ABSTRACT
This setting, in which the Buddha’s teaching was formulated and taught, has prompted scholars to try and determine what elements derive from innovations in the Buddha’s teaching and what elements were borrowed from non-Buddhist traditions. 7 The interpretation of various concepts and practices in the Pāli Nikāyas was often infl uenced by these preconceptions about what is ‘really’ Buddhist and what is not. This was done especially with reference to Buddhist meditation theory. In particular, the existence of two ostensible types of meditation, namely, samatha (i.e., the jhānas , the arūpa samāpattis and saññāvedayitanirodha ) and vipassanā (the practice of satipaṭṭhāna ) evoked an apparent diffi culty in their interpretation in the Buddhist path of awakening. As a result, in the Theravāda commentarial tradition, 8 in the study of early Buddhism, 9 and in modern Theravāda meditational circles, the supposition that the jhānas are a borrowed element from Indian contemplative traditions, 10 while vipassanā is the only unique liberating technique which is distinctively Buddhist, became a predominant view. In other words, the
jhānas were perceived as attainments which do not lead to liberation, on the assumption that they are not part of the unique teaching of the Buddha. 11
Writing on the subject of the jhānas , Walpola Rāhula gives a clear presentation of modern Theravāda perception on this issue: ‘[A]ll these mystic states, according to the Buddha have nothing to do with Reality, Truth, Nirvana.’ Rāhula further proclaimed that samatha meditation existed before the Buddha, and that it should not be considered as a practice leading to liberation. 12 Robert Gimello, for example, has also stated in his article ‘Mysticism and Meditation’ that ‘it is especially to be emphasized that samādhi and its associated experiences are not themselves revelatory of the truth of things, nor are they suffi - cient unto liberation from suffering’. 13 As Sarbacker has correctly pointed out in his book Samādhi: The Numinous and the Cessative in Indo-Tibetan Yoga , vipassanā and samatha have been a subject of considerable controversy in Buddhist studies, ‘where there has been diffi culty understanding why such an important part of Buddhist meditation theory ( samatha ) has become not only a marginal practice but one that might even receive ridicule by some practitioners’. 14
This issue has been approached in various ways by different scholars. Paul Griffiths, for example, presented a theory that attempts to resolve the difficulty, in his view, of integrating vipassanā and samatha meditation. Griffiths claimed that samatha meditation has a different aim from that of vipassanā meditation. 15 According to Griffiths, the attempt to reconcile the two methods of meditation and to integrate them into a single process of liberation is particularly difficult. 16 La Valleé Poussin has maintained that trance ( dhyāna ) in Brahmanism ‘is the necessary path to the merging of the individual self into the universal self ’, 17 and that ‘Buddhist trances were practiced by nonBuddhists, and scholars agree that Buddhists did actually borrow from the common store of mystical devises’. 18 La Valleé Poussin does distinguish between trance that does not have the right aim and trance that does, and he reminds that ‘Śākyamuni obtained “enlightenment” by the practice of trance’. 19 However, La Valleé Poussin also states that ‘trance, like asceticism, is not an essential part of the Path’. 20
In his book Tranquillity & Insight: An Introduction to the Oldest Form of Buddhist Meditation , Amadeo Solé-Leris presents a common view in modern Theravāda regarding the role of samatha meditation in the Buddhist path. He states that tranquillity meditation
[I]s not essentially different from the techniques used in other meditative traditions . . . These were the techniques (except, of course, for the attainment of cessation) to which Gotama the prince turned after abandoning his royal home. He tried them out and found them incapable of producing the defi nitive enlightenment he sought . . . This is why he left the two Yoga teachers with whom he had been practising and struck out on his own. The result of his endeavours was vipassanā , insight meditation, which, as I said before is dis-
The preceding references are only a few examples of the view concerning the secondary and superfl uous role of the jhānas in the path of liberation. I will not pursue this here since the interpretation of how the jhānas can be seen as an integral and intrinsic part of the Buddhist path to awakening will be addressed in subsequent chapters. Rather, I attempt to rethink the premise that the jhānas are a borrowed element from non-Buddhist sources. This will be done by searching for the origin of the fourfold jhāna model in early non-Buddhist texts (i.e., the model of four successive states that are referred to in the Pāli Nikāyas as the fi rst, second, third and fourth jhānas ). 22 I will fi rst show that the jhānas – as a distinct model of four successive states – cannot be found in any known early non-Buddhist texts. Second, I will trace references of the term jhāna / dhyāna in earlier non-Buddhist sources and examine their meaning and use. Third, I will argue that even though the term dhyāna appears in early Jain texts, it alludes to a different attainment when compared to depictions of the jhānas in the Pāli Nikāyas. Finally, I will discuss the occurrences of the term jhāna in the Pāli Nikāyas in contexts of which non-Buddhist practices are described. This will illustrate that the fourfold jhāna model is never associated in the Nikāyas with non-Buddhist practices as opposed to many other practices and attainments.
