Patanjali And Buddhists

Author(s): Johannes Bronkhorst
Publisher: Johannes Bronkhorst
Catalog link: https://jainqq.org/explore/269546/1

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Patanjali and the Buddhists* Johannes BRONKHORST Medhatithi's commentary on Manu 1.5 cites the following proverb (janapravada) (Jha, 1920-1939: I: 8. 1. 7): amran prstah kovidaran acaste. Wezler (1999: 139) translates: "Being questioned about mangoes he acquaints (one) with the kovidara (trees)", and oberves in a note (p. 151, n. 9): "Note that this proverb does not belong to those dealt with by Hopkins 1887 and Pischel 1893." It is however mentioned in the Nyayokti-kosa of Chhabinath Mishra (1978:22, s.v. amran prstah ...), where it is pointed out that the proverb occurs in the Mahabhasya (Maha-bh I, p. 219, 1. 16, on P. 1.2.45 vt. 8). However, a closely similar expression occurs in the early Buddhist Sramanyaphala Sutra. The different versions of this text can be most easily cited from Meisig's Das Sramanyaphala-Sutra (1987). We find the proverb in Sanskrit in the Sanghabhedavastu: tad yatha bhadanta/purusah amrani prstah lakucani vyakuryat, lakucani va prstah amrani vakuryat, evam ..., in Pali in the Digha Nikaya: seyyathapi bhante ambam va puttho labujam vyakareya, labujam va pusho ambam vyakareyya, evam ... (Meisig, 1987: 130, 140, 148, 156, 162, (168)). The Chinese parallels translated by Meisig confirm that the translators used a similar text, even though the precise nature of the fruits mentioned may not have been preserved in translation. In spite of the differences of detail, it is clear that Patanjali here uses essentially the same expression as certain Buddhist texts. This is interesting, for it suggests that Patanjali the author of the Mahabhasya may have been influenced by Buddhist texts, and may therefore conceivably have undergone Buddhist influence. Influence in the opposite direction, from Patanjali to the Buddhist texts concerned, seems excluded, since the Sramanyaphala Sutra is a canonical text, which we may assume to be older than Patanjali, if not exactly in its surviving form than at least in some earlier form. Given that our This article in honour of Professor Sodo Mori is in part based on two earlier studies by the present author (1987; 1995), which should be referred to for further details. 485

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Buddhist and Indian Studies proverb occurs in all the different versions of the Sutra, it seems safe to conclude that this earlier form already contained the proverb under consideration. It goes without saying that the occurrence of a similar proverb both in a Buddhist canonical text and in the Mahabhasya does not, by itself, prove that Patanjali has here been influenced by that particular E ddhist text, or by Buddhists in general. It is conceivable that this proverb was in use in Patanjali's circles, as it was in use in the circles of those who composed (or redacted) the Sramanyaphala Sutra. However, this is not the only example of striking similarity between Patanjali's Mahabhasya and certain Buddhist texts. Patanjali speaks at one occasion about "sciences which have something auspicious in the beginning, in the middle and in the end" (mangaladini mangalamadhyani mangalantani sastrani; Maha-bh I, p. 253, 1. 5-6, on P. 1.3.1 vt. la). He uses this expression in connection with Panini's Astadhyayi, but a closer inspection shows that it does not very well fit this text. The Astadhyayi has, to be sure, "something auspicious" in the beginning: P. 1.1.1 (vrddhir ad aic) begins with the word vrddhi, which is auspicious. But this text does not have something auspicious in the middle; or rather, the presence of bhu in P. 1.3.1 which Patanjali mentions in this connection does not occur in the middle at all: it occurs at the beginning of the third Pada of a text which altogether has thirty-two of them. The "something auspicious" at the end remains unspecified in the Mahabhasya. Some commentators propose the use of udaya in P. 8.4.67, which is not the very end of the Astadhyayi. It appears that Patanjali got the notion of "sciences which have something auspicious in the beginning, in the middle and in the end" from elsewhere. Once again it is not very difficult to identify a possible source. A number of early Buddhist texts speak of the Dharma taught by the Buddha as being "auspicious in the beginning, in the middle and in the end". The Pali expression is: adikalyana, majjhekalyana, pariyosanakalyana; the terms used in Sanskrit are: adau kalyana, madhye kalyana, paryavasane kalyana. The Pali expression is frequent, especially in the Vinaya and Sutta Pitakas (cf. PTC s.v. adikalyana); the Sanskrit expression has been preserved in the Mahaparinirvana Sutra, the Dasottara Sutra, the Nidanasamyukta, and elsewhere (cf. SWTF s.v. adi). For a third parallel consider the following passage from the Mahabhasya (Maha-bh II, p. 120, 1. 20-21): athava bhavati vai kascij jagrad api vartamanakalam nopalabhate/ tad 486 Patanjali and the Buddhists yathal vaiyakarananam sakatayano rathamarga asinah sakatasartham yantam nopalebhe/ "Alternatively, there are people who, though awake, do not perceive the present. For example: Sakatayana from among the grammarians, while sitting at [the side of] the carriage-road, did not perceive a group of carts that passed by." A variant of this account occurs in the Buddhist Mahaparinirvana Sutra and its parallels. Here the story is of course not told about the grammarian Sakatayana, but about someone called Arada Kalama. The Sanskrit version reads (MPS 28.18): samjni evaham ... samano jagran nasrausam pancanam sakatasatanam vyatikramamananam sabdam "Even though conscious and awake I did not hear the sound of five hundred carts passing by." In this particular case Patanjali's story about a grammarian who did not hear a deafening noise sounds rather improbable. Les us not forget that early Indian literature shows little interest for or acquaintance with absent-minded professors. The story fits much better in an originally ascetic context, where practitioners were deeply concerned with suppressing the activities of the senses. Here too, the Buddhist milieu may be the source from which Patanjali drew this story. Once again, however, it must be admitted that without further evidence it may be difficult to prove this with certainty. Consider now the following two expressions used by Patanjali: gunasamdravo dravyam (Maha-bh II, p. 366, 1. 26, on P. 5.1.119 vt. 5) and gunasamudayo dravyam (Maha-bh II, p. 200, 1. 13-14), to which attention has been drawn by Albrecht Wezler (1985). Both state that material objects are collections of qualities; the context makes clear that the qualities concerned are sound (sabda), touch (sparsa), colour (rupa), taste (rasa) and smell (gandha). There is no reason to believe that Patanjali himself accepted this position, yet its very mention proves that there were thinkers at the time of Patanjali who did. Who were they? It is known that the Samkhya philosophy accepted the position that material objects are collections of qualities during a part of its history (Bronkhorst, 1994). There is however no reason to think that Samkhya as a 487

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Buddhist and Indian Studies developed philosophy existed already at the time of Patanjali. His Mahabhasya, at any rate, contains no clear indication that he was acquainted with this school of thought. But Samkhya was not the only philosophy that accepted this position. Buddhist Sarvastivada accepted it well before Samkhya (see, e.g., Bronkhorst, 2000: 113-114). Patanjali's remarks are most easily explained by the assumption that he was, whether directly or indirectly, acquainted with Sarvastivada Buddhism. Patanjali's last considered remarks have taken us out of the domain of literary themes into that of philosophical ideas. They suggest that Patanjali may have undergone Buddhist influence (perhaps indirectly) in both these domains. This raises the question whether further Buddhist-like features of a philosophical nature can be found in the Mahabhasya. This is indeed the case. The Mahabhasya does not contain many philosophical ideas, but some of them are noteworthy. Particularly important are Patanjali's ideas about the nature of words and sounds. Nothing in the grammatical discussions dealt with requires him to take a position in this matter, yet he does. Patanjali distinguishes the individual speech sound as an entity, which he sometimes calls sphota, from the noise (dhvani) that expresses it. The sphota, as he puts it, is the sound itself, whereas the dhvani is a quality of the sound (Maha-bh I, p. 181, 1. 19-20, on P. 1.1.70 vt. 5: evam tarhi sphotah sabdo dhvanih sabdagunah). Elsewhere it becomes clear that he considers words and their speech sounds eternal and unchanging. He does, for example, call the speech sounds fixed (Maha-bh I, p. 181, 1. 14, on P. 1.1.70 vt. 5: avasthita varna[h]). The following passage is particularly clear (Maha-bh I, p. 18, 1. 14-15, on Sivasutra 1 vt. 12): nityas ca sabdah/ nityesu ca sabdesu kutasthair avicalibhir varnair bhavitavyam anapayopajanavikaribhih/ "And words are eternal. And the speech sounds in the eternal words must be permanent, unchanging, free from diminution, augmentation and modification." This last passage suggests that also words, and not only their constituent sounds, are eternal. Patanjali's discussion of the first part of what is presented in Kielhorn's edition as the very first varttika of the Mahabhasya (siddhe sabdarthasambandhe; there are reasons to think that this is not the first varttika, set Bronkhorst 1987a) confirms this in a long discussion. It is hard to think that a mere collection of speech sounds can be eternal. 488 Patanjali and the Buddhists It is clear from other passages that Patanjali considers words to be more than just collections of speech sounds. Indeed, he postulates the word as being one single entity (Maha-bh I, p. 31, 1. 10, on Sivasutra 5 vt. 13: samghatasyaikatvam). He explains that the sounds of words do not occur simultaneously. He states this in the following passage (Maha-bh I, p. 356, 1. 5-8, on P. 1.4.109 vt. 10): gaur iti yavad gakare vag vartate naukare na visarjaniye/ yavad aukare na gakare na visarjaniye yavad visarjaniye na gakare naukare/ uccaritapradhvamsitvat/ uccaritapradhvamsinah khalv api varnah/ "In the case of gauh, as long as speech is concerned with the sound g, [it is] not [concerned] with the sounds au and h. As long as [it is concerned] with au, [it is] not [concerned] with g and h. As long as [it is concerned] with h, [it is] not [concerned] with g and au. Because they disappear as soon as they are pronounced. Sounds indeed disappear as soon as they have been pronounced." Patanjali is not particularly prolix about the nature of words, but a relatively clear picture is obtained by piecing together various remarks which he makes in different contexts. It seems clear, for example, that the single entity which is the word according to Patanjali, has an objective existence, not a merely mental one. The word, as he states somewhere, is situated in ether, where it can be heard by the ear and grasped by the mind (Maha-bh I, p. 18, 1. 19-20, on Sivasutra 1 vt. 12: srotropalabdhir buddhinirgrahyah prayogenabhijvalita akasadesah sabda[h]). I have dwelt a bit on Patanjali's ideas about words and sounds (without being exhaustive), since these ideas are remarkably similar to ideas developed in Sarvastivada Buddhism. The classical enumerations of dharmas of the Sarvastivadins contain, as is well known, the following three linguistic dharmas: namakaya, padakaya and vyanjanakaya. These dharmas already occur in the lists of cittaviprayukta samskaras found in several canonical Abhidharma texts of this school, viz., the Dharmaskandha, the Prakaranapada and the Jnanaprasthana, as well as in the so-called Pancavastuka. This is not the place to discuss the original meaning of these three terms in detail. It may be significant that the earliest translation of the Pancavastuka into Chinese knows only two linguistic dharmas; perhaps there were only two of them in the beginning. However that may be, it seems clear that these linguistic dharmas covered, right from the beginning, words and sounds. Words and sounds, being dharmas, were conceived of as being independent 489

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Buddhist and Indian Studies Patanjali and the Buddhists entities: the word being different from its "constituting" sounds, and each sound being different from the noise that manifests it. The introduction of linguistic dharmas by the Sarvastivadins fits in well with their ontological concerns. Their lists of dharmas were thought of as lists of all there is. The Sarvastivadins were deeply concerned to determine what does and what does not exist. Chariots, houses, and everything that is composite does not really exist, they claim. Only the ultimate constitutents of those objects, that is to say the dharmas, do really exist. By including words and sounds into their lists of dharmas they gave expression to the view that these linguistic entities are independent entities that have no constitutent parts, and that are no sequences of sounds or anything else. Reflections like these fit naturally in their philosophical concerns. Contrary to the Sarvastivadins, Patanjali the grammarian had no such ontological concerns. Ontology plays no role whatsoever in his Mahabhasya. And yet we find there, somewhat hidden away in grammatical discussions, these unnecessary and quaint ideas about the ontological status of words and sounds, claiming that words and sounds have a separate existence independent from their constituent parts. The question is inevitable: where did Patanjali get these ideas from? An easy answer presents itself, of course. Patanjali may have undergone the direct or indirect influence of the early Sarvastivadin thinkers. It may be necessary to recall that with regard to the early period of Indian thought that we are dealing with our evidence is lacunary, and the nature of the texts concerned such that we cannot expect explicit mention of the sources that influenced them. It follows that all conclusions have to be tentative. Keeping all this in mind, it seems yet safe to consider Buddhist influence on Patanjali a probable proposition. BRONKHORST, Johannes (2000): "Die buddhistische Lehre," Der Buddhismus I. Der indische Buddhismus und seine Verzweigungen, Von Heinz Bechert et al. Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer (Die Religionen der Menschheit, vol. 24,1.), pp. 23-212. HOPKINS, W. Washburn (1887): "On proverb-literature," Journal of the American Oriental Society 13, ccxxviii-ccxxix. JHA, Ganganath (ed., tr.) (1920-1939): Manusmrti. With the Manubhasya' of Medhatithi, 10 vols., Second edition: Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi 1999. MEISIG, Konrad (1987): Das Sramanyaphala-sutra. Synoptische Ubersetzung und Glossar der chinesischen Fassungen verglichen mit dem Sanskrit und Pali. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, (Freiburger Beitrage zur Indologie, 19.) MISHRA, Chhabinath (1978): Nyayokti-kosa. A dictionary of nyayas (sayings) in Sanskrit sastras, Delhi: Ajanta. PISCHEL, Richard (1893): "Verkannte Sprichworter," Festgruss an Rudolf von Roth zum Dolor Jubilaum 24. August 1893 von seinen Freunden und Schulern, Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer. pp. 114-116. echt (1985): "A note on Mahabhasya II, 366.26: gunasamdravo dravyam (Studies on Mallavadin's Dvadasaranayacakra II.)," Buddhism and its Relation to Other Religions. Essays in honour of Dr. Shozen Kumoi on his seventieth birthday, Kyoto, pp. 1-33. WEZLER, Albrecht (1999): "Medhatithi on samanyato drstam [anumanam)," Journal of Indian Philosophy 27 (1/2; Guruvandana: Essays in Indology in Honour of K. Bhattacharya), 139-157. Abbreviations ADAW Abhandlungen der Deutschen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, Klasse fur Sprachen, Literatur und Kunst Maha-bh Patanjali, (Vyakarana-) Mahabhasya, ed. F. Kielhorn, Bombay 1880-1885 MPS Ernst Waldschmidt, Das Mahaparinirvapasutra, T. 1-3, Berlin 1950-1951 (ADAW 1949, 1; 1950, 2,3) P. Paninian sutra PTC Pali Tipitakam Concordance, ed. F.L. Woodward, E.M. Hare, London 1952ff. SWTF Sanskrit-Worterbuch der buddhistischen Texte aus den Turfan-Funden, begonnen von Ernst Waldschmidt, ed. Heinz Bechert, bearb. Georg von Simson und Michael Schmidt, Gottingen 1973ff. Vt. varttika on Paninian sutra References BRONKHORST Iohannes (1987). "The Mahabhasva and the development of Indian philosophy," Three Problems Pertaining to the Mahabhasya, Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (Post-Graduate and Research Department Series, No. 30, "Pandit Shripad Shastri Deodhar Memorial Lectures" [Third Series].), pp. 43-71. BRONKHORST, Johannes (1987a): "The first varttikas in the Mahabhasya," Three Problems Pertaining to the Mahabhasya, Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (PostGraduate and Research Department Series, No. 30, "Pandit Shripad Shastri Deodhar Memorial Lectures" [Third Series].), pp. 1-13. BRONKHORST, Johannes (1994): "The qualities of Samkhya," Wiener Zeitschrift fur die Kunde Sudasiens 38, 309-322. BRONKHORST, Johannes (1995): "A note on Patanjali and the Buddhists," Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute 75, 1994 (1995), 247-254. 491 490