“There are three kinds of activity: physical activity, verbal activity, and mental activity.”
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I think “activity” captures it well. In my own practice it’s movement that I observe, ie the movement of mind and senses. Some of its intentional, and some of it isn’t. 
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I have done a lot of reflecting on the concept of sankhara, or samskara. I believe that to approach the concept ethically misses the way they fit into the Dharma.
The Buddha’s task was to explain to sentient beings why the sensory world we perceive as reality is not, in fact, real, but an illusion created by our own minds. To do this, he had to explain causation–what brings this apparent reality into being. The Buddha knew that what we perceive as real is no more than an unceasing progression of moments of awareness (vijnana), each one of which has no effect whatsoever on any other, any more than a frame of a motion picture has any effect on the frame which follows it. Since dharma have no effect on dharma, what then is the cause of the rising of awareness that we perceive as reality? This is where sankhara come in. This realm is continuously created by our own volition, or karma. Karma engenders seeds: these seeds are sankhara. Time being a part of the illusion, these seeds may produce an effect immediately, or they may seem to lie latent for years–even until the next lifetime.
Karmic seeds–karma-abhisamskara–condition rebirth. Whatever lessons one has failed to master in this lifetime are re-created in the next lifetime. For example, two beings are paired by karma in this lifetime because they each have something to learn from the other. One being needs to learn to give love instead of trying to receive it, and the other needs to overcome the fear of death. The one who needs to learn to give love fails, and this produces an expectation (karma-abhisamskara) of wanting love, which sets up the conditions of the being’s next life. The two may find themselves paired again, but only if each stands to learn something from the other.
Sankhara are thus causes which produce effects: without sankhara the universe would disappear in an instant. Although I would have liked to call them volitions, the word in English is uncountable. Therefore I have settled on ‘karmic seeds’. http://inscribedonthebelievingmind.blog/2019/03/18/karma
Just to bear in mind, the suttas explicitly say that “viññāṇa is the seed”, so.
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I’m not familiar with early suttas, as my introduction to Buddhism was through the Ch’an school. In Ch’an the six vijnanas are that which is seen, heard, touched, smelled, tasted, and thought. Even Hinduism says that they are the things we perceive through the senses, e.g., Sri Yukteswar’s admonition to Yogananda to get rid of his mosquito-consciousness if he would stop being bitten.
For this reason I don’t understand how vijnanas are viewed as seeds; I would have to know how they are engendered and what they give rise to. If you say that an ear-vijnana gives rise to a sound, that would mean that there is a dharma called a sound which is separate from one’s perception of a sound. This is contrary to my understanding, which is that the perception is all there is.
I was tempted to call sankhara “commands” but that comes from information technology, something too recent and idiomatic for a sacred text, though I think it expresses the idea very clearly.
If we were dealing with anything but a sacred text, I would translate sankhara as “commands.” Whenever we have an expectation, or will something to happen (as opposed to desiring something to happen, which produces the opposite effect), we are like magicians waving a magic wand–that event happens. Every single event in the triple world comes about because beings willed it to happen–from the Earth revolving on its axis to an orchestra producing music to someone having a fatal accident. This is why sankhara are usually translated as volitional formations (the word formations being necessary only because volition isn’t a countable word). It is not to be wondered at that a person can cause a river to flow in the opposite direction or make his body disappear the moment he dies, because all phenomena are no more than illusions in the mind.
“A master called Avicenna declares that the mind of him who stands detached is of such nobility that whatever he sees is true, and whatever he desires he obtains, and whatever he commands must be obeyed.” - Meister Eckhart, On Detachment
“I see the lilies in the field, their brightness, their colour and all their leaves. But I do not see their fragrance. Why? Because the fragrance is within me.” - Meister Eckhart, Sermon Fifty Six.
Sankhara are what produce future events; they are come into being when we will something to happen. Nirvana is without sankhara because there is no self in Nirvana. We will things to happen from our desire for or attachment to existence. In the Ch’an school sankhara are considered defilements; in that sense they are the equivalent of what Christians call the stains of sin which defile the soul. Enlightenment is the abandonment of the self with all of its defilements, and this happens when one sees that the self never was, that it was an illusion. It is for this reason that upon attaining enlightenment karma (sankhara) ceases to operate–it, too, was all an illusion. Christian mystics say that when they attain union with God their souls are purified of the stains of sin. Thus we can say with certainty that samskara are produced by self-will and that they cease to produce events when it is seen that the self never existed.
Greetings @dbarahona and welcome to the forum 
If you have any questions about how this forum operates or have any issues, please don’t hesitate to tag us in topic by ‘at moderators’ or send us a PM.
Just for your information this is a quite tightly moderated Early Buddhist Texts forum. We ask that all members base their discussions around the EBT’s, and use citations and the like when making points etc. In the flow of conversation this may not always be required, but as a general rule, if one is challenging an understanding, then one should be prepared to cite the sutta referenes to back it up
Just in case you are not familiar with EBT’s or how they are defined here, please check out the main https://suttacentral.net/ site here. Bhante Sujatos introductions are a great source of information.
Looking forward to seeing you around the forum
Metta
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Well, try thinking of it like this. Viññāṇa is the seed in the sense that it receives the impressions of experience in life. It is, in a way “encoded” with experience. That encoding, like the DNA of a seed, is the blueprint for the next life. Our choices, i.e saṅkhārā, create the impressions: kammaṁ khettaṁ, “kamma is the field”, i.e. we “plow” the field to create the conditions for fertile consciousness. The whole set of metaphors is based on agrarian life.
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Dear Sujato,
You write:
Viññāṇa is the seed in the sense that it receives the impressions of experience in life. It is, in a way “encoded” with experience. That encoding, like the DNA of a seed, is the blueprint for the next life. Our choices, i.e saṅkhārā, create the impressions: kammaṁ khettaṁ ,
“kamma is the field”, i.e. we “plow” the field to create the conditions
for fertile consciousness. The whole set of metaphors is based on agrarian life.
I don’t agree with your understanding of vijnana, for the following reasons:
- The word ‘vijnana’ comes from the root ‘vi’ – to divide, and jnana – knowledge. Therefore it is knowledge. It is not an organ, such as an ear, which receives a dharma, a sound. Both the ear and the sound are dharmas, which means they don’t exist: they are illusions. What you call experience in life is no more than mental impressions, a dream.
You say that vijnana are seeds, like memory, but I don’t know where you get this impression. The vijnana rise from the alayavijnana or the Tathagatagharba, which is what stores all accumulated thoughts. The word alaya means abode, and alayavijnana contains the word vijnana because consciousnesses rise from it. As I explained in a previous post, all dharmas, including thoughts, are nothing more than consciousness or awareness. There is nothing that one is aware of–the awareness is the totality of every phenomenon. When Sri Yukteswar said, “Get rid of your mosquito-consciousness” he meant that the mosquitoes were all in Yogananda’s mind. The early Buddhist texts must mention that dharmas have no existence, no self-nature, that what we perceive has no more reality than a dream.
What is more important: to understand the teachings of the Buddha or to defend a position? If the universe is a hologram, sankhara are the commands programmed into the computer. We are the programmers. As I said before, it is not my intention to reduce the Dharma to an IT metaphor or a science-fiction movie, but until you grasp the reality that the universe is no more than an illusion within your mind you will miss the whole point of what the Buddha tried to teach.
Hi, Viveka.
You say, “as a general rule, if one is challenging an understanding, then one should be prepared to cite the sutta references to back it up.”
Even accepting the premise that discussion of the Dharma must be based on early Buddhist texts, I don’t believe that I have challenged the traditional understanding of sankhara. Wisdom Library says the following about the concept: 1. As the 2nd link of the formula of dependent origination, (paticcasamuppāda), sankhāra has the active aspect, 'forming, and signifies karma, i.e. wholesome or unwholesome volitional activity (cetanā) of
body (kāya-sankhāra), speech (vacī-sankhāra) or mind (citta- or mano-sankhāra).
This definition occurs, e.g. at S.XII.2, 27.
If I have cited Meister Eckhart in this discussion it was because his teachings are the same as those of Sakyamuni, which means that Eckhart is the Buddha.
In kindness,
Diana
Welcome to the forum@dbarahona. Reading through the conversation in this thread I get the impression that you may not have quite grasped what my fellow-moderator @viveka meant about referencing the EBTs. As background, we can add that this discussion forum is set up as part of the work done by the team at https://suttacentral.net/. It might help you to look at the introductory pages on Sutta Central, and also to read around in recent threads in this forum for a while so as to gain a “feel” for what our concerns are.
We tend to consider that discussion of the EBTs means discussion of specific texts rather than general discussion of concepts that are mentioned in the EBTs. There are a number of other Buddhist forums where such discussion is welcomed.
That was not what was intended. What was intended was the premise ‘that discussion of the Dhamma on Discuss & Discover must be based on/ be directly concerned with the EBTs.’ I hope that makes things clearer.
This can’t be relevant to the EBTs, since Meister Eckhart 1260-1328 CE lived centuries after the Buddha.
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Hi dbarahona,
The simile is given in AN3.77:
“So, Ānanda, deeds are the field, consciousness is the seed, and craving is the moisture.
“Iti kho, ānanda, kammaṃ khettaṃ, viññāṇaṃ bījaṃ, taṇhā sneho.
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Hi friend ,
deeds are the field, consciousness is the seed, craving is the moisture.
Perhaps view it another angle , consciousness is experiencing , craving is wanting more experience ,
actions then would be the process to achieve the experience .
Regards
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This is not the Buddhism of the EBTs. You are talking about the dispensation to the bodhisatva. Bodhisatva scriptures are not considered historical Buddhavacana here.
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This is quite off-topic for the board, but this is also incorrect from the perspective of the dispensation to the bodhisatva.
Venerable Vasubandhu describes the ālaya as a consciouness, one of three that is capable of “transformation.”
ātmadharmopacāro hi vividho yaḥ pravartate|
vijñānapariṇāme’sau pariṇāmaḥ sa ca tridhā ||1||
vipāko mananākhyaśca vijñaptirviṣayasya ca|
tatrālayākhyaṃ vijñānaṃ vipākaḥ sarvabījakam ||2||
From the delusion of self and phenomena,
Comes the conveyence of various manifestations;
These are supported and transformed by consciousness,
And there are only three of these which may transform.
These are retribution, thought,
And the perception of external objects.
The first of these is the Ālaya Consciousness,
Which is retribution as well as all the seeds.
Ālayavijñāna is Venerable Vasubandhu’s word. Your Chán school might have an autodidactic or idiosyncratic way to interpret it, but this is the original sense meant by the term.
This is a non-Buddhist proposal entirely IMO. Does your Chán school teach this?
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I wasn’t aware that the Alayavijnana predated the Mahayana school, so thank you for pointing that out. As for the term retribution, wouldn’t “effect” be a better translation?
Also, you might be in a better position than I to judge whether “alayavijnana” could possibly be interpreted as “abode of consciousnesses”–that is, the storage-place of all events ever experienced by all beings–every awareness of a sense-object, every thought, every sensation (vedana). If this were assumed to be the case, the last two lines might be understood (as D. T. Suzuki understood them) as “The Alayavijnana; which is the fruits as well as the seeds” (i.e., the effects as well as the causes).
Taking this one step further, one might consider, “The Alayavijnana; which is the manifestation (of the six consciousnesses–vijnana) as well as the seeds (of all consciousnesses–sankhara).”
Regarding your question of what the Ch’an school teaches, the methodology of the school is to refuse to teach any doctrine whatsoever. However there are a few things which one can assert, taken from the sermons of the masters:
- Learn first to distinguish the true from the false
- Renounce all views of true and false
- Do not be attached to a single thing, not even to the patriarchs or the Buddha, who died the way every other sentient being dies
- You are the Buddha
“You may have most earnestly and diligently disciplined yourself for aeons and passed through all the stages of bodhisattvahood, but when you come to have a realization in one thought it is no other than this: that you are from the start the Buddha himself and no other.” Huang-po
@Coemgenu and @dbarahona I suggest that you continue this discussion over PM so this thread doesn’t drift off-topic
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All I’ll say, for the sake of correct information on the forum, is that ālayavijñāna does not predate Mahāyāna. That earlier quote is from Venerable Vasubandhu, not a sutta. If more time is taken to read more thoroughly and carefully, there will be less misunderstandings like that.
One way I can see the thread branching back into the topic is in comparing sankhārā to the Sautrāntika proposal of seeds/bījāni, and analysing where in the sūtras they got that idea, since they are sort-of called the “scripturist school.”
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