MISCELLANY--Nirvana

By Louis De La Valle Poussin


The Indian Historical Quarterly


vol 4:2, June, 1928. pp. 347-348



p. 347 Nirvana I find that some of my views have been misconceived in some quarters. An instance of this will be met with in connection with the references to my views in the review of Stcherbatsky's Nirvana by Kaccayana (IHQ., III, no. 4,p.871). To remove such misconception of my views already clearly expressed in my works I want to make my position clearer by this opportunity. Nirvana, from the beginning, is perfect happiness, the summum bonum, much better than any paradise, not a paradise (of course) without any conceivable relations with any form of existence. The canonic literature sates clearly that the happiness of Nirvana, end of suffering, is blissful because it is not vedita. Later, in the Buddhabhumisastra, the philosopher understands that Buddhahood (id est the possession of apratisthitanirrvana) is better than the properly so called Nirvana: for Nirvana is sukha, but is not sukhasamvedana. I have said that "Le yoga est essentiellement un ensemble de pratiques en honneur des les plus vieux ages de l'Inde aryenne ou autochtone, pratiques des sorciers et des thaumaturges, et dent il semble que la recherche des etats hypnotiques soit le motif dominant: immobilite prolongee du corps............ c'est une technique etrangere en soi a toute morale comme a toute vue religieuse ou philosophique. Mais de cette technique peuvent se degager, a cette technique peuvent s'ajouter morale, theologie, devotion et, comme on dit, theosophie" (Nirvana, p.13). In Stcherbatsky's Nirvana (quoted in IHQ., p. 872) this definition is summarized as follows: "Yoga is nothing but vulgar magic and thaumaturgy coupled with hypnotic practices."--But "essentiellement" cannot be translated by "nothing but."--"Fakirism" or "yogism" (there is, I believe, a line in the Rg-veda on half-mad saints) is originally and "essentiellement" supernatural devices to which magical forces are attributed. But, from a very remote past--men are reasonable and religious beings--from these practices have emerged, or to these practices have been added, mystical, religious, metaphysical theories: It is by means of trance or ecstasy, dhyana, samadhi, etc. that a man obtains supernatural faculties, divine eye etc. It is by the same methods that man enters into relations with the gods, p. 348 identifies himself for a time with Brahman, contemplates the amata dhatu or Nirvana. In the same way, prayer, sacrifices, rites of every sort, brahmacarya, and so on, take a magical or a religious garb. I do not believe that prayer or sacrifice is "essentially" and from the very first, magical; but is it not "vraisemblable" that brrahmacarya was first practised without any speculation on the religious or moral merit of chastity, that the Yoga practices of fixing the eyes on the nose, etc., are, in themselves, hypnotic contrivances and that tapas, diksa etc., are the rude materials on which have been built intricate and beautiful ideologies? But my point is that, to the end, Buddhism remains faithful to its Yoga-orgins. Buddhists believe that the true and exact jnana is the avikalpakajnana, a certain knowledge, to be obtained in dhyana, which is beyond words and concepts, which is free from any duality, subject and object. In this jnana, there is neither a grahaka nor a grahya. In the canon, it is said that an ascetic sees Nirvana, or rather "touches Nirvana with its body," when he has entered into the samjnavedita-nirodhasamapatti. -- Here we have what may be called a "metaphysic of ecstasy." I thought that I could make such remarks without any risk of being accused of considering Sakyamuni as a sorcerer. But because I have denied that Nirvana is annihilation, Stcherbatsky concludes that I identify Nirvana and Svarga! European scholars can read French books, and I did not think it useful to answer my critic, for I hate controversies, as long as his inexact renderings were unknown abroad. But it is of importance for me that the learned Kaccayana and the readers of the IHQ. should be better acquainted with my opinions. These opinions may be inexact, are certainly inexact, but they are not thoroughly absurd.