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DEVELOPMENTS OF THE TWO NIRVANA THEORY [arahant’s] last thought’ (carimacittanirodhena khandhavaMMassa khepitattA). 99 We frequently see this type of explanation in the various MCkAs, exegeses of the aMMhakathAs. Taking ‘clinging’ as the aggregates seems to have been largely settled within Buddhist schools. Later in the PrasannapadA, Candrakcrti also adopted this interpretation. He said: ‘By the word upadhi is meant the five aggregates as fuel, which is the cause of the conventionally designated self (Atman).’ 100 49
THE DOCTRINAL DEVELOPMENT OF NIRVANA 4 NIRVANA IN THE THERAVfDA BUDDHIST TRADITION In Chapter 3, we saw that the right interpretation of nirvana with and without a remainder of clinging is, agreeing with its metaphorical structure, as the cessation of all defilements during life for the former and the cessation of the aggregates at death for the latter. In the early canon, the state of nirvana without a remainder of clinging was often explained through the image of a fire extinguished. In fact, we can get an early idea of this state through one of the well known discourses concerning one of the four unanswered questions: the state of the TathAgata after death. As its name suggests, the early canon did not really answer this question and, as a consequence, there have been many attempts to fill ‘the silence of the Buddha’ through clarifying this metaphor of a fire extinguished. One of the attempts to fill this silence is through the common Indian view on fire seen in the later UpaniLads. F. Otto Schrader, for example, tried to interpret this state positively through clarifying this metaphor in terms of the so-called common Indian view based on several later UpaniLads. 1 According to him, ‘an expiring flame does not really go out, but returns into the primitive, pure, invisible state of fire it had before its appearance as visible fire’. 2 Thus, the enlightened person after death does not become nothing but returns to the primitive and pure state like the paramAtman, the ultimate reality in Brahmanism. 3 Peter Harvey has recently tried to interpret this state as something positive, not a state of nothingness, from the DArukkhandhasutta in the AWguttaranikAya. 4 Through the fact that the monk who possesses supernormal powers (iddhimant) can see earth, water, fire and air elements in a large log of wood because there are these elements in the log, he drew the following conclusion: While to a Western-educated person, an extinct fire goes nowhere because it does not exist, the Buddha’s audience in ancient India would generally have thought of an extinguished fire as going back into a non-manifested state as latent heat. The simile of the extinct fire thus suggests that the state of an enlightened person after death 50
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METAPHOR AND LITERALISM IN BUDDHISM
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TEACHING BUDDHISM IN THE WEST Edite
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METAPHOR AND LITERALISM IN BUDDHISM
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FOR DONGJE MY ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE D
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CONTENTS List of figures and tables
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PREFACE I am glad to be able to tha
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ABBREVIATIONS The abbreviations for
Page 16 and 17: ABBREVIATIONS RV Rgveda. SA SaNyukt
Page 18 and 19: INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION In the Ab
Page 20 and 21: INTRODUCTION to reach it was descri
Page 22 and 23: INTRODUCTION two nirvana theory in
Page 24 and 25: NIRVANA AND ITS REFERENCE Part 1 TH
Page 26 and 27: NIRVANA AND ITS REFERENCE 1 NIRVANA
Page 28 and 29: NIRVANA AND ITS REFERENCE early Bud
Page 30 and 31: NIRVANA AND ITS REFERENCE original
Page 32 and 33: THE TWO NIRVANA THEORY IN THE EARLY
Page 54 and 55: DEVELOPMENTS OF THE TWO NIRVANA THE
Page 68 and 69: NIRVANA IN THE THERAVf DA BUDDHIST
Page 94 and 95: NIRVANA IN NORTHERN BUDDHIST SCHOOL
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NIRVANA IN NORTHERN BUDDHIST SCHOOL
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Table 5.4 Summary of the doctrinal
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CONCLUSION The term anAgAmin was of
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CONCLUSION passion, hatred and delu
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CONCLUSION The Sautrantikas probabl
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SELECTED SOURCES FOR THE NIRVANA CO
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NOTES Indians; and also because we
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NOTES 13 Huzita (1988: 8). 14 La Va
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NOTES 70 See Dutt (1960: 252-71), L
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NOTES 146 Akanuma (1929: 126). 147
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NOTES 39 yaP sAsravair dharmair vis
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NOTES 5 Harvey (1990: 66-7). 6 DN I
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NOTES 65 Tr. Norman (1992: 120): ac
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NOTES 132 Bareau (1955: 285). 133 B
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NOTES 15 Life faculty is one of the
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NOTES 77 Akb-h pp. 67-8. 78 Accordi
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NOTES 149 SA (TD2 57c8), SN IV 109.
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NOTES 6 SN IV 251-2. 7 The Chinese
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NOTES (1969: 378-82), which was mad
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BIBLIOGRAPHY BIBLIOGRAPHY PRIMARY S
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BIBLIOGRAPHY SECONDARY SOURCES Adik
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BIBLIOGRAPHY Pasadika, Bhikkhu (198
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faculty see indriya fetters see saN
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