The article analyzes the figure of Indian philosopher Vasubandhu (ca. S. IV), one of the most important representative of the vijñānavāda school of mahāyāna Buddhism. After a brief account on the legendary biography of Vasubandhu and other members of his school, the article focuses on the understanding of two of his seminal works: Trimśikā and Trisvabhāvakārikā through the concepts of vijñāna (showing the different meanings of this widely used concept in Buddhist thought), ālayavijñāna (store consciousness), vāsanā (mental trace), parikalpa (...) (imagination) and trisvabāva (three natures): parikalpita (imaginative), paratantra (dependent) and parinispanna (consummated). It also establishes the links between Vasubandhu and the nāgārjuna’s doctrine of śūnyatā and the Buddhist practice of puöya-praöidhana (dedication of merit) and bodhicitta (thought of awakening), showing, in a coherent fashion, the practical aspects of this philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Gilbert Ryle’s The Concept of Mind (1949/2002. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press) is generally considered a landmark in the quest to refute Cartesian dualism. The work contains many inspirational ideas and mainly posits behavioral disposition as the referent of mind in order to refute mind–body dualism. In this article, I show that the Buddhist theory of ‘non-self’ is also at odds with the belief that a substantial soul exists distinct from the physical body and further point out similarities between (...) the Buddhist outlook and Ryle’s ideas in three parts. First, I illustrate that Ryle’s ‘category mistake’ has certain points in common with the Buddhist refutation of ‘self’. Within the Buddhist framework, referents such as ‘mind’ and ‘self’ are merely imputed terms. The presumed existence of an independent substance such as a ‘soul’, when considered in isolation from the expedient usage of the term ‘mind’, can therefore also be viewed as a ‘category mistake’. Second, attempting to solve the questions of ‘what mind is’ and ‘how mind operates’ are two entirely different approaches to the study of mind. I argue that it is necessary to focus on ‘knowing-how’ rather than ‘knowing-that’, if we are to gain a more comprehensive understanding of mind and avoid any kind of category mistake such as those that follow from isolating the physical properties of brain or drawing inferences from a mystical soul. Third, I aim to show why investigating mind from the perspective of ‘dispositions’ of behavior is a valid approach. The Buddhist concept of karma-vāsanā elucidates the habitual tendency to act or not act in various situations. Based on this theory, I argue that the workings of the human mind bears strong links to the formation of karma and as such have important axiological implications that cannot be ignored. I conclude by pointing out that Ryle’s insightful ideas could in certain ways be complemented by the Buddhist theory of mind. In my view, his philosophy is not only a mediator between Analytic Philosophy and Phenomenology, but could perhaps also be seen as a mediator between traditional Eastern systems of thought and contemporary philosophies of mind. (shrink)

The paper discusses the issue of psychophysical agency in the context of Indian philosophy, focusing on the oldest preserved texts of the classical tradition of Sāṃkhya–Yoga. The author raises three major questions: What is action in terms of Sāṃkhyakārikā (ca. fifth century CE) and Yogasūtra (ca. third century CE)? Whose action is it, or what makes one an agent? What is a right and morally good action? The first part of the paper reconsiders a general idea of action – including (...) actions that are deliberately done and those that ‘merely’ happen – identified by Patañjali and Ῑśvarakṛṣṇa as a permanent change or transformation (pariṇāma) determined by the universal principle of causation (satkārya). Then, a threefold categorization of actions according to their causes is presented, i.e. internal agency (ādhyātmika), external agency (ādhibhautika) and ‘divine’ agency (ādhidaivika). The second part of the paper undertakes the problem of the agent’s autonomy and the doer’s psychophysical integrity. The main issues that are exposed in this context include the relationship between an agent and the agent’s capacity for perception and cognition, as well as the crucial Sāṃkhya–Yoga distinction between ‘a doer’ and ‘the self’. The agent’s self-awareness and his or her moral self-esteem are also briefly examined. Moreover, the efficiency of action in present and future is discussed (i.e. karman, karmāśaya, saṃskāra, vāsanā), along with the criteria of a right act accomplished through meditative insight (samādhi) and moral discipline (yama). (shrink)

Chinese Buddhist thought is more than a case of “Indianization” or “Sinicization,” and even less, “Distortion.” Chinese Buddhist thought should be grasped, first, in its own terms and only then in terms of the possible influences or confluences that flowed into it. The present article will seek to look into the concept of “Suchness vasana” (perfumation by the Buddhist absolute, Suchness, upon avidya, ignorance) as used by the Huayan school in China. Then it will show how, in the elaboration of (...) this idea, Fazang, the key patriarch of the Huayan school, apparently drew on a mode of thought that is derived from the Yijing, the Book of Changes. It is in the nature of the present article that only the Chinese influence will be underlined and that the Indian contributions to the formation of a theory of a “dynamic Suchness” will only be briefly touched upon. Scholars have long noticed the Daoist influence of Chinese Buddhological thinking, especially within the Ch'an and the Hua-yen circles. However, too often scholars only suggest impressionistic parallels, between, say, the book Laozi and the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch or between Mencian humanism (“Every man can be Sage Yao and Shun”) and the idea that “Every man can be Buddha.” Such presentations of Chinese influence bypass the various problems involved in the long and thorny history of conflict, compromise, mutual self-discovery, and fertilization between the two cultural traditions. The present article will try to be much more concrete by documenting and analyzing the series of incidents that led to a datable innovation on Fazang's part. (shrink)

The metaphysical possibility of agency at the phenomenal level, given the truth of a nomological and binding causal force, has long been a moot point in both Indian and western philosophical traditions. While an underlying implication of fatalistic resignation hangs over the possibility of phenomenal freedom within the ambit of the classical Indian interpretation of the Law of Karma, which forms the basis of the assumption that a fatalistic nexus of vāsanā (cravings for mundane achievements) and the ensuing karma (...) (action-tendencies to reach a mundane goal) circumscribes an agent’s choices, the western thought on the question of the freedom of choice has rather been preoccupied with the putative threat posed by the deterministic law of various nuances, such as theological determinism and logical determinism. A close analysis of the western philosophical debate surrounding free will reveals that the kind of linear causation that determinism supposedly entails is the primary reason for its being conflated with fatalism. The source of all the misgiving about determinism’s free will subduing influence is the oversight that it renders the agent’s rational endeavour a futile exercise in the same way as fatalism does. In this paper, therefore, an attempt has been made to disentangle determinism from fatalism. A key proposal advanced in this paper is that the causative force of the karmic law, admitted by most of the classical schools of Indian philosophy, may prima facie have a circumscriptive effect on agentic rational pursuits and choices. However, an intimate study reveals that this law does not preclude phenomenal freedom, although of a higher echelon. The classical Indian schools of philosophy admitting the undeniable presence of this karmic law allow the possibility of this seemingly inexorable causative force of the law being overridden by a more reason-guided pursuit, adopted by the agent, after an overhaul of his egoistic cravings. The model of agency developed in this paper is based on the claim that it is by way of undergoing self-determination that phenomenal freedom reaches its pinnacle. Drawing on the theories of volition and self advanced by some prominent classical Indian philosophical schools and the classical western philosophical theories of free will in the light of the deterministic threat, an attempt has been made to bring into harmony the rhetoric of both worlds, exploring the possibility whether phenomenal freedom can be salvaged through agentic self-determination and self-development. (shrink)

In the Abhidharma texts, that flowers perfume sesame is used as a simile describing the mechanism of perfuming (_vāsanā_/_paribhāvanā_) in the context of meditative cultivation. According to the Sarvāstivādins, the meditative perfuming requires the co-existence of the perfumer and the perfumed. In comparison, the Yogācāra-vijñānavādins employ the same simile to explain their doctrine of the perfuming of all _dharma_s in _ālayavijñāna_, which demands the _bīja_ as the perfumed and the manifested _dharma_s as the perfumer to be simultaneous. My hypothesis is (...) that the Yogācāra idea of the perfuming of all _dharma_s is derived from the Abhidharma doctrine of meditative perfuming through the Sautrāntika theory of perfuming in non-concentrated (_asamāhita_) state. The idea of equating _vāsanā_ and _bīja_ probably took place under the doctrine of successive causality during the sectarian communication among the Sarvāstivādins, the Dārṣṭāntika-Sautrāntikas, and the early Mahāyānists. The Vaibhāṣika principle of simultaneous perfuming, which requires that the perfumed must co-exist with the perfumer, makes it possible in the Yogācāra-vijñānavāda that a _bīja_ in _ālayavijñāna_ is simultaneous with its manifestation. (shrink)

In this article, I examine some traditional Indian conceptions of unconscious mental activity. There are concepts in the Indian philosophical tradition, notably saskāras and vāsanās, which can be taken to refer to unconscious mental states and dispositions. My discussion, which is essentially philosophical by nature, is loosely based on the English philosopher C.D. Broad's distinctions concerning the unconscious. Saskāras, which are interpreted realistically in Indian tradition, may manifest themselves as what I (and Broad) call relatively unconscious states. Evidence for this (...) interpretation can be found in discussions concerning the nature of dream state and the supernatural powers of yogis in Indian tradition. It is interesting to try to view the retributive system of karma as an absolutely unconscious system, but this is not a plausible interpretation of the Indian view of karma. (shrink)

El artículo analiza la figura del filósofo indio Vasubandhu , uno de los representantes más influyentes de la escuela vijñānavāda del budismo mahāyāna. Tras una breve reseña sobre su legendaria biografía y de otros miembros de su escuela filosófica, el artículo se centra en el análisis de dos de sus trabajos más importantes: Trimśikā y Trisvabhāvakārikā , mediante los conceptos de vijñāna , ālayavijñāna , vāsanā , parikalpa y trisvabāva : parikalpita , paratantra y parinispanna . Finalmente se establecen (...) las relaciones entre la filosofía de la conciencia de Vasubandhu y la doctrina de la vacuidad de nāgārjuna, así como sus conexiones con prácticas religiosas habituales en el mahāyāna como la dedicación de mérito y el pensamiento del despertar , mostrando, de un modo coherente, las consecuencias para la práctica budista de esta filosofía de la mente. (shrink)

В статті розкривається спосіб тлумачення віджняни в ранній йогачарі і пояснюються рівні віджняни та шлях їх очищення – пробудження. Буддисти переосмислили присутнє у філософській культурі Індії поняття віджняна, витлумачивши його дгармічним (миттєвим, унікальним, безсутнісним). Йогачарини ж, в прагненні з’ясувати причини оманливої позапотоковості віджнян, доповнили шість традиційних рівнів усвідомлення, алаєю-віджняною та кліштамано-віджняною. Вони ж впровадили поняття біджі, які накопичує алая-віджняна. Через васані відбувається забруднення усвідомлення, яке породжує дукгу. Очищення віджняни – звільнення від впливу накопичених біджів. Біджі – відбиток попередніх дгарм, який (...) продукує жагу відтворення миттєвої, а отже, неминуче зниклої реальності. (shrink)