Chapter 6 - Difficulty Of Understanding

The Buddha dhamma makes little appeal to the masses since it is diametrically opposed to their sensual desire. People do not like even an ordinary sermon, let alone a discourse on Nibbana, if it has no sensual touch. They do not seem interested in our teaching and no wonder, since it is devoid of melodious recitation, sentimental stories, hilarious jokes and other attractions. It is acceptable only to those who have practised //vipassana// or who seek the dhamma on which they can rely for methods of meditation and extinction of defilements.

But it is a mistake to deprecate, as some do, the sermons containing stories, jokes, etc., as sutta sermons. Suttas differ basically from popular sermons in that they are profound, as witness Anattalakkhana sutta, Satipatthana sutta and so forth. The doctrine of Dependent Origination too belongs to Sutta Pitaka. It is to be labelled Abhidhamma only because it is preached in the fashion of Abhidhamma Pitaka.

Since our teaching is unadulterated dhamma, some people confuse it with Abhidhamma and cannot follow it, much less grasp the Path and Nibbana which it emphasizes. Paticcasamuppada is hard to understand because it concerns the correlations between causes and effects. There is no ego entity that exists independently of the law of causation. It was hard to accept this fact before the Buddha proclaimed the dhamma.

The commentaries also point out the abstruse character of the doctrine. According to them there are four dhammas which defy understanding, viz., the four noble truths, the nature of a living being, the nature of rebirth and dependent origination.

It is hard to understand and accept the truth of suffering, the truth about its cause, the truth about its cessation and the truth about the way to its extinction. It is hard to appreciate these truths, still harder to teach them to other people.

Secondly, it is hard to understand that a living being is a nama rupa process without any separate self, that the nama rupa complex is subject to the law of kamma that determines a mans future life according to his good or bad deeds.

In the third place, it is hard to see how rebirth takes place as a result of defilement and kamma without the transfer of nama rupa from a previous life.

Lastly, it is equally hard to understand Paticcasamuppada. It involves the above three abstruse dhammas. Its negative aspect concerns the first two noble truths as well as the nature of a living being and rebirth while its positive aspect involves the other two truths. Hence, it is most difficult to grasp or teach the doctrine. It may be easy to explain it to one who has attained the path and Nibbana or one who has studied the Pitaka but it will mean little to one who has neither the illumination nor scriptural knowledge.

The writer of the commentary on the doctrine was qualified to explain it because he might have attained the lower stages of the path or he might have a thorough knowledge of the Pitaka. He refers to its difficulty probably in order that its exposition might be seriously studied by posterity. He likens the difficulty to the plight of a man who has jumped into the sea and cannot get to the bottom. He admits that he has written the exegesis on the basis of the Pitaka and the old commentaries handed down by oral tradition. The same may be said of our teaching. Since it is hard to explain the doctrine, the yogi should pay special attention to it. If he follows the teaching superficially, he will understand nothing and without a fair knowledge of the doctrine, he is bound to suffer in the wilderness of samsaric existence.

The substance of the Paticcasamuppada teaching is as follows.

From ignorance there arises sankhara (effort or kamma formation). From kamma formation there arises consciousness of the new existence. Consciousness gives rise to psycho physical phenomena or nama rupa. Nama rupa leads to ayatana (six bases). From ayatana arises the phassa (impression). Phassa causes feeling; feeling leads to craving. From craving there results clinging (upadana). Because of clinging there is the process of becoming (kamma bhava), from the process of becoming there arises rebirth (jati) and rebirth leads to old age, death, sorrow, grief and lamentation. Thus arises the whole mass of suffering.