[Buddha-l] Sabba Sutta

[Dan Lusthaus]

(second half)
> Can you say why you think Richard's claim that Dignaga was probably not
affiliated to *any school* but an original thinker might be wrong?

Because his context, his tools, his own position, and his goals were all
Yogacara. He was a faithful exponent of Asanga, though an updater and
refiner of Asanga's ideas. His arguments do not end in neutral positions
(and the same can be said for Dharmakirti), but reach conclusions, and those
are Yogacara as well.

Note, this is a different issue than Richard's current position, which seems
to be that even though everyone in India and China (and apparently Tibet)
called him a Yogacara, that's irrelevant, since only of historical
significance, and not philosophically germane. I disagree. Putting aside the
question of why everyone, except some current scholars such as Richard, saw
Dignaga as a Yogacara, there is the question of the hermeneutics of
unpacking Dignaga's texts. One can decontextualize them (in the name of some
sort of philosophical agenda) and make up what one imagines they mean, or
one can look at the materials he was responding to, and recover their
meaning with better data. One can, as most scholars do, *imagine* what
svasamvitti meant for Dignaga (his own usage does not convey a definitive
meaning, hence the varieties of interpretation), or one can look in the
literature and ideas he is responding to for clues.

Dignaga is not a simple parrot of Yogacara doctrine -- he is deeper and more
interesting than that. As I mentioned, the role that prasiddha (something
already accepted by both contestants in a debate) provides a crucial insight
into what his inference system is trying to do. Here is my translation of a
passage from Sankarasvamin's Nyayapravesa:

3.1. A fallacious or pseudo-pakṣa (pakṣābhāsa, 似立宗) is when what one
wishes to prove is contradicted by perception (pratyakṣādi-viruddhaḥ, 與現量
等相違), etc. Those [ābhāsas] are: (1) contradicted by perception; (2)
contradicted by inference; (3) contradicted by one's own scriptures or
tenets (āgama-viruddha, 自教相違); (4) contradicted by worldly consensus
(loka-viruddha, 世間相違); (5) contradicted by one's own statements
(sva-vacana-viruddha, 自語相違); (6) the qualifier is not agreed to [by a
disputant] (aprasiddha-viśeṣaṇa, 能別不極成); (7) the qualified is not
agreed to [by a disputant] (aprasiddha-viśeṣya, 所別不極成); (8) both
[qualifier and qualified] are not accepted [by a disputant]; and (9) the
relation [between the qualifier and the qualified] is [already] agreed to
[by the disputants, making further proof superfluous, since it does not
convey new knowledge] (prasiddha-saṃbandha, 相符極成).

The last four illustrate prasiddha (one might add #4 as well). Each
disputant has to accept both the qualified (that in which a property is
alleged to reside) and the qualifier (the property alleged to reside in the
qualified). What this means is that one cannot argue simply from the basis
of doctrine, but must begin with common ground, i.e., things accepted by
BOTH parties.

Here are examples of the last four abhasas (fallacious proofs) given in
Nyayapravesa:

(6) the qualifier is not agreed to [by a disputant]; e.g., a Buddhist
positing to a Sāṃkhyan, "sound is perishable (vināśi, 滅壞)."
(7) the qualified is not agreed to [by a disputant]; e.g., a Sāṃkhyan
positing to a Buddhist, "the self (ātman) is conscious (cetanā, 思)."
(8) both [qualifier and qualified] are not accepted [by a disputant]; e.g.,
a Vaiśeṣika positing to a Buddhist, "the self is the inherent cause
(samavāyi-kāraṇaṃ 和合因緣) of pleasure, etc."
(9) the relation [between the qualifier and the qualified] is [already]
agreed to [by the disputants, making further proof superfluous, since it
does not convey new knowledge]; e.g., "Sound is heard".

[my comments]
A Buddhist cannot *begin* with a statement like "sound is perishable"
because a Samkhyan believes that sound is eternal and non-perishable. Hence
it is illegitimate as a pak.sa (thing to be proven by the argument) from the
beginning. If a Buddhist is debating someone who accepts the perishability
of sound (e.g., a Vaisesika), then this would be a legitimate paksa.

Similarly, a Samkhyan cannot make claims about properties of an atman, since
a Buddhist doesn't accept (aprasiddha) there is any such thing as an atman.
A Samkhyan debating another Hindu who accepts the idea of atman could use
that as a paksa in that situation.

Buddhists accept neither "self" nor the Vaisesika padartha (fundamental
component and category of reality) called "inherent cause" (samavaya), so a
Vaisesika is precluded from arguing for it.

Everyone had to leave their favorite doctrines by the door when debating, no
matter how dear, and seek a common ground. A Buddhist had to find a way to
*build* an argument that would prove that sound is impermanent when debating
a Samkhyan, not by asserting it and offering a proof, but leading up to it
with paksas composed of things acceptable to a Samkhyan.

That was Dignaga's genius. To create an equal playing field where everything
is on the table, because the aprasiddha tenets could not be used as proofs.
This is also why he doesn't simply recite Yogacara tenets and vocabulary (or
any other sectarian verbiage) explicitly, but leads, via sequences of
arguments that do not violate the prasiddha stricture, to Yogacara
conclusions.

> You have still only cited circumstantial evidence, and not Dignaga
himself.

I did, but you seemed to miss it. Not only the four listed way above, but
previously also mentioned trairupya (often considered another signature
Dignaga doctrine, but already found in the Yogacarabhumi, as Tucci noted).
There's more, but we would have to go through a Dignaga text passage by
passage to uncover and document that.

>Is there anything concrete about Dignaga's work that makes it stand out as
Yogacara?

See my previous comments on Alambana-pariksa. Also, The "Hand" Treatise:
Hastavālaprakaraṇa

There are 2 ch. translations: mid-sixth century by Paramārtha (解捲論
Jiejuan lun, T31.1620); tr. by Yijing (掌中論 Zhangzhonglun)  T.31.1621, tr.
in 702.

The Tibetan tradition attributes this short text to Āryadeva, not Dignāga,
but both Chinese versions assign it to Dignāga (the Tibetan attribution is
very late, and confused; Parmartha and Yijing were, along with Xuanzang, the
primary transmitters of Dignaga to China, and would not have hesitated to
credit a Madhyamakan with authorship if that had been the case). It
discusses the rope-snake analogy, correct cognition, etc. It appears to be
familiar with the trisvabhāva model. An English translation (from the
Tibetan), accompanied by a reconstructed Sanskrit version, the Tibetan and
two Chinese versions was published by F.W. Thomas and H. Ui, " 'The Hand
Treatise,' A Work of Āryadeva," Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and
Ireland, April 1918, 267-310.

More importantly, one can take key passages in Dignaga's Pramanasamuccaya
and line them up with Asanga passages in Yogacarabhumi and
Abhidharmasamuccaya -- and the affinities become evident, especially when
one compares these passages with the works of others, in which such
parallels are never found.

Yogacara is what Asanga, et al., wrote, not what later doxographers say it
is supposed to be. When approached that way, Dignaga is clearly a Yogacara.

> Skilton's [...]
> So would you say that there is more than a 'passing reference' to Yogacara
doctrines in Dignaga then, or has Skilton got it about right?

Dignaga is drenched in Yogacara. Skilton's got it wrong. (I would refer him
to the aforementioned Tucci piece for starters)

Dan Lusthaus