Sati, in a loose sense, can certainly be translated as 'memory'; but memory is normally memory of the past, whereas in the eight-factored path sati is more particularly concerned with the present. In so far as one can speak of memory of the present, this translation will do, but memory of the present -- i.e. calling to mind the present -- is less confusingly translated as 'mindfulness'. In MANO [a] you will find two Sutta passages illustrating these two meanings of sati: in the first passage sati is 'memory', and in the second it is 'mindfulness'.

About the 'over-stimulation', I certainly agree that there is nothing abnormal about it in the sense that it is something unnatural -- indeed, as a layman I should have been very glad of this degree of 'virility', but it is hardly likely that I should have been able to decide to become a monk. It is abnormal only in this, that it is something to which I am quite unaccustomed. I have had it (in this strength, I mean) for only two years, and its onset was quite abrupt. It is like having a daily dose of cantharides! You are quite right in saying that it is more obtrusive in one who has been practising sati than in one who lives unmindfully, and that is because the unmindful person does not find it a nuisance and may positively welcome it. But when the task is to get rid of it then it becomes burdensome. It does not disgust me (I have never found sex disgusting), but it is a most unwelcome affliction.

I have been sent Huxley's last novel -- Island. It is a most unsatisfactory book. Since Huxley had visited Ceylon shortly before writing the book, and since the inhabitants of the Island are Buddhists, it has been thought that the Island is Ceylon. But this is clearly a mistake. The Island is undoubtedly Bali (Huxley calls it Pala), both from its geographical and political environment, and the women wear nothing above the waist (which is -- or was -- the case in Ceylon, I believe, only with Rodiyas)[1]. Besides, the people are Maháyána Buddhists (Tantric to boot) with a strong admixture of Shiva worship. The book is a kind of Brave New World turned inside out -- it describes a Utopia of which he approves. It is based almost entirely on maithuna and mescalin (one of the characters quotes a Tantric Buddhist saying that Buddhahood is in the yoni -- a very convenient doctrine!), which in combination (so it seems) are capable of producing the Earthly Paradise. The awkward fact of rebirth is eliminated with the statement that the Buddha discouraged speculation on such questions (whereas, in fact, the Buddha said quite bluntly throughout the Suttas that there is rebirth: the speculation that the Buddha discouraged was whether the Tathágata [or arahat] exists after death, which is quite another question).[a] And precisely, the worst feature of the book is the persistent misinterpretation (or even perversion) of the Buddha's Teaching.

It is probable that Huxley picked up a certain amount of information on the Dhamma while he was in Ceylon but, being antipathetic to Theraváda (this is evident in his earlier books), he has not scrupled to interpret his information to suit his own ideas. We find, for example, that according to Freudian doctrine Mucalinda Nágarája (Udána 11: 10) is a phallic symbol, being a serpent. So 'meditating under the Mucalinda tree' means sexual intercourse. And this in complete defiance of the verses at the end of the Sutta:

Sukhá virágatá loke kámánam samatikkamo Asmimánassa yo vinayo etam va paramam sukham.

Dispassion for worldly pleasure, getting beyond sensuality, putting away the conceit 'I am', -- this indeed is the highest pleasure.[2]

I am sending you, under separate (registered) cover, a package of Sister Vajirá's letters to me, written between the beginning of November 1961 and the end of January 1962. I think you will find them of interest, but for obvious reasons they should be treated as confidential. Without, for the present, commenting on the letters themselves, I shall fill in the background for you.

Up to 1961 I do not recall having met Sister Vajirá on more than one occasion, and then for hardly more than a minute. Before then, in 1956, I think, I wrote an article, 'Sketch for a Proof of Rebirth',[1] which was printed in the Buddha Jayanti. Sister Vajirá read the article and wrote to me saying that she was much impressed by it, and asking whether she could translate it. I gave my consent, but owing (partly) to a misunderstanding I was not satisfied with her translation and it was never published. We exchanged a few slightly acrimonious letters (neither of us being inclined to mince our words), and the matter was closed. After that, she sent me once or twice some articles she had written, asking me to comment on them. Being busy with my own affairs, I discouraged her from this habit and generally froze her off.

About July 1961 Sister Vajirá wrote to ask whether she could visit me to discuss Dhamma. I agreed, and she came one afternoon for about two hours. Thereafter we had a brief exchange of letters on vegetarianism (which she practised) and also to discuss an English translation of the Dhammapada that she was making. (I have not kept those letters.) Then I sent her my typescript of the NOTE ON PATICCASAMUPPÁDA and PARAMATTHA SACCA, which I had just finished writing. Sister Vajirá replied with a letter dated 12 November 1961, which is the first of the set I am sending you. She came again to the Hermitage on the 18th November and spent the whole day discussing Dhamma. I did not see her again after that.

At the beginning of the correspondence I did not expect anything very much to come of it but, having the time to spare, I was prepared to go on with it until it seemed pointless to continue. As it progressed, however, I found that she was giving attention to what I was saying, and I decided to keep it alive even though she seemed inclined to let it die. Towards the end (after her letter of 6 January 1962) I began to think it possible that something might happen, without however really expecting that it would. Anyway, I wrote my letter of the 10th January (of which you will find a rough draft[2]) with the thought, 'If this doesn't do it, nothing will'. Even so, her letter of the 21st came as a surprise, and I was delighted. (This letter alone was enough to convince me, and the next one, of the 23rd, came only as confirmation, though it was nonetheless welcome for all that!)

Things were now happening much too fast for me to keep up with them. (It seemed -- and seems -- to me that she went through in about five days what took me three months and a half -- though of course our circumstances were different -- and I was quite unprepared for her subsequent behaviour, though she gave me notice of it at the end of the letter of the 23rd.) Evidently what happened was that with the sudden release of the central tension all her compensating tensions found themselves out of work and began aimlessly expending themselves this way and that, and some time was required before she found a new position of stable equilibrium. I asked the Ven. Thera for a report, and he replied (as I hoped he would) that although she had recovered she 'seemed to be a changed person'.

I was not at all pleased when she was bundled out of the country before I was able, as the doctors say, to 'follow up the case'. But later reports seem to confirm that she has remained 'a changed person'. The fact that she now seems to have lost interest in the Dhamma and no longer associates with her former Buddhist friends is a good sign, not a bad one -- when one has got what one wants, one stops making a fuss about it and sits down quietly. (In my own case, I had previously been maintaining a continuous correspondence with the Ven. Ñánamoli Thera about the Dhamma, and then afterwards I stopped it entirely, finding it pointless. There was no longer anything for me to discuss with him, since the former relationship of parity between us regarding the Dhamma had suddenly come to an end. I could only have renewed the correspondence if he had been made aware -- which he was not -- of our new relationship.) Anyway, even though I have only Sister Vajirá's letters to go on, I do not see any reason to doubt her statement (23 January 1962) that she has ceased to be a puthujjana. Perhaps I should add that though she seems to have had a fairly strong emotional attitude towards me (as 'representing the arahat'), this has not been mutual. At no time have I found myself emotionally interested in her in any way, though, naturally enough, from the point of view of Dhamma I regard her with a friendly eye.




[L. 100]   24 August 1964

It is interesting to read your reactions to the letters I sent you. Sister Vajirá is an extremely passionate and self-willed person, with strong emotions, and, apparently, something of a visionary. In other words, she is totally different, temperamentally, from either of us (though in different ways). Besides, she is a woman. You will see, in her letters, how she alternates between moods -- one could almost say attacks -- of emotional periods and of admirable clear-headedness. During the former her letters tend to become incoherent, and she assumes that her reader is in a similar state and can fill in all the gaps. But, quite clearly, she is perfectly at home in her emotions, in a way that you and I find difficult to understand: emotion, for her, is quite normal, as it is for nearly all women. And it must not be forgotten that she was living more or less alone with her thoughts, and solitude always has the effect of magnifying and intensifying one's inner life. I do not at all think that Sister Vajirá's emotional manifestations are (or were -- since they are now past history) anything to be alarmed at, and far less a sign of mental disorder. Certainly, she does not find them alarming, and even gives due notice to other people in case they do.

One thing must be kept in mind when reading her letters: for about a dozen years she had had the idea that the Buddha taught that nothing really exists, and she had been developing this mistaken notion in solitude. But, being a mistake, it leads nowhere except to a state of exasperation and nervous tension. Furthermore, she was convinced that she had already reached the first magga (though not the phala); and this was the cause of her impatience, bad temper, and extreme conceit. I was quite aware of her discourteous attitude and even bad manners, but I said nothing at that time since I did not want to prejudice the outcome of our correspondence by pulling her up over a matter of secondary importance. We Europeans are much more accustomed to casual manners, and (perhaps wrongly) stand less on our dignity in this matter than Easterners. (The act of vandaná, for me, still keeps a faint air of artificiality -- we are not brought up with it.)

About the burning of my letters, I rather think that you must have mis-read what she says. You quote a passage[1] that you (quite rightly) describe as a 'song of victory',[a] but then go on to say that this idea was completely changed for you by the incident of the burning of the letters. From this I gather that you take the burning of the letters to have taken place after her would-be 'victory'. But I think this is a mistake. She herself says that it was after she had burnt my letters that she 'got the result'. The letter in question gives the result first (it was, after all, the important thing) and then goes on to apologize for having burnt the letters in a fit of passion.[2]

Nothing is done in this world, either good or bad, without passion. 'Mental stability' too often means lack of passion. But passion must be disciplined and used intelligently and some people need a teacher to do this for them. 'By means of craving, craving must be abandoned' say the Suttas (A. IV,159: ii,445-46). That, in any case, was how I read it. She had (so I gathered) been wrestling with the meaning of my letters and getting nowhere, until finally, in a fit of exasperation, she had decided that they were all wrong and had consigned them (and me too, by implication) to the flames. It was only then that she grasped the meaning of what I had written -- hence her later remorse. From her point of view it was indeed a 'dangerous act'[3] since she had not yet understood them when she destroyed them. But (I am inclined to think) some such act of despair was perhaps necessary to release an accumulation of tension before the meaning of the letters could occur to her. Attainment does not come at the moment when we are making a conscious effort to attain, because at that time we have uddhacca-kukkucca, 'distraction and worry', but rather at the unexpected moment when we relax after an apparently fruitless effort.

For my part I am satisfied (judging solely from the letters) that, however strange her behaviour may have seemed to her well-wishers in Colombo, there was nothing in it to contradict my opinion. What you speak of as the 'breaking point' was (as I see it) no more than the entry into a particularly strong (and pleasurable) emotional state consequent upon the realization (which, at the beginning especially, can be breath-taking) that 'nothing matters any more'. I don't suppose she was within a hundred miles of telling the people who were caring for her what the reason was for her condition. Certainly, her last letter,[4] for all its emotional colouring, gives no suggestion that she is in any way unhappy or distressed, or even that she has any doubts about her new state. And you will observe that I am quietly but firmly dismissed at the end of the letter. Whatever else happened, one thing is certain -- she no longer finds herself in any way dependent upon me. A psycho-analyst, at least, would be gratified with that result!

About paticcasamuppáda. I do not see that it is possible for anyone to reconcile my view of paticcasamuppáda with the three-life view. If anyone says that they are both correct, then I would suggest that he has failed to understand what I have written -- though, as I freely admit, that may be because I have failed to make myself clear.

P.S. The word 'sister' (bhaginí) seems to be used in the Suttas as a quite general term or form of address for women, particularly by bhikkhus. In my letters to her I addressed Sister Vajirá as 'Dear Upásiká'. I do not see that there is any objection to the word 'sister' as used for dasa-sil upásiká. Laymen used to address bhikkhunís as ayye, which means 'lady', but an upásiká is not a bhikkhuní. In the Suttas, bhikkhus used to address bhikkhunís as bhaginí.

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Footnotes:

[98.a] To ask these questions is to assume that before death at least the arahat does exist. But even in this very life there is, strictly, no arahat to be found. [Back to text]

[100.a] I am unable to see that it could have been written by a puthujjana, even if he were trying to deceive. It would never occur to him to add the part about 'losing a dimension of thought'. One must actually have had the experience to know how exactly this describes it. [Back to text]















Editorial notes:

[98.1] Rodiyas: Caste is not as important among Sinhalese as it is among Indians, but it exists. The Rodiyas are outcaste. [Back to text]

[98.2] Udána 11: This verse might better be rendered:

Pleasurable is dispassion in the world,
The getting beyond sensuality.
But the putting away of the conceit 'I am'
-- this is the highest pleasure.
[Back to text]

[99.2] rough draft: See L. 149. [Back to text]

[100.1] a passage: The letter being discussed begins:

     I feel that I owe a few lines to you, even though I am hardly able to give an adequate account of what happened; I am still rather benumbed.
     Your notes on viññána námarúpa have led me away from the abyss into which I have been staring for more than twelve years. (As if I did not know what I was asking from you! At the last moment you gave them to me; when I had almost abandoned all hope!) I had been addicted to a fallacious notion of the Teaching, which I held to be its clue, while, in reality, it was diametrically opposed to it. In accordance with my nature, however, I was given to it in such a way that, even though conscious that I was hanging between earth and sky, neither able to step forward nor backward, I could not surrender myself earlier than this, and, of course, after tremendous struggle. You must have seen what this notion consisted in, especially from my notes on saññá, though you did not directly name it, nor did I (or, rather, I somewhat concealed it) -- I would have fallen if we had done so. Even now, I shall not do so, in order not to fall from delusion into delusion. It concerns the reality of things;[1] I am not really interested in kamma and vipáka -- those only served me to support my misconception, and well indeed! Even my latest argument on the Arahat consciously aimed at the same thing. I do not think you saw it -- and that was good.
     Your dispassionate description of námarúpa and viññána has made me realize that I was unable to remove the tint of passion from things -- while at the same time denying their existence (or more concisely, because of doing so). I do not know how I stood that position for such a long time. I do not know either by what miraculous skill you have guided me to a safe place where at last I can breathe freely.
     It should scarcely be necessary to say that the question of pañcakkhandhá was not just one among others, but was the question. Your interpretation of cetaná as intention and significance, which to me were just the antipodes, was such a nuisance that only your last letter compelled me to enter into the matter at all; I had so far just pushed it aside. The connection cetaná/sankhára had entirely escaped my consciousness.... I had never any difficulty to follow your argument 'omnis determinatio...', provided, of course, I took it as pertaining to sankhárá, and not to cetaná. I can see the matter clearly now, though not, of course, all its implications. In that way, the subject is removed from experience, and the pañcakkhandhá can function apart from upádána. Thus the question is settled. I have lost a dimension of thought, at least to the degree to grasp this matter, i.e. my own upádána... [Back to text]

     You have seen that I took your repeated references to the puthujjana in connection with me as a challenge -- though I once denied it proudly. In your last letter you have put that challenge masterly; I could not possibly not take it up -- and this time seriously.... In fact, I was always passing from one thing to the other -- through the depths of my being. In connection with this, I have to confess something that will hardly come out from my pen. I must, however, at once say that, while doing it, I denied only myself -- not you; there was no disrespect in doing it towards you. I had recognized your letter as precious, so I have written already, but, nevertheless, the next day, at night, I burnt it -- along with all the rest. Even your precious notes. (That appeared, however, quite different at that moment -- a temptation of Mára, who seemed to whisper that were there teleological experience, without a self, and free from all dukkha, it could be a fine thing as such!) I cannot even ask your pardon, for I did not offend you. I was constantly trying to find my own image in you by reading the letters; you know that I am passionate, and, accordingly I acted, that is all. And I got the results as soon as I had done it. So the highest purpose of all your hitánukampá has been achieved, and, moreover, I have a good memory, and know almost every word that you have written....
     Can the puthujjana really make such a quest as mine has been, even though, as yet, negatively, his own, so as never even for a second to depart from it, as, in fact, I did? Whatever it may be, I am no longer worried about it, now that I have got rid of a great deal of delusion.... [Back to text]

     That I burnt your letters and notes was the most dangerous act that I ever committed. I did it as a puthujjana. I was indeed báhira; I had no grain of saddhá; I did not know what saddhá is. I realize now, where I most urgently need them, that I cannot remember the most essential parts, for the simple reason that those were the most obscure to me. I know that you will forgive me; it is hardly possible to offend you, though I am fully conscious that you gave your innermost to me. From the following you will see that I am also worth to be forgiven.
     Yesterday, when I once more tried to see pañcakkhandhá guided by your notes, I suddenly came across the thorn that had been sticking me uninterruptedly since '49. And I discovered -- dukkha. The conceit on which I had built my Ariyasávakahood was this thorn, which, somehow, I had received along with the 'Dhamma'. But I know now that the puthujjana can take upon himself any dukkha -- even for the 'Dhamma' -- because he does not know anything else. My conceit, however, did not stand out decisively (I hardly ever thought about it, except during certain periods, where circumstances were very trying) until now; and the moment I realized what it really means to be puthujjana, I ceased to be one.[1]
     ...I won a victory over myself; and when I awoke this morning I had found refuge in the Dhamma, and I realized everything (or a great many things) that we had been discussing. At least, Bhante, I did not conceal myself; I was proud, conceited, and, most of all, deluded, but I was straight. My strongest weapon was humility -- though I can see now also how you look upon it; anatimání[2] is somewhat different; only an Ariyasávaka possesses it, I think. I fought a fight knowing not for what -- and you have helped me most wonderfully.
     I begin now to discover the Dhamma. I can just stay in one place and see everything passing before my eyes that I knew without knowing. It is an entirely new landscape. I had concerned myself much with the most essential problems -- and yet the meaning was hidden from me. ...I do not know, but perhaps you do, why your notes on viññána etc. are opening out what I could not find in the texts. I mistook it all. What your notes essentially reveal to me is to allow things to be (present), whilst the Suttas seemed to say that I must deny them. Once I had found justification of cetaná = sankhárá (as already indicated), I laid hold of your notes in the way that I do things -- either/or. I wrestled with them to the utmost, always in turns with emotional states. ...I find that my position was most curious (but, of course, there is nothing particular in it, as I now understand)[3] -- I had no time to investigate into the nature of the pañcakkhandhá, because, radically, I negated everything as soon as I became aware of it. My blindness really was total. I brought myself into immense tension, and, in fact, it is strain that I also now experience to an extreme degree, especially while writing this (but I feel that I should do so). I can also understand something about akálika now. I had no idea that things can stand in relation to each other other than temporally (do I use the word now correctly? I think so). I meant it was a most sublime idea that rúpa should be saññá; it is crude indeed. I discovered the real meaning of anicca in connection with viññána, and many other things.
     It is hard for me to imagine that you do not know everything already, but, remembering that you are not a visionary (unnecessary to say that I know you are indefinitely much more), I must give you at least some evidence now itself, for I do really not know what will happen the next moment (I may not be able to keep full control over myself -- as I appear to others)....[4]

                                In deepest veneration,
                                V.
[Back to text]

...I have seen the Buddha as Paticcasamuppáda,[1] and I heard the Múlapariyáya Sutta intoned -- but I was tossing about in pains seeing it as sankhárá. I could never have found Nibbána -- with your face veiled. This you must have felt. I began to see the Paññávimutta Arahat in you before you had attained it[2] -- seeing at the same time that there was no ásava in a P. A. ...Everything was evident in our discussion -- even the question of upadhi -- which was probably the only thing that I had rightly grasped. It will still take me time to relax; I am simply passing from one emotional state into the other[3] -- but now, at last, I have found you.
     Do you know that the wind-element obeys you? It is to me the sweetest comfort. This also I knew; it is your most sublime ánápánasati that surrenders it. You need not write to me (or, of course, as you please).
     I could tell you many more things, but it is not so important.

                                In deepest veneration,[4]
                                V.
[Back to text]

[100.1.1] The last six words were underlined by the Ven. Ñánavíra. [Back]

[100.3.1] In the margin of the letter the Ven. Ñánavíra had written: 'This claim can be accepted.' [Back]

[100.3.2] Non-arrogance: Sister Vajirá may have had in mind the first verse of the well-known Mettá Sutta (Discourse on Friendliness), Sn. 143: 'One skilled as to the goal, having entered upon the way of peace, should do this: he should be capable, straight, upright, of good speech, gentle, non-arrogant.' The phrase 'I fought a fight knowing not for what' was underlined by the Ven. Ñánavíra, as were, in the next paragraph, the eleven words beginning 'that I knew without'. [Back]

[100.3.3] The parenthetical phrase was underlined by the Ven. Ñánavíra. [Back]

[100.3.4] The parenthetical phrase was underlined by the Ven. Ñánavíra. In the margin he wrote: 'Advance notice.' At the end of the letter he wrote: 'Sammattaniyámam okkanti?' (= 'entry into surety of correctness': see A. VI,86 & 98: iii,435 & 441). [Back]

[100.4.1] This phrase was underlined by the Ven. Ñánavíra, who wrote in the margin: 'Yo paticcasamuppádam passati so dhammam passati. Yo dhammam passati so mam passati.' (= 'He who sees dependent arising sees the Teaching. He who sees the Teaching sees me'. The first sentence is ascribed to the Buddha by the Ven. Sáriputta at M. 28: i,190-191. The second sentence is spoken by the Buddha at Khandha Samy. 87: iii,120.) [Back]

[100.4.2] In the margin: Who said? [Back]

[100.4.3] In the margin: Evidently. [Back]

[100.4.4] The phrase 'You need not write to me' is underlined by the Ven. Ñánavíra, who wrote, at the end of the letter: 'Letting off steam.' This was the final letter by Sister Vajirá; however, the collection shown to Mr. Samaratunga (and, later, to Mr. Brady: Section VIII) concludes with a few additional letters reporting on Sister Vajirá. Some extracts:

5-2-62. Dear Bhikkhu. I have to tell you something very sad. Sister Vajira has gone off her head. Please do not answer any of her letters on the dhamma. ...This is a hurried note to inform you as she may write some nonsense to you.

12-2-62. Dear Bhikkhu. ...We went on the 6th & brought Sister to Colombo. She ran away in the night & was walking along the streets, several followed her & with great difficulty put her into a car...and took her to Hospital at 2 a.m. ...Now she is much better after the treatment; there also, twice she had jumped through the window & roamed about, but the nurse & attendants managed to bring her back. Now Sister Vajira says she wants to get into a saree & at times she says she wants to go home....

26-2-62. Dear Bhikkhu. Just a line to inform you that Sister Vajira left for home on the 22nd. She had recovered but not perfectly normal. She was well enough to go by herself, without anyone else to look after her. The Embassy made arrangements for her trip...she gave up her nun's life & became a lay woman. She said she does not want to be a nun again so we made arrangements for her to go much against her wish. Since she gave up robes & not perfectly normal there was no one to support her....