p.303
This paper will attempt a general metaphysical
dialogue between A. N. Whitehead and the Buddha. To
be sure, the time gap between the two is enormous.
However, considering the fact that there has been
continuity in Buddhist faith and practice up to the
present, we can accept the Buddha's thoughts as
contemporary. As for Whitehead, especially in his
later works he makes several references to the
Buddha, and in these we are able to discern two
divergent aspects: [1] his knowledge of Buddhism was
generally based on a popular understanding of the
times, and thus his critical views concerning it were
basically and distressingly wrong,(l) and [2] however
misinformed he may have been, his philosophy shows
strains of thought remarkably similar to those of the
Buddha. I will explore the second aspect.
Whitehead has been taken to task by Whiteheadians
and non-Whiteheadians alike. Among other things, he
has been accused of being either too vague or too
profoundly abstract, of pointing and yet seemingly
not pointing at the reality of things. There is
indeed much to be said in this regard, but it must be
admitted that Whitehead's philosophy, much of which
had to do with the metaphysical accounting of nature
in flux, required and used new terms, terms that were
strange and incomprehensible except to those who were
attuned and sympathetic to process philosophy. Like
many other philosophers before him, Whitehead was
grounded in mathematics and looked to it as a model
and a tool for describing the nature of things. He
was deeply concerned with the meaning and effects of
symbolism in the natural order.
The Buddha, both in and after his time, attracted
the same kinds of charges that are lodged against
Whitehead. Even today, scholars (most of whom are,
alas, non-Buddhists) criticize the Buddha (and
Buddhism) for advancing nihilism, negativism,
mysticism, relativism, indifferentism, aloofness,
passivity, resignation, and so forth. Buddha's
statements, like Whitehead's, are at times
_________________________________________
Kenneth K. Inada is Professor of Philosophy at the
State University of New York at Buffalo.
1. For example, he consistently errs in understanding
Buddhism in each of the following assertions: [1]
there is a savior in Buddhism just as in
Christianity; [2] the souls of the blessed return
to God; [3] Buddhism discourages the sense of
active personality; [4] the moral aims of Buddhism
are directed to altering the first principles of
metaphysics; and [5] the multiplicity of finite
enduring individuals was relegated to a world of
appearances, and the ultimate reality was centered
in an Absolute. See Religion in the Making
(Cambridge: At the University Press, 1926) ,
particularly pp. 139-141.
In these assertions it is clearly seen that he
interprets Buddhism as a religion of the popular type
which accepts such elements as a savior, a soul, and
man's resignation from life. Though of later
development throughout Asia, this type of Buddhism
was the first to make contact with and an impact on
the Western mind. He also confuses Buddhism with the
orthodox Vedaantic type of religion where man is in
illusion (maayaa) until he is able to elevate himself
by a supreme effort and thus become immersed in the
reality of the ultimate (Brahman).
p.304
so cryptic that they simply lend themselves to all
kinds of interpretations and fabrications, some of
which, unfortunately, are drastically apart from the
original idea or true import. In a sense, the Buddha
also indulged in a new vocabulary. Thus, on this
count too, he was charged with being vague,
inconsistent, and abstract. For example, he was
criticized for discoursing on the unreality rather
than the reality of things, which clearly shows that
the new language he advanced was either rejected or
ignored by his opponents. But it is to be
acknowledged that the Buddha caused a major
revolution in India with regard to man's outlook on
the reality of things. He had to be "unorthodox" in
his expressions in reference to the content of his
enlightened nature. As a consequence, the Buddha
coined new terms and phrases which were against
tradition and religion. He did resort to old terms,
to be sure, but he deftly turned these into words
with different contextual meaning; he also went ahead
to use seemingly illogical terms or, in a very
dramatic way, he turned the old familiar terms
literally up-side-down. Such terms as anaatman
(nonself), in contradistinction to the accepted term,
aatman (self), or anitya (impermanence), instead of
nitya (permanence) , are indeed difficult to
understand, much less accept, in a tradition-bound
culture. But the insight of the Buddha proved to be
fruitful and enduring, as history has attested. We
must now attempt to see where the Buddha and
Whitehead converge in the discourse on the nature of
ultimate reality.
In the search for a common ground and perspective
the most natural and fruitful area on which to
concentrate would be man's nature. Both men were
intensely concerned with its ultimate status, and the
Buddha, even without the benefits of scientific
methodology and technique, was able to present a
remarkably sound view. Thus the dialogue between the
two should be meaningful and significant only as we
comprehend the similar strains in their ways of
thinking. Obviously the dialogue cannot be a strict
one-to-one comparison of details or minutiae in the
Buddha's and Whitehead's complete concepts of man.
That would be an impossible task not only on the
historical count but also with respect to the
cultural differences which ultimately dictate the
type of meaning specifically conveyed by the terms in
use. Moreover, it should be noted at the outset that
the aim or goal of man in the two concepts differs
quite drastically, especially in the realm of
religious experience, so that some comparative
analysis would have to be left out. However, if the
more basic points are focused on the results should
be rewarding.
The paper will then concentrate on Whitehead's
concept of an actual entity (or actual occasion) as a
basis for comparison with the Buddhist concept of
anaatman (the nonbifurcated-bifurcating "self").(2)
These concepts are seemingly
____________________________
2. I have now come to understand the anaatman concept
as a nonbifurcated-bifurcating "self" because in
the aatman concept there are involved at all times
two vital components or aspects. On the one side
there is the "bifurcated self," which presents a
situation
p.305
incompatible, but it would be worth our while to
examine them closely. I am quite mindful of the fact
that the concept of an actual entity is really the
alpha and omega of Whiteheadianism, so that to
discuss it means at once to implicate the rest of the
concepts abounding in this system of thought.
Curiously enough, the same is also true of the
doctrine of anaatman. In this respect both systems
are on common ground, and both strictly adhere to the
naturalistic rule or creed of the self-sufficiency of
the nature of things. The two concepts in question
will then be treated as a framework within which the
relevances of the respective complementary doctrines
will be exhibited.
ACTUAL ENTITY
Whitehead was a man of rare vision. He was profoundly
religious. In one of his more famous religious
statements, he remarked: "I hazard the prophecy that
that religion will conquer which can render clear to
popular understanding some eternal greatness
incarnate in the passage of temporal fact."(3) He
made this remark quite late in his life, but the idea
seems to have haunted him for a long time. Perhaps it
is not amiss to say that the deep concern for the
temporal fact and what it entails had compelled him
to reexamine or reappraise the whole function of
philosophy. Whether he succeeded finally in
presenting his case to popular understanding remains
an open question, although the challenge is
constantly present.
We are easily attracted to the rational and
abstractive (symbolic) processes, thinking that one
could continue the processes without relating the
abstracted elements to the immediacy of concrete
events. Whitehead was cognizant of the limitations of
logic, language, and the whole symbolic process in
man. But, in the ultimate sense, he says there is no
"mere awareness, mere private sensation, mere
emotion, mere purpose, mere appearance, mere
causation."(4)
_____________________________________________________
where the so-called self is taken to be something
static, structural, and thus is even looked upon as a
lifeless entity. This is the realm of pure
abstraction or symbolism. On the other side there is
the "bifurcating self" which, by virtue of being
thought of in its nature of isolation or
independence, continues the process of fragmentation
or abstractive discrimination of different realms of
existence. The status of an I, an ego, a subject
aloof from the experiential process in which it is
dynamically involved, is thereby advanced. Thus the
process only furthers the whole bifurcating series in
the continuity of being. The bifurcating self
necessarily relies on the bifurcated self and thus
keeps going the perpetual quest for discriminative
physical and mental realms and their elements. The
true self or anaatman is not grasped or achieved so
long as this quest goes on. It will be seen later in
the discussion that the Buddha admonished those who
indulge in extremes (antas) of all kinds, for they
are not able to experience the middle path (madhyamaa
pratipad).
3. A. N. Whitehead, Adventures of Ideas (New York:
Macmillan Co., 1933), p. 41.
4. A. N. Whitehead, Process and Reality (New York:
Social Science Book Store, 1941), p.27.
p.306
Events or things do not occur in a total vacuum nor
can they be definitively treated as such. In this
connection he repeatedly warned against falling into
the fallacy of misplaced concreteness.(5) He not only
showed what abstractions are and how they arise but,
more important, focused on the basic fact of the
coherent ontological nature of things. In Science and
the Modern World, he clearly asserted:
Of course, substance and quality, as well as simple
location, are the most natural ideas for the human
mind. It is the way in which we think of things, and
without these ways of thinking we could not get our
ideas straight for daily use. There is no doubt about
this. The only question is, How concretely are we
thinking when we consider nature under these
conceptions? My point will be, that we are presenting
ourselves with simplified editions of immediate
matters of fact. When we examine the primary elements
of these simplified editions, we shall find that they
are in truth only to be justified as being elaborate
logical constructions of a high degree of
abstraction. Of course, as a point of individual
psychology, we get at the ideas by the rough and
ready method of suppressing what appear to be
irrelevant details. But when we attempt to justify
this suppression of irrelevance, we find that, though
there are entities left corresponding to the entities
we talk about, yet these entities are of a high
degree of abstraction.
Thus I hold that substance and quality afford
another instance of the fallacy of misplaced
concreteness.(6)
Again:
I also express my conviction that if we desired to
obtain a more fundamental expression of the concrete
character of natural fact, the element in this scheme
which we should first criticise is the concept of
simple location.... To say that a bit of matter has
simple location means that, in expressing its
spatiotemporal relations, it is adequate to state
that it is where it is, in a definite finite region
of space, and throughout a definite finite duration
of time, apart from any essential reference of the
relations of that bit of matter to other regions of
space and to other durations of time. Again, this
concept of simple location is independent of the
controversy between the absolutist and the refativist
views of space or of time.(7)
When Whitehead made the profound statement that
"nature is closed to mind," he quickly added that
"this closure of nature does not carry with it any
metaphysical doctrine of the disjunction of nature
and mind."(8) Rather than disjunction he was
interested in the unity and continuity of the
temporal facts in nature. Thus despite the
"spatialization" of the elements of nature and the
corresponding abstractions wrought from them, he was
particularly concerned about how these can return, as
it were, within the inclusive whole.
_______________________________
5. Ibid., pp. 11, 27. Also, the most systematic
expression of this fallacy is presented in
chapters 3 and 4 of Science and the Modern World
(New York: Macmillan Co., 1948).
6. Science and the Modern World, pp. 76-77.
7. Ibid., p. 84.
8. A. N. Whitehead, The Concept of Nature (Ann Arbor:
The University of Michigan Press, 1957), p.4.
p.307
According to Whitehead, this can be done by
speculative philosophy. It is "the endeavour to frame
a coherent, logical, necessary system of general
ideas in terms of which every element of our
experience can be interpreted."(9) In the endeavor,
he goes on to say:
Whatever is found in 'practice' must lie within the
scope of the metaphysical description. When the
description fails to include the 'practice', the
metaphysics is inadequate and requires revision.
There can be no appeal to practice to supplement
metaphysics, so long as we remain contented with our
metaphysical doctrines. Metaphysics is nothing but
the description of the generalities which apply to
all the details of practice.
No metaphysical system can hope entirely to satisfy
these pragmatic tests. At the best such a system will
remain only an approximation to the general truths
which are sought. In particular, there are no
precisely stated axiomatic certainties from which to
start. There is not even the language in which to
frame them.(10)
Thus philosophers can never hope to formulate
metaphysical first principles because of weakness of
insight and deficiency of language.(11) Moreover, "we
can never catch the actual world taking a holiday
from their sway."(12) The only alternative is to
capture these metaphysical principles by "flashes of
insight" and develop an "asymptotic approach to a
scheme of principles."(l3)
Thus Whitehead has made it plain that the world
structure in entirety cannot be known by principles
or universals, but it is not a hopeless task to work
from the aspect of "things as they are" in their
becomingness to the greater generalized
characterization of those things in the "inclusive
whole."(l4) In this scheme, there is the rational as
well as the empirical side, or there are the
coherent, logical, and necessary aspects as well as
the adequate and applicable aspects. It is a
comprehensive scheme in which there is
interconnectedness through and through. But we must
start from somewhere and Whitehead does this on the
sure ground of human experience. He says, "the
ultimate facts of immediate actual experience are
actual entities, prehensions, and nexuus."(l5) They
are, as it were, on display in every experience. They
are interrelated terms in the immanent sense. Thus he
says, "just as the relations modify the natures of
the relata, so the relata modify the nature of the
relation. The relationship is not a universal. It is
a concrete fact with the same con-
_________________________________
9. Process and Reality, p. 4.
10. Ibid., p. 19.
11. Ibid., p. 6.
12. Ibid., p. 7.
13. Ibid., p. 6.
14. Speaking of the purpose of philosophy, he says:
"Its business is to explain the emergence of the
more abstract things from the more concrete
things.... The true philosophic question is, How
can concrete fact exhibit entities abstract from
itself and yet participated in by its own
nature?" Ibid., p. 30.
15. Ibid.
p.308
creteness as the relata."(16) This is his doctrine
of relatedness or mutual immanence, a doctrine which
prevents one from isolating or locating an actual
entity in any well-defined context. The actual
entities are the "final things of which the world is
made up, "(17) and are the basis of the relatedness.
Thus they cannot be empty or vacuous actualities.
They "involve each other by reason of their
prehensions of each other,"(18) or it is the nature
of each being to be a potential for every becoming.
Thus the togetherness or unity of these entities by
virtue of their prehensions is the fact of a nexuus.
According to Whitehead, a prehension involves a
"subject," the datum, and the subjective form which
refers to the "affective" aspect of the "subject." As
prehensions are the order of becoming in nature from
the smallest entity to the largest, the gradation or
hierarchy of being is possible. The human organism is
a complex higher order of being, a society of actual
entities; it is also called a "grouping of
occasions." In this respect, the traditional notions
of personal identity, ego, soul, individuality, etc.,
would have to be reassessed, and if they are to be
admitted they must be seen within the context of
related entities.
Whitehead is keen on justifying the doctrines of
becoming, being, and the relatedness of actual
entities. He cannot speak of one without implicating
the others. Thus, "Whenever we attempt to express the
matter of immediate experience, we find that its
understanding leads us beyond itself, to its
contemporaries, to its past, to its future, and to
the universals in terms of which its definiteness is
exhibited."(19) Moreover, in the immediate experience
he speaks of nonsensuous perception, which has a
great role in qualifying that experience. For
example, the knowledge of our immediate past is such
a perception.(20) A perception of this nature is also
an aspect of the continuity of nature, albeit in an
unseen way. In a more particular sense, the actual
entity in terms of its subjective form issues forth
the continuity of its own being.
The actual entity consequently is never static or
independent; it is perpetually becoming. It has its
prehensions and nexuus in harmony with the
becomingness of nature. It also has its "objectively
immortal" aspect, the not-being of being in the
passage of subjective forms. (21) The "objectively
immortal" aspect, in turn, is the potential for the
prehensions by other actual entities. The passage
from past to present and into the future is the
creative
_________________________________
16. Adventures of Ideas, p. 201.
17. Process and Reality, p. 27.
18. Ibid., p. 29.
19. Ibid., p. 21.
20. Adventures of Ideas, pp. 232-235.
21. "The not-being of occasions is their 'objective
immortality.' A pure physical prehension is how
an occasion in its immediacy of being absorbs
another occasion which has passed into the
objective immortality of its not-being. It is how
the past lives in the present. It is causation.
It is memory.... It is a basic element from which
springs the selfcreation of each temporal
occasion. Thus perishing is the initiation of
becoming. How the past perishes is how the future
becomes." Ibid., p 305.
p.309
advance of each actual entity. Such an advance means
that something novel is taking place or that the
diversified world of elements becomes unified in
terms of the concrescence of that actual entity. Each
entity then prehends the pure potentials or eternal
objects which constitute the forms of definiteness
with respect to the entity.
In the context of the dynamic novel concrescence of
each actual entity, the traditional view of the self
breaks down. Each "self" is no longer vacuous or
independent;each is coherently related to every other
entity and each presents itself potentially for the
concrescence by others; and each prehends the eternal
objects determinately to reveal the nexuus of itself.
In short, the "self" is too complex an entity to be
easily analyzed into a system of organic or
nonorganic structure. It entails both and much more.
There is something beyond the perishing transient
nature of being.
It can readily be seen in the light of the
foregoing brief discussion that Whitehead employed
quite a sophisticated vocabulary in order to express
the elements at play or interplay in experience, the
temporal fact. In a way, he was compelled to do so in
the hope of seeking greater adequacy and
applicability. On the whole, he was reacting against
traditional beliefs and modes of thinking based on
simple location. He thus admits to the use of
neologisms.(22)
ANAATMAN
As we now turn to the Buddha, we find a remarkably
similar situation existing. As with Whitehead, there
is a reappraisal of traditional beliefs and modes of
thinking and the consequent development of a unique
philosophy. The dominant view during the Buddha's
times was the Vedaantic monistic conception of the
universe. Man was part of the whole scheme of things,
but he generally had a very insignificant role. His
self or personal soul (jiiva) was for the most part
relegated to an illusory form of existence, and only
by a supreme spiritual effort could he elevate
himself and ultimately unite with the Brahman, the
absolute pure ground of existence. It was strictly a
metaphysical idealism of the first order.
The Buddha was influenced by the Vedaantic view of
life, to be sure, but in time he sensed its futility,
its inability to cope with the hard facts of
life-birth, disease, old age, and death. The answer
lay not in the spiritual unity, if that was possible
at all, of aatman-Brahman. For the Buddha, the
illusory (maayaa) nature attributed to man was a
fictitious metaphysical cover. In this condition
there were no adequate means to describe and to
alleviate the present plight of man within his
empirical nature. And so the Buddhist literature
dramatically records that the would-be Buddha set out
to find the answers to
_______________________________
22. For the treatment of neologisms, see Adventures
of Ideas, pp.294-301.
p.310
man's ills by taking up traditional yoga, but later
experienced its inadequacy; then he took a different
meditative tack and was awakened to the truth of
things.
The ultimate truth he gained was the middle
doctrine (madhyamaa pratipad) .(23) It is the
ontological principle in Buddhism, for it expresses
the nature of the supreme moment of experience in the
transient nature of things. It is also the
abandonment of abstract metaphysical notions
unrelated to that moment. Thus the Buddha declares:
This world, Kaccaayana, usually bases [its view] on
two things: on existence and on non-existence.
Now he, who with right insight sees the uprising of
the world as it really is, does not hold with the
non-existence of the world. But he, who with right
insight sees the passing away of the world as it
really is, does not hold with the existence of the
world. Grasping after systems, imprisoned by dogmas
is this world, Kaccaayana, for the most part. And the
man who does not go after that system-grasping, that
mental standpoint, that dogmatic bias, who does not
grasp at it, does not take up his stand upon it,
[does not think]: 'It is my soul! (aatman)'... who
thinks:...'that which arises is just Ill (du.hkha),
that which passes away is Ill.'... this man is not in
doubt, is not perplexed. Knowledge herein is his that
is not merely another's.'
Thus far, Kaccaayana, he has right view.
Everything exists:... this is one extreme. Nothing
exists:... this is the other extreme. Not approaching
either extreme the Tathaagata (i.e., the Buddha)
teaches you a doctrine by the middle [way].(24)
The middle doctrine or way is never a rational or a
psychological middle. It is not even a balanced
middle between any two points or a middle sought in
any quantitative or qualitative analysis. The
Buddha's message in the passage above is clearly one
of seeking the true unclouded nature of one's own
being, a being which is what it is, or in technical
terms, the thusness of being (yathaabhuutam). The
Buddha's great insight here is to indicate that man
is a constantly bifurcating creature, that he bases
his whole epistemological viewpoints upon the two
extremes (anta) of existence (bhava) and nonexistence
(vibhava, abhava). Or, in more common terms, man
builds up his world of knowledge by implicitly
positing the extremes of something and nothing in the
world, and continues to function in the fashion of an
"either/or" logic, despite the fact that the world of
logic, which is the realm of abstraction, is not
always in one-to-one correspondence with the world of
reality (yathaabhuutam). Nevertheless, man grasps at
a system which is another form of abstraction because
he seeks rational clarity and coherency even at the
expense of losing the more basic aspects of the
nature of total experience. Thus every view,
_____________________________________
23. Proclaimed in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta of
the Samyutta Nikaaya, V. 420; allegedly the first
words of the Buddha at Sarnath, near Banaras.
24. Samyutta Nikaaya II. 15; also, III. 135. The
translation is from The Book of Kindred Sayings,
trans. Mrs. Rhys Davids, Pali Text Society
Translation Series, no. 10 (London: Luzac & Co.,
1952), pt. II, pp. 12-13.
p.311
concept, or dogma, if unwarily maintained, becomes an
abstract entity in an already abstracted framework.
The meta-metaphysical series or process knows no end
since man constantly bifurcates and, what is more, he
is unmindful of his own bifurcated state of being.
There is thus a dual aspect in man, who suffers
(du.hkha) by virtue of his bifurcated state (the I,
me, ego, etc.) and the bifurcating process he
indulges in. It was against this dual aspect
underlying the aatman concept that the Buddha
revolted, and he substituted in its stead the
�anaatman theory. Consequently, the right insight into
the rise and passing away of one's own experience
belongs to the anaatman, and is never possible with
the aatman or self-concept. It is the grasp of the
ontological coherency in the total experiential
process.
The venerable Raahula once asked the Buddha: "How,
lord, should one know, how should one see, so that in
this body, together with its consciousness, and
likewise in all external objects, he has no more idea
of 'I' and 'mine,' no more leanings to conceit?"(25)
The Buddha replied:
Whatsoever material object, Raahula, be it past,
future or present, inward or outward, subtle or
gross, low or high, far or near, one regards thus:...
"this is not mine; this am not I; this is not the
Self of me,"... that is seeing things by right
insight as they really are.
Thus knowing, Raahula, thus seeing, in this body,
together with its consciousness, and likewise in all
external objects, one has no idea of "I" and "mine,"
no more leanings to conceit.(26)
On another occasion the Buddha referred to the
so-called personal identity claimed by some with
respect to the three temporal moments as "merely
names, expressions, turns of speech, designations in
common use in the world. And of these a Tathaagata
(one who has won the truth) makes use indeed, but is
not led astray by them."(27)
The Buddha's dying words allegedly were: "All
compounded nature of things is impermanent or subject
to decay."(28) Immediately after the Buddha's demise,
one of the disciples clarified the profound statement
thus:
They all, all beings that have life, shall lay
Aside their complex form... that aggregation Of
mental and material qualities,
That gives them, or in heaven or on earth,
Their fleeting individuality!
E'en as the teacher... being such a one,
________________________________________
25. Ibid., III. 136. The Book of Kindred Sayings
(London: Luzac & Co., 1954), pt. III, p. 115.
26. Ibid. Also, the Nakulapitar section of the
Samyutta Nikaaya, III. 1-5, carries the same
discussion on not setting up a self or an I.
27. Po.t.t.hapada Sutta of the Diigha Nikaaya, Sutta
IX. The translation is from The Dialogues of the
Buddha, trans. T. W. Rhys Davids, Sacred Books of
the Buddhists, vol. 2 (London: Luzac & Co.,
1956), pt. I, p. 263
28. Mahaaparinibbaana Sutta of the Diigha Nikaaya,
II. 120, 156.
p.312
Unequalled among all the men that are,
Successor of the prophets of old time,
Mighty by wisdom, and in insight clear...
Hath died!(29)
Accordingly, the human organism is compounded, an
aggregate of "mental and material qualities." These
refer to the five skandhas, which are [1]
corporeality (ruupa), [2] feeling or sensitive nature
(vedanaa) , [3] primary imagery (sa^mj~naa), [4]
interplay of the imagery or activity thereof
(sa^mskaara) , and [5] conscious play or
discriminative knowledge ( vij~naana ). Any of the
above cannot be identified with a self or a being so
as to assert "I feel" or "I am conscious, " as if
feeling and consciousness are separate entities. In
separation they lose all meaning but in unity they
gain something. They are all intimately bound
together to form the unit of becoming that we
conventionally call the self. The classic expression
of the unit of becoming is presented in the Questions
of King Milinda (Milindapa~nha, 25) , where the
learned monk questions the validity of assigning
reality to the constituent parts of a chariot. He
points out that the wheels are not the chariot; nor
is the carriage, etc. But the chariot is. Likewise,
the constituent parts of a king or a monk lack
reality in themselves but the king or monk does
exist, albeit in a conventional sense. Thus man's
conglomerate existence cannot be reduced to its
parts: he is a unique complex entity in the
becomingness of nature.
In another suutra, the analysis of the five skandhas
goes a step further to condemn them as a burden of
existence.(30) Each one of the skandhas is said to be
corruptible and also the source of suffering
(du.hkha). The reason for this is that the so-called
self or ego is constantly grasping or clinging to the
elements derivable in each of the skandhas. Looked at
from another angle, the assertion of a personal
identity or a self is the fact of the skandhas
burdening or asserting themselves. The burdening
process takes the form of a phenomenon of
permanently settling down or a restraining bond with
respect to the elements of the function despite the
overbearing transient nature of things. A
contradiction then arises in which there is
permanence on the one hand and impermanence on the
other. Such a situation becomes a cause for
uneasiness or delusion, which is a form of suffering.
It can now be seen that a self or aatman would be
difficult to justify in the light of transiency or
impermanence. The other alternative, nonself or
anaatman, fares much better, for it does not have to
adhere strictly to a structural analysis. It is in
constant harmony or rhythm with passage. But now, the
question arises, how does the Buddha explain the
continuity of human experience? At this juncture, he
introduces the concept of dependent or relational
_________________________________
29. Ibid., II. 157. The Dialogues of the Buddha
(London: Luzac & Co., 1959), pt. II, p. 175.
30. Samyutta Nikaaya III. 25. On the Burden.
Translation from The Book of Kindred Sayings, pt.
III, pp. 24-31.
p.313
origination (pratiityasamutpaada), which is commonly
called the Wheel of Life or Becoming. No experience
or event, according to this concept, happens in
isolation. Each arises from and is within a
multidimensional background. Thus the Wheel begins
(quite arbitrarily, since any element in it could be
taken to be the point of inception) in the following
manner:
Conditioned by ignorance activities come to pass,
conditioned by activities consciousness; thus
conditioned [arises] name-and-shape; and sense
arises, contact, feeling, craving, grasping,
becoming, birth, decay-and-death, grief, suffering...
even such is the uprising of this entire mass of ill.
But from the utter fading away and ceasing of
ignorance [arises] ceasing of activities, and thus
comes ceasing of this entire mass of ill.(31)
Consequently, the Wheel of Life, similar in nature to
the five skandhas, can be looked upon as the cause of
suffering, but it also can be the basis for a way
out. The five skandhas and the twelve elements of the
Wheel express the empirical nature in man and yet the
Buddha, paradoxical as it might seem, expounds the
middle doctrine within such a context. In short, the
anaatman must be sought within the becomingness of
things. This spirit was captured very well by
Buddhagho.sa quite a few centuries later:
There is no doer (attaa, aatman) who does the
deed (Kamma, karma);
Nor one who reaps the content (phala) of the deed
as such.
The aggregates of being (Khandhas, skandhas)
continue to become.
This alone is the correct view [of the reality of
experience].(32)
Again:
There is suffering (dukkha, du.hkha) but none who
suffers;
Doing exists but none who does (i.e., no doer)
There is cessation (nirodha) but none who ceases
(i.e., the extinguished person in the
nirvaa.nic realm)
The path (magga, maarga) exists but not the goer
(i.e., one who experiences empirical or
tangible elements)(33)
And thus in a very cryptic way the concept of
anaatman has been advanced. Its discovery must be
considered one of the greatest insights by an Asian.
Many of us are only now feeling its full impact.
CONCLUSION
We have seen that the actual entity and anaatman are
dynamic concepts and, consequently, that they do not
lend themselves to any static description or
analysis. This does not mean, however, that all
descriptive or analytic attempts or devices must be
ruled out completely. These are vitally important,
espe-
_________________________________
31. The Book of Kindred Sayings, pt. II, p. 13.
32. Visuddhimagga XIX. 602.
33. Ibid., XVI. 513.
p.314
cially to ordinary thinking and understanding based
on such thinking. Both Whitehead and the Buddha
acknowledged the fact that although language and the
thought process go a long way in promoting man's
knowledge of things, they have limitations, and in
the final analysis they fail to help man grasp
reality as such. Whitehead said it quite pointedly:
"Only what is clearly and distinctly conceived (or
perceived) is verbalized. Frequently, however, that
which is verbalized is superficial."(34)
Since both men were interested in man's temporal
process, they concentrated on the "elements" that can
be divulged in that process without being restricted
to or caught up in the "elements" themselves. They
worked from the inside, the human experience, to
treat the myriad "elements" at play. Where Whitehead
had the whole Western philosophical and scientific
tradition to rely on in refining his theories, the
Buddha principally worked alone and finally revolted
against the prevailing dogmatic tradition. The
Buddha's view was in a way revolutionary, in that
wisdom entailed the vision of an ontological absolute
in the flux of things rather than the traditional
unity with the metaphysical absolute in the flux of
things. In this respect, both men disdained to resort
to school metaphysics, since it would lead to more
problems and result in inane descriptions. Where
Whitehead resorted to an increasingly inclusive
method of "descriptive generalization" grounded in
concrete experiential elements, and hoped for a syno
ptic vision of things in process, the Buddha plunged
straight into the disciplinary and introspective
course in order to control the rise of suffering
states of being and thereby view things as they
really are (yathaabhuutam, or the achievement of the
nirvaa.nic realm). Both were empiricists in this
respect: Whitehead remained with the tangible aspects
of experience as far as possible but made way for the
acceptance of nonexperiential data in the end; the
Buddha, on the other hand, sought an absolute ground
of existence in the experiential components
themselves and, in so doing, had to reappraise the
whole order of things so that the ground of
understanding paralleled and ultimately coincided
with the reality of things.
For both the passage of the temporal fact must be
unhampered in the physical as well as the mental
realm. Whitehead is understandably more scientific in
treating the rise of abstractions, but the Buddha too
accounted for their rise, the whole realm of
symbolism, and the dubious role of dogmatic views
(d.r.s.ti). The Buddha always invoked the principle
of indeterminacy or indescribability (avyaak.rta)
when anything definitive or absolute was demanded,
because he saw that definitive answers on the abstrac
tive or symbolic level only vitiate the temporal fact
in passage.
_______________________________
34. A. H. Johnson, "Whitehead as Teacher and
Philosopher, " Philosophy and Phenomenological
Research XXIX, no. 3 (Mar. 1969), 360.
P.315
In analyzing the temporal fact, both saw the need
for a twofold approach, the morphological and the
genetic. A temporal fact can be "seen"
morphologically in the sense of a structure but not
genetically; and yet both aspects are only
complementary phases of each other. As Whitehead
says, "An actual entity is to be conceived both as a
subject presiding over its own immediacy of becoming,
and a superject which is the atomic creature
exercising its function of objective immortality."(35)
This is an attempt to accommodate the static,
structural aspect within the dynamic becoming. The
Buddha too gave a morphological analysis of
experience by way of the five skandhas, twelve
aayatanas, and eighteen dhaatus, but in the ultimate
sense these had to be subsumed under the genetic
process. Thus for both the genetic process was
supreme, and was that into which all the elements of
the structural analysis had to be framed.
Both men took the world, inclusive of man, to be
nonbifurcated or, in Whiteheadian terms, to have no
disjunctive reality. Both, however, acknowledged the
fact that man is basically a bifurcating creature,
forever asserting his own individuality. And yet, as
Whitehead rightly observes, "process and
individuality require each other. In separation all
meaning evaporates."(36) For the Buddha, there is a
continuity of the becoming process by virtue of the
carry-over of the subjectivity-corporeality
(naama-ruupa) in different forms. Such forms are
relative to the contents of the five skandhas, etc.,
as they are involved in the experiential process.
Thus for both there is no room for mere personal
identity, self, mind, or ego. Whitehead, like the
Buddha, dismisses the notion of a consciousness that
is prior to experience."(37)He even goes to the extent
of saying that "mental operations do not necessarily
involve consciousness."(38)
The nonbifurcated world means that there is
interconnectedness. Here both men worked within the
monadic structure.(39) Where Whitehead introduced the
doctrine of mutual immanence of actual entities, the
Buddha also expounded on the nature of a unique
relational origination (pratiityasamutpaada) where
all experiential arisings are involved in the total
relational sense. For both there was a serious
repudiation of any "vacuous actuality."
_____________________________________
35. Process and Reality, p. 71.
36. A. N. Whitehead, Modes of Thought (New York:
Macmillan Co., 1938), p. 133. In the same vein,
he says,"One main doctrine, developed in these
lectures, is that 'existence' (in any of its
senses) cannot be abstracted from 'process.' The
notions of 'process' and 'existence' presuppose
each other." Ibid., p. 131.
37. "The principle that I am adopting is that
consciousness presupposes experience, and not
experience consciousness." Process and Reality,
p. 83.
38. Ibid., p. 130.
39. There is a feeling that the germs of monadology
may have been an Asian import rather than a
coincidence since Leibniz had access to the
material on cosmology and philosophy brought
back by the Jesuit fathers from their trips to
Asia.
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