Buddha-nature (as Depicted in the Lankavatara-sutra)

by Nguyen Dac Sy | 2012 | 70,344 words

This page relates ‘Early period (b): The Shrimala-sutra’ of the study on (the thought of) Buddha-nature as it is presented in the Lankavatara-sutra (in English). The text represents an ancient Mahayana teaching from the 3rd century CE in the form of a dialogue between the Buddha and Bodhisattva Mahamati, while discussing topics such as Yogacara, Buddha-nature, Alayavijnana (the primacy of consciousness) and the Atman (Self).

1. Early period (b): The Śrīmālā-sūtra

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The Śrīmālā-sūtra [śrīmālāsūtra] or full title as the Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanādasūtra, i.e., The Lion’s Roar of Queen Śrīmālā Sūtra, is a sermon delivered by a queen, a lay woman, and it was certified by the Buddha. The text exists in Tibetan and Chinese. The Sanskrit original is lost, but fragments of it are preserved as citations in other works.^[1] This text was translated into Chinese^[2] in 436 CE by Guṇabhadra (394-468). The first English translation of this sūtra was made in 1974 by Alex Wayman and Hikedo Wayman from Tibetan, Sino-Japanese and Sanskrit versions. These translators accepted this feature as the scripture’s way of honoring certain queens in the Andhra region of South India who in the third century CE were supporting the Buddhist establishments there. Alex and Hikedo Wayman also insisted that this scripture is an outcome of the Mahāsāṅghika sect of Buddhism, because of a scripture of this sect called Mahāvastu fitting in certain ways with the chapters of the Śrīmālā scripture.^[3]

The Sūtra is one of the main early Mahāyāna texts that taught the theories of Tathāgatagarbha, Dharmakāya, and Ekayāna (One Vehicle) through the words of the Indian Queen Śrīmālā:

“The vehicles of the Disciplines (śrāvakas) and the SelfEnlightened Ones (Pratyekabuddhas) are included in the Great Vehicle (Mahāyāna). Lord, “Great Vehicle” is an expression for Buddha Vehicle. In that way, the three vehicles are counted as One Vehicle (Ekayāna). By realizing the “One Vehicle” one attains the incomparable rightly completed enlightenment which is an expression for the nirvāṇa-realm or the Dharmakāya of the Tathāgata”^[4]

Therefore, the text as it stands draws a sharp contrast between the non-Mahāyāna saints on the one hand and the fully enlightened Buddha on the other. The Arhats and Pratyekabuddhas have not attained full enlightenment and they are far from the realm of nirvāṇa. The Tathāgatagarbha is the realm of the Buddha alone; it is not realized by the non-Mahāyāna saints and is not within the realm of logic and reasoning. Although the term foxing (Buddha-nature) does not appear in this Sūtra, the concept of the Buddha-nature manifests its full notion through the term Dharmakāya and Tathāgatagarbha.

The Dharmakāya is the “Dharma-body” of the Buddha; it is what the Buddha himself is. This Dharmakāya, when viewed as intrinsically free from spiritual ignorance, is said to constitute Eternity, Bliss, Purity and Self in their perfect state.

The great Queen Śrīmālā, empowered by the Buddha to teach the Dharma, affirms:

名無始無作無起無盡離. 盡常住自性清淨離一切煩惱藏. 世尊. 過於恒沙不離不脫不異不思議佛法成就說如來法身. 世尊. 如是如來法身不離煩惱藏名如來藏^[5]

“The Dharmakāya is beginningless, uncreated, unborn, undying, free from death; permanent, steadfast, calm, eternal; intrinsically pure, free from all the defilement-store; and accompanied by Buddha natures more numerous than the sands of the Ganges, which are nondiscrete, knowing as liberated, and inconceivable. This Dharmakāya of the Tathāgata when not free from the store of defilement is referred to as the Tathāgatagarbha.”^[6]

Thus, the Sūtra has significantly contributed to the Mahāyāna notion of the permanent, steadfast and eternal Tathāgatagarbha, which is nothing less than the perfect Dharmakāya temporarily concealed by unreal mental contaminants. In this Sūtra, therefore, Tathāgatagarbha is the name given to the Dharmakāya, which is in reality permanent, when it is obscured by defilements in mundane one. Although Dharmakāya is permanent, it is no-self. Something permanent is needed, it is implied, to unify experience and thereby draw spiritually significant lessons.

There is no self within the realm of impure circle of birth and death (saṃsāra), and the Tathāgatagarbha is very basis of saṃsāra:

如來藏者. 非我非眾生非命非人. 如來藏者. 墮身見眾生顛倒眾生空亂意眾生. 非其境界^[7]

The Tathāgatagarbha is neither self nor sentient being, nor soul, nor personality. The Tathāgatagarbha is not the domain of beings, who fall into the belief in a real personality, who adhere to wayward views, whose thoughts are distracted by voidness.^[8]

Therefore, the Tathāgatagarbha is only the name given to the same “thing” which in enlightenment is the Dharmakāya, and the Dharmakāya has the perfection of Self, so the Tathāgatagarbha is not Self only inasmuch as it is egoistic. From an enlightened perspective the same “thing” can be spoken of as a True or Transcendent Self.

And finally, the Śrīmālādevīsūtra makes it clear that the “pure self-nature” (zixingqingjingxin 自性清淨心) or the Buddha-nature is a mystery understandable only to the Buddhas and advanced Bodhisattvas, and approachable only through faith:

謂自性清淨心. 難可了知. 彼心為煩惱所染亦難了知. 如此二法^[9]

It is difficult to understand the meaning of the intrinsically pure self-nature in a condition of defilement. The self-nature intrinsically pure is difficult to understand; and the defilement of that self-nature is difficult to understand.^[10]

Thus, the purpose of the Śrīmālādevīsūtra is to describe the ontological and epistemological aspects of the Tathāgatagarbha by identifying the garbha with the Absolute Body (Dharmakāya). To begin with, the ontological status of the garbha as the ground of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa is set forth, and a distinction between ontic substance and ontic subject is discussed. The Sūtra also gives the more exact definition of the Tathāgatagarbha in its processing advance to realize itself perfectly as Dharmakāya. One of the particular characteristics of this Sūtra is that the concept of Tathāgatagarbha is presented in the language of no-self. Because it is the necessary emergence of itself to itself, its movement from potential to actual Buddhahood, the garbha is then identified as the fundamental soteriological principle upon which the concept of the One Vehicle (Ekayāna) is founded. Its subsequent identification as the Great Vehicle (Mahāyāna) and the Buddha Vehicle (Buddhayāna) is evaluated in the light of the various stages of the spiritual path belonging to the Arhat, Pratyekabuddha, and Bodhisattva.

We have just presented the two earliest texts belonging to the first period of the Tathāgatagarbha literature, i.e. the Tathāgatagarbhasūtra and Śrīmālādevīsūtra. Although these texts presented in pure and typical form of the Buddha-nature thought through the concept of Tathāgatagarbha and Dharmakāya, both of them did not develop in Chinese Buddhism. The reason why the Chinese did not show interest in these texts is still the question. However, the other text which made the Tathāgatagarbhasūtra and Śrīmālādevīsūtra be overshadowed is the Mahāparinirvāṇasūtra of the Tathāgatagarbha literature.