The Spread and Development of Later Buddhism MBI 105
Lesson 4
The Birth of Mahayana
The term Mahayana and, of course, Hinayana appeared first in the Sutras on Far-Reaching Discriminating Awareness, the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras (Prajnaparamita), in approximately the second century of the modern era. Two monks, Fa-Hsien and Hsuan-Chuang, who travelled to India from 392 to 414 A.D. and from 629 to 645 A.D. respectively, reported that two kinds of doctrines called Maha and Hina existed, and that there were temples where monks were learning either or both of them.
Now that becomes an interesting observation, for it shows that the division that had developed between Dharmayana and Mahayana still allowed mutual study and co-operation at that time.
Unfortunately that peaceful coexistence was not to last until the present age.
Lesson 4 The Birth of Mahayana
Today, the so called lesser vehicle, consisting of Sravakas and Pratiekas has become a collective term for the eighteen major Buddhist schools that evolved. This, of course, denies the subtle base of the revolutionary seven groups that led to the Mahayana path, which in itself was to evolve into many different paths. Here we will use three references in describing early Buddhism: Sravakayana, Pratiekayana and Bodhisattvayana, while making it clear that some of the schools under these banners evolved after Mahayana declared itself.
During the early years, while the Pratieka Buddhas continued in their customary silence, the Sravakas continued as the visible representative of Buddhism. After Buddhas death, they codified and directed the rules of the monastic order, classified the teachings of Buddha and generated Abhidharmas. Buddha Dharma spread and eleven major schools continued, while seven schools, as we saw, flourished with new ideas. All, however, remained faithful to the basic Dharmayana ideas.
When the seeds were in place, a new Buddha Dharma emerged. It was the Great Vehicle (Mahayana), called the Bodhisattva Vehicle.
Without supplanting the Sravaka vehicle or displacing the Forest Pratieka vehicle,-- which continued spreading eventually into Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, and Cambodia,-- the Mahayana took hold with creative fervor and extended eventually into China, Tibet, Bhutan, Sikkim, Nepal, Mongolia, Japan, and Korea and Vietnam.
While the Sravakas involved themselves with the sutras and inclined towards a prajna concerned with impermanence, suffering, and no identity and looked towards the dissolution of craving and clinging as a solution, the new prajna looked to the perfection of wisdom (prajna-paramita), which also included impermanence, suffering and No Identity, but looked towards non duality as a solution
For those sincere practitioners upon the path, the Sravaka Prajna indeed led to Awakening (bodhi), but the new schools looked to a knowing of all things in all their aspects (sarvakaraj-nata), which they considered to be the supreme, correct and natural Awakening (anuttarasamyak-sambodhi).
This was rooted in the initial concept of arousing the thought of a complete enlightenment (Bodhichitta), in which one was expected to pledge oneself to…
“attain Buddhahood; just as all the Buddhas, through their Buddha knowledge, free of all obstacles, and their Buddha eye, know and see; just as they acknowledge the absence of the self-nature of things ...and ...arouse the thought of supreme and right complete Enlightenment”
This resolve immediately made the pledgling a Bodhisattva (flawed at that moment to be sure), but certain to reach eventually the supreme and perfect enlightenment that all Buddhas attained.
Yet at the same time they had to allow the paradox that neither Buddhas nor perfect enlightenment, as such, existed. For this, without the direct experience, they were expected (at least those sincerely on the path) to completely understand at a deep level the concept of “neither this nor that”.
Among all the great Mahayana sacred texts, there are many that are essential to understand. Chan Ssu Lun, for example, has its base laid upon four treatises: the Lankavitara Sutra, the Vimlamakirti Sutra, the Diamond sutra and the Garland Sutra.
But there are earlier sutras that give a simpler idea of the Mahayana concepts of the early Mahayana years. One of the first was really dedicated to lay understanding. It is sometimes called the Enlightenment Sutra, but in the version translated by Shramana An-Shr-Gao of the Latter Han Dynasty, it is called by a more elegant and deserving title: The Eight Great Awakenings Sutra.
The Eight Great Awakenings Sutra
Buddhist Disciples! At all times, day and night, sincerely recite and bear in mind these eight truths that cause great people to awaken.
The First Awakening: The world is impermanent. Countries are perilous and fragile. The body is a source of pain, ultimately empty. The five skandhas are not the true self. Life and Death is nothing but a series of transformations—hallucinatory, unreal, uncontrollable. The intellect is a wellspring of turpitude, the body a breeding ground of offenses. Investigate and contemplate these truths. Gradually break free of death and rebirth.
Now this is not a new idea of the Mahayana doctrine, but here it must be pointed out that it is considered a point of Lay Awakening. This means that it cannot be just perceived as a Truth by intellect, for it is easy to deduce that all things decay and change. It must be understood much more profoundly, at a level that allows one to be continually conscious of this impermanence of all things.
The Second Awakening: Too much desire brings pain. Death and rebirth are wearisome ordeals, originating from our thoughts of greed and lust. By lessening desires we can realize absolute truth and enjoy peace, freedom, and health in body and mind.
Once again presented here is a Dharmayana ideal, which is to restrain all craving. But as an awakening we are urged to make that restraint a natural embodiment of becoming, thus the constant rebirth of identity birth is curtailed.
The Third Awakening: Our minds are never satisfied or content with just enough. The more we obtain, the more we want. Thus we create offenses and perform evil deeds. Bodhisattvas don’t wish to make these mistakes. Instead, they choose to be content. They nurture the Way, living a quiet life in humble surroundings—their sole occupation, cultivating wisdom.
Humble surroundings and the cultivation of wisdom is here suggested as the way of the Layman. Here the Wisdom required is that which allows the development of the first two awakenings
The Fourth Awakening: Idleness and self-indulgence are the downfall of people. With unflagging vigor, great people break through their afflictions and baseness. They vanquish and defeat the four kinds of demons, and escape from the prison of the five skandhas.
Idleness and self indulgence are the natural enemies of anyone in the lay community who lives amidst the temptations of the world of the senses. This unflagging vigor is to be developed as a natural unfolding of the life force and is not to be corrupted by a zealous fanaticism directed by the mind, which can only produce more eventual suffering and tension.
Here we consider the four devils to be (a) the devil that keeps us bound to the world of the senses (b) the devil that keeps us bound to the world of the mind (c) the devil that keeps us bound to the clinging after existence and finally (d) the devil that keeps us bound to a clinging after non existence. When these devils are destroyed, there are no more aggregates of form, sensation, emotion, perception, nor consciousness.
The Fifth Awakening: Stupidity and ignorance are the cause of death and rebirth. Bodhisattvas apply themselves and deeply appreciate study and erudition, constantly striving to expand their wisdom and refine their eloquence. Nothing brings them greater joy than teaching and transforming living beings.
This is a special message to those who are confused. Normally self confined within their nests of comfort, they appear stupid, stubborn and ignorant, no matter what education or culture they have managed to cover themselves with. But this we see revealed here as just another mask of Identity, for Buddha declares, “get moving” and develop the great joy that is available to you by teaching the Buddha Dharma and transforming others.
The Sixth Awakening: Suffering in poverty breeds deep resentment. Wealth unfairly distributed creates ill-will and conflict among people. Thus, Bodhisattvas practice giving. They treat friend and foe alike. They do not harbor grudges or despise amoral people.
Here Lay persons are exhorted to develop charity. Now that is a different thing from both Buddhist compassion or benevolence, which are to be directed at all sentient creatures.
The Seventh Awakening: The five desires are a source of offenses and grief. Truly great people, laity included, are not blighted by worldly pleasures. Instead, they aspire to don the three-piece precept robe and the blessing bowl of monastic life. Their ultimate ambition is to leave the home life and to cultivate the Path with impeccable purity. Their virtuous qualities are lofty and sublime; their attitude towards all creatures, kind and compassionate.
Here those who are lay persons are encouraged not to rest simply on the lay path and close the door to the greater liberation available when one goes forth in the homeless life.
The Eighth Awakening: Like a blazing inferno, birth and death are plagued with suffering and affliction. Therefore, great people resolve to cultivate the Great Vehicle, to rescue all beings, to endure hardship on behalf of others, and to lead everyone to ultimate happiness.
Here, finally, is the only true Bodhisattva exhortation for lay persons. What is that advice? Cultivate the great vehicle, which is the Bodhisattva state.
These are the Eight Truths that all Buddhas, Bodhisattvas and great people awaken to. Once awakened, they even more energetically continue to cultivate the Path. Steeping themselves in kindness and compassion, they grow in wisdom. They sail the Dharma ship across to Nirvana’s shore, and then return on the sea of birth and death to rescue living beings. They use these Eight Truths to show the proper course for living beings, causing them to recognize the anguish of birth and death. They inspire all to forsake the five desires, and to cultivate their minds in the manner of Sages.
If Buddhist disciples recite this Sutra on the Eight Awakenings, and constantly ponder its meaning, they will certainly eradicate boundless offenses, advance towards Bodhi, and will quickly realize Proper Enlightenment. They will always be free of birth and death, and will abide in eternal bliss.
What this sutra shows is that the Mahayana are not effectively promoting any change among lay persons with respect to Dharmayana ideals except by telling them to support the Mahayana Ideal. There is no plea to see deeper transcendentally, there is no talk of the awakening of a sage. There is no admonition that suggests the idea of gradual or rapid Awakening. All that are presented are eight attainable Lay Awakenings, that do not even suggest delving deeper into true compassion or benevolence. Thus Mahayana, for the layman, meant no essential change, for it speaks nothing of deities or other ceremonies and rituals. It allows them also to retain the availability of the state of arahat, which many had actually attained.
Yet it calls for their support. Furthermore that support was given. Perhaps this is because the basic Indian culture, founded upon deities and transcendental phenomena, was more comfortable and less rigid than that proposed by Dharmayana,-- at least as it was presented by the monasteries and their monks. Perhaps too, the kindness shown by the new Mahayana also had an effect. History cannot tell us, for its writers invariable paint the picture that their minds tell them and being human and flawed, they can see no further.
Thus they generated two de facto stages, without perhaps meaning to do so: the arahat stage, available to all laics together with the Bodhisattva path; and an Awakened Bodhisattva stage, with its corresponding Bodhisattva path for monks. Thus the only difference in the two Bodhisattva paths was the intensity given to the path. The “going forth” signified a change of intensity rather than a giving up of the householder life.
“If a man who has committed a misdemeanor come to the knowledge of it, reform himself and practice goodness, the force of retribution will gradually exhaust itself as a disease gradually loses its baneful influence when the patient perspires.”
The law of Karma stands. What one sows one reaps, but it is possible to dissolve that retribution. Thus in this life one can actually work on negating the negative energy accrued. That becomes a great incentive to avoid pitfalls as well as remedy the karma of old errors.
“The most awakened is a mind which is thoroughly cleansed of dirt, and which, remaining pure, retains no blemishes. From the time when there was yet no heaven and earth till the present day, there is nothing in the ten quarters which is not seen, or known, or heard by such a mind, for it has gained all-knowledge, and for that reason it is called awakened.”
While this is clear, it contrasts with the Chan idea, proposed in the poem of Hui Neng, that the mind is not at all like mirror, for there is neither dust to obscure the mind nor a mind itself. Only when both are let go, is there a true awakening beyond words.
42. The Buddha said: “I consider the dignities of kings and lords as a particle of dust that floats in the sunbeam. I consider the treasure of precious metals and stones as bricks and pebbles. I consider the gaudy dress of silks and brocades as a worn-out rag. I consider this universe as small as the holila fruit. I consider the lake of Anavatapta as a drop of oil with which one smears the feet.
This is the correct vision of the world perceived by the senses. It is to be understood and emulated by every sincere Buddha Dharma monk.
I consider the various methods of salvation taught by the Buddhas as a treasure created by the imagination.
I consider the transcendental doctrine of Buddhism as precious metal or priceless fabric seen in a dream.
I consider the teaching of Buddhas as a flower before my eyes.
I consider the practice of Dhayana as a pillar supporting the Mount Sumeru.
I consider Nirvâna as awakening from a day dream or nightmare.
I consider the struggle between the heterodox and orthodox as the antics of the six dragons.
I consider the doctrine of sameness as the absolute ground of reality.
I consider all the religious works done for universal salvation as like the plants in the four seasons.”
Exercise 4
What is your understanding of the final verse of the “The Sutra of the Forty Two Sections” for the benefit of Mahayana monks?