T’ien T’ai’s Doctrines of The Middle Path and Reality – Part 1 of 2

T’ien T’ai-Buddhism is a school representing, most faithfully and elaborately, the Middle Path of the Buddhist doctrine. It is a school founded, in the sixth century by a Chinese monk from T’ien T’ai, named Chih-i; and its chief aim was to achieve a higher synthesis of the external realism of materialistic tendency and the acosmism [a theory that denies that the universe possesses any absolute reality] of transcendental extreme. It further elaborated the theory of reality along the line of the thought above indicated, and on the basis of the “Lotus of Truth.” This book, as has been observed above, may be called the Johannine Gospel of Buddhism. It tries to solve the problems of reality by the key given in the identification of Buddha’s enlightenment with cosmic truth.

Omitting further reference to the book, I here cite a saying which became the starting point of T’ien T’ai’s theory of reality. The saying is a verse in Nāgārjuna’s Madhyamika Sastra, or Treatise on the Middle Path. It says:

Everything arises according to causation;
We regard it as a vacuity (śūnyatā),
(But) it is phenomenal reality by virtue of appearance,
Which is at the same time the Middle Path.

Vacuity [emptiness] (śūnyatā, or suññatā in Pali) is an ancient term used in Buddhism and meant something beyond common sense or ordinary ratiocination [reasoned train of thought]. It was not a mere negation, as it is often understood; but speculations at which we must now glance clustered about it.

“Vacuity” [emptiness] was understood by the transcendentalists to mean the voidness of phenomenal things, and so the real entity was interpreted as being beyond all distinctions and causal relations. This position is most fully stated in the one hundred thousand ślokas [verses] of the Prajñā-pāramitā, a book aiming at “the annihilation of all relativities” by an almost endless repetition of neither, nor. But this annihilation was always carefully distinguished from the nihilistic view (uccheda [utterly annihilated]) that nothing exists, because the Buddhist vacuity supposes a something beyond relativities, unknowable, yet attainable in meditation. Now Nāgārjuna accepted the transcendentalist standpoint, but at the same time admitted an apparent reality (prajāñpti) in what is given (upadā). What he called the Middle Path was a synthesis of the two points of view. In spite of his adherence to the Middle Path, which was the precious inheritance of Buddhist thought, he did not give a definite statement of it, but left it to the domain of contemplative vision, attainable by only a select few. Thus, it was T’ien T’ai’s task to draw a more positive and definite conclusion from Nāgārjuna’s statement of the Middle Path, and for this purpose he translated the two extreme views into the terms of universality and particularity.

Vacuity [emptiness], according to T’ien T’ai, means nothing but the nonbeing of a particular existence apart from the universal Dharmatā [nature of a thing]. We speak of this or that thing or substance, quality or condition, and think it to be a reality, in and by itself. Nothing is more erroneous than this, because we know that nothing in this world, visible or tangible, exists without causal nexus. It is a Dharma, a thing or condition, because it is a manifestation of the Dharma, the law of causation. Vacuity does not mean the voidness of any existence in itself, but vanity of the view that sees in it a reality apart from the fundamental Dharmatā.

Thus, the thesis of vacuity [emptiness] implies the antithesis, that what is apparently existing is a reality, in the sense that it is given, given as something the meaning of which must be sought deeper and higher. In other words, an abstract universality is a vacuity, not less than a mere particularity; either is a mere abstraction apart from a datum. A particular datum may be an appearance, and yet be a product of the universal law of causality, and a manifestation of the fundamental nature of existence. A thing or a condition exists actually, and although it is subject to decay, and may disappear according to causality, it is so far a reality – a phenomenal appearance.

The synthesis amounts to affirming both vacuity [emptiness] and [provisional] appearance at the same time. The conception of vacuity has shown us that a particular existence is void, when taken in itself; but it points to the reality of the universal, as an outcome of a thoroughgoing negation of relativity. On the other hand, the idea of phenomenal appearance has demonstrated that there is a reality in phenomena which is no less essential to our conception of being than the reality attached to the universal. The world of the universal, the unity of all things in the fundamental nature, is the foundation of every particular existence, pre-existent to all particular manifestations. Yet its manifestations in concrete beings are as real as the pre-existent universals, being subject to the laws that rule all. That they are ruled by the same laws shows their unity in the basis. The particular derives its being from the universal nature of things, while the universal could not fully realize its true nature without manifesting itself in a particular. Both are real, but either by itself is imperfectly real. The Middle Path consists in uniting the two aspects of existence, universal and particular, and in seeing therein the true reality. To this argument, the consideration of Buddha’s personality gave the key, and we shall see how it is developed.

As to the relation between the particular and the universal, the case of Buddha is not only an example, but the typical representative. He was born as a human being, passed through mental struggles, and finally attained Buddhahood, and lived the fifty years of his ministry as the Truth-revealer. This is an actual life of a particular person, and no one can deny its facts, except the docetists [who believe the body of Buddha was not human], against whom the orthodox Buddhists took a united stand. Yet he was a Buddha, because he was enlightened in cosmic truths and realized the universal nature of Buddhahood, which is called Bodhi, or Enlightenment. He is Bodhi incarnate, so to speak, and Bodhi is the universal and fundamental nature of the spiritual existence, which is preexistent to appearance of particular Buddhas, and the a priori basis of their attainment. The epithet “Tathāgata” is an adequate expression of the relation between the universal Bodhi and particular Buddhas. Buddha’s personal life is a particular phenomenon, and the significance of his Buddhahood is lost, is a vacuity, when considered apart from the Truth he has attained and revealed to us. Yet the Truth (tatha) is a mere abstraction, a dead name, unless there appears a Tathāgata in concrete human life. The true reality in the person of Buddha consists in the dignity of the Tathāgata attained by a particular person, in virtue of the universal Bodhi, which is the essential condition of his communion with the Buddhas of the past and of the future.

This solution of the relation between the particular and the universal in the person of Buddha as the Tathāgata serves, at the same time, as the solution of the questions which arose concerning the acquisition or inherence of Buddhahood. Buddhahood is an acquisition, viewed from the standpoint of phenomenal appearance, as is actually shown in the career of Buddha. But it is, at the same time, inherent in his nature, and also in each of us, because without the pre-existent universal Buddhahood, a Buddha loses the foundation of his dignity. He has become a Tathāgata by treading the same way, the One Road, as all other Tathāgatas, and by thus entering the communion of Buddhahood; and this apparent acquisition is the necessary development of the Buddhahood inherent in an individual and pre-existent to individual persons. The standpoint of the Middle Path thus emphasizes equally both the a posteriori acquisition and the a priori inherence of Buddhahood, because either one of these two aspects, without the other, is an imperfect idea of the Buddha as such. In other words, Buddha is really a man, and verily the Truth. As a man he has realized the truth of the oneness of existence; he is the Truth-winner. The person in whom the Dharmatā of the universe has come to light, and who has “become Truth,” “become knowledge,” cannot but be the adequate representative of the Dharmatā, that is, the Tathatā. The Lord of Truth, the Ruler of the Realm of Truth, derives his dignity from the very source of Truth, and therefore he can work as the Truth-revealer. The actual human manifestation is a condescension on the part of the universal Truth; while the latter is first embodied and actualized in the former.

The universal Buddhahood is called Dharmakāya, or “Truth-body,” while the personal Buddha is Nirmāṇakāya, or “Condescension-body”; and these two, together with another, the Sambhogakāya, or “Bliss-body,” the spiritual manifestation of Buddhahood, make up the Buddhological Trinity. This doctrine of the Trinity is a very old one in Buddhism, and T’ien T’ai emphasizes the unity of the three, because the three aspects, considered as a unity, constitute the only right view of Buddha’s person, and of the true reality exemplified in his person.

The Trinity of Buddha’s person, however, is not limited to him alone, but in each of us is inherent the corresponding Trinity, or, as we may conveniently express it, the unity of the universal foundation and the particular manifestation. A concrete human being is a reality, but his full meaning is based on humanity in general. There is a man, and he is the man who would embody in his person the essential nature of humanity, not in the abstract, but concretely. The universal “humanity” is the “Truth-body” of every human being, and his life under particular conditions is his “Condescension-body,” while his own self-consciousness, and the influence that he means to exert upon his fellow-beings constitute his “Bliss-body.” In short, the unity of the universal man and the particular man is the reality of man.

The same remark applies to every other kind of existence, and T’ien T’ai assumes, in accordance with Buddhist tradition, ten different realms of sentient beings. The nethermost one is the hell (Naraka), or rather purgatory, where beings of extreme viciousness, deprived of the light of wisdom, are tormented by their own vices. The furious spirit (asura) is a manifestation of hatred and greed; the hungry ghost (preta) represents never satisfied greed, combined with stupidity; the beast (tiryak) is the life of stupidity and blindness; the heavenly worlds (deva) are the abodes of those beings who are intoxicated with pleasure and careless of others. These five, together with mankind (manusya), are the six stages of transmigration. Above these, are two kinds of beings who are self-satisfied in their own attainment in meditation or learning and make no further effort to realize the vitality of the universal communion, represented by the learned Sravaka and the self-contented Pratyekabuddha. The Bodhisattva is a being, who, having attained a certain height of spiritual illumination, is striving earnestly for the salvation of others. Above them all stands Buddha, in whom the universal communion and the fundamental nature of all beings are realized in idea and life, and who, by virtue of his wisdom and mercy, leads other beings to the same light. Thus, in every being in each of these classes there is manifested the relation of the universal and the particular, the concrete life of the universal Dharmatā [nature of a thing]; but it is in Buddha alone that the full light of universal truths and the all-embracing communion are realized.

The Fundamental Tenets of Buddhism Concerning Reality – Part 3 of 3

Now, let me further expound the Buddhist conception of the relation between the world and the individual, which gives the key to the understanding of its conception of reality.

The individual, as such, is neither real, in the commonly asserted sense of being a personally persistent entity, nor unreal, in the sense that it has no place in existence. It is unreal, because it is subject to constant change; but it is real, as a product of causation, as a manifestation of character accumulated by karma. Either of these points of view leads to the thesis, “There is no (substantial) ego.” But Buddhism sees in the person of the Tathāgata a real individual, the individual par excellence, because the Dharmatā of the universe is represented, embodied, realized, in his person as the Tathāgata. It is in the personal enlightenment of universal truths in Buddha that the realm of Dharma has come to self-consciousness, to the full realization of its meaning. In other words, the person of the Tathāgata is not an individual personality, in contradistinction to other individuals, but in communion with all others. When I say, “all others,” I mean it, not as an aggregate of separate individuals, nor as a haphazard crowd of individuals, but as unified in the basic unity of the Dharmatā, and united in the realization of the universal communion. This is the teaching of the Ekayāna [One Vehicle], of which we shall see more presently. An individual, according to Buddhism, is no more a mere individual, if, and so far as, he identifies himself with others; his ego is transformed to a universal self. Buddhism does not call this transformed and expanded self a self, but a Tathāgata, or a “being of truth” (dharmā-bhūto, dharma-kaya), as in the case of Buddha.

Looked at in this way, any individual is a Tathāgata who realizes the universal Dharmatā of the universe, not only in his ideas, but in his life, and lives the life of the universal self. So long as, and so far as, he regards himself as separate from others, every individual is only a partial, and therefore imperfect, manifestation of his own real nature (dharmatā), while everyone is destined to attain the height, or depth, of his own true self in communion with all others, by virtue of the basic unity of the fundamental Dharmatā. When this ideal is attained, even partially, one has so far realized his real self, which is no longer an ego in the sense that he once cherished. He is the same person in appearance, but in reality his self is so far transformed. What thus happens resembles the metamorphosis of an insect. Buddha, in recalling his former lives, designates his former self by the pronoun “I,” but he is at the same time most emphatic in distinguishing his former “I” – even the “I” when he lived as a prince or a recluse – and calls himself “Tathāgata,” in the third person, as the designation of his true personality and high dignity. The same title may be applied to anybody who reaches the same attainment as Buddha; and, in fact, Buddha called everyone of the same attainment a Tathāgata. In short, everyone who has found his own real nature in the fundamental Dharmatā of all existences, that is, in communion with the Tathāgatas, is one who has become truth, become insight, and thereby identified himself with the universe. It is in the conception of reality attained by such a person that the universe is realizing its universal Dharmatā [– the intrinsic nature or reality of phenomena].

A necessary consequence of this idea about the relation between the individual and the world is the teaching of the Ekayāna [One Vehicle]. It means the one and the same way for all the Tathāgatas of the past, present, and future. It is the Way, and at the same time the Ideal – the way to realize the truth of universal communion, and the ideal to be reached by that way. It is also the foundation of existences, and the goal of the way, because an ideal is vain without foundation, and the two are simply two aspects of the same Dharmatā. Buddha said:

“The Perfectly Enlightened of the past, and the Buddhas of the future,
As well as the present Perfectly Enlightened One who dispels sorrows from many –
All have lived, do live, or will live,
By revering Dharma; this is the Dharmatā of all Buddhas.
(Samyuga, 6.1.2; com. S. 47. 18.)

This unity of the Ekayāna [One Vehicle] is manifested in the Buddhist community, which, though limited in its visible manifestation, is to be extended without limit to include all beings of every possible description, and of all ages. Thus, the Buddhist community is a realization of the universal communion of all Buddhas and Buddhas-to-be, who are – or ought to be – united in the revelation of the final Dharmatā. This is the reason why Buddha disdained anyone who, being satisfied with the tranquility of his mind, remains a solitary sage. Such a sage is called a Pratyekabuddha, or self-satisfied wise man, and is regarded not only as a selfish man, but one who does not see the real light, either his own, or that of the world. The Tathāgata, on the contrary, is an individual who is no longer an individual merely, but has identified himself with all others.

Thus, the Tathāgata is the ideal person in the Buddhist religion, and it is only in the life of the Tathāgata that the full meaning of the universe is realized. This ideal is also called Dharma, which here means “norm,” as Mrs. Rhys Davids correctly renders it. [Buddhism: A Study of the Buddhist Norm, 1912.] The moral norm and religious ideal for every Buddhist consists in attaining, as Buddha has shown by his own example, the supreme enlightenment in the truth-order and the fundamental nature of the world, in accordance with the truth of existence, and by treading the same One Road, in company with the Buddhas of all ages. The Buddhist ideal, seen in this light, necessarily demands the life of fellowship, in which the real continuity of life, or the Dhammatā of existence, is first realized. In this fellowship, an individual no longer remains a separate being, but becomes a personal embodiment of the universal life – “das Objectwerden des Subjects,” to borrow the Hegelian terminology. The “communion of saints” transforms our self into the universal self; and therein is brought to light the true nature of reality.

To sum up, the Buddhist conception of reality is the existence in which the universal nature of existence is realized in the enlightened mind, which is the realization of the all-embracing fellowship. It rejects reality apart from this personal enlightenment; it rejects an enlightenment in a secluded self – the former being externalism and the latter transcendentalism. But both aspects of being embraced and “aufgehoben” in the realization of the universal Dharmatā. In short, the true conception of reality is brought to light only in the unity of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.