BUDDHACARITA 4.23: Truly Heart-Stopping Women

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yā hi kāś-cid-yuvatayo haranti sadśaṁ janam |

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nikṣṭotkṣṭayor-bhāvaṁ yā ghṇanti tu tāḥ striyaḥ || 4.23

4.23

For any old girls

Entrance those on their level,

But those who stop the heart of low and high:

They are true women."

COMMENT:

The two verbs used in today's verse are hṛ and grah, as in 4.19. Each of these verbs has a wide range of meanings, several of which overlap – both verbs can mean, for example, to entrance and to eclipse. Bhāva also has a very wide range of meanings, from “real state,” through “heart,” down to “emotion” and “rank.”

Because of this ambiguity, the phrases haranti sadṛśaṁ janam and nikṛṣṭotkṛṣṭayor-bhāvaṁ gṛhṇanti can mean completely different things depending on who is saying them.

The brahmin Udāyin is thinking about class, so that sadṛśaṁ janam means “lovers of the same class as themselves” [EHJ] and haranti means captivate sexually -- any old girl can captivate a man of her own class.

But I think what Aśvaghoṣa has in mind in the first half of the verse is the principles of entrainment and sympathetic resonance, so that haranti expresses mutual entrancement by people who are sitting together. Sadṛśam in that case does not mean "of the same social class" but means "on the same wavelength" -- any old meditator can enter into mutual entrancement with other meditators who are already on the same wavelength. 

In Hurry-Up Udāyin's definition of a true woman, again, true women are those who are sufficiently sexy and wily to be able to capture the hearts of lowly peasants and lofty aristocrats alike. A true woman, then, in Udāyin's definition, is a heart-stopper in the sense of being universally exciting, thrilling, intoxicating, breathtaking -- to heterosexual chavs and poshos alike.

The hidden meaning which I think Aśvaghoṣa intends is that a true woman is one who goes to the heart of such relative conceptions of low and high, and stops off those conceptions at source.

How in practice does a woman or a man go to the heart of low and high, and arrest the pernicious relative thoughts emanating from that centre?

Dogen wrote of “not discussing intelligence as high and stupidity as low”

(JOCHI KAGU RON SEZU). 

不

FU, ([se]zu) not/beyond

論

RON discussing

上

JO high

智

CHI intelligence

下

KA low

愚

GU stupidity

These six characters can be taken as an expression of sitting in lotus itself, which Dogen praised as supreme beyond the supremacy of the Buddha's supremacy, but at the same time as beyond discussion of high and low.

Today's verse, then, is another verse that is ostensibly concerned with things that people like to turn into “issues” for discussion – things like gender, and race, and class.

But a true woman, Aśvaghoṣa is suggesting, is one who nips all such discussion in the bud by her sheer practicality, which is rooted not in intellectual activity but in paying attention to a process.

Hence the link with yesterday's verse expressed by hi (“for/because”) – a true woman nips intellectual discussion in the bud  because the light of the lineage of the buddha-ancestors is sheer attention to practice. 

VOCABULARY

yāḥ … kāś-cid (nom. pl. f.): any [girls] whatsoever (ka is only made indefinite when connected with the particles ca, caná, cid, vā ,and ápi , in which case ka may sometimes be preceded by the relative ya – e.g. ye ke ca , any persons whatsoever)

hi: for

yuvatayaḥ (nom. pl.): f. girl, young woman

haranti = 3^rd pers. pl. hṛ: to take , bear , carry ; to take away , carry off ; A1. (older and more correct than P.) to take to one's self , appropriate (in a legitimate way) , come into possession of (acc.) ; to master , overpower , subdue , conquer , win , win over (also by bribing) ; to outdo , eclipse , surpass ; to enrapture , charm , fascinate

sadṛśam (acc. sg. m.): mfn. like , resembling , similar to ; conformable , suitable , fit , proper , right , worthy

janam (acc. sg.): m. creature , living being , man , person ; m. a common person , one of the people ; people , subjects (the sg. used collectively)

nikṛṣṭotkṛṣṭayoḥ (gen. dual): of both the low and the high

nikṛṣṭa: mfn. debased , vile , low , despised , outcast

utkṛṣṭa: mfn. (opposed to apa-kṛṣṭa and ava-kṛṣṭa) drawn up or out ; taking a high position ; excellent , eminent

kṛṣ: to draw , draw to one's self , drag , pull

bhāvam (acc. sg.): m. ( √ bhū) becoming , being , existing , occurring , appearance ; state , condition , rank ; state of being anything ; true condition or state , truth , reality ; manner of being , nature , temperament , character ; manner of acting , conduct , behaviour ; any state of mind or body , way of thinking or feeling , sentiment , opinion , disposition , intention; purport , meaning , sense ; (in rhet.) passion , emotion; love , affection , attachment ; the seat of the feelings or affections , heart , soul , mind

yāḥ (nom. pl. f.): who

gṛhṇanti = 3^rd pers. pl. grah: to seize, take ; to arrest , stop ; to catch , take captive , take prisoner , capture , imprison ; to take possession of , gain over , captivate ; to seize , overpower (esp. said of diseases and demons and the punishments of varuṇa) ; to eclipse ; to abstract , take away (by robbery) ; to perceive (with the organs of sense or with mánas) , observe , recognise ; to receive into the mind , apprehend , understand , learn ; to accept , admit , approve

tu: but

tāḥ (nom. pl. f.): they

striyaḥ (nom. pl.): f. women

女人性雖賤 尊榮隨勝天
何不盡其術 令彼生染心

BUDDHACARITA 4.22: Work In Such a Way, It Being So

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tad-evaṁ sati viśrabdhaṁ prayatadhvaṁ tathā yathā |

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iyaṁ npasya vaṁśa-śrīr-ito na syāt-parāṅmukhī || 4.22

4.22

It being so, with calm confidence,

Apply yourselves in such a way,

That this light of the lineage of a protector of men

Might not be turned away from here.

COMMENT:

The following comment does not do today's verse justice, but I hope it will at least serve to underline the point that Aśvaghoṣa is very often saying the profoundest things about sitting-meditation, indirectly, in those verses where sitting-meditation might seem to be the furthest thing from the speaker's mind.

Udāyin's intention is to tell the courtesans to trust the reliability of his words and on that basis to hurry up and get on with captivating the prince, so that he might not abandon his father's kingdom and make for the forest.

Returning to his well-used instrument of verbal irony, however, Aśvaghoṣa has framed Udāyin's expression in such a way as not only to express what Udāyin would have the women do in the way of doing (pravṛtti), but also to express what Aśvaghoṣa would have his readers and listeners NOT do in the way of non-doing (nivṛtti). 

Thus, the first half of the verse, as Hurry Up Udāyin intends it, is a pushy exhortation to bold striving– “This being so, boldly put forth your efforts that...” [EBC]; “This being so, exert yourselves boldy, so that...” [EHJ]; “Such being the case you should, therefore, strive boldly in such a way that...”

But Aśvaghoṣa might really intend the same words, on the contrary, to be a gentle encouragement to practice that ineffable practice, non-doing, which proceeds from letting things be as they are.

Such being the case, “it being so” (tad-evaṁ sati) means, in other words, fishes swimming like fishes and birds flying like birds.

And such being the case, “work in such a way” (prayatadhvaṁ tathā yathā) can be read as an exhortation to practice the ineffable practice of detachment, or non-doing, in the spirit of let it be.

Again, the desired outcome expressed by the second half of the verse, as the king's errand boy Udāyin intends it, is that the prince will not turn his back on all the royal riches and rank and glory attendant on his succession to Śuddodhana's throne (vaṁśa-śrīḥ).

But the desired outcome Aśvaghoṣa has in mind, on the contrary, might be related to the transmission that at the end of Saundara-nanda the Buddha encourages the enlightened Nanda to serve:

Therefore forgetting the work that needs to be done in this world on the self, do now, stout soul, what can be done for others. / Among beings who are wandering in the night, their minds shrouded in darkness, let the lamp of this transmission be carried. // SN18.57 //

Such being the case, śrī means not riches and rank but light -- the light of the conscious awareness and the light of conscious inhibition which can, when conditions are right, beget each other in a virtuous circle.

And such being the case, “not being turned away from here” (ito na syāt-parāṅmukhī) can be read as a description of the light that is not turned away from here, when a bloke is practising the backward step of turning his light and letting it shine within.

Udāyin's words, then, although Udāyin himself does not know it, contain Aśvaghoṣa's indirect encouragement to stick to principle, applying the principle of conscious inhibition here and now, and thus working on the self in such a way that the light which is not turned away from here, might ultimately help others too.

Such being the case, coming as it does after several verses in which I could not detect any brightness, today's verse truly seems like clarity, after fearful darkness (bhīmāndhakārād-iva ca prakāśam; SN17.68).

VOCABULARY

tad: ind. therefore, so

evam: ind. thus, so

sati = 3^rd pers. sg. pres. part. as: to be

viśrabdham: ind. confidingly , quietly , without fear or reserve

viśrabdha: mfn. confiding , confident , fearless , tranquil , calm ; showing or inspiring confidence

vi- √śrambh: to confide , be confident , trust in or rely on

√śrambh: generally found with the prefix vi: to be careless or negligent ; to trust , confide

prayatadhvam = 2^nd pers. pl. imperative pra- √yat: to be active or effective ; to strive , endeavour , exert one's self , devote or apply one's self to

√yat: to place in order , marshal , join , connect ; to keep pace , be in line , rival or vie with (instr.); march or fly together or in line ; to seek to join one's self with , make for , tend towards (loc.) ; to endeavour to reach , strive after , be eager or anxious for ; to exert one's self , take pains , endeavour , make effort , persevere , be cautious or watchful

tathā yathā: ind. in such a way that, so that

iyam (nom. sg. f.): this

nṛ-pasya (gen. sg.): m. 'ruler/protector of men,' king

pa: mfn. ( √pā) guarding , protecting , ruling

vaṁśa-śrīḥ (nom. sg. f.): the royal rank/glory of his lineage ; the light of a lineage

vaṁśa: m. a bamboo cane ; the line of a pedigree or genealogy (from its resemblance to the succession of joints in a bamboo) , lineage , race , family , stock (esp. a noble race , a dynasty of kings etc.)

śrī: f. light , lustre , radiance , splendour , glory , beauty , grace ; prosperity , welfare , good fortune , success , auspiciousness , wealth , treasure , riches ; high rank , power , might , majesty , royal dignity ; symbol or insignia of royalty

itaḥ: ind. from hence , hence , here ; from this point ; from this world , in this world ; from this time , now

na: not

syāt = 3^rd pers. sg. opt. as: to be

parāṅmukhī (nom. sg. f.): mfn. having the face turned away or averted , turning the back upon ; averse from , hostile to , regardless of , shunning , avoiding

當更勤方便 勿令絶王嗣 

BUDDHACARITA 4.21: Some People Say There's a Woman to Blame...

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evam-ādīn-ṣīṁs-tāṁs-tān-anayan vikriyāṁ striyaḥ |

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lalitaṁ pūrva-vayasaṁ kiṁ punar-npateḥ sutam || 4.21

4.21

Various seers such as these

Have women brought down;

How much more then the son of the king,

Who is in the first flush of frolicsome youth?

COMMENT:

When would-be celibate devotees fail to maintain their celibacy, Udāyin, like the unenlightened Nanda and the striver in Saundara-nanda, blames women as the cause.

To think that Aśvaghoṣa's portrayal of these three characters somehow reflected a prejudice against women in Aśvaghoṣa himself would be the most extreme stupidity – stupidity on a par with the stupidity of the academic who opined that Aśvaghoṣa, as a Buddhist, was necessarily “anti-beauty.”

On the contrary, what Aśvaghoṣa is drawing our attention to, using dramatic irony, is the truth of which the unenlightened Nanda, the Buddhist striver, and the young Brahmin Udāyin, are all strikingly unaware. That truth is, namely, that when would-be male celibates fail to maintain celibacy, though some people say there's a woman to blame, we should know, in every case, that it's our own damn fault.

So this business of blaming women for seeming to be too attractive (when in fact, the striver would have us believe, women are intrinsically foul) is a particular case of what is known in Alexander work as “blaming the stimulus." 

The Buddhist striver and the Brahmin Udāyin are more glaring examples of blaming the stimulus. Nanda, being a naturally unassuming type, blames the stimulus only gently and in passing: 

With their way of being, their pride, their way of moving, their grace; with a smile or show of indignation, with their exuberance, with their voices, / Women have captivated hosts of gods and kings and seers: how then could they fail to bewilder a bloke like me? // SN7.24 //

But male ignornance in each of the three cases -- the stupidity of the unenlightened Nanda in blaming the stimulus, the stupidity of the Buddhist striver in blaming the stimulus, and the stupidity of Udāyin in blaming the stimulus -- is portrayed so as to provide a dark background against which the Buddha's teaching is brought into more vividly stark relief. That teaching is to see the fault, not in women, and not in any other external stimulus, but in faults themselves. 

Marjory Barlow, as I have reported ad nauseam, taught me a practical method for observing faults -- for watching how the many-tentacled monster of misuse which is sustained by faulty sensory appreciation raises its ugly head, when it is spurred into action by the merest hint of an idea of doing something. Marjory's teaching, it dawns on me more and more clearly in the years since she died in 2006, is just too fucking true for words. And gradually the truth will out, if not because of me, then in spite of me. As sure as eggs is eggs. 

If we want to cite textual evidence in Saundara-nanda, Aśvaghoṣa's epic story of Beautiful Joy, to support the assertion that in the Buddha's teaching the blame for going wrong resides with the faults in us, we are spoilt for choice.

Try searching for “fault” in Saundara-nanda Canto 16, for example, and you will find it, by my count, no less than 29 times.

In conclusion, then, it seems that I cannot repeat often enough, for the benefit of self and others, that when somebody (or something in me) like Udāyin blames the stimulus, that is an example of striking ignorance of the Buddha's teaching (as also the teaching of FM Alexander/Marjory Barlow) wherein the faults which are the cause of suffering are never to be found on the outside.

VOCABULARY

evam-ādīn (acc. pl. m.): such as these

ṛṣīn (acc. pl.): m. seers

tāṁs-tān (acc. pl. m.): mfn. various, these and those, different

anayat = 3^rd pers. pl. imperfect nī: to lead towards or to (acc. with or without prati) ; to bring into any state or condition (with acc. e.g. with vaśam , to bring into subjection)

vikriyām (acc. sg.): f. transformation , change , modification , altered or unnatural condition ; change for the worse , deterioration , disfigurement , deformity ; perturbation , agitation , perplexity ; injury , harm , failure , misadventure (acc. with √ yā , to suffer injury , undergo failure)

striyaḥ (nom. pl.): f. women

lalitam (acc. sg. m.): mfn. sported , played , playing , wanton , amorous , voluptuous ; artless , innocent , soft , gentle , charming , lovely

pūrva-vayasam (acc. sg. m.): mfn. being in the first period or stage of life , young

kiṁ punar: ind. how much more?

nṛ-pateḥ (gen. sg.): m. " lord of men " , king

sutam (acc. sg.): m. son

如彼諸美女 力勝諸梵行
況汝等技術 不能感王子  

BUDDHACARITA 4.20: Subjugated Seer (5/5) – Viśvā-mitra

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viśvāmitro maharṣiś-ca vigāḍho 'pi mahat-tapaḥ |

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daśa-varṣāṇy-ahar-mene ghtācy-āpsarasā htaḥ || 4.20

4.20

And the great seer Viśvā-mitra, 'Friend of All,'

Though steeped in rigorous asceticism,

Deemed ten years to be a day,

While captivated by the nymph Ghṛtācī.

COMMENT:

The story of Viśvā-mitra's maintenance of mighty asceticism for thousands of years, in his effort to rise from the rank of a kṣatriya to that of a brahmin, is the culminating example in Hurry-Up Udāyin's present series of five examples of seers who were distracted in their practice by women. Viśvā-mitra's seduction by a nymph generally known as Menakā resulted in the conception of Śakuntalā, who is the heroine of Kalidaśa's famous play “The Recognition of Śakuntalā.”

Nanda also refers to the story of Viśvā-mitra's seduction in the 7^th canto of Saundara-nanda:  

And the son of Gādhin who, in order to become 'the Brahman Seer,' renounced his kingdom and retired to the forest, having become indifferent to sensual objects: / He was captivated by the nymph Ghṛtācī, reckoning a decade with her as a single day. // SN7.35 //

The British situation comedy called "Till Death Us Do Part" (which transferred to America as "All In the Family") featured a patriarch named Alf Garnett who the writer Johnny Speight used as a vehicle for the comical investigation of racial and other prejudices. 

Udāyin, like the striver in Saundara-nanda, is an ancient prototype of Alf Garnett. 

People who watched Till Death Us Do Part and thought that its creater Johnny Speight must have been out to encourage viewers blindly to harbour bigoted views, singularly failed to get the point. 

Whereas Alf idolized West Ham United legend Bobby Moore and Her Majesty the Queen, Udāyin sees as great the seer Viśvā Mitra -- not to be confused with Victor Moses, currently playing football at Chelsea but formerly of Wigan Ascetic. 

Speaking of Her Majesty the Queen, a few days ago she was filmed shaking hands one by one with the members of the British cabinet. Arriving at the place of Chancellor George Osborne, she asked a question to the effect of "How much of the gold in the Bank of England's vaults actually belongs to us?" Osborne's smiling reply (cognissant of the fact that political opponent Gordon Brown was responsible for the decision to sell) was something like "We sold most of it but still have some left." 

Was it the harmless inquiry of an innocent old lady? I somehow doubt it, in which case it is good to know that there is at least one person who genuinely cares about the parlous state of Britain's finances. 

A few years ago a royal butler named Paul Burrel revealed that the Queen had warned him to be careful of "dark forces." Maybe the Queen saw these dark forces as behind the selling off of 60% of the UK's gold reserves, about 395 tons of gold over 17 auctions from July 1999 to March 2002, at an average price of about US$275 per ounce. 

The Queen's question, and a bit of internet research into what may have lain behind it, caused me to re-examine my view of the Queen and her function in British society.  If I subconsciously had a view that I was quite a clever bloke, whereas she was an irrelevant old relic with little real understanding of how things are on the ground in Britian, the Queen's pointed question to the chancellor causes me to glimpse the possibility that the reality might be totally the other way round. 

In 3 days from Tuesday to Thursday this week, the price of gold has fallen steeply from  US$1700 to  $1640 per ounce. Why? I honestly have not got a clue. Maybe the Queen has a view on it. Or maybe she knows something about it. 

It is humbling to be reminded by reality how little one really knows. But some things, for my sins, I do know. 

When Patrick Olivelle writes as follows in his introduction to his translation of Buddha-carita for the Clay Sanskrit Library, I know that Patrick Olivelle has totally missed Aśvaghoṣa's point.

“Life of the Buddha” is concerned principally with the intellectual challenges to the Buddhist dharma, especially to the Buddhist view of the ascetic life as the highest religious aspiration and the only mode of life that can lead a person to final liberation from the phenomenal life of suffering.

There is no Buddhist view on asceticism. Thousands of years of rigorous practice of asceticism are the playing out of a view. The Buddha's teaching, as transmitted by Aśvaghoṣa, is to abandon all views. 

VOCABULARY

viśvāmitraḥ (nom. sg.): m. (prob.) " friend of all " N. of a celebrated ṛṣi or Sage (he was at first a functionary , together with vasiṣṭha , of su-dās , king of the tṛtsus ; seeing vasiṣṭha preferred by the king , he went over to the bharatas , but could not prevent their being defeated by su-dās , although he caused the waters of the rivers vipāś and śutudrī to retire and so give the bharatas free passage RV. iii , 33 ; he was born as a kṣatriya , deriving his lineage from an ancestor of kuśika , named purū-ravas , of the lunar race of kings , and himself sovereign of kanyā-kubja or Kanoj ; his fame rests chiefly on his contests with the great Brahman vasiṣṭha , and his success in elevating himself, though a kṣatriya , to the rank of a Brahman » Manu vii , 42 : the rāmāyaṇa , which makes him a companion and counsellor of the young rāma-candra , records [i , 51-65] how viśvāmitra , on his accession to the throne , visited vasiṣṭha's hermitage , and seeing there the cow of plenty , offered him untold treasures in exchange for it , but being refused , prepared to take it by force ; a long contest ensued between the king and the saint [symbolical of the struggles between the kṣatriya and Brahmanical classes] , which ended in the defeat of viśvāmitra , whose vexation was such that , in order to become a Brahman and thus conquer his rival , he devoted himself to intense austerities [during which he was seduced by the nymph menakā and had by her a daughter , śakuntalā] , gradually increasing the rigour of his mortification through thousands of years , till he successively earned the titles of rājarṣi , ṛṣi , maharṣi , and finally brahmarṣi ; he is supposed to be the author of nearly the whole of RV. iii , and of ix , 67 , 1315 ; x , 137 , 5 ; 167 ; moreover , a law-book , a dhanurveda , and a medical wk. are attributed to him)

maharṣiḥ (nom. sg.): m. great seer

ca: and

vigāḍhaḥ (nom. sg. m.): mfn. plunged into , entered ; one who has entered or plunged into , bathing in (loc.) ; (a weapon) that has deeply penetrated ; deep , excessive

api: though

mahat-tapaḥ (acc. sg. n.): mighty austerity, intense asceticism

mahat: mfn. great (in space , time , quantity or degree) i.e. large , big , huge , ample , extensive , long , abundant , numerous , considerable , important , high , eminent ; violent (pain or emotion) ; thick (as darkness) , gross ; loud (as noise)

daśa = acc. daśan: ten

varṣāṇi (acc. pl. n.): m. and (older) n. rain; a year

ahar (acc. sg.): n. a day

mene = 3^rd pers. sg. perf. man: to think, deem; to regard or consider any one or anything (acc.) as (acc.)

ghṛtācyā (inst. sg.): f. 'Abounding in Ghee,' name of a nymph

apsarasā (inst. sg.): f. celestial nymph

hṛtaḥ (nom. sg. m.): mfn. taken , taken away , seized ; ravished , charmed , fascinated

毘尸婆梵仙 修道十千歳

深著於天后 一日頓破壞 

BUDDHACARITA 4.19: Subjugated Seer (4/5) – Ṛṣya-śṛṅga

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ṛṣya-śṅgaṁ muni-sutaṁ tathaiva strīṣv-apaṇḍitam |

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upāyair-vividhaiḥ śāntā jagrāha ca jahāra ca || 4.19

4.19

Ṛṣya-śṛṅga, 'Antelope Horn,' a sage's son,

Was similarly inexpert in regard to women;

Śāntā, 'Tranquillity,' using various wiles,

Took him captive and carried him away.

COMMENT:

Udāyin is of the view that the unenlightened Nanda expresses in Saundara-nanda Canto 7, which is namely that a male would-be celibate is liable to be helpless to resist the wiles of an attractive woman.

In expressing this view, Nanda also cites the example of Ṛṣya-śṛṅga and Śāntā:

Again, on catching sight of the princess Śāntā, 'Tranquillity,' though he had been living in tranquillity in the forest, / The sage Ṛṣya-śṛṅga, 'Antelope Horn,' was moved from steadfastness, like a high-horned mountain in an earthquake. // SN7.34 //

But also implicit in today's verse is another view; namely, that the likes of Dīrgha-tapas and Ṛṣya-śṛṅga were particularly vulnerable because of not knowing how women really are. In suggesting this, Udāyin is singing from the same hymn sheet as the Buddhist striver in Saundara-nanda Canto 8 in his tirade against women.

Hence the striver, who evidently IS an expert on women (strīṣu paṇḍitam), at least in his own mind, asks Nanda:

So you fail to see how pernicious, in their intense duplicity, are their little lightweight hearts? / Do you not see, at least, that the bodies of women are impure, oozing houses of foulness? // SN8.47 //

And again:

In nails and in teeth, in skin, and in hair, both long and short, which are not beautiful, you are inventing beauty. / Dullard! Do you not see what women originally are made of and what they originally are? // SN8.54 // So then, reckon women, in mind and in body, to be singularly implicated with faults; / And hold back, by the power of this reckoning, the mind which strains so impulsively for home. // SN8.55 //

Because Aśvaghoṣa allows such views to be eloquently expressed in his poetry, a woman of scant attention who proudly considers herself to be "feminist" is liable to suspect that Aśvaghoṣa himself might be a man who harbours a sexist view of women.

I say that a person like that is not thinkingly stupidly because she is a woman. She is thinkingly stupidly because of not paying due attention to the teaching that Aśvaghoṣa is actually endeavoring to convey.

Aśvaghoṣa gives us such true-to-life portrayals of the likes of the young brahmin Udāyin and the Buddhist striver, not because he has any time for their view, or for any view, but because he wishes to contrast their views with the teaching of the teacher who taught the true dharma as the abandonment of all views.

Thus, while the likes of Udāyin and the striver advocate being awake to the wiles of women, the Buddha solely advocates being awake to the four noble truths:

Giving oneself to this path with its three divisions and eight branches -- this straightforward, irremovable, noble path -- / One abandons the faults, which are the causes of suffering, and comes to that step which is total well-being. // SN16.37 // Attendant on it are constancy and straightness; modesty, attentiveness, and reclusiveness; /  Wanting little, contentment, and freedom from forming attachments; no fondness for worldly activity, and forbearance. // 16.38 // For he who knows suffering as it really is, who knows its starting and its stopping: /  It is he who reaches peace by the noble path -- going along with friends in the good. // 16.39 // He who fully appreciates his illness, as the illness it is, who sees the cause of the illness and its remedy: / It is he who wins, before long, freedom from disease -- attended by friends in the know. // 16.40 // So with regard to the truth of suffering, see suffering as an illness; with regard to the faults, see the faults as the cause of the illness; / With regard to the truth of stopping, see stopping as freedom from disease; and with regard to the truth of a path, see a path as a remedy. // 16.41 // Comprehend, therefore, that suffering is doing; witness the faults impelling it forward; / Realise its stopping as non-doing; and know the path as a turning back. // 16.42 // Though your head and clothes be on fire direct your mind so as to be awake to the truths. / For in failing to see the purport of the truths, the world has burned, it is burning now, and it will burn. // SN16.43 //

VOCABULARY

ṛṣya-śṛṅgam (acc. sg.): m. 'Antelope Horn'

ṛṣya: m. the male of a species of antelope , the painted or white-footed antelope

śṛṅga: n. the horn of an animal

muni-sutam (acc. sg. m.): son of a sage

tathā: ind. likewise

eva: (emphatic)

strīṣu (loc. pl.): f. women

apaṇḍitam (acc. sg. m.): mfn. unlearned , illiterate; inexpert

upāyaiḥ (inst. pl.): m. coming near , approach , arrival ; that by which one reaches one's aim , a means or expedient (of any kind) , way , stratagem , craft , artifice

vividhaiḥ (inst. pl. m.): mfn. of various sorts , manifold , divers

śāntā (nom. pl. f.): mfn. appeased , pacified , tranquil , calm , free from passions

śānta: m. N. of a daughter of daśa-ratha (adopted daughter of loma-pāda or roma-pāda and wife of ṛṣya-śṛṅga)

jagrāha = 3^rd pers. sg. perf. grah: to seize; to catch , take captive ; to take possession of , gain over , captivate

ca: and

jahāra = 3^rd pers. sg. perf. hṛ: to take , bear , carry ; to take away , carry off , seize , deprive of , steal , rob ; to master , overpower , subdue , conquer , win , win over ; to enrapture , charm , fascinate

ca: and

勝渠仙人子 習欲隨沿流 

BUDDHACARITA 4.18: Subjugated Seer (3/5) – Dīrgha-tapas

−⏑−−¦⏑⏑⏑−¦¦⏑−−−¦⏑−⏑−

gautamaṁ dīrgha-tapasaṁ maharṣiṁ dīrgha-jīvinam |

−−−−¦⏑−−−¦¦−−−−¦⏑−⏑−

yoṣit saṁtoṣayām-āsa varṇa-sthānāvarā satī || 4.18

4.18

The great seer Gautama Dīrgha-tapas

Was long on asceticism and in longevity,

But a girl pleasured him

Who was low in colour and standing.

COMMENT:

A high-minded ascetic named Dīrgha-tapas features at the beginning of the 1^st canto of Saundara-nanda:

In high-mindedness, he was like a second Dīrgha-tapas; / And he was like a third in the mould of Kāvya and Āṅgiras, in religious thought. // SN1.4 //

When he says that the girl who pleasured Dīrgha-tapas was low in colour and standing (varṇa-sthānāvarā satī), Udāyin presumably means that she had the darker skin of one of the darker-skinned original tribes of India as opposed to the fairer skin of the Āryan conquerors who invaded India from the north.

In the background to today's verse, then, is a view that Hurry-Up Udāyin has not only about women but also about colour and standing. 

EBC, EHJ, and PO all translate varṇa as “caste,” which somehow sounds less direct, or less univerally offensive, than “colour.” But before it means “caste” varṇa means “colour.” 

I think the whole point about Udāyin might be that, beneath his friendly, well-educated and eloquent veneer, he is a man of unexamined views.

But Aśvaghoṣa, again, was not in the business of contradicting ancient Indian views on gender and race by counterposing a Buddhist view on gender and race. He was not a politician with an agenda to reform the Indian caste system. Neither was he, like some professor of a mickey-mouse subject like "gender studies," an expert in views on views. He was a buddha-ancestor whose only duty was to practise sitting-meditation, as a vehicle for abandoning all views.

VOCABULARY

gautamam (acc. sg.): m. Gautama

dīrgha-tapasam (acc. sg. m.): mfn. performing long penances ; name of several ṛṣis.

maharṣim (acc. sg. m.): great seer

dīrgha-jīvinam (acc. sg. m.): long-lived

dīrgha: mfn. long (in space and time) , lofty , high , tall

jīvin: mfn. ifc. living (a particular period or at a certain time or in a certain way)

yoṣit (nom. sg.): f. a girl , maiden , young woman , wife

saṁtoṣayām-āsa = 3^rd pers. periphrastic causative perf. saṁ- √ tuṣ: to make well satisfied or contented , propitiate , please

varṇa-sthānāvarā (nom. sg. f.): inferior in colour and standing

varṇa: m. covering ; outward appearance , exterior , form , figure , shape , colour; colour of the face , (esp.) good colour or complexion , lustre , beauty ; colour = race , species , kind , sort , character , nature ; class of men , tribe , order , caste (prob. from contrast of colour between the dark aboriginal tribes and their fair conquerors)

sthāna: n. the act of standing; station , rank , office , appointment , dignity

avara: mfn. inferior ; low , mean , unimportant, of small value ; n. ifc. the least , the lowest degree , lowest sum

satī = nom. sg. f. pres. part. as: to be

長苦行瞿曇 亦爲天后壞 

BUDDHACARITA 4.17: Subjugated Seer (2/5) – A Dubious Beggar

−−⏑−¦⏑−−−¦¦−⏑−−¦⏑−⏑−

manthāla-gautamo bhikṣur-jaṅghayā vāra-mukhyayā |

−−−⏑¦⏑−−−¦¦⏑−⏑⏑¦⏑−⏑−

piprīṣuś-ca tad-arthārthaṁ vyasūn niraharat purā || 4.17

4.17

The beggar Manthāla Gautama,

Wishing to please the royal courtesan 'Legs' Jaṅgā,

Again in olden times, with that aim in view,

Carried corpses out for burial.

COMMENT:

EHJ saw today's verse as problematic for a number of technical reasons – including the use of bhikṣu (beggar) for “a mendicant other than a Buddhist” – and he doubted the verse's authenticity.

Whether or not Aśvaghoṣa wrote these four pādas as they have come down to us in the Nepalese manuscripts, they are contained in a series of verses in which Udāyin expresses an idea about the power of women, which he measures in terms of ability to influence men.

What clue might there be in Aśvaghoṣa's records of the Buddha's teaching as to how an intelligent reader or listener might be expected to respond?

One clue that springs to mind is contained in the 15^th canto of Aśvaghoṣa's epic story of Beautiful Joy:

So for the giving up, in short, of all these ideas, / Mindfulness of inward and outward breathing, my friend, you should make into your own possession. // SN15.64 //

The Buddha is referring to a virtuous circle whereby simply being aware of breathing conduces to giving up of ideas and, conversely, recognizing that one is under the sway of an idea and abandoning that idea conduces to freer breathing.

A woman can influence a man in this direction. And a man can influence himself in this direction. But this is the kind of truth of which Hurry-Up Udāyin is strikingly unaware.

Aśvaghoṣa does not try to contradict male-centric views of women by counterposing a view of his own about women. Aśvaghoṣa's technique is rather (1) to let the likes of the Buddhist striver in Saundara-nanda, and the brahmin Hurry-Up Udāyin, express as eloquently as befits educated types such as they are, their own views and ideas; and (2) to point us in the direction of abandoning all views and giving up ideas. 

VOCABULARY

manthāla-gautamaḥ (nom. sg. m.): Manthāla-gautama

√manth = √math to stir or whirl round

mantha: m. stirring round , churning

manthā: f. a churning-stick

āla: n. spawn ; any discharge of poisonous matter from venomous animals ; yellow arsenic , orpiment ; mfn. not little or insignificant , excellent

bhikṣuḥ (nom. sg. m.): m. a beggar , mendicant , religious mendicant (esp. a Brahman in the fourth āśrama or period of his life , when he subsists entirely on alms)

jaṅghayā (inst. sg.): f. ( √ jaṁh, to kick) the shank (from the ankle to the knee); the leg

vāra-mukhyayā (inst. sg.): f. the chief of a number of harlots , a royal courtezan [See BC3.52]

vāra: m. (fr. √1. vṛ) keeping back , restraining

vārā: f. a harlot , courtezan

vāra: m. (fr. √2. vṛ) choice ; anything chosen or choice or exquisite , goods , treasure (often ifc.)

mukhya: being in or coming from or belonging to the mouth or face; being at the head or at the beginning , first , principal , chief , eminent (ifc. = the first or best or chief among)

piprīṣuḥ (nom. sg. m.): mfn. (fr. desid. √prī, to please) wishing to give pleasure

ca: and

tad-arthārtham (acc. sg. n.): in order to accomplish that aim ; with that end in view

arthārtha: mfn. effective for the accomplishment of the aim in view

vy-asūn (acc. pl. m.): the dead

vy-asu: mfn. lifeless , dead

asu: m. ( √as) breath , life

nir-aharat = 3^rd pers. sg. imperf. nir- √ hṛ : to take out or off , draw or pull out , extract from (abl.) , expel , remove , destroy; to carry out (a dead body)

purā: before , formerly , of old

令習於愛欲 以足蹈其頂