ABSTRACT
The Buddhist technical term vedanā continues to elude just the right translation. Using semantic methods, scholars have argued both for and against the usual choices: ‘feelings’ and ‘sensations’; as well as suggesting that phrases borrowed from psychology offer more semantic precision. In an attempt to break the deadlock and arrest the continuing search for the perfect translation, I argue that the term vedanā was not defined semantically. Instead, it was defined in the way that Humpty Dumpty defines words in Through the Looking Glass. Vedanā means what Buddhist say it means, neither more nor less, only because we say it does and not for any reason deriving from etymology or semantics. This observation leads me to conclude that methods from pragmatics, speech act theory, and cognitive linguistics offer better tools for analysing the term and settling on a translation.
The article is behind a paywall, but feel free to email me and request a copy (my name @gmail.com)
Vedanā is more at ‘sensation’ where vedita [pp. of vedeti] is better represented as ‘experience’ e.g. veditabba, as the experience of, rāgadosamoha at SN. 35.153.
First much of the vedana passages of DN work much better with “expereience” that with “feeling”
Compare:
Tatrānanda, yo so evamāha: Now, as to those who say:
‘na heva kho me vedanā attā, nopi appaṭisaṁvedano me attā, attā me vediyati, vedanādhammo hi me attā’ti. ‘Experience is definitely not my self. But it’s not that my self does not experience experiences. My self experiences, for my self is liable to experience.’
So evamassa vacanīyo— You should say this to them,
vedanā ca hi, āvuso, sabbena sabbaṁ sabbathā sabbaṁ aparisesā nirujjheyyuṁ. ‘Suppose experiences were to totally and utterly cease without anything left over.
Sabbaso vedanāya asati vedanānirodhā api nu kho tattha ‘ayamahamasmī’ti siyā”ti? When there’s no experience at all, with the cessation of experience, would the thought “I am this” occur there?’”
with
Tatrānanda, yo so evamāha: Now, as to those who say:
‘na heva kho me vedanā attā, nopi appaṭisaṁvedano me attā, attā me vediyati, vedanādhammo hi me attā’ti. ‘Feeling is definitely not my self. But it’s not that my self does not experience feeling. My self feels, for my self is liable to feel.’
So evamassa vacanīyo— You should say this to them,
vedanā ca hi, āvuso, sabbena sabbaṁ sabbathā sabbaṁ aparisesā nirujjheyyuṁ. ‘Suppose feelings were to totally and utterly cease without anything left over.
Sabbaso vedanāya asati vedanānirodhā api nu kho tattha ‘ayamahamasmī’ti siyā”ti? When there’s no feeling at all, with the cessation of feeling, would the thought “I am this” occur there?’”
Now in the first case, the argument is obviously true, if we had no experience at all, then we couldn’t have the experience of thinking “I am this”.
But in the second case it’s not at all clear that the argument works, I can imagine having an experience of a sort that is none of good bad or indifferent, but still think “I am this”.
See?
that experiences can be positive, negative or neutral is also clear.
the aggregates teaching develops later and the word’s meaning has to be modified to a more restricted sense.
There’s a technical term in psychology, “valence”, the adjectival form of which enables what I think is an exact translation.
Unfortunately, of the few people out there who are familiar with valence, the vast majority are only familiar with its technical meaning in chemistry (number of binding sites) or in grammar/linguistics (number of arguments a verb can take).
But “valent sensation,” using the psychology sense of “valent” is pretty much exactly what vedanā means. Too bad it’s a phrase and not a word, and too bad it’s a phrase that most folks won’t know the meaning of.
I never knew that valence has a meaning outside linguistics in both chemistry and psychology. Thanks for pointing that out!
I just read the wikipedia-article on it and I absolutely agree! This is the perfect 100% infallible translation and you should get an award for it.
I’m serious - this is a great find.
And this being Suttacentral we can all help promote this translation.
“Valence” suffers from the same problem as “feeling” in the passage I qoute.
I can have an experience of thinking “I am this” without a “valence”.
The problem here is that people are putting the cart before the horse.
The “pleasurable, unpleasurable, neither unpleasurable nor pleasurable” trichotomy in DN15 needn’t be read as a definition of vedana, it makes more sense to think of it here as a useful analysis of vedana, one that allows the Buddha’s philosophical argument to work.
The point is that if expereinces can be good or bad or indifferent, then experiences are not nicca and therefore cannot be atta.
Once again, people are confusing the cart and the horse, trying to figure out what a good word for “something that is either good, bad, or indifferent” is in English, but that is not the orignal meaning of vedana, as can be inferred from reading the context at DN15 and asking what ideas would actually allow the argument about regarding a self to carry.
Feeling, valence, hedonic tone, none of these, taken literally, preclude the possibility of thinking “I am this”. Only experience suffices to make the argument succeed.
In DN (where there is a parralel in DA) there are no aggregates. The individual terms are all more than mentioned, vedana gets this major philosophical treatment at DN15, sanna gets it’s treatment at DN9, etc etc.
But they are never spoken of as a collective, even though they should be, since literally everywhere else these arguments are given with all 5.
This is because DN predates SN and the MN suttas that contain the 5.
So SN probably does take vedana as something akin to “valence”, because it is trying to “Squeeze” the semantic range of the term to fit it in with rupa, sanna, vinnana et all and want’s to avoid overlap.
It looks back to the argument at DN15, and like contemporary Buddhists, misconstrues the analysis of decomposition of vedana for it’s definition.
We can tell this by understanding the argument being made and seeing that nothing short of the cessation of experience itself is sufficient to render the thought “I am this” impossible, because there is no this to function as the object of the thought. Feeling/valence/tone simply doesn’t cut it because even if i have no feeling about an experience I can still think “I am this”.
Vedanā (in the limited context of the Pali canon and in Sanskrit early-Buddhist texts) is feeling as in sensation, sensory experience, i.e. the sensory input as it registers on the mind. The feeling of touching something, the feeling of seeing something, the feeling of taste, the feeling of hearing, the feeling of smell etc… this is the feeling it is referring to. Vedanā arises when the indriya organs (eyes, ears, tongue, nose and skin) come into contact with rūpam or the objects that are being sensed.
Vedanā here does not however mean feeling as in “I feel you are a good person”; I feel disgusted by that; I feel elated; do you feel comfortable etc.
I still think that the term sensation is too restrictive, and I still think that most of the problem here is people trying to make sense of the term in a way that respects how it has been pressed into service by later MN and SN texts.
take paṇḍitavedanīyā for example,
it is after all the first occurrence of the root √vid in the canon at DN1
The discussion is about deep meditative attainments that allow the practitioner to remember a seemingly endless number, or at least an arbitrarily large number, of past lives, and the inference that is drawn from this meditative evidence.
The Buddha says they are not attached to such inferences because they have seen the arising, ceasing, flavor, danger and escape form vedana, again, sans some kind of expansion of the term, "sensation: simply does not cover the case under examination, that of deep meditative attainment resulting in past life recollection (nor does it cover the case of “hammering it out by reasoning”)
“Experience” (or “experiences”) works much better here, just like it works much better in the DN15 case, the past life recollections infer eternal existence by the experience of past life recollection, the buddha says that they do not make such an inference because they understand the arising, ceasing, flavor, danger and transcendence of “experiences”.
“sensations” in this case only works if we make some sort of convoluted argument to the effect that recollection is somehow the same as sensation, but that argument is certainly not made int he text, and if we take vedana to mean something more like “experience” (of any kind, sensation, recollection, mediative) we don’t need the argument and the whole ting works as is.
here once again the idea of sensations as an interface between the sense organs and the outside world doesn’t really make sense, the Buddha is not experiencing terrible sights, smells, tastes, touches etc, they are experiencing , internal pains, from their illness.
again, neither the “sights, sounds, smells, touches, tastes, thoughts” idea, nor the “pleasurable, painful, neither” idea really works here, the experience of satisified contentment as one drifts into a food coma is, first of all a much richer “vibe” than just “pleasant” and secondly not a taste, touch, sound, smell, sight, though, but something much more all pervasive and qualitative.
the “qualitative nature of experience” is what combines both the ideas of a sort of extended-to-include-the-internal sensations and the pleasant-unpleasant-niether aspects of these contexts.
so again, “experience” is a good translation. Well done Ajahn Brahm.
But that’s zero valence. Valence is just the name of the spectrum that ranges from negative, to zero, to positive. The problem with using “sensation” alone to translate vedanā, and the reason why many translators avoid that word, is because it doesn’t capture this at all.
All I was doing was pointing out what’s missing from the bare word “sensation,” not trying to engage with the critical analysis (of theories of attā) into the upādānakkhandhā, and certainly not trying to engage with your complex historical analysis of the development of the terminology, so I’m afraid your long reply is pretty much lost on me, sorry.
I also wasn’t seriously suggesting “valent sensation” as a usable translation. It’s a phrase where we need a word, and it’s a phrase that isn’t going to signify anything to most people.
No worries! I was just adding my two cents worth to the old thread, having come across it, and then I guess I thought since you had chimed in I had an opportunity to engage with you around the arguments I raised. Even if it’s lost on you, maybe other people reading later might find some use in it. I live in hope.
Why specify “she” if your not going to use the pronoun again in the example?
As for the rest of what you said, It doesn’t appear to engage with any of my arguments at all and I am therefore not particularly convinced.
Yes, would you mind re-posting the sections in the DN with the corresponding English translation where you think that valence is not a good translation? I tried to look these up, but the suttas in the Digha Nikaya tend to be quite digha so I didn’t find the paragraphs you quoted.
vedanīyā is not = vedanā, they are two different participles, formed from two different verbs (that mean two different things but are identical in their root form).
I have mentioned about the 5 √vid verbs that are identical in their root form here
paṇḍita-vedanīyā means something like “understandable (only) to the intelligent” or “knowable only by the intelligent” where the meaning that applies is “to know” and is the first verb in the list (in the above link). To this root, the anīyar participle is applied and then it gets the masculine plural ending as the word is used as an adjective of dhammā.
vedanā however is formed by a special participle called yuc, applied to the third verb meaning “to get/obtain” in the list (in the above link) whereby the resulting word vedanā acquires the meaning “habitually receiving (sensory inputs from the 5 sense organs)”.
Here vedanānaṁ (in genitive plural) is the same as the vedanā you’re asking about. However nothing in the text quoted above refers to past lives, it merely says 'the Tathāgata knows the arising and falling of vedanās, their enjoyment, their evils and the remedy from them.
As far as I have dealt with vedana in the teachings, valence as a translation makes very much sense. It may be a technical term and as for now only known to a minority but this can change. I mean you could argue that replacing one technical term with another doesn’t really make sense. But the term valence is imbued with meaning like e.g. in the English word value or worth. I really think it makes sense.
Yeah, but if you just use “valent” or “valence” all by itself, you’re leaving out the “sensation” aspect, which is just as bad as translating as “sensation” alone and leaving out all the valence aspect.
This is why “feeling,” unsatisfactory as it is, is the standard. It at least hints at both aspects (along with several other misleading connotations).
The following topic by Choong Mun-keat may be useful to understand feeling ‘vedanā’ according to the collection, Vedanā Saṃyutta of SN/SA:
“3. The arising and the cessation of feeling” (pp. 116-122), Chapter 4. Feeling (pp. 108-129), in The Fundamental Teachings of Early Buddhism: A Comparative Study Based on the Sūtrāṅga portion of the Pāli Saṃyutta-Nikāya and the Chinese Saṃyuktāgama.
Thanks! I will read your link at my earliest convenience, you are as ever a veritable font of useful knowledge on these matters.
Yes, but the passage is referring to the previous passages about the last life recollections.
So the first one, asssuming @srkris is correct about paṇḍitavedanīyā, although I have yet to read his linked thread, is:
Tayidaṁ, bhikkhave, tathāgato pajānāti: The Realized One understands this:
‘ime diṭṭhiṭṭhānā evaṅgahitā evaṁparāmaṭṭhā evaṅgatikā bhavanti evaṁabhisamparāyā’ti, ‘If you hold on to and attach to these grounds for views it leads to such and such a destiny in the next life.’
tañca tathāgato pajānāti, tato ca uttaritaraṁ pajānāti; tañca pajānanaṁ na parāmasati, aparāmasato cassa paccattaññeva nibbuti viditā. He understands this, and what goes beyond this. And since he does not misapprehend that understanding, he has realized quenching within himself.
Vedanānaṁ samudayañca atthaṅgamañca assādañca ādīnavañca nissaraṇañca yathābhūtaṁ viditvā anupādāvimutto, bhikkhave, tathāgato. Having truly understood the origin, ending, gratification, drawback, and escape from feelings, the Realized One is freed through not grasping.
this is in response to, amongst other examples;
Santi, bhikkhave, eke samaṇabrāhmaṇā sassatavādā, sassataṁ attānañca lokañca paññapenti catūhi vatthūhi. There are some ascetics and brahmins who are eternalists, who assert that the self and the cosmos are eternal on four grounds.
Te ca bhonto samaṇabrāhmaṇā kimāgamma kimārabbha sassatavādā sassataṁ attānañca lokañca paññapenti catūhi vatthūhi? And what are the four grounds on which they rely?
Idha, bhikkhave, ekacco samaṇo vā brāhmaṇo vā ātappamanvāya padhānamanvāya anuyogamanvāya appamādamanvāya sammāmanasikāramanvāya tathārūpaṁ cetosamādhiṁ phusati, yathāsamāhite citte (…) anekavihitaṁ pubbenivāsaṁ anussarati. It’s when some ascetic or brahmin—by dint of keen, resolute, committed, and diligent effort, and right application of mind—experiences an immersion of the heart of such a kind that they recollect their many kinds of past lives.
Seyyathidaṁ—ekampi jātiṁ dvepi jātiyo tissopi jātiyo catassopi jātiyo pañcapi jātiyo dasapi jātiyo vīsampi jātiyo tiṁsampi jātiyo cattālīsampi jātiyo paññāsampi jātiyo jātisatampi jātisahassampi jātisatasahassampi anekānipi jātisatāni anekānipi jātisahassāni anekānipi jātisatasahassāni: ‘amutrāsiṁ evaṁnāmo evaṅgotto evaṁvaṇṇo evamāhāro evaṁsukhadukkhappaṭisaṁvedī evamāyupariyanto, so tato cuto amutra udapādiṁ; tatrāpāsiṁ evaṁnāmo evaṅgotto evaṁvaṇṇo evamāhāro evaṁsukhadukkhappaṭisaṁvedī evamāyupariyanto, so tato cuto idhūpapanno’ti. Iti sākāraṁ sauddesaṁ anekavihitaṁ pubbenivāsaṁ anussarati. That is: one, two, three, four, five, ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand rebirths. They remember: ‘There, I was named this, my clan was that, I looked like this, and that was my food. This was how I felt pleasure and pain, and that was how my life ended. When I passed away from that place I was reborn somewhere else. There, too, I was named this, my clan was that, I looked like this, and that was my food. This was how I felt pleasure and pain, and that was how my life ended. When I passed away from that place I was reborn here.’ And so they recollect their many kinds of past lives, with features and details.
So evamāha:
They say:
‘sassato attā ca loko ca vañjho kūṭaṭṭho esikaṭṭhāyiṭṭhito; ‘The self and the cosmos are eternal, barren, steady as a mountain peak, standing firm like a pillar.
te ca sattā sandhāvanti saṁsaranti cavanti upapajjanti, atthi tveva sassatisamaṁ. They remain the same for all eternity, while these sentient beings wander and transmigrate and pass away and rearise.
So when we read over this passage and come to
Vedanānaṁ samudayañca atthaṅgamañca assādañca ādīnavañca nissaraṇañca yathābhūtaṁ viditvā anupādāvimutto, bhikkhave, tathāgato. Having truly understood the origin, ending, gratification, drawback, and escape from feelings, the Realized One is freed through not grasping.
We see that there is nothing about either sensations or valences in what precedes.
What appears to be the sense here is that the Buddha truly understands the origin, ending, savor, danger and escape from past life recollection, but doesn’t grasp at an inference to the effect of externalism, because they are liberated by their understanding.
The restricted SN style gloss simply doesn’t work here without severely distorting the english meaning of sensation, or feeling, or valence, because going into a deep meditative trance and recalling a previous existence from before you where born isn’t a “sensation” or a “feeling” or a “valence” it is an experience, so at least in this case it makes more sense to translate it that way in this context in DN1.
In the DN15 case (not the DO part, where “sensation” appears to work fine) we have:
Kittāvatā ca, ānanda, attānaṁ samanupassamāno samanupassati? How do those who regard the self regard it?
Vedanaṁ vā hi, ānanda, attānaṁ samanupassamāno samanupassati: They regard feeling as self:
‘vedanā me attā’ti. ‘Feeling is my self.’
‘Na heva kho me vedanā attā, appaṭisaṁvedano me attā’ti iti vā hi, ānanda, attānaṁ samanupassamāno samanupassati. Or they regard it like this: ‘Feeling is definitely not my self. My self does not experience feeling.’
‘Na heva kho me vedanā attā, nopi appaṭisaṁvedano me attā, attā me vediyati, vedanādhammo hi me attā’ti iti vā hi, ānanda, attānaṁ samanupassamāno samanupassati. Or they regard it like this: ‘Feeling is definitely not my self. But it’s not that my self does not experience feeling. My self feels, for my self is liable to feel.’
So here again it is hard to see how either sensation in it’s english meaning, or valence, can work.
compare:
“sensations are my self, I am my sensations”
or
“valences are my self, I am my valences”
with
“experiences are my self, I am my experiences”.
I think it is undeniable that the third alternative makes the most sense, and is the most defeasible philosophical position, one worthy of (the Buddha’s) critique.
again, later in the same sutta;
Tatrānanda, yo so evamāha: Now, as to those who say:
‘na heva kho me vedanā attā, appaṭisaṁvedano me attā’ti, so evamassa vacanīyo: ‘Feeling is definitely not my self. My self does not experience feeling.’ You should say this to them,
‘yattha panāvuso, sabbaso vedayitaṁ natthi api nu kho, tattha “ayamahamasmī”ti siyā’”ti? ‘But reverend, where there is nothing felt at all, would the thought “I am” occur there?’”
again, sans a claim that thoughts are sensations, and that in fact, everything that can be experienced is a “sensation”, a stratagem that simply defines the English word to be equivalent to experience, it is hard to see how this argument carries, and it is even less clear how it could possibly carry if instead of sensation we mean the hedonic tone or valence of a sensation, something that clearly in no way prevents us from thinking “I am this”.