1. The traditional interpretation of paticcasamuppáda (of its usual twelve-factored formulation, that is to say) apparently has its roots in the Patisambhidámagga <i,52>, or perhaps in the Abhidhammapitaka. This interpretation is fully expounded in the Visuddhimagga <Ch. XVII>. It can be briefly summarized thus: avijjá and sankhárá are kamma in the previous existence, and their vipáka is viññána, námarúpa, saláyatana, phassa, and vedaná, in the present existence; tanhá, upádána, and bhava, are kamma in the present existence, and their vipáka is játi and jarámarana in the subsequent existence.

2. This Note will take for granted first, that the reader is acquainted with this traditional interpretation, and secondly, that he is dissatisfied with it. It is not therefore proposed to enter into a detailed discussion of this interpretation, but rather to indicate briefly that dissatisfaction with it is not unjustified, and then to outline what may perhaps be found to be a more satisfactory approach.

3. As the traditional interpretation has it, vedaná is kammavipáka. Reference to Vedaná Samy. iii,2 <S.iv,230> will show that as far as concerns bodily feeling (with which the Sutta is evidently dealing) there are seven reasons for it that are specifically not kammavipáka. Only in the eighth place do we find kammavipákajá vedaná. This would at once limit the application of paticcasamuppáda to certain bodily feelings only and would exclude others, if the traditional interpretation is right. Some of these bodily feelings would be paticcasamuppanná, but not all; and this would hardly accord with, for example, the passage:

Paticcasamuppannam kho ávuso sukhadukkham vuttam Bhagavatá (Nidána/Abhisamaya Samy. iii,5 <S.ii,38>).

The Auspicious One, friend, has said that pleasure and unpleasure are dependently arisen.

4. There is, however, a more serious difficulty regarding feeling. In Anguttara III,vii,1 <A.i,176> it is clear that somanassa, domanassa, and upekkhá, are included in vedaná, in the specific context of the paticcasamuppáda formulation. But these three feelings are mental, and arise (as the Sutta tells us) when the mind dwells upon (upavicarati) some object; thus they involve cetaná, 'intention', in their very structure. And the Commentary to the Sutta would seem to allow this, but in doing so must either exclude these mental feelings from vedaná in the paticcasamuppáda formulation or else assert that they are vipáka. In either case the Commentary would go against the Sutta we are considering. This Sutta (which should be studied at first hand) not only treats these mental feelings as included in vedaná but also specifically states that to hold the view that whatever a man experiences, pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral, is due to past acts, is to adopt a form of determinism making present action futile -- one is a killer on account of past acts, a thief on account of past acts, and so on. To take these mental feelings as vipáka would be to fall into precisely this wrong view; and, in fact, the traditional interpretation, rather than that, prefers to exclude them from paticcasamuppáda, at least as vedaná (see Visuddhimagga, loc. cit.). Unfortunately for the traditional interpretation there are Suttas (e.g. Majjhima i,9 <M.i,53>[1]) that define the paticcasamuppáda item námarúpa -- also traditionally taken as vipáka -- in terms of (amongst other things) not only vedaná but also cetaná, and our Commentary is obliged to speak of a vipakácetaná. But the Buddha has said (Anguttara VI,vi,9 <A.iii,415>[2]) that kamma is cetaná (action is intention), and the notion of vipakácetaná, consequently, is a plain self-contradiction. (It needs, after all, only a moment's reflection to see that if, for example, the pleasant feeling that I experience when I indulge in lustful thoughts is the vipáka of some past kamma, then I have no present responsibility in the matter and can now do nothing about it. But I know from my own experience that this is not so; if I choose to enjoy pleasure by thinking lustful thoughts I can do so, and I can also choose [if I see good reason] to refrain from thinking such thoughts.)[a]

5. Let us now consider sankhárá, which we shall make no attempt to translate for the moment so as not to beg the question. We may turn to Nidána/Abhisamaya Samy. i,2 <S.ii,4> for a definition of sankhárá in the context of the paticcasamuppáda formulation.

Katame ca bhikkhave sankhárá. Tayo'me bhikkhave sankhárá, káyasankháro vacísankháro cittasankháro. Ime vuccanti bhikkhave sankhárá.

And which, monks, are determinations? There are, monks, these three determinations: body-determination, speech-determination, mind-determination. These, monks, are called determinations.

But what are káyasankhára, vacísankhára, and cittasankhára? The Cúlavedallasutta (Majjhima v,4 <M.i,301> & cf. Citta Samy. 6 <S.iv,293>) will tell us.

Kati pan'ayye sankhárá ti. Tayo'me ávuso Visákha sankhárá, káyasankháro vacísankháro cittasankháro ti. Katamo pan'ayye káyasankháro, katamo vacísankháro, katamo cittasankháro ti. Assásapassásá kho ávuso Visákha káyasankháro, vitakkavicárá vacísankháro, saññá ca vedaná ca cittasankháro ti. Kasmá pan'ayye assásapassásá káyasankháro, kasmá vitakkavicárá vacísankháro, kasmá saññá ca vedaná ca cittasankháro ti. Assásapassásá kho ávuso Visákha káyiká, ete dhammá káyapatibaddhá, tasmá assásapassásá káyasankháro. Pubbe kho ávuso Visákha vitakketvá vicáretvá pacchá vácam bhindati, tasmá vitakkavicárá vacísankháro. Saññá ca vedaná ca cetasiká, ete dhammá cittapatibaddhá, tasmá saññá ca vedaná ca cittasankháro ti.

-- But, lady, how many determinations are there? -- There are, friend Visákha, these three determinations: body-determination, speech-determination, mind-determination. -- But which, lady, is body-determination, which is speech-determination, which is mind-determination? -- The in-&-out-breaths, friend Visákha, are body-determination, thinking-&-pondering are speech-determination, perception and feeling are mind-determination. -- But why, lady, are the in-&-out-breaths body-determination, why are thinking-&-pondering speech-determination, why are perception and feeling mind-determination? -- The in-&-out-breaths, friend Visákha, are bodily, these things are bound up with the body; that is why the in-&-out-breaths are body-determination. First, friend Visákha, having thought and pondered, afterwards one breaks into speech; that is why thinking-&-pondering are speech-determination. Perception and feeling are mental, these things are bound up with the mind; that is why perception and feeling are mind-determination.

Now the traditional interpretation says that sankhárá in the paticcasamuppáda context are kamma, being cetaná. Are we therefore obliged to understand in-&-out-breaths, thinking-&-pondering, and perception and feeling, respectively, as bodily, verbal, and mental kamma (or cetaná)? Is my present existence the result of my breathing in the preceding existence? Is thinking-&-pondering verbal action? Must we regard perception and feeling as intention, when the Suttas distinguish between them

(Phuttho bhikkhave vedeti, phuttho ceteti, phuttho sañjánáti...

(Contacted, monks, one feels; contacted, one intends; contacted, one perceives;...)

[Saláyatana Samy. ix,10 <S.iv,68>])? Certainly, sankhárá may, upon occasion, be cetaná (e.g. Khandha Samy. vi,4 <S.iii,60>[3]); but this is by no means always so. The Cúlavedallasutta tells us clearly in what sense in-&-out-breaths, thinking-&-pondering, and perception and feeling, are sankhárá (i.e. in that body, speech, and mind [citta], are intimately connected with them, and do not occur without them); and it would do violence to the Sutta to interpret sankhárá here as cetaná.

6. Nevertheless, it would be a mistake to suppose from the foregoing that sankhárá in the paticcasamuppáda context cannot mean cetaná. One Sutta (Nidána/Abhisamaya Samy. vi,1 <S.ii,82>) gives sankhárá in this context as puññábhisankhára, apuññábhisankhára, and áneñjábhisankhára, and it is clear enough that we must understand sankhárá here as some kind of cetaná. Indeed, it is upon this very Sutta that the traditional interpretation relies to justify its conception of sankhárá in the context of the paticcasamuppáda formulation. It might be wondered how the traditional interpretation gets round the difficulty of explaining assásapassásá, vitakkavicárá, and saññá and vedaná, as cetaná, in defiance of the Cúlavedallasutta passage. The answer is simple: the traditional interpretation, choosing to identify cittasankhára with manosankhára, roundly asserts (in the Visuddhimagga) that káyasankhára, vacísankhára, and cittasankhára, are káyasañcetaná, vacísañcetaná, and manosañcetaná, -- see §16 --, and altogether ignores the Cúlavedallasutta. The difficulty is thus, discreetly, not permitted to arise.

7. No doubt more such specific inadequacies and inconsistencies in the traditional interpretation of paticcasamuppáda could be found, but since this is not a polemic we are not concerned to seek them out. There remains, however, a reason for dissatisfaction with the general manner of this interpretation. The Buddha has said (Majjhima iii,8 <M.i,191>) that he who sees the Dhamma sees paticcasamuppáda; and he has also said that the Dhamma is sanditthika and akálika, that it is immediately visible and without involving time (see in particular Majjhima iv,8 <M.i,265>). Now it is evident that the twelve items, avijjá to jarámarana, cannot, if the traditional interpretation is correct, all be seen at once; for they are spread over three successive existences. I may, for example, see present viññána to vedaná, but I cannot now see the kamma of the past existence -- avijjá and sankhárá -- that (according to the traditional interpretation) was the cause of these present things. Or I may see tanhá and so on, but I cannot now see the játi and jarámarana that will result from these things in the next existence. And the situation is no better if it is argued that since all twelve items are present in each existence it is possible to see them all at once. It is, no doubt, true that all these things can be seen at once, but the avijjá and sankhárá that I now see are the cause (says the traditional interpretation) of viññána to vedaná in the next existence, and have no causal connexion with the viññána to vedaná that I now see. In other words, the relation sankhárapaccayá viññánam cannot be seen in either case. The consequence of this is that the paticcasamuppáda formulation (if the traditional interpretation is correct) is something that, in part at least, must be taken on trust. And even if there is memory of the past existence the situation is still unsatisfactory, since memory is not on the same level of certainty as present reflexive experience. Instead of imass'uppádá idam uppajjati, imassa nirodhá idam nirujjhati, 'with arising of this this arises, with cessation of this this ceases', the traditional interpretation says, in effect, imassa nirodhá idam uppajjati, 'with cessation of this, this arises'. It is needless to press this point further: either the reader will already have recognized that this is, for him, a valid objection to the traditional interpretation, or he will not. And if he has not already seen this as an objection, no amount of argument will open his eyes. It is a matter of one's fundamental attitude to one's own existence -- is there, or is there not, a present problem or, rather, anxiety that can only be resolved in the present?

8. If paticcasamuppáda is sanditthika and akálika then it is clear that it can have nothing to do with kamma and kammavipáka -- at least in their usual sense of ethical action and its eventual retribution (see KAMMA) --; for the ripening of kamma as vipáka takes time -- vipáka always follows kamma after an interval and is never simultaneous with it. It will at once be evident that if an interpretation of the paticcasamuppáda formulation can be found that does not involve kamma and vipáka the difficulties raised in §§3&4 will vanish; for we shall no longer be called upon to decide whether vedaná is, or is not, kamma or vipáka, and there will be no need for such contradictions as vipákacetaná. Irrespective of whether or not it is either kamma or vipáka, vedaná will be paticcasamuppanna. We shall also find that the apparent conflict of §§5&6 disappears; for when sankhárá, as the second item of the paticcasamuppáda formulation, is no longer necessarily to be regarded as kamma, we shall be free to look for a meaning of the word sankhára that can comfortably accomodate the káya-, vací-, and citta-sankhárá of the Cúlavedallasutta, as well as the puñña-, apuñña-, and áneñja-abhisankhára of Nidána/Abhisamaya Samy. vi,1. (We may note in passing that though kamma is cetaná -- action is intention -- we are in no way obliged, when we deal with cetaná, to think in terms of kamma and its eventual vipáka. Present cetaná is structurally inseparable from present saññá and present vedaná; and thoughts about the future are quite irrelevant to the present problem of suffering --

Yam kiñci vedayitam tam dukkhasmin ti [Nidána/Abhisamaya Samy. iv,2 <S.ii,53>].[b])

Whatever is felt counts as unpleasure (suffering). [See Vedaná Samy. ii,1, quoted in NIBBÁNA.]

9. It will be convenient to start at the end of the paticcasamuppáda formulation and to discuss játi and jarámarana first. To begin with, játi is 'birth' and not 're-birth'. 'Re-birth' is punabbhavábhinibbatti, as in Majjhima v,3 <M.i,294> where it is said that future 'birth into renewed existence' comes of avijjá and tanhá; and it is clear that, here, two successive existences are involved. It is, no doubt, possible for a Buddha to see the re-birth that is at each moment awaiting a living individual who still has tanhá -- the re-birth, that is to say, that is now awaiting the individual who now has tanhá. If this is so, then for a Buddha the dependence of re-birth upon tanhá is a matter of direct seeing, not involving time. But this is by no means always possible (if, indeed, at all) for an ariyásavaka, who, though he sees paticcasamuppáda for himself, and with certainty (it is aparapaccayá ñánam), may still need to accept re-birth on the Buddha's authority.[c] In other words, an ariyasávaka sees birth with direct vision (since játi is part of the paticcasamuppáda formulation), but does not necessarily see re-birth with direct vision. It is obvious, however, that játi does not refer straightforwardly to the ariyasávaka's own physical birth into his present existence; for that at best could only be a memory, and it is probably not remembered at all. How, then, is játi to be understood?

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Footnotes:

[a] A present intention (or action) is certainly determined, but it is determined by a superior (or more reflexive) intention that also is present: it is, therefore, not pre-determined. (To be future is essentially to be under-determined. See FUNDAMENTAL STRUCTURE.) Every voluntary (or reflexive) intention (i.e. every volition or act of will) is perpetually revocable, and every involuntary (or immediate) intention (i.e. every inclination or tendency) is voluntarily modifiable. (There is a mistaken idea, common [and convenient] enough, that our inclinations are in the nature of impulsions to which we can only submit, rather as a stone passively suffers the pressure that moves it. But, far from being an imposition that must be passively suffered, an inclination is an active seeking of a still only possible state of affairs. Cf. 'D'ailleurs, si l'acte n'est pas pur mouvement, il doit se définir par une intention. De quelque manière que l'on considère cette intention, elle ne peut être qu'un dépassement du donné vers un résultat à obtenir. ...Lorsque les psychologues, par exemple, font de la tendance un état de fait, ils ne voient pas qu'ils lui ôtent tout caractère d'appétit [ad-petitio].' --- J.-P. Sartre, L'Être et le Néant, Gallimard, Paris 1943, p. 556. ['Besides, if the act is not pure movement, it must be defined by an intention. In whatever way we may consider this intention, it can only be a passing beyond the given towards a result to be obtained. ...When the psychologists, for example, turn tendency into a state of fact, they fail to see that they are taking away from it all character of appetite <ad-petitio>.']) Cf. CETANÁ [e]. [Back to text]

[b] The anguish of the moment when a man apprehends that he is going to die is evidence of this perpetually present sankháradukkha (see Vedaná Samy. ii,1, quoted in NIBBÁNA), and has to do with the changing joys and miseries of this life only in so far as they are, in fact, changing.[cf.17] It is this anguish that makes deliberate suicide, even if it is to be painless, such a difficult enterprise. Only the arahat has no anguish in the face of death:

Nábhinandámi maranam     nábhinandámi jívitam, Kálañ ca patikankhámi     nibbisam bhatako yathá;    Nábhinandámi maranam     nábhinandámi jívitam, Kálañ ca patikankhámi     sampajáno patissato. Theragáthá vv. 606 & 607.

I delight not in death,      606     I delight not in life, I await my time     like a hireling his wage; I delight not in death,      607     I delight not in life, I await my time     composed and aware.

[Back to text]

[c] This, naturally, is not to be taken as denying the possibility of evidence for re-birth quite independent of what is said in the Suttas. (A curious view, that the Buddha was an agnostic on the question of re-birth and refused to pronounce on it, seems to be gaining currency. Even a very slight acquaintance with the Suttas will correct this idea. See e.g. Majjhima ii,2 <M.i,73-7>.) [Back to text]