BUDDHACARITA 14.17: Karmic Irony, On Many Levels

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sukhaṁ syād iti yat karma ktaṁ duḥkha-nivttaye |

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phalaṁ tasyedam avaśair duḥkham evopabhujyate || 14.17

14.17

The action taken with the thought that it might bring happiness,

The deed that was done with a view to cessation of suffering,

Now has as its result, this, 

Suffering itself, experienced by the helpless. 

COMMENT:

To think too heavily or pessimistically about karma is to have a wrong view. Conversely to think too lightly or optimistically about karma is also to have a wrong view.

From bang in the middle of these two views, what the bodhisattva is expressing in today's verse, as I read it, is just an irony that is all too true. It is an irony that is too true on many levels – whether we translate sukham, for example, as pleasure or happiness or comfort; and duḥkham, for example, as pain or unhappiness or suffering or discomfort.

Whatever deed was done only to hinder pain with the hope that it might bring pleasure, its result is now experienced by these helpless victims as simple pain. (EBC)

The retribution of the act which was committed by them for the cessation of suffering in the hope of obtaining pleasure, is experienced by them against their will in the shape of this suffering. (EHJ)

These translations capture the irony well enough, at the ostensible level. At the ostensible level the bodhisattva seems to have in his sights the ignorance of the sensualist who seeks the antidote to suffering in sensual pleasure. The irony, at this level, is for example the irony that pleasurable over-indulgence in food and drink results in the discomfort of heart disease; or the irony that illicit sexual relations, though forbidden fruit is said to taste sweetest, cause the emotional pain of family break ups.

A deeper irony, though, is observed when a religious community hits the rocks, despite the best of professed intentions in the way of promoting the happiness of all beings. It is usually because the leader of the congregation has strayed from the broad sunlit uplands of the middle way onto the treacherous side roads of errant behaviour. What follows is invariably disillusionment – all those sticks of incense burned in vain!

Tomorrow's posting, incidentally, will be late because I will be on the road, literally, pedalling to the local train station, and then along the canal tow path from Caen to the ferry port of Ouistreham. But today's posting is late because I have just spent 45 minutes listening to an interview on the radio with former al-Qaeda member Aimen Dean. There is no doubt that the deeper irony in today's verse would not be lost on him. Shining through his testimony, as I heard it, was the suffering of somebody who is truly devoted to Islaam, the real meaning of which word might be helplessness. 

Thus emerges the deeper meaning of the second half of today's verse.

On the surface, avaśaiḥ (by the helpless) refers to people who, for their sins, are unable to stop themselves from suffering in hell, even though they would like to stop this suffering (hence EHJ's "against their will"). 

Below the surface the description of helplessness seems to me to find its echo in Marjory Barlow's “Let it all be wrong.” 

Being truly helpless in Marjory's teaching, as I understood it, if I understood it, was an excellent state of affairs – because when we are truly helpless (as opposed to trying to be right, or trying to do the directions), then the right thing has got a chance to do itself. Then the real truth, in other words, is given the chance of making itself known. 

Not my will be done, then, but Thy will be done. 

In Nāgārjuna's teaching, Thy is tattva, which means thatness, the truth, reality. 

So let's return again to Nāgārjuna's conclusion about the teaching of pratītya-samutpāda, in which direction these observations of the bodhisattva are leading:

The doings which are the root of saṁsāra thus does the ignorant one do. / The ignorant one therefore is the doer; the wise one is not, because of reality making itself known (tattva-darśanāt). //26.10// In the destruction of ignorance, there is the non-coming-into-being of doings./ The destruction of ignorance, however, is because of the bringing-into-being of just this act of knowing.//26.11// By the destruction of this one and that one, this one and that one are discontinued. / This whole edifice of suffering is thus well and truly demolished.//MMK26.12//

I think the point that Aśvaghoṣa is alluding to, below the surface, is that ignorance is invariably manifested in the doing (kṛtam) of a deed (karman).

The teaching of pratītya-samutpāda, then, does not encourage the doer to go forth, like an overly zealous holy warrior, doing brave deeds with the thought that good doing will bring happiness and put a stop to suffering.

There is no need for me to spell it out any further. The whole thing has already been spelled out as clearly as could be by Nāgārjuna:

The doings that lead to rebirth one veiled in ignorance, in the three ways, / Does do; and by these actions he enters a sphere of existence. //MMK26.1 // Consciousness seeps, with doings as causal grounds, into the sphere of existence./ And so, consciousness having seeped in, pychophysicality is infused. //26.2// There again, once psychophysicality is infused, there is the coming into existence of the six senses; / The six senses having arrived, contact arises; //26.3// And when the faculty of sight, going back, has met a physical form, and met indeed a meeting together, / – When sight has gone back, in this way, to psychophysicality – then consciousness arises. //26.4// The combination of the three – physical form, consciousness and faculty of seeing – / Is contact; and from that contact arises feeling. //26.5// On the grounds of feeling, there is thirst – because one thirsts for the object of feeling. / While the thirsting is going on, grasping hold takes hold in four ways.//26.6// While there is grasping hold, the becoming originates of the one who grasps – / Because becoming, in the absence of grasping hold, would be set free and would not become becoming. //26.7// The five aggregates, again, are the becoming. Out of the becoming rebirth is born. / The suffering of ageing and death, and all the rest of it – sorrows, along with lamentations; //26.8// Dejectedness, troubles – all this arises out of rebirth. / In this way there is the coming about of this whole mass of suffering. //26.9// The doings which are the root of saṁsāra thus does the ignorant one do. / The ignorant one therefore is the doer; the wise one is not, because of reality making itself known. //26.10// In the destruction of ignorance, there is the non-coming-into-being of doings./ The destruction of ignorance, however, is because of the bringing-into-being of just this act of knowing.//26.11// By the destruction of this one and that one, this one and that one are discontinued. / This whole edifice of suffering is thus well and truly demolished.//MMK26.12//

VOCABULARY

sukham (nom. sg.): n. happiness, pleasure

syāt = 3^rd pers. sg. opt. as: to be

iti: “...,” thus

yat (nom. sg. n.): which

karma (nom. sg.): n. act, deed

kṛtam (nom. sg. n.): mfn. done

duḥkha-nivṛttaye (dat. sg.): for the cessation of suffering

nivṛtti: f. returning , return ; ceasing , cessation , disappearance ; ceasing from worldly acts , inactivity , rest , repose (opp. to pra-vṛtti)

ni- √ vṛt : to turn back , stop (trans. and intrans.)

phalam (nom. sg.): n. fruit, result

tasya (gen. sg.): of that

idam (nom. sg. n.): this

avaśaiḥ (inst. pl.): mfn. unsubmissive to another's will , independent , unrestrained , free ; not having one's own free will , doing something against one's desire or unwillingly

duḥkham (nom. sg.): n. suffering

eva: (emphatic)

upabhujyate = 3^rd pers. sg. passive upa- √ bhuj: to enjoy , eat , eat up , consume ; to experience (happiness or misfortune &c )

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