western scholars in Oriental languages, though not scholars in the teachings expressed therein, yet venture to offer their criticism on this most essential point in the Dhamma. They will explain “no-self” as “self” in the following way: When the Buddha speaking of the compo­nents of the aggregates of clinging (pa.tcupadaanakkhandhaa) said of each separately: “that does not belong to me; that am I not; that is not my self,” what else could he mean but that the self or soul exists separate from them? To which we answer: Had the Buddha stated simply and directly that there is no permanent ego-entity, he would have given the impression of siding with the Annihila­tionists against the Eternalists. Well, both schools of thought were wrong and the Buddha wanted to show to both their wrong. Therefore, without saying that life comes to a com­plete end at death, which is the teaching of Annihilationism, he merely analyzed the so-called being and whatever he found of matter or of mind, he did not find a soul there.

Could he have taught us the doctrine of no-self (anattaa) more explicitly and more impressively?

Whatever there be, “that does not belong to me; that am I not; that is not my self” (neta.m mama, nesoha.m asmi, na meso attaa).

Personality was described by the Bhikkhunii Vajiraa as a bundle of aggregates, thus a stream of successive states without abiding entity.

There is then no sound basis for the assertion that the soul is distinct from the body or mind. If, therefore, one maintains that the soul is immortal, one must equally predicate that body and mind are immortal, which is clearly absurd.

Human soul cannot be distinct from human life, and human life collapses together with the body, just like animal life and body.

What remains? The influence of good or bad deeds, which will cause another life on the same basis of good or bad.

There is no soul, there is no self, no permanent “I” or ego-entity. But there is a flux, a process of life, of action and reaction, which rises and falls like the waves of the ocean. Those waves will come to rest, that process will come to a stop, when all desires are stilled, because “I” is an expression of selfishness, of craving. When craving has gone, no “I” will be left.

If the teaching of the Lord Buddha is rightly said to be beyond sophistry (atakkaavacara) it is never more so than with regard to the teaching of soullessness (anattaa). For, any reasoning, even the purest logic, will presuppose the ego in thinking, as Descartes did: “I think therefore I am—Cogito ergo sum.”

“Soullessness” cannot be proved with reason, as darkness cannot be seen by bringing in a light. Darkness can be experienced only when all light is quenched. Likewise “soullessness” can only be realized when all selfishness is excluded. When the craving of “mine” and the pride of “I” have vanished, then also the error of self (sakkaaya-di.t.thi) cannot arise.

But when there is no more thought of self, disgust will be felt, leading to dispassion on the Path of Sainthood; and this detachment will produce the sweet Fruit of Eman­cipation with the knowledge of attainment that “the possi­bility of rebirth is extirpated, lived is the holy life, done is what had to be done, beyond this there is none.”

The load of life laid low,
The precious price is paid;
The waves of well and woe
of stormy stream are stayed.
The direst duty’s done,
A tenfold tiger tamed;
The weary war is won,
The timeless term obtained.

It is significant that after hearing the first discourse of the Buddha only one of the five disciples understood and even he could only enter the Path to Holiness. A fuller explanation of the Truth was necessary. But after hearing this second discourse, the Anattalakkha.na Sutta, all five attained the highest perfection of Arahatship.

“Soullessness” is indeed a lakkha.na, a distin­guishing mark, the essential characteristic of the Truth. For with self all morality is immorality, but without self good and bad alike are transcended in the pure deliverance of heart and mind, in the freedom from all attachment or lust, from all aversion or hate, from all ignorance or delusion.

May the understanding of soullessness grow in us through the practice of unselfishness!

“May we come unto this darkness which is beyond the light of mere reason; may we without seeing and without knowing, see and know that which is above vision and knowledge, through the realization that by not seeing and by not knowing we attain true vision and knowledge” (Dionysius, the Areopagite). May in the realization of non-self all beings be happy!

Joy and Sorrow

Dukkha.tc’eva pa.t.tapemi dukkhassa ca nirodha.m
One thing only do I teach:
Woe and how its end to reach.

(MN 22, Alagadduupamasutta)

In this saying the Lord Buddha has summed up the whole of his noble teaching, laid down its essential features, and indicated the line of thought and action, which we, his disciples, ought to follow, if we too wish to attain what so many have attained before us, and what all of us are striving for, Buddhists and non-Buddhists, knowingly or unknowingly—the attainment of the highest and purest bliss.

The very fact that we all are striving for greater happi­ness shows that the degree of happiness in our possession is not satisfactory, that that degree of happiness is not even considered as good. We do not strive for what is better, but for the best. The best, however, is not better than the good, but it is the good that we have recog­nized as such. And after having recognized it, all the rest cannot even compete; it becomes simply evil, and as such it is rejected, whatever other name we may give to it.

Because the good is not attained, the quest of the good involves striving, struggle. Hence it is that even the vaguest idea of happiness contains an element of no-­more-struggle, no-more-striving, attainment, equilibrium, rest. It is the eternal rest we all are seeking.

“The night keeps hidden in its gloom the search for light;

The storm still seeks its end in peace, with all its might.”

(Rabindranath Tagore)

Rest is the natural goal of all action; and all action, because it is non-attainment, is dissatisfactory: dukkha. As life is action, actuality, non-attainment, striving, it is also impermanent.            Hence life is sorrow-fraught, because it is impermanent.

To see that there is suffering in the world is not such an extraordinary discovery. The greatness of the Buddha’s insight, however, lies in the fact that he realized that every­thing is suffering; in other words he saw not merely that there was suffering in life, but he realized that life itself is suffering.

Thus suffering is actuality and as such it forms the foundation of the Buddha’s teaching. This does not make Buddhism pessimistic. It has merely to be accepted as a fact, as the truth, as actuality. There is nothing to be unhappy about the fact of dukkha, but there is something to be learned from that fact. Indeed, the whole of Buddhism is dependent on it. Here in suffering lies the origin of Buddhism, and in the deliverance from suffering its culmi­nation.

Even if Buddhism would teach the universal fact of suffering without showing at the same time the deliverance thereof, still it could not be said to be pessimistic; it would be stating the truth without exaggeration. But pessimism is an exaggeration towards the dark side. It would be pessimistic to state that no deliverance from, no cessation of suffering were possible. But the Buddha said: “As there is in the mighty ocean but one taste, the taste of salt, thus there is in my teaching but one taste, the taste of Deliver­ance” (Udaana).

So stands Buddhism marked, not as a pessimistic religion, a religion of sorrow and sadness, but as leading to the purest happiness and joy, because it teaches the deliv­erance from sorrow.    

But in order to be delivered from sorrow, we must first understand what sorrow is.

Like the idea of happiness is linked up with eternal rest, so the idea of unhappiness is based on restless change. It is the teaching of change, of transience, of impermanence: anicca, which makes us understand all as suffering: dukkha.

To see the world as a continual flux, to see its dynamic nature, its perpetual impermanence, should not seem to be so very difficult to people who are used to discriminate. Yet most of those who even scientifically accept universal impermanence make a double exception, thereby breaking down their own logic. First of all there are those who are firmly convinced of the impermanent nature of all things, but who maintain at the same time an underlying substance that unchangingly supports the ever-changing pheno­mena. Secondly there are those who place themselves outside the field of observation, thus imagining to judge the phenomena objectively, as if they were the only fixed point in this raging ocean of change.

No, there is no exception to the law of nature that all component things are transient: sabbe sa.nkhaaraa aniccaa.

But why should suffering always be the result of impermanence? Not all separation is bound up with sorrow.

The rays of the setting sun part with the landscape, clouds are dispersed by the blowing wind, yet there is no suffering. Only that separation, only that transience, which is experienced through the delusion of self, is expe­rienced as sorrow, But when there is no “self,” when soullessness, “anattaa,” is not only known but also realized, then there will still be transience, but no more sorrow. And transience too will be no more when all component things are decomposed.

Sorrow thus depends on transience, and on the mis­conception of “self.” As long as “self” is not understood as a misconception, as a delusion, as an act of ignorance, so long also impermanency will not be understood as suffer­ing. Here nothing can be learned by argument. Here nothing can help, but to pass, over and over again, through the crucible of suffering and thus to learn by experience. This is the meaning of sa.msaara. It is our egoism that makes us suffer, and suffer direly all the more, because we suffer in ignorance.

The fact of suffering is admitted by all, but it is not by all understood in the same way.

There are some, (like the Hindus) who do not see sorrow as real, but as an illusion; it is an illusion indeed to see sorrow as an illusion, not as real. There are others, (like the Christians,) who admit the widespread fact of sorrow in human life, but they consider it as a divine favour: “Blessed are the sorrowful.” It is the sickly effect of an over-worked imagination.

There are others again, (like the Moslems) who do not see much evil in the world at all and submit to it fatalistically. It is contrary to actuality.

But in Buddhism sorrow is not accepted as a blessing in disguise, but as an evil to get rid of; sorrow is not an illusion, but real enough, though it is dependent on igno­rance; sorrow is not to be submitted to, but to be over­come. And Buddhism alone teaches how to overcome in a final victory which needs not to be fought again, because it teaches how to uproot the evil and cut down the root by the overcoming of craving, through which alone an escape from “self,” from sorrow and transience is possible. If the breadth and the depth of a religion may be measured by the keenness of its analysis of evil and by the appro­priateness of the salvation that it offers, then certainly the prize should go to Buddhism. For, when sorrow is identical with life, the only solution lies in no-more-rebirth. But rebirth and all the evil resulting therefrom will occur as long as there is the will to live.

Thus that will to live, that desire to be, that lust to enjoy, that craving to possess, that clinging to keep, has to be rooted out so that it will not grow again.

“Through not understanding the Noble Truths of Suffering, its origin, its cessation and the way to its cessa­tion, we have been wandering in this beginningless sa.msaara, both you and I,” said Lord Buddha (Parinibbaana Sutta).

It is ignorance that leads to rebirth, i.e., to sorrow; thus it is in knowledge that the great problem of life and death must be solved. To understand that decay, disease, death, sorrow, lamentation, grief, woe and despair are un­satisfactory does not require much understanding indeed. But to understand that birth is suffering, it is necessary to know that birth is not only the physical process in which a living being appears in this world, but also the mental conception that is followed by craving. It is the birth of the defilements (kilesajaati): greed, hate, delusion, pride, false belief, scepticism, sloth, agitation, unscrupulousness and recklessness of consequences. It is the birth of actions (kammajaati) that will give rise to effects (vipaakajaati). Understood in this way, any existence is evil, for it is arisen from craving and offers fresh fuel for ever-renewed craving. But to understand that life itself with all its beauty and joy is suffering, one must have tasted and understood the impermanency of life. Experience and understanding both are necessary. For if transience is only experienced, it might well become a new source of fresh delight which keeps away the boredom and the tedium of constant and unchanging beauty and joy. Is not the sea made beautiful by the rise and fall of her waves? Do not the different seasons add to the attraction of nature? Does not a change of food add to better appetite, a change of climate to better health?

But the fact that our craving ever wants a new supply of new delights must lead to disappointment, because the supply is not always at our command. Not to understand this is ignorance of the first Noble Truth of the univer­sality of sorrow. To miss this point is to miss the whole of Buddhism. No introduction, no argument can be of any use. He who finds happiness in suffering, who is satisfied with what he has, will never seek beyond. The understanding, the realization of sorrow, of life as sorrow, is a growth of insight. No fruits can be expected of a seedling; growth is necessary and development, till at the proper season from the fading blossom of transience, will ripen the fruit of understanding.

What matters it, if that fruit be bitter in taste, as long as it cures the chronic disease of craving? Sorrow, if recog­nized as a by-product of “self,” may become the means, may open the road to Deliverance, as the proper diag­nosis of an illness is the first step, the chance for a cure.

But the sorrow, the suffering, on which the Lord Buddha based his doctrine of actuality and deliverance, is more than pain-laden affections. The five aggregates of clinging (pa.tcupadaanakkhandhaa), the psycho-physical composition of mind and body (naama-ruupa) itself is said to be sorrow. Thus suffering is both bodily and mental; it is the imper­fection inherent in life, whatever form that life may take.

A certain amount of happiness may fill the emptiness within to some extent, but that craving, like an abysmal emptiness, will never be fulfilled. Before the cup is full to the brim, it has sprung a leak at the bottom. Hence that constant thirst resulting from that fleeting happiness. When the object of craving is within reach for a moment, that craving becomes clinging (ta.nhaa-paccayaa upaadaana); but clinging is impossible because all is impermanent (anicca).

Even if one finds some little happiness through satis­fying one’s desire, does this mean that complete satisfaction will give complete happiness? Because a thirsty man gets satisfaction in drinking water, everlasting bliss is not found in being drowned.

It is the want that makes one strive for satisfaction, but if that satisfaction is obtained, the need for it is no longer felt, and it is not wanted any more.

Even the satisfaction bears in itself the seed of fear and discontent, fear owing to its uncertainty, discontent over its impermanence, which is even hidden in the folds of smiling lips, while it leaves one afterwards emptier than ever before.

The satisfaction of a want is not a final satisfaction; it seems only to create a new want instead.

Modern civilization has made much progress and given to man many comforts. But those very comforts have only made life more complicated; easier communications have made the problems and quarrels of families those of nations. It is like an attempt to reach the horizon; the harder one strives, the greater is the disappointment for not getting nearer the goal.

But why then is the goal unattainable?

It is because the goal exists not in reality but only the mind’s fiction. Not by striving, but by bringing the mind at peace, by giving up even the idea of self, is it possible to attain that rest and equilibrium which form the foun­dation and essence of happiness.

But the striving, which is involved even in the attain­ment of states of spiritual absorption (jhaana), is attended with great difficulties and is known as the distressful path (dukkha-pa.tipadaa). It would be interesting to draw a com­parison here with what mediaeval spiritual authors have called “the dark night of the soul.”

Thus “dukkha” is not only bodily pain (kaayika dukkha) and mental distress (cetasika dukkha), that is physical and psychological suffering—it is also the ethical, religious experience as opposed to bliss and even the difficulty encoun­tered in the process of attaining that bliss. Nay, even joy and delight itself is called sorrow-fraught: “nandi pi dukkhaa”: not merely because joy and delight are not lasting, but far more because delight is a fetter (nandi-sa.myojana) which will prevent the attainment of perfect freedom.

Though delight is thus shown as a source of sorrow, yet sorrow, well understood, can become a source of happiness. Here especially lies the greatness of the Buddha’s teaching—that it shows the deliverance from sorrow and also from pleasure, which leads to sorrow.

Like the knowledge of an illness, though painful in itself, may be the reason why one consults a doctor, who finally cures the disease—similarly the understanding of all life as suffering will be the driving force to seek a remedy. And as of all religious teachers only the Buddha has pointed out all life as sorrow-fraught, it is natural that to him we turn in confidence.

Confidence is not the same as Faith. For Faith is in things that cannot be known; knowledge destroys faith and faith destroys itself, for it is based on that which it cannot know. Faith is defined (by Pope Pius X) as a real assent of the intellect, thus condemning those Modernists holding that faith is merely a blind feeling about religion in the sub-consciousness.

Voltaire said: “The proof of faith is that it is unin­telligible.” “Faith is to believe in something which your reason tells you cannot be true, for if your reason approved of it, there could be no question of blind faith.” (Edwin Montagu).

Confidence, however, is not a mental acceptance of that which cannot be known; it is an assured expectation, not of an unknown beyond, but of what can he tested and experienced and understood by every one for oneself (paccatta.m veditabbo vi.t.tuuhi). It is the confidence a student has in his teacher who explains in the classroom the inverse square law of gravitation as stated by Newton. But if the student has heard something of the relativity-theory of Einstein, he will not implicitly believe his teacher and his textbook, but reserve his judgment till the time that he will be able to investigate for himself.

Likewise a student of Buddhism will have confidence in the Teacher, because his teaching can be tested and ought to be tested. As a doctrine of actuality Buddhism cannot attach any value to blind submission. No possible good “can follow from the neglect of use of the very sense which lifts man sky-high above his surroundings, the use of reason. But when, walking on the Path, one sees the light grow while proceeding, one may safely continue in confidence and yet investigate the path step for step. It is that con­fidence, which is the immediate fruit of the understanding of sorrow: dukkhupanisaa saddhaa. And it is that same confidence which gives already that first taste of the happi­ness towards which all striving is moving. It is the joy (paamojja) of having found a possibility to escape from this round of birth, suffering and death; the increase of that joy will become sheer delight (piiti) only to make place for a serene tranquillity (passaddhi) and that sense of security, equilibrium, the bliss of well-being (sukha), which is the very opposite of that sense of insecurity, unbalanced striving, which is sorrow-fraught (dukkha).

When this tranquillity and sense of security have been obtained through the experience and understanding of suffering, the vicissitudes of life will no longer be able to create disturbances in the peace of mind.

Concentration of mind (samaadhi) will become a second nature; and in that natural peacefulness things will be seen in their real nature, not coloured by likes or dislikes, not disfigured by passions, not hazed by ignorance, like objects seen at the bottom of a rippleless lake of clear water.

It is with this knowledge and insight into the real nature of things (yathaabhuuta.taa.nadassana) that the golden mean can be attained, when exaggerated enthusiasm is cooled down, thus preventing the disillusion of the idealist; on the other hand preventing also the other extreme which makes life materialistic, mechanical and sombre.

By seeing things as they really are, valueless trifles will not be treated as occurrences of the highest importance, which tend to make life unnecessarily complicated.

It will leave room for a sense of humour in which we may laugh even at ourselves, for it is the sense of actuality which gives the sense of humour, in which the world is seen but as the world:

“a stage where every man must play a part ”

(Merchant of Venice).

“a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

(Macbeth, V. 5).

It is the lack of this insight that creates worry, a resultant of craving. The world puts all its “self” in every action, and thus the reaction is so keenly felt. Indeed, dukkha has no existence apart from ta.nhaa. This world is merely the shadow of truth, for the world as we know it is only the reaction of our contact and thus the reflection of our “self.” The more of “self” we have put in, the greater will be the reaction—thus we make our own sorrow and suffering. But for all that it remains a reaction all the same, a shadow, a reflection of self.

“The world is a comedy to those who think,
A tragedy to those who feel.”

(Horace Walpole).

We all can enjoy even the most terrible misery as long as it is painted upon a piece of canvas; then we can ap­preciate the skilfulness of the artist, the exquisiteness of forms, the beauty of colours, hardly being moved by the represented misery. The reason is that it is not “real,” by which we mean that we do not take part in it, there is no “self” in it, and we are mere spectators.

Thus we are mere spectators in this picture palace of the universe. Even if we see ourselves acting on the screen, we know that that is no real self who suffers or rejoices. It is mere acting.

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players.
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.

(As You Like It, 11 7).

This sense of humour may seem rather grim now and then, as if mocking at what is holiest and dearest, at life itself. It is the grin of a skull which can look at life from the other side of the grave. Thus he who perceives and understands sorrow and the emptiness of sorrow, he per­ceives also a sense of the human comedy.

Through understanding the real nature of things, through understanding the nature and origin of sorrow and suffering, i.e. of actuality—weariness, repulsion, disgust (nibbidaa) arise which can only lead to passionlessness, dispassion (viraaga), the detachment from world and self, from matter and mind which is the real freedom and release (vimutti) for which we all are striving. Detachment, indeed, is not a morbid asceticism which aims at mortification of the flesh, or at subjection of the mind, but it should grow from under­standing as necessarily as a flower in due season from a well developed plant. It is the knowledge of things as fearful (bhaya-.taa.na) and the knowledge of things as dan­gerous (aadiinava-.taa.na), the understanding of the evil of con­ditionality (sa.nkhaara-dukkha) and of the evil of changeability (vipari.naama-dukkha), which make craving and clinging im­possible, because the object is no longer seen as one worthy to possess, but rather as one causing disgust. Craving for, and attachment to, disgusting states or things is impossible; and thus it is that the realization of suffering, so far from being pessimistic, leads to the deliverance from all suffer­ing and even to the deliverance from a possible return.

Once a misconception is realized as such, it cannot be reinstated, but clarity of insight will lead to purity of virtue (siila-visuddhi), the first of the seven stages of Purity on the way to Nibbaana.

Virtue thus purified will further purify the mind with further progress on the Path of Holiness, till finally the fruit of Sainthood (arahatta-phala) is obtained, where a final death with no more rebirth will make an absolute end to all suffering, happy (sukha) because free from all sorrow, desirable (subha) because free from all desires, which are the causes of sorrow, eternal (dhuva) because free from be­coming and rebirth which result in decay and death.

May all attain to that birth-less, death-less state, the supreme deliverance of heart and mind, Nibbaana.

The Process of Life

Kamma.m satte vibhajati yadida.m hiinapa.niitataa
Kamma makes the distinction between     
different grades of beings.

Where life’s entirety can only be comprehended as an unsatisfactory process of change, the natural question will arise how this proceeding takes place. If this process is not only change and unsatisfactory (anicca-dukkha) but also a mere process of changes without an entity to pass on from change to change (anattaa), it will be asked what is it then that changes, what is it that suffers and passes on that suffering, what is it that proceeds?

In a previous lecture we have seen already that Buddhism does not deny the individuality of the process, but merely the permanency of an individual.

Individual processes are differentiated and this is caused by kamma.

Beings are said to be owners of their deeds (kamma­saka), for whatever we have of other possessions cannot be said to be ours in such an intimate degree as the actions, the deeds, which have produced this very existence and life. Of nothing else but our action, our kamma, can we be called owners in such an absolute sense, as over nothing else we have such absolute power of disposing.

We are called heirs to our deeds (kammadaayaada) for in the reaction we inherit the full consequences of our actions, so that whatever we are and in whatever condition we are, we must see therein the effect of past causes, the fruit of previously sown seed.

It is from action, from kamma, therefore, that we take our origin (kammayoni), so that kamma is compared with the mother’s womb from where this life arose.

We are linked to kamma so closely, as family-ties (kammabandhu) that cannot be broken.

But also we have in kamma our greatest protection (kammapa.tisara.naa), so that we need not rely upon any external agency as long as our deeds are good and pure.

“Whatever deed they do, either noble or evil, they be­come heirs to that.”

(Dasadhammasutta, AN 10).

Kamma (=karma in Sanskrit) cannot be comprehen­sively dealt with under one chapter heading, for all the truths and conclusion derived therefrom are centred in and emanating from the kamma-doctrine.

To understand kamma, one must first study the mind by which kamma is produced: and that is Psychology. The effects of this mind-production can be deduced to some extent by reason and experience: and that is Logic. Further, kamma leads to rebirth, renewed existence: and that is Ontology. Finally the moral aspect of skilful and unskilful action should lead to the overcoming of all kamma: and that is Ethics. Thus we see how this one word covers the whole of Buddhist Philosophy.

When analyzing a thought-unit (cittuppaada) into seven­teen thought-moments (cittakkha.na), one will meet with some mind-impressions (manosamphassa), which are so weak (paritta, atiparitta) that they hardly disturb the subconscious stream (bhava.nga-sota). But if an impression is strong enough (mahanta) to arrest the subconscious stream, thus not merely knocking at the sense doors, but actually forc­ing an entrance, gate-crashing, only then will full apperception (javana), consciousness in the full sense, arise.

Only now arises the possibility of forming new kamma. Thus we see that though kamma means action (from “karoti”: he acts), it is an action of the mind, therefore a thought, an active thought. Here our character is formed and hence the Buddha calls kamma our inheritance, and our parent. When physical elements are added to, and combined with others, something new emerges from that composition. Similarly, when psychical action is added to psychical results previously obtained, new life, new character will be produced.

Kamma thus is action, mental action; yet not all action of the mind or of the body is kamma.

Action will be present as long as there is existence, because existence is not static, but a process; and a pro­cess must proceed. The very existence of the senses con­sists in activity. As a flame cannot exist without con­suming, its very nature being combustion, so the senses cannot exist without activity.

To understand this it will be good to remember that in Buddhist philosophic terminology the senses are not understood merely as the material organs. Each sense is considered as threefold: (1) the material base (subject), (2) the material object, (3) the appropriate connection. “If the subjective eye is in good order, and if external matter (e.g. visible form) comes into focus, but if there is no appropriate bringing together, then the corresponding species of consciousness (i.e. eye-consciousness) does not come into manifestation. But if the subjective eye is in good order and if external matter comes into focus, and if there is also the appropriate bringing together (conjunction), then the corresponding species of consciousness manifests itself.” (MN 28).

Thus if one of three conditions is wanting, no consciousness arises, and there will be no sense-activity. This is meant when it was said that the very existence of the senses consists in activity.

It is not the mere contact between subjective organ and external object that constitutes the activity. Not the wick drenched in oil produces the flame. After analyzing a poem into lines, each line into words, each word into letters, we still cannot say that those letters compose the poem: for, only when set in a particular order they will form words and sense; out of order they are sheer non­sense. Thus an individual can be analyzed into corpore­ality, sensations, perceptions, differentiations and concep­tions. Yet the mere heaping up of those aggregates would not constitute a living process in the sense of growth, of development, of kamma-formations. For even in an Arahat are present all those aggregates; but in him is missing that which binds them together in activity: craving.

Like the mind of the poet gave order to the letters which thus received life, so does craving set the aggre­gates in working order; and rebirth is the effect. Who only considers the formation of the letters will never be able to read and understand the poem. Thus he who only analyses the body in anatomy, or the mind in psy­chology, will never he able to read, understand and solve the problem of kamma i.e. of life as craving.

If body or mind is conceived as a thing complete in itself, identical with itself, as an isolated self-contained en­tity, it becomes absolutely impossible to explain the interac­tion of different subjects upon one another. As long as the process of life is cut up into artificial segments, each of them considered as something static, it is impossible to conceive the whole as a process in which all is seen in its natural connection.

As long as one is concerned with analyzing individu­ality into the five aggregates of existence (pa.tcakkhandha), one might consider a person as a rounded off whole of mind and matter (naama ruupa), isolated in so far as he is not another (na ca a.t.to). But things become different as soon as one is concerned no longer with the component parts, but with the process of its growth, kamma.

One can consider a tree in itself, composed of leaves, fruits, twigs, branches, bark, wood and further characteris­tics. Those peculiarities make a tree what it is, that individual tree and not another one. But all those peculiarities and component parts of the individual have come there by a process of growth; and in this process of growth the individual can no longer be isolated (na ca so).

Kamma is a process of action, mental action, mental action with craving.

“Cetana.m aha.m bhikkhave kamma.m vadaami”
“I say, O monks, that kammic action is volition.”

In this process of volitional activity the aggregates of an individual are not parts of a whole, but forms of action, modes of grasping.

As action with volition, kamma does not come in the field of observation, except through its effect. This effect is the reaction (vipaaka). It is somewhat incorrect to call this reaction old action (puraa.na kamma) for, if action is past, it is no more action, no process of actuality.

Yet to some extent the action is continuing its pro­cess in the reaction, which is entirely dependent on that previous action. It is with a view on the inherent connection of condition and effect that both will always belong to the same class. In dependence on the desirability or non-desirability of the effect, its cause is called either skilful (kusala) or unskilful (akusala).

From the fact that thus kamma is always either moral or immoral, it must be clear that kamma is the very oppo­site of fate, with which it is sometimes confused. For fate has nothing to do with morality, as it is a predetermining power (real or imaginative) that fixes one’s destiny with disregard of action, good or bad. Fate interferes with the working of cause and effect in so far as it produces results which are not caused by corresponding acts. As a denial of cause and effect fate must be dismissed as a mere fiction.

The undesirable effect of akusala kamma in some con­ditions cannot be altered, but has merely to be outlived.

Take as illustration a man who has borrowed 100 pounds from his master in order to marry. The feast being over, he finds himself incapable of repaying the debt. If the master is kind-hearted, he might not confiscate his property, but say e.g. that his servant can pay him off with his work, one day counting for one pound. In that case a hundred days will be needed before the accounts are squared, be­fore the servant can begin to earn again something. During that period no new acquisition can he made, but his pre­vious possessions remain his all the same.

Somewhat similarly akusala kamma can effect a rebirth in such a state of misery that no new kusala action can be done there. This undesirable effect has simply to be outlived, “till the last penny of the debt is paid.” When the effect of that unskilful action is exhausted, like a cloud which has shed all its rain, then naturally like the sunshine, the previously accumulated good tendencies will produce their good effects (kusala vipaaka). This can happen at any time whenever the opportunity is favourable. It is this accumulated kamma (katatta kamma) that can become indefinitely effective (aparaapariya vedaniiya kamma). If, however, it would miss the opportunity to become effective, it would become “dead,” unproductive (ahosi kamma).

This unproductiveness is the only escape from this repeated round of rebirth (sa.msaara). From this possibly unproductive kamma one can clearly understand that Bud­dhism is neither an absolutely rigid law of cause and effect, where every seed must produce its fruits, nor fatal predetermination, nor blind chance.

"There are these three sources of irrational views,” it is said in the A.nguttara Nikaaya (Tikanipaata, Mahaavagga 61), “which are questioned, investigated and abandoned by the wise who follow the hereditary traditions—­three sources of irrational views which establish themselves in the denial of kamma: (1) there are some who believe that all is a result of acts in previous lives; (2) there are others who believe that all is the result of creation by a Supreme Ruler; (3) there are others again who believe that everything arises without reason or cause. But then if a person becomes a murderer, a thief, an adulterer, etc., if this would be due to past actions, or made by the creation of a Supreme Ruler, or if this would happen by mere chance, then one would not be responsible for evil action.”

Kamma is the very opposite of all these irrational views, because it is action itself; and upon each new action depends all further effects. If that action produces results and that depends on other actions—those results will correspond to their cause. Any other view is unproved, unprovable, illogical, irrational, untenable.

“Karma avoids the superstitious extreme, on the one hand, of those who believe in the separate existence of some entity called the soul; and the irreligious extreme, on the other, of those who do not believe in moral justice and retribution.” (Buddhism: Prof. T. W. Rhys Davids, p. 103).

What we are and that we are is not mere chance; it is not rigid determinism either, for that would leave un­explained the differences in faculties and modes of life. As a scientific law, be it physical or biological, is clearly not a law with binding force, but only a description of a way of action, constant as far as our observation goes—­similarly the law of kamma is not a necessity of causality where every action must produce its effect. Laws are like grammatical rules for a language, which have always some exceptions and might become modified in time through the progressive use of that language. Similarly an effect of a certain action cannot be predicted, because there are so many factors present which through their influence might support, impede, modify or even destroy the effect alto­gether. Not causality, but conditionality!

Though we speak of causality as the foundation of Buddhism, we should not take it in too strict a sense. As in science so in daily life everything is based on cause and effect—what would be the chaos in the kitchen, if one day the salt were no longer salt! Yet modern physics sees the need of a certain free play for chance or fate, so that natural laws are not determinate and uniform for each indi­vidual case, but for the average. In the same way we cannot always speak of causation, but rather of condition, which has not such a rigid meaning and corresponds more faith­fully to the Paali: paccayaa, as it is used in the last book of the Abhidhamma, the Pa.t.thaana, the Book of Origination.

If we pay attention to the operative force (kicca), kamma is fourfold.

Reproductive or generative kamma (janaka kamma) is that action which acts again in the combination of mind and matter (naama ruupa) or in other words the plant that gives fruits, the cause that produces effects (vipaaka). Once having reproduced itself, this kind of kamma is lost in its effect and cannot generate, germinate again. It is, so to say, a transformation, if that term be understood properly i.e. not in the sense of an entity, but of a process of growth. Like the seed from which a plant has grown cannot ger­minate again, because it has no more existence, but lives in the plant, so this reproductive kamma is exhausted in the act of generating. Yet the effect produced may make itself known during very long periods and many lives. It will always be, however, of the same kind as the generating kamma force.

During this course of process new actions, called supporting kamma (upatthambhaka kamma), may maintain the effects of previous actions or even intensify them, thus leading from good to better, or from bad to worse. On the other hand, counteractive action (upapii.laka kamma) may interfere with the working out of the effects of re­productive (janaka) action, weakening, modifying, impeding its potential energy, thus making good effects less good and evil effects less evil. If this kind of counter-action is so strong as to completely annihilate the effects of previous kamma, it is called destructive kamma (upaghaataka kamma). This fourfold division according to the operating forces or function is the most important for the proper under­standing of kamma. For, if all action would be reproductive, an escape from the effects would not be possible and the faring on through this round of repeated rebirths (sa.msaara) would be endless. Only because action can counter­balance action, and thus nullify the otherwise unavoidable result, deliverance is a possibility.

The possibilities of supporting, counteracting or anni­hilating the good or evil effects of action that would have been normally reproductive, depend entirely on the poten­tial efficacy of the interfering activity. Thus there are four possibilities of producing effects (paakadaana).

Weighty kamma (garuka kamma) is that kind of action, the effects of which cannot be counterbalanced. They are fixed as to their consequences for good or for bad. Fixed in good results (sammatta niyataa) are e.g. the four paths (ariya magga) in the quest of Nibbaana inevitably establish­ing the state of exemption from a miserable rebirth. Fixed in bad results (micchatta niyataa) are the five crimes which find retribution in a miserable rebirth without delay i.e. immediately on the disintegration of the aggregates of exis­tence (aanantarika kamma) namely matricide, parricide, mur­der of an Arahat, wounding of a Buddha, causing a schism in the Sangha. Sometimes we find also “wrong views” (micchaa-di.t.thi) mentioned as such a crime. In that case “wrong views” means the extreme perversity of opinion, disregard even of the law of causality and moral retribution, and not mere disbelief, resultant from lack of knowledge. Thus it will be seen that, only in rare occasions, kamma will be of such a nature that nothing else can influence it.

It is logically the very last thought of a life-span which decides the immediately following rebirth; therefore it is called death proximate (aasanna) kamma.

Thought giving rise to thought, as a flame sets all burning which it can lay hold of—and the last thought of a life-time being extremely weak owing to the failing physical conditions under which it arises—this last dying thought will lack the power to influence or modify for better or for worse and thus it will give rise to the re-link­ing consciousness (pa.tisandhi vi.t.taa.na) according to its own nature. And so it happens that this one single last thought determines a whole coming life. Usually, of course, it will be one’s habitual mode of thinking that will prevail, when in dying all resistance has been reduced to a minimum. This habitual (aaci.n.na) kamma is one’s tendency for good or bad, formed through numerous repeated actions during one’s life. It is extremely improbable—though not impos­sible—that in one’s dying hours one should be able to break the fetters of habit forged during a whole lifetime. But even if this would happen through force of external conditions, e.g. relations reminding the dying man of a certain good action done many years ago, this would not mean that all the other actions have become ineffective.

The kamma, which through force of circumstances cannot express itself, may do so at any time when condi­tions are more favourable. Till then it is said to be ac­cumulated (ka.tattaa).

Take for example a miser. The energy of his whole life having been directed towards the hoarding of wealth, he has made avarice his habitual kamma (aaci.n.na). Thus most likely his last thought will be one of craving for, and attachment to, his possessions, and of regret to be unable to take his wealth with him. If he dies with such-like thoughts, no other rebirth can be expected but in the planes of ”unsatisfiable” desire (petayoni). But it may happen that through kindly influence of relations his last thoughts are directed towards nobler ideals, thus resulting in a happy rebirth owing to his good death-proximate (aasanna) kamma. As, however, the cause of this good effect was only his one last thought, the fruits thereof may very soon be ex­hausted, and then the habitual kamma of the miser which was temporarily suspended as accumulative (ka.tattaa) kamma will get the upper hand. This exhaustion of proximate kamma may be an explanation of the death of embryos and infants.

The reverse might happen equally well, in which case a last thought of worry, e g. temporarily suspends the natural consequences of a very virtuous life, as it is said to have happened in the case of Queen Mallikaa, whose subsequent life in a state of misery lasted only for seven days.

Other kammic thoughts can become effective only in the second birth, in which case they are called subse­quently effective (upapajja vedaniiya kamma). If such a thought does not get the opportunity then, it becomes inoperative (ahosi kamma). Weaker even than this kind is the initial stage, the first moment of a thought-unit, which also becomes ineffective (ahosi), unless it can produce an effect in that life itself (di.t.tha dhamma vedaniiya kamma). Kamma which is so strong that it can produce an effect at any other than the above mentioned births is called indefinitely effective (aparaapariya vedaniiya kamma).

Properly classified, kamma is thus:

(A) According to function (kicca):

          1. Reproductive (janaka)

            2. Supportive (upatthambhaka)

            3. Counteractive (upapii.laka)

            4. Destructive (upaghaataka)

(B) According to the strength of effect (paakadaana):

            1. Serious (garuka)

            2. Death-proximate (aasanna)

            3. Habitual (aaci.n.na<¯i>)

Source : http://www.bps.lk/wheels_library/wh_132_133.html#_Toc165017908
 

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