paticcasamuppada.pdf

EDITORIAL: PA T ICCASAMUPP ¯ DA—

BEYOND LINEAR CAUSALITY AND

DUALISM

The Buddha offers a penetrating and perceptive account of the human condition

when he describes it in terms of the three marks of conditioned existence

(tilakkha _ na). These three marks are not the inherent qualities of a putative

‘human nature’, but are the rather the characteristics of ‘actuality’ as perceived by

an ‘Awakened One’ (Buddha). Thus the Buddha in the Dhammapada (277 – 9)

states that:

All conditioned phenomena are impermanent (sabbe sa nkh¯r¯ anicc¯),

All conditioned phenomena are unsatisfactory (sabbe sa _ nkh¯r¯ dukkh¯)

All phenomena are not-self (sabbe dhamm¯ anatt¯)

The Buddha, therefore, rather than offering a path to liberation based on a priori

judgements, offers a wholly empirical path to liberation founded on the practice

of ethics and the ineluctable facts of birth, growth, decay and disappearance.

Human existence, the Buddha, insists, is subject to this same ‘law’ that governs all

phenomena, with there being no exceptions to this law. At the heart of the

Buddha’s dispensation, therefore, is the message of ‘conditioned co-arising’, more

commonly known as ‘dependent origination’. What the Buddha realised is that the

world or ‘reality’ is not simply ‘out there’, but is constructed and conditioned by

what we bring to it. Collectively human beings share common faculties and

desires, and therefore create a ‘common’ illusion bolstered by the desire to

perceive what they want to perceive. This is the tendency to attempt to mould

things in accordance with our desires, and it is the frustration of desire that leads

to craving for a form of happiness that lies beyond the impermanent and unstable.

Philosophies and religious thinking, both of the East and West, bear ample

testimony to the craving for a ‘beyond’ that is not subject to the vicissitudes of

impermanence. From the desire for a metaphysical ‘heavenly’ realm to the

positing of a Ding an sich, all are expressions of the longing for permanence.

However, the distinctive nature of the Buddhist ethical path is summed up in the

expression sabbe dhamm ¯ anatt ¯ (‘all phenomena are not-self’).

It is this longing for a permanent, unchanging reality beyond sense

experience that the Buddha rejects. What he offers us instead is a world that is

evanescent and lacking in any substantial unchanging existence. In offering this

radical rejection of metaphysics the Buddha is not offering an alternative ‘system’

that is true independent of the inquirer. Rather than displaying a ‘will-to-system’,

Contemporary Buddhism, Vol. 7, No. 1, May 2006

ISSN 1463-9947 print/1476-7953 online/06/010001-5

q 2006 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/14639940600919879

2 EDITORIAL

the Buddha is much more concerned in investigating a problem; namely, the

question of existential distress or dukkh ¯ and its overcoming. As such the Buddha

can truly be termed a ‘problem thinker’, for it is not some arcane philosophical

conundrum that impels him to ‘go forth’ but the ‘problem’ of what activates and

fosters human distress. In the Sutta Nip¯ta the Buddha appears to offer a very

personal account of what motivates his investigation of the ‘problem’.

Fear comes to one who embraces violence—look at people quarrelling.

Let me tell you of the strong agitation that I felt. Seeing people struggling like

ﬁsh in shallow water with enmity towards one another, I became fearful.

Wanting a safe place to shelter I saw that the world lacked substance and there

was not one part of it that was changeless. Seeing people trapped in mutual

enmity I grew dissatisﬁed. Then I saw buried in their hearts a barb that was

difﬁcult to perceive. It is this barb that impels people to run in all directions.

Once it is pulled out the running ceases as does the exhaustion that

accompanies it. (Sutta Nip¯ta, 935 – 9)

In his rejection of metaphysics the Buddha radically focuses his attention upon

becoming as opposed to Being, and in directing his attention to the problem of

becoming the Buddha discerns an endless ﬂux of co-genesis and co-cessation.

However, the Buddha does not posit any kind of transcendental subject outside of

or behind the process. There is only the process with nothing ﬁxed or

foundational, and no attempt is made by the Buddha to suggest that there is any

hidden reality above and beyond that process. What, however, is essential to the

Buddha’s message is the need to identify the conditions that bring about the

general malaise of human life in order to change them. Human actions, the Buddha

insists, change conditions. Just as the artisan or craftsmen—the Buddha often

applauds the skilfulness of the carpenter, smith, farmer, etc.—masters the

materials that they work with, the Buddha suggests that humans could realise

the truth about themselves, by piercing the veil of delusion and ‘master’ the

destructive and blind forces within them.

At the core of the Buddha’s teaching is the doctrine of paticcasamupp¯da—

the conditioned co-arising of phenomena. This is attested to by the opening

verses of the P ¯ li Ud ¯ na where the initial three ‘inspired utterances’ (ud ¯ na) deal

with the content of the Buddha’s awakening; namely, paticcasamupp¯da. The

general formula for conditioned co-arising can be summed up in the following

way:

When this is, this is (imasmim sati idam hoti)

This arising, this arises (imassupp¯da idam upajjati)

Where this is not, this is not (imasmim asati idam na hoti)

This is not arising, this does not arise (imassa nirodh¯ idam nirujjhati)

The Buddha in this formula clearly uses the P ` li words imasmim and idam, both of

which mean ‘this’—imasmim is the locative of ida. However, all too often this

EDITORIAL 3

statement is translated as: ‘When this is, that is.’ This is then often further glossed

as, ‘When A is, B is’ and then subsequently described as a Buddhist theory of

causality. 1

While not wholly inaccurate, this way of viewing conditioned co-arising fails

to do justice to the precision of the Buddha’s formulation. In addition, it introduces

the suspicion of linearity into the process by hinting at a sequential link between

‘this’ and ‘that’. There is thus the assumption of a time interval between two things

in a space – time continuum. The projection of linearity onto the process of

conditioned co-production conﬁgures multidimensional reality into something

two dimensional. The Buddha states that when certain conditions are present

a certain event occurs. When those conditions are absent that event does not

occur. Conditioned co-arising, as described by the Buddha, neither constructs or

destroys, but simply discloses or reveals what happens. Beyond this the Buddha

has no further claim to make:

I will teach you conditioned co-arising and the conditioned co-arisen

( paticcasamupp¯da˜a–paticcasamuppanna). (Sa¨ yutta Nik ` ya, II. 20)

Paticcasamupp¯da is considered by the Buddha to be a universal law governing

human consciousness, perception and action. This law is not, however, revealed to

the Buddha but is discovered by him, and as such is not a metaphysical or

transcendental principle. This law pre-exists the emergence of a Buddha and will

continue to exist after his demise, as in the same way a scientiﬁc law is not

revealed but discovered. Conditioned co-arising is simply a statement about the

way things are, or come to be.

The most important quality of paticcasamupp¯da is considered to be

idapaccayat ¯ (‘thus conditioned’), which is a way of describing speciﬁc

conditionality. Put another way, idapaccayat¯ refers not to isolated connections

but to structure or recurrent patterns. It is this ‘patterning’ that is at the heart of

the doctrine of conditioned co-arising and gives it its characteristic as an invariable

law. Human experience and existence, according to the Buddha, is ‘patterned’ in a

way that is clearly discernible to one who investigates this law. The veriﬁability of

his teaching was clearly stressed by the Buddha:

Imin¯ sandhittena dhammena ak¯kalena ehipassikena opaniyikena paccattam

veditabbena vi ˜˜ uhi

(through this clear dhamma, which is a-temporal, directly perceptible, goal-

oriented and personally veriﬁable by any intelligent person) (Majjhima Nik`ya,

I. 265)

The term ‘causality’, however, is widely used by Buddhist scholars to refer to

the law of conditioned co-arising. Nevertheless, ‘cause’ in western philosophical

thinking is generally associated with efﬁcient causality. The historical under-

pinning for such a view is to be found within Aristotelian thinking, with its

emphasis on separate substances and linearity. In this view things act upon each

4 EDITORIAL

other externally, setting in motion chains of cause and effect. Causes and effects

are thus seen as separate substances, with the former producing the latter in a

linear succession. As such, a cause pre-exists its effect. As part of its inherent

nature the cause has a potentiality to act upon things and produce effects that did

not exist previously. In linear causality, a cause is neither dependent upon nor

conditioned by its effect. In this view an effect can continue to exist when the

cause has ceased to exist. However, the reverse is not the case.

With the doctrine of conditioned co-arising the Buddha goes beyond linear

causality. For example, in conditioned co-arising, ‘When A is, B is’. However, the

reverse is equally true, ‘When B is, A is’. To take a more explicit example from the

formula of conditioned co-arising: ‘With consciousness as a condition name-and-

form arises’, ‘With name-and-form as a condition consciousness arises’. This kind of

mutual conditionality is not possible in linear causality.

Paticcasamupp¯da, rather than being a ‘Buddhist theory of causality’, is an

explanatory device to disclose the patterning of events. Indeed the Buddha is

often spoken of as a hetuv`din (a discloser of conditions). This is certainly how the

Buddha perceived himself:

Ye dhamm¯ hetuppabhav¯—tesam hetu tath¯gato ¯ha, tesa˜ ca yo nirodho evam

v¯di mah¯sama _ no.

(Of realities which arise due to a hetu—of these the Tath¯gata discloses their

hetu. this and that which is their stopping, the great striver speaks of). (Vinaya,

I. 40)

Once paticcasamupp¯da is correctly understood, a world conceived of in terms of

hard dualism is overcome. Dyadic entities are not now viewed as opposites but as

mutually conditioned and conditioning relationships. The idea of unbridgeable

oppositions is thus seen as a chimera. This is certainly a radical departure in

thinking and the Buddha describes it as ‘going against the current’. The following

verse from the Dhammapada (385) clearly indicates that the passage beyond

opposites is crucial for the passage from the unawakened to the awakened state:

For whom there is neither the far shore nor the near shore nor both, him, free

from distress and without connections, I call a brahman. (Norman 1997)

This going beyond binary oppositions is often described as a ‘Middle Way’.

All too often the ‘Middle way’ is treated as some golden mean seated spatially

‘between’ oppositions. The Middle way, however, is not some spatially midway

position, but a ‘crossing over’ beyond oppositional thinking, a transcendence of

dualisms. Thus it is a practical and concrete transcendence of binary oppositions.

This transcendence, however, does not take place through some Hegelian

aufhebung of thesis and antithesis productive of a new thesis. In the dynamic of

the dialectic, conﬂict and opposition is endemic. Whereas, with conditioned co-

arising as a guide to knowledge, it becomes apparent that binary oppositions

EDITORIAL 5

are mutually dependent upon each other, perpetuating, as they often do, conﬂict

and distress.

To conceive of paticcasamupp¯da as simply a Buddhist theory of causation

is to seriously underestimate the power of this central teaching of the Buddha to

radically re-orient our thinking. To fully address this problem, however,

unfortunately passes well beyond the scope of this editorial, which is much

more limited. The purpose of what is stated here is merely to alert us to the

potential ways in which we can ‘neutralise’ the far-reaching implications of the

Buddha’s thought by conscripting it to well-known patterns and paradigms of

thinking.

John Peacocke

University of Bristol & Sharpham College, UK.

NOTE

1. A good recent example of this is Gowans’ Philosophy of the Buddha (2003). In this

work Gowans describes conditioned co arising as a ‘basic expression of causality’

(2003, p. 83)

REFERENCES

GOWANS, CHRISTOPHER W. 2003. Philosophy of the Buddha. London and New York:

Routledge.

NORMAN, K. R. (trans). 1997. The Words of the Doctrine (Dhammapada). Oxford: Pali Text

Society.

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