仙石山仏教学論集
Sengokuyama Journal
of Buddhist Studies
Vol. XIII, 2022
第 13 号(令和 4 年)
Some More Equal than Others: Restriction and
Exclusion in Early and Middle Indic Buddhism
Corin Golding
仙石山仏教学論集第 13 号 令和 4 年 11 月
33
Some More Equal than Others:
Restriction and Exclusion in Early and Middle
Indic Buddhism
Corin Golding
Abstract
Buddhism, from the early tradition to the later Mahāyāna (and beyond),
contains a wide-ranging taxonomy of restriction, exclusion and, from a
modern perspective, perhaps, discrimination. Many examples exist, from
prohibitions on certain categories of person (and non-person) entering the
monastic order or listening to the Buddha’s teachings, to more
comprehensive statements against those who are denied the capacity to
achieve Buddhahood. Arguably, this exclusion gained its fullest
articulation in later Buddhism in the form of the icchantika. In this paper,
I trace some of the possible antecedents to the icchantika found in two key
passages from the Pali tradition, before presenting sections from a
Mahāyāna treatise in which we are introduced to the category of
agotrastha, ‘one lacking in the lineage (for attaining Nirvāṇa)’, who has
much in common with the icchantika; ultimately, at least in one key text,
the two appear to be conflated.
Introduction*
One of the most culturally influential teachings of Buddhism, in its
contemporary incarnations in the West as well as historically in most sects
* I am delighted for the opportunity to acknowledge the tremendous support and
assistance of all the faculty and related staff at the International College for
Postgraduate Buddhist Studies, Tokyo, many of whom have provided invaluable
feedback on this paper in particular, and contributed greatly to my studies more
broadly. Most of all, I owe an inexpressible debt of gratitude to Prof. Florin
Deleanu and Prof. Habata Hiromi, both of whom have conferred on me untold
generosity and patience, sharing their own translations of many difficult passages
― 180 ―
34
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
throughout East Asia, is that all beings can become a Buddha; or, in the
canonical formulation(s), variations of the following: Skt. VDUYDVDWWYƗV
WDWKƗJDWDJDUEKƗ ;ۊTib: sems can thams cad la de bzhin gshegs pa͛i snying
po yod; Chin. ୍ษ╓⏕ᜳ᭷షᛶ (often translated along the lines of ‘all
1
beings have Buddha Nature’). However, contrary to popular imagination,
early Buddhism contains many instances of beings, human and non-human,
who are excluded in some capacity from the Buddha dharma, from
prohibitions on certain individuals entering the monastic community
(Saূgha), to others who are denied the capacity to achieve Buddhahood, in
some circumstances for a provisional time-frame, in extreme cases, for
eternity.
Perhaps the earliest, and best known, instance of exclusion relates to
the well-NQRZQVWRU\RIWKH%XGGKD¶VPDWHUQDODXQW0DKƗSUDMƗSDWƯ*DXWDPƯ
ZKRVHRUGLQDWLRQZDVUHIXVHGE\WKH%XGGKDXQWLOƖQDQGDLQWHUFHGHGRQKHU
2
behalf. It would be several centuries after that episode before the appearance
discussed in this paper, and regularly enlightening me with their extensive
exegetical insights. If there is any scrap of merit contained herein, it is entirely
owing, and owed, to them. Needless (yet absolutely necessary) to say, any and all
errors and shortcomings that doubtless remain are my own.
1 6HHHVSHFLDOO\+DEDWD.DQǀ
2 See e.g., Jonathan S Walters (1994). There are several other examples beyond
those I summarise in this paper, which either are too vast a subject for the scope of
this survey, or do not bear immediately apparent affinities with the icchantika. Two
obvious RPLVVLRQVLQDGGLWLRQWRWKDWRI0DKƗSUDMƗSDWƯZRUWK\RISDVVLQJPHQWLRQ
concern the FƗ۬ڲƗOD HJ-RQDWKDQ6LON DQG'KDUPƗNDUDWKH%RGKLVDWWYD
ZKR ZRXOG EHFRPH $PLWƗEKD WKH %XGGKD RI 3XUH /DQG %XGGKLVP ,Q WKH
6XNKƗYDWƯY\njKD 'KDUPDNƗUD¶V th vow famously adds a qualification to his
commitment to save all beings, namely that this would not extend to those who
commit the five sins of immediate retribution or those who slander the dharma.
This is not without at least indirect relevance to the figure of the icchantika;
KRZHYHU 6LON Q TXHVWLRQV µKRZ LPSRUWDQW LW PD\ KDYH EHHQ LQ
,QGLD LWVHOI¶ DQG P\ LQWHUHVW KHUH LV GLVFRXUVHV RI H[FOXVLRQ LQ ,QGLF %XGGKLVP
Finally, one further example (though by no means the last) that will be of interest
to a wider study are the several sub-categories of slave and how these speak to the
― 179 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
35
of the icchantika, perhaps the most notorious villain in the South and East
Asian Buddhist worlds who, at least in some characterisations, is wholly
3
denied the capacity to attain ultimate Nirvāṇa (parinirvāṇa). However,
clearly the icchantika did not appear in a vacuum, and there are some striking
continuities with some categories from the early tradition that suggest they
are very much part of a wider discourse of exclusion, inflected, at least,
perhaps in part determined, by these categories. To be sure, none of these
earlier classes constitute as thoroughgoing an exclusion as would be
articulated in some characterizations of the icchantika, though the
agotrastha, elaborated primarily within the later Yogācāra school, very
much appears to be of the same genus. In brief, Buddhism from the outset
has not been the catholic church that is often popularly assumed.
While the restrictions placed on certain categories in the early sources
may not be as radical as the icchantika, several of them anticipate the latter
in interesting ways, while others often appear together with them in later lists
of beings considered to exemplify the most degraded behaviour and vilest
impulses. That is to say, despite often being presented in the literature as
exceptional in the Buddhist world, we can see that the icchantika emerged
in a milieu already punctuated by often finely calibrated (and from a modern
point of view, perhaps discriminatory, even arbitrary) systems of exclusion.
Furthermore, I would like to suggest, hesitantly, that in some passages the
icchantika comes to function as something of a catch-all for many of the
early categories, representing metonymically a litany of vices and sins that
coalesce and cohere in them.
question of who can or cannot become ordained as monks or nuns (see e.g.,
Gregory Schopen, 2010).
3 However, to be clear, I will not be discussing the icchantika in any depth in
this paper; that vexed topic is the subject of several forthcoming articles.
― 178 ―
36
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
In the first part of this paper, I introduce a representative passage from the
4
para-canonical Milindapañha (The Questions of King Milinda; Mil ), in
which we find a list of beings that are defined as being ‘unable to gain
complete insight into the nature of things’ even if they were to practise
correctly the Buddha’s teaching. I then note a similar list found in the
Mahāvagga of the Vinaya cataloguing those who may not be granted
permission to ordain as a monk, or, if already ordained, are to be expelled.
A discussion of several of these categories is followed by a limited number
of representative sequences depicting the icchantika, primarily from the
Mahāparinirvāṇa-mahāsūtra.
In part two I turn to a section of a Yogācāra text, the Śrāvakabhūmi,
to present passages which introduce, define, and elaborate, among others, the
category of the agotrastha, ‘one lacking in the lineage (for attaining
Nirvāṇa)’. As will be seen, unlike the provisional forms of restriction found
in part one, the agotrastha bears striking affinities with the icchantika, and
though conceived as part of the Yogācāra classificatory system while the
icchantika emerged in a less clearly defined context, these two figures have
much in common, both in terms of the characteristics on the basis of which
they are defined as bereft of any potential for awakening, and in the extent
to which their condemnation is unequivocal. Finally, the logic by which they
each find their ultimate rehabilitation also bears the imprint of the other, until
4 According to Oskar von Hinüber (1996b, 85), Mil, which takes the form of a
dialogue between the Indo-Greek king Menander (Menandros; Milinda) and the
Buddhist monk Nāgasena, can be analysed into five separate layers united ‘only
by the persons of the interlocutors’, and that developed over several centuries, the
first layer from roughly 100 BCE to 200 CE. The passage in question is found in
the second layer, meaning it likely postdates 200 CE. Consequently, this list of
restricted categories may well be later than the earliest references to the icchantika
found in e.g., Mahāparinirvāṇa-mahāsūtra. However, it is not my intention to
claim a direct influence on the icchantika of any of these specific cases; rather, I
only hope to demonstrate an extensive and pervasive discourse of exclusion in the
context of which the icchantika emerged.
― 177 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
37
at last they appear to be conflated, at least in one well-known passage in the
Laṅkāvatārasūtra.
1. Antecedents to the icchantika in early Buddhism
In looking for enumerations of classes or categories of exclusion in the
Buddhist canon, perhaps the obvious place to start is the Vinaya. I B Horner
(1951, xiv) in the introduction to her translation of the Mahāvagga (MV)
comments on the gradual regulation of the Saṃgha and its members, noting
‘the first steps of all – admission and ordination into the Order – were
experimented with until various types of applicants regarded as not eligible
for entry could be excluded by rules, based either on experience or on
forethought’. Vin I 91.7-18, for example, lists 32 types of physical
impairment and diseases, the bearer of which may not be ordained, including
having various limbs cut off (e.g., hands [hatthacchinna], feet
[pādacchinna]), being a dwarf (vāmana), suffering from elephantiasis
(sīpadi), or being blind and/or dumb and/or deaf (andha, mūga, badhira). No
doubt there were important social and medical reasons for some of these
prohibitions (though perhaps it is not always clear to a modern reader why
some of these conditions should disbar one from the community), and we
shall see echoes of these restrictions on physical impairment when we turn
to the ŚrBh in part 2, below; others were perhaps intended to maintain the
credibility of the Saṃgha in the eyes of the laity, upon whom the monks and
nuns depended for subsistence.
In this paper, I would like to look more closely at another list of
excluded categories from the MV, alongside a later passage from Mil. These
two contain striking similarities in their contents, though they are by no
means identical. Indeed, one important point of difference concerns not the
categories they include so much as the extent of the restrictions being
imposed. In the case of the MV, the list enumerates individuals who are
precluded from being ordained, or from remaining, as a monk, while in Mil,
― 176 ―
38
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
the scope has been expanded to describe those beings (human and nonhuman) who, ‘even if they were to correctly follow the path, would not gain
5
complete insight into the nature of things’. That is, from one perspective it
may be helpful to think of the development of the process of restriction and
exclusion to follow along a historical continuum, from social and concrete
categories at the time of the Buddha, to theoretical and soteriological
6
discourses in the centuries that followed. For the sake of clarity, it will be
helpful to present the later Mil passage first, and then notice the common
categories found in the earlier sequence from the Vinaya.
In the section in question, the King Menander asks the Venerable Nāgasena:
Do all those who correctly follow the path gain complete insight into the
nature of things? The answer is a resounding ‘No’, and Nāgasena goes on to
enumerate, without much further elaboration, 16 classes of being that will
not attain insight.
Bhante Nāgasena, ye te sammā paṭipajjanti tesaṃ sabbesaṃ yeva
dhammābhisamayo hoti, udāhu kassaci na hotīti. – Kassaci mahārāja
hoti, kassaci na hotīti. – Kassa bhante hoti, kassa na hotīti. –
Tiracchānagatassa mahārāja supaṭipannassāpi dhammābhisamayo na
hoti,
pettivisayūpapannassa
micchādiṭṭhikassa
kuhakassa
mātughātakassa
pitughātakassa
arahantaghātakassa
sanghabhedakassa
lohituppādakassa
theyyasaṃvāsakassa
titthiyapakkantakassa bhikkunidūsakassa terasannaṃ garukāpattīnaṃ
supaṭipannassāpi dhammābhisamayo na hoti (Mil. 310.18).
This process may also nuance our understanding of the icchantika’s passage
from historical reality to theoretical abstraction. The complex question of the
historical identity of the icchantika will be addressed more fully in a future paper.
See brief outline in section on the icchantika below, and, especially, Fujii (1999);
Mochizuki (1988); Shimoda (1997) for extensive discussions of the topic.
5
6
― 175 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
39
aññataraṃ āpajjitvā avuṭṭhitassa paṇḍakassa ubhatobyañjanakassa
supaṭipannassāpi dhammābhisamayo na hoti, yo pi manussadaharako
ūnakasattavassiko tassa supaṭipannassāpi dhammābhisamayo na hoti.
Mil 310.5-18
7
‘Venerable Nāgasena, do all those who correctly follow the path gain
complete insight into the nature of things, or do some not [gain such
insight]?’
‘Some do, Great King, others do not.’
‘Who does, Venerable One, and who does not?’
8
‘An animal, Great King, even if it were to correctly follow the path,
would not gain complete insight into the nature of things; [nor] one born
9
in the realm of the departed; [nor] one holding false views; [nor] one
who is a fraud; [nor] one who has committed matricide, parricide, or
killed an Arhat; [nor] one who has created a schism in the Saṃgha; [nor]
one who has spilt the blood [of a Buddha]; [nor] one who falsely
10
11
purports to be a monk ; [nor] one who has converted to the heretics ;
[nor] one who corrupts a nun; [nor] one who has committed one of the
12
13 serious offences [but] has not been absolved; [nor] a eunuch; nor
7 PTS edition appears to contain a typographical error (supatipannassāpi),
corrected here.
8 Occurrence of tiracchānagata here with pettivisaya indicates two of the three
‘evil destinations’ (durgati); in MV to follow we only see tiracchānagata.
9 PTSD s.v. pettivisaya ‘der. fr. pitar, but influenced by peta’; peta: including
‘the departed spirit [; ...] represents the Vedic pitaraḥ (manes) [; ...] ghosts’.
10 ‘one who has furtively attached himself to the Order’, Rhys Davids (1963,
177); ‘one living in communion as though by theft’, Horner (1964, 144).
11 theyyasaṃvāsakassa and titthiyapakkantakassa appear to be understood as a
collective term. See note 18 on MV below.
12 garuka-āpatti; according to Rhys Davids, ‘equivalent to the Samghādisesa
offences’ (1894, 177). However, for more see below on pārājika.
― 174 ―
40
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
13
would one who has the characteristics of both genders, even if they
were to correctly follow the path, gain complete insight into the nature
14
of things; nor would a human child under the age of seven years , even
if they were to correctly follow the path, gain complete insight into the
nature of things.’
As may be immediately apparent, the Mil catalogue appears both
unsystematic and inexhaustive, mixing smaller lists and individual items
with no apparent logic and seemingly addressing both the laity and the
monastic community. In addition to noting the range of class of being who
is included in the list, from animals to children to the departed, there are also
several categories that anticipate some of the charges levelled against the
icchantika and thus perhaps highlight a degree of continuity connecting the
latter to the early tradition. For example, in several places in the key texts
that seek to establish the manifold sins and failings of the icchantika
(primarily, for my purposes here, Mahāparinirvāṇa-mahāsūtra [MPM],
Ratnagotravibhāga
Mahāyānottaratantraśāstra
[RGV]
and
the
Laṅkāvatārasūtra [LAS]), the icchantika is accused of holding false views,
13 ubhatobyañjanaka, ‘hermaphrodite’ in both Rhys Davids (1963, 177) and
Horner (1964, 144). The extent to which the terms overlap, much less equate, is a
complex question and deserves a separate study.
14 Just before the passages from the MV summarized below, we find two other
age restrictions, considerably older than the seven years in Mil, defining the age at
which an individual can be fully ordained (upasampajjati/upasampadā), or be
accepted as a novice (pabbajati/pabbajā):
Vin I 78.30-32: na bhikkhave jānaṃ ūnavīsativasso puggalo upasampādetabbo.
yo upasampādeyya, yathādhammo kāretabbo ’ti. O monks, an individual younger
than 20 is not to be ordained. Whoever ordains (such an individual) is to be treated
according to the law.
Vin I 79.5-6: na bhikkhave ūnapannarasavasso dārako pabbājetabbo. yo
pabbājeyya, āpatti dukkaṭassa ’ti. O monks, a boy younger than 15 is not to be
admitted as a monk. Whoever admits [such a boy commits] an offence of wrong
doing. (Unless, that is, he can scare crows [kākuṭṭepaka], Vin I 79.19-20).
― 173 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
41
while the accusation of rejecting and slandering the teachings, perhaps a
close cousin of the heretic, is absolutely central to the figure of the icchantika
15
as they are conceived throughout the MPM and RGV. Similarly, making
false claims concerning their attainments is one of the fundamental
definitions of the icchantika proposed by Karashima (2007, 74). I will return,
briefly, to these and other affinities with the icchantika below. First, however,
a comparison with the list from the MV will help focus more keenly attention
on the several classes that I would like to highlight.
The passage in question comprises 10 verses in the MV identifying 20 types
of person who, ‘if they have not been ordained as a monk, they are not to be
ordained, [or] if they have been ordained as a monk they are to be expelled’.
The types are presented in the following order:
16
17
paṇḍaka-; theyyasaṃvāsaka-; titthiyapakkantaka- ; tiracchānagata-;
mātughātaka-; pitughātaka-; arahantaghātaka-; bhikkhunīdūsaka-;
saṃghabhedaka-;
lohituppādaka-;
ubhatovyañjanaka-;
anupajjhāyaka- (one who has no preceptor); saṃghena upajjhāyena(one who has the Saṃgha as preceptor); gaṇena upajjhāyena- (one who
has a group as preceptor); one who has any of the first 11 of these
15 In the RGV, for example, the icchantika are defined alongside, and therefore
associated with but distinct from, the heretics, as two of four forms of obstruction
(āvaraṇa). See below.
16 anupasampanno na upasampādetabbo, upasampanno nāsetabbo (Vin 1
passim).
17 theyyasaṃvāsaka and titthiyapakkantaka appear to be taken as a single unit
as they are both given in the same verse and the restriction against them is given
at the same place. Vin I 62: theyyasaṃvāsako bhikkhave anupasampanno na
upasampādetabbo, upasampanno nāsetabbo. titthiyapakkantako bhikkhave
anupasampanno na upasampādetabbo, upasampanno nāsetabbo 'ti. Further, if
they are counted separately, the section would contain 21 categories, while it
clearly states there are 20 (naupasampādetabbakavīsativāraṃ niṭṭhitaṃ). See also
PTSD s.v. theyya-, ‘-saṁvāsaka [...] (always foll. by titthiyapakkantaka)’.
― 172 ―
42
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
classes (i.e., from paṇḍaka- to ubhatovyañjanaka-) as a preceptor;
apattaka- (one who has no bowl); acīvaraka- (one who has no robe);
apattacīvaraka- (one who has no bowl or robe); yācitakena pattena(one ordained by being lent a bowl); yācitakena cīvarena- (one
ordained by being lent a robe); yācitakena pattacīvarena- (one ordained
by being lent a bowl and a robe) (Vin I 85-91 passim).
This passage also seems somewhat lacking in consistency, and in fact has
the impression of combining two distinct lists, the first ending with the
prohibition on those having as a preceptor any of the first 11 classes, and the
second beginning with those who have no bowl. The main point to notice
here is that in this Vinaya list, the first 11 categories are all found in the Mil
passage.
Perhaps the most immediately obvious group contained in both
passages are the five sins of immediate retribution (Pali. e.g.,
pañcānantariyakammaṃ; Skt. e.g., pañcānantaryāṇi [karmāṇi]): one who
has committed matricide, parricide, killed an Arhat, created a schism in the
Saṃgha or spilt the blood of a Buddha (usually, in various Sanskrit
18
formulations, ‘with evil intent’). The pañcānantaryāṇi are found in several
commentarial sources, including the Abhidharmakośabhāṣya (AKBh),
where they are presented in the following way:
pañcānantaryāṇi
pitṛvadho
karmāvaraṇam
’rhadvadhaḥ
tadyathā
saṃghabhedaḥ
mātṛvadhaḥ
tathāgataśarīre
duṣṭacittarudhirotpādanam.
18 In the MV, we notice having sex with a nun occurs between the three kinds
of murder (mother, father, Arhat), on the one hand, and schism and spilling a
Buddha’s blood, on the other. Perhaps, then, the five-fold classification was not
yet known to the MV. According to the CPD s.v. ānantariya-kamma, the term with
pañca appears in Mil and later commentaries.
― 171 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
43
19
AKBh 259.8-9
The karmic obstacle is the five [sins of] immediate [retribution], namely:
killing one’s mother, father, or an Arhat, causing a schism in the
monastic community, and spilling the blood of the Tathāgata with evil
intent.
La Vallée Poussin (1971) notes that this is the same sequence as that found
in the Vibhaṅga, while in the Mahāvyutpatti, the murder of the Arhat
precedes that of the father; in the Dharmasaṃgraha, saṃghabhedaḥ comes
last (IV.201, n.3). We will notice later that in the ŚrBh the sequence follows
that of the AKBh, while in RGV harming the Buddha comes first, schism
20
comes last.
As for the precise meaning of ānantarya in this regard, it is generally
glossed as a sin entailing immediate rebirth in one of the hells, often (but not
always) Avici (e.g., Silk 2007, 254). However, as often with such terms, and
which we shall see also in the case of the pārājika below, the tradition
recognizes both etymological explanations and practical definitions. For
example, the AKBh provides the following gloss a little further on from the
above explanation:
ānantaryāṇīti ko ’rthaḥ
nāntarāyituṃ
śakyāni
vipākaṃ
prati
janmāntaraphalena
karmāntareṇety ānantaryāṇi. na tiraskartum ity arthaḥ. na vā
tatkāriṇaḥ pudgalasyetaś cyutasyāntaram asti narakopapattigamanaṃ
All references to Pradhan (ed.) 1967.
‘C’est l’ordre de Vibhaṅga, p. 378: dans Mvy, 122, le meutre de l’Arhat
précède le parricide; dans Dharmasaṃgraha, 60, la blessure du Tathāgata
précède le schism.’ See also Silk (2007, 254 ff) on the sequence in several other
sources, as well as variations in and developments of the members of the list.
19
20
― 170 ―
44
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
pratīty anantaraḥ. tadbhāva ānantaryam yasya dharmasya yogāt
so ’nantaro bhavati śrāmaṇyavat.
AKBh 259.21-24
What is the meaning of ānantaryāṇi?
Ānantaryāṇi means, concerning their fruition, [the five sins of
immediate retribution] cannot be crossed (i.e., skipped over) by other
karmic results from another life. This means, [the five sins cannot] be
crossed (or, passed) over. Or again, it is called ‘without interval’
because the person who commits [one of the five sins], after they fall
from this world (i.e., die) [they enter the state of] going to an existence
in hell without interval. That state (bhāva) [is called] ‘without interval’
(ānantarya), [because it is a state] whose [defining] factor (dharma) is
connected with [the condition of] ‘non-interval’ (anantara),
[linguistically speaking] just as ‘the state of being a recluse’ [is named
so on account of being connected to ‘śrāmaṇa’].
Thus, ‘immediate’ refers both to the fact that, even if an individual has
amassed a wealth of positive karma from any previous life (or lives), no good
result can come to fruition before the consequences of these sins; and,
secondly, they are destined to fall into one of the hells in their (immediately)
subsequent birth.
The manner of exclusion in the case of those who commit the
pañcānantaryāṇi karmāṇi is complex. Widely considered the gravest of all
transgressions in the Buddhist world, the sinner is thus excluded both
socially, from the community, and soteriologically, from being able to gain
clear insight into the nature of reality, though they may practice well the path.
However, paradoxically, perhaps, the very gravity of their transgression(s)
may actually be their saving grace, as it were. Compelled to expiate their
sin(s) in their very next birth, they will, albeit after vast amounts of time,
eventually pay off the karmic debt, and, in principle, once again be eligible
― 169 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
45
to join the Saṃgha and hope for a clear understanding of the nature of things.
As Silk (2007, 282) ends his discussion: ‘... every act, no matter how criminal,
evaporates as its results become manifest. ... Nothing lasts forever, and even
the worst evil will, inevitably, make room for the very highest good, in the
21
end’.
There is a great deal more than can be said, but the point to note here
is that the category often appears with the icchantika in the MPM along with
a third group of sinners, those who commit the four pārājika. The pārājika
are admittedly only hinted at in the Mil passage, and do not occur at all in
22
the MV list. Indeed, as the four most serious transgressions a monk can
commit (there are eight pārājikas in the case of the Bhikkunī Pāṭimokha),
their absence in the list of reasons for which a member of the Saṃgha must
be ‘expelled’ (nāsetabbo) is conspicuous.
The main source for discussion and definition of the pārājika is the
Suttavibhaṅga. Briefly, the four comprise a member of the monastic
community breaking the prohibitions on: sex (Vin III 23.33-36), stealing
(Vin III 47.16-20), killing (Vin III 73.10-16), and making false claims about
one’s spiritual achievements (Vin III 90.32-91.2). The earlier debate among
scholars regarding the etymology of pārājika being derived either from a.
parā- + √ji, ‘defeat’ or b. parā + √aj, ‘expel’ (see Horner 1949, xxvi; Clarke
21 That may be so, in the case of those who commit the five sins, though in
several places this contrasts with the icchantika, most notably in the MPM and
RGV. For example, in the passage from the RGV presented below we are told that
only if they accept the teachings can they hope for liberation (vimukti).
22 While reference in Mil is made to the 13 samghādisesa offences, no explicit
mention is made of the pārājika. However, despite the number 13 clearly
suggesting only the second category (i.e., samghādisesa), the term garuka-āpatti
more properly refers to both samghādisesa and pārājika (see von Hinüber 1997,
91 n.15). That said, the four pārājika offences – sex, stealing, killing, making false
claims about spiritual achievements – only apply to the monastic community, and
thus there is apparently no such exclusion stipulated for the laity who may have
committed e.g., murder.
― 168 ―
46
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
2009a, 22-3) is significant for a survey of categories of exclusion, and seems
to have been settled by von Hinüber, who endorses Burnouf’s interpretation
as deriving from parā + √aj (1988, 3, n.2; see also Clarke 2009b, n.2).
However, both von Hinüber and Clarke also note that the etymology,
23
deriving as it does from the Vedic period (Horner [ibid.] states √aj is not
known in Pali), may have little connection to how the term was understood
24
by Buddhists, and the meaning had been lost by the time of the passages in
question. Thus, we appear to have three possible interpretations: etymology
25
26
27
proper; usage; and, folk etymology. Regardless of which of these
directs our analysis, the significance of the term as harnessed by passages in
especially the MPM, in which those who commit the pārājika inflect and
reflect the icchantika, seems to carry clear overtones of exclusion.
Another category in both lists worthy of brief mention, though of
only oblique relevance to the icchantika, is the paṇḍaka. The precise
meaning of this term, which is often translated as eunuch though the
23 Note, however, that Tib. seems to have understood it as defeat, e.g., Mvp.
8358: phas pham par 'gyur ba'i chos bzhi; see also examples from MPM below.
24 Whitney 1963, √aj s.v.
25 Etymologically, as we have seen, it appears to be traceable to a root meaning
‘expel’, and thus provides another category of exclusion, in this case, directed at
those have been ordained. See, however, Clarke 2009a for a discussion of the
śikṣādattaka (‘penitent monk’), found in all Vinayas except Theravādin.
26 The usage as understood by the tradition can be found, following von Hinüber
(1995, 9 n.9), in the Parivāra, at 148.15:
pārājikan ti yaṃ vuttaṃ taṃ suṇohi yathātathaṃ. cuto 'paraddho bhaṭṭho ca
saddhammehi niraṃkato, saṃvāso ca tahiṃ n'; atthi: ten'; etaṃ iti vuccati.
Vin V 148.14-16
Listen well to that which is called pārājika:
Disappeared, transgressed, and fallen down, repudiated by the correct rules,
For such a one there is no residing together: therefore, it is called [pārājika].
27 As for the folk etymology, again von Hinüber directs us to Samantapāsādikā
259.17, where we read:
pārājiko ti parājito parājayaṃ āpanno
pārājika means one who is defeated, who has met with defeat.
― 167 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
47
etymology is much more uncertain than that word suggests, is complex,
and Leonard Zwilling (1992, 206) refers to ‘the utter inadequacy’ of the
English. Zwilling (ibid., 204) tells us paṇḍaka is the ‘primary term
employed in the [Buddhist] literature [for homosexuality]’ and suggests
the derivation apa + aṇḍa + ka, ‘without testicles’. Summarising instances
in e.g., Asaṅga’s Abhidharmasamuccaya and Yaśomitra’s commentary on
the Abhidharmakośa, along with the entries in the Mahāvyutpatti (87688773), Zwilling finds that paṇḍaka is used as a ‘general rubric’ for
‘dealing with a variety of sexual dysfunctions and variations’, all of which
‘share the common quality of being ‘“napuṃsaka,” “lacking maleness”’
(Zwilling notes there are also female paṇḍakas) (ibid., 205).
Inclusion of the paṇḍaka in these two passages also connects to a
sequence in the ŚrBh (see part 2), in which clear reference is made to the
prerequisite that an individual has definitively male or female genitalia to be
able to aspire to ātmasampat. The fact that only anatomically normative
individuals can qualify for awakening seems to find its corollary in the
28
AKBh, where the paṇḍaka is denied the potential to commit the
pañcānantaryāṇi. That is, in an apparent inversion of the exclusory process,
only those worthy of ultimate Nirvāṇa are also capable of extreme
transgression. The section in question reads as follows:
triṣu dvīpeṣv ānantarya
nottarakurau nānyāsu gatiṣu. kuta evānyatra dhātau teṣvapi
stripuruṣāṇām eva.
śaṇḍhādīnāṃ tu neṣyate.
kiṃ kāraṇaṃ tad evāsaṃvarābhāve kāraṇam uddiṣṭam
29
AKBh 260.1-5
See note 57 for a brief discussion of this term.
According to Monier-Williams, mistaken form of ṣaṇḍha (s.v.). Yaśomitra
reads ṣaṇḍha (e.g., Wogihara 1936, 426.12).
28
29
― 166 ―
48
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
The [five sins of] immediate retribution [take place] in the three
continents.
[They do not take place] in Uttarakuru or in other destinations. Among
those in any of the states, [they take place] only among men and women.
30
It is not held that those such as eunuchs [can commit the five sins].
The reason is said to be their lack of unrestraint.
Zwilling explains this ‘paradox’ in the following way: ‘On the one
hand, paṇḍakas are incapable of religious discipline because ... they possess
the defiling passions of both sexes.’ At the same time, they lack the necessary
‘unrestraint one must have the capacity to check if one is going to
successfully lead the religious life’. That is, for example, the paṇḍaka does
not have close ties to their parents, so cannot commit the sins of matricide or
31
parricide.
Finally, several other classes that find resonances in the icchantika
include theyyasaṁvāsaka and titthiyapakkantaka, and kuhaka. The latter
term may have a general sense of ‘fraud’, ‘deceit’, though it can also refer to
‘hypocrisy, specifically display of behaviour designed to stimulate laymen
30 In general, ṣaṇḍha appears to be a synonym of, or at least closely related to,
paṇḍaka. Janet Gyatso (2003, 94) writes: ‘The early monastic sources provide
several subtypes within the group of people excluded from male ordination on
sexual grounds. These usually include the hermaphrodite (ubhatovyañjanaka), a
class of people called paṇḍaka, and sometimes a class of people called ṣaṇḍha.
Neither of the latter terms seem ever to be precisely defined; but as the Vinaya
tradition develops, paṇḍaka becomes the term of choice that most often stands for
the excluded third sex category as a whole.’
31 As an aside, the status of the paṇḍaka may be instructive for a wider
sociological study of the icchantika, in so far as the category appears to have begun
as a social reality that confounded existing classificatory systems, then through
long and troubled reflection it developed a theoretical formulation whose
complexity reflected its initial status as someone who defied orthodoxy. A further
point that is suggestive is that the icchantika appears alongside the category of
napuṃsaka in the list of Mahāmati’s 108 questions at LAS 27.6.
― 165 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
49
32
to give gifts’. Thus, if indeed it may denote specifically a monk defrauding
the laity, collectively these three appear to refer to monks who generally
deceive, lie and even convert to other schools. We shall see passages from
the RGV that distinguish the icchantika from the heretic (tīrthya; tīrthika);
nonetheless, they are grouped together, firstly, to comprise a group of four
obstructions, and secondly, as those who are contrasted with those ‘firmly
established in the Mahāyāna’. Further, elsewhere the icchantika is routinely
described as rejecting or slandering the teachings (in particular, of the
Vaitulya), which, if not coterminous with titthiyapakkantaka, perhaps can be
understood as an elaboration of the class.
Icchantika
As noted in the introduction, this is not a paper on the icchantika, per se.
However, in order to demonstrate how the foregoing instances of restriction
and exclusion, as well as those to come in part 2, are suggestive of some of
the resonances accrued to ‘a being condemned forever to spiritual darkness’
(Liu 1984, 59), it is necessary briefly to sketch their rough contours here, and
to offer a few representative passages. In this section I will provide a limited
number of references from the MPM and RGV, while in the next I will
present a specific instance from the LAS in response to the translations from
the ŚrBh.
One of the most puzzling features of the icchantika is that, in the earliest
references we have, they appear fully formed, with no introduction,
definition or explanation. They are elaborated, at least as far as can be
ascertained based on the available witnesses of the MPM, not by reference
to their name but to their characteristics, which include a wide range of
negative attributes, many of which, I propose, appear to draw on categories
32
BHSD s.v. kuhaka.
― 164 ―
50
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
that are at least suggestive of the early lists introduced above. This statement
is of course speculative, but in the case of the icchantika, a certain degree of
33
hypothesising is unavoidable.
There is broad (though by no means univocal) consensus in the
Western and Japanese scholarship that the word icchantika derives from
Sanskrit √iṣ, and thus has as its root a meaning related to ‘wish’, ‘desire’.
However, regardless of how the original meaning of icchantika is to be
34
35
understood semantically, its philosophical range clearly expanded during the
course of the development of the relevant literature. As far as I know, there
is only one passage that explicitly defines the icchantika in terms of the verb
The difficulty of pinning down the precise identity, historical or philosophical,
of the icchantika is perhaps captured most pleasingly by Mochizuki Ryōkō, who
described the task as being ‘like trying to scratch your foot through your shoe’
ࠕ㝸㠐ᥙࡢឤࠖ(1988, 97).
34 There is slightly less agreement, however, on the precise meaning and
grammatical form of that root.
It is generally, though not universally, accepted to be the present active participle,
strong stem, icchant with suffix -ka. Edgerton: ‘somehow based on pres. pple. of
icchati’. Karashima: ‘This explication is not without difficulties, as we may expect
*icchantaka instead of icchantika, to have derived from icchant- plus -ka’ (2007,
77, n. 52). Karashima suggests an alternative, icchā-anta-ika: *icchāntika >
icchantika, ‘someone who claims, maintains’, and explains the -anta- as
‘pleonastic’ (ibid., n.53). Habata (forthcoming) agrees with Karashima’s
grammatical analysis, though her interpretation of the individual morphemes
differs, suggesting ‘icchā and anta suffixed with -ika, in which the long vowel -ā
(*icchāntika) is shortened because of the principle of two moras in the Middle
Indic’.
35 e.g., Habata (forthcoming); Shimoda (1997, 358-9); Suzuki (1930, 219 n.1);
Tagami (2000). Exceptions include Unrai Wogiwara, who suggested a derivation
from ‘“itthamtvika or aitthamtvika, meaning “being worldly” or “belonging to this
world.”’ (1927, 23); and Karashima (2007), for whom the term denotes, at least in
its use in the MPM, ‘an opinionated one’ (ibid., 72), ‘a monk who, claiming (or
fancies; icchanti) himself to be an Arhat, rejects the teaching of the Vaipulya’ (ibid.,
76), or again, ‘one who claims (to be an authority)’ (ibid., 77).
Several other scholars prefer to discuss the icchantika based on descriptive
passages in the sources, without extensive reference to etymology: e.g., Hodge
(2006); Jones (2020); Liu (1984); Silk (2007); Takasaki (1966).
33
― 163 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
51
36
icchati in the RGV, while in the LAS we also find a definition based on the
sense of desire, but in the negative, indicating that they have ‘no desire for
37
liberation’. However, this is not that text’s primary designation for the
icchantika; that is the term sarvakuśalamūlotsarga (‘one who has abandoned
all roots [of merit]’). Thus, the question arises, how did we get from an
etymology likely (though not definitively) indicating desire, greed, to
association with the four pārājika and the five ānantaryāṇi, as well as
slandering or rejecting the teachings, abandoning all good roots (of merit),
and grouped along with e.g., those holding false views, among several other
characterisations.
The question of how to understand the passage from an epithet
denoting desire to the accrual to the icchantika of a litany of established
charges of base conduct and nature may be fruitfully addressed in parallel
with an important theme developed primarily in the Japanese secondary
literature, namely, the relation between monastic history (ᩍᅋⓗ), i.e.,
institutional or social history, and the history of ideas (ᛮⓗ), along with
the attendant conceptual binary of concrete-hypothetical ( ල య - ௬ ᐃ ).
Following the work of, primarily, Mochizuki Ryōkō and Shimoda Masahiro,
and at the risk of simplifying these wide-ranging and extensive studies, there
is a persuasive argument that the icchantika began as a concrete, historical
36 RGV 28.14-15: tadubhayānabhilāṣiṇaḥ punar mahāyānasaṃprasthitāḥ
paramatīkṣṇendriyāḥ sattvā ye nāpi saṃsāram icchanti yathecchantikā ...
Further, those sentient beings who desire neither [existence nor freedom from it]
are ones who are firmly established in the Mahāyāna and are of superior faculties.
They do not desire Saṃsāra like the icchantika ...
37 LAS 65.17-66.2: tatrecchantikānāṃ punar mahāmate anicchantikatā mokṣaṃ
kena
pravartate
yaduta
sarvakuśalamūlotsargataś
ca
sattvānādikālapraṇidhānataś ca |
Again, Mahāmati, how is it that no desire for liberation arises in the icchantika?
[Either because] they have abandoned all [their] good roots or [because of taking]
vows [to follow the Bodhisattva path] since beginningless time [for the sake of all]
sentient beings.
― 162 ―
52
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
reality, but over time and as a result of the demands of philosophical
innovation, the concept developed into a hypothetical tenet of doctrine.
Mochizuki (1988, 107) traces possible antecedents to the icchantika
in earlier texts, including the Saddharmapuṇḍarīkasūtra and, noting
affinities with the two classes of monk who are identified therein as
committing the four and five serious offences, argues that the icchantika
were a specific historical class of Buddhist monk who were perceived as
‘pseudo-Mahayanists’ (ఝ㠀) whom he defines as ‘attached to desire
for profit’ (㣴㈎ⴭ) (Mochizuki 1988, 107). Shimoda, meanwhile, most
explicitly states the relation between social history and the history of ideas:
There is a need to remain clearly aware that making a distinction
between religious organisation [social history] and thought [history of
ideas] is merely an expedient. [...] In the MPM, the icchantika never
take a sectarian form clearly distinguished from their ideology;
[similarly, the MPM] does not express its thought unrelated to a
sectarian figure. The image of [the icchantika] emerges at the
38
intersection of the two.
(Shimoda, 1997, 356-7)
This emphasis on the relation between social history and doctrine is both
analytically necessary while also providing a framework that enables us at
least to begin to organize some of the almost overwhelmingly unsystematic
characterisations of the icchantika that we confront in the various versions
of the MPM, in particular. Finally, Fujii Kyōkō (1991, 538) finds a process
38ᩍᅋ㸬ᛮ࠸࠺ศ㢮ࡣࠊ༢౽ᐅⓗ࡞ࡶࡢ࡛࠶ࡿࡇࢆࡣࡗࡁࡾ
⮬ぬࡋ࡚࠾ࡃᚲせࡀ࠶ࡿࠋ[...] ᾖᵎ⤒ࡢ୰࡛ࡣࠊ୍㜢ᥦࡣࡅࡗࡋ࡚ࡑࡢᛮ
ࡽษࡾ㞳ࡋ࡚᫂ࡽ࡞ࡿࡼ࠺࡞ᩍᅋⓗጼࢆᣢࡗ࡚࠸ࡿࡶࡢ࡛ࡣ࡞
࠸ࡋࠊᩍᅋⓗጼ㛵㐃ࡢ࡞࠸ᛮࢆ⾲᫂ࡋࡓࡶࡢ࡛ࡶ࡞࠸ࠋࡑࡢ୧⪅ࡢ
㘒Ⅼᾋࡧୖࡀࡿᫎീ࡞ࡢ࡛࠶ࡿࠋ
― 161 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
53
of ‘dilution’ (⛥ⷧ) by which the icchantika develops from a historical
reality to a generalised class of ‘evil beings’ (ᝏ࡞ࡿᏑᅾ). I suggest it is
precisely in this process of dilution that the icchantika gathers many of the
resonances of the earlier expressions of exclusion.
Ahead of presenting some brief examples from the MPM, it is
impractical here to go too deeply into the thorny issue of its historical
development; it will suffice to notice simply that, with all due caveats, the
text(s) as we know it (them) clearly contain(s) multiple layers and developed
in several stages, likely in various geographical locations, and the vast
majority of references to the icchantika in the portion common to both
Chinese versions (Dharmakṣema [ChinD] and Faxian [ChinF]) and the
Tibetan translation (Tib.) occur in the context of the elaboration of
39
*buddhadhātu.
However, the topic continues to be discussed at length in
40
the (extensive) portion unique to Dharmakṣema (henceforth D-unique ), as
well. As a – perhaps foolish – attempt at both brevity and comprehensiveness,
therefore, I summarise two examples that occur in all three main witnesses,
and then present three others from D-unique. Finally, I return to a passage
from all three versions to note a further possible affinity with several of the
earlier categories.
In a sequence in which the Buddha is explaining his appearances in the world
taking various forms that appear to defy the expectations of living beings
regarding the nature of the Buddha, he states (with slight variations among
41
the three witnesses ) that he has taken the forms of one who commits the
39 Or, among other related terms, tathāgatagarbha; Chin. foxing షᛶ, rulaixing
ዴᛶ; Tib. sangs rgyas kyi khams, de bzhin gshegs pa’i khams. (See e.g., Habata
2015, passim; Radich 2015, 23-25.)
40 i.e., the material that is not found in ChinF or the Tibetan, and for which we
have no corresponding Sanskrit fragments.
41 ChinD. 389b12-19; ChinF. 871b25-29; Tib. MPM § 205-207.
― 160 ―
54
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
42
43
44
four grave offences , an icchantika , a schismatic , one who commits the
45
46
five sins of immediate retribution , and one who rejects the true teachings.
In a later passage, the Buddha is describing his imperishability, explaining
the futility of the efforts of various categories to cause him harm. These
47
include a similar grouping: those who would spill the blood of a Buddha
48
with evil intent , commit the five sins of immediate retribution, the
icchantika, and schismatics.
Already, it should be easy to recognize at least affinities with several
of the categories in the Mil and MV presented earlier, and to discern a rather
mechanical use of these classes. It is noteworthy that very often it is not
specified which pārājika or ānantaryāṇi offence is being referred to, and
these terms, not unlike icchantika, gradually seem to be depleted of their
original critical focus.
Two passages from D-unique by turns distinguish the icchantika from,
and conflate them with, the four serious offences of a monk (*pārājika), the
five sins of immediate retribution (*pañcānantaryāṇi) and those who deny
or slander the *Vaitulya.
ChinD 374 448b7-9
ၿ⏨Ꮚ㸟᭷✀ࠋ୍⪅㜿ಟ⨶ࠊ⪅ே୰ࠋே୰᭷୕✀㸸୍
⪅୍㜢ᥦࠊ⪅ㄦㅫ᪉➼⥂ࠊ୕⪅≢ᅄ㔜⚗ࠋ
ChinD. ≢ᅄ㔜⨥; ChinF. ≢ᅄ㔜ἲ; Tib. pham pa byung ba.
ChinD., ChinF. ୍㜢ᥦ; Tib. ’dod chen pa.
44 ChinD◚>ྜ@ൔ ChinF. ◚ൔ; Tib. dge ’dun gyi dbyen byed pa.
45 ChinD. none; ChinF. స↓㛫ᴗ; Tib. mtshams med pa lnga’i las.
46 ChinD., ChinF. none; Tib. dam pa'i chos spong ba (*[saddharma]pratikṣepa).
vaitulyaṃ na prati-√kṣip attested in MPM SF 16.2, 16.3 and 16.5; dharmapratigha
in the RGV; bodhisattvapiṭakanikṣepa in the LAS.
47 ChinD. 416c9-11; ChinF. 890c11-12; MPM § 457.
48 ChinD. ᚰฟష㌟⾑; ChinF. ⌧യష㌟; Tib. ngan sems kyis khrag phyung
ba.
42
43
― 159 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
55
O good son! Evil is of two kinds. One [appears in] the Asura [realm],
the other [appears in the] human [realm]. In the human [realm], there
are three kinds of evil [person]: one, the icchantika; two, those who
deny the teachings of the *Vaitulya; and three, those who commit the
four serious prohibitions (*pārājika).
ChinD 374 487c23-24
୍㜢ᥦே≢ᅄ㔜⚗ࠊస㏫⨥ࠊㅫ᪉➼⥂ࠋ
The icchantika commits the four serious offences, the five sins of
49
immediate retribution, and slanders the teachings of the *Vaitulya.
In a further passage from D-unique, we notice three further categories
reminiscent of the Mil and MV passages: evil destinies, 㐨 (*durgati),
where Mil includes tiracchānagata and pettivisaya (MV only includes
tiracchānagata); eunuch (*paṇḍaka; ཷ 㯤 㛛 ㌟ ); and, hermaphrodite
(*ubhatovyañjanaka; ↓᰿᰿), along with, again, the four serious offences
of a monk and the five sins of immediate retribution.
ChinD 374 431a6-9
ၿ⏨Ꮚ㸟ᡃᚘᮍ᭯᭷↹ᴗ⦕㐨ࠊㄦㅫṇἲࠊస୍
50
㜢ᥦࠊཷ㯤㛛㌟ࠊ↓᰿᰿ࠊ㏫∗ẕࠊẅ㜿⨶₎ࠊ◚ሪኀ ൔࠊ
ฟష㌟⾑ࠊ≢ᅄ㔜⚗ࠋ
O good son! Since then, I have never, having evil defilements and
karmic conditions, fallen into evil destinies, slandered the True
Teaching, become an icchantika, [I have never] taken the body of a
eunuch [or] a hermaphrodite, rebelled against my parents, killed an
49 Again, it is noteworthy that no specific offence among the four and five
transgressions is referenced.
50 In the earlier example, ChinD. used ◚ൔ; here ◚ is replaced by ኀ
― 158 ―
56
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
Arhat, destroyed a stupa, split the Saṃgha, shed the Buddha's blood,
[or] committed the four serious prohibitions.
Finally, a passage from all three witnesses that, despite the complexities in
its precise meaning, is suggestive of several of the earlier categories that
encompass notions of deceitful or false monks:
MPM §483 5-8
’dod chen pa long ba gcig bu dgra bcom pa yin par ’dod pa ni lam
mi bzad pa chen por ’gro ’dod do //
byams pa dang ldan pa’i dgra bcom pa yin par ’dod la shin tu rgyas
51
pa sun dbyung bar ’dod de /
The icchantika who is blind, alone, and desires to be an Arhat,
greatly desires the frightful path. He desires to be a compassionate
Arhat, and desires to renounce the *Vaitulya.
The key phrase here is dgra bcom pa yin par ’dod pa, rendered by
Karashima as ‘claims to be an Arhat’ (2007, 74) and which forms one of the
key pieces of evidence in his argument that the icchantika is to be understood,
according to the MPM, as ‘a monk who, claiming ... himself to be an Arhat,
rejects the teaching of the Vaipulya – namely, the [MPM] itself’ (ibid., 76).
52
51 Karashima (2007, 74) translated this passage from the Peking edition before
Habata’s critical edition of the MPM was published; therefore, he could not have
known that mi zad pa, endless, is to be emended to mi bzad pa, frightful, terrible
(*ghora). The Skt. can be reconstructed with some confidence on the basis that in
SF 20.6 we read (na bibh)y(a)ti gacchaṃti goraṃ mānavaśaṃ (with gora as
unaspirated form of ghora [Habata 2019, 156]), which corresponds to the Tibetan
byis pa rnams ni lam chen ’jigs pa med // nga rgyal dbang gis mi bzad ’gro
bar ’gyur // (MPM § 481.13-14).
52 This interpretation of the icchantika as ‘a monk who (falsely) claims to be an
Arhat’, supported by Karashima’s extensive analysis of uses of icchati in the Pali
and Sanskrit sources, may be quite persuasive. However, as suggestive as it is for
― 157 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
57
We have already seen that the icchantika is routinely accused of rejecting the
teachings, variously conceived; the additional suggestion that they make
(false) claims regarding their status as an Arhat, in addition to the classes
kuhaka and theyyasaṃvāsaka, also brings to mind the fourth pārājika,
making false claims about one’s spiritual achievements.
Before rounding off this section, two further passages worth attention
can be found in the RGV, and similarly link the icchantika to, first, the
heretic (tīrthya), and second, the pañcānantaryāṇi. Early in the RGV, the
icchantika is defined as dharmapratigha, one who rejects the dharma, and
comprises the first of a group of four types of obstruction to awakening:
my purposes here, i.e., connecting depictions of the icchantika to earlier categories
of exclusion, including e.g., kuhaka, ‘fraud’, there should be some hesitation in
wholly accepting the understanding based on dgra bcom pa yin par ’dod pa. Firstly,
the use of a verb to indicate reported speech, as in Karashima’s understanding
of ’dod pa here, ought to require a speech marker, for example zhes. Secondly, as
demonstrated by Habata (forthcoming), we find an earlier statement, in MPM §
179, that appears to carry precisely the meaning Karashima suggests, namely, a
monk who claims to be an Arhat, except here we see the use of zhes as well as a
different verb for ‘claim’: bdag ni dgra bcom pa yin no zhes khas ’che ba. The
form of the verb yin also seems less problematic than yin pa(r) in the verse in
question. Furthermore, elsewhere in the same text we find the Tib. verb ’dod pa
translating Skt. arthin (SF 21.2; MPM § 495.6): Skt. kṛṣyarthisatva, Tib. zhing las
byed ’dod pa’i sems can. It may therefore be doubtful whether there is a clear
semantic or etymological relation between ’dod pa and icchati based on these
examples. Finally, it remains unclear why Karashima rejects the translations of
Mochizuki (㜿⨶₎ࡓࡿࡇ㢪࠺) and Shimoda (㜿⨶₎࡛࠶ࢁ࠺ᛮࡗ࡚) of
this passage as ‘grammatically not possible’ (ibid. 75), as well as precisely what
Skt. may be expected based on his understanding of the Tibetan.
Both Chinese translations appear to similarly struggle to understand this passage,
suggesting the Sanskrit may already have been corrupt: ChinD. 374 419a4-7: ୍
㜢ᥦ⪅ྡ∔↓┠ࠊᨾぢ㜿⨶₎㐨ࠋዴ㜿⨶₎⾜⏕Ṛ㞋அ㐨ࠋ௨↓
┠ᨾㄦㅫ᪉➼ࠊḧಟ⩦ࠋዴ㜿⨶₎ಟឿᚰࠊ୍㜢ᥦ㍮ಟ᪉➼ዴ
ࠋChinF. 376 892c9-1: ᭷ఝ㜿⨶₎୍㜢ᥦ⪋⾜ᴗࠋఝ୍㜢ᥦ㜿⨶₎⪋⾜
ឿᚰࠋ᭷ఝ㜿⨶₎୍㜢ᥦ⪅ࠋㅖ⾗⏕ㄦㅫ᪉➼ࠋఝ୍㜢ᥦ㜿⨶₎⪅ࠋ
― 156 ―
58
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
caturdhāvaraṇaṃ dharmapratigho ’py ātmadarśanam |
saṃsāraduḥkhabhīrutvaṃ sattvārthaṃ nirapekṣatā ||
icchantikānāṃ tīrthyānāṃ śrāvakāṇāṃ svayaṃbhuvām |
adhimuktyādayo dharmāś catvāraḥ śuddhihetavaḥ ||
53
27.13-16
The obstructions are four-fold: [1] opposition to the teaching; [2]
[holding to] the view of the self;
[3] Fear of suffering in Saṃsāra; and, [4] having no care for the
welfare of beings.
[Namely:] [1] the icchantika; [2] heretics, [3] Śrāvakas and [4]
Pratyekabuddhas.
The causes of purification are the four factors starting with earnest
application leading to conviction [in the Mahāyāna].
That faith in the teaching (adhimukti) is the remedy prescribed to the
icchantika is important, and this emphasis is re-enforced in the final
section of the RGV, underlining its central place in tathāgatagarbha
discourse. Here, again, even those who commit the pañcānantaryāṇi are
afforded the possibility of redemption, while the icchantika are firmly
denied it, though only as long as, and to the extent that, they continue to
reject the dharma.
yo ‘bhīkṣṇaṃ pratisevya pāpasuhṛdaḥ syād buddhaduṣṭāśayo
mātāpitrarihad vadhācaraṇakṛt saṃghāgrabhetā naraḥ |
syāt tasyāpi tato vimuktir aciraṃ dharmārthanidhyānato dharme
yasya tu mānasaṃ pratihataṃ tasmai vimuktiḥ kutaḥ ||
119.1-4
53
All references to Johnston (ed.) 1950.
― 155 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
59
The one, who again and again serves evil friends, has evil intent
towards the Buddha, commits the acts of killing their mother, father or
an Arhat, and creates schism in the best of the communities of monks,
Even that person could quickly be liberated from those
[transgressions] through [gaining] insight into the meaning of the
Dharma; however, how can there be liberation for one whose mind
rejects the Dharma?
54
In brief, then, we have seen several of the early categories of
restriction and exclusion accrue to the icchantika, who is at times equated
with, and at others distinguished from, these classes. The impression, I
suggest, is that, regardless of whether they are identified as e.g., one who
commits the pañcānantaryāṇi or as one who exceeds even their baseness,
the figure of the icchantika is, to some extent, defined and determined by the
reflections of many other, lesser, forms of exclusion.
2. Exclusion in the Yogācāra:
The agotrastha
If the examples of exclusion in the earlier passages were provisional, while
suggestions of affinities with the icchantika were largely speculative, those
in this section elaborate a much more thoroughgoing category of person
denied the potential for ultimate Nirvāṇa with altogether much clearer
correspondences with the icchantika. The main focus will be on the
Śrāvakabhūmi (ŚrBh), a Yogacāra text, specifically the first section, the
Gotrabhūmi. First, I will present important passages that describe those who
54 In Chin. (1611 847c27 ᪇ㅖၿ᰿) we find that the list of transgressions and
traits that can be redeemed by devotion to the doctrine includes those who have
cut off all their good roots, which we do not see in the Sanskrit or Tibetan. The
term ‘cutting off all good roots’ is routinely used in the MPM to refer to the
icchantika, which would be well known to the author(s)/compiler(s) of the RGV.
― 154 ―
60
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
have the capacity for ultimate Nirvāṇa though may be precluded from
attaining it in a current incarnation, before introducing the agotrastha,
highlighting those characteristics that bear comparison with the icchantika.
Finally, I will also briefly refer to the Laṅkāvatārasūtra, which presents a
slightly different classification of the agotra, and also most explicitly, if still
rather puzzlingly, identifies this class with the icchantika. Before turning to
the texts, however, it will be helpful to try and get a grasp on this rather
opaque term gotra, whose range of meanings are many. The topic has been
the subject of several thorough and intricate studies; it will only be possible
here for me to pick up on the primary meanings as far as they prepare us for
an understanding of the term as used in the ŚrBh and LAS.
Gotra discourse
David Seyfort Ruegg (1976, 341-2), in one of several seminal studies on the
subject, identifies two primary groups of meaning of gotra, a ‘soteriological
or gnoseological category or class’, or ‘the spiritual factor or capacity that
determines classification in such a category or class’. Within these two
groups, the main cluster of meanings centres around relations to ‘the concept
of a lineage, clan, or family, or of a genus and its meanings are then
associated with a socio-biological metaphor (gotra = kula, vaṃśa “family”,
etc.) and a biological or botanical metaphor (gotra = bīja, “seed, germ”)’. To
these two primary meanings of gotra, Ruegg also surveys additional
scriptural and commentarial references to add a third metaphorical usage,
connected with ‘mineral’, namely ‘mine’ or ‘matrix’. Finally, he notes
‘“class, category” could be derived from any one of these three meanings’
(ibid. 354).
Takasaki Jikido (1966, 22) offers a similarly wide-ranging catalogue
of possible meanings, chief among them in Buddhist usages being 1. dhātu,
hetu; and 2. bīja, and offers for English translations: element, cause, source,
origin, basis, ground, essence, or nature. Takasaki also notes as a third group
― 153 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
61
of meanings those mentioned by Ruegg, namely: lineage, clan, family, and
‘analogically’ ‘germ, mine or matrix’. Thus, to summarise and synthesise
Ruegg and Takasaki, we find the following clusters of primary meanings
(and these are not exhaustive): i. family, clan, lineage; ii. germ; seed; iii.
mine, matrix; and iv. class, category.
The ŚrBh offers three synonyms for gotra that help to clarify our
understanding of its meaning in that text, and also to distinguish its use from
that of the LAS: seed (*bīja), element (*dhātu), and nature (*prakṛti;
*svabhāva). The ŚrBh also broadly categorises beings into two divisions:
parinirvāṇadharmaka, those with the factor or nature of one who will attain
Nirvāṇa; and aparinirvāṇadharmaka, those who do not possess this
fundamental factor, the latter equated with the agotra. In slight contrast, in
the LAS, as we will see below, gotra is most clearly used to refer to one of
five lineages of spiritual attainment (pañcābhisamayagotrāṇi) and the fruits
of that lineage.
Certainly, by the time of the LAS, the icchantika appears to have been
wholly conflated with agotrastha. Commenting on the use of the latter two
terms in the LAS, Ruegg (1976, 341) notes that ‘…since they [agotras] …
achieve neither bodhi nor nirvāṇa, they represent the same type as the
icchantikas to the extent that the latter also are considered to lack this
capacity’. The question of how the agotra might have come to denote the
icchantika is puzzling from the perspective of scholastics. The gotra system,
though not uniformly analysed in the manner I have presented it above, is
very much a part of the classificatory apparatus of the Yogācāra, while the
icchantika appears to have emerged alongside tathāgatagarbha theory as
more of a popular denomination; having more public currency, the
icchantika is perhaps more historically grounded and, therefore, arguably
more of a pejorative than the agotra, and remains unsystematised throughout
the tathāgatagarbha literature. On the other hand, when we look more
closely at the traits ascribed to the agotra presented below, as well as at the
― 152 ―
62
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
prognoses regarding their chances of liberation (which are often, though not
exclusively, nil), we see striking affinities with the icchantika. Thus,
although Yogācāra and the tathāgatagarbha corpus of texts are very much
55
distinct strains in Indic Buddhism, at least until we come to the LAS, it is
tempting to wonder whether there was not some degree of cross-fertilization,
or at least mutual awareness, between the two communities that finally came
to full expression in the latter text.
56
Gotrabhūmi
The Gotrabhūmi comprises the first portion (yogasthāna) of the ŚrBh. In the
first sequence below, we are told that possessing the factor of ultimate
Nirvāṇa (*parinirvāṇadharmaka) is not in itself a guarantee of that
attainment, at least in a given specific life; there are several obstacles that
57
may preclude one from ‘propitious conditions’ (*ātmasampat ). The second
section explains various physical and circumstantial obstacles to attaining
ultimate Nirvāṇa, several of which may seem, to a modern reader, either
arbitrary or outright discriminatory, and also bring to mind some of the
categories already discussed in part 1. The final section establishes the
existence of the agotrastha, perhaps the most systematically classified
reference to individuals excluded from the ultimate goal in Buddhism. There
55 Indeed, one of the defining characteristics of the Yogācāra is their rejection
of the tathāgatagarbha theory that all beings have inherent Buddha Nature. See
e.g., Ruegg (1976).
56 References follow Taishō Group (TG) edition. Some of the portions of ŚrBh
relevant to this discussion are not available in the Sanskrit, so for those passages I
translate the Tibetan in the body of the text, and present the Chinese in the
footnotes, only noting significant variants or points of interest; for the sections
where we have the Sanskrit, I present that alone, similarly only referring to the
Tibetan and Chinese where necessary.
57 See Deleanu (2006, 38 n.23) on possible translations of saṁpad. In ŚrBh there
are a ‘series of factors (five each) ensuring that oneself and the environment in
which one lives are fit for the practice of the Buddhist path’. See also Kragh (2013,
110) on ātmasampat as ‘a human rebirth in a place and condition that is opportune
for practicing the Dharma’.
― 151 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
63
are several ‘marks’ (liṅga) of an agotrastha; I draw attention only to those
here that, again, echo features of the icchantika.
1. Four reasons why parinirvāṇadharmaka may not attain ultimate Nirvāṇa
(I)-A-I, D.1b5
de la rigs gang zhe na / smras pa / rigs la gnas pa'i gang zag gi sa
bon gyi chos gang yin pa ste / gang yod cing med pa ma yin la rigs la
gnas pa'i gang zag rnams kyi rkyen yang rnyed na mya ngan las 'das
pa 'thob pa dang reg par nus shing mthu yod par 'gyur ba'o //
...
sa bon dang khams dang rang bzhin zhes bya ba ni ming gi rnam
grangs dag yin no //
In this case, what is gotra? Answer: [it is] the quality (dharma) of
the seed (bīja) of the person established in a lineage. [For someone who
58
certainly] has it and [for whom] it is not non-existent, when the
conditions are realised for the persons dwelling in a lineage, they can
attain and touch Nirvāṇa and bring it into effect.
...
Seed (*bīja), element (*dhātu), or nature (*prakṛti / *svabhāva) are
59
the synonyms [of gotra].
58 Deleanu (n.d.): ‘Since it actually exists’; ‘literally, “given the fact that it exists
and is not inexistent”’. TG (3): ‘ࡑࢀࢆ☜᭷ࡋ࡚࠸ࢀࡤࠊ...’.
59 Chin. 1579 395c19-22; 23-4
பఱ✀ጣ㸽ㅝ:ఫ✀ጣ⿵≉ఞ⨶᭷✀Ꮚἲࠋ⏤⌧᭷ᨾ㸪Ᏻఫ✀ጣ⿵≉ఞ⨶ⱝ
㐝⦕㸪౽᭷ሓ௵㸪౽᭷ໃຊ㸪ᾖᵎ⬟ᚓ⬟ㆇࠋ
...
ᡈྡ✀Ꮚ, ᡈྡⅭ⏺, ᡈྡⅭᛶ ྡᕪูࠋ
― 150 ―
64
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
(I)-A-II-3, D.2b.4
smras pa / gal te rigs la gnas pa'i gang zag rnams yongs su mya
ngan las 'da' ba'i chos can yin la / rigs la gnas pa ma yin pa rnams ni
yongs su mya ngan las 'da' ba'i chos can ma yin par lta na / 'o na ci'i
phyir yongs su mya ngan las 'da' ba'i chos can rnams sngon gyi mtha'
nas yun ring por 'khor bar gyur cing / yongs su mya ngan las ma 'das
she na / smras pa / rgyu bzhis yongs su mya ngan las ma 'das te / bzhi
gang zhe na / mi khom par skyes pa dang / bag med pa'i nyes pa dang /
log par zhugs pa dang / sgrib pa'i nyes pas so //
It is said: If we see that there are those established in the gotra who have
the factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa (*parinirvāṇadharmaka) and those with
no gotra who do not have the factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa
60
(*aparinirvāṇadharmaka), in that case why have those who have the
factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa been wandering in Saṃsāra since the
beginning of time, why do they not [attain] ultimate Nirvāṇa
(*parinirvāṇa)?
It is said: there are four reasons for not [attaining] ultimate Nirvāṇa.
What are the four [reasons]? [There are people who are] born with no
61
opportunity [to practise] (*akṣaṇyopapanna) ; [who are] guilty of
negligence (*pramatta; *pramāda); [who hold to] wrong views
(*mithyāpratipanna); and [those with] the fault of obstructions (sgrib
pa; 㞀; *āvaraṇa; *āvṛta).
60 Here we see clearly spelled out, in the Tibetan, the identification of the
agotrastha and aparinirvāṇadharmaka: rigs la gnas pa ma yin pa rnams ni yongs
su mya ngan las 'da' ba'i chos can ma yin par lta na.
Chinese does not have the negated formulation corresponding to the Tibetan above.
In fact, the Chinese syntax is a little hard to understand, as it appears to repeat the
existence of individuals who are established in the gotra and have the factor of
Nirvāṇa: ⱝఫ✀ጣ⿵≉ఞ⨶᭷ᾖᵎἲ㸪Ṉఫ✀ጣ᭷ᾖᵎἲ⿵≉ఞ⨶ࠋ
61 Skt. *akṣaṇa: lack of opportunity, favourable occasion. Tib. mi khom pa; Chin.
↓.
― 149 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
65
The first three of these reasons perhaps speak for themselves, at least for the
purposes of this paper (though it is worth noting, in passing, that the third
reason, *mithyāpratipanna, again reminds us of the list in Mil); however, the
last, ‘the fault of obstructions’, warrants a little further scrutiny.
(I)-A-II-3-d, D.3a4
62
sgrib pa gang zhe na / smras pa / 'di ltar dbus kyi mi rnams su
skyes pa'i bar du rgyas par snga ma bzhin du gyur cing sangs rgyas 'jig
rten du byung ba dang / dam pa'i chos ston pa'i dge ba'i bshes gnyen
dag rnyed par gyur kyang / de glen pa dang / dig pa dang / lkugs pa
dang / lag pas brda byed par gyur zhing legs par gsungs pa dang / nyes
par bshad pa'i chos rnams kyi don kun shes par mi nus pa dang /
mtshams med pa'i las rnams byed par 'gyur ba dang / nyon mongs pa
yun ring ba yin te / de ni sgrib pa zhes bya'o //
What are the obstructions (*āvṛta)? It is said: even if one is born in
the Central Kingdom (i.e., central north India), as previously [explained]
at length, and the Buddha has appeared in the world, [even if] they
encounter spiritual friends (*kalyāṇamitra) who preach the True
63
Dharma, they are either slow-witted, or stammer, or deaf-mute and
speaking by hand, or cannot understand the meaning of any doctrine
[whether] well-spoken or badly spoken, or has committed [one of the
62
Literally: ‘central people’, perhaps translating madhyajanapada more
literally than the alternative yul dbus for madhyadeśa as found in D.3b5 below.
Chin. 1579 396a.25 reads: ዴ᭷୍㞪⏕୰ᅧ. Hirakawa (1997, 72): e.g., madhyadeśa, madhya-janapada. See e.g., Cheng (2018) for a discussion of the confusion
that has surrounded zhongguo ୰ᅧ, potentially referring as it can to both central
north India (Madhyadeśa) and to China. For the specific boundaries of
Madhyadeśa, see Law (1933-34, 8-9).
63 Tib. dig pa; ‘intoxicated’ may also be possible, though ‘stammer’ seems more
likely in the context, as the list enumerates perceived physical impairments. Chin.
does not seem to have a corresponding term.
― 148 ―
66
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
five] sins of immediate retribution (*ānantariyakarman), or has
accumulated defilements (*kleśa) over a long period. These are called
the obstructions.
(continued)
rgyu gang dag gis yongs su mya ngan las 'da' ba'i chos can rnams
yongs su mya ngan las ma 'das pa'i rgyu ni bzhi po de dag yin no // de
dag kyang gang gi tshe sangs rgyas 'byung ba dang dam pa'i chos nyan
pa dang rjes su mthun pa'i gdams ngag rjes su bstan pa rnyed cing rgyu
de dag kyang med par gyur pa, de'i tshe na dge ba'i rtsa ba dag yongs
su smin cing rim gyis yongs su mya ngan las 'da' bar yang 'gyur ro //
yongs su mya ngan las mi 'da' ba'i chos can rnams ni nges pa'i
tshogs la gnas pa yin pas / de dag ni rkyen rnyed kyang rung ma rnyed
kyang rung ste / rnam pa thams cad kyi thams cad du yongs su mya
ngan las 'da' ba'i skal ba med pa kho na yin no //
These are the four reasons why those who have the factor of
ultimate Nirvāṇa do not attain ultimate Nirvāṇa. But if they meet by
chance the Buddhas appearing in the world and hear the True Dharma,
64
and realize and follow [it], receiving instruction and precepts in
harmony with (*ānulomika) [the scriptures], [if] at that time these four
causes are not present, then their wholesome roots will ripen and they
will gradually attain ultimate Nirvāṇa.
Those who do not have the factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa
(aparinirvāṇadharmaka) [in contrast], because they abide in the class
which is fixed [*niyata; Tib. nges pa; Chin. Ỵ ᐃ ], regardless of
64
lit. ‘hear’: *√śru; Tib. nyan pa; Chin. ⫎⪺.
― 147 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
67
whether or not they encounter [favourable] conditions, in no way can
65
66
they possibly [attain] ultimate Nirvāṇa.
2. Circumstantial and physical obstacles
In the following section, we notice several impediments which appear to be
beyond the control of the individual, and the reason that (lack of) such
characteristics should preclude ultimate Nirvāṇa is not always clear.
Nonetheless, the restrictions become undeniably closely drawn: one must be
born a human (contrary to some strands of later Buddhism); one must be
fortunate enough to take a birth in the ‘noble lands’ of India (and at that, a
specific part of north India, often associated with the region of Magadha);
one must have all one’s senses and limbs, even secondary body parts such as
fingers (reminiscent of the list of deformities precluding one from ordination
in the Vinaya noted earlier); and, one must apparently be of unambiguous
gender, also reminding us of the exclusion of the paṇḍaka and
ubhatovyañjanaka in the Mil and MV cited earlier.
(I)-A-II-4-b-(1); D.3b5; 1579 396b15
67
(de la bdag gi 'byor pa gang zhe na | mir gyur pa dang | yul dbus
su skyes pa dang) indriyair avikalatā, āyatanagataḥ prasādaḥ,
aparivṛttakarmāntatā.
65 Tib. reads literally, ‘absolutely (rnam pa thams cad kyi thams cad du,
*sarveṇa sarvam) lack the good fortune / condition / allotment (skal ba med pa;
*bhāga) [to attain] ...’; Chin. more simply: ‘in every way are absolutely incapable
of attaining...’.
ዴྡⅭᅄ✀ᅉ⦁, ⏤Ṉᅉ⦁ᨾ, 㞪᭷⯡ᾖᵎἲ⪋⯡ᾖᵎࠋᙼⱝ‣
㐝ㅖషฟୡ, ⫎⪺ṇἲ, ⋓ᚓ㞉㡰ᩍᤵࠊᩍㄕ, ↓ᙼᅉ⦁∞, ᪉⬟ၿ᰿ᡂ
⇍, ḟ⮳ᚓ⯡ᾖᵎࠋ
↓ᾖᵎἲ⿵≉ఞ⨶ఫỴᐃ⪹, ᙼⱝ㐝⦁, ⱝ㐝⦁, 㐢୍ษ✀␌❵⬟ᚓ⯡
ᾖᵎࠋ
67 See note 62 above on madhya-deśa, where Tib. reads ltar dbus.
66
― 146 ―
68
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
68
What is [necessary for] perfecting oneself (ātmasampat) ? It is
[being born with] the quality of being a human (‘humanness’), being
69
born in the Central Kingdom, with unimpaired senses, having pure
70
faith in the teaching, and having no karmic hindrances.
(I)-A-II-4-b-(1)-i; D.3b5; 1579 396b17
tatra
manuṣyatvaṃ
katamat.
yathāpīhaikatyo
sabhāgatāyāṃ pratyājāto bhavati puruṣaś ca
manuṣyāṇāṃ
puruṣendriyeṇa
samanvāgataḥ strīś ca idam ucyate manuṣyatvam.
In this case, what is humanness? If someone is reborn among the
class of humans, and that person is endowed with male or female
71
faculties, this is what is called humanness.
(I)-A-II-4-b-(1)-ii; D.3b5; 1579 396b19
āryāyatane
pratyājātiḥ
katamā.
yathāpīhaikatyo
madhyeṣu
janapadeṣu pratyājāto bhavati, pūrvavad yāvad yatra gatiḥ
satpuruṣāṇām iyam ucyate āryāyatane pratyājātiḥ.
What is rebirth in the noble realm? If a person is reborn in the
middle country (India), previously extensively [explained], there
72
[taking] form among good men, this is called rebirth in the noble
realm.
68 Tib. bdag gi 'byor pa > Skt. ātmasampat; Chin. ⮬ᅭ⁹ (1579 396b15). See
note 57.
Chin. ⪷ 1579 396b16).
āyatana, support can refer to the six senses, but has several other uses in
Buddhist contexts (Edgerton, s.v.), inter alia department, field; a worthy object;
dharma. The latter meaning, in the sense of teaching, is clear in the definition to
follow (see below). Chin. ‘place/base of overcoming’.
71 indriya, faculty, clearly here implies sex organs. See PTSD (s.v.). Chin. ⏨
᰿ ... ዪ㌟(1579 396b18).
72 gati, destiny, realm or state of rebirth. Chin. 㐟΅ (1579 396b20-21).
69
70
― 145 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
69
(I)-A-II-4-b-(1)-iii; D.3b6; 1579 396b21
indriyair avikalatā katamā. yathāpīhaikatyo ’jaḍo
73
bhavaty
74
vistaraḥ
aṅgapratyaṅgāvikalo
vā
aneḍaka
iti
yadrūpeṇāṅgapratyaṅgāvaikalyena śrotrāvaikalyādikena bhavyaḥ
kuśalapakṣasamudāgamāya. idam ucyate indriyā[']vaikalyam
Who are they of unimpeded senses? If someone is not unintelligent
or stupid, as described [above], or whose primary and secondary body
parts are unimpaired, who by way of their primary and secondary body
parts being unimpaired, their hearing etc., being unimpaired, is capable
of attaining the virtuous qualities, this is called being of unimpeded
senses.
(I)-A-II-4-b-(1)-iv; D.3b7; 1579 396b25
āyatanagataḥ
prasādaḥ
katamaḥ.
yathāpīhaikatyena
tathāgatapravedite dharmavinaye śraddhā pratilabdhā bhavati cetasaḥ
prasādaḥ. ayam ucyate āyatanagataḥ prasādaḥ. tatrāyatanaṃ
tathāgatapravedito dharmavinayaḥ sarveṣāṃ laukikalokottarāṇāṃ
śukladharmāṇām
utpattaye.
pūrvaṅgamenādhipatyena
yā
punar
sa
atra
āyatanagataḥ
śraddhā
tena
prasādaḥ.
sarvakleśamalakaluṣyāpanayanat.
What is pure faith in the teaching? If someone obtains faith in the
Dharma (i.e., sūtras) and Vinaya taught by the Tathāgatha; that is the
pure faith of the heart. This is called pure faith in the teaching. In this
case, the teaching is the Dharma and Vinaya preached by the Tathāgata,
for the purpose of producing all bright teachings of the mundane and
supramundane worlds. Further, that faith [developed] by previous
Shukla reads ajāto; emended according to SSG.
Tib. includes in the list dig pa, ‘intoxicated’ or ‘a stammerer’. See note 63
above.
73
74
― 144 ―
70
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
power is pure faith in the teaching, because it removes the impurities
and filth of all defilements.
(I)-A-II-4-b-(1)-v; D.4a2; 1579 396c2
aparivṛttakarmāntatā katamā. yena pañcānām ānantaryāṇāṃ
karmaṇāṃ,
tadyathā
mātṛvadhāt
pitṛvadhād
arhadvadhāt
75
saṃghabhedāt
tathāgatasyāntike
duṣṭacittarudhirotpādād
anyatamānyatamād ānantaryaṃ karma dṛṣṭa eva dharme na kṛtaṃ
bhavati nādhyācaritam iyam ucyate ’parivṛttakarmāntateti imāni
76
pañcānantaryāṇi
karmāṇi
kṛtopacitāni
dṛṣṭa
eva
dharme
parivartyābhavyo bhavati parinirvāṇāyāryamārgasyotpattaye. tasmād
etāni parivṛttakarmāntatety ucyate.
What does it mean, ‘not obstructed by karma’? Where there is [the
state of] not having committed the five acts of immediate retribution,
namely: killing one’s mother, father, or an Arhat, causing a schism in
the monastic community, and spilling the blood of the Tathāgata with
evil intent; [if] any of these are not enacted (na kṛtaṃ bhavati), do not
manifest ([bhavati] nādhyācaritam) an immediate karm[ic effect] in
this very life, this is called ‘not obstructed by karma’. Having
committed these five sins of immediate retribution which [then]
75 Where Skt. and Tib. use negated forms (aparivṛttakarmāntatā; las kyi mtha'
ma log pa [D4a2.4]) when introducing the category, Chin. reads ‘separated from’
the karmic obstructions (1579 396c2: பఱྡⅭ㞳ㅖᴗ㞀㸽). However, in the
concluding statements of this section, Skt. and Tib. both switch to the positive
formulation to define the five sins of immediate retribution: parivṛttakarmāntatā;
las kyi mtha' log pa, while Chin. retains 㞳ㅖᴗ㞀.
76 Lit. ‘in the factors which are indeed manifest’, i.e., in this very life; the
meaning, therefore, appears to be that committing these sins results in the
incapacity to work off the negative karma in this life, and the individual must go
directly to hell; however, this is not a permanent state of affairs, and in due course
(albeit, likely a very long course), they may be able to gain the fruits of the path in
a later birth. See Silk (2007).
― 143 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
71
77
accumulate, one becomes incapable of accomplishing the noble path
78
[that leads to] ultimate Nirvāṇa in this very life. Therefore, these [five
sins] are called ‘obstructed by karma’.
79
3. The various kinds of agotrastha (aparinirvāṇadharmaka)
Several categories of agotrastha delineated below bear remarkable
similarities to the icchantika, chiefly: latent craving; lack of shame; lack of
faith and rejecting the teaching of the true doctrine; and, desiring
phenomenal existence. It is consequently hard to believe the two categories,
77 upacita: see e.g., Edgerton. ‘technically applied to karman, piled up’ (s.v.);
PTSD: e.g., ‘accumulated, produced (usually of puñña and kamma karma)’ (s.v.).
Tib. bsags; Chin. ቑ㛗.
The meaning is unclear. The previous sentence reads anyatamānyatam(a),
indicating any single one of the sins has the result of immediate retribution, so it
is unlikely that the intention here is to emphasise the accumulation of multiple sins
in one life.
78 Is there a hint in this instance of ‘in this life only’? Tib. tshe 'di nyid la; Chin.
⌧ἲ୰.
Alexander von Rospatt (2013, 865-66) comments: ‘The ŚrBh specifies that it is
“in this very life” (dṛṣṭa eva dharme) that those who have committed one of these
five sins is unable to accomplish the path.’ Comparing this to a corresponding
passage in the Bhāvanāmayī Bhūmi, von Rospatt states: ‘this limitation [i.e., that
it is only for this life that one is debarred from the path] is missing entirely ... in
the BhāvBh [which] instructs the practitioner ... to consider ... that the five sins
“with immediate retribution do not allow for a bridge” that would connect to
monastic renunciation (pravrajyā) and the subsequent fruits of practice. By not
spelling out clearly that the commitment of an ānantarya sin disqualifies for this
life alone [emphasis added], the BhāvBh hints that the adverse consequences of
such a crime last into the distant future, and thereby ensures that they are viewed
with due terror. If a deliberate choice, this was to improve upon the formulation of
the ŚrBh, which, while technically correct, may have been perceived to be lacking
in emotive impact.’
79 agotrastha: lit., ‘one established in no lineage’.
― 142 ―
72
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
which emerged apparently independently in Yogacāra and tathagatagarbha
literature, respectively, remained unknown to each other.
80
(I)-A-III; D.7a6; 1579 397c27
kāni punar aparinirvāṇadharmakaliṅgāni yaiḥ samanvāgato
‘parinirvāṇadharmakaḥ pudgalaḥ “aparinirvāṇadharmako ‘yam” iti
vijnyeyaḥ. āha bahūny aparinirvāṇadharmakaliṅgāni pradeśamātraṃ
tu nirdekṣyāmi.
What furthermore are the marks of one who lacks the factor of
ultimate Nirvāṇa (aparinirvāṇadharmaka) by which the person who
lacks the factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa is endowed so that “this
aparinirvāṇadharmaka” can be known? It is said: there are many marks
of one who lacks the factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa, but I will name just a
few.
(I)-A-III-a; D.7a7; 1579 398a1
ihāparinirvāṇadharmakasya pudgalasyādita evālayatṛṣṇā sarveṇa
sarvaṃ
sarvathā
ca
sarvabuddhair
āśrayasaṃniviṣṭā
aprahāṇadharmiṇī bhavaty anutpīḍyā dūrāgatā pragāḍhasaṃniviṣṭā /
idaṃ prathamam agotrasthasya pudgalasya liṅgam //
In the case of a person who lacks the factor of ultimate Nirvāṇa,
from the very beginning they [are characterised by] latent craving and
are attached to the basis [of existence which] has [such a] nature [that
80 I present four of the six types below to pick up only on the most striking
affinities; however, that is not to say there are not also opportunities for
comparison in the other two. For example, the following depiction of the fifth type
of agotrastha certainly suggests the various types of fraud, lying, and putative false
claims discussed at various points earlier in this paper:
(I)-A-III-e; D.8a1; 1579 39b1: aśramaṇaḥ śramaṇapratijñaḥ, abrahmacārī
brahmacāripratijñaḥ; ‘not being a Śramaṇa, claims to be one; not being a
Brahmacārin, claims to be one’.
― 141 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
73
it can]not be eliminated [even] by all the Buddhas whatever [they may
do], cannot be squeezed out, originates from long ago [being] firmly
bound [to the basis of existence]. This is the first mark of the person
who is agotrastha.
(I)-A-III-c; D.7b5; 1579 398a17
punar
aparam
agotrasthaḥ
pudgalaḥ.
ādita
evādhimātreṇāhrīkyānapatrāpyeṇa samanvāgato bhavati yenāyam
aghṛṇacittaś cāsaṃkucitacittaś ca prahṛṣṭacittaś ca sarvaṃ pāpam
adhyācarati. na ca kadācit tan nidānaṃ vipratisārī bhavati. [gzhi des
tshe 'di'i zang zing dang bcas pa'i bdag nyid nyams pa kho na tsam du
mthong bar zad de /] idaṃ tṛtīyam agotrasthaṃ liṅgam.
Again, there is [another kind of] person who is agotrastha: From
the very beginning, [the agotrastha] is endowed with excessive
shamelessness and a lack of conscience, because of which their mind
lacks aversion and fear and with delighted mind they commit all manner
of sins. Therefore, they never become repentant. [For this reason, [the
agotrastha] ends up experiencing only decline of the self which pursues
(lit. endowed with) [nothing more than] worldly wealth (prosperity]) in
this very life (lit. of this time)]. This is the third mark of the agotrastha.
(I)-A-III-d; D.7b6; 1579 398a23
punar aparam agotrasthaḥ pudgalaḥ. sarvākāraparipūrṇe sphuṭe
yukte citre gamake duḥkhaṃ vārabhya samudayaṃ vā nirodhaṃ vā
mārgaṃ
vā
saddharme
deśyamāne
na
labhate
cetasa
āvarjanamātrakam adhimuktimātrakaṃ ca [spu zing zhes byed pa'am /
mchi ma bkrug
81
81
ces byed pa thob par gyur pa lta ci smos te]
I read as dkrug. See D.8a1.2; Śrāvakabhūmi Study Group (SSG), (26 n.10).
― 140 ―
74
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
atītānāgatapratyutpannam adhvānam upādāya. idaṃ caturtham
agotrasthaṃ liṅgam
Again, there is [another kind of] person who is agotrastha: Upon
being taught the true doctrine, which is in all respects perfect, plain, in
conformity with reason, clear, easy to understand whether with regard
to suffering, or [its] origination, or cessation, or the way [to cease it],
[the agotrastha] does not gain even a measure of being convinced in
82
their mind , [let alone, making the hairs stand on end, or being moved
to tears] whether in the past, the present or the future. This is the fourth
mark of the agotrastha.
(I)-A-III-f; D.8a7; 1579 398b18
punar aparam agotrasthaḥ pudgalaḥ. yat kiṃcit kuśalaṃ karma
karoti kāyena vācā manasā vā, tat sarvaṃ bhavābhiprāyo vā viśiṣṭaṃ
āyatipunarbhavam abhiprārthayamānaḥ, bhogābhiprāyo vā viśiṣṭaṃ
bhogam abhiprārthayamāno karoti / idaṃ ṣaṣṭham agotrasthasya
pudgalasya liṅgam //
Again, there is [another kind of] person who is agotrastha: That
person does some measure of good things, whether by body, speech or
mind, but [he/she] does all [of this] with the aim of [happiness in this]
existence, or with the intention of an excellent rebirth in the future, or
83
with the aim of enjoyment, with the intention of [obtaining] excellent
enjoyment. This is the sixth mark of the person who is agotrastha.
adhimukti-mātraka, Tib. mos pa tsam, Chin. ᚤᑠಙゎ: ‘earnest application
leading to conviction’, an important term in the Mahāyāna, and a quality regularly
identified as lacking in the icchantika.
83 bhoga of course has several meanings, including both sensual pleasure(s)
(chiefly, perhaps, culinary as well as sexual) and wealth. I am tempted to
foreground the former here, to highlight the overlap with the icchantika, without
excluding the latter. Chin. reads ㈈ᑌ ‘wealth’, 1579 398b21.
82
― 139 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
75
The Laṅkāvatārasūtra
It only remains to note a slightly different usage of gotra in the LAS
compared with the Gotrabhūmi passages. In so doing, we also have the
chance to observe the moment where the agotrastha is conflated most clearly
with the icchantika.
punar aparaṃ mahāmate pañcābhisamayagotrāṇi katamāni pañca
śrāvakayānābhisamayagotraṃ
yaduta
pratyekabuddhayānābhisamayagotraṃ
tathāgatayānābhisamayagotram aniyataikataragotram agotraṃ ca
pañcamam |
84
63.2-5
Further, Mahāmati, [regarding] the five lineages of spiritual
attainment, what are the five? [They are those of: 1]. the Disciples’
vehicle; [2.] the Solitary Buddhas’ vehicle; [3.] the Tathāgatas’ vehicle;
85
[4.] the uncertain vehicle; and, [5.] those of no spiritual lineage.
After elaborating at some length how to recognise each of the first four
categories, as well as describing various sub-divisions within them, and after
some intervening verses, the Buddha turns to the icchantika.
tatrecchantikānāṃ punar mahāmate anicchantikatā mokṣaṃ kena
pravartate
yaduta
sarvakuśalamūlotsargataś
ca
sattvānādikālapraṇidhānataś ca |
65.17-66.2)
Again, Mahāmati, how is it that no desire for liberation arises in the
icchantika? [Either because] they have abandoned all [their] good roots
All references to Nanjio (ed.) 1923.
1.⫆⪺✀ᛶ2.⦕む✀ᛶ3.ዴ✀ᛶ4.ᐃ✀ᛶ5.↓✀ᛶ
T16.597a29-b2.
84
85
― 138 ―
76
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
or [because of taking] vows [to follow the Bodhisattva path] since
beginningless time [for the sake of all] sentient beings.
We should note carefully here that the language in the initial list above refers
86
to the agotra, with the Chinese also using ↓(✀)ᛶ. Suddenly, however,
and with no apparent explanation for the slippage, the term becomes
icchantika in the Sanskrit, and accordingly ୍ 㜢 ᥦ in Śikṣānanda .
Bodhiruci does, at least, appear alert to the inconsistency, and attempts to
87
transition between the terms by drawing attention to the shift, defining the
88
agotra as icchantika, and then the icchantika as aparinirvāṇagotraka.
Conclusion
We have, then, encountered several classes of human and non-human beings
who are excluded to a lesser or greater extent from the Buddhist world, either
socially or cosmologically. In some cases, we noticed early traces in the Pali
tradition that may foreshadow the icchantika, including the examples of
those who hold false views, frauds, heretics, and those who commit the four
serious offences of a monastic (pārājika), and the five sins of immediate
retribution (pañcānantaryāṇi). The second example we saw, the agotrastha,
those denied the capacity or lineage necessary for ultimate Nirvāṇa, also
exhibits several psychological and behavioural tendencies that apparently
echo the icchantika to such an extent that at some stage, the two seem to have
merged.
My purpose here has been to provide an admittedly rather
unsystematic survey of some of the main classes and behaviours that bear
Bodhiruci ↓ᛶ 671 526c11; Śikṣānanda ↓✀ᛶ, 672 597b2.
672 597c9.
88្ࠋఱ⪅↓ᛶࠋㅝ୍㜢ᥦࠋ୍㜢ᥦ⪅↓ᾖᵎᛶࠋ671 527a29-b1 As
noted above, the aparinirvāṇagotraka is explicitly identified with the agotrastha
in the Gotrabhūmi.
86
87
― 137 ―
Some More Equal than Others(Golding)
77
affinities with the icchantika and that may speculatively be considered to
have inflected the understanding of the latter over the course of time.
Notwithstanding the fact that the passages discussed were drawn from
disparate schools within the Indic Buddhist fold, there are some striking
continuities regarding the language and conceptual frameworks with and
within which these various forms of exclusion are elaborated. Viewed in the
light of these categories, then, the icchantika may be understood less as a
doctrinal aberration or a historical exception; rather, they have a long line of
institutionally sanctioned antecedents.
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Keywords: Buddhism; exclusion; agotra; icchantika
Postgraduate Student,
International College
for Postgraduate Buddhist Studies
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せ ᪨
୍㒊ࡢ⪅ࡣࡢ⪅ࡼࡾ᭦ᖹ➼
̿ึᮇ࣭୰ᮇࣥࢻᩍࡅࡿᕪู̿
ࢥ࣭ࣜࣥࢦ࣮ࣝࢹࣥࢢ Corin Golding)
ᩍ⤒ࡣࠊࡑࡢᡂ❧ᙜึࡽࠊᕪูࡸࡀぢࡽࢀࡿࠋࣃ࣮
ࣜㄒ⪷ࡸᩍࡢᩥ⊩ࡣࠊ࠶ࡿ✀ࡢே㛫㸦ே㛫࡛࡞࠸ࡶࡢ㸧ࡀ
ൔఞධࡿࡇࡸ㝀ࡢᩍ࠼ࢆ⪺ࡃࡇࢆ⚗Ṇࡍࡿࡶࡢࡽࠊ࠶ࡿேࠎ
ࡀᡂࡍࡿ⬟ຊࢆྰᐃࡍࡿ࠸࠺ࠊࡼࡾໟᣓⓗ࡞⚗Ṇࡢグ㏙⮳ࡿࡲ
࡛ࠊࡉࡲࡊࡲ࡞ࡀぢࡽࢀࡿࠋࡇࡢࡼ࠺࡞㝖እࡣࠊ࠾ࡑࡽࡃᚋୡᩍ
࠾࠸࡚ࠊ୍㜢ᥦ࠸࠺ᙧ࡛᭱ࡶ᫂☜⾲⌧ࡉࢀࡿࡼ࠺࡞ࡗࡓࠋᮏㄽᩥ
࡛ࡣࠊࣃ࣮ࣜㄒࡢࡢ୰ࡢ 2 ࡘࡢ㔜せ࡞⟠ᡤࡽࠊ୍㜢ᥦࡢ๓㌟ᛮ
ࢃࢀࡿࡶࡢࢆ᥈ࡋฟࡍࠋḟ୍㜢ᥦඹ㏻Ⅼࡢከ࠸ agotrasthaࠕ㸦ᾖᵎࢆ
ᚓࡿ㸧⣲㉁㸦ࡲࡓࡣ⾑⤫㸧Ḟࡅࡿ⪅ࠖ࠸࠺࢝ࢸࢦ࣮ࣜࢆྲྀࡾୖࡆ
ࡿࠋᩍࡢㄽ᭩ࡢ୰ࡢ agotrastha 㛵ࡍࡿ࠸ࡃࡘࡢ⟠ᡤࡢⱥヂࢆᥦ
♧ࡋࠊᑡ࡞ࡃࡶ࠶ࡿࢸ࢟ࢫࢺ࡛ࡣࠊagotrastha ୍㜢ᥦࡀΰྠࡉࢀ࡚࠸
ࡿྍ⬟ᛶࡀ࠶ࡿࡇࢆᣦࡍࡿࠋ
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