The Conception of Buddhist Nirvana — Th. Stcherbatsky (1927)

The simple man constructs them in imagination. The foolish sticks to these constructed conceptions. Whether we stick to them or do not stick to them, they are not real. These our conceptions are like fata morgana ».

Thus it is proved that these (separate) entities (of the phenomenal 54 . 5 . world) have no real (independent) existence of their ow r n. To simple people who are mislead by their own subjective illusions they become a source of moral defilement in this life. In our ((Introduction into the Madhyamika System *) 5 we have explained at length how it is that objects which have no reality of their own can nevertheless produce eitlier moral defilement or moral purification. There it can be learnt.

1 i. e. the illusions of a real Self,its bliss,its purity and its permanence, cp. Yogas., II. 5.

3 sarve dharmdh.

3 nirupadhi - Sese nirvana,-dhatau.

4 This work is quoted in Sikijasamucc.ay a asanautkorityon confession, p, 104,168,178,200.

5 Tha tenor of this work in general is probably meant.

NIRVANA

1 34

XXXIII. The twelve membered Causal Series refers to the

PHENOMENAL WORLD.

54. o. To this (the Hinayanist) objects. If there is (altogether no causation), if things arise neither out of themselves, nor out of something extraneous, nor out of both these sources, nor at random, (how is the causal series preached by the Buddha to be understood), how is it that he has declared that as long as illusion (has not been extinct by knowledge and meditation) prenatal forces (will always produce new lives ')? 1

54. in. We answer. This is the phenomenal'point of view ), 2 it is not (absolute) reality . 5

54. li. The Realist. Please tell, how is phenomenalism proved?

Madhymika. Phenomenalism is nothing but (the expression) of the fact of (Universal) Relativity . 4 It cannot be established otherwise than by denying the four theories (of causation just examined), siuce they necessarily imply the realistic view 5 (of a plurality of substances having their own reality). But if we take our stand upon Universal Relativity , 4 the cause and effect, being correlative, have neither of them any absolute existence. Realism 5 is thus repudiated.

1 The last but one chapter of the Madhy. sastra is devoted to an examination of the formula of the twelve inembered Causal Series. Jt is there given the following interpretation. There is in the world a craving for life (punar-bhavdrthaxn) produced by an illusion (avidyd) which can be stopped by the tattvadarsin. In Mahayana it is the Saint who intuits the world sxib specie aeternitatis. (In Hinayana it it is the Yogin who really stops all the functions of life and converts it into an eternal death). Under the influence of such illusion prenatal forces (samsl'Tirn = karnui) produce a new life ( vijnana ), an embryo (ndma - rupa = panca- skandlia) is formed Ikuksau riamarupam nisicyate), which gradually develops the senses ( sadUyatana ), sensation ( sporsa ), feeling (vedarid), sexual appetite (trsnn), the habits underlying (upadana) life, life itself (bhava = new karma), and, after death, a new birth, old age and death again. The formula represents the rotation of phenomenal life (duJikha) in which there is no eternal prin¬ ciple, which is kevala = andtma = 12 ayatana, with the implication that it can be completely stopped, without any residue of life, in Nirvana. If its connection with the theory of the separate elements ( dharmas ) and there total extinction in Nirvana, ultimately through yoga, is overlooked, the formula simply states that living beings come and go, are born and die. Cp. 0. Rosenberg, Problems, ch. XVI. The interpretation of Nagarjuna is virtually the same as is current in all Buddhist countries, cp. Aung, Compendium, p. 259 ft’. In prof. B. Keith’s interpretation, op. cit. p. 99 ff, the simple formula is converted into a heap of absurdities.

2 samvrtih, or this is «the covering». «the face of it».

3 tattvam.