Refutation of Buddhism's Doctrine of Causal Efficiency & ToM
Jun 28, 2017 6:37:24 GMT
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Post by Aj_June on Jun 28, 2017 6:37:24 GMT
This post attempts to refute the Buddhist doctrine of Causal Efficiency and Buddhist theory of Momentariness [ToM] as was argued by Jain religious Guru. The arguments provided against both the Buddhist doctrines were provided by Jain scholar Hemachandra in 11the century but I will put them in my own words as they were not written in English. Because I don't want to refute Buddhism by incorrectly interpreting their doctrines, I will put the explanation of their theories as has been made by Buddhist scholars themselves. The part in blue is written by me.
Jain religious scholars much like Hindu scholars had a temporary set back because of the rise of Buddhism in India. At one point of time, Buddhism had become the religion of kings whereas in the past some of the greatest kings of India were followers of Jain religion. In an attempt to counter Buddhism, Jain religious teachers offered many refutations of Buddhism. One of the most solid refutation was given by HemaChandra even though Buddhist philosophers were already defeated by Kashmir Shaivites, Nyaya philosophers and Advaita philosophers by the the time HemaChandra lived. The four main arguments provided by HemaChandra were following:
Nirvana Bhanga:
If the individual is momentary then there is no need for her to strive for nirvana as miseries are also momentary. If a person ceases to exist after a moment then there is no need to make effort to attain nirvana as another person will ultimately get the nirvana and not the one who made effort to gain nirvana. So the theory of momentariness makes the four great truths advocated by Buddhism completely useless. Only if nirvana is taken as transcendental truth and momentariness as pragmatic truth then there can be any meaning found in ToM.
Krta pransa:
Karma cannot be explained by following the logic of ToM as it will be unethical and meaningless. If a man or a woman performs an action and then transforms into another person then how would this new person be given the fruits of karma done by the person who no longer exists? So if the self is merely a process of momentary modification then who is the door of karma and who reaps the actions of karma?
Smrti Bhang:
Various mental processes such as memory and recognition cannot be explained on the basis of theory of momentariness. If a person keeps changing to another entity from moment to moment then things like memory will not work in the long run.
Bhava Bhanga:
The world cannot be explained on the basis of ToM if Buddhist principles and virtues are to be held true. The true identity of sentient being will become meaningless if ToM holds true. Rebirth and cycle of births cannot be explained on the basis of ToM.
The object of the Buddhist doctrine of momentariness is not the nature of time, but existence within time. Rather than atomizing time into moments, it atomizes phenomena temporally by dissecting them into a succession of discrete momentary entities. Its fundamental proposition is that everything passes out of existence as soon as it has originated and in this sense is momentary. As an entity vanishes, it gives rise to a new entity of almost the same nature which originates immediately afterwards. Thus, there is an uninterrupted flow of causally connected momentary entities of nearly the same nature, the so-called continuum (santāna). These entities succeed each other so fast that the process cannot be discerned by ordinary perception. Because earlier and later entities within one continuum are almost exactly alike, we come to conceive of something as a temporally extended entity even though the fact that it is in truth nothing but a series of causally connected momentary entities. According to this doctrine, the world (including the sentient beings inhabiting it) is at every moment distinct from the world in the previous or next moment. It is, however, linked to the past and future by the law of causality in so far as a phenomenon usually engenders a phenomenon of its kind when it perishes, so that the world originating in the next moment reflects the world in the preceding moment. www.rep.routledge.com/articles/thematic/momentariness-buddhist-doctrine-of/v-1
Nirvana Bhanga:
If the individual is momentary then there is no need for her to strive for nirvana as miseries are also momentary. If a person ceases to exist after a moment then there is no need to make effort to attain nirvana as another person will ultimately get the nirvana and not the one who made effort to gain nirvana. So the theory of momentariness makes the four great truths advocated by Buddhism completely useless. Only if nirvana is taken as transcendental truth and momentariness as pragmatic truth then there can be any meaning found in ToM.
Krta pransa:
Karma cannot be explained by following the logic of ToM as it will be unethical and meaningless. If a man or a woman performs an action and then transforms into another person then how would this new person be given the fruits of karma done by the person who no longer exists? So if the self is merely a process of momentary modification then who is the door of karma and who reaps the actions of karma?
Smrti Bhang:
Various mental processes such as memory and recognition cannot be explained on the basis of theory of momentariness. If a person keeps changing to another entity from moment to moment then things like memory will not work in the long run.
Bhava Bhanga:
The world cannot be explained on the basis of ToM if Buddhist principles and virtues are to be held true. The true identity of sentient being will become meaningless if ToM holds true. Rebirth and cycle of births cannot be explained on the basis of ToM.
