WHAT IS NIRVANA
?
Lin Yu Tang
Every student of Buddhism must be
interested in a coorect notion of Nirvana,the goal of this religious effort.Naturally this
has puzzled many serious minds.Sir Edwin Arnold,in his preface to "The Light of
Asia" expresses the "firm conviction that a third of mankind would never have
been brought to believe in blank abstractions,or in Nothingness as the issue and the crown
of Being." Yet what is it?
The foregoing philosophical exposition in
the Surangamma Sutra must have prepared the reader to expect a philosophic and at
the same time mystic outcome of such speculations.The process of religious enlightenment
is a process of divesting oneself of the illusions of the sensory world and constantly
rising to a higher conception of an ideal world ,such as arrived at by Kantian idealism.It
is a steady process of dropping off of errors arising from the finite "discriminating
mind," such as the habitual and ingrained notion of the ego and the individuality of
things.From this,the reader can already deduce what the final outcome must be.It is the
reaching of that unconditioned,infinite world.But then the mechanism of our thinking and
language fails,because our words must fail to describe an unconditioned existence.To call
it "destruction" is to assume that there is something to destroy,and call it
"emptiness" is to assume the contrast of a substantial world.when we read that
Nirvana is "neither being,nor non-being" we realize that the words
"being" and "non-being" are no longer adequate.If we could think of a
world without our pet notions of space and time,that is,an unconditioned world,we would
have a fair notion of what Nirvana means.The doggedly logical,finite mind can never rise
to this conception,and therefore it is hard western scholars to grasp its significance.
The following disquisition gives,in my
opinion,the best description of the Mahayana conception of the Nirvana,found in the end of
Lankavatara Sutra.The Lankavatara Sutra is very popular with the Chinese
Buddhist students ,there being four Chinese translations of it,in A.D.420,443,513,AND
700,of which the first one was lost.It gives a clear and well-reasond outline of Buddhist
metaphysics in a shorter,better- ordered and more complete scheme than the Surangamma.Readers
who are interested in such a clear summary are referred to "The Buddist Bible"
,edited by Dwight Goddard (published by Goddard,Thetford,Vt.).But I have chosen the Surangamma,rather
than the Lankavatara,because the latter is like a well-written history of
philosophy,while the former is like an original masterpiece in philosophy.Both employ the
Buddhaesque method of dialogue,but anyone who examines both can have no dobt as to the
superior aptness and freshness of Buddha’s illustrations and the flesh-and
–blood quality of the Surangamma.
WHAT IS NIRVANA ?
Then said Mahamati to the Blessed One
:Pray tell us about Nirvana?
The Blessed One replied:The
term,Nirvana,is used with many different meanings,by different people,but these people may
be divided into four groups:There are people who are suffering,or who are afraid of
suffering,and who think of Nirvana;there are the philosophers who try to discriminate
Nirvana;there are the class of disciples who think of Nirvana in relation to
themselves;and,finally,there is the Nirvana of the Buddhas.
Those who are suffering or who fear
suffering,think of Nirvana as an escape and a recompense.They imagine that Nirvana
consists in the future annihilation of the senses and the sense-minds;they are not aware
that Universal Mind are One,and that this life-and-death world and Nirvana are not to be
separated.These ignorant ones,instead of meditating on the imagelessness of Nirvana,talk
of different ways of emancipation.Being ignorant of,or not understanding,the teachings of
the Tathagatas,they cling to the notion of Nirvana that is outside what is seen of the
mind and,thus,go on rolling themselves along with the wheel of life and death.
As to Nivanas discriminated by the
philosophers:there really are none.Some philosophers conceive Nirvana to be found where
the mind-system no more operates owing to the cessation of the elements that make up
personality and its worlds:or is found where there is utter indifference to the objective
world and its impermanency.Some conceive Nirvana to be a state where there is no
recollection of the past and present,just as a lamp is extinguished,or when a seed is
burnt, or when a fire goes out;because then there is the cessation of all the
substrate,which is explained by the philosophers as the non-rising of discrimination.But
this is not Nirvana,because Nirvana does not consist in simple annihilation and vacuity.
Again,some philosophers explaind
deliverance as though it was the mere stopping of discrimination,as when the wind stops
blowing,or as when one by self-effort gets rid of the dualistic view of knower and
known,or gets the notions of permanencyand impermanency;or gets rid of the notions of good
and evil;or overcomes passion by mean of knowledge;to them Nirvana is
deliverance.Some,seeing in "form" the bearer of pain,are alarmed by the notion
of "form" and look for happiness in a world of "no-form".
Some conceive that in consideration of
individuality and generality recognizable in all things inner and outer,that there is no
destruction and that all beings maintain their being for ever and,in this eternality,see
Nirvana.Others see the eternality of things in the conception Nirvana as the absorption of
the finite-soul in Supreme Atman ;or who see all things as a manifestation of the
vital-force of some Supreme Spirit to which all return;and some,who are especially
silly,declare that there are two primary things,a primary substance and a primary
soul,that react differently upon each other and just produce all things from the
transformation of qualities;some think that the world is born of action and interaction
and that no other cause is necessary;others think that Ishvara is the free creator of all
things;clinging to these foolish notions,there is no awakening,and they consider Nirvana
to consist in the fact that there is no awakening.
Some imagine that Nirvana is where
self-nature exists in its own right,unhampered by other self-natures,as the variegated
feathers of a peacock,or various precious crystals,or the pointedness of a thorn.Some
conceive being to be Nirvana,some non-being,while others conceive that all things and
Nirvana are not to be distinguished from one another.Some,thinking that time is the
creator and that as the rise of a world depends on time,they conceive that Nirvana
consists in the recognition of time as Nirvana.Some think that there will be Nirvana when
the "twenty-five" truths are generally accepted,or when the king observes the
six virtues,and some religionists think that Nirvana is the attainment of paradise.
These views severally advanced by the
philosophers with their various reasonings are not in accord with logic nor are they
acceptable to the wise.They all conceive Nirvana dualistically and in some causal
connection; by these discriminations philosophers imagine Nirvana,but where there is no
rising and no disappearing,how can there be discrimination?Each philosopher relying on his
own text book from which he draws his understanding,sins against the truth,because truth
is not where he imagines it to be.The only result is that it sets his mind to wandering
about and becoming more confused as Nirvana is not to be found by mental searching,and the
more his mind becomes confused the more his mind he confuses other people.
As to the notion of Nirvana as held by
disciples and masters who still cling to the notion of an ego-self and who try to find it
by going off by themselves into solitude:their notion of Nirvana is an eternity of bliss
like the bliss of the Samadhis-for themselves.They recognize that the world is only a
manifestation of mind and that all discriminations are of the mind, and so they forsake
social relations and practise various spiritual disciplines and in solitude seek
self-realisation of Noble-Wisdom by self effort.They follow the stages to the sixth and
attain the bliss of the Samadhis but as they are still clinging to egoism they do not
attain the "turning-about"at the deepest seat of consciousness and therefore
they are not free from the thinking-mind and the accumulation of its habit-energy.Clinging
to the bliss of the Samadhis,they pass to their Nirvana,but it is not the Nirvana of the
Tathagatas.They are of those who have "entered the stream";they must return to
this world of life and death
Then said Mahamati to the Blessed One:
When the Bodhisattvas yield up their stock of merit for the emancipation of all
beings,they become spiritually one with all animate life;they themselves may be
purified,but in others there yet remains unexhausted evil and unmatured karma.Pray tell
us,Blessed One,how the bodhisattvas are given assurance of Nirvana? And what is the
Nirvana of the Bodhisattvas?
The Blessed One replied:Mahamati,this
assurance is not an assurance of numbers nor logic;it is not the mind that is to be
assured but the heart.The Bodhisattva’s assurance comes with the unfolding insight
that follows passion hindrances cleared away,knowledge hindrance purified,and egolessness
clearly perceived and patiently accepted.As the mortal-mind ceases to dicscriminate,there
is no more thirst for life,no more sex-lust,no more thirst for learning,no more thirst for
eternal life,with the disappearance of these fourfold thirsts,there is no more
accumulation of habit energy;with no more accumulation of habit-energy the defilements on
the face of Universal Mind clear away,and the Bodhisattva attains self-realisation of
Noble Wisdom that is the heart’s assurance of Nirvana.
There are Bodhisattvas here and in other
Buddha-lands,who are sincerely devoted to the Bodhisattva’s mission and yet who
cannot wholly forget the bliss of the Samadhis and the peace of Nirvana-for themselves.The
teaching of Nirvana in which there is no substrate left behind,is revealed according to a
hidden meaning for the sake of these disciples who still cling to thoughts of Nirvana for
themselves,that they may be inspired to exert themselves in the Bodhisattva’s mission
of emancipation for all beings.The Transformation-Buddhas teach a doctrine of Nirvana to
meet conditions as they find them,and to give encouragement to the timid and selfish.In
order to turn their thoughts away from themselves and to encourage them to a deeper
compassion and more earnest zeal for others,they are given assurance as to the future by
the sustaining power of the Buddhas of Transformation,but not by the Dharmata-Buddha.
The Dharma which establishes the Truth of
Noble Wisdom belongs to the realm of the Dharmata-Buddha.To the Bodhisattvas of the
seventh and eight stages,Transcendental Intelligence is revealed by the Dharmata-Buddha
and the Path Is pointed out to them which they are to follow.In the perfect
self-realisation of Noble Wisdom that follows the inconceivable transformation death of
the Bodhisattva’s individualised will-control,he no longer lives unto himself,but the
life that he lives thereafter is the Tathagata’s universalised life as manifested in
its transformations.In this perfect self –realisation of Noble Wisdom the Bodhisattva
realises that for Buddhas there is no Nirvana.
The death of a Buddha,the great
Patinirvana,is neither destruction nor death,else would it be birth and continuation.If it
were destruction , it would be an effect-producing deed,which it is not.Neither is it a
vanishing nor abandonment,neither is it attainment,nor is it of no attainment;neither is
it of one significance nor of no significance,for there is no Nirvana for the Buddhas.
The Tathagata’s Nirvana is where it
is recognised that there is nothing but what is seen of the mind itself;is
where,recognising the nature of the self-mind,one no longer cherishes the dualisms of
discrimination;is where there is no more thirst nor grasping;is where there is no more
attachment to external things.Nirvana is where the thinking-mind with all its
discriminations,attachments,aversions and egoism is forever put away;is where logical
measures,as they are seen to be inert,are no longer seized upon;is where even the notion
of truth is treated with indifference because of its causing bewilderment;is where ,
getting rid of the four propositions,there is insight into the abode of Reality.Nirvana is
where the twofold passions have sibsided and the twofold hindrances are cleared away and
the twofold egoless is patiently accepted;is where,by the attainment of the
"turning-about" in the deepest seat of consciousness,self-realisation of Noble
Wisdom is fully entered into-that is the Nirvana of the Tathagatas.
Nirvana is where the Bodhisattva stages
are passed one after another;is where the sustaining power of the Buddha upholds the
Bodhisattvas in the bliss of the Samadhis;is where compassion for others transcends all
thoughts of self;is where the Tathagata stage is finally realised.
Nirvana is the realm of Dharmata-Buddha;it
is where the manifestation of Noble Wisdom that is Buddhahood expresses itself in.Perfect
Love for all;it is where the manifestation of Perfect Love that is Tathagatahood expresses
itself in Noble Wisdom for the enlightment of all;-there , indeed,is Nirvana!
There are two classes of those who may not
enter the Nirvana of the Tathagatas:there are those who have abandoned the Bodhisattva
ideals,saying,there are not in conformity with the sutras,the codes of morality,nor with
emancipation.Then there are true Bodhisattvas who,on account of their original vows made
for the sake all beings,saying, "So long as they do not attain Nirvana,I will not
attain it myself," voluntarily keep themselves out of Nirvana.But no beings are left
outside by the will of theTathagatas;
some day each and every one will be
influenced by the wisdom and love of the Tathagatas of Transformation to lay up a stock of
merit and ascend the stages.But,if they only realised it,they are already in the
Tathagata’s Nirvana for,in Noble Wisdom,all things are in Nirvana from the beginning.
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Loan
Update
: 01-12-2000