Tathāgatagarbha sūtras

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The Tathāgatagarbha sūtras are a group of Mahayana sutras that present the concept of the "womb" or "embryo" (garbha) of the tathāgata, the buddha. Every sentient being has the possibility to attain Buddhahood because of the tathāgatagarbha.

This concept originated in India but was a major influence in the development of East Asian Buddhism, where it was equated with the concept of Buddhadhātu, "buddha-element" or "buddha-nature".

The Tathāgatagarbha sūtras include the Tathāgatagarbha Sūtra, Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanāda Sūtra, Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra and the Aṅgulimālīya Sūtra. Related ideas are in found in the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra and Avataṃsaka Sūtra. Another major text, the Awakening of Faith, was originally composed in China,Template:Sfn while the Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra was considerably extended in China Template:Citation needed.

Comparing the tradition of Tathāgatagarbha sūtras to the Yogachara and Madhyamaka schools, Paul Williams writes that this collection appears to have been less prominent in India, but became increasingly popular and significant in Central Asian Buddhism and East Asian Buddhism.Template:Sfn

Nomenclature and etymology

The Sanskrit term tathāgatagarbha (Template:Cjkv) may be parsed into tathāgata "the one thus gone"Template:Sfn (referring to Buddhahood) and garbha "root, embryo, essence".Template:Sfn

Development of the concept

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Luminous mind in the Nikāyas

In the Anguttara Nikāya, the Buddha refers to a "luminous mind".Template:SfnTemplate:Refn

The canon does not support the identification of the "luminous mind" with nirvanic consciousness, though it plays a role in the realization of nirvana.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Upon the destruction of the fetters, according to one scholar, "the shining nibbanic consciousness flashes out of the womb of arahantship, being without object or support, so transcending all limitations."Template:Sfn

Tathagatagarbha and Buddha-nature

Though the tathagatagarbha and the Buddha-nature do not have exactly the same meaning, in the Buddhist tradition they became equated. In the Angulimaliya Sūtra and in the Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra the terms "Buddha-nature" (Buddha-dhātu) and "tathāgatagarbha" are synonyms.

All are agreed that the tathāgatagarbha is an immortal, inherent transcendental essence or potency and that it resides in a concealed state (concealed by mental and behavioural negativities) in every single being, even the worst - the icchantika.Template:Source?

Although attempts are made in the Buddhist sutras to explain the tathāgatagarbha, it remains ultimately mysterious and allegedly unfathomable to the ordinary, unawakened person, being only fully knowable by perfect Buddhas themselves.

The tathāgatagarbha itself needs no cultivation, only uncovering or discovery, as it is already present and perfect within each being: Template:Quote

Charles Muller comments that the tathagatagarbha is the mind's original pure nature and has neither a point of origination nor a point of cessation: 'tathagatagarbha expresses the already perfect aspect of the original nature of the mind that is clear and pure without arising or cessation.'Template:Sfn

The tathāgatagarbha is the ultimate, pure, ungraspable, inconceivable, irreducible, unassailable, boundless, true and deathless quintessence of the Buddha's emancipatory reality, the very core of his sublime nature.

List of sutras

According to modern scholarship

Michael Radich provides the following list of key Indian sutras associated with Tathāgatagarbha:Template:Sfn

A similar and related sutra which synthesizes buddha-nature with Yogacara is the Ghanavyūha Sūtra.<ref>Brunnholzl, Karl (2014). When the Clouds Part, The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra, pp. 38-41. Boston & London: Snow Lion.</ref>

In the Tibetan tradition

Karl Brunnhölzl, drawing on the Tibetan tradition, provides the following list of 24 sutras "explicitly or implicitly associated with tathagatagarbha":<ref>Brunnholzl, Karl (2014). When the Clouds Part, The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra, p. 11. Boston & London: Snow Lion.</ref>

  1. Tathāgatagarbhasūtra
  2. Anūnatvāpurnatvanirdeśa
  3. Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanādasūtra
  4. Dharanisvararajasutra
  5. Mahāyānamahāparinirvāṇasūtra
  6. Aṅgulimālīyasūtra
  7. Mahābherīsūtra
  8. Laṅkāvatārasūtra
  9. Tathāgatagunajñanacintyavisayavataranirdesasutra
  10. Sarvabuddhavisayavatarajñanalokalamkarasutra
  11. Ratnadārikāsūtra
  12. Mahāmeghasūtra
  13. Abhidharmamahāyānasūtra
  14. Sthirādhyāsayaparivartasūtra
  15. Avikalpapravesadharani
  16. Sunyatanamamahasutra
  17. Buddhāvataṃsakasūtra
  18. Ratnakuta
  19. Suvarnaprabhasottamasutra
  20. Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra
  21. Gaganagañjaparipṛcchsūtra
  22. Sāgaramatiparipṛcchāsūtra
  23. Prasantaviniscayapratiharyanamasamadhisutra
  24. Candrapradipasutra

Overview of major sutras

Tathāgatagarbha Sūtra (200-250 CE)

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}} The Tathāgatagarbha Sūtra presents the tathāgatagarbha as a virtual Buddha-homunculus, a fully wisdom-endowed Buddha, "a most victorious body ... great and indestructible", inviolate, seated majestically in the lotus position within the body of each being, clearly visible only to a perfect Buddha with his supernatural vision.Template:SfnTemplate:Request quotation This is the most "personalist" depiction of the tathāgatagarbha encountered in any of the chief Tathāgatagarbha sutras and is imagistically reminiscent of Mahāyāna descriptions of the Buddha himself sitting in the lotus posture within his own mother's womb prior to birth: "luminous, glorious, gracious, beautiful to see, seated with his legs crossed" and shining "like pure gold ..."<ref>Lalita Vistara Sutra, "Voice of Buddha", Dharma Publishing, 1983, p.109</ref>

Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanāda Sūtra (2nd century CE)

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}} Some of the earliest and most important Tathāgatagarbha sūtras have been associated by scholars with certain early Buddhist schools in India.

Brian Edward Brown dates the composition of the Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanāda Sūtra to the Andhra Ikshvaku in the 3rd century CE, as a product of the Mahāsāṃghikas of the Āndhra region.Template:SfnTemplate:Fv Wayman has outlined eleven points of complete agreement between the Mahāsāṃghikas and the Śrīmālā, along with four major arguments for this association.Template:Sfn

Sree Padma and Anthony Barber also associate the earlier development of the Tathāgatagarbha Sūtra with the Mahāsāṃghikas, and conclude that the Mahāsāṃghikas of the Āndhra region were responsible for the inception of the Tathāgatagarbha doctrine.Template:Sfn According to the Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanāda Sūtra, the tathāgatagarbha is "not born, does not die, does not transfer, does not arise. It is beyond the sphere of the characteristics of the compounded; it is permanent, stable and changeless."Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Fv<ref name="The Shrimaladevi Sutra">The Shrimaladevi Sutra</ref>Template:RpTemplate:Full citation needed Moreover, it has been described as "the sphere of experience of the Tathāgatas [Buddhas]."<ref name="The Shrimaladevi Sutra" />Template:Page needed

Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra (c. 200 CE)

Cave complex associated with the Mahāsāṃghika sect. Karla Caves, Mahārāṣtra, India

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The Nirvana Sutra is an eschatological text.Template:Sfn Its core was written in India in a time which was perceived as the age in which the Buddha-dharma would perish, and all the Mahayana sutras disappear. The sutra responds to this awaited end with the proclamation of the tathagatagarbha, the innate Buddhahood present in all man.Template:Sfn

According to Sallie B. King, the Mahaparinirvana Sutra does not represent a major innovation, and is rather unsystematic,Template:Sfn which made it "a fruitful one for later students and commentators, who were obliged to create their own order and bring it to the text".Template:Sfn According to King, its most important innovation is the linking of the term buddhadhātu with tathāgatagarbha.Template:Sfn

Buddhadhātu, "Buddha-nature", "the nature of the Buddha", that what constitutes a Buddha, is a central topic of the Nirvana sutra.Template:Sfn According to Sally King, the sutra speaks about Buddha-nature in so many different ways, that Chinese scholars created a list of types of Buddha-nature that could be found in the text.Template:Sfn The "nature of the Buddha" is presented as a timeless, eternal "Self", which is akin to the tathāgatagarbha, the innate possibility in every sentient being to attain Buddhahood and manifest this timeless Buddha-nature.Template:Sfn This "hidden treasury" is present in all sentient beings: Template:Quote

This does not mean that sentient beings are at present endowed with the qualities of a Buddha, but that they will have those qualities in the future.Template:Sfn It is obscured from worldly vision by the screening effect of kleshas, tenacious negative mental afflictions. The most notable of which are greed, hatred, delusion, and pride. Once these negative mental states have been eliminated, however, the buddhadhātu is said to shine forth unimpededly and the buddhadhātu can then be consciously "entered into", and therewith deathless Nirvana attained:Template:Sfn Template:Quote

Anunatva Apurnatva Nirdeśa

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}} The development of the Buddha-nature doctrine is closely related to that of Buddha-matrix (Sanskrit: tathāgatagarbha). In the Anunatva-Apurnatva-Nirdesa, the Buddha links the tathāgatagarbha to the Dharmadhātu (ultimate, all-equal, uncreated essence of all phenomena) and to essential being, stating: "What I call "be-ing" (sattva) is just a different name for this permanent, stable, pure and unchanging refuge that is free from arising and cessation, the inconceivable pure Dharmadhatu."<ref>言眾生者即是不生不滅常恒清涼不變歸依。不可思議清淨法界等異名。T668.477c08</ref>

Angulimaliya Sūtra

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}} Every being has Buddha-nature (Buddha-dhatu). It is indicated in the Aṅgulimālīya Sūtra that if the Buddhas themselves were to try to find any sentient being who lacked the Buddha-nature, they would fail. In fact, it is stated in this sutra that the Buddhas do discern the presence of the everlasting Buddha-nature in every being:

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Belief and faith in the true reality of the tathāgatagarbha is presented by the relevant scriptures as a positive mental act and is strongly urged; indeed, rejection of the tathāgatagarbha is linked with highly adverse karmic consequences. In the Angulimaliya Sutra it is stated that teaching only non-self and dismissing the reality of the tathāgatagarbha karmically lead one into most unpleasant rebirths, whereas spreading the doctrine of the tathāgatagarbha will bring benefit both to oneself and to the world.Template:Sfn

Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra (3rd century CE)

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}} The later Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra presents the tathāgatagarbha as being a teaching completely consistent with and identical to emptiness. It synthesizes tathāgatagarbha with the emptiness (śūnyatā) of the prajñāpāramitā sutras. Emptiness is the thought-transcending realm of non-duality and unconditionedness: complete freedom from all constriction and limitation.

The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra describes the tathāgatagarbha as "by nature brightly shining and pure," and "originally pure," though "enveloped in the garments of the skandhas, dhātus and ayatanas and soiled with the dirt of attachment, hatred, delusion and false imagining." It is said to be "naturally pure," but it appears impure as it is stained by adventitious defilements.Template:Sfn Thus the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra identifies the luminous mind of the canon with the tathāgatagarbha.Template:Sfn

It also equates the tathāgatagarbha (and ālaya-vijñāna) with nirvana, though this is concerned with the actual attainment of nirvana as opposed to nirvana as a timeless phenomenon.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

In the laterTemplate:Sfn Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra it is said that the tathāgatagarbha might be mistaken for a self, which it is not.Template:Sfn In fact, the sutra states that it is identical to the teaching of no-self.Template:Sfn

In Section XXVIII of the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, Mahāmati asks Buddha, "Is not this Tathagata-garbha taught by the Blessed One the same as the ego-substance taught by the philosophers?" The Buddha's response: Template:Quote

Yet in the concluding Sagathakam portion of the text, coming after the above-quoted passage, the sutra does not deny the reality of the Self; in fact it castigates such denial of the 'pure Self'. According to Thomas Cleary, "The original scripture rigorously rejects nihilism and does not ultimately deny either self or world",Template:Sfn and quotes the sutra: "Confused thinkers without guidance are in a cave of consciousness running hither and thither seeking to explain the self. The pure self has to be realized first hand; that is the matrix of realization [Tathagatagarbha], inaccessible to speculative thinkers."Template:Sfn

The tathāgatagarbha doctrine became linked (in syncretic form) with doctrines of Citta-mātra ("just-the-mind") or Yogācāra. Yogācārins aimed to account for the possibility of the attainment of Buddhahood by ignorant sentient beings: the tathāgatagarbha is the indwelling awakening of bodhi in the very heart of samsara. There is also a tendency in the tathāgatagarbha sutras to support vegetarianism, as all persons and creatures are compassionately viewed as possessing one and the same essential nature - the Buddha-dhatu or Buddha-nature.

Treatises based on the Tathāgatagarbha sūtras

There are two very influential treatises (shastras) on buddha-nature which draw on and systematize the Tathāgatagarbha sutra material:

Furthermore, there are three other Indian buddha-nature treatises preserved only in Chinese:<ref>Takasaki, Jikido (1966). A Study on the Ratnagotravibhāga (Uttaratantra) Being a Treatise on the Tathāgatagarbha Theory of Mahāyāna Buddhism (Rome Oriental Series 33). Rome: Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, pp. 45–52.</ref>

  • Dharmadhātvaviśeṣaśāstra (Ch: Dasheng fajie wuchabie lun, 大乘法界無差別論), attributed to Saramati (the same author to which the Chinese tradition attributes the Ratnagotravibhāga).
  • Buddhagotraśāstra (佛性論, Fó xìng lùn, Buddha-nature treatise, Taishō no. 1610), said to have been translated by Paramartha and is attributed by Chinese tradition to Vasubandhu.
  • Anuttarâśrayasūtra, which according to Takasaki "is clearly a composition based upon the Ratna-[gotravibhāga]."

Ratnagotravibhāga

Of disputed authorship, the Ratnagotravibhāga (otherwise known as the Mahāyānottaratantraśāstra or just Uttaratantra - "The Supreme Continuum"), is the only Indian attempt to create a coherent philosophical model based on the ideas found in the Tathāgatagarbha Sutras.Template:Sfn The Ratnagotravibhāga especially draws on the Śrīmālādevī Siṃhanāda Sūtra.Template:Sfn Despite East Asian Buddhism's propensity for the concepts found in the Tathāgatagarbha Sutras, the Ratnagotravibhāga has played a relatively small role in East Asian Buddhism.Template:Sfn This is due to the primacy of sutra study and the centrality of the Awakening of Faith in East Asian Buddhism.Template:Sfn

The Ratnagotravibhāga sees the Buddha-nature (tathāgatagarbha) as "suchness" or "thusness" - the abiding reality of all things - in a state of tarnished concealment within the being. The idea is that the ultimate consciousness of each being is spotless and pure, but surrounded by negative tendencies which are impure. Paul Williams comments on how the impurity is actually not truly part of the Buddha-nature, but merely conceals the immanent true qualities of Buddha mind (i.e. the buddha-nature) from manifesting openly:

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See also

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Notes

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References

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Sources

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Further reading

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