Thich Nhat Hanh

He was born in 1926 and became a monk at the age of 16. He later received a tertiary education in the West and taught at Columbia before returning to Vietnam. His tradition was a Vietnamese form of Zen that had adopted several Theravada meditation approaches.

During the Vietnam War between a Communist North and a Capitalist Christian South Vietnamese regime (allied with Western forces – note not West Vietnamese but Western in the global sense) he advocated Buddhism as a third way. He was again at Columbia in this period where he met Martin Luther King, Jr. He influenced King’s attitude to the war and King nominated him for a Nobel Peace Prize. He was also involved in non-violence movements in the US, generally.

He argued in these so-called ‘non-violence’ movements (that were often havens at the time for angry people) that peace was gotten at moment by moment by means of awareness and that angry actions lead to angry results. Therefore, he taught the angry people that they should always seek the place of compassion in their hearts if they truly sought peace. “Being peace” was the consistent somewhat mystical focus of his message and plans for the movements more so than “aiming for peace” without any internal thought for how that can come from an angry place. He talked of his philosophy of “Interbeing”. The basic idea was that the interconnectedness of all of us stressed in the Buddhist idea of dependent arising meant that we had (and were) a joint-being. So he advocated peace and compassion and said “to be is to interbe”. Non-violence naturally followed from interbeing. The link with Gandhi’s (and Buddhism’s) views of wisdom and compassion is also fairly clear.

The question arises whether the self-immolation practiced by several monks taught by Nhat Hanh as a result of the situation in Vietnam during the war is truly non-violent and/or righteous. Books of Buddhist Ethics usually provide extensive discussions of the issue of Buddhism’s approach to suicide in comparable circumstances. The monks were, of course, meditating and seated in the Lotus position. The Buddhist view of such things is not necessarily like the Western view, as I hope has become clear in the course of these posts. This is however at the extreme end of “Engaged Buddhism”.

There is a Mahayana tradition of self-immolation. See, for example, part 23 of the Lotus Sutra and there is also in some traditions a routine burning of parts of the body as an initiation rite for postulants to the vows of the religious life. The rationale for this latter rite at least is to signify the sincerity of the vow. Thich Nhat Hanh suggested that the self-immolation, too, was a sign of the sincerity of the monks who committed to it as a form of non-violent protest against the war and so was (and is) not comparable to either violence to other beings or mere suicide. The motive was regarded as the issue and the motivation here was the purest of compassion for the people of Vietnam. The monks had also first attempted other forms of action to address the issue including meditation and a letter-writing campaign so they further argued that the suicides and their publicisation were last resorts.

Many Buddhists do have a problem with it (as many Muslims and Christians reject suicide bombings and ‘abortion doctor’ killings for their own reasons). Part of the issue is the violence per se and part is that idea rejected so firmly by Gandhi that religion simply does not belong in politics or social policy to such a potentially revolutionary extent, Aung San Suu Kyi and the Dalai Lama notwithstanding. One may ask: did the ‘tactic’ of self-immolation achieve peace? It certainly produced an effect and that is perhaps more to the point for “Engaged Buddhism” as it was sincerely entered into. The issue may still remain: was that effect positive?

The next issue for Nhat Hanh may have been: is “Engaged Buddhism” what Siddhartha wanted his monks to do? The man himself spent 75 years as an enlightened being speaking mainly with Buddhist religious though, of course, we know he also gave advice to kings in that time. By comparing Buddhism with other religions, we may notice similar changes that may be attributable to modernity but also to the way of Siddhartha.

So any 'changes' may be doctrinally valid as well as modern but there is probably at least an element of modernity? The common theme of ‘modern’ religious observance (since the Christian Reformation at least) is that the rules of observance are to be understood personally rather than merely ‘handed down’ by scholars. So if a scholar says I can’t be a suicide bomber, ‘abortion doctor’ killer or self-immolator, my modern education tells me that I may also have an opinion on how I may observe my religion. I can read the religious texts for myself and in my own way. The Theravada tradition remains the most conservative tradition within Buddhism in this regard though even here this situation is not static. Buddhadasa Bhikkhu is a noted Theravadan activist, for example. Also, within India around the time of partition, quite apart from what Gandhi was doing, Buddhism achieved a large number of new converts as a protest by former Hindus at both the Hindu caste system and Islamic and Christian systems led by a leading ‘untouchable’ politician of the time. Other still earlier examples of modern “Engaged Buddhism” though they didn’t yet have that name were the 19^th Century Japanese lay movement and a 19^th Century movement inspired by a European convert. Not all of these movements are necessarily either right or wrong, however, from a 'true Buddhist' perspective.

So the locus of religious authority is the subject of a fraught debate within Buddhism just as it is in most religions today. Al Qaeda (much of the leadership is Western tertiary-educated) and “Engaged Buddhism” are perhaps the Calvinists and Lutherans of today in their religions dealing with an unprecedentedly educated mass audience. It can further be argued that, in the harsh environment which modernity can provide, it is virtually inevitable that a wide variety of solutions to problems might well urgently and sincerely be preached and earnestly and wholeheartedly be adopted by adherents to a wide variety of the consequent and inevitable sectarian divisions.

Nhat Hanh also met Thomas Merton, the Catholic writer, who apparently took an interest in the war (Merton, though sworn to silence as a Trappist monk, is a well-respected writer on spirituality and may have asked to meet Nhat Hanh - he was given permission from his superiors to meet him). He apparently greatly influenced Merton, who later wrote that monasticism may be a common ground and meeting point between religions. Incidentally, the Dalai Lama also met Merton and later planted a tree near his grave.

Today Thich Nhat Hanh lives in France where he runs an order and community that he founded called “the Order of Interbeing”. He was once expelled by the Communist government of Vietnam but was allowed to return to attend a conference recently to be a keynote speaker and has apparently returned since.

Bodhisattva Cults, Cosmology and Iconography

Perhaps not surprisingly, then, given how difficult the levels were to achieve (see the last post), those who attained the higher levels came to be viewed as great teachers and almost as gods. Level ten must have been virtual Buddha status and thus must have not been seen much. Much of this adoration ran in parallel with a similar trend in the Hindu Bhakti movement. Krsna was the prime Hindu example of a god on earth that came to be worshipped in a similar way.

A number of beliefs arose concerning the lives of various of the greatest Bodhisattvas and their current whereabouts and degree of contactibility. They were venerated and indeed contacted (allegedly). The realm of earth into which Siddhartha came is called Saha for these purposes. By its nature it only permitted Siddhartha to teach for about 50 years as he was a man on earth.

As I mentioned in a recent post, however, Mahayana Buddhists learn there are other better purer realms in which Buddhas and Bodhisattvas now live and sometimes they rule that entire realm and are able to teach for hundreds of years. Amitabha is the best known and apparently the greatest (as I mentioned in an earlier post). His name in Japanese is Amida (for those who were wondering - since in an earlier post I mentioned the alleged supernatural power of repeating his name in Japanese). He rules the Western pure Buddha-realm also called the ‘full of bliss’ realm (Sukhavati). The Pure Land scriptures that I’ve mentioned contain the most details of all of this.

The order of the development of cults is interesting. The first object of worship was the coming Buddha, Maitreya, but his cult has been overtaken by others. Next came the great Amitabha. His cult is still going strong. Avalokitesvara is a Buddha (or a Bodhisattva, depending on who you ask) and the 14^th Dalai Lama is believed by his followers to be a re-birth of Avalokitesvara (as are the 1^st to the 13^th). Avalokitesvara seems to be believed to have manifested himself in many forms (and again, depending on whom you ask, he may himself be a manifestation of Amitabha or Amitabha may be a manifestation of him).

There are thought to be five ‘families’ of Buddhas and Siddhartha is regarded as being of the "Lotus" family.

Also icons of various Bodhisattvas came to be standardised so you could tell (if you knew the iconography) who was being depicted and why. For example the fat Buddha we know isn’t Siddhartha (i.e. the historical Buddha). He hasn’t yet become a Buddha and will be known as Maitreya in about 8,000 years once he is born on earth. In earlier posts I’ve given images of the Buddas Manjusri and Amitabha. Manjusri is usually depicted with the sword as in the image I provided. Avalokitesvara is often depicted with many heads and many arms with eyes on them. In some cases, one of the heads is thought to be the head of Amitabha. Here is one e.g:

Avalokitesvara with many heads and arms (from Vietnam and Wikipedia)

Tara is a female Buddha (or, again, possibly a Bodhisattva). She, too, is said to have manifested herself many times incarnately as indeed we all have (around 21 or 22 known times at least in Tara's case). You will usually see her depicted with green skin as in the following image from Wikipedia. She is also usually depicted (as here) moving her foot down so she can get up from her lotus position and help people. She’s another Tibetan favourite:

If you see a red Buddha it’s likely to be Amida (the Japanese version of Amitabha) (see below) but the Tibetans also have a love affair with him as one can imagine given his relationship with Avalokitesvara:

More on what seemed to make Yogacara such an Improvement

So what was really so positive about this change? A few doctrinal notes follow:

Tathagatagharba:

This is the idea of the Buddha Nature (or Essence or Matrix or Seed) in all of us. In this sense we are all Buddhas. Our Buddha-seed needs to be grown, though, and that means we must nurture it in an analogous way to the way we would nurture plant seeds if we wanted to grow a garden. We need to give it the sun it needs, the right amount of water (neither too much nor too little – Buddhism is all about the Middle path, after all), etc. We are sleeping Buddhas because our minds are just like Buddha minds ready to become awakened.

Obscurations (avarana) are hiding these facts from us, in this doctrine, as clouds hide the vastness of the sky beyond on a very dark (and wild and woolly) day. This concern at avarana (and its imagery) especially appealed to Mahayana Buddhists in China but affected all of Mahayana Buddhist thinking. There are two types of avarana, klesa avarana (caused by passions and the idea of self) and jñeya avarana (caused by cognition), and Arhats are supposed to have only dealt with the first type.

The Three Kayas of Buddhas

These are three dimensions or bodies of Buddhas. Works popular in the second turning literature had mentioned two bodies: rupakaya (Siddhartha himself as a man was a rupakaya) and dharmakaya (some kind of ultimate Buddha dimension). Yogacara tradition calls the formed rupakaya dimension nirmanakaya (a ‘measured-out’ dimension), uses the same word for the same second dimension and adds sambhogakaya. This translates as the enjoyment dimension. The distinction between all three is believed to be such a subtle one that only a Bodhisattva at a somewhat advanced level can perceive it.

Ordinary beings can somewhat experience all the kayas, however, by experiencing a statue of a Buddha. The final kaya is held to link the first two somehow. Thus the studied iconography I will mention in a future post is regarded as important as its proper execution is the avenue that best allows this luminous kaya linkage to be experienced by the ordinary mortal. This is part of the reason for the jewellery and elaborate clothing often depicted – that’s the best material way to indicate (if unfortunately imperfectly) the greatness of the luminosity.

Meditating on the Buddhas (as many Mahayana Buddhists do) can even somewhat reveal this three-kaya complex for normal mortals, too. It’s meant to ‘tap into’ our own Buddha-like dimensions.

This all may be a rationale for lay devotionalism but it is stressed that only the advanced Bodhisattva may experience the radiance to the full extent. Again Chinese and Zen Buddhists have some confusing sayings (in this case along with some from the Tantric/Vajrayana form of Tibetan Buddhism) that arise from this idea of the three kayas. In Zen, for example, it has been said that “the trees, stones and mountains all preach sunyata” and that “the teaching of vulture peak [where Siddhartha preached about sunyata] is still going on”. This is meant to mean that there is Buddha-radiance around today for those who will see it and learn from the sambhogakaya.

The devotional “Pure Land” Schools such as Amitabha devotees connected especially with the idea of sambhogakaya.

The Eight Consciousnesses

Regular Buddhism notes six consciousnesses (the five Western senses and the sense of mind). Yogacara adds what it calls store-consciousness and defilement of mind bringing the total to eight.

Store-consciousness contains our karmic seeds (vasana or samskara) that affect us by making us see ourselves as subjects. Other Buddhists have claimed that this doctrine sneaks the idea of self back into a Buddhism where it doesn’t belong. The Yogacarins counteract this criticism by reaffirming the impermanence and dependence of all of the consciousnesses and asserting that the difficulty of this doctrine for the human mind is part of the reason it is part of the third turning. They ask for trust that this doctrine is in no way eternalist.

The defilement of mind (klistamanas) is the consciousness that perceives the store-consciousness to be an ego and formulates the idea of subject and object.

The clear aim of Buddhism in this connection, then, is to purify our minds of these last two consciousnesses.

The Three Natures (Svabhavas)

These three new philosophical concepts are needed, according to the Yogacara view, to give an adequate account of reality (in this philosophical role, they replace the two truths in a way). There are two things regarded as being wrong to do: attribution (samoropa) and negation or “cutting off (vccheda)”, linked to the first two turnings. Our experience, then, goes on and produces appearances and there are three progressive aspects of this:

1) Parikalpita – constructed and mistaken knowing (an issue for epistemology);

2) Paratantra – dependent existence (an ontological question); and

3) Parinispanna – perfected existence (a soteriological matter).

Realisation that normal knowledge (parikalpita) is mistaken leads to an end of externalising and ideas of subject and object and of paratantra which also leads to parinispanna, the true realisation of paratantra. Rationalisation of paratantra is not sufficient, realisation is required, and paratantra is not negation as that would be productive of a nihilist parinispanna. Parinispanna is regarded as a cleansing of parikalpita from paratantra (as a nugget of gold is refined out of its usual ore).

The Yogacara Reaction (a Third Turning Exemplar)

Was it a reaction to problems with Madhyamika? Certainly, the problems it claims to address are that of negativity and the potential for nihilism of the Madhyamika way (how Middle Way can negation really be, it essentially argued?) This school also (as with Madhyamika) arose out of the practice of meditation more than as a purely scholastic divergence. Its name means “practice (cara) of (a) discipline (yoga)” and it rose to prominence in the 4^th and 5th Centuries CE – so it was the latest starter I’ve so far considered (though I’ve briefly mentioned later-developed schools such as Zen and the Tibetan Vajrayana schools and also modern day divisions).

The Mahayana view, generally, had begun to dominate India and Buddhist thought was experiencing one of its heydays. One of its greatest thinkers and the great Sarvastivadan scholastic abhidharma commentator Vasubandhu lived at this time and eventually converted to the less scholastic Yogacara Mahayana view himself after producing his great Sarvastivadan commentary (in which he noted with concern the Sarvastivadan school’s decline), though he remained a thinker and commentator, just with the reduced scholastic pressure inherent in this meditative school. He was apparently converted by his half-brother Asanga and clearly went on to become a key philosopher of the new school.

Asanga had been Sarvastivadan but become a devotee of the not-yet-Buddha, Maitreya, and was also the originator (with alleged assistance of Maitreya during meditation) of much of the Yogacara School’s ideology. According to a popular fable, Asanga’s complete conversion to Maitreya devotion had come about after much searching and prayer to Maitreya for guidance. Finally, when he had reached a point close to despair if not of actual despair, he saw a dog ridden with worms. Further, he realised in his then state that the only way to rid the extremely weakened dog of the worms without killing it was to lick the worms out of its body one by one and proceeded to do so (whereupon the dog revealed itself to be Maitreya and explained that his compassion and wisdom had finally allowed him to see the Maitreya, who had always been with him, in the dog). Besides the Sandinirmocana that I refer to below, Asanga was given five other Sutras by Maitreya (hence their author is usually cited as Maitreya-Asanga). There is a story of one of these Sutras being recited to Asanga by the alleged voice of Maitreya in front of an assembly that was unable to see Maitreya (could Asanga (or Maitreya) have been a great ventriloquist?)

The view’s major special claim to fame is its explicit emphasis on the idea that we all have a Buddha nature (remembering from an earlier post that there was a class of Sutras that had this emphasis – it is, generally, a Yogacara-specific class of Sutra). One of its pre-eminent ones is called the Sandinirmocana, which explicitly mentions that its teachings are a third turning of the wheel of dharma and discusses the limitations of the other turnings (without supplementation by the affirmation and negation of Yogacara that is the true Middle way).

The most completely Yogacara-only class of Mahayana scriptures is the Mind Only class (in terms of what different Mahayana Siddhantas view as useful Mahayana texts). As a rule, it has a more positive-sounding spin on things than Madhyamika. There is for this new view something in the sunyata of an excellent or even an ordinary mind that luminesces, radiates and possesses clarity (prabhasvara).

The difference between these schools is perhaps reminiscent of the difference between Plato and Aristotle later further developed in Western philosophy on the nature of mind and in fact this school may have been inspired by debate within the Hellenistic world that came to the attention of Buddhists.

The Avatamsaka Sutra uses an analogy that suggests all Buddhas are like jewels in an infinite cosmological net all reflecting off each other for us to experience in all their splendid co-reflected awesomeness. This became an especially important Sutra in China where it was seen by many as the highest explanation of what Siddhartha’s actual way of experiencing the universe was (once he became a Buddha). Many of the apparent paradoxes and confusions generally found in Zen and Chan commentaries and thought can be partly traced back to this particular idea of Siddhartha’s (and, by extension, enlightened ones') experiences. For instance, when asked what the ultimate principle of Buddhism is, a Zen master might answer “the oak tree in the garden” because the enlightened Zen monk is expected to see the luminescence, radiance and 'thusness' or 'suchness' (tathata) in all things where the ordinary person isn’t looking.

Being all about meditation, it was natural for its focus to be on the mind, perception and experience. It attempted to deal with so-called false appearances to the mind (pravrtti) by a turning about of this false reality (paravrtti) to get around the false appearances. The focus is on the teaching that it is realisable that there are no objects or subjects, which it calls graspable things (grahyas) and graspers (grahakas), in this state. The unique emphasis here (by the unique use of these specific terms and rejection of the more usual Mahayana terms subject and object and thereby their existence) is thus on undermining whatever it is that ‘causes’ grasping by denying any possible graspability of any actual object by any actual subject.

More on the Controversy and Mahayana Buddhism

So I’ve referred to the great Buddhist controversy and noted that the Mahayana tradition came out on top in India and eventually North Asia via Tibet and Afghanistan. But let’s examine what the actual controversy meant in real terms. It really comes down to Arhat v Bodhisattva and also to where Siddhartha might be today.

The Mahayanan Lotus Sutra tries to explain why there have needed to be these two Buddhisms. It gives the story of a man talking his children out of a burning building by offering them temptations such as beautifully carved rhinoceros toys as an aid. The idea here is that the idea of nirvana being desirable was the temptation humans needed to persuade us out of our old lives. It is certainly true that we can achieve nirvana but that man probably wouldn’t recommend that his children play with toys all day once the emergency has passed and neither did Siddhartha (in this role as a loving father) recommend that we all seek nirvana even though we may selfishly choose to (in our roles as ignorant children). This splitting also appears to be a feature of at least Christianity and Islam, to an extent (along the lines I mentioned in at least one earlier post – competing morality and wisdom traditions seem to coexist in most religions).

Far from being a simple and invented way out for laypeople to get more of the trinkets, the Mahayana School saw itself as offering the most mature way to be a Buddhist directly approved by Siddhartha. This partly gets to where Siddhartha is now and how there can possibly be new scriptures goes along with that. Apparently monks could still access him after his parinibbana (when they meditated).

I’ve mentioned the idea that the Mahayana view was a cult of some kind. One example of a version of Mahayana that may indeed be viewed as a cult is the mainly Japanese Ni Chi Ren Sho Shu Ha (日蓮系諸宗派 in Japanese) or NiChiRen Buddhism. Ni Chi Ren was a 13^th Century Buddhist who became its inspiration. This sect focuses today on the Lotus Sutra (the sutra from which the ‘burning building’ parable I’ve just discussed came). Pronouncing its short title in Japanese is said to have ‘magical’ results. In some sense this Sutra is also said to actually be Siddhartha (or perhaps some kind of composite of the Buddhas). Tina Turner has been a devotee of this cult. Things like levitation are possible according to various versions of Mahayana Buddhism especially.

A particular effect of the advent of the Mahayana tendency to innovate was that this vaipulya Buddhism could now cross-pollinate with indigenous religions such as Chinese Daoism, Japanese Shinto and Tibetan Bön even more easily. As a matter of authority, however, Mahayana belief is that their Canonical works are teachings of Siddhartha’s “second and third turnings” during his lifetime. What precisely that means isn’t entirely clear today but it appears that the second and third turning teachings were first taught in the order suggested by their names by Siddhartha during his lifetime after he had already been enlightened and teaching the “first turning” (often but not always accepted as the Tripitaka – sometimes Mahayana Buddhists prefer to exclude the abhidharma, often decried as too intellectualising, as any actual teaching of Siddhartha) for 16 years. The sravakas (hearers) were reckoned to only be ready for the idea of striving for Arhathood for the first 16 years. The second turning was apparently taught at one place but the third turning may have been taught much more widely. The Mahayana beliefs include the idea that the written teachings were hidden for many years by semi-divine snake-like beings called nagas (see below):

(From Wikipedia – guarding a temple in Vientiane)

The nagas are also known more generally in Indian religions as keepers of esoteric learning. The tradition continues that in around the year 1 BCE or CE around 500 teachers of what became known as Mahayana Buddhism held a conference at Mount Abu (now in Rajasthan in North West India) and there made the decision to reveal the hidden scriptures and begin to teach their meaning(s). To be continued...

The Split within Buddhism as an argument over the Abhidharma – Mahayana

Early in the tradition of Buddhism there were as many as eighteen schools of thought (and perhaps more than 30 have been discerned by modern scholars). Of these, a group called the Mahasanghika (Greater Assembly) proved the most controversial. Within India, their position became the majority viewpoint while Sthaviravadans (“keepers of the doctrine of the elders” – now called Theravadans with the same meaning but in Pali in Sri Lanka and south-east Asia) became the main opposition party. In India, the Sthaviravadan School became the Sarvastivadan School later responsible for the lost Sanskrit Canon. Another school (the Pudgalavadins (personal exponents) or Vatsiputriyas) believed in the actual existence of a soul (person – pudgala) beyond the skandas. The idea of the transmigration of ‘souls’ from lifetime to lifetime was also a controversial area (among many others). The Pudgalavadins were among those that sailed closest to the wind, which is part of the reason for their development of the idea of the pudgala. It was all very scholastic.

I mentioned in an earlier post that there were two accepted councils in the first hundred years after Siddhartha’s death. There was actually a second 2^nd council soon after the 2^nd council and soon after that the Mahasanghika split occurred. Mahayana Buddhism owes something to the Mahasanghika view but it is certainly a different view. The advent of Mahayana (after firstly being brought into existence) as the major of the two streams of Buddhism by the 5^th Century CE (as reported by 5^th Century Chinese pilgrims - the minor stream became Theravada) wasn’t simply brought on by an argument over abhidharma (although the existence of two versions presented that opportunity) but that was part of it. An orthodox Buddhism beyond the abhidharma had developed that was questioned and Buddhism had no problem intrinsically with any questioning. As I mentioned in an earlier post, monks and nuns could happily exist in the same communities for a long time despite holding different views.

Ultimately, though, disagreement upon Canon inclusions and especially the acceptable form of the vinaya forced new communities to be formed. Mahayanans still accepted the Sarvastivadan Canon in full, however. The scriptures that distinguish the Mahayana view appear to have been written around the time the Pali Canon was written but tradition asserts an earlier ultimate inspiration directly from Siddhartha (as does the tradition of the Pali Canon, of course). The name “Mahayana” probably arose in the 3^rd or 4^th Century CE possibly along with the derogatory “Hinayana” euphemistically translated as “the lesser way or vehicle”.

In this period the ‘Buddhist’ Mauryan Empire established by Asoka with its capital near modern-day Patna on the Ganges and extending to southern India and Afghanistan and Pakistan had been broken up by invasions from the north-west. Many of the invaders had taken on the Buddhist religion in some form for the same reasons Indians and others did (discussed in an earlier post). Two new Buddhist strongholds formed: one in the north-west of the old Empire under Kusana rule and one in the south. A further settlement project had occurred in Sri Lanka. Much later (by around the 13^th Century) Buddhism had virtually died out completely in India itself.

The disagreement in the views had to do with the ultimate aim of Buddhism.

The conservatives who had virtually fled to Sri Lanka believed the object of Buddhism was the making of Arhats as soon as possible. This process was individual and to be undergone essentially by the monks. Other Theravada Buddhists could really only hope to be reborn as monks before they could get to this stage in their own existences. This view meant that each monk was only responsible for achieving his own nirvana and thus becoming free of his own cycle of death and rebirth. They did, however, accept (naturally, as Mahayana arguments made a lot of sense within Buddhism) that Bodhisattva- and Buddha-hood were noble enterprises (while yet not accepting that they were superior pathways).

This view also had it that this was all Siddhartha had taught and that to teach anything else was to corrupt his message. The proto-Mahayana views, they held, claimed that the Arhat was still a conditioned being and that Siddhartha had planned something different for them.

This was actually a misrepresentation of the Mahayana view which was that the Arhat did become unconditioned but shouldn’t. He should rather pull back so that he might benefit others (I write “he” because nuns and other women were probably not considered as likely to arrive at being a potential Arhat in the first place).

The Theravadans were also most keen to stress the humanity of Siddhartha. The idea that he truly had a super human quality and was actually enlightened before the lifetime in which he taught Buddhism was another Mahayana view that they opposed. On that view, his whole life as Siddhartha was a teachable moment for humanity undergone due to this enlightened being’s extreme compassion.

But the Vaipulya (expanded – Mahayana) view gained the ascendency based on the newly recognised Vaipulya scriptures. There were five distinguishing features of the new teachings that led to claims of superiority:

1) It was better to also help others (as the historical Buddha, himself, did) rather than merely achieve nirvana for oneself only, as the Arhats did (thus the idea of being a Bodhisattva or Buddha was better than the idea of being an Arhat);

2) The more traditional view had wrongly changed since the time of Siddhartha to exclude even nuns from the possibility of Arhathood (thus the expanded teaching also accorded better with the original teaching, though there were several sub-views concerning the enlightenment potential of laypeople);

3) More upaya (ways to become enlightened) became available according to these scriptures (so Buddhism was actually easier than it had been claimed to be – even a king could remain a king and still become enlightened, though this hadn’t been Siddhartha’s path);

4) The newly revealed scriptures and thus commentaries upon them had a more comprehensive cosmology and ontology that also incorporated the first three features well (so it had a coherent theology); and

5) It had more canonical scriptures (84,000) so this made Buddhism easier to understand fully.

The Mahayanans claimed in addition that these teachings were genuine but had been initially hidden for the good reason that it was first necessary for a sufficient number of people to understand the traditional teachings before a critical mass could appreciate the expanded teachings. So these were the real teachings of gnosis. One particular correction to the old view was that Buddhas could in fact (and potential Arhats should also aim to) remain in existence in some sense beyond their parinirvana (for the good of others). The ultimate Mahayana view was that there were actually three so-called “turnings of the wheel of dharma” begun by Siddhartha and that the old Canons represented the first, only, of the turnings.

The opposing view also asserted that the Mahayana view was an innovation produced by simply bowing to popular pressure. There have been six Western scholarly views (all but the last of which are still held by some scholars):

1) The ‘new’ scriptures were the centre of a new “cult” of Buddhism;

2) The Mahayana view was a speculation prompted by new ideas within Hinduism (including the Bhakti tendency) as well as other Indian religions;

3) It was an anti-intellectualism anti-abhidharma trend and a trend towards a more holistic approach to Buddhism;

4) It was a set of ideas derived during meditation during which Buddhas had been encountered and had taught the meditators (the scriptures themselves support this idea);

5) Mahayana Buddhism was simply realised to be in the true spirit of the original teachings of Siddhartha (c.f. “the second and third turnings of the wheel of dharma” idea – further turnings may yet perhaps be realised); and

6) Some Japanese scholars especially suggested that pressure from the laity (Japanese priests marry
suggesting susceptibility to the scholars) led to Mahayana Buddhism (note that this view also agrees
with the traditional view).