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The Previous Buddhist Thinking and the works of Asanga cxli
Asanga gives an exposition of this doctrine of Ps. as ‘janma-pravstti' and explains it as the internal and external origination of objects and beings and as the anitya, paratantra, nirīha and saṁkleśa-vyavadāna.1
He further explains the various aspects of the twelve links of Ps.? and summarises it in the light of the four pratyayass and the aspects of this doctrine as anitya, duḥkha śünya and nairātmya. It also represents an elucidation of the dharmatā-doctrine of the Buddha."
- Anitya-Anātma. Duhkha, anitya and anātma--are the three main pivots on which the edifice of early Buddhism stands. The Buddha analysed the present state of the phenomenal existents and stated that all that we perceive and meet with in our experience is non-eternal, ephemeral and is in the state of flux. It is of the nature of suffering also. It has no intrinsic character of its own (anattā).
Thus, he compared all phenomenal existents to the foams and bubbles, bannana-trees and mirage :
Phenapiņdūpamam rūpam vedanā bubbulūpamā | Maricikūpamā saññā sankbārā Kadalīnibhā ||
Mayopamañca viññāpaņ desitādiccabandhunā //
· The five skandhas referred in the above couplet represent the state of all phenomenal existents which are regarded by the Venerable Master as “anicca'. This view-point
1. YBS, I. 203, cf. also, SBh. p. 210, 228. 2. YBS, I, 198 sq. 3. SBh., p. 248 sq.; Bodhi, p. 70; Asm., pp. 28-29, vide also MK
with Akutobbaya and Prasannapadā, I. 4. 4. Asm., pp. 38-41, YBS, I. 5. Cp. Asm , pp. 80-81, Bodhi., pp. 24-27. 6. Cf. M. N., II. 195-97, 81; S. N. II. 295; 333, 338-341, 274-79,
295-96 etc. 7. M. N., I. 183-4, 236-37; D. N. II. 120-121, 53 sq.
