Talk:Mahayana

Bodhisattva and postponing Nirvana

In at least two places on the current Mahayana page, there is the simple assertion that a bodhisattva postpones his or her own Nirvana in order to lead all other sentient beings to Nirvana. There are even some places that mention this presumed goal without mentioning Bodhi for either the bodhisattva or the sentient beings. This is a strange twisting of the ideal of selflessness, and a misrepresentation of the basic concept of a bodhisattva.

We should first begin by remembering that the basic story in the Jataka Tales, is that of Shakyamuni Buddha when he was a bodhisattva, practicing the paramitas, the groundwork for enlightenment and the basic task of a bodhisattva. Going into the earliest known Mahayana literature, the Astasahasrika Prajnaparamita Sutra has the first known Mahayana definition of bodhisattva:

"Because he has enlightenment as his aim, a bodhisattva-mahasattva is so called."

Referencing a basic Buddhist dictionary, there is another definition of the bodhisattva that begins with his role in Mahayana Buddhism, and reinforcing the basic idea that a bodhisattva is one on the path to enlightenment. However, this is amended with "for the sake of all beings." (Damien Keown / A Dictionary of Buddhism / p. 38)

"Bodhisattva: The embodiment of the spiritual ideal of Mahayana Buddhism, in contrast to the earlier Arhat ideal advocated by the Hinayana. Bodhisattva literally means 'enlightenment being' but the correct Sanskrit derivation may be 'bodhi-sakta' meaning 'a being who is orientated towards enlightenment.' The ideal is inspired by the lengthy career of the Buddha before he became enlightened, as described in the Jatakas. A bodhisattva begins his career by generating the aspiration (pranidhana) to achieve enlightenment for the sake of all beings, often in the form of a vow, which according to many Mahayana texts is often accompanied by a prediction of success (vyakarana) by a buddha."

In fact, there are a number of slightly differing ideas about bodhisattvas, sentient beings, and Nirvana in the Mahayana sutras. To make matters more complex, Mahayana sutras often adopt "skillful means" of truths that seem to be incomprehensible at a superficial level, and defy analysis in many ways. Paul Williams has criticized the understanding that a bodhisattva simply postponed Nirvana, and categorizes it with "textbook lore" on Buddhism, proliferated by early Buddhist studies. He also specifically asks a respected Tibetan Buddhist monk and scholar about this matter. The response he gets is essentially the same as what I have seen in other forms of Mahayana Buddhism as well. (Paul Williams / Mahayana Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations / pp. 58-60)

"It is frequently said in textbooks that the compassion of the bodhisattva is so great that he postpones nirvana, or turns back from nirvana, in order to place all other sentient beings in nirvana first. Such a teaching, however, appears prima facie to be incoherent, and contains a claim that somehow a buddha must be deficient in compassion when compared to a bodhisattva. [...] Moreoever if sentient beings are infinite, a widely-held view in the Mahayana, then the bodhisattva is setting himself an impossible task, and no bodhisattva could ever attain buddhahood. I asked the late Kensur Pema Gyaltsen, a former head abbot of Drepung Monastery and one of the most learned scholars, about this while he was on a visit to Britain. I explained that it was widely asserted in books available in the West that the bodhisattva does not become enlightened until he has helped all other sentient beings to enlightenment. The eminent Lama seemed to find this most amusing since, as he put it, all those who become bodhisattvas would not become enlightened, while those who had not become bodhisattvas would. He stated quite categorically that the final view is that this is not how bodhisattvas behave. In Tibetan practice the merit from virtuous deeds is always directed towards obtaining full buddhahood in order to be able to help beings most effectively. There is never any mention of really postponing or turning back from buddhahood. Otherwise any bodhisattva who did become a buddha would be presumably either deficient in compassion or have broken his vow. [...] According to Kensur Pema Gyaltsen, if a text states or implies that a bodhisattva postpones nirvana, it is not to be taken literally. It does not embody the final truth. It may be that it embodies a form of exhortatory writing -- the bodhisattva adopts a position of complete renunciation. In renouncing even buddhahood, the bodhisattva precisely attains buddhahood. [...] My purpose is simply to suggest sensitivity to the initial incoherence and textual uncertainty concerning the bodhisattva's claimed postponement of nirvana, an assertion which appears to have become part of the lore of textbooks on Buddhism."

In contrast to the notions of postponement, sentient beings, and Nirvana, the basic idea of a bodhisattva practicing the paramitas, and finally attaining Anuttara Samyaksambodhi, is basically constant across Mahayana Buddhist literature. Furthermore, this simplest definition goes back to the Jataka Tales, which verifies a basic understanding through time, traditions, and philosophical expressions. Since the path to Bodhi is first and foremost in basic definitions of "bodhisattva", the term should be primarily defined in terms of this. With regard to postponing Nirvana, any matter such as this should be in its own appropriate already-existing section in the Mahayana page, or be moved to the Bodhisattva page. Tengu800 (talk) 04:13, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

The notion that a Bodhisattva postpones Buddhahood is a Western fallacy that keeps being perpetuated. It is not correct. Ask anyone knowledgeable about buddhism, scholars or teachers. In fact a Buddha is STILL a bodhisattva. A bodhisattva is ANYONE who expresses the compassion to help infinite sentient beings, even you or I. Of course there is a distinction between Bodhisattvas such as us and those on the "grounds" or bhumi levels. Actually a bodhisattva tries to achieve Buddhahood as FAST as possible. Thats the whole point of Vajrayana practice. Thigle (talk) 15:36, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

Biased article skewed towards controversial origins of Mahayana, rather than actual practice and traditions

Much of what we know about Mahayana Buddhism comes from Chinese transliterations and practices. It's ironic that so little emphasis in this article is given to the Sinicization of Mahayana and its further propagation to Japan and Korea. Talk about hidden agendas and biases by some of the authors of this article. The whole article reads like one or two overly zealous pan-Buddhist scholars' original research. Sanskrit might have been the original language, but you don't see specific Christian terms written in Aramaic. It's usually in Latin or translated into English.

It's frankly offensive to see the Infinite Life Sutra (無量壽經) translated in this article into Sanskrit as the "Larger Sukhāvatīvyūha Sūtra" when this sutra is absolutely obscure in India and Southeast Asia. It is instead the primary text of Pure Land Buddhism practiced in China, Japan and Korea.

How many people practice Mahayana Buddhism using the non-Sinicized terms? Less than 1% of total Mahayana practitioners? --Naus (talk) 10:06, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

To begin with, there are other traditions of Mahayana outside of East Asia, and these include (1) Tibetan Buddhism, (2) Nepalese Buddhism, (3) the historical Buddhism of India, and (4) the historical Buddhism of Southeast Asia and Indonesia. Besides this point, the standard practice when translating sutras is to translate names and special terms back to Sanskrit if they are known. This is not only the method used by academics and buddhologists, but also by translators from East Asian traditions. As a reference for this, you can look to the translations of Charles Luk, who was the first major translator into English from the Chinese Buddhist tradition. You can also look to the Numata Center's translations, which represent probably the most significant effort to translate the Chinese Buddhist canon into English, to date. These translations all use Sanskrit terms, because that was the original language, and the de facto standard for Mahayana Buddhism. Far from being an insult, Chinese Buddhism has always taken pride in the Indian origins of its own tradition of Buddhism. By emphasizing the Chinese-ness of Mahayana Buddhism, you would make it seem as though there was not some 1000 years of Mahayana Buddhism in India, during which these sutras developed, were brought to China, and were then translated.

As for the Longer Sukhavativyuha, it was definitely not obscure in India, and its pure land teachings became very popular in Northwest India and Central Asia. This was the original "Pure Land Buddhism." Its popularity within Mahayana Buddhism can be told from its references in other sutras, and the popularity of Amitabha in Mahayana countries as far away as Indonesia. If you say that the Sukhavativyuha should not be referenced by its original name, then what name should it have? Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, Korean, Japanese, or Vietnamese? And which version of the name, from which translation? Many sutras were translated as many as six times, and may have six different names in Chinese. By selecting any East Asian language, the article would then be skewed toward one tradition. Sanskrit is used precisely because it is (1) accurate as the original language, and (2) neutral to any one tradition. Tengu800 (talk) 14:42, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Serious errors

How is yogacara early mahayana, but its ancestor Madhyamaka, late Mahayana?

Something is really messed up here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahayana#Late_Mah.C4.81y.C4.81na_BuddhismThigle (talk) 19:35, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The article text states: "During the period of late Mahāyāna Buddhism, four major types of thought developed: Mādhyamaka, Yogācāra, Buddha Nature (Tathāgatagarbha), and Buddhist Logic as the last and most recent. In India, the two main philosophical schools of the Mahāyāna were the Mādhyamaka and the later Yogācāra." I don't see anything here about Madhyamaka being later than Yogacara...? Tengu800 20:40, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Read the next two sectionsThigle (talk) 00:43, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

In these next two sections, I don't see any reference at all to Madhyamaka. Tengu800 02:39, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

the missing dot

Is there a good reason to specify that two of the as are long (ā) but not that the n is cerebral (ṇ), i.e., to write Mahāyāna rather than Mahāyāṇa? In some environments an n is predictably cerebral (after another cerebral consonant or a non-low vowel; probably others that I've forgotten), and so the dot can be considered redundant – but this isn't such a case, is it? —Tamfang (talk) 05:54, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Reference for motivation behind buddha-nature doctrine

We had a broken reference link in the Buddha nature section, The reference is currently No. 46 in the list: "King, Sallie B. The Doctrine of Buddha-Nature is impeccably Buddhist."

I have tracked down a version of the article on scribd and replaced the link and page numbers in the citation (now at http://www.scribd.com/doc/33827209/Sallie-B-King-The-Doctrine-of-Buddha-Nature-is-Impeccably-Buddhist). However, I'd like to ask, regarding this passage:

The language used by [Madhyamaka] is primarily negative, and the Buddha nature genre of sūtras can be seen as an attempt to state orthodox Buddhist teachings of dependent origination and on the mysterious reality of nirvana using positive language instead, to prevent people from being turned away from Buddhism by a false impression of nihilism.

Does anyone have further historical reference material to back up the claim of motivation here? "can be seen as" is a bit weaselly, and I'm not entirely convinced by this paper alone that this was a historical motivation. Thanks! /ninly_(talk) 04:36, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

I see no indication that these were reactions to Madhyamaka specifically in any way whatsoever. It is even debatable whether there was even such a group as "Madhyamaka," at the time that the original Tathgatagarbha sutras were composed. In Yin Shun's book, Way to Buddhahood, he instead cites non-Buddhists and "some Hinayana practitioners" who are afraid of anatman, as some of the reasons why the Tathagatagarbha sutras were spoken. He cites the Lankavatara Sutra for this passage...

"The Tathagatagarbha that I teach differs from the Self taught by non-Buddhists. Great Wisdom Bodhisattva! Sometimes, terms such as emptiness, formlessness, wishlessness, suchness, reality, the nature of things, the Dharma body, Nirvana, being without inherent nature, neither production nor extinction, fundamental stillness, the inherent nature of Nirvana, and so forth, are used to describe the Tathagatagarbha. In order to put an end to ignorant peoples' fear of the nonexistence of the self, the Tathagata, worthy of worship and perfectly enlightened, expounds the doctrine of Tathagatagarbha which is separate from the state of erroneous imagination of nothingness. [...] With regard to the Dharma, which is without inherent nature and which is separate from all features of false erroneous imagination, I spoke of either the Tathagatagarbha or the nonexistence of the self, with various wise and skillful means."

Here the Tathagatagarbha and Anatman are regarded as two expressions for ultimately the same thing, with the Buddha expounding either according to the situation (skillful means). That is to say, that Anatman is the negative expression, whereas Tathagatagarbha is the positive expression. Tengu800 22:58, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

• If one takes the internal evidence of the tathagatagarbha sutras (and the Lankavatara Sutra, incidentally, is not regarded generally as belonging to the specific category of tathagatagarbha/buddha-nature sutras), then the reason for the promulgation of the original tathagatagarbha doctrine was rather the other way around: the Buddha in the Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra (which Mahayana views chronologically as the final sutric statement of the Buddha on the tathagatagarbha and indeed on the Dharma - post-dating any statements in the Lanka about the TG) states that the monks to whom the Buddha taught the Self or Buddha-nature doctrine were those who were thoroughly schooled in non-Self teachings but who had become extreme in their view of non-Self and were now afraid of the Self! The Angulimaliya Sutra is similarly excoriating of those monks and Bodhisattvas who only apply 'non-Self' and 'dependent origination' to everything, and fail to see that there is something higher and transcendental to all that: the Self or Buddha nature. People who are not specialists in the Buddha-nature / tathagatagarbha doctrine are sadly frequently ignorant of these facts. What the 'historical' reasons for the doctrine's emergence may have been is of course uncertain. There is only really speculation. What were the 'historical' reasons for Buddhism after all? Who knows if the story of Prince Siddhartha's seeing three signs of samsara's suffering-filled nature was historically true at all? But that is taking us too far afield! Best wishes from Suddha (talk) 01:19, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

The Lankavatara uses both Tathagatagarbha and Yogacara elements, but there is no simple rule for what is "canonical" Tathagatagarbha. It may just be that later Tathagatagarbha sutras tended to employ aspects of the Yogacara system. I agree with most of what you say, in that the Tathagatagarbha doctrines seem more or less aimed at an already Buddhist audience. However, as you say, the historical reasons are somewhat a matter of speculation. Although a comprehensive study that looked at many specific passages could make the motivations clearer, it is difficult to claim anything as fact for such a subject. As to the original point, though, I don't think there is any clear evidence that the Tathagatagarbha doctrines were in any way a reaction to Madhyamaka teachings, which is what the original source seems to be claiming. As usual, the best approach is to tread carefully when writing article material, and to attribute views to their respective sources. Tengu800 05:55, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

• Hello Tengu. I like what you say and agree with much of it. Just one point: the main tathagatagarbha sutras (such as the Tibetan and Faxian Nirvana Sutra, the Tathagatagarbha Sutra, the Srimala Sutra, and even the Angulimaliya Sutra) were probably set down in writing before the Lankavatara Sutra; certainly they display no interest in Yogacara or Vijnanavada. These key TG sutras do seem to be trying to correct what they perceived as an overly negative understanding of Emptiness. To say specifically that they were attacking Madhyamaka is perhaps more difficult, as the word Madyhamaka is used positively by different schools, even by Dolpopa of the Jonang! Whatever the historical reasons for the appearance of the TG sutras, it is undeniable that they represent a fresh look at the Dharma, in language that is often rather startling in its cataphatic emphases. Best wishes to you. From Suddha (talk) 09:35, 29 January 2012 (UTC)