... some well intentioned Buddhist monks as well as some Buddhist laymen
are making an ill-advised effort to prove that Buddhism is a scientific
religion. Walpola Rahula [1]

... The Tao of Physics is in a sense, a book about Buddhist physics...
Fritjof Capra [2]

Preliminary Remarks

This paper forms part of a more comprehensive study of 'The Nature of
Nature' which attempts critically to explore Western as well as Eastern
views of nature.

One of the basic problems arising is that of translating technical
terminology relating to 'nature'. The word 'nature' is used in English in
many different contexts and carries a great diversity of meanings. V. S.
Apte's Student's English-Sanskrit Dictionary (p. 303) offers over forty
different Sanskrit terms under the entry 'nature'. It is obvious that the
following essay can neither deal with all these meanings nor make reference
to all uses of the few terms discussed.

The purpose of this paper is not to provide an exhaustive treatment of
concepts connoting 'nature' in Buddhist literature but to point out firstly
that the notions of 'nature' underlying Buddhist teaching are important
presuppositions of Buddhist doctrine itself, determining to some extent
'the nature of Buddhism', secondly that Buddhist notions of 'nature' reveal
insights into the 'nature of nature' that should become part of
contemporary understanding, and thirdly that Buddhist notions of 'nature',
are complex and cannot easily be subsumed under a general notion of
'Eastern mysticism' as is done, for example, by Fritjof Capra.

Capra, no doubt, must be given credit for drawing the attention of many
science interested Western readers to the treasures of insight found in
Eastern philosophies and traditions and for establishing striking
connections between some models of contemporary physics and some images of
ancient Asian traditions. His presentation of 'Eastern mysticism', however,
does not sufficiently differentiate between the vastly different systems of
Eastern thought and tends to blur the significant controversies among them.
His reliance on English translations (by different hands) of Eastern
sources lets him draw conclusions which are not warranted by the texts
themselves. Thus in Chapter 14 of the Tao of Physics, entitled 'Emptiness
and Form', he offers a translation of an Upanishad phrase '... Brahman is
the Void' and follows it up with the observation "Buddhists express the
same idea when they call the ultimate reality sunsata -- 'Emptiness' or
'the Void'..." [3]. The Upanishad uses the term kham, sky, space, heaven
with connotations quite different from the notion sunyata emptiness, zero,
void as used by the Buddhists. Vedantins, the followers of Upanishadic
thinking, rejected the Buddhist notion of sunyata as incompatible with
their notion of brahman--the controversy has been sustained for over a
thousand years and is documented in hundreds of important volumes.

While one must certainly welcome the interest which a contemporary
physicist shows in ancient Asian thought one must caution against a
premature collapsing of ideas coming from very different backgrounds and,
especially, a physicalisation of notions which, in Western terminology,
would be clearly metaphysical.

Introduction

Among all the great traditional systems of thought it was Buddhism which
many scientists discovered as most compatible with modern scientific
thinking and, quite often, ahead of it! This attitude was quickly noticed
by Buddhists, especially from Sri Lanka, who were eager to point out the
scientific nature of the Buddha's approach to the world and the superiority
of Buddhist teaching over Western science as well as religion and
philosophy [4]. Before supporting or denying these claims let it be stated
that whatever the relation between Buddhism and modern science may or may
not be, Buddhism has developed a comprehensive theory of the nature of
nature, encompassing all aspects of it and applying concepts of great depth
and breadth to its analysis. Early Buddhism does not know the
compartmentalisation of knowledge, so typical of the modern West, and thus
its views of the nature of nature cut across physics and psychology, ethics
and religion. Its analysis being so comprehensive and its view so
allencompassing, it also includes itself in it: the 'nature of Buddhism'
tries not only to provide information on how Buddhism views nature but
suggests also that these views define Buddhism itself.

In the course of its more than 2500 years of existence Buddhism developed a
very large number of schools and sects -- many of them almost as far apart
from each other in fundamental tenets and practices as any totally
unrelated schools of thought and sects could be imagined. If we go by the
mere label 'Buddhist' almost every teaching and almost every practice could
be found justified by a reference to 'Buddhism'.

In order to remain coherent and meaningful when using the words 'Buddhist'
and 'Buddhism' this presentation restricts itself to sources close to the
historic origins of Buddhism and those later interpretations of these
sources which bear visible resemblance to and represent an intelligible
exposition of them.

Being so far removed in time from the origins of Buddhism increases our
difficulty to find out the original teaching of the Buddha. Each and every
human institution degenerates over the ages. Buddha himself quite clearly
foresaw this. He considered his own teaching as the clearing of a path in
the jungle that had been forgotten and overgrown. He did not expect this
clearing to remain open forever -- eventually the path would again be
forgotten and become overgrown.

Apart from the internal decay to which every institution is exposed there
is the problem of remoteness in time and culture which makes it so
difficult not only to understand, but to accept such Ancient Oriental
teaching. Nanamoli Bhikku, a modern Western Buddhist, the translator of the
famous Visuddhimagga by Buddhagho.sa into English, thinks that this problem
is less severe for Buddhism than for most other religions of the past. Thus
he writes:

Much that is circumstantial has now changed, since the Buddha discovered
and made known his liberating doctrine two thousand five hundred years ago,
and likewise since [the Visuddhirnagga] was composed some nine centuries
later. On the other hand, the Truth he discovered, has remained untouched
by all that circumstantial change. Old cosmologies give place to new; but
the questions of consciousness, of pain and death, of responsibility for
acts, and of what should be looked to in the scale of values as the highest
of all, remain. Reasons for the perennial freshness of the Buddha's
teachings -- of his handling of those questions -- are several but not
least among them is its independence of any particular cosmology.
Established as it is for its foundation on the self-evident insecurity of
the human situation (the Truth of Suffering), the structure of the Four
Truths provides an unfailing standard of value, unique in its simplicity,
its completeness and its ethical purity, by means of which any situation
can be assessed and a profitable choice made. [5]

Nanamoli has correctly pinpointed the central concern of the serious
Buddhist bhikku .and it would certainly be wrong to expect the Buddha to
have an expert opinion on contemporary scientific issues. However -- and
that is central to my thesis -- in spite of his rejecting as not relevant
for salvation questions of cosmology and psychology hotly debated by his
contemporaries [6], and in spite of his aiming for a kind of freedom of
knowledge which was not tied to any opinion in these areas [7], Buddhism
possesses and presupposes a view of nature which in turn determines its
self-understanding. In other words: in Buddhism too, as in all other
systems of thought with a strongly ethical and practical component, the
interdependence of views on nature and views on human destiny is
demonstrable. And Buddhism too, as all other religions and philosophies,
takes over existing notions of the physical universe and fills them with
existential and soteriological meaning. The Buddhism that we can study in
the Pali Canon (and the Buddhisms of later periods in other cultures)
shared with other faiths (Brahmanism, Jainism, Ajivikas) a great many
assumptions regarding the world in which it lived. While refusing to deal
with questions concerning an absolute past (a creation, etc.) or an
absolute future (eternity) or an absolute space (or its opposite) early
Buddhism rested on certain assumptions about the present (any present of
living beings) and about the 'sphere of experience' which was stretched --
in comparison to our sphere of experience -- by the assumed experiential
nature of the law of karma, the existence of superhuman intelligences
(spirits of all kinds, devas) and the acceptance of experiential states of
consciousness in yogic stages of trance which are called 'occult' nowadays
or 'metaphysical' in that specific modern Anglo-American use of the word.

Since it was this world of real experience rather than the world of
speculation on ultimate cosmological questions in which the average
disciple of Buddha moved and lived, we would expect Buddha's teaching to
have something to say about it. In accordance with Buddha's own words,
'Whosoever sees Truth sees Me -- Whosoever sees Me sees Truth', we would
expect to see in Buddha the truth about this foreground world as well. The
'four noble truths', by making a statement about reality as such, must, by
implication, make a statement about the world of experience: the world both
of everyman and of the scientist.

I

The Buddhist analysis of the 'composite things' -- which on account of
their being composite are unstable -- arrives eventually (after having
dealt with the grosser aspects of composition) at some kind of 'atoms' of
experiential reality: the dharmas. 'Dharma' has, in Buddhist thought, a
great many meanings [8].

'Dharma' is defined as 'carrier of its qualities', a consciousness-element,
a Daseinsfaktor, a component of reality as it appears to the mind (manas).
Dharmas are the ultimate elements of our cognition of objective reality but
since they are produced by manas (under the impact of sense-perceptions)
they do not have a reality of their own.

The importance of this dharma--doctrine can be gauged from what might be
termed the 'Buddhist creed':

The Tathagata has explained the dharmas which are (causally) conditioned,
he has explained their causes and their extinction. Therein consists the
great teaching of the Sramana. [9]

The relationship of dharmas is regulated by three laws:

1. Each dharma is separate from all others and cannot be contained in
another dharma which would enter into it or proceed from it.

2. Each dharma is in constant mutual reciprocal relationship to all others.

3. Certain dharmas always appear simultaneously.

A new dharma can only come into existence through a co-operation with
others, but not in the sense of causa materialis or efficiens, but only in
the sense of 'conditions': if this -- then that. The following classical
quote provides an example.

When there is an eye and there are colours, there originates a
seeingconsciousness: the combination of these three dharmas results in an
'experience'. Conditioned by this experience there is a feeling of pleasure
or pain, etc.' This 'being conditioned by something else' is one of the
basic 'laws' of the world.

Dharmas are called dharmas because they can only arise in accordance with
the law that they embody.

On the basis of this theory of dharmas the often-discussed Buddhist
doctrine of 'nosoul' becomes understandable [10]: Every human is composed
of a great many dharmas, none of which is identical with the Real.
'Personality' is not an indivisible whole but a stream of factors of
existence which act together according to certain laws. These are arranged
into five groups (skandhas). Buddha is not proclaiming a modern
materialism, but he certainly is going beyond the level of
consciousness-realisation of his time.

Truth is freedom from illusion. The most pernicious of all illusions is the
selfidentification with one of the five skandhas, all of which are
transient. Thus it is written:

A well-trained disciple of the Noble-One does not consider the material
form as the Self, nor the Self as something which possesses material form,
or the material form as something which exists in the Self, or the Self as
something that exists in the material form. And he does not see feeling,
perception, instincts or consciousness in any of these forms.

He understands of each of these skandhas as it really is, that it is
transient, painful, not-self, composite and death-bound. He does not
approach them, does not grasp them, and does not determine them as his
'self'.

The well-trained disciple sees in material form, etc. 'That is not mind,
that I am not, That is not my Self'. So that if the body form, etc.,
changes and becomes different, there does not arise in him frustration,
sorrow, pain, grief, or despair. [11]

II

Roughly parallel to what psychologists today describe as 'realistic' and
'autistic' thinking the Buddhist philosopher Vasubandhu (4th century A.D.)
declares that all conceptualisation concerns either elements (dharmas) or
the self (atma). Conceptualisation, then is seen as a transformation of
vijnana, the cognitive power. Conceptualisation is inherent in our verbal
behaviour. On the basis of concepts alone and on the basis of an analysis
of our consciousness-content we cannot come to a conclusion as regards
either the reality or the non-reality of an 'outside'. It is wrong to
impute the existence as entity to a conceptualised thing as it is also
wrong to deny the reality of the thing-in-itself which is inaccessible to
verbal expression.

Conceptualisation is inherent in discursive thought and in language. As
such, conceptualisation takes place both with regard to self (atma) and to
elements (dharmas).

Conceptualisation, however, does not exhaust the modes of consciousness.
According to the Yogacarabhumi reality can be grasped in four stages each
leading to a higher comprehension:

1. Loka-prasiddha tattvartha: reality as accepted by common sense.

2. Yukti prasiddha tattvartha: reality as appearing in our
rational/conceptual thinking.

3. Klesavarana visuddhi jnana gocara tattvartha: the reality attained after
discarding the notion of individual self.

4. Jneyavarana -- visuddhi-jna-gocara tattvartha: the reality comprehended
after doing away with the notion of object.

While we cognise something, this cognised object is not a thing in reality,
but an image, a likeness of that thing, a likeness fabricated in our minds.
Moreover, this pattern of thinking, i.e. conceptualising in terms of a
subject-object dichotomy, as well as the fallacy of thinking the cognised
thing to be a really existing object in and of itself, is inherent in our
minds.

This is the conclusion reached by Vasubandhu regarding the epistemological
field in our empirical world. Ignorance (avidya) is not merely 'one does
not know' but it is indeed 'one cannot know anything as it really is'
(yathdbhuta) as long as one remains in samsara.

The threefold nature of nature (tri svabhava) is thus explained:

1. parikalpita svabhava (nature of being reconstructed): All things,
cognised by whatever mode of cognition, have the nature of being
reconstructed; they do not exist as such.

2. paratantra svabhava (nature of being dependent on others): Mental
reconstruction is inherently dependent on other factors.

3. nispanna-svabhava (nature of ultimate being): The ultimate nature of
being consists of paratantra devoid of parikalpita. Therefore, parinispanna
is neither different from nor the same as the paratantra.

The nature of ultimate being is inseparable from the nature of ultimate
non-being. Ultimate reality being such, the realisation of ultimate reality
becomes cognitively quite inaccessible and unknowable from the
gnoseological point of view, although it is the final goal of Buddhists
from the soteriological point of view. It is beyond our human cognition
which cannot escape from the deficiency of dichotomising conceptualisation.

This is 'no-mind' (acita) and non-perceiving, and this is jnana (wisdom)
beyond this world. This is converting the substratum (alayavijnana) as
two-fold corruption (klesa-avarana and jneya-avarana, defilements of
emotion and intellect) is revoed.

This is the realm of the no-flow. It is inconceivable, virtuous and
unchangeable. This is bliss, no-body of emancipation. This is said to be
the dharma of the great sage.[12]

III

Central to the classical Buddhist analysis of the nature of nature is its
identification of nature with the 'three marks' of impermanence (ksanikam,
'momentariness'), ill (duhkham, 'sorrow'), and non-substantially (sunyata,
'emptiness')[13]. As long as it was understood that these were
transcendental principles, terms of comparison with nirvana, expressions
which highlighted Buddha's disagreement with Hindu notions of the nature of
nature, Buddhism was on safe ground. When Buddhists made the mistake of
physicalising these concepts, especially the niton of momentariness, they
entanbgled themselves in a maze of contradictions in their debates, viz.
 that his teaching concerned only those issued which had a bearing on the
attainment of nirvana and which overlooked the agreed upon imperviousness
of maya to rational thought.)

Madhyamika philosophy tried to circumvent the problem by speaking of two
realms of knowledge and reality which intersected but which were in
principle incommensurable: samvrtti and paramarthika. Higher knowledge
cancel out the lower -- reveals it as 'false'. Lower knowledge, i.e. the
knowledge of the physical world obtained through senses and through
reasoning, cannot contain the higher truth. Physical nature is unknowable
in itself--what is described as knowledge of nature is a projection, the
product of human ignorance. In a pointed manner we could say that from a
Buddhist point of view modern science is a highly complicated form of
ignorance, a systematic pursuit of questions not conducive to liberation.
It is, thus, somewhat amazing to note that some Western scientists and some
Eastern Buddhists alike seek a convergence of modern science and
Madhyamikahis view seems to be based on the assumptions of some Buddhist
though. It also is based on misleading translations of Buddhist texts by
Western and Buddhist scholars alike, who chose a modern science-coloured
vocabulary to translate Buddhist texts which say, in fact, something quite
different as was pointed out earlier.

Nevertheless, in a more subtle and less tangible way there is a
rapprochement. Signs of it are the breakdown of the Cartesian dichotomy,
the acceptance of the idea that subject and object cannot be separated
wholly and that scientific investigation of nature contains elements of
'personal knowledge'. Another sign is the acknowledgement of the priority
of theory over observation, the growing readiness of acknowledge the acute
insight and intelligence of ancient Buddhist analysts of human nature. We
must not forget, however, that, as E. Conze has it, [the] Madhyamakas were
interested in one problem only -- the conditions which govern the
transcendental intuition of the Absolute and they devoted an enormous
amount of ingenuity to distinguishing absolute from empirical knowledge,
which was ipsofacto held to be false. [14]

IV

Nature as the passive object of active human enquiry, the res extensa
unrelated to the res cogitans, is a modern Western notion. It was
introduced by Descartes and Bacon, resisted by Leibniz and Goethe and is
being questioned today by scientists such as W. Heisenberg and D. Bohm. We
should not expect to find this notion in earlier and non Western thought
and should, therefore, not read it into texts originating from the Buddhist
tradition. Quite clearly Buddhist notions of 'nature' contain both
objective and subjective elements, and nature is perceived as something
which human mind, will, and desire have helped to shape. However, Buddhism
possesses its own dichotomies, viz. that of knowledge and actions conducive
to, or not conducive to reaching nirvana. The notion of nature is not set
over against the notion of freedom as something unrelated to it, but there
exist manifold relations. Some are aiding and some are hindering human
efforts to realise freedom. Buddhism argues against the existence of a
soul, a separate substance different from all other material substances,
while it insists on a life of highest ethical standards motivated by the
ideal of enlightenment. Buddhism accepts the operation of karma in all
spheres of that 'which has become'. And if we translate the Greek physis as
'that which becomes', the Buddhist corollary to it is, that physis is
constitutionally afflicted by the three 'ills' of impermanence,
insubstantiality and painfulness, that it cannot in and of itself provide
enlightenment and peace eternal, but that it is the medium through which,
and the backdrop against which, nirvana is achieved. The practical Buddhist
mind did not enter into speculations as to whether the kosmos as a whole
had a beginning or not. It convinced itself (by means of Buddha's
enlightenment) that it was constitutionally affected by these ills, eternal
or not. A case in point is the central Buddhist notion of sankhara
(Sanskrit: samiskara),

one of the most difficult terms in Buddhist metaphysics in which the
blending of the subjective-objective view of the world and of happening,
peculiar to the East, is so complete, that it is almost impossible for
Occidental terminology to get at the root of its meaning in a
translation... Just as kdya stands for both body and action, so do the
concrete mental syntheses called sankhdra tend to take on the implications
of synergies, of purposive intellection, connoted by the term
abhiiankhdra... [15]

To make sense of such terms we have to enter into the Buddhist view of the
world from the standpoint of the Enlightened one. Clearly, the
Enlightenment of the Buddha is not the Enlightenment of the modern West.
His point of reference is not analytical ratio, not instrumental reason,
not modern anti-metaphysical rationality but nirvana, the cessation of
passions, the transcendence of individual rationality.

Consequently, Buddhist notions of 'nature' throw light on nature in a way
very different from modern Western science. It can be understood and
appreciated best if we share the Buddhist notion of human destiny and human
fulfillment. If we find the Baconian notion of nature responsible for many
social, psycho-physical, and ecologico economical ills of our present
world, we probably cannot solve these by replacing it with a Buddhist
notion of nature, unless we also accept a Buddhist view of human life and
its meaning. This, in turn, proves the point that the ethos of a
civilisation and its concepts of nature are inter-connected and that the
one cannot change without having profound repercussions on the other.

For the Theravadins 'nature' is the 'other side of nirvana', the reverse
image of reality which directs the existential search for permanence, bliss
and being towards nirvana.

For the Vijnanavadins 'nature' is a mind construct, a projection of desires
and imaginations onto a canvas of reality which does not exhibit any of the
properties it is supposed to have.

For the Madhyamikas the experiential nature of nature is not true nature at
all, it is hiding, distorting, alienating true nature which is one, not
accessible to senses, not to be grasped in concepts.

Nature, in varying degrees, is a vehicle for the Buddha to express himself:
"The rock, all matter, all life, are charged with dharmakaya... everything
is emptiness and everything is compassion". [16].

NOTES

[1] 'Religion and Science', Mahabodhi, 2526/7, April-June 1983, pp. 61-65.

[2] 'Buddhist Physics', in: S. Kumar, ed., The Schumacher Lectures (London:
Blond and Briggs, 1980), pp. 121-143.

[3] (Berkeley: Shambhala, 1975), p. 210ff.

[4l KIRINDE DHAMANNAND, 'Religion in a Scientific Age', Mahabodhi, 2525/6,
April-June 1982, pp. 60-65; Henepola Gunaratna, 'Relevance of Buddhism to
Modern World', ibid., pp. 66-70. See also T. J. SALOMON, 'Soka Gakkai on
the Alleged Compatibility between Nichiren Buddhism and Modern Science',
Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, 7/1, March i980, pp. 34-54.

[5] 'Translator's Preface', in: BHADANTACARIYA BUDDHAGHOSA The Path of
Purification (Visuddhimagga) (Colombo, 1964), p. VII.

[6] The questions which the Buddha refused to answer--questions of
absorbing interest to his contemporaries-have traditionally been enumerated
as fourteen. These fourteen avyakrtas are four sets of questions, three of
which have four alternatives each, the last one (concerning the jiva) only
two:

1. Whether the world is eternal (in time), or not, or both, or neither.

2. Whether the world is finite (in space) or infinite, or both, or neither.

3. Whether the Tathagata exists after death, or does not, or both, or
neither.

4. Is the soul identical with the body or different from it?

These questions are repeatedly asked -- and an answer is refused -- in the
Pall Canon suttas -- they are also dealt with by Nagarjuna in his
Madhyamakakdrika, 22, 12.

[7] The Buddha refused to discuss cosmological theories, because they do
not contribute to liberation. As we read in Samyutta Nikaya, V. 437:

At that time the Blessed One dwelt at Kosambi in the Sinsapa forest, He
took a few leaves into his hand and spoke to His disciplines: What do you
think, you monks: which is more--these few Sinapa leaves which I hold in my
hand or these leaves there in the forest? The disciples answered: Lord, the
few leaves which you have taken in your hand are little -- and the leaves
there in the forest are much more! Buddha then continued: Thus, you
disciples, what I have known and not preached is much more than what I have
preached. And why did I not preach it? Because it would not profit you, it
would not make you progress on the Right Path, it would not lead to a
rejection of the world, to a destruction of all lust, to a cessation of the
transient, to peace, to enlightenment, to nirvana -- therefore, I did not
tell you.

[8] Pall-Text-Society Pall-English Dictionary, Dhamma, pp. 335-339: "...
dhamma as the interpreted Order of the World..."; "That which the Buddha
preached, the Dhamma kat'exochen was the order of the law of the universe,
immanent, eternal, uncreated, not as interpreted by him only, much less
invented or decreed by him, but intelligible to a mind of his range, and by
him made so to mankind as bodhi, revelation, awakening..."; "this universal
logic, philosophy or righteousness ('Norm') in which the rational and the
ethical elements are fused into one..."; "Natural or Cosmic Law...".

[9] Mahavagga, I. 23.

[10] Cf. the Chariot simile in Milindapanho, II, 1. 1.

[11] Samiyuttanikaya, III. 114.

[12] YAMADA, ISSHI 'Vijnaptimatrata of Vasubandhu', Journal of the Royal
Asiatic Society, 1977, p. 171.

[13] The famous bhava-cakra (Wheel of Becoming) illustrates this Buddhist
tenet in the figure of the threeeyed demon clutching the world.

[14] Buddhist Thought in India (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press,
1970), p. 239.

[15] Pall-English Dictionary, p. 664.

[16] MERTON, T. Asian Diary (edited from notebooks by Naomi Burton, Bro.
Patrick Hart & James Langhan, New York: New Directions, 1973), p. 235. The
quote is taken from Merton's description of the experience of the collossal
Buddha statues at Polonnaruwa.

~~~~~~~~

By KLAUS KLOSTERMAIER

Dr Klaus Klostermaier, Department of Religion, The University of Maniwba,
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada R3T 2N2.
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