Early Buddhism: An Article by Bhikkhu Anālayo

Discussion
42

The irony here is that all Buddhists abandoned so-called “early Buddhism” over 2000 years ago. That’s why we have to reconstruct it from texts. “Early Buddhism” didn’t exist as a category until we invented it. The real question here is, why did you all feel the need to invent it. What was so very dissatisfying with modern Buddhism that necessitated this project?

The other irony is that those texts you rely on to reconstruct “early Buddhism” don’t actually reflect early Buddhism. Early Buddhism died out before writing was used in India. Pali texts are the Mahavihāra version of Theravāda Buddhism from the 5th century. The oldest Pali manuscript in existence is also from the 5th century. And the idea that Pali was written down earlier is also first attested in the 5th century.

The Gāndhārī corpus is not a canon, and includes numerous Mahāyāna texts. The oldest Prajñāpāramitā manuscript is from the 1st century CE, some 300-400 years older than the oldest Pali text. Similarly for the oldest translations into Chinese: a mixed bag (often poorly distinguished in terms of well known Buddhist categories), not a canon, and not consistent with the views of the Mahāvihāra.

“Early Buddhism” as we know it now, is an invention of 19th century Europe. Before this, no oriental Buddhists were concerned with or interested in “Early Buddhism” because all Buddhists believed themselves to already be practicing the most authentic form of Buddhism available. Oriental Buddhists had faith. It’s Europeans who lack faith and constantly seek out more authentic teachings.

Think about what question “neo-early-Buddhism” is an answer to. Since it is a doctrine of authenticity and authority, neo-early Buddhism, has to be seen as the answer to a perceived lack of authenticity amongst modern Buddhists and a perceived lack of authority in modern Buddhist teaching.

The desire to reconstruct neo-early Buddhism and to adapt one’s practice in the light of what one reconstructs, is an admission that Buddhism as presented doesn’t make sense or doesn’t work for you. At least not enough to make you content with your practice.

I mean, if you were making any kind of progress on the path, you would not be falling over yourselves to reinvent Buddhism. Right? You would be like an oriental Buddhist, content to get on with your practice, rather than arguing about what words mean. I note there is no consensus on most of the issues raised in this forum.

It would be more interesting to see people offering up their personal rationales for why we need neo-early Buddhism at all. What is wrong with modern Buddhism that we feel the need to abandon it for something else? Or is it simply that the grass is always greener on the other side?

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43

Mike…why would we want it to be prevalent and acceptable to permanently call into question, not only the work of the ancient grammarians, but of the success of the oral tradition? Didn’t some monastics during the time of the Buddha also not hear directly from him either? Sure, we are more disadvantaged because things are less fresh, but are we just completely shut out?

I don’t why it is so wrong to be open to the possibility that the Sangha was more or less successful in protecting the Pali, and that while we must contend with a more complicated a gray area, there is a high degree of solidity and consistency in the texts that is worthy of acknowledgment, and is grounds for hope. I don’t know why people are so contented to place this whole thing out of reach, and pick up an alternative plan. It’s hypocritical to believe we are by default qualified to make that choice. Hey, we don’t have the Buddha’s exact words so let’s just empower ourselves to make use of the instructions to as a tool to manage our contemporary world. Again: the texts talk about “future generations”, “future times”, and “future perils”. If he expected us to reapply what he taught to meet with contemporary circumstances, wouldn’t he have addressed that? What makes anyone here and now think they are qualified to declare with certainty that the texts we have can’t possibly contain the meanings the Buddha intended when the oral tradition began? That is as arrogant as those who blindly declare that they do contain them.

Look, I don’t disagree that the entire translation process inevitably introduces a contemporary tone into the texts, but that doesn’t mean that a more accurate meaning is inaccessible as things are clarified - as we grow less bound to the sways of circumstances. The idea is to start in range of an accurate meaning, which even if we had the best of them, would still require us to clarify what it actually means in our direct experience. The corruption is ultimately on the level of view, which means that if we can adopt the efforts of virtue and restraint, purification is still possible, and will allow for a higher degree of precision when it comes to clarifying the meanings described in the suttas.

It seems as though you are suggesting that since we can’t be sure what the Buddha actually said, we have little to no chance of ever accessing the four noble truths. But if that is not your position, I don’t think you or Ven. Analayo is introducing anything new as far as uncertainty is concerned. Even if we were in front of the Buddha we would still have to do the work after we walked away. We would still be unsure what the instructions mean prior to applying them and seeing them through. Why take the extra step of trying to redefine the challenge, completely disconnecting it from the one we read about in the suttas?

So, what I really want to know is, why does anyone here and now think they are qualified to ascertain the degree to which the Dhamma remains accessible prior to having accessed it? Many are doing it from a purely objective position, having little to do with any development in Dhamma. Why is that a reasonable position to hold? Why is this the smart way to approach the practice? What happened to simply saying, “I don’t know”? Should we use our intelligence? Yes. Are we inevitably bound by a baseline degree of doubt? Absolutely. But why do we think that is enough to make decisions about accessibility?

I know I put a lot more here than is necessary, but you know that is how I like to have these discussions. I’m not ignoring anything you’ve said, but I don’t think you are taking into consideration just how much subtext is packed into what you’ve said.

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44

What is “modern Buddhism?” Is it Vajrayana, Pure Land, Ch’an, Zen or something else? Most of us here (I assume) are converts, that is, we chose Buddhism. As we chose Buddhism, we studied various schools of Buddhism and eventually decided on Theravada or EBTs or some other form of Buddhism. Since we were not born into it, there had to be some analysis and choice made.

Why not choose or look for what appears to be the most authentic? Why would we want to follow something very far removed from the original teacher (of this Dispensation)? This can be done with analysis but without disparaging other schools of Buddhism and without conceit.

Or maybe some of us are prone to orthodoxy, to looking for authenticity; it could be a personality trait. When I was in the Jewish religion (by birth) I also looked for authenticity. I wondered why I had to spend hours with my debate partner discussing oral law (talmud) instead of just going to the original texts in the torah and bible. I had an affinity for the Samaritans because that is what they did and had no oral law or talmud. Similarly in all other religions people look for getting back to the original teachings and of course have different interpretations of what those original teachings are.

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45

I consider myself an analyst and i consider the pali suttas to be worth analyzing as to infer the intended meaning.

I ponder this meaning and do as i inferred.

To me the texts are not art, fiction, it’s not an ancient self-help manual, an inspiring bio, suggestions on moral guidelines, nor a historical record.

Therein are described results of an experiment, to be performed here & now, propositions inviting verification, come & see they say.

This is about shaping one’s mind to do as teacher intends. He really is a trainer of tamable men. A wise person would submit like a throughbred horse to a skilled trainer.

There are guidelines on how to study the texts in cross-reference, this way one can isolate things which are missing or do not fit in with the rest.

46

I’m certainly not qualified to judge. But the purpose of this particular Forum is discussion of such EBT issues, rather than practice issues (however, I’ll say a little about practice at the end). In this thread we are discussing an article by someone who has spent decades working on the issue of how well the EBTs represent what the Buddha actually taught. I’ve not seen Ven Analayo (or others, such as Bhantes @Sujato, @Brahmali, etc) ever advocate a leap from “the EBTs are not a literal recording of what the Buddha said” to “therefore we can just make them mean whatever we like”. On the contrary:

I don’t disagree. This is a practice issue that I’ll come back to.

I think you bring up an important question in the sentence that I’ve bolded. The Dhamma is, in the end, about practice. Understanding our situation in life(s) and attempting to reorient towards happiness (elimination of suffering). As Jayarava said above:

I sometimes ask myself what would be the practical difference to my progress if I hadn’t put in many hours reading and listening to suttas, ancient and modern commentaries, talks, etc. Probably not a lot to be honest, so I’ve got some sympathy for @Jayarava’s post and your (@SDC’s) comments. My various in-person monastic teachers have instructed me in keeping sila, developing mindfulness and calm, viewing development in terms of the noble truths, hindrances, awakening factors, etc. This is not unique to some particular sect or some small group of teachers. However, as you say, it’s the responsibility of the student to pursue it seriously…

However, as I said above, this is a Forum about EBTs, so that’s why we are discussing Ven Analyo’s article, not details of practice. And such discussions can provide useful hints and motivation to practice…

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47

I don’t mind description “arrogance” to Venerable Ñanavira statement, it may be interpreted as such;

These books of the Pali Canon correctly represent the Buddha’s Teaching, and can be regarded as trustworthy throughout. (Vinayapitaka:) Suttavibhanga, Mahāvagga, Cūlavagga; (Suttapitaka:) Dīghanikāya, Majjhimanikāya, Samyuttanikāya, Anguttaranikāya, Suttanipāta, Dhammapada, Udāna, Itivuttaka, Theratherīgāthā. (The Jātaka verses may be authentic, but they do not come within the scope of these Notes .) No other Pali books whatsoever should be taken as authoritative; and ignorance of them (and particularly of the traditional Commentaries) may be counted a positive advantage, as leaving less to be unlearned.

Whether it was made blindly… Well, it depends on one’s own faith, which is strictly related to one’s own understanding. I do believe it was not just blindly declaration.

But of course, no need to argue with someone who believes in different things, it is enough to point out that there is such approach as Suttas are right, I am wrong. And since from infinite time I was wrong, preferring my own ideas, perhaps such attitude is worthwhile to consider.

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48

I don’t recall seeing it in any Pali text, nor in the Nak Tham textbooks composed by Prince Vajirañānavarorasa in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This leads me to think that it’s likely a mid-20th century coinage – a sort of posh alternative to the more colloquial ชาวพุทธ and พุทธบริษัท. Like the latter two words, พุทธศาสนิกชน is most often used to refer to Buddhists in the plural, with an individual Buddhist usually being called a คนที่นับถือพระพุทธศาสนา or ผู้ถือศาสนาพุทธ.

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49

In essence this is an off-topic question in a thread about an academic article entitled “Early Buddhism”. But it does serve as a contrast.

All living Buddhists practice modern Buddhism. All Buddhists everywhere across time have changed their teachings from “the original” and not just once. All the living Buddhism has gone through multiple reforms over something like twenty centuries. Reform movements pop up quite regularly.

The only reason I can see to seek “authenticity” in the dead writings of the distant past, is dissatisfaction with the authenticity of the living traditions of the present. And I get this, since I find everything about and everyone in the modern world disappointing.

This backwards-looking move is bound to fail. People change things for reasons. And as far as I know, no one has ever bothered to enquire why Buddhists abandoned their own early teachings. Because this is not a question we are permitted to ask. If we don’t know why they changed, why are we seeing the texts they abandoned as a kind of restore point?

How would you know if one school of Buddhism is more authentic than another? On what criteria are you judging authenticity?

If you assume that the so-called “Early Buddhist texts” reflect authenticity then you ought to have a good explanation for why ancient Buddhists abandoned those teachings for others.

The idea that we have anything like the “original texts” is part of the Mahāvihāra myth. The oldest Pali text in existence (some fragments of Vinaya lore) dates from the 5th century. The actual Pali texts that people here cite are likely from manuscripts no older than the 18th century. The texts were preserved but not practiced.

Trying to recreate the past is short-sighted, and I would say dangerous. The myth of the Golden Age of Buddhism is too close to certain nationalistic myths of the “once great nation”.

We live in 2024 and we confront many problems on a daily basis that are simply never imagined in Buddhist mythology. Trying to bend an Iron Age mythology into a guide for modern living is burying your head in the sand. Here we are communicating using computers connected to a global spanning communications network. Is religious fundamentalism really our best move?

I think this might be partially true. But the “all the other religions are doing it” defence of fundamentalism seems a bit weak. Yes?

The last thing the world needs is a “neo-X” approach: anachronistic attempts to recreate the past. In my view we simply waste time by starting early Buddhism reenactment societies. We face modern problems that require modern solutions. We can’t just bury our heads in the sand or pretend that we are living in ancient India. We need to be thinking in terms of the present. Just look at the disaster that is neo-liberalism.

The past is gone. It’s up to us to create the conditions here and now for the thriving of the Dharma for the next few centuries. And I can’t see how anachronisms are going to help. Nor is utopianism the answer.

I would say that a big part of the problem is that Buddhists have clearly failed in Europe and her colonies where Mammon is God. Less than 1% of the population in any European or colony nation is Buddhist after 200 years of proselytisation and evangelising, and a good chunk of that >1% is due to the migration of ethnic Buddhists from Asia.

When I arrived in the UK, the census of 2001 had just been published. In 2001, 0.3% of the UK population was Buddhist. And 0.7% were Jedi. Now 0.5% are Buddhist. That’s a few hundred thousand, including many immigrants, in a nation of 65 million.

Actually I just checked and US Buddhists have hit 1% of the population. Congrats. But Pew seem to put this down to migration not conversion. The US is a favoured destination for Buddhist migrants from Asia.

I agree that we need a new spiel. But going back to Iron Age mythology seems doomed to fail to produce what we need in the face of accelerating social and technological change and systemic global problems.

A simple example is that ancient Buddhism lacks any ethics. We have moral rules of all kinds, but no rationale for making new rules to meet changing conditions. The past has nothing to teach us on this score.

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There are many ways to practice Buddhism, but there is only one way to practice it correctly - there is only one way to practice Dhamma as Dhamma.

Fortunately, there are those who practice Dhamma even in our days, which means that there are living Buddhists who practice exactly the same Early Buddhism that the Buddha himself taught in prehistoric times.

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51

Agree, that is why I think it is important to look at the EBT with a critical eye, not a reason to reject the EBT as too old to be of much interest.

“Uninstructed worldlings” did what they will do and behaved as though chockers with greed hatred and delusion, as 99% were. I don’t see the confusion here.

The EBT followers (as I see it, and if Im wrong this is how this one EBT follower at least sees it):

  1. The Buddha was enlightened and explained what he had discovered
  2. This was transmitted by oral tradition for centuries
  3. The oral tradition was then written down
  4. Things were added and subtracted over subsequent centuries

It is impossible to know for sure what was said in #2, and whether there are earlier writings (#3) that have been lost. It is not impossible to review the body of available texts that were written down, including texts from subsequent times, including Agamas and Tibetan and other sources, and attempt to determine what is consistent and what is not.

Is there anything in the 4 Noble Truths, the 8-fold path, or the meditation techniques taught over the last two plus millennia that do not apply now? It all makes sense to me (at least intellectually, alas not direct insight yet :slight_smile: !) still and I don’t see any need to update or modernise any of that. On the other hand, the occasional reference to things that are sexist seem added later, whereas the repetitive teachings from the rest of the EBT clearly show the Buddha teaching beings are actually assessed based on their thoughts, speech and action (not birth as a Brahmin or by their genitalia etc).

At the end of the day, it could all be rubbish…sure. I am not enlightened, I cant say for sure. However, there is nothing that better explains my experience of the Universe so far so what is wrong with sticking with the best option available to date…for me that is ‘Early Buddhist Texts’ read with a critical eye, but not changing anything ‘core’.

52

This implies that if the Buddha Dhamma was right, multitudes would be converted and Buddhism would have taken over the world. I completely reject that. There are many reasons for conversion, and being right cant be a very big factor purely mathematically as at least 7 billion people must be wrong…could be all 8 billion, of course, but its at least 7…

53

It’d be incredibly difficult to add to a canonized body of information inhereted from the oral transmission, i think any attempt to do this would be opposed by martyrs.

It’s not really supposed to be able to happen. Whatever corruption is in what was written down is utter most likely be inhereted from the oral mutation, and here we are primarily talking about distortion, rather than deletion or addition.

As i see it, in course of transmission, it is much easier to change the expression than it is to delete it. And to delete is much easier than it is to add to it what is not supposed to be there.

If we are talking about corruption by addition of entire lines or discourses, then we are essentially talking about a conspiracy theory wherein people managed to add conterfeit texts to what has been canonized. How exactly do they think this happens? The amount of intrigue would make a plot for netflix series, this requires that much imagination.

54

That would mean accepting some of the Abhidharma and things like momentariness (which many EBT folk tend to reject). Despite their name, they never really fully rejected the Abhidharma. They only rejected some of it. A complete rejection of Abhidharma seems to be a modern phenomenon. Of course, its possible individual monks and nuns did reject it or didn’t care much for it back then.

55

Personally I don’t think anybody does or can completely reject “abhidhamma.” The reason being that “abhidhamma” simply means “about the dhamma” and is a system of understanding, clarifying, organizing, and systematizing teachings from the discourses while also adding in extra models relevant to the times to fill in gaps and so on. Every Buddhist engages in this in one way or another; otherwise, we would simply repeat sutta passages verbatim without reflecting or commenting on them apart from the precise words present. It’s a matter of what or who’s ‘abhidhamma’ we take as more or less authoritative. And at that point even many modern, traditional Theravādins will have different opinions and approaches that may or may not agree with canonical Theravāda Abhidhamma + commentaries.

The Sautrantikas went on to develop their own ideas about the Dhamma, not taking on faith the Sarvastivadin Abhidhamma system, but returning back to the sutta passages as a higher authority. Just as many “sutta-based” groups nowadays develop sub-systems for talking about and teaching dhamma.

Mettā :slight_smile:

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56

However, Buddhism now conquers European nations, the West, the whole world in the form of mental health, i.e. mindfulness practice; e.g. Oxford Mindfulness Centre. https://www.oxfordmindfulness.org/

So, I think Early Buddhism is still a living tradition based on EBTs, particularly based on the essential teachings of SN/SA suttas (i.e. knowing and seeing the four noble truths/conditioned arising, the notion of anicca, dukkha, suñña (empty), anatta, and of the middle way).

57

Yes, you and I have debated this before I think! :slight_smile:
There is no way for me or you to prove or disprove whether the current Sutta Pitaka is the verbatim record of the Buddha’s words … so be it. However, anyone who takes them as the “gospel truth” does then need to justify the inconsistencies, and explain why the texts include the Buddha correcting Sangha who had misrepresented him during his life itself (let alone misrepresentation two millennia later, which you seem to think is an impossibility). The fact that there is the Buddha specifically correcting mistakes while he is still alive, in the very texts you take to be an unblemished record, seems reasonable evidence alone that things change.

The core teachings of the Buddha are anicca, dukkha anatta…anicca refers to the scriptures as well. The Buddha taught again and again that things are impermanent, yet here we are 2.5 millennia later debating whether or not things are impermanent… I really dont know what else to say :slight_smile:

58

No one I know of is saying that there is nothing interesting in Pāli. I have certainly never said anything of that kind.

I still occasionally read Pāli. And I have pioneered using Pāli texts to understand the Heart Sutra, for example, and not in the “proto-Madhyamaka” framework, but as a continuous with texts like the Cūḷasuññata Sutta (MN 121). I have argued that Prajñāpāramitā is, in fact, a conservative movement within a very changeable Buddhist milieu.

By the way, I think it is a mistake to essentialise the Pāli canon of texts by referring to EBT. This is typical of the intellectual ruts that you guys find yourselves in. It speaks to an established view of the kind I think you should abandon. “EBT” is another reified abstraction. And this can only lead you to faulty conclusions.

Here is the rub. Historians date written texts to the time of writing, even if they reflect an existing oral tradition. Oral traditions change over time and people who write things down may have extensively edited their texts and we would not know (though we can see a heavy Mahāvihāra hand at work in Pāli). There is no reason to believe that the Buddhist oral tradition was preserved with any fidelity: look at the three extant versions of the Kaccānagotta Sutta for example. Very much a low fidelity text, despite its later importance in Madhyamaka. At this point many commentators invoke the Vedic mnemonic practices which Buddhists never used.

Buddha is a figure of Buddhist myth.

It depends on how you understand these. It’s not enough to invoke lists as reified abstractions, one has to know which of the 84,000 interpretations of these ideas you are invoking. For example, I’m unlikely to explain the four truths of the noble ones (caturariyasaccāni) in the same terms as you.

The “meditation techniques” were lost across the entire Theravāda world for centuries, which did not believe that liberation was possible. And they were reinvented by the forest monks in Burma and Thailand in the 19th century. And most of the rest of the Buddhist world simply stopped doing those practices and adopted other practices in their place. And yet they too claimed to be practising the Buddhism of the Buddha.

Even if you were enlightened, you still couldn’t say for sure. But even so, this has not stopped you from being certain about a great many things, eh?

But “core” is subjective. Many people have tried to extract the core, and they all come up with different cores. Notably, Indian Buddhists all decided on different core texts leading to multiple schisms. Your certainty is unwarranted.

No. It’s not about “right” and “wrong”. My point is unrelated to your interpretation. My point is that the Buddhism you are actively promoting simply doesn’t appeal to the people that you might wish to take it up. If Buddhism doesn’t benefit people, or if it only benefits an elite of less than 1%, then what is the point of it?

This is all straying well beyond the topic of the OP.

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59

I don’t quite follow to what kind of inconsistencies do you refer here. Could you be more precise, and support yourself with quotes which according to you show such inconsistences?

Regarding mistakes, bhikkus are humans and make mistakes, but I don’t see how this obvious truth could undermine trust in Suttas, especially Suttas were authorised by arahats, and further memorialized by virtuous monks with the great respect for Dhamma, it is unlikely that less virtuous monks boder with passing Suttas to future generations.

60

Sure. Except religious Buddhists are generally agreed that secular mindfulness is not Buddhism, and as presented is not even Buddhist. At best, it is one element of preparation for doing Buddhist meditation.

Also the guy who pioneered mindfulness therapies—Jon Kabat Zinn—was primarily influenced by Soto Zen and Advaita Vedanta.

A fantastic example of a non sequitur. This conclusion is completely unrelated to the stated premise (which is itself false).

“Early Buddhism” died out 2000 years ago. And we know next to nothing about it, except for the mythology it left us. All Buddhists in the world, without any exceptions (including Theravāda), abandoned “early Buddhism” for “late Buddhism”.

If there is a “living tradition” based on early Buddhist texts, it was invented in the last 10-15 years or so. When I started writing about Buddhism 25 years ago, literally no one talked in these terms.

If “early Buddhism” is your religion, then why are you not a bhikkhu? The absolute necessity of going forth from the household life is one of the most powerful messages of the “EBTs” and a central feature of the Buddha myth. You appear to lack the courage of your convictions, Thomas.

61

Jayarava is not mincing his words that’s for sure !
First thing first. Your take is certainly unpopular but I must say I like it very much. I have a few questions.

Exactly, I was about to right such a comment ! Do you have any sources about this absence of vedic mnemonic practices in buddhist circles ? because I kinda recall otherwise but my uni days are a bit far from now and I could be mistaken.

About EBT, do you think the majority rule can apply to the sutta in a certain measure ? What I mean is, if something is talked about in most of suttas, doesn’t it means it has a higher chance of being what was actualy taught by the Buddha ?
If I open 50 times in a row any sutta collection, there’s zero chance I’ll find instructions telling me to focus on my nostrils until some light appears to then plunge into it and Voila! There’s a zero chance I’ll find instructions telling me to mentally note everything that’s happening in my mind and body and to keep going until I blip out and Voila !
There’s a zero chance I’ll find instructions telling me to scan my body from top to bottom and bottom to top trying to feel every sensations until Voila !

What we find is practice of virtue, sense-restraint, seeing the danger in the slightest fault, knowing what is wholesome and what is unwholesome, wakefulness, clearly-knowing and attention with the right perspective. Jhana is here too but almost never as something you reach through focusing techniques !!

Do you think there is a higher chance that the above represents what the Buddha actually taught and practice ? This approach needing more honesty and self transparency, needing a more inquisitive mind could be perceived as less appealing than the technical approach, where basically you’re given a set of reassuring precise instructions to follow until some kind of big bang and then you’re first path, rinse and repeat. If so the technical approach would have garnered more appeal quite quickly, don’t you think ?