Could Daṇḍapāṇi be a Pāśhupata seeking dishonor in the Honey-Cake Sutta?

[Nicole]

I have been eagerly reading “The Shape of Ancient Thought” by Thomas McEvilley. It has created a lot of connections for me between Buddhism, Indo-Europeans, philosophy, mythology, and history. Chapter Nine “Cynics and Pāśhupatas” is particularly intriguing and could possibly add a new interpretation to Madhupiṇḍikasutta (Honey-Cake sutta).

In the Madhupiṇḍikasutta, the Buddha encounters Daṇḍapāṇi, a combative person whose name indicates that he carries a staff. When Daṇḍapāṇi asks the Buddha what his doctrine is, the Buddha’s response is a little curious because he answers “my doctrine is such that one does not conflict with anyone in this world” rather than saying anything about Four Noble Truths, Noble Eightfold Path, etc.

Bhante @Sujato’s translator’s note shares that the Mahāvaṁsa explains Daṇḍapāṇi as a relative of the Buddha who has a grudge over Siddhattha abandoning his wife and child. The Mahāvaṁsa’s explanation is possible and Daṇḍapāṇi’s grudge makes sense as a reaction that a family member might have to Siddhattha’s going forth. However, the Mahāvaṁsa is a history of Sri Lanka composed around 1000 years after the time of the Buddha.

From McEvilley’s book, there was a group at the time of the Buddha called the cult of Śīva Pāśhupata who was known to carry a staff (Daṇḍa) and purposefully create fights and receive the resulting abuse as a spiritual practice of seeking dishonor. A practitioner did this based on an idea of black magic karma, thinking they could drain off someone else’s good karma and secretly transfer to them the practitioner’s bad karma. This cult is referenced in the Mahābhārata, which was composed around 100 to 200 years after the Buddha lived. Makkhali Gosāla and Mahāvīra were also known to practice seeking dishonor.

I’m wondering if Daṇḍapāṇi in the Madhupiṇḍikasutta is actually a Pāśhupata (or something similar) seeking dishonor rather than a disgruntled relative of the Buddha. If that is indeed the case, then the Buddha’s response that “my doctrine is such that one does not conflict with anyone in this world” seems to make much more sense. It would be an answer that goes directly to the heart of another ascetic’s wrong view.

Any thoughts?

Here are the relevant pages from McEvilley’s book for more context:

[saavaka]

I’m pretty sure “staff-carrying ascetic” was a term for a type of ascetic, like “matted-hair ascetic”.

I personally doubt Ājīvikism has any connection to the Pāśupatas. The connections made in the portions you showed are really tenuous (‘both include reanimation in some form’, ‘there’s one story where a commonly stereotyped Jain character known for being a worse ascetic than Mahāvīra is said to have been a bad ascetic so it must have been intentional self-defacement’), and even if we assume Makkhali Gosāla was a precursor to the group it must have been indirectly because he founded his own distinct religion that existed for as long as two millennia (dying out around 1500 CE) including roughly 1,000 years of coexistence with Pāśupata Shaivism.

I’m not sure about Daṇḍapāṇi, but I think it’s more likely that he was either an actual ascetic, whether independent, an Ājīvika or part of an obscure group, or a literary invention.

[srkris]

Pāśupatas get that name as they are followers of Paśupati (‘paśūnāṁ patiḥ’, i.e. lord of cattle/animals), and that is a name of the god Rudra/Śiva in the Vedas. However Pāśupatas are not any/all followers of Śiva, they are a particular defined sect of Śaivas (followers of Śiva). There is nothing to indicate that Daṇḍapāṇi is even a Śaiva, leave alone a Pāśupata Śaiva, and such empty guesses fall really short of any evidence based scholarship.

Now coming to the name Daṇḍapāṇi, you would find that this is a very common type of name. Daṇḍa means stick and pāṇi means hand, that does not mean everyone named Daṇḍapāṇi held/holds a stick in his hand. You will find thousands of Daṇḍapāṇis in India even now, it is and was a common name. It is a name of the god Kumāra / Skanda (short for daṇḍāyudhapāṇi, and is so called as he bears a daṇḍa-āyudha i.e. a spear in his hand). Similar names from non-Buddhist Sanskrit literature are as follows:

Vajrapāṇi = Weilder of the diamond-weapon i.e. the thunderbolt - a name of the Vedic god Indra/Śakra.
Kodaṇḍapāṇi = One who wields the famous bow called Kodaṇḍa i.e. Rāma
Pinākapāṇi = One who wields the famous bow called Pināka i.e. Śiva
Kiraṇapāṇi = The Sūrya (Sun) conceptualized as a deity and bearing his kiraṇa (rays of light) in his hand.
Cakrapāṇi = Viṣṇu who wields the Sudarśana-Cakra in his hand
Śārṅgapāṇi = One who bears the Śārṅga bow i.e. Viṣṇu
Śūlapāṇi = One who bears the śūla (trident) i.e. Rudra/Śiva.
Śaṅkhapāṇi = One who carries a śaṅkha (conch) in his hand i.e. Viṣṇu

So this type of compounding (called bahuvrīhi) name is quite widely used, and such names are virtually in the thousands. They dont always have a lived reality behind them, particularly when they are used as proper names as in the case of the Madhupiṇdaka Sūkta that you have referred to.

[sujato]

Hey Nicole, thanks for the post, to which my attention was recently drawn by Sabbamitta.

I too like McEvilley’s book, it’s really interesting and thought-provoking. However, it is obvious reading it that he is a western classical scholar whose knowledge of India culture is secondhand. He has a very loose grasp of what was said where and by whom. And, like virtually all American scholars, he has no grounding in early Buddhism at all, and only cites secondary literature.

Now those limitations aside—and who does not have limitations?—let’s look at the specifics.

@Nicole

Bhante @Sujato’s translator’s note shares that the Mahāvaṁsa explains Daṇḍapāṇi as a relative of the Buddha who has a grudge over Siddhattha abandoning his wife and child.

That’s not quite right. I give the Mahavamsa and Lalitavistara as examples of the Buddha’s relationship with Dandapani as recorded in Buddhist literature. There will doubless be others. But what they agree on is that he was, in fact, a family member. And that this detail is agreed on by two divergent schools of Buddhism—one in Sri Lanka, one in Kashmir—suggests that it is old and probably authentic. Of course he could be both the Buddha’s family and an ascetic.

@Nicole

there was a group at the time of the Buddha called the cult of Śīva Pāśhupata who was known to carry a staff (Daṇḍa)

There’s no real evidence for this. There may have been some staff-bearing ascetics, but no contemporary mentions of this particular sect. Or indeed of daṇḍapāṇī ascetics at all, at least not in the suttas.

MN 18 doesn’t use any descriptor that would identify Dandapani as an ascetic, which we would normally expect. The only detail that might support this is that the Buddha addresses him with the respectful āvuso (“elder”). But this could simply be because he was, in fact, Siddhattha’s elder, namely his uncle.

As for the “seeking dishonor”, McEvilley is again blurring his sources. The quotes from Manu are not talking about a practice of seeking dishonor, but are rhetoric to stop students from seeking honor and praise. There are many similar statements in the Suttas, but as usual McEvilley has not read them. The “seeking dishonor” practice that he cites is much later, and I don’t see any evidence for it in the Buddha’s time.

He also cites the Mahābhārata as “late centuries BC”, which is not really useful. The Mahābhārata was compiled over a long period. The sources predate the Buddha, while the final form is probably mid centuries CE. So you can’t really argue from the Mahabharata to an early date, at least not without first establishing that the specific passage in question is early.

Is it nonetheless possible that Dandapani was an ascetic of some kind? It’s possible, but so far I haven’t seen any evidence for it.

@saavaka

I personally doubt Ājīvikism has any connection to the Pāśupatas

I agree, it’s very hand-wavy. It’s unfortunate, TBH I think McEvilley’s book has value. I think he did it as a part time labor of love and ended up with this huge manuscript that, while well-written and often persuasive, would have benefited by collaboration with an Indologist.