Home > news > dossier

news

dossier : The Abhidharma. Part three

The Eight Chapters of the Abhidharmakosha
The abidharmakosha is comprised of eight chapters: 1.khams: the elements that constitute the three realms
2.dbang po: the sense faculties
3.'jig rten: the world, how it appears and develops
4.las: karma
5.nyon mongs: emotional afflictions and mental veils
6.lam dang gang zag: the path and the practitioner
7.ye shes: timeless wisdom
8.snyom 'jug: the description of different states of meditative absorption

Suffering and the origin of suffering, cessation and the path are the main subject of the Abhidharmakosha:
Chapters 1 and 2 give a general explanation about samsara and nirvana. They are an introduction to understanding how samsara functions.
Chapters 3, 4 and 5 explain contaminated phenomena in detail.
Chapters 6,7 and 8 describe non contaminated phenomena.

Chapter 1: the elements (skt: dhatu; tib: khams)
The classification of phenomena into 18 elements, or dhatus, includes everything that is considered to be an object of knowledge. Dhatu means "basis" or "potential" or "seed of all things", or "element containing the potential for a relationship of cause and effect".
This chapter defines samsara. Understanding the nature of samsara leads to renunciation.
The first chapter describes the object to be analyzed, the second describes the subjet: the sense faculties.

Chapter 2: the sense faculties (skt: indriyastib; tib: dbang po)
This chapter concerns the five sense faculties (sight, hearing, smell, taste, and feeling) and the mental faculty.
A detailed explanation of how perception functions leads to an understanding of how our perception of phenomena is flawed.
These two chapters are the basis for distinguishing between samsara and nirvana. This basis will allow us to understand samsara and its origin.

Chapter 3: the world (skt: lokaprajnapti, tib: 'jig rten)
This chapter is concerned with the truth of suffering. Samsara is the result of mental obscurations and karma. The world is the basis of suffering in samsara.
In brief, in Buddhist cosmology the world is comprised of three levels of existence, called the "three realms":

• The formless realm and the form realm

... are realms of pure meditative absorption, beginning with the highest: "the formless realm", then "the form realm". Beings belonging to these spheres of existence are not endowed with a physical body, per se, but dwell in a state of total meditation.

• The desire realm

… is itself broken down into six sub-realms: gods, titans, humans, animals, hungry ghosts and hells.
These three realms in which beings live are termed the outer world whereas the beings themselves are called the inner world.
This chapter also describes how worlds are formed through the elements and the different ways beings can be reborn through birth from a womb, an egg or other channels.

• Rebirth in the three realms

Beings who are between two lives are driven by karma to take rebirth. The text describes the process undergone in the intermediate state (tib: bar do). Beings are reborn as a function of their karma and level of awareness:
“The being who has little merit enters because he thinks, ‘the wind is blowing, the sky is raining, it is cold, it is stormy, people are making a lot of noise,’ and because he thinks that he will avoid problems in this way. He thinks he is entering into a retreat place, a shelter, a root or leaf hut, or he takes cover at the base of a tree or against a wall.
“ In the same way, the being who has much merit believes he is entering into a park, a garden, a pagoda, a pavilion; he thinks he can dwell there and depart.
“ The being who is fully aware knows that he is entering into a womb, that he resides there and then exits.”
La Vallée Poussin: L'Abhidharmakosha de Vasubandhu; Chapter 3

Chapter 4: How karma works
This chapter explains the functioning of karma (tib: las) which is the cause of suffering.
Through analytical reasoning, the l'Abhidharmakosha also refutes certain points of view, such as the existence of a creator of the universe, etc.
The origin of karma is mental obscurations.
"Who makes the variety of living beings in the world and the vessel – the world itself - that were described in the previous chapter?
No God used his intelligence to create them; the variety within the world is born of karma. The variety of the world is born of the actions of living beings."
La Vallée Poussin: L'Abhidharmakosha de Vasubandhu; Chapter 4

In order to help beings cultivate actions which lead to happiness and liberation, the Buddha taught ethical discipline:
"No one who abides by discipline can be undisciplined towards any being; it is through positive thoughts having all beings as their object that discipline is acquired."
La Vallée Poussin: L'Abhidharmakosha de Vasubandhu; Chapter 4

Chapter 5: Mental obscurations (skt: klesha, tib: nyon mongs)

• Mental events and latent tendencies

To describe how mind functions, it is said that there are 84,000 mental occurrences that can be resumed into 51. The sum total of mental events is called "karmic formations or latent tendencies" (skt: samskara, tib: 'du byed).
"They condition that which is conditioned" using the Abhidharmakosha’s phraseology. Karmic formations based on past karma determine our future karma.
Our experience of the world is nothing other than a vision inherited from past lives, conditioned by karma and habitual tendencies.
"How many emotional influences are there?
Six: attachment, and thereby hostility, pride, birth, false views and doubts.
The word thereby shows that because of attachment the other five settle into their object."
La Vallée Poussin: L'Abhidharmakosha de Vasubandhu; Chapter 4

• Mental obscurations

Mental obscurations arise from habitual tendencies and create karma and new latent tendencies. They are samsara’s common denominator. Suffering is based on them.

Part 4 : Chapters 6, 7 and 8 of the Abhidharmakosha >>>

To know more
about the Abhidharma in Pali click here Bibliography