[Buddha-l] Buddha, an 'emotional weakling'? What are the "joys

[jkirk]

>From John Whalen-Bridge:

Poet Gary Snyder quotes Dogen's "Painted RIce Cake" parable at the beginning 
of MOUNTAINS AND RIVERS WITHOUT END to bring art/illusion/aesthetic pleasure 
back into the picture.  Dogen's argues in this way: those who say a painted 
rice cake cannot satisfy hunger are wrong, since EVERYTHING is a "painted 
rice cake," and our hunger, too, is composed of pigments, shapes, 
constructions.  thus, only a painted rice cake can satisfy hunger.  The 
general understanding of Buddhism extrapolated from such texts points toward 
compassion and away from ascetic denial of pleasure.  To some Buddhists, 
this is an offensive revision.  Thanissaro Bhikku in TRICYCLE referred to 
this as "Romantic Buddhism."

I'm interested in hearing more about textual authority on this. My 
supposition is that Pali / elder Buddhism will consistently disparage 
singing and dancing, whereas mahayana sutras will complicate matters and 
will ameliorate monastic/ascetic denial with a notion of 
pleasure-without-attachment.  Which makes art possible, again.
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Revisiting a former message on aesthetics and the Pali suttas:
Sent: Sunday, July 11, 2004 12:17 PM
Subject: Esthetics: Natyashastra rasa and Buddhism, Part 1 (3) ctd

I wrote:
Now drawing from the Samyutta Nikaya we find the following negative
 moralisation of the senses including those closely associated with the 
experience of
 beauty. Since the eye, ear and form are most commonly associated with 
esthetics, I
 cite only the two suttas pertaining to these senses:

 Samyutta Nikaya XXVII
 Upakkilesa Samyutta
 Translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.

 Samyutta Nikaya XXVII.1
 Cakkhu Sutta
 The Eye
 At Savatthi. "Monks, any desire & passion with regard to the eye is a
 defilement of the mind. Any desire & passion with regard to the ear...[etc]

 Samyutta Nikaya XXVII.2
 Rupa Sutta
 Forms
 At Savatthi. "Monks, any desire & passion with regard to forms is a
 defilement of the mind. Any desire & passion with regard to sounds... 
aromas...
 flavors...tactile sensations... ideas is a defilement of the mind.
 When, with regard to these six bases, the defilements of awareness are
 abandoned, then the mind is inclined to renunciation. The mind fostered by
 renunciation feels malleable for the direct knowing of those qualities
worth realizing." [And he does not mean rasas or rupas.]

 These are straightforward statements rejecting the connections between
 senses and desire. Here there seems to be no room at all for any kind of
 esthetic.
 ==================================================================

 The theras cited above came to terms of practice with eye, ear etc. such
 that they felt they were in a position for "direct knowing of those
 qualities worth realizing."
 They delighted in the esthetic contrast between the forest retreat and
 civilisation, expressing sentiments of esthetic joy with regard to the
 former, and perhaps it's fair to say, sentiments of disgust (bhibatsa
 rasa) for the latter.

The much later commentator, Abhinavagupta (10-11th c.CE) developed a theory
of rasa that proposed a kind of renunciation (as a merging of the quotidian
and the transcendant) that produces shanta, or peaceful mind, emotional 
quiescence.
His seems to have been an attempt to rationalise the differences between the
Buddhist and Hindu views on natya/the senses and sentiments/esthetic value.




So far, I have only brought out esthetic sentiments of a forest retreat
poetics, but no Buddhist esthetic theory (as found in rasa theory, e.g.)
because there really is not any explicit one, with the eception of what
Dhammapala said, following:



Dhammanando sent me a revelatory citation of an untranslated commentary by
the

5th c.CE monk, Dhammapala, which actually critiques the natya rasas (loosely
dated 200BCE to 200CE). I reproduce what he sent me:



http://www.accesstoinsight.org/canon/sutta/samyutta/sn42-002.html



 Dhammanando wrote: The sub-commentary to this Sutta contains what

I think is the only allusion to classical rasa theory (I mean that

of the Natya`saastra) in any of the Pali commentaries. Like any sensible

art-despising monk, Dhammapaala naturally takes a pretty dim view

of it. For him the rasas are simply what the Sutta calls "things

inspiring passion ... things inspiring aversion ... things

inspiring delusion". He breaks them down as follows:



Inspiring passion (dhammaa rajaniiyaa) :-

eros (Pali: si`ngaara, Skt. `s.rngaara)

wonder (abbhuta, adbhuta)

revulsion (biibhaccha, biibhatsa)

mirth (hassa, haasya)



Inspiring aversion (dhammaa dosaniiyaa) :-

fury (rudda, raudra)

heroism (viira)

terror (bhayaanaka)



Inspiring delusion (dhammaa mohaniiyaa) :-

pathos (karu.na)

tranquillity (santa, `saanta)

terror (bhayaanaka)



As we see here, the rasas can only lead to moral ruin. They only inspire
passions or invoke the three poisons for this commentator. We don't know the
context in which he was considering the rasas. Was it in the context of pure
natya: staged performances that included dance, song, music and acting, of
which he naturally as an educated person would be au courant even if he
never attended one, since natya had been around presumably since at least
the 3d c. CE.



What Dammapala shares with Bharata (presumed author of the Natyshastra,
although they are also said to have been given by Brahma and some call them
the 5th Veda) is the moral contingency of an esthetic system. Dhammapala's
esthetic is morally negative, Bharata's morally positive. It is these two
opposite valuations of an esthetic system or "theory" that Abhinavagupta
took on and mediated in his own critique.