Pāli Pericope and Wrong View

In Richard Gombrich’s article, Three Souls, One or None: The Vagaries of a Pāli Pericope, Gombrich demonstrates how pericopes or stock phrases in the Pali Canon can arise in various suttas that can result in confusion of meaning within the larger context of the sutta it is embedded in.

Gombrich indicates that the pericope makes only perfect sense in its original context, and when supplanted into a different context it sometimes makes no sense at all.

This form of textual contamination or corruption can be seen throughout the Pāli Canon. One particular example is the frequently quoted passage in the Pāli Canon that defines wrong view (taken from the Sāleyyaka Sutta of the Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha):

There is no gift, no offering, no sacrifice. There is no fruit of good and bad actions. There is not this world nor a world beyond. There is no mother, no father, no beings who are spontaneously born. There are no good and virtuous recluses and brahmins who have themselves realised by direct knowledge and declare this world and the world beyond.

What is interesting about this passage is that wrong view (micchā diṭṭhi) is actually composed of a series of views, one view of which denies the efficacy of sacrifice. The mention of sacrifice in this passage is referring to Brahmin sacrificial actions of killing animals to propitiate the gods.

What makes this passage so dubious is that the Buddha never condoned the killing of any animals, especially for empty rituals whose soteriology he explicitly denied and spoke against.

The originating text for this pericope can be found in the Sāmaññaphala Sutta of the Digha Nikaya. This sutta, considered by many scholars to be contain early elements, relates the exposition the Buddha gives on being asked by King Ajatasattu on what is the “reward visible here and now as a fruit of the homeless life.”

Prior to the Buddha answering the question, the King tells of the replies given by other religious leaders when asked this same question. The King goes ahead and quotes the answer of Makkahali Gosala and Purana Kassapa before relating Ajita Kesakambali’s answer (translation from Walshe’s Long Discourses of the Buddha):

‘Ajita Kesakambali said: “Your Majesty, there is nothing given, nothing sacrificed; no fruit or result of good and bad actions; no this world; no other world; no mother; no father; no beings that are reborn spontaneously; no good and virtuous recluses and Brahmins in the world who have themselves realized by direct knowledge and declare this world and the other world.”’

After relating the replies of three more leading teachers the Buddha finally provides his own answer never explicitly condemning or belittling the other answers.

While the Buddha most certainly disagreed with the overall notion that actions do not lead to any result, he never went ahead and refuted every point expressed by Ajita Kesakambali. Yet we find in the suttas the Buddha preaching this exact passage as being wrong view as these words are his very own.

The fact of the matter is that these words were never spoken by the Buddha but were spoken by King Ajatasattu who was giving an account of what Ajita Kesakambali purportedly said.

Here is an excellent example of the lifting out an ancient passage and applying to a foreign context where it is elevated as an essential doctrine. In reality, the lifting out of the text is merely a self-made fictional, corrupting construction that disguises itself as an authentic piece of doctrine.

I will show in future posts of other suttas concerned with question of rebirth and karma that have pericopes which obscure the meaning by promulgating metaphysical notions of rebirth which underlining text does not support. The result of which is a mischaracterization of the Buddha’s innovative notion of karma as a psychological process rather than a metaphysical one.