I was reading English translations of Agama sutras and then its parallel from the pali canon. Again, I have noticed quite substantive difference in content. This particular case was MA21 and AN 2.36. While it might be possible to nit-pick and try to make them carry the same message in essence (one sutta explicitly talks about anagami while the other mentions just the person), it is a stretch… Interesting, the background story was very similar and both had strange piece about how many devas can stand on a tip of a pin (are devas bacteria or other microorganisms) ?
In this case the major differences were:
non-returners, who have [only] internal fetters, and who will not be reborn into this [human] realm - Agama
vs
the person fettered internally, who is a returner, one who returns to this state of being. - AN2.36 Ven Bhikkhu Bodhi translation.
Who are not [yet] nonreturners, who have external fetters, and who will be reborn into this [human] realm - Agama
vs
-This is called the person fettered externally, who is a non-returner, one who does not return to this state of being.*
and
-This is called a person fettered externally, who is a non-returner, one who does not return to this state of being*. -pali
The terms here are rare in the suttas, and appear to be somewhat confused in the Chinese.
The distinction being drawn in the Pali is between someone who is attached (fettered) to things of the word and someone who is not.
So the person who is fettered externally but not internally is still "constrained by the outside world, but has found “internal” peace of mind, and such a one, on death, does not come back.
Conversely, one who is still internally attached does come back.
Yes, I understand what the translation of the pali and agama sutta says. My concern is not this sutta in particular but the differences in them and many other suttas.
Which story, if any, to believe more? One found in this or that collection? I believe in units of teaching which generally are the same between them, but question the historical account which I am saddened to say, we might never know without a chrono-visor of some sort.
So I am not sure I see the problem here really. The dispute is between the two rare terms, and the pali makes more sense in this case, so the pali is probably correct and the Chinese corrupt.
But what is your concern exactly? There is a vast, like hundreds of thousands of words vast, where the chinese and the pali agree in very nearly identical words, sentences and paragraphs.
Where there is textual corruption, or differences in sectarian tradition, or whatever other reasons may be implicated in a particular difference in parallel texts a person has to make their own judgments about what is plausible and what is relevant.
Again, not sure what you mean here, in the case that you site, the story is more or less identical, with one technical term flipped in the Chinese, and the sense obviously identifies which of the two texts is corrupt.
If you mean “should i devote myself to the Chinese exclusively or the Pali exclusively” then you are asking a religious question about personal practice, since any actual scholar or student of the texts would tell you you need to compare both (and where possible the Gandharai, Sanskrit, Tibetan, etc)
None of the source are predictably more reliable than the others.
This may be true, but we can certainly learn a lot from a systematic comparison of the extant canons.
Investigate the subject matter to determine, where possible, what has gone wrong between the two texts. In this case, it seems as though what is meant by external and internal fetters is the problem. Unfortunately, it’s an obscure concept in Chinese sources.
I can find a passage in the Yogacarabhumi (at T1579.30.878a11) that interprets the terms like MA 21 does: Externally fettered means a person accomplishes the precepts and virtue and is reborn in heaven. Internally fettered means a person accomplishes some measure of inner liberation, like a samadhi, but becomes attached to it and doesn’t realize the noble truths. But neither of these cases are linked to being a non-returner or not in that passage. Still, it seems to suggest that AN 2.36 may have switched the adjectives internal and external around.
Do these terms (internal and external fetters) occur anywhere else in Pali sources?
I did a pali search and I’ve found that those terms as used in the sutta (ajjhattasaṃyojano, bahiddhāsaṃyojano) were found in AN book of 2s (that sutta), Peṭakopadesa, Vibhaṅga and Puggalapaññatti.
I also do recall reading in English that sometimes there are called “higher” and “lower fetters”.
The commentaries on the sutta in AN and on the Puggalapaññatti have an internal consistency. They say that internal bondage means bondage to the desire realm, and external bondage is bondage to the form and formless realm. They also say that internal bondage refers to the five lower bonds and external bondage refers to the higher bonds. Which explains the connection to non-returners and returners. One passage says that internal and external bondage only refer to stream-winners to non-returners, not ordinary people.
The trouble is that I’m not able to find similar commentary in Sarvastivada texts so far. Perhaps this was an obscure teaching in that tradition, and they simply switched the adjectives around like it appears to be in Asanga’s Yogacarabhumi.
There is a passage in Kumarajiva’s commentary to the Prajnaparamita Sutra that reads:
Beings (sattva) have two kinds of behavior (pratipad):[4] sensualism (tṛṣṇācarita) and rationalism (dṛṣṭicarita). The sensualists (tṛṣṇābahula) are attached to happiness (sukharakta) and are bound (baddha) by outer fetters (bāhyasaṃyojana). The rationalists (dṛṣṭibahula) are strongly attached to the view of the individual (satkāyadṛṣṭi), etc., and are bound by inner fetters (adhyātmasaṃyojana). This is why the sensualists [usefully] contemplate the horrors of outer visibles (bāhyarūpāśubha), whereas the rationalists [usefully] contemplate the horrors (aśubha) and corruption (vikāra) of their own body.
Kumarajiva generally stuck to Sarvastivada teachings as his foundation and added Mahayana teachings on top of them, so this might refer to that school’s way of defining internal and external bonds.
Lamotte says this concept of two kinds of pratipad is found in Vasubandhu’s Kośa and also in the Netti in Pali. Looking it up, I see that the Netti does have these two temperaments of people, but it doesn’t mention the internal and external bondage in the discussion of them like Kumarajiva does. Nor does the Kośa or Yaśomitra’s commentary to it. While Lamotte provides the Sanskrit version of the Pali words, I can’t find any occurrences of adhyātmasaṃyojana or bāhyasaṃyojana on GRETIL or the rest of the Internet.
So … It seems to be a case of traditions having differing ideas about these two terms that have become obscure now. The few times they come up, there are different ideas about them.
