[Buddha-l] 9. Attadiipaa Sutta (Joy Vriens)

[Joy Vriens]

Hi Joanna,

"Thinking this over, one can view a river as samsara because it is so often
used as a metonym for samsara, as in the raft teaching. Therefore, the
sandbar (to me a 'doab' is too vast to serve the purpose here), standing
above the river as it flows around it instead of over it, makes sense as
refuge and as solid ground (nothing solid about river/samsara, right?).
In India the rivers don't run full during the dry season, lowering in depth
and producing sandbars and what could be called small islands. These are
indeed viewed as solid ground by locals (even if not always solid ground),
in that in dry season these grounds are cultivated. They are solid. People
put up huts and live on them while cultivating crops."

There are two different aspects here for me. One the image of a river, a
stream, a torrent for samsara. Which I prefer to the ocean, where one has to
navigate for a long time before being able to cross it. As long as one is
navigating towards the final destination, it is as if nothing has changed.
Whereas the river and its stream is more similar to our mind stream, where
patches of temporary peace can be found immediately.

The second part is the island, or sandbar as such as an image of safety. We
all know the phenomenon of waning and flooding of rivers. People avoid to
settle on grounds that can be inundated. No building permits will be
delivered for those grounds, because they are not safe. They will be used
for cattle in the summer. In France many rivers have signs telling you not
to bathe in the river, because it's connecte to a hydro-electrical dam and
when the water is let out, the river level can raise very suddenly. The huts
and the crops on the sandbars are precarious and temporary. Not a good image
for refuge.

Another idea. Dhammapada 188. "Many people, out of fear, flee for refuge (
sara.na) to (sacred) hills, woods, groves, trees, and shrines." In other
words, they flee to the traditional sanctuaries and places of safety. The
attadipa sutta has the word refuge (sara.na) appearing a couple of times.
And sara.na and "island" are similar/synonyms. Dhammapada 189 comments : In
reality this is not a safe refuge. "In reality this is not the best refuge.
Fleeing to such a refuge one is not released from all suffering." Therefore
a sandbar would not be a safe refuge. As soon as the water rises again, you
would have to move on.

The Tibetan equivalent for dviipa, gling, has kept the different meanings of
"dviipa". The first temple built in Tibet in the 8th century with the help
of the Indian acarya Śāntarakṣita was called Samye Ling (bsam yas gling). I
don't know whether Śāntarakṣita was involved in the choice of the name, but
here dviipa is clearly not an island or a sandbar. The architecture of Samye
Ling was modeled on a Buddhist temple in India. It is current nowadays to
add gling = dviipa to the names of temples and centres. It was current in
the 8th century in Tibet. Perhaps it was even current in the India of
Śāntarakṣita. At least there are no rapports about Śāntarakṣita having been
shocked by the name "gling" / dviipa and having shouted out "Why island,
there is no water here!".

Joy