⏑⏑−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−−¦¦⏑⏑−−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−− Aupacchandasaka
tata
indra-samo jitendriyāśvaḥ pravivikṣuḥ param-aśvam āruroha
|
⏑⏑−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−−¦¦⏑⏑−−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−−
parivartya-janaṁ
tv-avekṣamāṇas-tata evābhimataṁ vanaṁ na bheje || 5.22
5.22
And so, powerful as Indra,
with the powerful horses of his senses tamed,
with the powerful horses of his senses tamed,
He mounted his highest of
horses, wishing to get started.
But then, having regard
for people,
he turned [his horse] around again,
he turned [his horse] around again,
And did not repair
directly to the longed for forest.
COMMENT:
When I
prepared yesterday's comment I had not translated or formed a view on
today's verse, so it is reassuring to find that today's verse, at
least as I read it, supports the tentative conclusion I came to
yesterday about directness and indirectness of approach.
The
point, as I read it, is that the prince – even in spite of his
Indra-like strength of mind and his strong desire to get started –
remained somewhat circumspect and aware of himself as part of a wider
picture. He did not just dive in following the lowly evolved
end-gaining principle.
Part of
the reason I hadn't formed a view on today's verse until translating
it just now is that there were some textual issues to iron out in
process of translation.
In the
2nd pāda, EHJ amended the original param (best/highest [describing
the horse]) to puram (the city [object of wishing to enter]). The
Chinese translation's 還入城
appears to support this
amendment.
In the
3rd pāda, EHJ amended the original parivartya (he turned
[himself/his horse] around, and...) to parivāra, so that
parivāra-janaṁ means “his following” or “his companions.”
EHJ's
reading, then, is that the prince wished to go back to the city out
of consideration for his companions:
"Then he, who was Indra's peer and had conquered the horses of the senses, mounted his horse with the intention of entering the city; but out of regard for his following he did not go straight to the longed for forest."
But in that case, as EHJ himself
recognizes in a footnote, the appropriate particle in the 3rd pāda
would be hi and not tu.
I
prefer the original reading of param and parivartya for two or three
reasons: firstly, because it is the original reading; secondly
because it fits the logic of tu; and thirdly because I think there is
philosophical and practical meaning in the description of the prince
not going directly for the target in an end-gaining manner but rather
having the circumspection and flexibility to turn around (pari-vṛt).
In this
the prince was both similar and different to Nanda as described in SN
Canto 4:
Reverence for the Buddha drew him on; love for his wife drew him back: / Irresolute, he neither stayed nor went, like a king-goose pushing forwards against the waves. // SN4.42 // Once she was out of sight, he descended from the palace quickly -- / Then he heard the sound of ankle bracelets, and back he hung, gripped in his heart again. // 4.43 // Held back by his love of love, and drawn forward by his love for dharma, / He struggled on, being turned about (vivartyamānaḥ) like a boat on a river going against the stream. // SN4.44 //
The
similarity is indicated by the two verbs from the root vṛt –
vivartyamānaḥ in Nanda's case, parivartya in his older brother's
case. The difference also might be indicated by these two verbs, with
Nanda being turned around passively while his older brother makes a decision
to turn around, out of regard for people.
It
would be natural to say “out of regard for others,” but as
discussed previously I think that in this part Aśvaghoṣa is
deliberately avoiding the language of self and others. Hence when he
describes the prince as janam avekṣamāṇaḥ, “having regard
for people,” people includes not only others but also self.
This having regard also is related with the question of directness or indirectness, to
do or not to do. When we just do, i.e. when we go directly for the
end we have in view, there is self and its object. Others exist but
their existence is incidental and they are liable to suffer
collateral damage. But when we eschew such end-gaining in favour of
non-doing, then collateral damage does not have to follow. Undesirable side effects,
in other words, if we slow down and follow indirect means, might be
avoidable.
FM
Alexander saw that evolution has equipped us all, like animals, to go
directly for whatever end we have in view, relying on instinctive or
subconscious guidance and control. He saw further that when human
beings whose sensory appreciation is faulty rely on these means, even
if we gain the end we have in view, we only do so at the expense of
undesirable and unintended consequences – like side-effects in
medicine, and collateral damage in war.
The
antidote that Alexander proposed to this kind of ignorance was the
application of a principle he called “inhibition and direction”
to everyday actions like sitting, standing, and lying down. Hence:
I venture to assert that if the gap is to be bridged, it will be by means of a knowledge, gained through practical experience, which will enable us to inhibit our instinctive, 'subconscious' reaction to a given stimulus, and to hold it inhibited while initiating a conscious direction, guidance, and control of the use of the self that was previously unfamiliar." (The Universal Constant in Living, 1946)
This
principle as I understand it is, if not the same, then very close to
the Buddha's teaching of smṛti, mindfulness or awareness.
In
today's verse, as I read it, the prince is exhibiting such
mindfulness or awareness in a natural, undeveloped form – in the
form that comes naturally to us as healthy human beings before we are
corrupted by personal agendae and other tainted things; in the form, that is, of common consideration for fellow human beings.
The
initial irony of Zen practice might be that in our desire to rush in
like fools and get started in it, we are liable to demonstrate that
lack of mindful consideration that results in harmful side effects. I know whereof I speak.
Human
instinct and human ignorance being as strong as they are, and the
end-gaining habit being as strong as it is, the ultimate irony of Zen
practice manifests itself when a Zen master barges about creating
harmful side-effects in the pursuit of the drug of sexual pleasure,
or creating collateral damage in the pursuit of his historical
mission as conceived by him.
Whether
I myself am part of the problem or part of the solution, I do not
honestly know. I am afraid that much of the time I am trying to be
part of the solution, and in that very trying I inevitably maintain myself as part of
the problem. On a bad day, impatient end-gaining thus causes me to fly
into a rage when wires get tangled up, or a computer doesn't work as
expected, or I cannot find something which I feel I need in a hurry.
“WHERE IS MY FUCKING KEY???!!!”
On a
good day, especially when I am alone here in France, I distance
myself from the desire to be right and other delusions and from
tainted things like trying, and thereby experience the joy and ease
of the first dhyāna, born of separateness.... which is not the end,
nor even the beginning of the end, but which might be a worthwhile
end in the beginning.
I think
there a lot of people in the United States who have suffered the
harmful side-effects, or collateral damage, from the end-gaining of
Zen masters of Japanese and other stripes.
If I
personally went over to America with the agenda of trying to sort it
all out, trying to do some kind of imitation of Bodhidharma, nothing is more certain than that I would be part of the
problem. Not that I don't sometimes have that impulse. But I am thankfully able to realize it as one of those ideas described in SN Canto 15, whose title is "Abandoning Ideas."
Still, I
would not hesitate to recommend the writings of FM Alexander as
pointing to the solution, and I hope that, in spite of the personal
shortcomings of the translator, this translation and these comments
also might be part of the solution.
VOCABULARY
tataḥ:
ind. then
indra-samaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): like Indra
jitendriyāśvaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): the horses of his senses conquered
jita:
mfn. conquered, defeated
indriya:
mfn. fit for or belonging to or agreeable to indra; n. sense, power
of the senses
aśva:
horse
pravivikṣuḥ
(nom. sg. m.): mfn. (fr. Desid. pra- √viś) wishing to enter
(acc.)
pra-
√viś: to enter , go into , resort to ; to enter upon , undertake ,
commence , begin , devote one's self to
param
(acc. sg. m.): mfn. extreme; best, highest
puram
(acc. sg.): n. the city
aśvam
(acc. sg. ): m. horse
āruroha
= 3rd pers. sg. perf. ā- √ ruh: to ascend, mount
parivartya = abs. causative pari- √
vṛt: to cause to turn or move round or back or to and fro ; to
overthrow , upset (a carriage) ; to invert , put in a reverse order ;
to turn topsy-turvy i.e. search thoroughly ; (A1.) to cause one's
self to be turned round (in having one's head shaved all round)
janam (acc. sg.): m. people , subjects
(the sg. used collectively ; ayaṁ janaḥ , " this person ,
these persons " , I , we )
parivāra-janam
(acc. sg. m.): his companions
parivāra:
m. surroundings , train , suite , dependants , followers
tu: but
avekṣamāṇaḥ
= nom. sg. m. pres. part. ava √īkṣ: to look towards , look at ,
behold
tataḥ:
ind. then, from that time
eva:
(emphatic)
abhimatam
(acc. sg. n.): mfn. longed for , wished , desired ; supposed ,
imagined
abhi- √
man: to think of , long for , desire
vanam
(acc. sg.): n. forest
na: not
bheje =
3rd pers. sg. perf. bhaj: to turn or resort to ; to
declare for , prefer , choose (e.g. as a servant)
歛情抑諸根 徐起還入城
眷屬悉隨從 謂止不遠逝
[Relation with Sanskrit tenuous]
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