Inside Vasubandhu's Yogacara

by Ben Connelly

  In Vasubandhu’s model of practice, our capacity to respond to the dream of life in each moment with compassion is also dependent on the work we do, using the first fifteen verses, with the barrier of afflictive emotion. In this and the next several chapters we will dive into Vasubandhu’s model for taking care of the barrier of delusion. We have stepped into this stream by looking at the depth of our delusion, by looking into the imaginary nature. Now, let us look into other-­dependence and complete realization.

  21

  Dependence and Realization

  The other-­dependent nature is conceptualization arising from conditions;

  The complete, realized nature is the other-­dependent nature’s always being devoid of the imaginary. || 21 ||

  All things arise from conditions. Rain comes from the accumulation of moisture in clouds, flowers come from seeds, babies come from parents, anger comes from perceived injuries, joy arises from being kind to those we love. If we take time to think about this, the situation starts to seem rather complex. The rain actually comes from the interaction of every particle of air in the atmosphere. If one drop of water forms right above your head, ready to land on your umbrella, it must be conditioned by the air around it, but every particle of the air around it is conditioned as well. Everything has to be operating the way it is for anything to happen. The blooming of one tulip in Belgium is dependent on the accumulation of gases in an orb billions of years ago that began to form our sun, and on unknowable years of human effort, and that’s less than a billionth of the things it depends on. As Carl Sagan once said, “If you wish to bake an apple pie from scratch you must first invent the entire universe.” We cannot see all the conditions that give rise to anything, unless we can see everything that has ever happened in the entire universe. What we can see, if we see the other-­dependent nature, is a conceptualization of those conditions. This statement has a twofold meaning, with some practical applications.

  Many Buddhist teachings encourage us to conceptualize the other-­dependence of things. To think of a cup as being empty of cup nature, for instance, because it is entirely composed of non-­cup elements—human ingenuity, sunshine, water, electricity, sand—is to conceptualize other-­dependence. I highly encourage you to do this kind of practice. When you see that your child is angry and frustrated, perhaps take a moment to think of all the conditions that arise to create this suffering person in this moment. When you are in the grocery store, take time to contemplate all the things that come together so that you can lift an apple into your basket. When you recall that countless people worked together to bring this piece of food to you, I hope you may taste some appreciation and connection. When you see that emotions and harmful actions come from a vast history of human suffering, I hope that you may feel some compassion for those you might otherwise judge. When you see that your accomplishments are the results of infinite conditions outside yourself, I hope you feel some humility and gratitude.

  So it is good to use the mind to think about, to conceptualize, the other-­dependent nature. However, Vasubandhu is also saying something deeper and actually a little contentious in Buddhist thought. He’s saying that when you see the other-­dependent nature—when you don’t just think about it, but deeply know it—it is still a conceptualization; you have not transcended the operations of consciousness. This is in contrast to many Buddhist texts, generally Mahayana sutras, which suggest that we can completely transcend conceptualization and that it is precisely when we do this that we realize the other-­dependence of things. Certainly the other-­dependent nature of things can only be seen by a mind much less bound by gross-­level conceptions; the other-­dependent nature is not the same as the imaginary nature. To truly see the other-­dependent nature generally requires a mind trained for years in meditation. To actually see nothing but things free of self-­nature and manifesting infinite interdependent harmonious connection is generally the result of long, devoted practice of letting go of mental conceptual habits. However Vasubandhu says that to see this is still a “conceptualization arising from conditions.”

  Let me illustrate: Many sutras, and many people I know, speak of experience where there is not time—no coming, and no going. As my teacher Tim Burkett said to me rather simply during a face-­to-­face meeting on retreat where I mentioned to him that time was not apparent to my consciousness, “Time is a concept, and meditation messes with your concepts.” It is very hard to describe this state of mind, timelessness, though many descriptions exist. However none that I know of speak of being able to see everything that has ever happened. To realize timelessness does not allow you to see the workers laying the stones for the foundation of the building in which you are practicing meditation, nor to see the space where that building was when it was at the bottom of a great ocean a million years ago; it does not make you omniscient. You can see the infinite connection of everything through practice, you can see through time, but you still see it in this moment, and in the phenomena of this moment: a cup of tea, the sounds of birdsong, the crack of ice melting on a lake in spring.

  Consciousness is a momentary phenomena. Infinity is revealed in the phenomena that appear now. As Buddha said, this is the All: sight, sound, smell, taste, touch, and mind. If we contemplate other-­dependence, we know that this moment is devoid of self-­nature; it is made up entirely of non-­moment elements. The human mind is limited to perceiving in this moment, but the fact that there is a moment separate from other things is only a concept. Even when we see the infinite through practice, we see it through the limited lens of the conceptual capacities of consciousness.

  “Complete, realized nature” is a translation of parinispana. It’s a difficult term. Various other translators have called it “the really real nature,” “the perfectly accomplished nature,” “the absolute,” and “the fulfilled own-­being.” The Sanskrit word carries three principal connotations: wholeness, the way things really are, and what one sees in enlightenment. Our translation of the “Thirty Verses” tries to convey these three using “complete” to express wholeness and “realized” to convey both how things are made real by infinite conditions in the moment and what is seen in realization. Vasubandhu’s definition of the complete, realized nature in this line of verse is quite challenging as well. We are entering the realm of the nondual. The logic of nonduality breaks down every possible dualism as it arises—and as a result makes for very confusing statements. Please trust that ultimately it is here to help free our minds. So to dive into what will be one of the more complex passages in this book, let’s look at the verse again:

  The other-­dependent nature is conceptualization arising from conditions;

  The complete, realized nature is the other-­dependent nature’s always being devoid of the imaginary.

  The first thing I’ll note is that the complete, realized nature is not defined as a “thing”; it is defined as an absence, the quality of the other-­dependent nature’s always being empty of the imaginary. If we take out the word “always,” it can help us work our way toward understanding. Complete, realized nature is the other-­dependent without our imaginations or conceptions applied to it. This looks reasonable. What is really real, what the enlightened see, is infinite interdependence with no conceptions layered onto it. This sounds pretty Buddhist to me! Sadly for our minds, which want simple answers, this is only a small facet of what Vasubandhu is presenting.

  Let’s look again at his definitions of the imaginary and the other-­dependent: “whatever thing is conceptualized by whatever conceptualization” and “a conceptualization arising from conditions,” respectively. So the complete, realized nature is that “a conceptualization arising from conditions” is always devoid of “whatever thing is conceptualized by whatever conceptualization.” My friends, I did not bring you here to confuse you. Let’s take a breath. The complete, realized nature is that things are always conceptions arising from conditions that are not conceptualized by conceptualization. I’ll paraphrase in a much less philo
sophically precise but hopefully helpful way: enlightenment is a way of seeing that both transcends and is not other than conceptualization. As Zen Master Yaoshan taught, “think not-­thinking.” In Mahayana discourse, we may speak of going beyond all conceptions to a state of pure nondual awareness where there is only interdependence. Vasubandhu is pointing out that, with this type of discourse, we create a dualism between conceptualization and nonconceptualization. He is encouraging us to realize that conceptualization is not within or without enlightenment. The way our minds work is neither an enemy nor a friend. It is just this. Enlightenment, complete realization, is not somewhere else.

  22

  The Harmony of Difference and Sameness

  Thus it is neither the same nor different from the other-­dependent;

  Like impermanence, etc., when one isn’t seen, the other also is not seen. || 22 ||

  It would be hard to overstate the importance of the language of nondualism in Mahayana literature, and we see its origins in the earliest Buddhist teachings. In the Samyutta Nikaya, the Buddha teaches that wrong view “depends on duality, upon the idea that things exist and the idea that things don’t exist.” Countless Mahayana sutras deconstruct dualistic conceptions to point toward a mind that is completely liberated from divisions and separation, a mind that is free and intimate with everything, a mind of infinite compassion. Seeing through dualisms, or seeing their emptiness, is held up as absolutely central to enlightenment. In the Heart Sutra, the most widely chanted text in most Mahayana schools, Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, the embodiment of compassion, teaches that form is emptiness and emptiness is form. He goes on to say that every sight, sound, smell, suffering, liberation, and thought is exactly not itself. Each thing is no-­thing. To realize this is to enter infinite compassion. Like seeing everything we perceive as being imaginary, seeing everything as both itself and not-­itself disarms the rigidity of our views and liberates us from the tendency to suffer due to the attachments that grow from those views.

  If you find the concept that form is emptiness hard to grasp, that is just fine. The language of nondualism presents an ungraspable vision of the world. If all phenomena are empty of self-­nature, there is nothing to hold on to and nothing to reject. There is no ground on which suffering can originate.

  Vasubandhu uses nondual language here to describe the relationship between the other-­dependent nature and the complete, realized nature. They are neither the same nor different. In Xuanzang’s Chengweishilun, arguably the most authoritative existing commentary on the “Thirty Verses,” he says this: “If they were different, the complete, realized nature would not be the real nature of the other-­dependent nature. If they were not different, the complete, realized nature would not be timeless.” That things arise dependent on one another is enlightenment. However enlightenment is timeless and things in their other-­dependent nature appear only for a moment—they are impermanent. Impermanence and timelessness are not separate. This is true right now of everything you are experiencing.

  It is not clear what Vasubandhu is referring to when he says, “Like impermanence, etc.” Various commentators provide various interpretations, many of them very confusing (like the rest of this section of the “Thirty Verses”!). When I see a Buddhist text that says “Impermanence, etc.,” I think of the three marks of existence taught by the Buddha in his second Dharma talk and referred to extensively throughout his teaching career: impermanence, suffering, and nonself. Vasubandhu says the other-­dependent nature and the complete, realized nature are “like impermanence, etc., when one isn’t seen, the other also is not seen.” When we see that things are impermanent, we see that there is suffering that comes with them, and we see that things don’t have a stable, continuous self. When you are on a lovely vacation from your difficult and stressful job, you may not see impermanence. You may forget that this vacation will end, and you may be quite happy; your vacation may seem to be exactly what is real. But it does end, and when you see its impermanence, you may feel let down and miss the bright sand beach, the fruity drinks, and the people waiting on your needs. You will see that the vacation does not exist, it is gone, and then you may feel loss.

  Buddha recommends we actually see and deal with these three marks rather than trying to pretend they are not there. He says actually facing them is the road to real liberation from suffering. If we just see that everything in every moment is impermanent, connected to the vast web of human suffering, and empty of self-­nature, we can be present to things as they are, in the moment, without trying to hold on to them. We can be present to suffering wherever it arises, with an open heart and without trying to escape from it.

  When we see one of these three marks, we tend to see them all. Likewise Vasubandhu teaches that we only see the other-­dependent nature if we are seeing the complete, realized nature and vice versa. When we see the infinite, timeless connection of all things in their immediate, vivid, dependently arising nature, we see through our imaginary world.

  23

  No Own Nature

  With the threefold nature is a threefold absence of self-nature,

  So it has been taught that all things have no self. || 23 ||

  Many people have critiqued Yogacara teachings for going against the central Mahayana doctrine of the emptiness of all phenomena, saying Yogacara claims that consciousness is a kind of ultimate reality, the only thing that exists. Others have said it sneakily subverts the key Early Buddhist doctrine of anatman, nonself, that we cannot locate a lasting self amid everything that is arising in the moment; they argue that consciousness is treated in Yogacara as a kind of soul—a self, an atman. It seems quite clear in reading this verse that Vasubandhu is not forwarding any such views. He says things have three natures—imaginary; other-­dependent; and complete, realized—and that all of those natures have no self. No matter how you look at something in this model of understanding, what you are looking at ultimately does not have an independent, lasting self. This verse makes very explicit that the three-­natures teaching is in accordance with these central tenets of both Early and Mahayana Buddhism.

  The teachings of nonself and the emptiness of phenomena are important for many reasons. They reflect the experience of people who have tasted a vast, spacious sense of their connection to all things, the shedding of suffering, and the absence of ultimate truth in anything that comes through the filter of conceptualization. They are also very valuable in keeping the mind supple. According to these doctrines, everything you think to be ultimately true is not. This is incredibly disarming for the mind’s habit of creating suffering.

  I recall many years ago I was involved in a very difficult and painful relationship with someone, which was characterized by long, furious arguments and even longer protracted periods of aggressive silence. I had been practicing meditation daily and chanting the Heart Sutra, that great articulation of seeing the emptiness of all phenomena. I was desperate for a way out of the pattern of suffering in which I was caught. One day we said some things that began to heat into a wrenchingly frustrating argument. My meditation practice began to manifest and I became aware of my bodily sensations. I felt the heat rising to my face and chest, my mind beginning to race. I intimately tasted my own suffering and saw the thoughts zooming by, trying to control my opponent. Suddenly everything fell away. It’s rather hard to describe. The angry face of my partner, the painful sensations of anger in my own body, the morning sunlight streaming across the room—none of them were separate from anything. The totality of the connection of all these things to the vastness of human suffering, the complete lack of truly knowing what was really happening, the profound intimacy of everything—all were manifest in a dreamlike sense of things not being themselves, not being what moments before I would have angrily sworn they were. I saw the suffering in that room connected to all of history, and I stopped fighting. I would like to be clear: this is not a description of enlightenment, this is a description of a simple moment in the life of someone dedicated to Bu
ddhist practice.

  The material in the first half of the “Thirty Verses” recommends practicing mindfulness of phenomena, particularly the five universal factors and beneficial and afflictive emotions. The later verses, in keeping with their relationship to Mahayana Buddhism’s great emphasis on the nondual nature of phenomena, suggest a different kind of practice—one not based on observing an object, which creates a duality.

  The idea of practicing nonduality is problematic, since it’s kind of hard to know how to do something that already both exists and doesn’t exist. For instance, one of the higher states of meditation (dhyanas) described in Early Buddhist texts is “neither perception nor nonperception.” How does one do that? In the largest body of texts on the subject, the Prajnaparamita sutras, we are not given very clear instructions. In the Heart Sutra, we learn that prajnaparamita (the perfection of wisdom) is nonduality and that Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, by practicing this perfection of wisdom, liberates everything from suffering. We don’t, however, get instructions in how to practice the perfection of wisdom, how to practice nonduality. Nonduality is, by nature, slippery and ungraspable, but there are some texts that can give us clues on how to practice it.

  In Early Buddhist texts, we find two aspects of meditation practice—vipassana, or insight, and samatha, or calm abiding. They are understood and explained quite differently among the schools of Buddhism. One of the first known Yogacara texts, the Samdhinirmocana Sutra, lays them out in a distinctive way that clearly inspired aspects of Vasubandhu’s verses. It defines vipassana as the practice of mindfulness of phenomena recommended in the first half of this work and samatha as practicing “the observation of nonconceptual images.” The language is hard to parse; given that in Yogacara teachings all things that we can see or know are conceptualized, observing nonconceptual images seems kind of difficult, certainly paradoxical. However if we soften our stance on the definition of what is conceptualized, the Samdhinirmocana Sutra’s definition of samatha works pretty well; practice observing what is happening without adding any concepts. Just see what arises, just sit. In vipassana we label or discern phenomena: here is calm, here is envy, here is a volition impulse, etc. In samatha we suspend all judgment and analysis.