The Bhagavad Gita and the Pali Suttas: Some Hindu/Buddhist Comparisons and Contrasts
The Bhagavad Gita is a very popular classic in the Hindu tradition, originating in roughly the same period in Indian history as the Pali suttas. The present essay discusses some comparisons and contrasts between Hinduism and Buddhism in this period, illustrated in some comparisons and contrasts between the Gita and the Pali suttas. One of my main focuses will be a comparison between meditation instructions given in the Gita, and somewhat comparable instructions in the Pali suttas.
Early Buddhist Jhana-meditation
On the Buddhism side the best point of comparison consist in passages describing a type of meditation very different from Mindfulness meditation, which involves a progression through a series of meditative states. These are usually nine in number, the first four of which are called jhanas. The last five are called ayatanas “[mental] regions,” which the meditator “enters and abides in.” For convenience’s sake I will follow the common practice today, referring to the entirety of this meditation practice as “jhana-meditation.”
I begin by first describing several unique features of this type of Buddhist meditation exercise. That is, in its earlier stages, the meditator is said to experience a kind of piti-sukha “rapture and bliss,” as a result of practicing mental concentration. But after the first three meditative jhanas, this rapture and bliss is said to fade away. What the meditator is aware of also becomes less and less definite and more tenuous, until the final stage (the fifth ayatana) is one that can be described as the complete “cessation of [all] perception [and all] feeling” (sañña-vedanā-nirodha). The meditator is assumed to be conscious, but perceives nothing, and so has no feeling-reactions to anything perceived.
Several versions of this set-piece quoted below make it clear that the progression from the first jhana to this fifth ayatana is also a progression from what is of less value and worth, to what is of much higher value and worth–from what is less excellent and sublime, to what is more excellent and sublime.
So here we have one set of problems: Even granting the possibility of a state in which the mind is aware of nothing at all, what is the basis for saying, as one sutta puts it, that “there is no state higher and more sublime” than this?
And, if this is the highest and most sublime state achievable by human beings, why not try to achieve it directly, rather than approach it through a series of eight other less sublime states?
Another broader context pertinent here is a problem raised at several points earlier in these essays: This is the problem that (1) the suttas clearly claim that Nibbana is the highest state possible to human beings, and yet (2) the lack of positive descriptions of nibbana–the fact that nibbana is most often described in terms of “cessations” or absences–make this claim problematic. The mere achievement of “the cessation of Craving and Clinging” and “the cessation of dukkha” could be a description of a state of a person who has escaped life’s anxieties and frustrations, but has done so by simply becoming numb, ceasing to care about anyone or anything, having no motivation to do anything. We have a similar problem here: What could be sublime about perceiving nothing at all? This again leaves the Buddhist message open to the “nihilist” interpretation advocated by some early Western interpreters (See Guy Welbon Nirvana and its Western Interpreters, p. 64-75.)
I have proposed at several earlier points a particular resolution to this problem: Buddhists found a way of fulfilling the desire for a life that is most highly meaningful, through an inner transformation of their own being. This meaningfulness, found completely within their own being, gave them a source of meaning completely independent of sources of meaning external to themselves, making them also impervious to having their sense of meaning deeply undermined by changing conditions in the world.
It is in this context that the peace and bliss mentioned in connection with the first stages of jhana-meditation take on potentially important significance. We do find verses here and there in the suttas (e.g. MN 75.19; Kindle 10923; also Dhammapada 203, 204) which say that nibbana is “ultimate bliss” (parama sukha). But it is in the context of jhana-descriptions that we have more definite indications of the kind of deeply satisfying state of mind involved here, and one concrete kind of meditation practice that might at least help lead to this state.
I refer here again especially to descriptions in the first three jhanas of a kind of rapture and bliss “born of [mental] seclusion” (viveka-ja) and “born of [meditative] concentration” (samadhi-ja). This will lead us into discussion of some aspects of the psychology of meditation pertinent in this context. But also of course we have the problem as to why this rapture and bliss is something that must be “surpassed and abandoned” as some texts put it, as the meditator progresses to “higher” meditative states. I will address these problems later in this chapter, after a discussion of some details.
Comparisons to the Bhagavad Gita.
But first I want to begin these further discussions with a treatment, not of suttas, but of some relevant elements of a Hindu writing called the Bhagavad Gita, probably written down in roughly the same era of Indian history in which the Pali suttas were written down. As I will show below, parts of the Gita describe meditation practices that bear some similarity to sutta passages related to jhana-meditation. Especially helpful are Gita passages that bring up similar factors in the psychology of meditation–indicating I think that early Buddhists belonged to a broader sub-culture of meditators in ancient India, engaged in very similar meditation-exercises, which also included the author(s) of the Gita. Both groups engaged in a specific and very similar set of meditation practices, and with similar aims, if we consider things from a purely experiential point of view. Differences have a great deal to do with the context of certain religious beliefs used to interpret meditative experiences in the Gita, which are completely absent in the suttas.
Concrete experience, internal transformation, and religious interpretation of meditative bliss in the Gita.
There can be no question of dealing here with all the complex themes of the Gita, or all the points of similarity and contrast between the Gita and the suttas. Rather, the following treatment focuses on a more narrow set of themes more directly relevant to outlining certain Hindu/Buddhist comparisons and contrasts.
#1. Relatively concrete elements, meditative practice and meditative experiences, and psychological descriptions of the internal transformation that is the ideal to be achieved by meditation.
#2. Beliefs about unseen realities existing in a supernatural otherworld (Brahman, Krishna, Atman) that in the Gita function as a context for interpreting meditative experience and personal transformation, and clothing these experiences with religious meaning.
Similarities between the Gita and the suttas lie in #1 above. Completely lacking in the suttas are any beliefs like those described in #2 above, the religious beliefs in a superior realm of realities, which in the Gita give intense religious meaning to meditative experience, and to the personal transformation that is the goal of meditation.
Introspective Mysticism in the Gita
“Introspective mysticism” is one way of describing something central to the spirituality of the Gita, absent in the suttas. “Introspective” here refers to to meditative exercises in which the meditator reduces to a minimum contact and engagement with the material world, and pays attention to experiences happening within her own mental/emotional being. This is a common element in practices covered by the term “meditation,” occurring in many of the world’s religious traditions.
“Mysticism” refers to the fact that, in some religious traditions, certain experiences of meditative bliss or ecstasy achieved through meditation are seen as direct experiences of, or union with, realities existing in the highest realm of being. The fact that introspective mysticism is central to the Gita, makes the spirituality of the Gita similar to several strands of Western monotheistic religion, in which mystical experience at meditation is said to put the mystic in direct contact with God, uniting the mystic with God, sometimes interpreted as an event in which the meditator actually “becomes God.”
In the Gita, the highest realities involved are most frequently named as Brahman, Atman, and Krishna. These are somewhat different concepts, connected to somewhat different sets of ideas. But lines between them are very often blurred in the Gita, especially from an experiential point of view. The same sorts of meditative experiences are said to be experiences of, or union with, Krishna, Brahman, and/or Atman.
For present purposes what is important about Krishna is that he is a divine being, one of the Gods worshiped at popular shrines in India.
Brahman is one name for the highest reality, the Supreme Being, a God beyond the Gods (although Brahman is not pictured as a personal being like the Christian God).
Atman (the Sanskrit equivalent of atta) is a person’s inner “True Self” residing within. But it is a special kind of inner or deeper self, which a person only becomes directly aware of in certain meditative experiences.
The idea that Atman and Brahman are really the same reality, is an idea found in some earlier Hindu writings (See Mandukya Upanishad 2 “This Self is Brahman.” See also Manduka Upanishad. 2.1. 2-4, 9-10; Chandogya Upanishad 3.13.7 to 3.14-4; Brhadaranyaka Upanishad 1.4.9-10) This renders Atman itself a quasi-divine reality. This means that the ideal in the Gita is not to come face to face with God, or to respond in the proper way to God conceived of as external to the believer, as in mainstream Western monotheistic traditions. The ideal is to find and identify with a Supreme Being found within one’s own being, conceived of as identical with one’s own True Self (Atman). Mystical experience at meditation is a direct experience of, and unity with, Brahman as the highest divinity.
Some Comparisons and Contrasts
In the present account of early Buddhism, the state of Nibbana/Enlightenment that Buddhists strive for is comparable to these ideas in the Gita in one important respect: When the Buddha reached the state of Enlightenment, this made him the highest being in the universe. And this is in principle a possibility inherent in the being of every human being.
But several important differences are also evident here:
First, insofar as the experience of meditative bliss is interpreted as direct experience of, and union with, the highest beings (Krishna, Atman, Brahman), this means also that the highest positive valuation is accorded to this blissful experience, in a very unqualified way. Contrasted with this is the more complex and reserved attitude toward meditative bliss implied in sutta descriptions of jhana-meditation.
Secondly, the worldview of the Gita is very “religious” in a traditional sense, in a way that Buddhist personal spirituality is not. That is, in the Gita, Krishna, Brahman, and Atman are conceived of as always-existing realities inhabiting an unseen superior realm of reality. Brahman and Atman especially are pictured as realities known and understood by religious believers, but unknown to unbelievers. Meditative experiences are understood as direct experience of these highest realities always existing in this superior realm, and a means by which the meditator actually enters into and becomes part of this superior realm of reality.
The inclusion of Krishna in this complex also establishes a continuity between meditators and the religion of non-meditators among the general populace who worship at shrines dedicated to Krishna or to other divinities in the polytheistic pantheon of contemporary Hindu popular religion. These devotees of popular religion are said to be really (though mostly unconsciously and ignorantly) worshiping the same Krishna who is directly experienced in deep meditation by meditators (See BG 9.23-24). It is in this way that the Gita envisions a continuity between popular religion and the higher spirituality of meditators, a continuity absent in the suttas.
It is not that the suttas deny the existence of otherworldly realms populated by divine beings. The suttas frequently tell stories about various divine or supernatural beings. (A good summary can be found in https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/jootla/wheel414.html)
It is just that these divine and supernatural beings play no role at all in early Buddhist transformative spirituality. Nibbana is something achieved by purely personal effort, following a path revealed by Buddha. In the suttas the Buddha is not a divine being encountered in meditation. Nor is he a divine being helping others to achieve the Nibbana that he achieved. No other divine beings play any part in achieving the internal transformation which is Nibbana, nor in the descriptions of what Nibbana consists in. Achieving nibbana/Enlightenment is purely and simply a fundamental change happening in a particular human being at a particular moment in time, explainable in purely psychological terms. It does render a person the highest being in the universe, but it is not pictured as an event by which a person makes contact with, and enters into an always-existing superior realm of reality.
Another major difference between the Gita and the suttas has to do with the fact that in the Gita, direct experience of the Atman at meditation is a very particular kind of very blissful experience. In this sense, from a Buddhist point of view, Atman itself is a possible perceptual object, a dhamma “mind-object” perceived by introspective mano, able to be contrasted with other mind-objects.
It is possible that opposition to this aspect of Hinduism is part of the reason Buddhists insisted that all objects-of-awareness are an-atta not-atta, not-Atman. To put this very concretely: If a former devotee of the spirituality of the Gita came to a Buddhist teacher, the teacher might say to him: “Think of those kinds of meditative experiences which you have been taught to regard as experiences of Atman, as a sign you have gotten in touch with your True Self. Buddhist teachings urge you to regard these same experiences instead as an-atta, not-Atman, ‘not-my-self’.”
Meditation in the Gita.
Next I want to comment on a Gita passage describing meditation practice. (My translations here follow the basic understanding given in Winthrop Sargeant’s translation, though sometimes I depart from his wording. Sargeant’s book also includes the Sanskrit text, and I’ve included some Sanskrit terms where I think it might help, especially in cases where Pali equivalents to these Sanskrit terms figure in my discussion of Buddhist texts.)
In regard to my first Gita excerpt here, one thing to keep in mind is that the entirety of the Bhagavad Gita is presented as a long discourse by the God Krishna. So in phrases like “the mind fixed on Me,” Krishna is the “Me” being spoken of. The passage quoted here makes particularly clear the blurring of distinctions between Krishna, Atman, and Brahman.
Holding the body, head and neck erect and motionless...
With quieted self (atman)...
Controlling the mind (manas), the mind (citta) fixed on Me,
He should sit disciplined, devoted to Me.
Continually disciplining himself
The yogin of subdued mind
Goes to peace (santi), to supreme nirvana (nirvāna-parama)
To union with Me (6.13-15)
Here and throughout this excerpt, “disciplining the mind” and “subduing the mind” is connected with mental concentration. In this verse, concentration is concentration on Krishna (“Me”), assumed then to be a felt presence within the meditator. One element in the psychology of meditation evident here is that stilling of all bodily activity (“sitting motionless”) and meditative concentration (referred to as samadhi in BG 2.53-54), can be expected to result in mental peace (santi). The Gita also describes this state as nirvana, which (very unlike in Buddhism) can equivalently be described as a state of union with the God Krishna.
The immediately following verse assumes that mental concentration achieving union with Krishna, described in the previous verse, can equivalently be described as being “absorbed in the Atman,” so that this meditation exercise can also be described as “Atman-yoga.” (Note that “yoga” in the Gita refers to almost any spiritual or religious discipline.)
When with controlled thought (citta),
He is absorbed in the Atman,
Free from longing, from all sense-desires,
He is said to be disciplined
As a lamp in a windless place does not flicker…
[So is the] yogin of controlled thought,
Performing the yoga of the Atman (6.18-19)
“Free from longing and desires” is also an important element here, indicating that the meditator is redirecting his attention and desires away from the external world, toward attention to something to be found in his own inner life.
Where the mind (citta) comes to rest
Restrained by yoga practice,
Where the atman, by the Atman, is content (tusyati) in beholding the Atman (ātmanā ātmanam pasyann ātmani). (6.20)
The above lines connect mental concentration with a gradual reduction in the mind’s activity (the citta “mind” comes to rest). This results in a state of contentment, a state which can also be described as “contentment in the Atman,” due to having direct experience of the Atman.
He knows that limitless happiness (sukha)
Which is grasped by the higher mind (buddhi) beyond the senses…
Having attained this, no greater gain can he imagine
Established in this, he is not moved even by profound sorrow (dukkha)… (6.21-22)
This meditative experience can also be described as experiencing “limitless bliss [sukha]” which is the “greatest gain.” One result of experiencing this kind of internal happiness is that it enables a person to endure also great sorrow (dukkha) while remaining unshaken.
Abandoning those purpose-driven desires,
Completely restraining the multitude of senses with the mind,
Little by little he should become quiet.
Firmly grasping the higher mind (buddhya)
The mind having been established in the Atman.
He should not think of anything
Whenever the mind (manas), moving to and fro, unsteady, wanders away,
He should restrain it, and lead it to control in the Atman. (6.24-26)
Mental concentration is the opposite of an “unsteady” mind. It means not letting the mind wander, “not thinking of anything,” thus reducing mental activity, “quieting the mind.” And this state of mental inactivity and quiet can also be described as “being established in the Atman,” “control[led] in the Atman.”
The yogin becomes Brahman (brahma-bhutam), who, with quieted mind (manas), the passions quieted, approaches the highest happiness (uttama sukha).
Thus constantly disciplining himself… [he] easily encounters Brahman, [and] attains limitless happiness. (6.27-28)
Meditation practice described in earlier verses can be expected to result in the experience of the “ultimate” kind of happiness. “limitless” happiness. And this experience of great meditative bliss can also be described as “encountering Brahman,” actually “becoming Brahman,” i.e. becoming one with the Supreme Being.
Two other passages.
For the sake of discussions to follow, I want now also to point to two other Gita passages describing the role that bliss or happiness found within through meditation plays in the overall worldview of the Gita.
In BG 3.17, we first have a description of the ideal person as one who “finds gratification only in the Atman, finds satisfaction in the Atman, and is content in the Atman.” Then the immediately following lines (3.17-18) say that finding satisfaction in the Atman relieves the person of need for anything else in the world.
One other related Gita passage (2.59) is relevant here because of some parallels in the suttas. Referring to fasting, this passage says that fasting can “remove food,” but not necessarily “remove the taste,” the appetite, for food. The appetite for food only goes away “once the Supreme (param) is seen,” a reference to direct and blissful experience of Brahman in meditation. “Seeing the Supreme” is also one way of describing meditative bliss, regarded as direct experience of, and union with the highest being. Once one has experienced this great pleasure and satisfaction found within one’s own being, food-pleasures pale by comparison and cease to exercise much attraction.
These two passages touch on one element in my interpretation of early Buddhism: One thing that unites sutta authors and the author(s) of the Gita, is that both belonged to movements that had found a way of satisfying man’s quest for meaning through developments in one’s own inner life, liberating individuals from the need to seek for meaning-fulfillment through engagement with the external world.
Parallels and contrasts in the suttas.
Now we come to some comparable passages in the suttas.
First, I want to introduce some key Pali terms that figure in the sutta passages to be discussed below. I divide these terms into two groups. The first group consists in experiential terms, words describing what it feels like to experience certain meditative states. A second group consists in value-terms, words describing the extremely high importance and value attributed to these meditative experiences. I draw attention also here to vocabulary similarities between the suttas and the Gita.
Experiential terms.
Sukha is the most important of such experiential terms. In the suttas, sukha has a very wide range of meanings. It can refer to any pleasurable experience, all the way from sense pleasures (kama-sukha), to pleasant feelings (sukha-vedanā) in general, to the most exalted state of “sublime” meditative bliss (parama sukha). The Burden Sutta (discussed in Metaphors for Nibbana in the Pali suttas) treats a sutta which says that “laying down the burden [of the five khandhas] is happiness [sukha].” Sukha occurs several times in the Gita passages quoted above, and very frequently elsewhere in the Gita.
Piti “rapture” or “joy” is one description of the experience of the first two meditative jhana-states in the suttas, discussed further below.
Santa or santusita (Sanskrit santi) are other terms found both in the suttas and in the Gita, describing what the ideal state feels like. It is usually translated as [mental] “peace” or “tranquility.” A passage commented on above in another essay says that, when viññana has no resting place in anything perceivable, this results in a very “peaceful” (santusita) mental state, free of agitation, which is Nibbana.
Value-terms.
Next here are some “value words” describing the supreme value and importance of the experiences described by the terms above.
“Parama” (Sanskrit param) translated in PTS as “highest,” “superior,” “best,” “excellent.” Above I noted descriptions of nibbana as parama sukha. At AN 4:[24] Nibbana is described as paramā santi, “highest [mental] peace.” Param also occurs frequently in the Gita, as for example param santi “highest peace” (BG 4.39), and in a passage quoted above, indicating that appetite for food is diminished, “once the Supreme (param) is seen.”
Panīta, translated in PTS as “high, raised, exalted, lofty.”
Abhikkanta, whose basic meaning is “gone beyond.” Other meanings based on this are given in PTS (p. 62) as “excellent,” “supreme,” “superb, “extremely wonderful.” At SN 36:[226-229] (Kindle 23544-23584), discussed below, each successive jhana-state is described as “more excellent” (abhikkanta-tarança) and “more exalted” (panita-tarança) than the previous state.
Uttari also has the basic meaning of “beyond” (see PTS p. 131). It is especially noteworthy when it occurs in the phrase uttari manussa-dhamma, which PTS gives as as “beyond the power of men,” “superhuman,” “an order which is above man… of a transcendental character, miraculous, overwhelming.”
At MN 36.30 (Kindle 6047) Gotama the future Buddha indicates that he tried but failed to achieve a “superhuman” state through extreme asceticism. Another sutta passage (MN 31.10-17; Kindle 5365) uses the same term uttari manussa-dhamma “superhuman” to describe the first four jhana-states. Compare BG 6.27, which connects the experience of “ultimate bliss (sukha uttama)” to the highest goal, “becoming Brahman.”
I call attention to these latter many value-terms, because I argue that their pragmatic function in Buddhist discourse is similar to the function of Krishna and Brahman in the Hindu discourse of the Bhagavad Gita. That is, from a practical point of view, interpreting experiences of meditative bliss as contact with and absorption in a realm of higher beings (Krishna and Brahman), functions to attribute the highest possible value and status to this experience. The Gita uses this “mythological” language to give expression to the feeling that this is not just a very pleasurable experience, one kind of pleasure among others, but is something of the highest value. These same points are made by Buddhists, without the use of mythological language, when they use words listed above–parama, panita, abhikanta, uttari-manussa-dhamma–to describe certain meditative states, and when they describe Nibbana as parama sukha, “the ultimate happiness.” This is also connected to the view that I think is implicit throughout the suttas, that when Gotama achieved Enlightenment, he became the highest being in the universe.
My critical reconstruction puts all this in modern terms: these are all ways of describing something that fulfills person’s desire for a meaningful life in a superb way. This is why it has effects lasting beyond the momentary experience in meditation. It transforms this person’s whole way of relating to the world–no longer needing to find meaning through external connections and involvements, because he has found this higher fulfillment within.
Some sutta passages.
We come now to some sutta passages illustrating some of the points mentioned above.
First, here is a sutta passage making a point similar to the point made by two Gita passages quoted above. One of these Gita passages says that a person who has “found contentment in the Atman” no longer has need of anything else. Another says that once a person has “experienced the Supreme” in meditation, this reduces the desire for other kinds of pleasures such as the pleasure of eating tasty food.
The following sutta passage makes a very similar point: Just intellectually realizing that attachment to sense-pleasures is the cause of dukkha, does not automatically reduce the strength of desire for sense-pleasures. Neither does Buddhism advocate merely repressing these desires by will-power. What can reduce the strength of these desires, is the experience of a “higher” kind of pleasure, the “rapture and bliss” experienced in the first two jhanas.
Even though the noble disciple has seen clearly as it actually is with proper wisdom how sensual pleasures (kama-sukha) provide little gratification, much suffering, and much despair, and how great is the danger in them, as long as he still does not attain to the rapture and bliss (piti-sukha) unconnected to sensual pleasures (kama), unconnected to unwholesome mental states (a-kusala dhamma), or to something more peaceful (santa-tara) than that, he may still be attracted to sensual pleasures. (MN 14.4; Kindle 3302)
“Rapture and bliss unconnected to sensual pleasures and unconnected to unwholesome mental states” is a phrase taken from standard descriptions of the first jhana (see below p. 000). “Unwholesome,” (a-kusala) is a very general term in the suttas, encompassing everything from immoral vices to various states of mind that are hindrances to Buddhist Nibbana. I will argue below that a-kusala is best understood in the present context as a reference to the underlying tendency to seek for external sources of happiness and fulfillment (the meaning I give to tanha, “Craving”). It is important that the internal piti-sukha “rapture and pleasure” one experiences in jhana-meditation is in no way connected to this (akusala “unwholesome”) kind of outward-directed Craving. In the Buddhist conceptual universe, any pleasure connected with outward directed Craving is also accompanied by agitation–in contrast to more “peaceful” (santa) kind of pleasure and happiness derived from completely internal sources.
It is noteworthy that, further on at the end of the same sutta just quoted (MN 14.21-22; Kindle 3351), the Buddha claims that he “dwells in greater pleasure” than a local king living a life of pleasure, because, unlike the king, he can “abide without moving my body or uttering a word, experiencing “exclusively bliss” (ekanta-sukha) “for two… three… four… five… six… seven days and nights.” This seems to reflect a kind of claim, occurring often in the suttas, that an enlightened Buddhist “in whatsoever way he wishes” can enter and remain in extremely pleasurable and satisfying jhana-states.
Gotama’s Enlightenment story.
Next I want to comment on a sutta passage (MN 36.20-37; Kindle 5594-6066) describing the early stages of Gotama’s life, before he was Enlightened. In this account (probably at least partly fictionalized), at an early stage in Gotama’s spiritual quest, he sought to achieve a state that is “superhuman” (uttari manussa-dhamma) through very extreme ascetic practices that he observed among some other samanas. He first describes this (36.20) as trying to forcibly “crush mind with mind.” Then he describes it (36.21-26) as trying to stop breathing entirely, so that others thought he was dead; then (36.27-30) he took so little food that he was starving himself (when he touched his belly he could feel his backbone), his skin turned black and brown, and he found himself likely to fall over from weakness.
But what he found (MN 36.30; Kindle 6048) is that these painful ascetic practices did not lead to the attainment of anything “superhuman” (uttara manussa dhamma) which evidently is what had motivated him to engage in these practices. Finding that they did not produce what he expected, he thought “Is there some other path to Enlightenment?”
It is at this point (MN 36.31; Kindle 6048) that he recalled an incident from his youth when he was out with his father working in a field.
I recalled that when my father… was occupied, while I was sitting in the cool shade of a rose-apple tree, quite secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unwholesome mental states, I entered upon and abided in the first jhana… with rapture and bliss (piti-sukha) born of seclusion (viveka-ja). Could that be the path to enlightenment? Then following on that memory came the realization: “That is indeed the path to enlightenment (maggo bodhaya).”
I thought “Why am I afraid of that bliss (sukha) that has nothing to do with sensual pleasures (kama) and unwholesome mental states (akusala dhamma)?” I thought, “I am not afraid of that bliss since it has nothing to do with sensual pleasures and unwholesome states.”
The implication here is again that there are some kinds of sukha pleasure/happiness that are indeed a danger to an individual striving for Enlightenment. These are sensual pleasures (kama-sukha), as well as pleasures that are associated with “unwholesome” (a-kusala) outward-directed Craving. But there is another kind of rapture and pleasure not connected to either of these dangers. So the Buddha reflected:
I considered: “It is not easy to attain that bliss with a body so emaciated. Suppose I ate some solid food – some boiled rice and porridge”….When I had eaten solid food and regained my strength… I entered in and abided in the first jhana… the second jhana… the third jhana… the fourth jhana…
One thing striking about this passage is the statement that the “rapture and bliss” experienced in the first jhana is “the path to Enlightenment (maggo bodhaya).” I think this needs to be qualified in the light of passages further cited and discussed below. But my ultimate argument is that the very satisfying bliss experienced within in the first stages of jhana-meditation is at least one important part in the total Buddhist path to bringing about that kind of internal transformation which is Enlightenment/Nibbana.
Finally, I want to emphasize here the fact that what Gotama was unsuccessfully seeking through extreme asceticism, and apparently was able to achieve through jhana-meditation, was a state described as uttari manussa-dhamma, beyond (uttari) the capabilities of human beings in their normal state (manussa-dhamma). Another sutta passage (MN 31.10-17; Kindle 5365-5383) describes the states attained in jhana-meditation using the same term uttari manussa-dhamma. Uttari, “beyond” here is clearly an ethical claim: this is not a kind of pleasure on the same level as sensual pleasures a person might enjoy eating a tasty meal. The implied claim is that this is a qualitatively different, “higher” kind of pleasure, something “transcendent” in today’s language.
Jhana-meditation.
Now we finally come to a discussion of the standard set-piece I have been mentioning often above, describing jhana meditation itself, as progression through a series of four jhanas and then through five ayatanas. I begin by quoting from a version found at MN 4.22; Kindle 1789, which contains a description of the first four jhanas, put in the mouth of the Buddha himself.
He begins with the standard description of the first jhana
Secluded from sensual pleasures (vivicceva kamehi)
Secluded from unwholesome mental states (vivicca a-kusalehi dhammehi)
with applied thought (sa-vitakka)
[and] with sustained thought (sa-vicāra)
with rapture and pleasure (piti-sukha) born of seclusion (viveka-ja).
I entered upon and abided in the first jhana.
Viveka “seclusion” or “separation” is a word that sometimes in the suttas describes the physical isolation and separation from society, characterizing the life of wandering samanas. Here it refers to mental separation that is aspect of most meditation exercises, secluding the mind from contact with the external world (as for example by simply closing one’s eyes). But here again we have an ideal of trying to further separate the mind from any desire for sensual pleasures or any other “unwholesome” outward-directed desire (as explained above p. 000). Thus when the text speaks of a kind of rapture and pleasure “born of seclusion,” this begins to suggest a kind of rapture and pleasure found in one’s own being, separated from any contact with, or desire for, anything external.
But this is only the first jhana, to be succeed by eight further meditative states in which certain features of earlier states are “abandoned” or “fade out,” to be replaced by other features. Several suttas make it very clear there is something defective about earlier meditative states, and that each successive state is higher than the one that precedes it. This is very explicitly stated in the description of the four jhanas and the five ayatanas in MN 66.26-34; Kindle 9920-9948).
Here after describing this first jhana, the text says that “this is not enough” and must be surmounted by going on to the second jhana.
But that [first jhana], I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
With the stilling of applied and sustained thought, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the second jhana, which has internal happiness (ajjh-atta sam-pasādana) and singleness of mind (cetaso ekodi-bhāva), without applied and sustained thought, [but still] with rapture and bliss born of concentration (samādhi-ja pīti-sukha). He makes the rapture and bliss born of concentration drench, steep, fill, and pervade his body, so that there is no part of his whole body unpervaded by the rapture and bliss born of concentration.
As we saw in the Gita, we have here one psychological feature that seems common to many meditation practices: the idea that mental concentration (samadhi), and a one-pointed mind (cetaso ekodi-bhava), can be expected to result in an experience of meditative rapture and bliss, described as samadhi-ja, “born of [mental] concentration.”
Noteworthy also is the phrase ajjh-atta sampasadana, literally a happiness (sampasādana) “connected with atta” (ajjh-atta). Atta here does not have the religious resonances that Atman has in the Gita. But it does seem to represent an idea similar to ideas in the Gita when considered experientially: it is a reference to a kind of happiness found “internally” within a person’s own being. (For example PTS p. 10 gives the opposite of ajjh-atta as bahida “external”)
This point is reinforced by a metaphor which two sutta passages (MN 39.16; Kindle 6558, and MN 77.26; Kindle 11433) add at this point:
Just as though there were a lake whose waters welled up from below and it had no inflow from east, west, north, or south and would not be replenished from time to time by showers of rain, then the cool fount of water welling up in the lake would make the cool water drench, steep, fill, and pervade the lake, so that there would be no part of the whole lake unpervaded by cool water; so too, a bhikkhu makes the rapture and pleasure born of concentration drench, steep, fill, and pervade this body, so that there is no part of his whole body unpervaded by the rapture and pleasure born of concentration.
Here “internal happiness” is illustrated in the case of a lake whose water does not come from external sources (rain, or inflowing streams), but from springs at the bottom of the lake. This suggests again an emphasis on the point that the “rapture and bliss” experienced here is something that wells up from within a person’s own being, (ajjh-atta) in contrast to happiness and satisfaction gained through engagement with the external world.
Here MN 66.27 again says of the second jhana that it is “not enough,” and must be surmounted by progressing to the third jhana:
But that [second jhana], I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
With the fading away as well of rapture (piti), a bhikkhu abides in equanimity (upekhā), and mindful and fully aware, still feeling bodily bliss (sukkha kayena), he enters upon and abides in the third jhana… He makes the bliss divested of rapture drench, steep, fill, and pervade this body, so that there is no part of his whole body unpervaded by the bliss divested of rapture…
Here the stronger and more emotionally vivid experience of piti “rapture” or “joy” (a feature of the first two jhanas) disappears. It is replaced by calmer mental “equanimity,” which however still coexists with a kind of meditative bliss or happiness (sukha). This is still pictured as something very concrete, felt in a very bodily way (it is a sukha kayena, “bodily bliss”), felt as pervading a person’s entire body.
But again this third jhana is “not enough,” requiring progression to the fourth jhana:
But that [third jhana], I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what Surmounts it?
With the abandoning of pleasure and pain, and with the previous disappearance of joy and grief, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the fourth jhana, which has neither-pain-nor-pleasure and purity of mindfulness due to equanimity. He sits pervading this body with a pure bright mind, so that there is no part of his whole body unpervaded by the pure bright mind.
Here the meditator feels no more pleasurable feelings. Pleasurable feelings are replaced by mental equanimity, and a feeling that a “pure bright mind” pervades one’s entire body.
Some passages stop here (indicating perhaps that this description of four jhanas once stood on its own without descriptions of any further meditative states). But in many suttas, this fourth jhana-state is followed by a progression to five more states–called now not jhanas but ayatanas “[mental] regions.”
But that [fourth jhana] I say is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
With the complete surmounting of perceptions of form, with the disappearance of perceptions of sensory impact, with non-attention to perceptions of diversity, aware that “space is infinite,” a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the region (ayatana) of infinite space.
That [first region] surmounts it. But that, I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
By completely surmounting the region of infinite space, aware that ‘consciousness is infinite,’ a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the region of infinite consciousness. That surmounts it.
But that [second region], I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
By completely surmounting the region of infinite consciousness, aware that ‘there is nothing,’ a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the region of nothingness. That surmounts it.
But that [third region], I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
By completely surmounting the region of nothingness, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the region of neither-perception-nor-non-perception.
But that [fourth region], I say, is not enough. Abandon it. Surmount it. And what surmounts it?
By completely surmounting the region of neither-perception-nor-non-perception, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the cessation of perception and feeling (sañña-vedana-nirodha). That [fifth region] surmounts it.
MN 66.36 (Kindle 9948) pictures this “cessation of perception and feeling” as the final stage–nothing is added indicating that this stage also needs to be abandoned and surmounted.
Thus I speak of the abandoning even of the region of neither-perception-nor-non-perception.
[There is no] fetter (samyojana), small or great, of whose abandoning I have not spoken.
The implication of this last comment is that, despite their positive value, all eight previous states also represent potential “fetters,” obstacles to the final goal of this kind of meditation, which is only attained when the mind is no longer aware of anything at all, and has no feeling reaction to anything at all. This is the final “stopping of the mind,” achieved by depriving the mind of any object-of-awareness (any phassa, “[cognitive] contact,”) that might stimulate it into activity.
So this entire progression through nine meditative states is pictured as a progression that begins with a state in which what the meditator is aware of is quite definite (“rapture and bliss”) resulting from one-pointed mental concentration on some particular object. The meditator progresses through states in which what he is aware of becomes more and more tenuous, devoid of definite content. The progression ends in an idealized state (sañña-nirodha, “cessation of perceptions”) in which the meditator is aware of nothing at all, and thus feeling-reactions that ordinarily arise in reaction to stimuli also cease (described as vedanā-nirodha).
This is thus the stopping of all mental activity, an ideal connected with meditation that we saw in the Gita as well. Except that, unlike in the suttas, in the Gita this inactive mental state is also a blissful state, and is charged with entirely positive religious significance by being connected to an always existing completely inactive Atman, identical with the God Krishna, that is part of an otherworld, which is the object of religious belief in the Gita.
So here again the suttas and the Gita are very similar if we consider things purely from the point of view of a psychology of meditation, and the attribution of the highest value to this state of mental inactivity. One big difference is that in the Gita the psychological events and changes that occur as the meditator progresses to higher states are pictured as the meditator entering into an always-existing superior otherworld, and becoming one with divine beings believed to inhabit this otherworld.
In the suttas, achieving this highest state of mind is only a psychological event and a change happening at particular moments in time. This change has no connection at all to any realm of higher beings external to the meditator.
Further, as noted earlier, when the Gita interprets meditative bliss as an event uniting the meditator with higher divine realities, this accords extremely and unreservedly positive religious significance to this blissful experience. The jhana-meditation set-piece discussed here expresses a much more complex and reserved attitude toward this bliss. While the meditator needs to start with “lower” meditative states before progressing to higher ones, the meditative bliss experienced in the first three jhanas is a potential “fetter” to be abandoned as one progresses to higher meditative states.
A “more sublime” kind of happiness.
Here I want to comment on another sutta passage containing some interesting elaborations on the standard set-piece describing jhana-meditation quoted above. This passage (SN 36:[225-228]; Kindle 23544-23584) puts the discussion of the four jhanas and five ayatanas in the context of a discussion of various kinds of sukha “happiness.” It begins with a reference to that kind of pleasure or happiness enjoyed through the five senses (kama-sukha).
Although some may say “This [sensual pleasure] is the supreme pleasure and joy that beings experience,” I would not concede this to them. Why is that? Because there is another kind of happiness more excellent (abhikkanta-taranca) and more sublime (panita-taranca) than that happiness. And what is that other kind of happiness?….
Then there follows a verbatim account of the part of the set piece describing the first jhana, as quoted above. After this description of the first jhana, we hear again
Although some may say “This [the sukha/happiness experienced in the first jhana] is the supreme peace (santa), happiness (sukha), and gladness (somanassa) that beings experience,” I would not concede this to them. Why is that? Because there is another kind of happiness (sukha) more excellent and more sublime (abhikkanta-taranca panita-taranca) than that happiness. And what is that other kind of happiness?.…
Then follows the standard description of the second jhana, said to be more excellent and sublime than the first jhana. This sequence is repeated over and over in relation to each of the four jhanas and the five ayatanas. Despite the fact that sukha “bliss” is no longer mentioned in descriptions after the set pieces describing the third jhana, the text continues to describe the fourth jhana, and also each of the five ayatanas that follow as “a kind of sukha/happiness more excellent and sublime” than the happiness experienced in previous meditative state in this nine-fold progression. Even the fifth and last ayatana, involving the “cessation of perception and feeling” is said to be “another kind of happiness (sukha) more excellent and sublime (abhikkanta-taranca panita-taranca) than the previous kind of happiness [pertaining to the fourth ayatana].”
In its conclusion, this sutta poses a possible objection that might be raised by non-Buddhist samanas against the idea of a kind of “happiness” that can persist even after all vedanā “feelings” have disappeared. This is the occasion for an objection: Isn’t happiness a feeling?
The wanderers of other sects might speak thus: “The ascetic Gotama speaks of the cessation of perception and feeling, and he maintains that it is included in happiness. What is that? How is that?...”
They should be told: “The Blessed One… does not describe a happy state as included only with reference to pleasant feeling (sukha vedana). But rather… whatever happiness (sukha) is found in whatever way, the Tathagata describes that as included in happiness.” (SN 36:[228]: Kindle 23584)
In other words, the Buddha embraces the apparent contradiction. He is asking us to imagine a highest kind of sukha, happiness, which however is not a happy “feeling.” (SN Kindle 26646 note 248) cites a later Buddhist commentator which says exactly this: The Buddha is here describing the highest ayatana as a-vedayita sukha – literally an “un-felt happiness.“)
Some problems.
Next I want to deal with some problems regarding Buddhist teachings raised by discussions above.
First, there is a problem raised by the last comments above: What would Buddhists find problematic about the kind of meditative bliss that is a vedana “feeling”? And what can we make of the idea that there is a kind of sukha “happiness” that is not a “feeling”?
I think the first question here has a rather obvious answer. It goes back to a point made about a unique feature of Buddhist spirituality noted in the essay Nibbana as “Escape from the Mind”, which includes “mind-objects” among the Impermanent objects-of-awareness that should not be Clung to. I noted there that, considered from this perspective, meditative bliss–or anything else a meditator could be introspectively aware of in her own mental/emotional life–counts potentially as just one kind of dhamma “mind object,” something Impermanent, Clinging to which would be an obstacle to Nibbana. (MN 102.25 [Kindle 15148] makes explicit this connection of the jhanas to the six sense-regions.)
We can be more specific here by recalling further comments made in the essay Nibbana as “Escape from the Mind”. There I noted that Nibbana cannot itself be a kind of dhamma or mind-object, something a person can be directly aware of. Nor can Nibbana be the opposite of any particular mind-object. Nibbana is the ability to be fully accepting of, and comfortable with, all possible mind-objects (having neither desires nor aversions for any mind-objects).
More specifically, in the present context: the danger posed by meditative bliss is that a person could become Attached to this very pleasurable feeling, which could make her less able to be comfortable with unpleasant feeling-states perceived to be the opposite of this very pleasurable feeling-state. (Such a person would not only sometimes get upset, she would be additionally upset about being upset, because this unpleasant feeling stands so in contrast with very pleasurable meditative bliss she has become Attached to.)
This explains why it is that every meditative state prior to the fifth and very last ayatana can be described as a potential “fetter” that needs to be abandoned and surmounted. All previous states constitute “mind-objects” which must be abandoned until there are no more mind-objects which the meditator is perceiving (the “cessation of perception”), and so also is no longer having any feeling-reactions to any perceptions (the “cessation of feelings”).
I think all this needs to be understood also in the context of Conditioned Arising: So long as a person is in the grip of the underlying tendencies to Craving and Clinging, all contact (phassa) with anything perceived gives rise to involuntary reactions driven by Craving and Clinging. So one way of achieving liberation from Craving and Clinging is to deprive the mind of all contact with anything perceivable (sañña-nirodha) the “cessation of perception”), which will bring about the cessation of all feeling-reactions to perceptions (vedana-nirodha), which can then be described as viññanassa nirodha, “the stopping of the mind”.
Several suttas connect these ideas to the earlier states of jhana-meditation in a pretty explicit way.
For example MN 102.17-25 (Kindle 15098-15150) makes rather explicit the point that all jhana-states are Impermanent and potentially dukkha-causing objects of Clinging. MN 102.17 begins by speaking of a bikkhu who enters and abides in “the rapture of seclusion” (an aspect of the first two jhanas).
He thinks, “this is the peaceful (santa), this is the sublime (panita).” [Then] that rapture of seclusion ceases in him. When rapture of seclusion ceases, grief (domanassa) arises.
Further on in this same sutta (MN 102.24-25) the connection with Clinging is made even more explicit in relation to a bikkhu who might get beyond the first four jhanas.
[A bikkhu] surmounts the rapture (piti) of seclusion… surmounts neither-painful-nor-pleasant feelings [characteristic of the fourth jhana]… This venerable one regards himself thus: “I am at peace (santa), I have attained Nibbana, I am without clinging (an-upadana).”
That too is declared to be Clinging… Seeing the escape from that, the Tathagata has gone beyond that… this unsurpassed (an-uttara) state of sublime peace (santi) has been discovered by the Tathagata, that is, non-Clinging liberation (an-upadā-vimokho)
MN 64.9-15 (Kindle 9569-9601) makes a similar point. After speaking about a bikkhu progressively entering higher meditative states from the first jhana up to the third ayatana (the “nothingness” region) this sutta connects all these states to the five Impermanent khandhas, which are dukkha-causing for anyone who might Cling to any of these states. After each section describing the four jhanas and the first three ayatanas, this sutta repeats the refrain:
whatever exists [in these meditative states] of rupa, vedanā, sañña, sankara, viññana he sees as Impermanent (anicca), dukkha, a disease… void.. an-atta… He turns his mind away from those mental states. He turns his mind toward the deathless element (amata dhatu) thus: “this is the peaceful (santa), this is the sublime (panita), the stilling of all constructings (sankhara), the relinquishing of all Clinging (upadhi) the destruction of Craving (tanha), dispassion, cessation (nirodha), nibbana.
Relation to liberating and transformative practice
But here I want to note that all this also needs to be understood in the context of the total project of Buddhist liberating and transformative practice. No matter what meditative states a meditator might go through, these are after all particular states which themselves last only during times set aside for meditation. One can clearly not go through everyday life perceiving nothing at all, and having no feeling reactions to anything at all. If we are to understand Nibbana as a fundamental restructuring of a person’s inner psychological dynamics, enduring beyond meditation and affecting a person’s everyday life, we have to understand it as a particular and highly admirable way of being in the world and relating to the world, on an everyday basis. One passage quoted above has the Buddha describing the rapture and bliss experienced in the first jhana as maggo bodhaya, “the path to Enlightenment.” But, for many reasons made obvious above, this cannot mean that this bliss is Nibbana/Enlightenment. We have to ask rather: What might the experience of bliss experienced during a meditation session contribute to the fundamental restructuring of a person’s internal psychological dynamics, that endures beyond the times set aside for this particular kind of meditation-exercise?
In other words, the fact that the standard set-piece describing the four jhanas and the five ayatanas is repeated so often in the suttas, makes it pretty clear that this meditation-exercise is a particular puzzle-piece that has some important place in the total Buddhist picture-puzzle. But, as is often the case, this often repeated set-piece taken by itself does not offer any clear explanation of where it is supposed to fit in this total picture.
Here is the way I propose of addressing this question.
First, Buddhism assumes that there is a kind of great happiness and satisfaction that can be found in one’s own being. This is to be found by moving in an internal direction opposite to the outer-directed search for meaning-fulfillment through connections to the world outside. (Cast in terms of early Buddhist psychology, this outer-directed quest can be described as the quest for those kinds of sañña/perceptions that will stimulate pleasurable and satisfying vedanā/feelings in response.)
This is a kind of internally-generated happiness that wells up from within, like a lake not fed by incoming streams or rainwater, but by internal springs deep within itself. One thing that Buddhism (and the Hinduism of the Gita) reveals, is that this is a possibility inherent in the being of human beings, unrealized so long as the mind follows instinct and seeks for sources of meaning-fulfillment outside itself. The rapture and bliss experienced in the first three jhanas, born of meditative seclusion and concentration (viveka-ja, samadhi-ja), functions to give an aspiring Buddhist a concrete taste of what this internally generated happiness feels like, and in this way helps this person maintain this inner-generated source of meaning-fulfillment in everyday life outside of meditation-sessions. This is why the Buddha could say that the rapture and bliss experienced in the first jhana is maggo bodhaya, “the path to Enlightenment.”
But this experience of bliss during meditation only functions as it should if it contributes to a fundamental restructuring of a person’s internal psychological dynamics that lasts beyond the meditation session and endures in everyday life. Meditative bliss is valuable for giving a person a concrete taste of something that must become an ongoing part of that person’s psychological being, influencing her whole way of being in the world and relating to the world. The dynamics involved in the psychology of meditation discussed earlier, can be seen as more general factors in a transformed human psychology which can remain operative in everyday life outside meditation.
That is, finding meaning-fulfillment within one’s own being is an essential factor enabling this person to cease relating to the world on a “needy” basis, needing to find outside what she lacks inside. This is one of the main things giving positive content to the nibbana-ideal, which otherwise might consist in mere forced repression of a desire for any kind of meaning-fulfillment, resulting in a meaningless life.
The Gita (3.17-18) makes a similar point in a very clear way: Contentment in the Atman leads to a state in which a person feels no need of anything else in the world, nothing that needs to be gained by action in the world.
On the other hand, from a Buddhist point of view, the very concreteness of this experience of meditative bliss also renders it a potential obstacle to the ultimate Buddhist ideal. The concreteness of this experience of meditative bliss gives it the potential of being just one particular mind-object among others. Specifically, there is the danger that Attachment to this very pleasurable experience will render a person less able to be fully accepting of and comfortable with, unpleasant feeling-states (other mind-objects a person might become aware of), such as mental/emotional turmoil felt as an obvious contrast with this pleasurable state of internal peace and happiness. Progress toward the Buddhist ideal must make a person more able to be fully accepting of and comfortable with the entire range of feelings including the most unpleasant ones. (See also the Gita passage quoted above [BG 6.22] which says that the sukha/bliss experienced at meditation makes a person able to endure the deepest sorrow.)
This accounts for the fact that meditative bliss is experienced only in the first stages of jhana-meditation, and fades away in more advanced, “more excellent and sublime” stages. This is also why, although the fifth and final ayatana can be described as the most excellent and sublime kind of happiness, this happiness is not an ordinary kind of happy feeling (a sukha-vedanā) that can be contrasted with other unpleasant feelings (dukkha-vedanā).
In other words, the deep and unshakeable feeling of meaning-satisfaction existing in the Enlightened person must be a very unusual kind, in that it must be able to coexist with all other feeling-states a person might feel, including very unpleasant states that might ordinarily seem the exact opposite.
In a other essay I proposed that we can resolve this problem by envisioning two layers of human consciousness: (1) a more “surface” level, in which the Enlightened person experiences the full range of emotions all other humans experience, including those that are most unpleasant and difficult to endure, and (2) a deeper level, in which a person experiences an unshakeable and deeply satisfying peace of mind.
A helpful image: Think of an ocean whose surface goes through many changes, including violent storms, while the ocean depths remain peaceful and undisturbed throughout.
Appendix. Further similarities and contrasts.
Discussions above deal with the main similarities and contrasts between meditation practice and its goals in the Bhagavada Gita, and jhana-meditation and its goals in the suttas. In this appendix I want to deal with a few other major themes in the Gita, relevant here because of some other illuminating similarities and contrasts with the message of the suttas.
Calm indifference in the Gita, compared to the absence of “desires and aversions” in the suttas.
One ideal emphasized in the suttas is most commonly described as the cessation of Clinging. But it should be pointed out that inflexible Clinging to X also results in an inflexible and strong aversion to whatever contrasts with X. Inflexible Clinging to wealth increases a person’s aversion to lack of wealth. Inflexible Clinging to pleasant feelings of mental calmness increases a person’s inflexible aversion to unpleasant emotional turmoil, an increased inability to cope with turmoil.
Like the suttas, the Gita also does sometimes describe its ideal as non-attachment (e.g. 5.10-11). And sometimes (e.g. 2.14-15) the Gita speaks specifically of the impermanence of pleasant conditions as a reason not to seek contentment in them. The Gita and the suttas are also similar in appealing to what we would call stimulus-response psychology, to explain how contact with sensory objects gives rise to attachment
The senses forcibly carry away the mind… dwelling on sense-objects, attachment is born (2.60-62).
But the point I made above–that absence of inflexible attachments also means the absence of inflexible aversions–is an ideal much more frequently emphasized in the Gitas. Here the ideal person:
Feels that happiness and unhappiness are the same (2.15); holds pleasure and pain to be alike, likewise gain and loss, victory and defeat (2.38); is indifferent to success and failure (2.47-48); neither hates nor desires (5.3); does not rejoice on attaining what is pleasant, nor shudder on encountering what is unpleasant (5.20); feels that pain and pleasure are equal, a clod, a stone, and gold are the same, loved and unloved are alike, blame and praise are alike, honor and dishonor are equal (13.24-25).
The Gita also associates this ideal of being equally accepting of pleasant and unpleasant, with mental tranquility, peace, contentment, and happiness.
The ideal person will abandon all desires, and thereby attain peace (santim, 2.71); he will be content with whatever comes(4.22);the ability to endure the agitation that arises from desire and anger makes a person a happy (sukhi) man (5.23); the cessation of all sorrows (dukkha) is found in tranquility (2.65)
Meditation practice.
All this sheds particular light on meditation practice described in the Gita. Here I want comment on a few more Gita passages dealing with meditation that elaborate on the points just made. For example, the idea that sense-contact automatically carries away the mind and causes attachment (2.60-62), explains the specific goal of the frequently repeated meditation-advice to control and restrain the mind. The ideal person
should completely restrain the multitude of senses (6.24); he should try to free himself from longing, and from all sense-desires (6.18); whenever his mind (manas), moving to and fro, unsteady wanders away, he should restrain it (6.27)
This negative idea of trying to control and restrain the mind’s automatic responses to sense-stimulation, is very often connected to descriptions of mental states that are pictured as the ideal positive result. Meditation practice will ideally result in state that can be described by speaking of a mind that is steadfast in concentration (samadhi, 2.54), unmoving (nis-cala, a-cala, 2.66, 2.72), peaceful (santi) and happy (sukha) (2.66).
Many Gita-descriptions of this ideal state to be achieved at meditation involve the use of the term Atman.
The highest Atman (param-atman) of him who has conquered himself, is peaceful and steadfast in cold, heat, pleasure, pain (6.7); one whose self is not attached to external contacts,finds happiness (sukha) in the Atman, and reaches imperishable happiness (sukha) (5.21);the mediator who experiences delight and satisfaction in the Atman, is contentin the Atman (3.17); his self is satisfied in the Atman (3.43).
Here I think it is again useful to distinguish between (1) what it means experientially to “find delight and contentment in the Atman,” and (2) the interpretation of this experience in terms of religious belief in a particular being called Atman, which is identical with Krishna and Brahman, and which inhabits a superior realm of reality. Experientially speaking, “finding delight and contentment in the Atman,” can just mean finding delight and contentment in some internal state of mind, as contrasted for example seeking satisfaction in sense-pleasures. This is an idea found in the suttas also. And we did see above the use of the compound term ajjh-atta “in atta” to refer to internal bliss experienced in the second jhana. Other than this, the suttas tend to avoid using the term atta in descriptions of this kind of internal contentment. This avoidance may reflect a desire to distinguish Buddhism from Hindu belief in an Atman as an actual entity inhabiting a superior otherworld.
The completely inactive Atman, and the active “gunas of prakrti”
The need to control the mind’s activities is a point of considerable emphasis in the Gita. This assumes that the normal state of human beings is one of uncontrolled mental activity. One of the most striking extensions of this idea comes when the Gita asks us to imagine the Atman, a True Self existing within a person, which is completely inactive, completely disconnected from mental or physical activity.
Only the deluded person thinks ‘I am a doer’” (3.27) The one who knows the truth knows that, “whether seeing hearing, touching, smelling, eating, walking, sleeping, breathing, talking, excreting, grasping, opening and shutting eyes,” “I do nothing” (5.8-9); the imperishable, “ultimate Self” (param Atman), although situated in the body, does not act (13.31); the embodied Atman “sits happily (sukham) in the nine-gated city [the body], not acting nor causing to act” (5.13); Krishna, identical with the Atman, calls himself “the eternal non-doer.” (4.13)
So, on the view proposed here, I am completely mistaken if I think that on some occasion, “I am thinking,” or “I am doing X”, and that I am thinking because I want to think, or doing X because I want to do X. My inner Atman, my True Self, exists, but is never active in doing anything at all. No mental activity, and no bodily actions, are activities and actions which this Atman has freely chosen to engage in. All human activity and all human actions, are by nature involuntary, driven by an impersonal set of forces which the Gita calls “the gunas of prakrti.”
Everyone is forced to perform action, even against his will, by the gunas of prakrti (3.5); there is no doer other than the gunas (13.19); All human activity is to be rightly understood as only “gunas active among gunas” (3.28); all actions are performed exclusively by prakrti… Atman is not the doer (13.28); One who sees rightly “perceives no doer other than the gunas” (4.19); [the ideal person] sits indifferent, not disturbed by the gunas, thinking “the gunas are operating” (14.23).
BG 14.24-25 connects these ideas to the ideal of indifference to the desirable and undesirable, when it says that the ideal person “transcends the gunas” by being “steadfast,” and when he considers that “pain and pleasure are equal, a clod, stone, and gold are the same, loved and unloved are alike, blame and praise are alike, honor and dishonor are equal” (14.24-25).
A completely inactive state might be achieved at meditation, but of course it is impossible to remain inactive after the meditator returns to everyday life. The Gita’s authors are very aware of this. They engage in a strong polemic especially against those who might take this as a reason to refuse to “act” in fulfillment of their caste duties. I will deal with this facet of the Gita’s thought below. But first I want to remark on several other issues connected to this radical doctrine.
First, this is another example of giving special religious significance to meditative experience. Quieting all mental activity in mediation is given special religious significance if one sees this as the meditator identifying himself with the supernatural “inactive” Atman, identical with Krishna and Brahman.
But I also want to point out some interesting similarities between this radical Gita doctrine regarding the inactive Atman, and the role that Dependent Arising plays in my critical reconstruction of early Buddhist teaching.
First, I argued in Early Buddhism Overview (2) that one main point of the Buddhist doctrine of Conditioned Arising is to emphasize the involuntary character of a good deal of human activity. This idea is partly an interpretation of middle section of the twelve-fold chain of Conditioned Arising that I argue for below. That is: In a person still in the grip of underlying tendencies to Craving and Clinging, “contact” (phassa) with any object of awareness, gives rise to an involuntary feeling-response (vedanā), which in turn awakens Craving and Clinging (tanha and upadana).
I think that something implicit but not explicitly stated here, is the involuntary character of this response. That is, Craving and Clinging do not figure here as voluntary responses freely chosen by a personal human subject. In the unenlightened person, still in the grip of “underlying tendencies” to Craving and Clinging, any sensory “contact” automatically evokes responses driven by Craving and Clinging, which come about involuntarily.
Here is where we can see a parallel between the doctrine of Dependent Arising in the suttas, and the Gita’s account of the senses “forcibly carrying away the mind” (2.60-62), and in which human activity is the result of humans being “unwillingly” impelled to become active by the impersonal gunas of prakrti (3.5). The Gita makes more clear and explicit the involuntary character of psychological responses, which I think is implied but not made so explicit in the account of Dependent Arising in the suttas.
This doctrine of the involuntary Dependent Arising of human activity in response to sensory stimuli, is also central to my account of the purpose both of mindfulness meditation and of jhana-meditation in the suttas. What I propose here is that underlying tendencies to Craving and Clinging are very deeply rooted in normal human psychology, and (in the unenlightened person) are present in practically all purposeful human striving. Thus the antidote, envisioned in meditation-instruction in the suttas is not willful repression of these powerful driving forces driving all human activity. The antidote envisioned both in Mindfulness meditation and in jhana-meditation, is to bring all mental activity to a halt. What the suttas call “the stopping of the mind” is similar to ideas concerning the inactive Atman in the Gita.
Jhana-meditation in the suttas aims to bring to a halt all (involuntary) mental reactions to sensory stimuli, by trying to remove all contact with even the most tenuous internal mental stimuli (culminating in the cessation of all perceptions sa a-nirodha).
In Mindfulness-meditation, as I understand it, the goal is not really to stop all mental/emotional activity. Rather, the meditator ceases to allow himself to be involuntarily drawn into involvement with this activity. He will instead become a non-reactive observer of whatever thinking-activity he might become aware of. He should try to refrain from personal engagement in any thinking activity; but he should also refrain from becoming engaged in attempts to bring this thinking activity to a stop.
In some ways, this can be regarded as putting into practice the Gita’s extremely bifurcated vision of human activity: Involuntary activity driven by the gunas of prakrti, on the one hand, and a True Self forever remaining inactive on the other. In mindfulness meditation, the ideal is that the meditator himself should remain unengaged and “inactive,” observing activity going on in his being as something wholly separate from himself, driven by forces having nothing to do with any voluntary choice-to-act on his part.
We could easily take as a description of Buddhist Mindfulness practice the Gita passage (14.23) which says that “he sits indifferent, not disturbed by the gunas, thinking “the gunas are operating.” That is, the meditator sits as an inactive observer, aware of mental/emotional processes going on in his being, but undisturbed by them because he views them from a distance as processes completely separate from himself as observer.
Criticism of withdrawal from society and social responsibilities.
In many passages, the authors of the Gita show great concern that meditators, finding fulfillment within and identifying with an “inactive” Atman, will then refuse to carry out their social responsibilities. This is partly connected to the meaning of the term karma, which in the Gita can refer both (1) to “action” in general (as when the Atman is said to be a-karma, “in-active), but also (2) more specifically to actions fulfilling a person’s social responsibilities, identified in the Gita with caste-duties.
This problem takes a particularly concrete form in the Gita, because of a very specific problem with which the Gita begins: Arjuna, an individual of the warrior caste, is hesitant and go into battle as his caste-duty requires. And indeed the Gita’s authors are very aware that their teaching might make meditating members of the warrior caste reluctant to go into battle because, having achieved meaning-fulfillment within, they have no need for social prestige that they might achieve by this.
But in addition to this, the Gita’s authors seem to assume that meditators have a certain prestige in their society, so that if they were seen refusing caste-duties, this would cause others to refuse to carry out their caste-duties as well. Thus they would be responsible for the breakdown of social order (which in the authors’ minds is dependent on everyone carrying out their caste duties).
The assumption that meditators have this kind of prestige is expressed I think by calling them “the best men,” as when the Gita says (3.21) “Whatever the best man does, so do the rest; whatever standard he sets, the world follows that.” That is, if prestigious meditators who have no more need to act to achieve anything, were observed by others to cease acting to fulfill their caste duties, others would imitate them, causing the dissolution of social order. The author thus appeals to the desire of meditators not to be responsible for social disorder.
At the same time, they are aware of a dilemma: They do not want to appeal to any need for reputation or social approval that is what ordinarily motivates people to carry out their social responsibilities. Their solution: the Gita’s ideal meditators would carry out social responsibilities out of a pure altruistic desire to “maintain the order of the world” (3.20 & 25). More specifically they would carry out their social responsibilities without any desire or need to get something from performing their duties, in such a way that success or failure in their endeavors would not deeply affect them. They would “act without concern for the fruits of action.” Specifically in relation to Arjuna’s predicament, he should go into battle “unattached” (3.19), unconcerned with “the fruits [i.e. the results] of action,” (2.47, 4.20)
Thus the Gita’s ideal meditator should be “content with whatever comes to him, constant in mind, whether in success or failure” (4.22). One passage actually suggests that “acting without attachment” is equivalent to the ideal of being completely “inactive.”
He who has abandoned all attachment to the fruits of action, always content, not dependent, in effect does nothing at all. (4.20)
I discuss these ideas at some length here because, although they have no exact parallel in the thought of the suttas, they bear some similarity to one aspect of my account of the Buddhist ideal. This part of my account addresses the problem that “the cessation of Craving and Clinging” advocated in Buddhism cannot do away entirely with all motivation for action in the world. I asked then about what kind of motivations might remain in a person once this person no longer needs to get anything from engagement with the world. In answer, at the end of Early Buddhism Overview (2), I suggested the idea of “expressive” motivations, a desire to act just to express oneself and one’s goodness. Action as self-expression, done for its own sake, not motivated by any need to get anything further from the action, would also be the kind of motivation and engagement with the world which could not be a cause of dukkha because of failure to achieve some further aim.
These ideas could be seen as a more generalized version of one aspect of the Gita’s teaching as described above. It is more generalized in that, while it recommends “action without attachment to the fruits of action,” it does so without any narrow confinement to issues regarding social responsibilities or to notions of caste duties specific to ancient India.
An eternally existing Atman as what is reincarnated.
Another religious belief promoted in the Gita worth mentioning here is the idea that when a meditator gets in touch with, and identifies with, his inner Atman, he is identifying with an eternal and immortal part of his being. This Atman existed previous to entering into this individual’s particular body. At the death of this body, this same Atman will be reincarnated in a different body, in the same way that a person might take off one set of clothes and put on some other clothes:
There never was a time when I [Krishna] was not, nor you. The embodied [Atman] goes through childhood, adult, old age, then acquires a new body (2.12-13); the Atman is not born nor does it die, it is birthless, eternal, perpetual (2.20). The embodied Atman takes on new bodies like a person changing clothes (2.22).
This again is a religious belief that clothes meditative experience of the inner Atman with additional religious significance. I mention this here also because this is one very specific belief taught in the Gita that is brought up in the suttas, and specifically rejected. As examples:
– MN 38.2 (Kindle 6208) condemns the “pernicious view” of a person who mistakenly attributes to the Buddha the teaching that “it is this same consciousness (viññana) that runs and wanders through the round of rebirths”
– MN 2.8 (Kindle 1574) condemns the false view that “it is this self [atta] of mine that speaks and feels and experiences here and there [in future reincarnations] the result of good and bad actions.”
-SN 22:[9] (Kindle17102) cites as a false view: “Having passed away… I shall be permanent, stable, eternal, not subject to change”;
But here we meet also a possible internal conflict in the message of the Gita. That is, the idea that identifying with one’s inner Atman is identifying with what it is reincarnated, exists side by side with the idea that identifying with Atman/Krishna/Brahman found within, actually liberates a person from the round of rebirths. This is a central theme in BG 8.15-26. For example:
Up to Brahman’s realm of being, the worlds are subject to successive rebirths; but he who reaches Me [Krishna] is not reborn (8.16); attaining the supreme (parama) goal they do not return, this is My [Krishna’s] supreme dwelling place (8.21)
This of course is another point of similarity as well as contrast with the early Buddhism of the suttas. Liberation from rebirth is an ideal goal very frequently emphasized in the suttas. On the other hand, the Gita offers a specific positive picture of what happens to the ideal person after death. Achieving union with Atman/Krishna/Brahman in this life amounts to entering “Brahman’s realm of being” (8.16), Krishna’s “supreme dwelling place” (8.21). Brahman and Krishna of course are eternal beings. Contrast this with the adamant refusal in the suttas to give any definite picture at all about the afterlife fate of an Enlightened Buddha (see the essay Demythologizing Buddhist Afterlife Beliefs)
Atman/Krishna pervading the entire world.
A final contrast worth mentioning here concerns a prominent idea in the Gita, the idea that the same Atman/Krishna found within, is also a presence pervading the entire material universe.
Krishna is
the radiance in the moon and sun… the pure fragrance of the earth, the brilliance in the fire, the life in all beings (7.8-9); the ideal person should see Krishna everywhere, and all things in Krishna, and see Krishna abiding in all beings (6.30-31); the ideal person is one whose Atman has “become the Atman of all beings (5.7); he sees all beings in himself and also in Krishna (4.35); he sees Atman present in all beings, and all beings present in the Atman (6.29); he sees Krishna everywhere, and all things in Krishna (6.30); he honors Krishna abiding in all beings (6.31); he sees sameness in everything in the image of his own Atman (6.32)
What is relevant in the present context is the practical significance of these ideas. The idea that in getting in touch with my True Self, the Atman within, I am also getting in touch with a divine presence pervading the entire world, promotes a feeling of oneness between myself and the world.
I bring this up because this idea of feeling “one with the world” is also sometimes associated with Buddhism today. Whatever can be said about later Buddhism, I think this idea is not one found in the Pali suttas. If anything, the ideal in the suttas is described in terms of separating oneself from the world, “escaping from the all” as one sutta puts it.
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