The Conscious Vijnanam and its Nature in Buddhism

Sumanapal Bhikkhu

The idea of ‘self’:

Can we think without language? Nope. Language comes first ideas next to carry one’s idea. And, in this context, this world is constituted by language. Kamala a little girl was brought up among the tigers. She could only grunt. That is, she was not brought up in the environment of the human language. That is the Namarupa of Buddhist thought. Kamala could not develop any human consciousness. She had some kind of animal consciousness. It may be said that humans are born with consciousness primarily. Consequently we have human consciousness being born of human mother and father. In this context Lacan and Julia Kristena could be remembered.

       When a body is inside another body the former thinks that it is an inseparable part of the larger body. When the child is born, it does not know that it is separate from its mother. When the mother leaves it for some house-hold chores, the child finds that it is separate from its mother and at once bursts into cries. And gradually it enters into language. Below its learning lurks its craving for the unification with its mother. Gradually the child enters into the symbolic import of language and becomes aware of the world and its objects. The desire of the moth for the star and night for the morrow crops up in the baby and he becomes a person like us looking before and after and pining for what is not.

           Lacan points out that when a child is not that physically strong it sees its image on the mirror. The image however looks well built and the child imagines that it is what his mirror depicts; there is the rub. The child develops a fantasy about his self and the ego develops in him.

          I/we, you/you and she/he/they are all that constitute the world for the growing child. The notion of I is very elusive. It is almost like a striker of a carom board. When I speak, the ‘I’ is with me. When your turn comes for speaking, you use the pronoun ‘I’. When a third person’s turn to speak is there, he/she uses the pronoun ‘I’. So the self and ‘I’ are different. The ‘self’ is however a fiction. It exists only through its difference from other selves. If others were not there the self would not be there. Self and self awareness are thus the function of the other and one wonders whether consciousness is generated there from. But if consciousness could be there, there must be an a priori receptacle or form of intuition in man where consciousness could be born. Let us call it consciousness too.

 What is consciousness?

It is very difficult to define what consciousness is. The word consciousness first appeared in English in the 16^th century. It was derived from Latin conscious, con meaning together and the verb scio meaning to know. Thus conscience originally meant – to know together with knowing or knowledge with another. In Latin however there was the phrase conscious sibi or knowing with oneself. In other words, one could be conscious unto oneself. And gradually the modern meaning of ‘consciousness’ is evolved. In our context consciousness means awareness of something, referring an idea within or without.

Consciousness in the western concept:

            Consciousness is the function of mind Rene Descartes observed that man has both a body and a mind. While the attribute of mind is thought, the attribute of body is extension. Descartes was at a loss to explain how body and mind could be together. We posit that while the mind is the witness of body, the body is the witness of mind. But there is no third party that bears witness to either mind or body or to both. Neither mind/consciousness is true nor body is true. Neither not-consciousness is true, nor not-body is true. That may prompt to hold that neither not-not-consciousness is true nor not-not-body is true and so on. These four elimensional dialectics, as pleaded by Nagarjuna may be an imagery.

            But in the contingent both body and consciousness exist, however illusory they might be in reality. One’s body is visible to other. But one’s consciousness cannot be demonstrated. It is not verifiable in the world of objects. The human heart physically is not observed but a cardio-surgeon observes when it is opened. But the consciousness of a man cannot be demonstrated that way. If one studies the neurons one cannot guess what feelings are evoked by the color red in an individual. Yet one is aware of one’s consciousness. One is aware of one’s consciousness intuitively. In this way one is aware of one’s consciousness; one is not aware of another person’s consciousness. But when one hears what others speak the hearer can follow what is spoken. The problem of consciousness is not only restricted to what a person speaks. In course of ‘walking’, laughing and weeping consciousness functions with awareness if the agent or speaker is a laughing one or a weeping one. So, to study one’s consciousness one has to be inward. Study of consciousness has to be subjective. The third person method of science cannot make any headway in studying consciousness.

          Now when one is inward and seeks to observe his/her consciousness, one does not visually locate consciousness. One finds one’s consciousness of something within. Generally consciousness is relative. Consciousness is distracted from here to there. Right now John is conscious of urgency to go to the office. Next moment he might be conscious of a cry of a child. This is awareness of the urgency to go to the office followed by the awareness of a child’s cry. And consciousness could be described as the attention to countless sensations one after another. And that leads to countless perceptions one after another and countless ideas one after another. Thus there could be on the surface no consciousness but a stream of consciousness of varied kinds in response to various subjective and objective factors that show up in the world of appearance.

Consciousness in the Buddhist psychology:

Buddhism has elaborately discussed the different planes of consciousness in

1.      Consciousness as experienced in Kamaloka.

2.      Consciousness as experienced in Rupaloka.

3.      Consciousness as experienced in Arupaloka.

4.      Consciousness as experienced in the beyond of the above three.

Thereby consciousness vijnana in the Buddhist thought is a wider term as dealt in Abhidharma literature and in the Prajnaparamita sutra and in the Lankavatara sutra etc.

In course of progressive order of the 3 human minds, according to the Buddhist Abhidharma and Abhisamaya psychological analyses consciousness would be inwardly experienced. Everyone are directed by what Kant call one’s a priori forms of notions. An object is perceived in Time and space contest by the individual. But as Kant points out, the notion of time and space is what we add to the world. So this is a world which we half-create and half perceive.

Now being limited by the world and our discourse consciousness or awareness flowing along a stream ever in flux as it were, we cannot vouch for a permanent self just as there is no permanent objective world. Even one’s body is ever in flux. There are ten trillion cells in an average human body. And cells die and cells are born ceaselessly. But on the surface one’s body is the same and permanent lingering through the decades. Here the surface is illusory. Permanent human body is illusion. Lord Buddha has exploded the myth of the Permanent and permanent self or atman. When there is no permanent self, there cannot be any permanent objective world. Because if there is not the same John always, John changing every hour, every minute, every second, the world perceived by John also a second earlier and a second later becomes different. Now, through meditation limits of time and space could be transcended.

        If one avows anything as perceived in meditation, that is subjective and on the surface un-scientific. In this context His Holiness Dalai Lama could be referred to. His Holiness Dalai Lama observes – unlike that of modern science Buddhism’s approach has been primarily from first person experience. The comtemplationary method as developed by Buddhism is an empirical use of introspection, sustained by rigorous training and technique and robust testing of the reliability of experience. All meditatively valid subjective experiences must be verifiable of both through repetition by the same practitioner and through other individuals being able to attain the same state by the same practice. If they are thus verified, such states may be taken to be universal, at any rate for human beings. (www. Shambhalasun.com).

         Now there are four classes of consciousness on the Arupaloka plane. They are

1.      Moral consciousness aware of the infinitude of space. This is associated with Kamaloka Rupaloka and this Arupalaka

2.      Moral consciousness aware of the infinitude of consciousness.

3.      Moral consciousness of being aware of Nothingness.

4.      Moral conception of being aware of neither is nor is-not.

         In other words consciousness on the Arupa-loka plane transcends time and space, and everything in the world within and world without turns into something elusive that baffles language.

          Then comes the Lokottara consciousness or consciousness beyond the world of the five aggregates or pancaskandha. It is of four types-

1.      Consciousness associated with the path of stream attainment

2.      Consciousness associated with the path of once returning

3.      Consciousness associated with the path of Never – returning

4.      Consciousness belonging to the path of Arahatship.

       The path consciousness is followed by the perception of the timelessness, timelessness (Akalika) being one of the attributes of Dhamma. The Abhidhamma Pitaka elaborately dwells on forty kinds of transcendental consciousness. According to Dhammasangani the term “Dhamma”are meant mind and body; it, therefore, deals with different states and classes of consciousness and qualities of body of Buddhist Philosophy. According to Patthana ‘in their zeal to do away with the of a permanent entity or the Soul and grafting on it  a new personality wholly phenomenal, impermanent, law-determined and yet none the less, able to effect a personal salvation, the Doctors of the Theravada analysed sentient existence into Dhammas- like Khandha, Ayatan, Dhatu, Samkhara and these have been brought together and their relation shown, by a verity of permutations and combinations.

    Thus like a lark that excelsior’s higher and higher inward in the field of consciousness one finally reaches Nibbana which is a state of nasanjna and naivasanjna or not-consciousness and not-not-consciousness. This happens when Bodhi arrives. The notion of Bodhi could be best understood in the context of the debate between Shen Xin and Hui Neng –

While Shen Xin posits-

                       The body is a Bodhi tree

                       The mind is a standing mirror bright

                       At all times polish it diligently

                       And let no dust alight.     

               Hui Neng says –

                        Bodhi is fundamentally without any tree.

                        The bright mirror is also not a stand.

                        Fundamentally there is not a single thing.

                        Where could any dust be attracted?

 It should be, however, noted that however higher Man one reaches he is aware of the lower planes too. Hence those who have attained the highest plane or Nibbana, those who are Buddha’s can move about on the mundane plane, if they so desire.

       The state of Nibbana, it seems is charged with Buddha nature. As Hui Neng pointed out there is no south nor north in Buddha nature, or Bodhi. Buddha nature admits of no distinction between subject and object, self and the other. Everything that belongs to the world of eyes and ears, and thoughts and ideas are the spontaneous manifestation of Buddha-nature or Bodhicitta. Since Bodhicitta alone is, it is not. The awareness of nothing is the true consciousness.  

Apatisankhanirodha, with no scope of arising mandane consciousness in arupajhana sanna vedayi nirodha naiva sanna and nasanna the consciousness for knowing becomes non related to objective world nor to subjective phenomena to be detectable. Under such stand of consciousness it prevails with no response to objective world nor that to subjective phenomena. Vasubandhu calls it Vijnaptimatrata and Lankavatarasutra designates its Tathagata dhyana.

The present author is greatly indebted to the savant and the Buddhalogist Prof. Suniti kumar Pathak for this write-up.

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