critical study of Karma theory in early Buddhism

Theory of Kamma in Early Buddhism

 

Name: Dai Sung Han

Introduction

Kamma is one most fundamental Buddhist philosophy which necessarily leads to the concept of rebirth and liberation. Scholars unanimously agree at the importance of the theory in Buddhist practice and its soteriology. The great Etienne Lamotte wrote:

‘The doctrine of the act, karman, is the keystone of the entire Buddhist

edifice; the act is the ultimate explanation of existences and of the world;

the Buddhist philosophers built up their philosophies as a function of karma.’

 

Etymological and general meaning

The word karma derives from the verbal root kṛ, which means "do, make, perform, accomplish." The nominative singular form of the neuter word karman means 'act, action, performance, deed.' It is believed in the system of Indian faiths that if a deed once carried out, it must bears a result. In this connection the plight of present condition attributed to the former deeds which committed by oneself. In Indian religions Karma was not simply good or bad; to a greater or lesser extent it was all bad. Thus karma is the engine which drives the wheel of the cycle of uncontrolled rebirth for each being.

 

Attitude of the Buddha toward the karma theory

In spite of such importance and fundamental position the theory of karma it was not explained in detail in the early sutras, as found in the Pali Canon and the Agamas preserved in Chinese translation, for the concept was taking granted to the people of the ancient India. Such fact is well expressed by Bruce Matthews: "there is no single major systematic exposition" on the subject of karma and "an account has to be put together from the dozens of places where karma is mentioned in the texts." (Post-Classical Developments in the Concepts of Karma and Rebirth in Theravada Buddhism, 1986)

 

Origin and development of the theory in Indian religions

We first can track the idea of karma in Brahmanical religion which was dominant in the society then. As the Prof. R. Gombrich propounded “The central teachings of the Buddha came as a response to the central teachings of the old Upanishads, notably the Brhadarajyaka,” we can find the original meaning of karma in the context of Upanishads. The scholar introduced the concept of karma of Upanishads as following:

“Man is reborn according to the quality of his works (karman). ‘Works’ refers to

following ritual prescriptions. The typical karman is a sacrifice; this is normally

positive. Violating a ritual norm is negative. Each such act has a given, finite result,

positive or negative: a purifying act will be rewarded, a bad/polluting act punished(How Buddhism began, 1996 ).”

 

It is obvious from above explanation that the early Brahmanical religion’s concept of karma is purely ritualistic. We came to know now that there were various versions of theory of karma but we know very little about any of the others except the Jain, and from the aspect of Jain theory of karma, we can see that the Buddha was not alone in opposing the brahmanical concept of karma. Jain conceptualized karma as a kind of dust or dirt which clung to the soul, which too was material, whenever one acted. The dust weighed down the soul and kept it in this world, eventually to be reborn in another body. Bad deeds were worse than good deeds, producing worse karmic dirt, but to attain liberation one had to expunge all karma from the soul so that it could float, weightless, to the top of the universe. Buddhism shares most of the Jain concept of kamma in early canons, thus it says that even good deed should be removed in order to achieve the summon-bonum. Such fact well expressed in following sutta:

      “The karma done with one of these three virtues, caused by it, arising out of it,

is skilful, not blameworthy, and brings happiness;

it conduces to the destruction of karma, not to the arising of karma.”

(Avguttara Nikaya (sutta III, 108 or I, 263))

 

Philosophical implication

In Buddhism, the main function of karma is meant to refute pre-determinism, fatalism or accidentalism. Since all these ideas destroy human motivation and effort the Buddha categorically denied it through inculcation of the karma theory:

1. Pubbekatahetuvada: The belief that all happiness and suffering, including all future happiness and suffering, arise from previous karma, and human beings can exercise no volition to affect future results (Past-action determinism).
2. Issaranimmanahetuvada: The belief that all happiness and suffering are caused by the directives of a Supreme Being (Theistic determinism).
3. Ahetu-appaccaya-vada: The belief that all happiness and suffering are random, having no cause (Indeterminism or Accidentalism).

Thus Buddha's theory of karma is one of strongest tool to teach the concept of causality. Any given action (hetu) may cause all sorts of results (vipāka). In the Abhidharma they are referred to by specific names for the sake of clarity, karmic causes being the "cause of results" ( vipāka-hetu) and the karmic results being the "resultant fruit" ( vipāka-phala). The Buddha declared that the precise working of how karma comes to fruition was one of the four incomprehensibles (P. acinteyya or acinnteyyāni) (AN.2.80), but the Buddha sees the workings of karma with his "superhuman eye."

 

Further development in Buddhism

The karma theory analyzed and systematized intensively when it introduced in Buddhism. The ritualistic concept of Brahmanical karma transformed into fundamental ethical teaching of the Buddha. Buddhist first divided the karma into two categories, and clarified its condition depend upon personality:

l  Kusala kamma (skilful deed): It is done with non-greed (alobhapakatam), non-hatred (adosapakatam) and non-delusion (amohapakatam). It is not blameworthy (anavajjam), and brings happiness (sukha-vipaka);

it conduces to the destruction of karma, not to the arising of karma (kammanirodhaya samvattati, na kammasamudayaya samvattati).

l  Akusala kamma: It is done with greed (lobhapakatam), hatred (dosapakatam) and delusion (mohapakatam). It is blameworthy (savajjam), and brings happiness (dukkha-vipaka); it conduces to the arising of karma, not to the destruction of karma(kammasamudayaya samvattati, na kammanirodhaya samvattati) (Avguttara Nikaya A III, 108 or I, 263)

l  Karmic result occurs depend on personality:  In the Buddhist theory of karma, the karmic effect of a deed is not determined solely by the deed itself, but also by the nature of the person who commits the deed. A discourse in the Avguttara Nikaya (AN.1.249) indicates this conditionality; “In the case of a person who has proper culture of the body, behavior, thought and intelligence ··· the consequences of a similar evil action are to be experienced in this very life, and sometimes may not appear at all.”

 

In spite of the some early suttas explicitly say of destruction of karma (kammanirodhaya samvattati) and its effectiveness of the consequences dependent upon the personality, later Buddhism replace it with strong dogma of essential causality of karma theory, says that once a deed is committed the individual must receive the consequence. This change of the view on the effectiveness on karma theory caused new problems, hence precipitated further development of the theory.

“The Buddha denied one could avoid experiencing the result of a karmic deed

once it's been committed (AN 5.292).”

 

Later Buddhist simply equates kusala karma with cause of worldly happiness and akusala kamma with cause of worldly unhappiness. As everyone has to experience their own karma in the developed theory, the Buddha and arahats also bound by the kusala karma and has to reborn again to receive the consequence of the results. In order to avoid such contradiction Buddhist invented other concepts like avyakata or kiriya. Here saints are being considered to conceive a thought which is neither kusala nor akusala, thus they could escape from the karmic resultant.

l  Avyakata : 'indeterminate' - i.e. neither determined as karmmically 'wholesome' nor as 'unwholesome' - are the karmmically neutral. They are either mere karma-results (vipaka) or they are karmmically independent functions (kiriya-citta).

l  Kiriya: It is a term first used in the Abh. Canon; Once one has attained liberation one does not generate any further karma, and the corresponding states of mind are called in Pali Kiriya.

Unfortunately the later Buddhist forgot the earlier definition of the kusala and akusala, thus they could not understand the logical fallacy inherited in it that a deed cannot be neither greed nor non-greed, neither hatred or non-hatred and neither-delusion nor non-delusion, i.e., since the kiriya is not a mental state of greed, hatred and delusion, it should be non-greed, non-hatred and non-delusion (kusala). One might argue as following “In Buddhism, the term karma refers only to samsāric actions, the workings of which are modeled by the twelve nidanas of dependent origination, not actions committed by Arhats and Buddhas,” as in Wikipedia, if they don’t know “Karmic result occurs depend on personality (AN.1.249).”

Active ethcisation of the theory of karma reached the conclusion that the criterion of the moral behavior should be the motivation. In the Nibbedhika Sutta (Avguttara Nikaya 6.63) it is recorded:

"Intention (P. cetana, S. cetanā) I tell you, is kamma. Intending, one does kamma by way of body, speech, and intellect (Cetanaham, bhikkhave, kammam vadami. Cetayitva kammam karoti– kayena vacaya manasa)."

 

This concept would necessarily lead to the logical conclusion that the Nyanatiloka reached:

“Thus the Buddhist term 'kamma' by no means signifies the result of actions.” But this kind of interpretation of karma cannot be sustained if we see other suttas:

“The Buddha makes a basic distinction between past karma (purānakamma)

which has already been incurred (karma as result), and karma being created    

in the present (navakamma).” SN.4.132

 

In addition, such evolution of the karma theory criticized by Buddhist themselves for its unsustainability:

“Bodily action is vain, verbal action is vain, only mental action is real.” MN.3.208

 

Karma and Nirvana

After redefining the concept of kusala and akusala karma by later Buddhist, there is an obvious distinction between worldly, wholesome karma that leads to samsāric happiness (like birth in higher realms), and path-consciousness (kiriyā) which leads to enlightenment and nirvana. On this account Samuel’s raising dissatisfaction in the Buddhist philosophy is legitimate:

 

“There is an apparent contradiction between the doctrine of karma and the central insight of the Buddhist Enlightenment . . . . The latter involves a going beyond the desires, hatreds, and motivations of the everyday world. How can it be reconciled with

a teaching in which certain actions are proper and to be cultivated, and others are not? The Buddhist answer to this paradox has remained essentially the same since the days of the early Sutras (1993: Civilized Shamans, Washington and London).”

 

If we go back to the beginning as long as when the Buddhist view of karma is close to that of Jain, there would be no such contradiction for kusala karma are being defined as reducing or removing greed, hatred and delusion.

 

Transfer of merit (patti-dāna)

As Prof. R. Gombrich pointed out rightly, “the idea that many properties we are accustomed to thinking of as non-transferable can in fact be transferred was probably part of a widespread popular belief, and in partly accepting it Buddhism was moving towards the general norm (How Buddhism began, 1996 ).” Initially many scholars believed that the transfer of merit was at first Mahāyāna practice and its acceptance in Therava tradition being due to Mahāyānist influence, but it is more plausible to say that Theravadin came to accept the practice of transfer of merit as it is then common practice of whole society of India.

In the Milindapañha, Nāgasena allows for the possibility of the transfer of merit to humans and one of the four classes of petas, but Nāgasena makes it clear that demerit cannot be transferred. The Petavatthu, which is fully canonical, endorses the transfer of merit even more widely, including the possibility of sharing merit with all petas.

Such practice of transfer of merit undermined the fundamental teaching of causality and ethic of the Buddha who says that one’s future sole decided by own deed and intention. The philosophy of Buddhism had huge blow of corruption since Buddhist accept the evil practice, and it caused subversion of whole teaching of the Buddha. 

 

References                            

• B. C. Law (1933) A History of Pali Literature: Indica Books.

• K. L. Hazra (1994) Pali Language and literature: D.K.Printworld(P) Ltd.

• Erich Frauwaller (2010) The Philosophy of Buddhism, Tr. Gelong Lodro Sangpo: Motilal Banarsidass.

• G.P.Malalasekera (1971) Encyclopidea of Buddhism : Government press, Ceylon.

• M.Monier-Williams (2002) Sanskrit-English Dictionary : Motilal Banarsidass.

• Nyanatiloka (1980) Buddhist Dictionary : Buddhist Publication society.

• Rhys Davids (1921) Pali-English Dictionary : Pali Text Society.

• R. Gombrich How Buddhism began (1996) : Athlone press.

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