Sunday 31 January 2010

Destroying Mara Forever 1

I've completed the first chapter, "Śāntideva, Virtue, and Consequentialism" by the great Śāntideva and Buddhist ethics scholar, Barbara Clayton.

The chapter argues for a version of "character consequentialism" (p.15) or "perfectionist consequentialism" (p.15 and 26) to make sense of Buddhist --- specifically Māhāyana --- specifically Śāntideva ethics. I note that because it should be an open question whether and/or how Śāntideva deviates from prior Buddhist ethics.

Clayton nods to this question when suggesting that Keown has it right (in his 1992 The Nature of Buddhist Ethics and the 1996 article "Karma, Character, and Consequentialism") when he suggests that if Buddhist ethics is consequentialist, it must be a form of ethical egoism (an ethics based on consequences for oneself) and this is clearly wrong (p.17). Keown argues this because in early Buddhism the consequences one is seeking are the elimination of one's own greed, hatred and delusion (aka the roots of suffering). So if we call Buddhism consequentialist, we are saying it is quite selfish indeed. Keown argues, rightly, that this misses the point of early Buddhist ethics, which instead focuses heavily on cultivating right kinds of other-regarding behavior.

But, Clayton adds, this just the case for Theravādin Buddhism. Buddhists who focus on the bodhisattva ideal explicitly identify all suffering as equal - refusing to differentiate the suffering of oneself and others. The consequence sought is not merely removing one's own suffering, but that of all beings. She notes several instances of this, notable one from the Compendium:
"When fear and suffering are dear neither to me nor others, what is special about me, that I protect myself and not others?" - p.19; ŚS 2.10-11 (Cf. BCA 8.96)
Universalism and Agent-neutrality

Two related notions are discussed here: Universalism and "Agent-neutrality." Universalism means that ones ethics are concerned with all beings, clearly a trait of Māhāyana ethics. And arguably not a feature of Aristotelian virtue ethics - the analogue argued for by Keown. Agent-neutrality, expressed in Śāntideva's quote above, denies the possibility of privileging one person's pain or pleasure above others. Clayton clarifies that not all of Śāntideva's work is so clear on this issue, including, for example, the suggestion that it would be worse to impede the progress of a bodhisattva than to kill every man, woman and child in India! (p.20, ŚS 83.20 - 84.5)

This, it is worried, might disqualify Śāntideva from being a consequentialist. But, Clayton argues, the reasoning here is still consequentialist in nature. The reasoning is that the results of impeding a bodhisattva, even the slightest bit, is an incredibly horrible thing to do because a bodhisattva does so much good in the world.

My sense that Śāntideva's words here can only be religious hyperbole, to be read with reverence and gratitude to bodhisattvas, and not to be read as a rational argument. Thought about rationally, too many obvious questions arise.

Along similarly troubling grounds is Śāntideva's claim that even a transgression of precepts rooted in the defilement of passion (rāga) may be acceptable if it benefits others (somehow). (p.23) It is here that the consequentialist strain in Śāntideva becomes worrisome.

Moral Accounting

A third concept that Clayton brings up is moral accounting (pp.24-25). Moral accounting, weighing out the pros and cons of a given act or rule, is a hallmark of consequentialist theories. And Keown, rightly again, argued at length that this is not the way Buddhists derive their ethics. The first precept, for instance, is not there because "more or less" it reduces suffering.

Clayton argues, however, that Śāntideva engages in just this sort of moral reasoning. Quoting again from the ŚS, I paraphrase, "what good is one's happiness when the world is suffering? What good is it when a body is in flames to have a fingernail unburnt?" This, Clayton suggests, is Śāntideva's way of saying that a little suffering (on his part) should be accepted if it relieves more suffering in others.

However, it is not clear to me that this is the kind of reasoning going on. It may not be a case of ethical reasoning at all, but rather exhortational, "hey, I, we, you have got work to do!" Based on pan-Buddhist karmic theory, one's happiness is a result of past good deeds, and, according to pan-Buddhist psychological theory, unless we're awakened, we're ignorant and thus likely to misunderstand this and waste our lives and all the good karma in them. So Śāntideva is likely just rousing these obvious understandings in his reader as a pep-talk. Based solely on the lines quoted, we needn't read into this some deeper moral accounting, as Clayton does: "bodhisattvas should do whatever will ultimately yield the most benefit to sentient beings."

The problem, here, is that it presents a paradox. Either the bodhisattva is an ignorant chump like you or me and this cannot possibly know what will "ultimately yield the most benefit..." or he/she is awakened and thus will spontaneously, that is, without the need of moral reasoning of this kind, always act in ways that will ultimately yield the most benefit to sentient beings. If the bodhisattva is ignorant, then this "decision rule" is either empty or, like the above, exhortational. If the bodhisattva is awakened, it's just empty.

I'm not sure that this critique of mine holds water and I invite your thoughts on it.

Clayton's article concludes by agreeing with Keown on his critique of the Transcendency Thesis, but comes back to restate her position that this does not disqualify Buddhist ethics, at least in the case of Śāntideva, from being a form of consequentialism.

Update 2/1/10: on second thought, perhaps the paradox is not as intractable as it seems. Even mainstream consequentialists, who have great faith in people's ability to reason and thus make the best decisions, would admit that noone is omniscient and that mistakes happen. So Śāntideva could, too, be making a clearly consequentialist plea/argument here.

21 comments:

  1. Thanks for this interesting post and sorry for the following, external comment:
    Cannot Śāntideva just address people who have willing to become Bodhisattvas (have taken a Bodhisattva-vrata) but are not yet Bodhisattvas?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Elisa and welcome! (I'm guessing you made your way here via our friend Amod)

    I'll need help from someone better-versed in Mahāyāna to fully answer your question; as I am not sure what the difference is between one who has taken the Bodhisattva vows and an actual (?) Bodhisattva.

    I'm somewhat familiar with the distinction between a Bodhisattva and a Bodhisattva Mahāsattva - but even this is sometimes unclear to me.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi Justin, yes you are right.
    As for Bodhisattva-vows, I am also no expert, but as far as I can recall the point is that in all Mahāyāna Scriptures it is said that the target audience is made of people who have taken the Bodhisattva-vows, that is, the Mahāyāna vow "I will not reach nirvāṇa until all other beings are free". These ones are not Bodhisattva yet, and hence need ethical directions.
    On the other hand, I always (to be honest: in Tibetan literature) met 'mahāsattva' as a honorific adjective referring to bodhisattva. Do you know of other usages?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Elisa, I've always thought of one who has taken the Bodhisattva vows as essentially a Bodhisattva (/ bodhi-sakta).

    There are various stages of a Bodhisattva, starting at the vow and ending with complete perfection. One who has achieved perfection, and yet remains for the sake of others, is called a Bodhisattva Mahāsattva.

    So not all Bodhisattvas are Mahāsattvas, just the big-name ones :) This is my understanding.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Justin, thanks for the suggestion about mahāsattva, I think it makes sense.

    As for bodhisattva, we forgot to distinguish between the Pāli and the Mahāyāna usage of it. In Theravāda Buddhism, Bodhisattva (or its equivalents) is basically the Buddha in his previous lives. Hence, he has still not reached the bodhi, though he eventually will, but he behaves mostly as if he had already reached it (though the jātakas do not always tell about a perfectly accomplished Buddha).

    On the other hand, in Mahāyāna Buddhism I would say that the distinction between Bodhisattva and Buddha tends to blur. A Bodhisattva like Avalokiteśvara is as 'perfect' as a Buddha, and could 'attain' nirvāṇa, if only he wants. He has just decided not to leave saṃsāra for 'our' sake. In this connection, a Bodhisattva is not someone who has just taken the Bodhisattva vow –this is my understanding, at least. What's your opinion?

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hi Elisa, you're right, we did forget to distinguish between the Pāli and the Mahāyāna usage. There is a (however limited) Bodhisattva ideal in Theravāda (cf: Jeffrey Samuels' article here http://www.jstor.org/pss/1399912 )

    But yea, I've yet to find someone who can give a really satisfactory distinction between a Bodhisattva and a Buddha in Mahāyāna. What would happen if Avalokiteśvara attained nirvāṇa? Could he no longer then help us? Would he have to retire to a Pure Land like Amitābha (Buddha)?

    Perhaps all just silly questions for a tradition that is multifaceted and, to my mind, highly pragmatic.

    I think for now I'll stick with the notion that once you're on the Bodhisattva path (arisen Bodhicitta being the requirement there) then you're a Bodhisattva. What 'stage' or bhumi you're on is a then a second question.

    www.angelfire.com/rings/prasangika/10Bodhis.doc

    ReplyDelete
  7. Thanks for the article (I cannot access it now, but I will surely read it).
    I am not sure I am completely following you: you say that

    " I've yet to find someone who can give a really satisfactory distinction between a Bodhisattva and a Buddha in Mahāyāna"

    and then

    "once you're on the Bodhisattva path (arisen Bodhicitta being the requirement there) then you're a Bodhisattva"

    which seem to me contradictory statements. I would solve the problem by saying that one who has taken the vow of becoming a Bodhisattva is not a Bodhisattva yet. But even if you want to call her a Bodhisattva, then she is surely not tantamount to a Buddha yet (and hence needs directions such as Śāntideva's one).

    As for the more general question, I agree with you. In many traditions of Mahāyāna (not in Amitābha's one, for sure) Bodhisattva are not just like Buddhas, they are even better, since they refute to enter nirvāṇa in order to help us. At least, this is how it seems to me.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Oops. My first statement:

    " I've yet to find someone who can give a really satisfactory distinction between a Bodhisattva and a Buddha in Mahāyāna"

    Is wrong. I have found such a person: Paul Williams (Mahāyāna Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations, 2nd Ed, pp.200-208). You're forcing me to dig out old books, which I appreciate.

    It's still a bit confusing - he examines the Daśabhūmikasūtra-śāstra and the Bodhisattvabhūmi, apparently a portion of the Yogācārabhūmi - but either bodhicitta or direct perception of emptiness puts you on the path as a Bodhisattva.

    Meanwhile a 10th stage bodhisattva can emanate countless Buddhas and Bodhisattvas from a single pore. BUT.... this is still way short of a Buddha who is like the endless realms of the earth compared to a few pebbles (bodhisattva).

    In either case, from these two texts, once you're on the path, you are a bodhisattva, but a Buddha's better.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I see (and thank you). So, a bodhisattva is a bodhisattva from the very beginning and what I was referring to is a 10th-stage one.
    Let me then rephrase my initial comment: "Could not Śāntideva address bodhisattva of the lower stages (who still need directions)?"
    I wonder whether the superiority of the Buddhas is really felt as such in the whole Indian and Tibetan Buddhism (I am leaving aside Japanese Buddhism for obvious reasons).

    ReplyDelete
  10. Ah yes, I think it's correct that Śāntideva is addressing Bodhisattvas still in their development. But that makes the idea of moral accounting somewhat problematic (in ignorance, it's hard to know what will have the best outcome; hence the need for precepts and the perfections, which are more readily available on the epistemic level).

    ReplyDelete
  11. Oh, and as for the Buddha vs advanced Bodhisattva distinction in India and Tibet, I would guess that most practitioners make no real differentiation. But I can see where scholastics, when pushed, would need to say something such as that of the Daśabhūmikasūtra-śāstra, where even an advanced Bodhisattva is mere pebbles compared to the infinite world-systems of the Buddha.

    But if an advanced Bodhisattva can emanate Buddhas from every pore in his body, it must make one wonder.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Justin, your penultimate comment sounds quite interesting, but I am not sure I am quite following it.
    You seem to imply:
    1. moral accounting is problematic if there is ignorance.
    2. the epistemic level is distinct from the moral one.

    As for 1, I agree, but I guess that one can be accountable according to one's ignorance-degree (ignorance is never absolute). If one has, say, just undertaken the bodhisattva-path, then she will be accountable for not having done b instead of a (minor transgression). On the 8th bhūmi, on the other hand, she can be blamed for not having given her life away for another person; and on the 10th, for a tiger (all just examples).

    As for 2, you seem to imply that it is problematic to assume that epistemically available precepts have a moral output. Why?

    ReplyDelete
  13. Hi Elisa,

    Great questions. I'm afraid I was not very clear. The point I was trying to make was that in our ignorance we don't know what we're accountable for, ie what we should or should not do. Just being told to do what *we think* is best is a recipe for disaster because of our ignorance.

    Even a baby bodhisattva needs guidance and at times to be told to do exactly what she thinks is not the best thing to do.

    Georges Dreyfus takes this up briefly in his excellent 1995 paper in the Journal of Buddhist Ethics (p.42) when discussing Vasubandhu's description of kuśala and karma - which comes out sounding very consequentialist.

    Dreyfus responds: "For, how are we supposed to evaluate the result of a given action? In many cases, recognized Buddhist virtues fail to bring immediate positive results, and the result described concerns the long term. But in this case, how do we know which result is produced by which action? The short answer to this complicated epistemological problem is that we do To decide which action produces positive effects, we must rely on the testimony of an enlightened person as found in a scripture. Thus, in final analysis, it is the scriptural tradition that decides what counts as virtuous."

    But you're absolutely right that our level of accountability rises as we develop.

    Poor wording on my part, but I definitely don't want to separate moral and epistemological levels. In all Buddhism, to my knowledge, our epistemological standing -ignorance- effects our moral standing. We are only good to the extent that we are free from ignorance.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Oops - I think I butchered that quote a tiny bit, so here it is again:

    "For, how are we supposed to evaluate the result of a given action? In many cases, recognized Buddhist virtues fail to bring immediate positive results, and the result described concerns the long term. But in this case, how do we know which result is produced by which action? The short answer to this complicated epistemological problem is that we do not know. To decide which action produces positive effects, we must rely on the testimony of an enlightened person as found in a scripture. Thus, in final analysis, it is the scriptural tradition that decides what counts as virtuous."

    http://www.buddhistethics.org/2/dreyfus.html

    ReplyDelete
  15. Thanks for this interesting comment and quotation.
    I agree with you (although I am no expert in Buddhist studies) that ignorance forces us to do 'bad' things (such as craving to things and clinging to saṃsāra). By the way, I think this applies to many other Indian schools, such as Nyāya (which also claims that ignorance is the cause of desire and, then, action).
    The point is: does the degree of our freedom from ignorance determine our morality (our doing morally good things, be they only NOT doing bad things) or does it only determine our moral accountability. If we are not ignorant, I guess that we will surely do the right things. And if we are ignorant, we are not accountable for not doing them. Hence (if I understood correctly), you wrote:

    "But that makes the idea of moral accounting somewhat problematic (in ignorance, it's hard to know what will have the best outcome; hence the need for precepts and the perfections, which are more readily available on the epistemic level)."

    Do you mean to say that ignorance hinders us from doing good things hence we need precepts, but precepts are only available for non-ignorant people? Can't one just obey blindly to the Sacred Texts? This clashes somehow with the stereotype of
    Buddhism as an "enlightened" religion, but it possibly fits the Indian background. I hope I got your point.

    ReplyDelete
  16. "Do you mean to say that ignorance hinders us from doing good things hence we need precepts, but precepts are only available for non-ignorant people? Can't one just obey blindly to the Sacred Texts?"

    I would say that ignorance is like a darkness in which going north (doing really good things) is difficult. Saying it 'hinders' suggests to me that it 'holds us back' somehow; but that is not how I would characterize it.

    The precepts and virtues, to follow the analogy, are like tiny lights on the ground pointing us to the exit: it may be too dark to really see the exit, but we trust that by following them we will get there.

    The non-ignorant person (awakened) still follows the precepts - according to doctrine. He/she does so spontaneously, without the possibility of doing otherwise.

    Perhaps this analogy does sound a bit like blind obedience to texts. But we might say that confidence in the texts itself must come from within the individual - through his/her own initial wisdom and experience. And Buddhism, as an 'enlightened' religion, demands the practitioner continuously look within; truly seeing oneself is the mark of progress. It is not the blind faith of other religions that deny the possibility of 'knowing' and thus demanding blindness and trust in the 'higher power'.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Justin, I may have sound dismissive and I did not mean it. I am myself not a fan of the idea of Buddhism as an "enlightened religion" –I think this is largely a Western stereotype. Personally, I think that faith is inevitable within a religious experience just because life is too short to seriously test all possible options. Hence, one picks out one of them and then tests it. The initial commitment to texts is, in fact, enhanced by one's own experience within the Buddhist path.

    You are right, the darkness metaphor fits better than the hindering one.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Elisa, you didn't come off as dismissive at all (perhaps I sounded a bit defensive). I think you're absolutely right about the 'enlightened religion' moniker being a Western invention; though I've read some Sri Lankans that proudly declare the same. I agree with you about the inevitability of at least some faith along the way.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Thanks for this interesting answer.
    When did the Sri Lankan you refer to live? I wonder whether they had been influenced by the Western approach and wanted to present their religion according to what Westerners claim to be unique and good in Buddhism.
    For the time being I cannot recall any instance of Indian Buddhists claiming that their religion is self-established through worldly pramāṇas and without the need for faith. Better: I recall many of them, but no more than their "Hindū" counterparts. They are both within the pramāṇa-frame and do not seem to differ from each other much.
    Why, on the other hand, do we need so much a "non religious religion"?

    ReplyDelete
  20. Hi Elisa, the Sri Lankan I referred to lived in the latter half of the 20th century (I'm just about to post a review of his work), but yes I do think that Western influences play a role in his evaluation of Buddhism - as I believe was the case with many Japanese masters of the 20th century as well.

    But I'd be curious to see if any such ideas pre-date Western colonial influences.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Having read your review, I absolutely agree with you. W's claim seems to have been influenced by Kant's idea of a religion within the precincts of reason.

    As I wrote already, I am not aware of such claims in Indian Buddhism –no more than in all Indian philosophers, since they all share the idea that their arguments are supported by means of valid cognition.

    By the way, this makes me reflect about the fact that the opposite is, indeed, the case: the role of faith is often (not always) stressed by Indian theologians (including Buddhist ones), but nonetheless the idea is still that means of knowledge may (at least) prove the validity of what one believes in. Perhaps: it is self-understood that means of knowledge only validate what faith tells?

    ReplyDelete