Asarva how does it flow

Author(s): Alex Wayman
Publisher: Z_Aspect_of_Jainology_Part_3_Pundit_Dalsukh_Malvaniya_012017.pdf
Catalog link: https://jainqq.org/explore/250022/1

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ĀSRAVA : HOW DOES IT FLOW ?
Alex Wayman
It is well known that in Jaina texts the term āsrava means an inflow of karmaa kind of material-into the soul. Still a Western translator of Buddhist texts has translated the same term as "out-flow.''2 Granted that a number of technical terms are employed in varying senses in the different philosophical systems and religions of India. The diametrically opposite rendition of the important term āsrava is certainly striking and warrants investigation, which I shall carry on by way of varieties and the theory of "flowing.”
Varieties and the negative form
A Pāli dictionary explains the term asrava as meaning "influx” or “outflow” (e. g. discharge from a sore). The Chinese renderings of asrava are overwhelmingly “flow, flux, leaking."'4 The Tibetan translation is regularly zag pa, "flow, leaking.” For my own translation projects I adopted a rendition "flux” or in the adjectival case "fluxional.” 6 The Sanskrit form is either asrava or aśrava."
Three kinds are stated in the Sammadiţthisutta of the Majjhima-Nikāya - kāmāsava, bhavāsava, and avijjāsava.8 The Abhidhammattha Samgaha of Bhadanta Anuruddhäcariya mentions four, which are the foregoing three plus ditthāsay take them individually :--
(1) The kāma variety is explained in Saddhammappakäsini as vatthukama (desire for given things) and kilesakāma (desire for defilement).10 This pair agrees with Asanga's self-commentary on the Paramārtha-gāthāli:
mokşam dvividham darśayati / klešamokşain vastumokşam ca / sarvabijasamutsādena klesapariksayāt klešamokşam tatraiva capy asamkleśãd vastumokşam yo bhikṣavas cakşuşi chandarāgas tam prajahita | evam ca tac caksuh prahiņam bhavisyatiti / Sūtrapadanyāyena evam sopadhišeşam moksam darśayitvā nirupadhiśesam darśayati |
That release he shows to be of two kinds : release from defilements and release from given things. There is release from defilements by destroying all seeds through eradication of defilement; and in the same place, as well, there is release from given things through no stain. The sūtra says: "O monks, whatever be the sensuous lust in the eye, abandon that! So also will the eye disappear.” In the manner of that text he thus shows the release with remaining basis and then shows the one without remaining basis.

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Asrava : How does it Flow ?
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According to this passage, if desire for defilements (klesakāma) is eliminated, desire for given things ( vastukāma ) will also leave.
(2) The bhava variety is a passion for gestation (bhava) in the realm of form and the formless realm, according to C. A. F. Rhys Davids' Compendium, 12
(3) The dittha variety is the sixty-two wrong views (drsti) of the Brahmajalasutta, according to the Compendium. 18
(4) The avijja variety is ignorance of the four Noble Truths, past and future lives, the formula of dependent origination, and so on, according to the Compendium. 14
The negative form an-āsrava may be employed as an unqualified negation; so the Saddhammappakāsini : anāsayan 'ti āsavavirahitam.15 Is it so in Vasubandhu's Abhidharmakośa (1, 4, 5) ?16
sāsravā 'nāsravā dharmāḥ samskstā mārgavarjitaḥ / sāsravāḥ āsravās teșu yasmāt samanuśerate // anāsravā mārgasatyam trividham cāpy asamskstam ākāśam dvau nirodhau ca tatrākāšam anāvștiḥ 11
The natures (dharma) are either sāsrava or anāsrava. The constructed ones are säsrava except on the path, since the āsrava leave their mark in those [= the constructed ones, the five skandha per AK I, 7a-b].
The anāsrava ones are the Truth of Path and the three non-constructed, namely, space and the two cessations. Among them, space is non-obstruction.
Vasubandhu comments on the verb samanuśerate : anuśayanirdeśa eva (an indication of 'trace', anuśaya). Here, while the term anāsrava can apply both to the Truth of Path and the three "non-constructed”, it appears to diverge in significance for the two cases. When applying to the “non-constructed” it is an unqualified negation, as in the Saddhammappakāsini comment. But when applying to the path (märga), it cannot be unqualified, or persons on the path would be entirely free of asrava while this was supposed to be Arhat attainment at the end of the path for which such a term as kşīņāsrava (erased the asrava) is used. 17 For the path, the term anāsrava appears to mean "opposed to asrava', i.e. actively opposing, hence reducing āsrava 18 Accordingly, the term sāsraya would mean "promoting asrava". Then Vasubandhu clarifies that the role of the asrava in "constructed” (saṁskṛta) natures-excepting the path-is described by anuśaya. This term is not connected with "flow" as is ásrava (āt vsru, to flow); rather goes with the root 12 si, to lie, referring to its varieties as dormant. The Abhidharmakośa, Chap. V, shows various ways of classifying the anuśaya. Asanga; in his Yogācārabhūmi, includes them among increasing enumerations (ekottara) of defilements (klesa).19 For the number seven he presents seven anuśaya, each labelled "anuśaya": kāmarāga (sensuous lust),
12

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pratigha (hostility), bhavarāga (passion for gestation), māna(pride), avidyā (nescience) drsti (wrong views), vicikitsā (doubt). Reducing kamarāga and bhavarāga to rāga, one gets his list of six which he does not label anušaya, but which is the basic list of six anuśaya in AK, Chap. V, lc-d. 20 According to Asanga's list, these defiled traces (anušaya) are an expansion of the four kinds of asraya. The renditions of this term asrava in its Pāli form āsava by translators of scriptures in that language, namely (Mrs. C.A.F. Davids) "intoxicants", (Miss I. B. Horner) "cankers", and the like, appear to attribute to the word asava qualities that go with certain varieties, which prejudges the case. 21
The theory of flowing
First, the ancient Buddhist canon, the Samyutta-Nikāya I, contains in the Māra Suttas the question by one of Māra's daughters and the Buddha's response, about the five streams and the sixth; and the episode is in a Sanskrit version in the Mahāvastu, II122; here the Pāli28 :
"katham vihārībahulodha bhikkhu, pancoghatinno ataridha chattham / katham jhāyi bahulam kāmasaññā, paribāhirā honti aladdhayo tam” ti // "passaddhakāyo suvimuttacitto, asankharāno satimā anoko / aññāya dhammam avitakkajhāyi, na kuppati na sarati na thino || “evam vihāribahulodha bhikkhu, pancoghatinno ataridha chattham evam jhāyi bahulam kāmasaññā, paribāhirā honti aladdhayo tam” ti //
For the translation, instead of the Pāli aladdhayo tam we should accept the Sanskrit alabdhagadha, supported by the Tibetan version gña' dag ma thob when the same verses are presented and commented upon by Asanga in Cintāmayi bhūmi in the Tibetan canon24 :
(Māra's daughter :) "How should a monk in his numerous states, having crossed the five streams, cross the sixth ? How should a meditator who has not attained union (Pāli, *yogam,25 Skt. gādhā) expel the abundant ideas of desire ?
(Buddha :) “With body cleansed and mind liberated; without instigation, mindful, and untroubled; knowing the doctrine (dharma) and meditating without constructive thought, passion does not stir, nor is he torpid.

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Åsrava : How does it Flow
"Thus should the monk in his numerous states, having crossed the five streams, cross the sixth. Thus should the meditator who has not attained union expel the abundant ideas of desire."
According to Asanga, the term "stream” stands for sensory activity; thus, the eye is a stream because viewing forms, and likewise for the remaining five senses; then the sixth stream is the mind (manas) because perceiving mental natures (dharma). The Pāli commentator Buddhaghosa has a consistent remark.26 Furthermore, when the “body is cleansed”--i. e. there is "cathartic of body" (kāya-praśrabdhi), the mind may be “liberated” from lust (rāga), hatred (dveșa), and delusion (moha). And tilus one crosses those streams. As to attaining "union”, as I understand Asanga's discussion, it is the union of "calming the mind” (samatha) and "discerning the real” (vipaśyanā, where the verse's "non-instigation" points to the "calming”, and where the verse's "mindful” as the four "stations of mindfulness” (smrtyupasthāna) points to the “discerning”, with the verse's remaining words representing further clarifications of this union.
Since Asanga's Srāvakabhūmi statement about “restraint of sense organs” contains the verb form anusraveyus, it is well to present it now27:
indriyasamvaraḥ katamaḥ / sa tam eva silasamvaram nisrityārakṣitasmộtir bhavati nipaka-smstiḥ / smstyārakṣitamānasaḥ samāvasthāvacārakaḥ sa cakşuşā rūpāņi drstva / na nimittagrāhi bhayati nānuvyañjanagrāhi yatodhikaraṇam asya päpakā akušalā dharmāś cittam anusraveyus teşām samvarāya pratipadyate rakṣati mana-indriyam sa śrotreņa sabdan ghrānena gandhān jihyaya rasan kāyena spraştavyāni / manasă dharmán vijñāya na nimittagrāhi bhavati nānuvyañjanagrābi yatodhikaraṇam asya pāpakā akusalā dharmāś cittam anusraveyus teşām samvarāya pratipadyate rakṣati mana-indriyam / mana-indriyeņa samvaram āpadyate / ayam ucyata indriyasamvaraḥ /
What is restraint of sense organs? When one has taken recourse to just the restraint of morality, be guards mindfulness. His mindfulness is prudent. His mind is guarded by mindfulness. He has the sphere of the even state. When he sees forms with the eye, he does not take hold of sign-sources or details by reason of which sinful,unvirtuous natures would flow (anusraveyus) after his mind. He acts in each case to restrain those. He guards his mind sense-organ. When he perceives sounds with his ear, odors with his nose, tastes with his tongue, tangibles with his body, natures (dharma) with his mind, he does not take hold of sign-sources or details by reason of which sinful unvirtuous natures would flow after his mind. He acts in each case to restrain those. He guards his mind sense organ. The mind sense-organ exerts the restraint. This is called "restraint of sense organs."

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The Mahāyāna biography of the Buddha called Lalitavistara in its dependent origination (pratityasamutpāda) verses has this one where "flow" is given by the word salila :28
skandhā pratitya samudeti hi duḥkham evam sambhonti trsnasalilena vivardhamānā / mārgeņa dharmasamatāya vipaśyamānā atyantaksiņa kşayadharmatayā niruddhāḥ //
The personal aggregates (skandha) arise in dependence in this way does suffering arise. They swell by the flow of craving. When discerned on the path by sameness of natures (dharma), undergoing extreme depletion, they cease by their underlying nature of destruction.
Edgerton, in his entry on “äsrava”, 29 also cites the Lalitavistara (351.1) to show how this "destruction” (kşaya) takes place : suskā aśrava na puna śravanti ("The fluxes, dried up, flow no more").
The foregoing investigation presents no suggestion that the word āsava means out-flow. Indeed, the verbal prefix ā- means here "to, unto". So Nārada explains the word in his book on the Abhidhammattha Samgaha : “They are so called either because they flow up to the topmost plane of existence or because they persist as far as the Gotrabhū consciousness (i, e., the thought-moment that immediately precedes the Path-consciousness of the 'Stream-Winner'--Sotāpatti). These Āsavas are latent in all worldlings and may rise to the surface in any plane of existence."0 Notice that the remark "latent in all worldlings'' points to the word anuśaya (traces), while "may rise to the surface” is normally expressed by a different term, paryavasthana (entrapment).
There is also a way of talking about an-āsrava as a kind of “bleeding”. One may refer to the Lankāvatāra-sūtra's passage on the anantariya (deadly sins, five in number, bearing immediate retribution),"patricide”, “matricide”, etc., by abhisamdhi, a deliberate transvaluation of the terms, 31 in this case the ānantariya of causing, with evil intention, the Tathāgata to bleed; and the sutra states 32 : -
svasāmānyabāhyasvacittadsáyamātrāvabodhakānām mahāmate astānām vijñānakāyānām vimokşatrayānāsravaduşțavikalpenātyantopaghātad vijñānabuddhasya duştacittarudhiropādanād ūnantaryakärity ucyate / Mahāmati, when the eight sets of vijñāna which imagine the inherent (sva) and the generalizing (sāmānya) [characters (laksana)] to be external while they are merely what is seen by one's mind, are completely extirpated of their faulty (= evil) constructions by the three liberations and "nonflux”, thus causing a bleeding, with "evil intention”, of the Vijñānabuddha
it is called an "immediacy deed”.

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Asrava : How does it Flow ?
93 Here, the negation an-āsrava has the effect of an opposite movement to asrava. Whereas asrava is a flow unto or upto, the an-asrava is a flow away from or down and out. I have elsewhere cited another passage about "bleeding"33 :
Another Tibetan text mentions omens that the defilement will be purged : Furthermore, there are omens for the purging of sin and defilement, that speaking generally, are superior when concrete, middling when mental, and inferior when in dream; to wit, the good omens that the body emits much filthy matter, or bleeds blood and pus, or that one is bathed and in white clothes.84 And so long as they do not occur one should continually trust (that they will).
So far I have not gone into the matter of the Buddha's "third watch of the night (of enlightenment)” when according to some Buddhist traditions he knew the eradication of asrava, that this is included in the supernormal faculties (abhijñā) as the sixth one, or that the Arhat-attainment is especially characterized by āsravakşaya. Such considerations would not have advanced my purpose of showing the significance of the positive term generally and of the negative form in special circumstances such as the Buddhist path.
Finally, I must applaud the consistency of translators of Jaina scriptures in rendering the term asrava by “in-flow”. My investigation suggests that everywhere that the term occurs in Buddhist texts and was rendered "out-flow' the context would have been better served by rendering it as "in-flow” or by the more neutral flux".
Notes
1.
A recent work continuing this rendition, in fact "influx", is Padmanabh S. Jaini, The Jaina Path of Purification (Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi, 1979). Edward Conze, Buddhist Thought in India (George Allen & Unwin Ltd., London, 1962), at one spot renders the term “outflows” and at another, “impurities.” However, this late Buddhologist, famous for his important works on the Prajñāpāramitā scriptures and whose various works on Buddhism are readily available and influential, adopted the rendition "outflows” for asrava in his "List of Buddhist Terms” which was duplicated and handed out at places where he would teach. T. W. Rhys Davids and William Stede, The Pali Text Society's Pali-English Dictionary, s. v. So in M. Honda, "An Index to the Philosophical Sūtras, No. II, “Proceedings of the Okurayama Oriental Research Institute (Yokohama, Japan), 1959, Vol. 3, p. 70.
3.
4.

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9.
11.
Alex
5, So in the Sanskrit-Tibetan Buddhist Dictionary Mahāvyutpatti, ed. Ryoza
buro Sakaki, 2 vols. (2nd ed., Tokyo, 1962). 6. So in Alex Wayman and Hideko Wayman, The Lion's Roar of Queen
Śrimāla; a Buddhist Scripture on the Tathāgatagarbha Theory (Columbia
University Press, New York, 1974), pp. 85-86. 7. Franklin Edgerton, Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Dictionary (New Haven, Yale
University Press, 1953), s. v. 8. Majjhima-Nikaya, I,55 (Pali Publication Board, Bihar, 1958, I, p. 75.11).
Nārada, A Manual of Abhidhamma : Abhidhammattha Sangaha (Buddhist
Publication Society, Kandy, Ceylon, 1968), p. 322. 10. Saddhammappakāsini : Commentary on the Pațisambhidāmagga, ed. by C.
V. Joshi, Vol. III, p. 624.11-12. Alex Wayman, Analysis of the Śrāvakabhūmi Manuscript (University of
California Press, Berkeley, 1961), pp. 177-178, 185. 12. Caroline A. F. Rhys Davids, Dhamma-Sangani (Compendium of States or
Phenomena), also: A Buddhist Manual of Psychological Ethics (London
1900), p. 293, n. 2. 13. C. A. F. Rhys Davids, Dhamma-Sangani, p. 293, n. 3. 14. C. A. F. Rhys Davids, Dhamma-Songani, p. 294, referring to p. 283. 15. Saddhammappakasini, Vol. III, p. 628.25. 16. Abhidharmakośabhāsyam of Vasubandhu, ed. P. Pradhan (K. P. Jayaswal
Research Institute, Patna, 1975), text, p. 3. 17. For Pāli passages about this Arhat attainment, cf. Pāli Tipitakaṁ Concor
dance, Vol. I: A-O (Pāli Text Society, London, 1956), p. 348. 18. This is a significance of a small group of a-an- negations, having as well
known example the term avidyā, which the commentaries, such as Vasubandhu in the Abhidharmakośa, do not accept as just not it or other than vidyā, but which actively opposes vidyā; cf. AK, III,28c-d, and Vasubandhu's
comment. 19. Vidhushekhara Bhattacharya, ed., The Yogācārabhūmi of Ācārya Asanga,
Part I (University of Calcutta, 1957), p. 161. 20. Cf. Louis de la Vallée Poussin, L’Abhidharmakośa de Vasubandhu (Chap.
V-VI). (Paris, 1925), pp. 2-3 21. Mis. C.A.F. Davids attempted to justify her rendition in Dhamma-Sangani,
p. 291, n. 1, starting with a claim that no adequate English equivalent is available to this there is response that the English "flux” is just what the Chinese and Tibetan translators adopted in their own languages, while her "intoxicant” is a translation by in place of presumed effect of the asava. Miss Horner's “canker(s)” in her translation of Majjhima-Nikāya seems to adopt the medical meaning of a sore that is discharging, which disagrees with the side of asrava constituted by the latent anuśaya.

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Asrava : How does it Flow ? 22. Cf. J. J. Jones, The Mahavastu, Vol. III (London, 1956), pp. 271-272; Radhagovinda Basak, ed. Mahavastu Avadana (Sanskrit College, Calcutta, 1968), pp. 375-376. Samyutta-Nikaya, 1, 126 (Pali Publication Board, Bihar, 1959, 1, p. 125.22 to 126.8). 24. Photo ed. of Tibetan Kanjur-Tanjur, Vol. 110, p. 4-5-8, ff. 25. J. J. Jones, The Mahavastu, Vol. III, p. 271, n. 4, observed that the Pali -yo tam is a corruption, but did not notice that the reading should be yogam, which is partially synonymous with the Sanskrit gadha; while he mistranslated the phrase by assuming Sanskrit gadha, which is from a different root. . 26. J. J. Jones, The Mahavastu, Vol. III, p. 271, n. 3. 27. Alex Wayman, Analysis of the Sravakabhumi Manuscript, pp. 61-62 28. I use the edition in Franklin Edgerton, Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Reader, pp. 24-25; he mentions that this passage, LV 418-22-420.10, immediately follows "The First Sermon". 29. Franklin Edgerton, Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Dictionary, s. v. 30. Narada, A Manual of Abhidhamma, p. 327. The word abhisardhi means "deliberate misrepresentation" but in the good sense of being required for circumstances of teaching. Four of them are stated in the texts and listed in the Mahavyutpatti, nos. 1672-1675. Examples are given for the four in a work of an ancient Tibetan translator, Dpal brtsegs, his treatise on Dharma-paryaya in Photo ed. of Tibetan Kanjur-Tanjur, Vol. 145, p. 128-4-6, ff. For the fourth one, parinamabhisardhi, he gives as example this very list of the five deadly sins. Here, parinama means "tiansvaluation of term(s) standing for sin(s). 32. Bunyiu Nanjio, ed. The Lankavatara Sutra (Kyoto, at the Otani University Press, 1956), 138.18-139.3. 33. Alex Wayman, "Purification of Sin in Buddhism by Vision and Confession", in G. H. Sasaki, ed., A Study of Klesa (Tokyo, 1975), p. 68. - 34. One immediately, thinks of the Jaina Svetambaia saint. 31.