Volume 1

Encyclopædia of religion and ethics / edited by James Hastings ; with the assistance of John A. Selbie ... and other scholars.

Date:
1908-1926
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Encyclopædia of religion and ethics / edited by James Hastings ; with the assistance of John A. Selbie ... and other scholars. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    (Bodhisattva) during his last existence, has the appearance of hesitating, thinking, speaking, act- ing, suffering as we do. This, however, is wholly due to his condescension. In reality this marvellous being is superior to all such emotions, and remains a stranger to them. To maintain the contrary is heresy. The body of the future Buddhas is en- tirely spiritual. There is nothing ‘ mundane ’ in them. A Bodhisattva has really no father, no mother, no son, etc. This ‘ hyperphysical ’ system (lokottaravada) is more precisely set forth in the Vetulyaka school. According to their teaching, Sakyamuni did not appear in person in the world, but deputed an image of himself to represent him (cf. DOCETISM). (4) The Mahavastu says that many ages ago Sakyamuni took the vow of Bodhi in the presence of another ancient Sakyamuni. The same book speaks of eight thousand Buddhas of the name of Dipah- kara,... of three hundred mUlions of Sakyamunis.* If we identify this ancient Buddha -with ours, make all the Dipahkaras, all the Sakyamunis, all the Dhvajottamas, etc., into one single Dipahkara, one single Sakyamuni, and adopt the docetic theory of the Vetulyakas, we obtain the system of the ‘ Lotus of the True Law.’ Countless ages ago, nay rather in the beginning, Sakyamuni became Buddha; his appearances on earth, in which he seems to become Buddha, to enter into nirvana, etc., are purely magical.t Although it was quite late when the Mahavastu received its final shape, the characteristics to which we have drawn attention seem to be ancient. For the Lotus the terminus ad quern is A.D. 265. As for the docetic theory, it is held to have been condemned at the Council of Pataliputra (circa B.C. 246). Although the historic^ existence of the Council may be doubtful, the impression re- mains that the Buddhists had early reached the follo-mng conceptions:— (а) Sakyamuni survives his ezxtlalj parinirvana, and prolongs the ‘ trance ’ (dhyana), from which he has never in reality issued since the moment that he became Buddha. There is no occasion, therefore, for reference, in addition, to the moment Avhen he will enter really into nirvana. ‘ The Blessed Buddhas, well equipped with knowledge and merit, fields of benevolence and compassion, shelters of the multitudes of beings, holding a perpetual concentration of mind, are neither in the sarhsara (world of becoming) nor in nirvana^ (saihsdra- nirvdnavimuhtah). So it is said in the Dhar- masangitisutra. J (б) In the orthodox theory (Vaibhajyavadin), Sakyamuni on becoming Buddha entered ‘ nirvana with residue,’ the residue being the body without an active ‘soul’ or thinking organism, which nevertheless continues to live and speak. But no speaking is possible in dhyana, therefore this body is only magical. Very probably the Buddhists soon came to believe that Sakyamuni during the whole of his earthly existence had only been the magical substitute of the real Sakyamuni, who had long since entered into eternal Buddhahood. The steps are as followsThe Bodhisattva comes from the heaven of the Tusitas to enter a human womb. The Buddha remains in the Tusita heaven [Is it there that he became Buddha? We do not know], and produces a double of himself. The Buddha, who has been Buddha from all time, or for such a long time that it comes to the same thing, reigns high up far beyond the Tusitas; if he acts and saves creatures, it is because * See Kern, Manual, 66, n. 2. The buddhology and myth- ology of the Mahavastu are confused; see, for instance, iii. 608, where the five (human) Buddhas are confronted with the thousand Buddhas. Cf. Barth, Joum. des Savants, 1899. t The same doctrine is found in the Suvarnaprabhasa. t Siksas, p. 322. Cf. na iuddhah parinirvdti na dkarmah parihiyate (Suvarnaprabhasa). The identification of ‘ nirvana ’ vrith some state of beatific meditation is clearly indicated by the Lotus of the True Law, ch. xi; cl. Kern, Geschiedenis, he is not deprived of all compassion by becoming Buddha, and is, in fact, still a ‘Bodhisattva’* (cf. Waddell, ‘Sambhogakaya,' in BuMhism of Tibet, pp. 127, 347). 2. The celestial Bodhisattvas.—It will be seen that one of the principal doctrines of the Great Vehicle is that of the Bodhisattva, a compassionate being, who, out of pure love, refrains from entering into nirvana in order to save created beings and to act the part of Providence (see Bodhisattva and AvalokiteSvara). In strict orthodoxy, the worship of a Buddlia jiroduces spiritual results only by a process which is entirely subjective and in which the Buddha counts for nothing; for the Buddha is either extinct or plunged in egoistic dhyana. It is different with the Bodhisattvas, and Chandrakirti says in so many words that, just as the new moon is celebrated and not the full moon, so mast the Bodhisattvas be worshipped and not the Buddhas, even though the latter are of greater dignity. The Buddhas have more majesty, the Bodhisattvas more inlluence.t The Buddhas derive their origin from the Bodhisattvas. For, in the first place, every Buddha has been a Bodhisattva before becoming a Buddha; and secondly, it is through the inter- vention of the celestial Bodhisattva (Manjusri) that the future Buddha takes the vow to become a Buddha, t On the other hand, the Bodhisattvas are sons of the Buddhas (jinaputra), for, unlike the Pra- tyekabuddhas, they owe their knowledge of the Buddhist truth to the teaching of the Buddhas; they are, ‘spiritually’ speaking, begotten by the Buddhas. In the doctrine of the Little Vehicle every future Buddha receives from a Buddha the announcement that he is to become a Buddha (vydkarana). It is the mere statement of a fact. To the vydkaraixa, however, might be, and has been, assigned an effective share in the attainment of the end in view. In the Lankavatara the Bodhisattva re- ceives not only an announcement but a consecra- tion (abhiseka). Conversely, it will be noticed in the Gandiiara sculptures that the Bodhisattvas bear the phial which Ls to become the phial of consecration; and in the later iconography the same Amitabha, sometimes in the form of the meditating Buddha, sometimes in the form of Bodhisattva, is seen carrying the same phial. § In theory, every Buddha begets innumerable Bodhisattvas to a spiritual life. But the Bodhi- sattvas, the usual companions of a Buddha, his associates in the spiritual administration of a Buddhaksetra, a ‘field of Buddha,’ do not very often appear as his spiritual sons; they are, we might rather say, younger brothers, since they com- mence their long term of existence as Bodhisattvas about the same time that the future Buddha enters upon his career. In certain texts which recall the two great Sravakas of the Little Vehicle, every Buddha has two chief Bodhisattvas (Ka- runapundarlka). The Amitayurdhyanasutra connects Avalo- kiteSvara' (q.v.) and Mahasthanaprapta with Amitabha; and Sakya at Buddh Gaya is represented between Avalokita and Maitreya. Sometimes a Buddha is seen surrounded by eight Bodhisattvas; and even when the system of the five ‘Dhyani- 1 fact, no more real than their very moment that a Bodhisattva ;s Buddha he is merged in ‘nirvana’ or ‘voidness’; but, „ to his merits, he still appears as a brilliant body among the Bodhisattvas who behold him. Thus it can be said with Waddell {Buddhism of Tibet, p. 357) that the Buddhas have two ‘ real ’ bodies, a nirvdria-iiodj (=a non-body) and a glorious body. See art. MahayIna. t The Bodhisattvas tend to become real gods, superior to the Buddhas, bearing the same relation to the Buddhas as Sa- kyamuni bore to the Arhats. t Contrast Lalita, 184.19, where the Bodhisattva has to be ‘ excited ’ by the Buddhas of the ten regions. n India, p. 191 ff.; rt bouddhique, p. 34. The ct is the fifth and last