streng 1982, realization of param bhutakoti (ultimate reality-limit) in the astasahasrika...

7/29/2019 STRENG 1982, Realization of Param Bhutakoti (Ultimate Reality-limit) in the Astasahasrika Prajnaparamita Sutra

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Realization of Param Bhutakoti (ultimate reality-limit) in theAstasahasrika Prajnaparamita Sutra

By Frederick J. StrengPhilosophy East and West

Volume 32, Number 1January 1982

pp. 91-98(C) by University of Hawaii Press

p. 91

Within the spectrum of religious attempts to express

ultimate reality, the Perfection of Wisdom Suutras

exhibit a deep sense of the arbitrary and imperfect

character of any terms or concepts. Nevertheless, in

a paper presented two years ago at the Regional

American Oriental Society meeting, I pointed out that

in these Indian Mahaayaana Buddhist texts there is

not a total rejection of all verbal form; rather,

sometimes words can help to purify the use of words

(Streng, 1977: 4).

In this article I want to examine a series of

shifts in the use of the term bhuutako.ti

(reality-limit) in The Perfection of Wisdom in

Eight-thousand Lines Suutra (A.s.tasaahasrikaa

Praj~naapaaramitaa Suutra, hereafter cited as PWEL).


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This series of shifts indicates a progression of

spiritual understanding which culminates in the

deepest knowledge of ultimate reality. The range of

shifts includes the use of the term "reality-limit"

as a designation of [l] the boundary between

sa.msaara and nirvaa.na, (2) the inferior spiritual

achievement of a Disciple (`sravaka) and

pratyekabuddha, which Edward Conze calls the

"Hinayanist nirvana" (Perfection, 1973: 321), (3) the

true nature of existence as "emptiness" (`suunyataa),

and finally (4) the ultimate reality-limit (param

bhuutako.ti) that is informed by perfect wisdom and

skill-in-means. The most dramatic shift is seen by

comparing the use of the term "reality-limit" as the

boundary between sa.msaara and nirvaa.na, and its use

as the attainment of perfect wisdom through

skill-in-means; however, we should note the basic

shift from the second to the third usage, which is

elaborated more precisely in the fourth usage where

the term param (ultimate) is added to bhuutako.ti.

In chapter 1 of PWEL, the Lord Buddha is reported

as saying that foolish people are attached to ideas

about the existence or nonexistence of their

experience. Such people continually shape more chains

of sa.msaara. He concludes:

While they construct all dharmas which yet do not

exist, they neither know nor see the path which is

that which truly is. In consequence they do not go

forth from the triple world, and do not wake up to

the reality-limit. For that reason they come to be

styled "fools." They have no faith in the true dharma

(Perfection, 1973: 87).

Here we see that the Buddha uses the term

"reality-limit" to specify that boundary marking a

release from the samsaric cycle, that is, the triple

world of desire, form, and nonform.

This image reflects the understanding of the


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Abhidhamma masters, who claimed that when an arahant

(a worthy person) was freed from all impurities

(kilesa) he attained nibbaana. The arahant did not

return to the illusory "reality created by desire--as

other beings did (Compendium, 1956: 69). This view

p. 92

recognizes how easy it is to construct by

mental-emotional attachments what appears as everyday

existence. Already in the Samyutta Nikaaya (II.l21ff.)

freedom from illusory reality is said to result from

knowing that the supports (sthiti) of phenomena

co-arise interdependently. These supports disappear

when the conditions requisite to their arising

disappear. Cessation of apparent existence is

achieved by methodical attention to the

arising-dissipating character of phenomena and to the

"occurences of factors" (dharmas) that constitute

phenomena.

This is a common use of the term"reality-limit"

in the PWEL; it is closely related to the second use

mentioned earlier. This use is emphasized by Edward

Conze in his translation of PWEL when he writes:

Reality-limit had for a while been one of the more

obscure synonyms of "Nirvana", but now by a shift in

meaning it becomes identified with the inferior

hinayanistic Nirvana of the Arhat as distinct from

the full and final Nirvana of a Buddha (Perfection,

1973: x).

Understood in this way, the "reality-limit" is

something that, according to the PWEL, the

bodhisattva is warned against. It is the realization

of an inferior insight into the nature of things--that

is, as perceived by a Disciple or pratyekabuddha.

For example, the Lord Buddha explains in Chapter 20

that while both the bodhisattva and disciple enter


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the concentrations on emptiness, signlessness and

wishlessness, that is, the three doors of

deliverance, the bodhisattva "does not realize the

reality-limit, that is, neither on the level of a

Disciple, nor on that of a pratyekabuddha. For he has

at his disposal very strong and powerful helpers, in

perfect wisdom and skill in means" (Perfection, 1973:

224). The warning against realizing this kind of

reality-limit is put in its strongest form when the

Lord says that the evil one, Mara, causes the

bodhisattva to confuse this inferior realization of

the reality-limit with Buddhahood. He says in

Chapter 11:

Mara may come along in the guise of a Buddha, with

magically created monks around him, and maintain that

a bodhisattva who courses in deep dharmas is one who

realises the reality-limit, who becomes a Disciple,

and not a bodhisattva ... (Perfection, 1973: 170).

Throughout the PWEL there is a distinction between

the bodhisattva path that includes the perfection of

wisdom and the path of the Disciple and

pratyeka-buddha whose chief characteristic is the

extinction of impurities (kle`sa).

The deeper awareness of the empty nature of the

dharmas in the perfection of wisdom is a major thrust

of the Perfection of Wisdom Suutras. By emphasizing

the empty (`suunya) nature of all existence,

including the experience of a reality-limit, there is

a dramatic shift from using the term "reality-limit"

to refer to the inferior realization by a Disciple to

its use to indicate the true (that is, "empty")

nature of things. In at least three places the term

"reality-limit" is used to indicate the true

understanding of reality-limit as empty. In Chapter 5

p. 93


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of PWEL the Lord says that the training of a

bodhisattva leads to the manifestation of the

reality-limit, as follows:

Come here, son of a good family, do train yourself in

just this Path of the Bodhisattvas, for as a result

of this training, this coursing, this struggling you

will surely quickly awake to full enlightenment.

After that you will educate an infinite number of

beings in the complete extinction of the substratum

of rebirth, in other words, in the revelation of the

reality-limit (bhuutako.ti prabhaa-vanataa;

Perfection, 1973: 121).

In Chapter 10 `Sariputra, who here speaks because of

"the Buddha's might," discusses the power of the

mature wholesome roots (ku`salamuula) in the karman of

the bodhisattva. In contrast, he warns: "through the

abundance of that karman beings who have not

collected wholesome roots will find no satisfaction

nor faith in this reality-limit. But those who find

satisfaction and faith in it are people who have

collected wholesome roots, well collected them"

(Perfection, 1973: 155-156).

In these two passages the reality-limit depicted

is that known through perfection of wisdom. In

Chapter 9 it is specifically described in the

traditional formulation of emptiness as the

nonperception of any living being or of any dharma.

There the spokesman for the perfection of wisdom,

Subhuti, says:

The perfection of the bodhisattva has no mental

attitude, because it is imperturbable. This

perfection is unshakeable, in consequence of the

stability of the realm of dharma... This perfection

is quieted, because no sign is apprehended in all

dharmas. This perfection is faultless, as the

perfection of all virtues. This perfection is


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undefiled, because imagination is not something that

is not. No living being is [ultimately] found in this

perfection, because of the reality-limit. This

perfection is unlimited because the manifestation of

all dharmas does not rise up(Pevfection, 1973:

151-152).

The profundity of the spiritual shift from the

practice and goals of the Disciple and pratyekabuddha

is seen in the description a few speeches earlier

when we are told that thousands of gods are overjoyed

because they will be able to see "the second turning

of the wheel of dharma taking place in Jambudvipa."

The Buddha then says: "This... is not the second

turning of the wheel of dharma. No dharma can be

turned forwards or backwards. Just this is the

Bodhisattva's perfection of wisdom" (Perfection,

1973: 150). Whereas before the term reality-limit

referred to the Disciples and pratyekabuddha's final

goal of nirvaa.na, it now serves to indicate a new

understanding of emptiness according to perfect

wisdom on the bodhisattva path.

Concentration on emptiness through perfected

wisdom and skill in means permits one to avoid

"realizing the reality-limit" in the earlier sense.

Specifically, the Lord says that a bodhisattva should

contemplate the emptiness of the skandhas

(personality factors) with a certain attitude,

namely,

with an undisturbed series of thoughts in such a way

that, when he contemplates the fact that "form, etc.,

is empty", he does not regard that true nature of

p. 94

dharmas [i.e. emptiness] as something which, as a

result of its own true nature [i.e. emptiness], is a

real entity. But when he does not regard that true


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nature of dharmas as a real thing, then he cannot

realize the reality-limit (Perfection, 1973: 222).

When Subhuti asks for a clarification of how a

bodhisattva stands firmly in the practice of

emptiness without "realizing emptiness," the Lord

distinguishes between "realizing" emptiness and

"completely conquering" emptiness. He says:

It is because a Bodhisattva contemplates that

emptiness which is possessed of the best of all modes

[that is, of the six perfections]. He does, however,

not contemplate that "I shall realize," or "I should

realize," but he contemplates that "this is the time

for complete conquest, and not for realization."

Without losing himself in the concentration, he ties

his thought to an objective support [for his

compassion] and he determines that he will take hold

of perfect wisdom [which is essentially skill in

means], and he will not realize [emptiness, because

its realization is not the final goal.] Meanwhile,

however, the Bodhisattva does not lose the dharmas

which act as the wings to enlightenment. He does not

effect the extinction of the outflows [which would

prevent renewed rebirths], but over that also he

achieves complete conquest (Perfection, 1973: 222).

The true reality-limit manifested in the

bodhisattva, then, includes the recognition that no

dharma, no practice, no experience is something

having a self-existing nature. But this is not all,

for one might become absorbed in the concentration on

emptiness and, so to speak, leave existence. The

shift to the forth usage of "reality-limit" is marked

by the addition of the term param, translated as

"ultimate" or "farthest," and set over against a

"midway reality-limit" (antaraa bhuutako.ti). The

ultimate reality-limit is attained only with skillful

means (upaayakau`sala), whereby a person achieves

complete conquest over even "the extinction of

outflows." This process is discussed in PWEL Chapter


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20 where the special value of the bodhisattva path is

that it avoids realizing a midway reality-limit. The

Lord is reported to have said:

A Bodhisattva who courses in perfect wisdom and who

is upheld by skill in means, does not realise that

farthest reality-limit until his wholesome roots are

matured, well matured in full enlightenment. Only

when his wholesome roots are matured, well matured in

full enlightenment, only then does he realise that

farthest reality-limit. A Bodhisattva who courses in

perfect wisdom, who develops perfect wisdom, should

therefore contemplate and meditate on the deep true

nature of those dharmas, but he should not realise it

(Perfection, 1973: 224-25).

In response to this declaration Subhuti exclaims how

wonderful it is that the Buddha is explaining how one

can enter the concentration on emptiness and not

realize the reality-limit understood in the sense of

withdrawing from existence. Then the Lord gives a

summary statement of the bodhisattva path:

For the Bodhisattva has not abandoned all beings. He

has made the special vows to set free all those

beings. If the mind of a Bodhisattva forms the

aspiration not to abandon all beings but to set them

free (vimok.sa), and in addition he aspires for the

concentration (samaadhi) on emptiness, the Signless,

the

p. 95

Wishless, i.e. for the three doors to deliverance,

then that Bodhisattva should be known as one who is

endowed with skill in means, and he will not realise

the reality-limit midway, before his Buddha-dharmas

have become complete. For it is this skill in means

which protects him. His thought of enlightenment


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consists in just that fact that he does not want to

leave all beings behind. When he is thus endowed with

the thought of enlightenment and with skill in means,

then he does not midway realise the reality-limit


In these passages we see that the bodhisattva does

not realize the reality-limit as understood in terms

of the spiritual achievement of the Disciple or

pratye-kabuddha; the distinction between such an

inferior realization and that of a bodhisatlva is

emphasized by saying that a bodhisattva realizes the

ultimate reality-limit, which is a perfect conquest

of emptiness through skillful means. Likewise, to say

that a bodhisattva realizes the ultimate

reality-limit is the same thing as saying that the

bodhisattva does not realize a midway reality-limit.

At this point it is useful to ask how it is that

skillful means is the key to realizing the ultimate

reality-limit. In Chapter 20 the Lord explains:

Since [the bodhisattva] has not abandoned all beings,

he is thus able to win full enlightenment, safely and

securely. At the time when a Bodhisattva has made all

beings into an objective support for his thought of

friendliness, and with the highest friendliness ties

himself to them, at that time he rises above the

factiousness of the defilements and of Mara, he rises

above the level of Disciple and Pratyekabuddha, and

he abides in that concentration [on friendliness]


This assertion that a bodhisattva makes all beings

into an objective support for his thought of

friendliness is revolutionary, and appears to

contradict the recognition that all arising of

existence is to be seen as empty, in order to avoid

the incipient tendency of mental processes to

establish ("station, " prati.s.thiti) the mental

processes within illusory forms (See Streng, 1975:


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77-80). The PWEL asserts that thought-constiuction

remains clear as long as it remains unobstructed. To

aid in keeping thoughts clear a person is asked to

regard the teaching of the perfection of wisdom, or

all-knowledge, as unproduced (Perfection, 1973:

90-91). In another Perfection of Wisdom Sutra, the

Diamond Sutra, the Buddha tells Subhuti that the

bodhisattva "should produce an unsupported thought,

i.e. a thought which is nowhere supported

(prati.s.thiti), a thought unsupported by sights,

sounds, smells, tastes, touchables or mind-objects"

(Conze, 1958: 47-48). The problem concerns how one is

to use "objective supports," such as images, ideas,

and perceptions, without letting them become

deceptions; or, to put it in the religious

phraseology of the PWEL, how can the "wholesome

roots," that is, the thought of enlightenment, the

purity of thought, and "freedom of egotism in all its

forms" (Dayal, 1932: 61) be transformed into perfect

enlightenment. This problem was considered directly

in Chapter 6 in a dialogue between Subhuti and the

celestial bodhisattva Maitreya: if everything is

empty, does that mean that there is no actual

spiritual transformation? If, on the other hand, a

person participates

p. 96

in the actual world, does one not by definition

willfully create thoughts which depend on signs and

objective supports? In the dialogue Subhuti says to

Maitreya:

If a bodhisattva treated as an objective support or

as a sign that foundation which does not exist, and

that objective support, which does not exist, would

he then not have a perverted perception, perverted

thought, perverted views? ... And as the foundation

entity, the objective support, the point of view [are

nonexistent], so is enlightenment, so is the thought


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[of enlightenment] and so, all dharmas, all elements.

But then on which foundations, by which objective

supports, or points of view, does he turn over that

thought into full enlightenment, or what meritorious

work, founded on jubilation, does he turn over into

what utmost, right and perfect enlightenment?

(Perfection, 1973: 126)

The problem, then, is if the perfect

enlightenment is empty, the talk about turning over

itself is empty, as well as any actual

transformation. Maitreya responds:

This should not be taught or expounded in front of a

Bodhisattva who has newly set out on the vehicle. For

he would lose that little faith, which is his, that

little affection, serenity and respect which are his.

... [After some further discussion, Maitreya

explains:] The Bodhisattva must not, as a result of

the thought by which he turns that over, become one

who perceives a thought. It is thus that the

meritorious work founded on jubilation becomes

something which is turned over into full

enlightenment. If he does not perceive that thought,

[identifying it] as "this is that thought," then a

Bodhisattva has no perverted perception, thought, or

view. But if he perceives the thought by which he

turns that over, [identifying it] as "this is that

thought," then he becomes one who perceives thought.

As a result, he has a perverted perception, thought

and view. But a Bodhisattva turns over rightly, not

wrongly, when he perceives and brings to mind the

thought which turns over in such a way that he

regards it as "just extinct, extinct," as "stopped,

departed, reversed"; and when he reflects that what

is extinct that can not be turned over; and that this

[extinctness, etc.] is the very dharmic nature also

of that thought by which one turns over, and also of

the dharmas through which one turns over, as well as

the dharmas to which one turns over. It is thus that

the bodhisattva should turn over (Perfection, 1973:


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126-128).

The depth of a bodhisattva's insight into the

empty nature of things allows him or her to

participate in the construction of thoughts, "

signs," and objective supports while not being caught

by them. The ability to attain "full knowledge"

without either destroying or being attached to forms

is exposed by the celestial bodhisattva Maitreya when

he says:

[A bodhisattva] does not bring to mind nor turn over

[that wholesome roots] to full enlightenment if he

brings about a sign by reflecting that what is past

is extinct, stopped, departed, reversed; that what is

future has not yet arrived; and that of the present

no stability is got at, and that which is not got at

has no sign, or range. On the other hand he also does

not turn over to full enlightenment if he fails to

bring about a sign or to bring to mind as a result of

sheer inattentiveness, if he fails to attend as a

result of lack of mindfulness or of lack of

understanding. But that wholesome root becomes

something which

p. 97

has been turned over [or transformed] into full

enlightenment on condition that he brings to mind

that signn, but does not treat it as a sign. It is

thus that the Bodhisattva should train himseIf

therein. This should be known as his skill-in-means.

When, through that skill-in-means, he turns over a

wholesome root, then he is near to the allknowledge

(Perfection, 1973: 128-129).

Again in Chapter 19 of PWEL this problem is

considered in a dialogue between `Saariputra and

Subhuuti. `Saariputra is perplexed about why the

Buddha's enlightened reaction to the experienced


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world does not result in more karman. He asks:

If, as a result of such conscious reflection, the

deed of that man is added on to his collection of

karma, then the deed of the Buddha, the Lord, when

he, thinking to himself, consciously forms the notion

that he wants to enter extinction, [--that deed] will

also be added to the Buddha's heap and collection of

karma? (Perfection, 1973: 215).

Subhuuti responds:

No, indeed not, Sariputra, for the Tathagata is one

who has forsaken all reflections and discriminations.

Space on its own cannot raise a deed or thought

without objective support, not without one. A thought

can arise only with an objective support, not without

one. Intellectual acts must refer to dharmas which

are seen, heard, felt, or known. In respect to some

objects, intellectual acts take defilement upon

themselves, in respect of others purification. Acts

of will and deeds can therefore arise only with

objective support, not without (Perfection, 1973:

216).

In response, `Sariputra asks: "Since the Lord has

described all objective support as isolated (vivikta)

[without an inherent relation to a subject], how can

an act of will arise only with objective support, and

not without"? (Perfection, 1973: 216).

Subhuuti replies,

An act of will is raised only with an objective

support, and not without, in the sense that one

treats an actually non-existent objective support as

a sign, as an objective support, in fact also the act

of will is isolated, and also the sign. And so are

karma-formations which are conditioned on ignorance,

and so all the links of conditioned co-production up

to decay and death conditioned by birth. Even so,


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objective supports are isolated. The act of will is

isolated from the sign [which seem to cause it] and

it arises only in reference to the conventional

expressions current in the world (Perfection, 1973:

216).

The realization of the ultimate reality-limit,

then, is an illumined awareness of the empty nature

of all existing things whereby a bodhisaltva, in an

empty mode of thought-construction, establishes an

isolated objective support for his or her

friendliness. This way of perceiving the world,

including oneself, can be described for communication

purposes as a spiritual process whereby the wholesome

roots are matured and thereby transformed into

perfect enlightenment.

p. 98

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Compendium of Philosophy:

1956. (Abhidhammattha-Sangaha) translated by Shwe

Zan Aung. London: Luzac and Co. (First published

by Pali Text Society, 1910.)

Conze, E.

1958. Buddhist Wisdom Books. London: George Allen

& Unwin.

Dayal, H.

1932. The Bodhisattva Doctrine in Buddhist

Sanskrit Literature. London: Routledge and Kegan

Paul Ltd.

Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines & Its Verse Summary

1973. (A.s.tasaahasrikaa Praj~naapaaramitaa &

Praj~naapaaramitaa-Ratnagu.nasa.mcaya-gaathaa)

translated by Edward Conze. Berkeley: Four

Seasons Foundation.

Streng, F. J..

1915. "Reflections on the attention given to


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mental construction in the Indian Buddhist

analysis of causality," in Philosophy East and

West, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 71-80.

Streng, F. J.

1977. "All-knowledge and the Perfection of

Wisdom, " in Southwest Conference on Asian

Studies, edited by Edgar Polom . Mimeograph.

Part. I, pp. 1--4.

streng 1982, realization of param bhutakoti (ultimate reality-limit) in the astasahasrika...

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