[Buddha-l] Re: buddha-l Digest, Vol 12, Issue 16

[Andrew Skilton]

Re: Chronology of Pali texts (Stefan Detrez) 3rd Feb:
 
SD: 
> I wonder why so few scholars deal with the issue of
>chronology/stratigraphy of the suttas, as the establishment thereof would
>have tremendous implications for the reconstruction of the 'evolution' of
>doctrinal history within the suttas. 

I agree. I think the problem includes the limitations of the methodologies that
can be employed to create a stratification.  Typically each involves big effort
for an outcome that on its own can often be easily undermined by some smart
alec. The best solution would be the application of a broad range of
methodologies, but who has the time and the skills?  Not to mention the
institutional support!  Which raises the issue of the fragmentation of
scholarship under the pressure to satisfy targets set by vacuous bureaucrats (I
speak from direct experience of the UK system only, but am pretty sure that
others could confirm similar pressures elsewhere.) Under the present UK system
there is no value given to projects that would last for more than 5 years (from
inception to publication) - the period of national research evaluations. In fact
there is considerable pressure against such projects. 

SD:
>As for now, I'm inclined to think that
>a synchronical approach (where all texts are regarded as having emerged
>simultaneously, and should therefore be seen as coherent) is fallacious. A
>diachronical approach, based on stratigraphy, would help to clarify a lot of
>'contradictions' within the suttas (not to mention 'upaya' being an
>erroneous explanation for inconsistencies between suttas).

There seem to be two starting points in the imagination when it comes to
'origins': either 'it' all started up pretty much as we have 'it' now, in a kind
of instantaneous creation ex nihilo; or 'things' (e.g. institutions or bodies of
literature or the expression of ideas) necessarily evolve. I do not subscribe to
the former personally, and am a little surprised by colleagues who do, but that
may be my problem.... I suspect that underlying this divide may be in part 
conflicting attitudes to authority. I sometimes wonder if those who wish to
invest a particular 'thing' with authority are perhaps inevitably pushed towards
wanting to see it as original, in the sense of unevolved, as if the latter
condition invalidates it. It neither invalidates it nor validates it, of course.

05/02/06 Richard Hayes:

>Two possible explanations spring to mind. First, I think there is a
fairly widespread feeling among historians that most attempts to
stratify the suttas rest on assumptions that do not bear up very well
under scrutiny. 

As above, I agree.

RH:
>Second, and here I speak mostly about scholars in North
America, I get the impression that most Buddhologists are more
interested in philosophical coherence than in historical sequence. To
someone interested primarily in what is true (or at least coherent), it
simply does not matter very much in what sequence various ideas came
forward. In other words, synchronic concerns seem to predominate over
diachronic concerns. I think that is the case. Whether it should be the
case is, of course, a different question.

Maybe these are just the guys you hang out with, Richard? The alternative to
'philosophical coherence' is not just 'historical sequence', is it? Perhaps
those who are interested in such possible 'sequences' seek other kinds of
coherence?

It does matter what sequence things arose in if you are interested in, for
example, understanding the evolution of Buddhism as a whole (academically or
personally), or in accommodating your (i.e. one's, I get the impression you
don't own up to having any) faith to an apparently contradictory tradition. Both
are valid motives.  And those who chew over the old bone of intellectual
coherence without due deference to the possibility of development, seem to waste
a lot of time trying to create a single monolithic intellectual structure out of
terminally diverse materials.  But this is 'merely' how it looks from another
side of the fence.

SD:
> A diachronical approach, based on stratigraphy, would help to clarify
> a lot of 'contradictions' within the suttas (not to mention 'upaya'
> being an erroneous explanation for inconsistencies between suttas). 
RH:
>A diachronic study might offer some interesting speculations as to the
>sequence in which contradictory (or apparently contradictory) doctrines
>arose, but how does that help to resolve (or clarify) the contradictions
>themselves? 

Well, it could give, when linked to other data, a context to explain why they
arose.

RH:
>Surely we have to do something more sophisticated than say "earlier is
>better" (since that rests on the unwarranted assumption that the Buddha
>was infallible and therefore got it all right the first time and any
>change from the original must be a degeneration) or "later is
>better" (since that rests on the equally unwarranted assumption that
>doctrines invariably become more refined as more and more minds think
>about them). But what exactly is that more sophisticated somewhat we
>have to do?

We all struggle, to varying degrees admittedly, with our own, or preferably
other people's, unwarranted assumptions. It did not look to me like Stefan was
trying to say 'earlier is better', though he had better fess up quick if he was!
Isn't the real carrot here the possibility of building a complex picture of
Buddhism (whether or not that has had anything to do with someone called the
Buddha) that delineates the organic web of conditions that have supported its
evolution? (In which case, it must be an organic carrot?) Those who resist the
idea of stratifying the canon (as distinct from those who might critique
individual attempts) seem to me to be blocking the possibility of a more
convincing picture of Buddhism, since the literature is pretty much most of what
we've got so far as evidence goes.  

Andrew



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Andrew Skilton 

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