This conference is co-organized by Ghent University, Belgium, and Dharma Drum Buddhist College, Taiwan.
Conference papers on the following topics are welcome:
- Indian Abhidharma Systems
- The adoption and adaptation of Indian Abhidharma in China - The translation of Indian Abhidharma texts into Chinese
- Hermeneutical issues concerning the Chinese reception of Indian Buddhist texts - The formation of Abhidharma schools in China
- Chinese Abhidharma masters
- The Importance of Abhidharma for the development of Chinese Buddhist schools - Central Asian manuscript founds
On the occasion of the 120th birthday of the appointment of Louis de La Vallée Poussin as professor at Ghent University in 1893, also a panel on the life and work of this famous buddhologist will be organized on July 9 2013.
Should you decide to attend, we kindly ask you to send the title of your paper by August 31, 2012. Please send us the abstract of your paper by October 31, 2012.
The conference will take place in ‘Het Pand’, conference centre of Ghent University.
Address: Onderbergen 1, 9000 Gent
Attendance of the conference is free of conference fee for paper presenters.
We will inform you on the possible funding of lodging expenses from our side at a later date. This funding depends on the approval of our application with the concerned institutions.
Warmest regards, Prof. dr. Bart Dessein
Ghent Centre for Buddhist Studies Prof. Huimin Bhikshu
President, Dharma Drum Buddhist College Prof. Weijen Teng
Coordinator, Dharma Drum Buddhist College
2. 發表論文
Paper to be presented at the Conference on “From Abhidhamma To Abhidharma:
Early Buddhist Scholasticism in India, Central Asia, and China,” Ghent University, Belgium, 8-9 July, 2013
Svalakṣaṇa (particular) and Sāmānyalakṣaṇa (universal) in Abhidharma and Chinese Yogācāra: Textual Sources and Interpretations
Draft Only, No Citation!
LIN Chen-kuo 林 鎮國 (National Chengchi University, [email protected])
I sit in the study room and experience the things in the surrounding, such as table, pen, books, music, and bell sound from the elementary school not far from the apartment where I live. Many other thoughts are also bubbling up in my mind even without notice. But I am still eligible to say that “I see a pen,” “I am reading Heidegger’s Being and Time,” “I have heard the bell ringing,” and so on. The experience I just described contains both cognitive and psychological tune. For instance, sometimes I
am in good mood, and sometimes not, when I am sensing and thinking. If I go further to analyze my own experience about, say, a pot of tulip on the table. I see the color of cup shaped pedals, even though I am not able to precisely identify a correct term for that shade of color. But I do see something. In Buddhist epistemology, that
“something” is called “particular” (svalakṣaṇa). If I go on to say, “The color of this tulip is purple,” then since the words “color,” “tulip” and “purple” in the statement are applicable to the concepts or qualities that are common in many individual entities, they are called “universal” (sāmānyalakṣaṇa).
Imagine another scenario. If the Buddha, an enlightened one, sits in the same room, does he have the same cognitive and psychological experience as mine described above? As claimed in many Yogācāra texts, the Buddha’s enlightened cognition is pure perception only. As for the Buddha himself, he does not need reasoning at the moment of enlightenment. All he experiences is nothing but perception in the
momentary flux. The difference from the ordinary experience is that he does not reify the momentary flux of perception within the dualistic conceptual framework of
‘”subject” and “object,” “I” and “mine”. However, the puzzle has not been completely solved. Is it true that the enlightened one does not need to use concept and reasoning for communication after the enlightenment? Or, does he only have perception without any aid of conception and reasoning? These puzzles were discussed in Kuiji (窺基 632-682)’s Cheng weishi lun shuji (成唯識論述記The Commentary on the Treatise on the Establishment of Consciousness-Only), a foundational treatise in the Chinese Yogācāra School in the seventh century.1
A key question I want to explore in this paper is about the cognition of svalakṣaṇa (particular) and sāmānyalakṣaṇa (universal) in the Buddhist epistemological and soteriological context. That is, what is right cognition, the cognition of universal or the cognition of particular, which can be employed to eliminate the psycho-cognitive hindrances for attaining final liberation? This is the fundamental question raised by both Abhidharma and Yogācāra Buddhists. According to the Abhidharma teaching, the various stages of meditation are designed to lead the practitioner to realize the truth of impermanence, suffering, and selflessness that will in turn help one free from
ignorance and defilement. “Impermanence,” “suffering” and “no-self” are identified as sāmānyalakṣaṇa for the reason that they are universal truth of phenomena, while the individual objects in the categories of five aggregates, twelve fields, and eighteen
1 The same passages in Kuiji’s Cheng weishi lun shuji is also found in his Dasheng fayuan yilin zhang 大 乘法苑義林章, T45.286.c.23-287.a.287.23, and Huizhao’s Dasheng fayuan yilin zhang buque 大乘法 苑義林章補闕.
realms are considered as svalakṣaṇa. When the question is raised with regard to the cognition which leads to the final elimination of defilements for attaining liberation, the Abhidharma’s answer is that the cognition of sāmānyalakṣaṇa leads to liberation.
This conviction is firmly stated in the Abhidharmamāhāvibhāṣa: “Only in the path which takes sāmānyalakṣaṇa as the object one is able to eliminate the defilements.”2 However, there are disagreements regarding this issue in the Chinese Yogācāra School.
Another important question is about the ontology of universals. In both Western and Indian (including Buddhist) philosophy, generally speaking, there are three positions:
(1) metaphysical realism, which holds the view that universal is real in the sense that it exists independently of mind; (2) nominalism, the view that universal is not real, while particular is real; (3) conceptualism, which argues that while universal is not real, it does exist in the mind in the form of concept. Regarding the ontological status of universal, the most Buddhists stand for nominalism while rejecting metaphysical realism. However, when we consider the various ontological stances taken by Sarvāstivāda, Sautrāntika, Mādhyamika, and Yogācāra, the label of “nominalism”
cannot be satisfactorily applied to all Buddhist schools without further clarification.
Could conceptualism be an option for Yogācāra? In Chinese Yogācāra, we find some discussion relevant to this issue. An important note with regard to the ontology of universals is that those theories are not resulted from the metaphysical speculation only. On the contrary, the debates on the ontological status of universals have
practical consequence in soteriology. Underlying the various theories of universal is a fundamental belief that only truth will set free those who are entrapped in ignorance and defilement: “Only the mental attention to the reality (tattva-manaskāra) is capable of cutting off the afflictions.”3