A History of Buddhist Philosophy, by David Kalupahana

Reviewed by Frank J. Hoffman

Religious Studies

Vol.29 No.3 ( Sept 1993)

Pp.408-411

COPYRIGHT Cambridge University Press 1993


            Kalupahana describes his 1992 work as an expansion and completion of 
            earlier ideas in his successful 1976 work, Buddhist Philosophy, and 
            the more recent volumes, Nagarjuna and Principles of Buddhist 
            Psychology. The present work is divided into two main sections: 
            'Part One: Early Buddhism' and Part Two: Continuities and 
            Discontinuities'. That Kalupahana has an authentic point of 
            departure within Sri Lankan tradition for providing a picture of 
            Buddhism from one sort of insider's perspective is a great merit of 
            the book. In this way it is distinguished from so much of the 
            scholarship, especially of Westerners on Buddhism, which is either 
            so text-specific as to be fragmentary and lacking in holistic vision 
            or so contrived from an idiosyncratic weaving of several ideas from 
            different Buddhist cultures as not to be about anything. Scholarly 
            quibbles aside for the moment, the vitality of the Sri Lankan 
            tradition of Buddhist exegesis is definitely represented in this 
            work. 
            'The middle way' in Buddhism is a systematically ambiguous term and, 
            as such, is subject to numerous construals. It may be styled, 
            ethically, as a middle between the extremes of princely pleasures of 
            Sakyamuni's palace life (hedonism) and the self-mortification of 
            Jainas and others (asceticism); metaphysically (pace Kalupahana), as 
            a middle between the eternalist soul theory of afterlife (Hindu 
            atmavada) and a materialist view denying karma and rebirth 
            (Carvaka). 
            In Part One, Kalupahana ends Ch. I therein driving one 
            interpretation of the middle way as, epistemologically, between the 
            search for ultimate objectivity in knowledge claims (objectivism) 
            and the belief that there can be no such objectivity (scepticism) 
            (2I). In Ch. II as Kalupahana pulls selected Mahayana bits towards 
            early Buddhism he also stretches bits of early Buddhism to reach 
            Mahayana. While not calling Buddha a hodhisattva, he does say, in 
            giving a diachronic account of Buddha's demise, that the Buddha's 
            strenuous life as a constant guide to thousands of people on matters 
            moral and spiritual gradually began to take a toll on his health 
            (rather than emphasizing synchronically the causal role of bad pork 
            or mushroom according to text and tradition) (29). In Ch. III we 
            find Buddha's middle way view explained, again epistemologically, 
            with reference to a pragmatic criterion of truth which avoids the 
            extremes of both the correspondence and the coherence theories of 
            truth (52). In Ch. IV on experience and theory one finds a holding 
            fast to the principle of dependent arising as superior to 
            substantialist views of nature and of the supposed eternal self in 
            that this Buddhist principle avoids mystery and explains phenomena 
            as arising and passing away in a 'verifiable manner'. (Over the 
            years, Kalupahana has neither sufficiently worked out in detail his 
            view that Buddhism is a form of empiricism, nor deigned to take his 
            critics seriously.) By contrast to Buddhist perception of things as 
            they have come to be (yathbhuta), those who hanker after mystery are 
            obscurantists courting anxiety and frustration (59). In Ch. V on 
            language and communication, holding neither to an ontological 
            one-one correspondence between concept and object nor to a theory 
            that experience is incommunicable through language, the Buddha's 
            view of communication as 'skill in means' emerges as an alternative 
            to the absolutism and nihilism of the other theories respectively 
            (66-7). In Ch. VI on the human personality there is exploration of 
            the theme of 'the selfless self' in Buddhism as this idea relates to 
            the concept of person, world, and others, including a consideration 
            of socio-political, moral and epistemological concerns (77). Ch. VII 
            on 'the object' argues that the non-substantiality doctrine applied 
            both to experiencing subject and object perceived neither denies 
            individuality nor urges abandonment of all views about the nature of 
            the object (84)- Objects already known and objects of knowledge 
            viewed as a generic category are distinguished and the distinction 
            forms the structure of the chapter. Ch. VIII on the problem of 
            suffering argues that Buddha views only dispositional phenomena as 
            unsatisfactory, not all phenomena or things generally (89). On 
            Kalupahana's interpretation, the realization of impermanence and 
            non-substantiality just is the attainment of freedom and happiness 
            (89). As he earlier puts it, the elimination of lust, hatred, and 
            confusion is the Buddha's distinctive achievement (i.e. the 
            knowledge of the destruction of defilements) which is constitutive 
            of his enlightenment (26). In Ch. IX on freedom and happiness he 
            holds that nirvana is the appeasement of all dispositions (90-1). 
            Ch. X explains that in early Buddhism there is no sharp distinction 
            between the moral life and the good life. The position is neither 
            absolutist nor relativist but pragmatic -- the rightness or 
            wrongness of an action or rule consists in 'what it does to the 
            person or the group of people in the particular context or 
            situation' (102). Here the eight-fold path is discussed in detail. 
            In Ch. XI on popular religious thought Kalupahana discusses 
            Redfield's distinction between the elite 'Great Tradition' and the 
            village 'Little Tradition', but in the course of discussing the 
            central Buddhist ritual of taking refuge in Buddha, Doctrine, and 
            Order, he comes to reject Redfield's distinction. If contemporary 
            Buddhist villagers have lost touch with academic understanding, that 
            is because of colonization and Western education in Buddhist lands 
            (i i8). In Part One Kalupahana is clearly on home ground. 
            In Part Two on continuities and discontinuities with early Buddhist 
            tradition (Chs. XXI-XXIII) Kalupahana develops his own view of 
            'common ground' between Theravada and Mahayana. The way in which he 
            does so is to find in Nagarjuna, Vasubandhu, and Dignaga selected 
            emphases (as was found in Moggaliputta-tissa) which elaborate the 
            early Buddhist message. It is in Part II that Kalupahana is likely 
            to sustain the greatest degree of criticism from Mahayana text 
            specialists, some of whom may find Kalupahana's conclusions 
            unacceptable. It is worth noticing, however, that his expressed 
            intention is the mature one of seeking common ground between the 
            Theravada tradition in which he was reared and the Mahayana (239)- 
            The author's own self-understanding seems however not that he is 
            constructing Buddhism for the reader, but objectively uncovering it 
            in the earliest stratum and finding similarities in later strata. 
            Whether such a stance can be maintained in the present-day 
            philosophical world is an interesting issue for debate. The work 
            concludes with an epilogue on philosophy and history, an appendix on 
            the Lankavatara, a bibliography, and an index. There are a few 
            embarrassing misprints, as when sabhava should be svabhava (I33) and 
            Kathavatthn should be Kathavatthu (I26), to mention but two. 
            Overall, one finds that 'one major text and three prominent 
            philosophers generally identified with Mahayana are representative 
            of the non-substantialist and non-absolutist teachings of the 
            Buddhist himself' (xiii). This is a controversial claim in a 
            controversial work, and it will be difficult for specialist readers 
            not to have strong views about it, pro or contra. 
            On balance, what can be reasonably said? Perhaps this: that 
            Kalupahana is a pioneering theoretician and harmonizer in the mould 
            of Buddhaghosa, whom he often chastises; but also that there is no 
            good reason to believe that one has the very words of the Buddha in 
            pristine exactitude -- in the Pali Canon or indeed elsewhere -- just 
            as one does not have the very words of Jesus (which in relative 
            chronology would have been more likely). Although it would be fair 
            to say that Kalupahana could have written a better book than this 
            one proffered as the 'consolidation of thirty years of research and 
            reflection' (ix), there are many in the field who are not producing 
            books this good. Kalupahana's History is his best book since the I 9 
            76 Buddhist Philosophy. 
            Kalupahana's 1992 Work reveals a deep philosophical commitment to 
            Buddhism, and a 'belief "in"' (to borrow H. H. Price's term) the 
            Buddha. The former emerges throughout the work in the use of 
            strategies of argument designed to elucidate 'the middle way' as a 
            invulnerable way free of various difficulties which obtain to 
            alternative 'extreme' views. The latter, the faith of a Buddhist 
            theoretician, may be glimpsed here and there, but most notably when 
            fending off a possible ethical criticism of Buddha with the 
            flourish: 'The legend about Siddhartha's leaving home while his wife 
            and new-born baby were asleep, while highlighting the emotional 
            stress in his renunciation, also symbolizes Yasodhara's acceptance 
            of her husband's decision. Any other interpretation of his 
            renunciation would do violence to the character of a person who 
            propounded an extremely enlightened form of love and compassion for 
            oneself as well as others' (24).