Yep, I think this whole sutta makes it clear that it’s not just good feelings turning to bad that causes suffering, but also the revelation that good feelings could be even better. 1st Jhana isn’t as good as 2nd Jhana, etc….until one realizes that all feelings hinge on greed, hatred, and delusion.
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The one doesn’t need to exclude another. Can’t it mean both as both are supporting letting go?
Yes, this is an important phrase for them. However, they gloss over the tampi bit in yampicchaṁ na labhati tampi dukkhaṁ, which indicates that this is one type of suffering and not the definition of it (a pedantic translation would read “not getting what is desired, too, is suffering”).
It is in saṅkhittena pañcupādānakkhandhā dukkhā that dukkha gets fully defined: the entire gamut of experience, past, present and future. For me, this is identical to yaṁ kiñci vedayitaṁ, taṁ dukkhasmiṁ (whatever is felt, is suffering), implying all-encompassing saṅkhāra-dukkhatā.
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Interesting question. Oddly, there seems to be ongoing global suffering about this very question of non-caring as many choose ignorance.
Covid out there waits,
Quite impermanent it is,
Caring not we die?
I wonder how Waharaka addresses this:
MN44:24.4: Neutral feeling is pleasant when there is knowledge, and painful when there is ignorance.”
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Thanks for the many interesting remarks, this is a really helpful thread. I’ll just make a few comments.
As some have noted below, there are good answers to this; the issue, however, is one of communication rather than doctrine. The Waharaka group have proven themselves effective communicators and rhetoricians, and it is hard to respond to that when all you have known is people agreeing with you.
Sorry, but I have to disagree. The “Mahasanghikas were more traditional” is based on a series of misreadings of historical accounts.
I’ve addressed this in my sects & Sectarianism and accompanying essays.
https://santifm.org/santipada/2010/mahasaṅghika-the-earliest-vinaya/
The first schism was based on a disagreement over the status of the arahant, i.e. the so-called “five points”. Differences in Vinaya and texts arose later. The Dipavamsa, which I am citing here, stems from perhaps 500 years after the schism, and represents the views of Theravadins at that time.
We have enough, I think. Have you tried reading the Mahavastu? Or the Lokuttaravada Vinaya? There are more spelling variations in a paragraph than you find in the whole Pali canon.
I just wrote that, and thought, huh, that sounds hyperbolic, I should check! So I opened a random page in the Lokuttaravada Vinaya:
https://suttacentral.net/san-lo-bi-vb-ss19/san/roth
And checked for what should be very basic, the name of the rule. And yep, in the same paragraph we find saṁghātiṣeśa and saṁghātiśeṣa. So yes, that’s more spelling variation in this word in one paragraph than literally the entire Pali Canon. Another word, samvāsa and saṁvāsa, also in the same paragraph. Coming from a Pali background, it’s just a whole different level in terms of textual consistency and precision.
My point is not that it’s better or worse. Maybe they were meditating instead of editing texts all day. Maybe less-edited texts better represent original sources. But it’s easy to understand why the Theravadins had a poor opinion about Mahasanghika texts.
Indeed. The reaction of the orthodoxy has been to enforce orthodoxy; but that is just a sign of weakness. Better to spend some time engaging with different views and perspectives, and get used to challenging your assumptions.
And therein lies the shame of it all. So far as I can tell, they seem to be well-intentioned reformers. I would like to be on their side.
Oh, I didn’t know that. I had a lengthy discussion with him in Colombo a couple of years ago.
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Is this really a feature peculiar to Mahāsāṃghika texts? My impression from admittedly cursory readings is that late-dated Sanskrit finds in northern India are generally in a very poor state. I once spent time romanizing parts of the Śatasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā so I could compare it to Chinese, and it was similar situation. The copyists just didn’t seem to really care by the medieval era after Buddhism was basically a distant memory. It’s similar case with some of the really old finds in Afghanistan, but it appears that they were often the leftovers of people learning to write and copy texts sometimes, or perhaps it was ordinary people who were copying texts for merit to be buried somewhere in the ground.
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I’m wondering if you or others from Sri Lanka can comment on the institutional religious education of lay people in Sri Lanka and how that might be a factor in the spread of this movement.
As I understand it, early childhood religious education focuses mostly on the life of the Buddha, “Buddhist Values”, and Jataka stories. Then in the older grades there is more attention to basic concepts, but they are taught in the way one might teach physics or history rather than as an inspirational religious subject. Then any education after that in the higher grades or university is really just Abhidhamma, also taught as a technical subject with information to be mastered.
Is this correct? And if so, does the fact that educated Buddhists would be attracted by something more practical than the Abhidhamma they were taught put them at risk for a novel approach to the suttas, which in this case they had never been taught?
I don’t disagree, but it seems like this movement is so untethered from scriptural reality that this won’t help. It’s very clear that debating with them is pointless. You can see this in a thread devoted to his teachings on DhammaWheel. It has over 1,300 posts, half of which are a true believer defending their novel interpretations.
I can’t get on board with this. There are many skillful ways of popularizing suttas and not going along with Abhidhamma/commentarial interpretations that don’t involve the distortions being promoted. My understanding is that they are not reformers, they are inventors taking advantage of the weaknesses of an established orthodoxy. I think they actually do a disservice to the real reform movements by creating a rather strong argument in favour of orthodoxy. (Which I don’t agree with, btw.)
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Well maybe, I don’t know. It’s certainly the case for Gandhari, as far as I know, so there’s that.
But the thing is, for the Mahavihara, the immediate opposition was the Mahasanghika. Probably because they both had monasteries in Andhra Pradesh, so they butted up against each other. So even if the state of manuscripts generally were poor, the ones that they knew of were the Mahasanghikas.
I mean at the end of the day, the facts remain: the Dipavamsa launches a scathing attack on the Mahasanghika on linguistic and textual grounds; and the criticisms well describe how BHS texts look from the perspective of someone used to Pali. It seems like we have a case of 2 + 2 here.
Oh I agree. This isn’t for them, it’s for the rest of everyone. The Sangha needs to get better at adapting and communicating. And that means giving people some breathing space to be vulnerable and personal, to try things out, to engage with criticism and argumentation.
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To be fair to Waharaka, they do care a great deal about other people. Like most religious organisations, they engage in quite a lot of charity work.
The ‘uncaring’ I was referring to was of a more fundamental kind, which I’ll try to illustrate with an example.
Consider a grain of sand out there somewhere, which is of no consequence. Most people (except perhaps the Jains) would be indifferent to the impermanence of this particular grain of sand. It is an aniccatā that does not seem to cause dukkha.
According to the Ābhidhammika interpretation, the impermanence of this grain of sand is indeed suffering. For them, objectively real things in the world (comprising of fundamental particles) are arising and falling, and thus suffering. For whom? No one knows.
With the Waharaka aniccha interpretation, dukkha is caused by things that are desired: they never remain as one wishes (which is ‘conventional’ anatta), and not to have what is desired is suffering (yampicchaṁ na labhati dukkhaṁ).
If I may propose an alternative Early Buddhist interpretation: the world is the world of subjective experience (it is the ‘all’ — SN 35.32). For the puthujjana, the world reflects a self; the self depends on the [things in the] world. i.e., for the puthujjana, there is nothing not grasped as ‘mine’ (a la mūlapariyāya, MN 1). For things in the world to be impermanent is for the self to be impermanent (as each thing is part of the subjective experience that is grasped as ‘mine, I, my self’). The impermanence of the grain of sand, being part of the world that reflects a self, causes suffering (saṅkhāra-dukkhatā) to one who experiences it.
This is a short expansion of the footnote 13 in the OP where I stated:
That there is nothing not grasped as ‘mine’ by the puthujjana (unawakened worldling) according to Early Buddhist teachings (MN 1 at MN I 1) and that aniccatā is entirely subjective for a self that feels (AN 3.61 at AN I 174), is a discussion beyond the scope of this paper.
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My school days are in the distant past, but the Buddhist ‘periods’ made a lasting impression on me for being the most boring subject of all. The curriculum was so utterly boring for both teachers and students that, at arguably the best school in the country, we had a teacher who would come in to the class, ask us to read the textbook, and promptly fall asleep on his chair until the bell rang.
Perhaps things are better now, I’m not sure.
The interest in the Suttas was kindled by Ven. Kiribathgoda Ñāṇānanda and his Mahamevna movement. His charismatic teaching style, devotion to the suttas and translations of the Pali Nikāyas (despite technical inaccuracies) inspired many Buddhists to seek out what the Buddha had actually taught. Mahamevna seems to be past their heyday but still remains a popular institution with strong lay support. They seem to have eased up on the urgency though: at the beginning, Mahamevna was all about trying to realise the Dhamma in this very life, and of late they seem to encourage being born in a heavenly realm and then realising the Dhamma there.
But the change they brought about in informal Buddhist education seems to endure.
The response from the traditional quarters has been to double down on the Abhidhamma. Unfortunately it remains an inaccessible teaching to many, possibly by design. Even for those whom it is accessible, it seems to bring about little benefit—what use is there in a theory which has unverifiability built into it? The late Ven. Nauyane Ariyadhamma Mahāthera, for example, was a beloved Ābhidhammika teacher who inspired many by his conduct, compassion and wisdom, but I’m not sure how many people actually understood his Abhidhamma teachings. Through a good orator like him, the Abhidhamma categories sound so deep and inviting, but my impression is that people like to consider the ‘higher teaching’ deep and venerate it, but not really dig into it.
It is into this background that Waharaka arrived with their message that one can realise the Dhamma in this very life, if only the correct Dhamma were to be heard. An arahant has arisen in the world from whom one can hear the true Dhamma, for it is in the act of listening—and listening alone—that one can attain sotāpatti.
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I appreciate your perspective and background on all this, it’s really interesting and useful!
Exactly, the scope of the teaching is the four noble truths. It’s a case where the Abhidhammic overreach, to attempt to define literally all existing things, creates unnecessary problems.
One of the things that is a little frustrating for me, I confess, is that we have been doing this all along. Starting, in my case, with Ajahn Brahm, we have been considering, discussing, and reflecting on many of these same issues for decades. None of us are teaching classical Theravada Abhidhamma, we are well aware of the pitfalls, and have been constantly saying that what we are teaching is early Buddhism, not Abhidhamma. Yet people still seem surprised when such problems are raised, as if no-one has noticed it before. Yes, we have, we just don’t use it to make a platform for attacking other Buddhists and defining ourselves as unique rediscoverers of lost ancient yada yada. It’s just normal, it’s part of a healthy inquiring mind. Orthodox Theravada is alright, it has many good features! I’m teaching a course right now on “Visuddhimagga for Sutta Lovers”, and there’s a lot of interesting stuff there! But it has its limitations, too, like all things in the world. But reformers who want to just sweep everything away end up just making more of a mess. /rant
I wrote an essay arguing this, many years ago. Somewhat tongue in cheek, I suggested the purpose of the Abhidhamma was to create inaccessibility, so that its custodians would become the unimpeachable guardians of of the Dhamma treasure, locked away in its cabinet. In Thailand, for example, the primary use of Abhidhamma texts is as quasi-magical incantations.
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Unfortunately the reach of these discussions remain limited in the Theravada stronghold of Sri Lanka. The same people who would flock in their thousands to a Dhamma talk from Ajahn Brahm would conveniently turn a deaf ear to his comments that go against the traditional Abhidhammic interpretation.
The pride associated with the preservation of the Tipitaka and the commentaries for centuries against all kinds of challenges remains an important part of the Sri Lankan Buddhist identity (and rightly so, I believe). This pride becomes an obstacle when it leads one to see critical evaluation of those texts as an attempt at destroying them—it then becomes yet another challenge against which the Sri Lankan Buddhists must rally, in order to protect the word of the Buddha for the world (which is their assigned duty, according to the Mahavaṃsa).
The idea that one can do both—have a sense of gratitude and pride for the admirable work of our ancestors, and evaluate the texts with an appreciation for their historic development—doesn’t seem to have gained any traction. A faithful follower of the Buddha who doesn’t take the Tipitaka and commentaries (and sub commentaries and so on) at face value is an enigma to most Sri Lankan Buddhists.
This can be seen even in the opposition to the draconian Tripitaka Conservation Act: hardly anyone commented on how putting the Dhamma into actual practice might require going against some of the texts, either because they don’t dare, or more likely, because they too take all the texts specified in the Act at face value, as the word of the Buddha and arahants. Mahamevna remained silent on the Act, the same way they remain silent on the Abhidhamma, which is the main criticism against them.
This timidity and/or devotion is seen even among Sri Lankan academics. If they have a critical attitude, it is certainly not reflected in their public discourse. It is all wrapped up in academic jargon and published where no Sinhala-speaking Buddhist would see them: in academic journals, mostly by and for whom Buddhism is just a curiosity and not a matter of practice.
The rare individual who dares to question the traditional interpretation would have to do so expecting to be labelled a heretic—as was the case with the brilliant scholar and practitioner, late Ven. Katukurunde Ñāṇananda Mahāthera (author of Concept and Reality, The Magic of the Mind and Nibbāna, the Mind Stilled).
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Hmm. There is currently a shortage of sand worldwide. Conventionally, we treat sand as permanent. But it is not. That ignorance is causing suffering.
The difficulty with the “uncaring” premise is that it is mired in identity view. Identity concerns itself about dividing the world into “care about” and “don’t care about”.
So really, this “uncaring” is rooted in a desire to not bother. And if the Waharaka accept this (which their charitable work would seem to suggest), then perhaps the interpretations are not so different.
MN1 does say:
MN1:25.2: But then they identify with all …
But that is given as an example of identification. Indeed, we see that MN1 also says:
MN1:17.2: But then they identify with the dimension of nothingness …
The danger with the Waharaka question is not the first quote. It is the latter quote. This “uncaring” falls into the abyss of nothingness. It is still identification and it still causes suffering.
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I have not huge knowledges about abhidhamma, suttas, Pali language, I am not native English speaker and I am also not young anymore to dig deep, so I rely on introspection instead.
Reading various opinions both helps and confuses. Last year I have spent a lot of time contemplating on three words - anicca, dukkha, anatta and their meanings. Both according to classic Theravada definition and also according to ven. Waharaka Thero.
As said here, when considering the world as internal, experienced by our internal sense faculties / aggregates, then I struggle to go with classic definition of anatta as not-self.
I ended up with explanation of anatta as “self, which falsely identify itself as having essence, having things under its control”. It can be presented by more ways, like “kind of helpless self”.
If one experiences dukkha, then one experiences anatta. They both are characteristics of this world, experienced by ordinary person. If one stops experiencing the dukkha, then one stops experiencing anatta.
If anatta would be not-self, then one stops experiencing not-self, which has no sense. But it would be possible to say a life stream finally experiences not-self. This would be the world characteristic of not-self equalling to its goal/ true state, and that is what doesn’t make sense too.
On the other side, it would make sense to say, that a life stream then stops experience itself falsely, stops experiencing helplessness, stops seeing (falsely) that there is an essence in this particular existence in this world.
This also would correspond to phrases from suttas like: “What is anatta, you should see as it truly is - this is not mine, I am not this, this is not myself.” (from memory 
)
Basis for holding on something like I, or me, is a belief of having something inside which can be of essence (or of control). As for body (as example), we can not say “let my body to be like this, let my body not to be like this”. Etc.
I am still open to any explanations, but also open to a view, that some translations might be not exactly correct. And some might be crucial to explain further to avoid any misinterpretation in future. (Example: For dukkha translated as suffering is not perfect, as dukkha covers much wider range of discontent feelings, and many choose to translate it by using various words…)
For me, ven. Waharaka Thero brought his views, it is up to individual to consider them, to think about them.
Could you give an example of this? I’m curious what you are thinking of.
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We could always talk about the antarabhava?
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The draft of the Act was, among other things, “to conserve and preserve Theravada Thripitaka, Atthakatha and Teeka (sic) in its pristine and unadulterated state.”
In my opinion, in practice, all parts of the commentarial literature which posits an objective reality that is independent of one who experiences it, is not only not conducive to practice but a dangerous hindrance.
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Oh dear, I wonder if any more recent scholarship has been done of the matter. I sort of considered the matter to have been closed. How embarrassing! 
Well, we know the Pali texts have, over time, been more standardized linguistically, with more and more occurring in the medieval period (something which happened in parallel to the developments in Pali grammar in Sri Lanka) and even more recently (with the modern councils). So it’s just as possible that the non-standard language is reflecting older forms (but I lack the expertise to comment further on this).
Where can one find more about this, which section of the Dipavamsa?
Hmm I am not so sure Bhante, though its certainly possible that a kind of monastic elitism may have been one of the various forces at work in the development of some forms of Abhidharma.
However, there also seem to be movement in the opposite direction, that is, towards using Abhidharma as a way to present the full scope of the Dharma in a shorter, more digestible format (which at the same time can be unfolded into more complex discussions).
For example, I am currently studying the Abhidharmakosha, it is very fascinating. What strikes me the most about it though is how it is a series of short, compressed verses, that contain all this very rich and intricate content that presents a full overview of the Dharma (as understood in the northern tradition of course).
Now, in ancient India, if one wanted an overview of the Dharma, before the widespread access to writing, you’d have to either live with a teacher who has memorized the Agamas (and work to try to memorize some of it yourself, or pay to have it copied down) or find a monastery with a set of Agamas and spend some time there reading it.
However, the alternative which developed was to get yourself one of these (relatively) short Abhidharma introductions (the Abhidharmahrdaya being one of the earliest of these, and the AKB being based on it), and study that. These things were much more portable (whether we are talking about written texts or just easier to memorize). So, I think, that in some ways, there were some trends in Abhidharma that also tried to make things easier and more digestible for folks, instead of the other way around. We also have these kinds of things in Theravada, with little booklets on Abhidhamma that are popular.
This is, of course, the same debate which occurred in India in the northern Abhidharma tradition, with the Vaibhasika school being the arch-realists, and the Sautrantika school being the semi-nominalists (which then the Madhyamaka school of Nagarjuna took to its ultimate pan-nominalist conclusion).
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Vaibhāṣika also had a nominalist aspect to it. Since they, in my view, correctly had an idea of two truths some “things” were only existent in name only, whilst others were not. The self for example is a nominal existent to them, whereas vedanā was substantially existent (dravyasat). If you are interested in learning about Sarvāstivāda-Vaibhāṣika and Sautrāntika I would recommend Ven. Dhammajoti’s “Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma” and “Abhidharma Abhidharma Doctrines and Controversies on Perception”. I’m reading both myself. Fascinating stuff. It’s nice to actually read the Sarvāstivādin arguments in their own words. Too often we only hear them from their opponents, with little or no defence from their side. The same usually with arguments over sabhāva in our times. The majority of the time one position is put forward, namely that of Ven. Nāgārjuna. Arguments in favour of the concept are hardly ever heard, or voiced even, in my experience.
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Indeed, but what I meant was, they were realists with regards to numerous dharmas which the Sautrantikas were nominalists about (such as the past and the future, “possesion” or prapti, etc).