Pericope Problems in the Mahakammavibhanga Sutta - Part 1

The second part of the excellent article, “Kamma in Context: The Mahakammavibhangasutta and the Culakammavibhangasutta”, comments on the philosophical imports of the Mahakammavibhangasutta.

The first part of the sutta begins the Buddha admonishing a monk for not properly answering a wandering ascetic who enquires into the different kinds of feelings one experiences for an intentional act of body, speech or mind:

This misguided man Samiddhi would have answered the wanderer rightly when asked about the three kinds of feelings 'Friend, Potaliputta, having done an intentional kamma by way of body, speech and mind [whose result is] to be felt as pleasant, one feels pleasure. Having done an intentional action by way of body, speech or mind [whose result is] to be felt as painful, one feels pain. Having done an intentional action by way of body, speech or mind [whose result is] to be felt as neither-pain-nor-pleasure, one feels neither-pain-nor-pleasure.'

This short and concise statement is revealing of the Buddha’s notion of kamma. For one thing, this statement indicates the importance the Buddha places on the psychological aspect of karma. Here he mentions how particular feelings result from certain intentional actions or kamma. It is important to note that there is no mention of future rebirths or any other metaphysical notions associated with cosmology.

Then an odd shift occurs and the Buddha starts his analysis of the “great exposition of action” by outlining four types of people who end up in heaven and hell: (1) Those who live unethical lives are born in hellish destinations (2) those who live unethical lives are reborn in heavenly destinations (3) those who live ethical lives are reborn in heavenly destinations (4) those who live ethical lives are reborn in hellish destinations.

He then goes on to relate how various religious men arrive at different ethical conclusions based on the perceived fate of people after death: (1) There are evil actions with negative results (2) There are no evil actions that have negative results (3) There are good actions that results in positive results (4) There are no good actions that result in positive results.

Interestingly, the Buddha mentions that one of the primary methods used to reach such conclusions is based on supernormal powers:

By means of ardor, endeavor, devotion, diligence and right attention, some recluse or brahmin attains such concentration of mind that, when his mind is concentrated, he sees with the divine eye, which is purified and surpasses the human, he sees . . .

What is interesting about this particular means of gaining knowledge is the primacy it is given in the text. While there does appear to be some evidence that there were other teachers in ancient India who did make various claims based on supra-normal insight, such insights are always associated with arguing for moral causality and never against it.

But this is exactly what we have:

By means of ardor . . . some recluse or brahmin . . . sees with the divine eye . . . sees that person here who abstains from killing living beings . . . after death, he reappears in the state of deprivation, in an unhappy destination, even in hell. He says thus: ‘Indeed, there are no good actions; there is no result of good conduct.’

The only religious school of the Buddha’s time who appeared to deny the result of moral conduct came from the Lokayata school. However, this school had a very materialistic view of the world and considered that the only valid means of knowledge was from the five senses. They would have probably denied the possibility of any such knowledge gained from the “divine eye.”

This red flag alerts us that this part of the text may not be original. Besides changing tone from a psychological one to a cosmological one, the definite scholastic systemization, that cannot be denied, all point to the fact of a possible later addition.

The article mentioned above does not even notice these difficulties and continues to take the sutta at face value which only makes author's main argument more difficult to make.

The main conclusion he comes to is based on the last series of passages in the text. In these passages the Buddha concludes that there is indeed moral causation and further elucidates the functioning of kamma:

As to the person here who kills living beings. . . and holds wrong view, and on the dissolution of the body, after death, reappears in a state of deprivation . . . even in hell: either earlier he did an evil action to be felt as painful, or later he did an evil action to be felt as painful, or at the time of death he acquired and undertook wrong view. . . . And since he here killed living beings . . . and held wrong view, he will experience the result of that either here and now, or in his next rebirth, or in some subsequent existence.

This passage is then repeated three times with the permutations of evil/good actions leading to heaven/hell.

The author then summarizes the meaning of this passage by noting, "This is the key message: do not be fooled by your own (limited) knowledge of events; do not let that undermine trust in the metaphysical principle, which is continually at work, although sometimes (perhaps often) not apparent."

In the basic outline of his conclusion, I agree with him. However, if he is referring to the “metaphysical principle” in terms of the cosmological kamma/rebirth passages then I disagree. In the next part, I will provide further evidence of rebirth interpolations and the show that the text makes the same important point in an even clearer fashion without them.