The Shunyata of the Atman of Hinduism and the Atman in the Shunyata of Madhyamika Buddhism
The Shunyata of the Atman of Hinduism and the Atman in the Shunyata of Madhyamika Buddhism
Dr. Amartya Kumar Bhattacharya
BCE (Hons.) ( Jadavpur ), MTech ( Civil ) ( IIT Kharagpur ), PhD ( Civil ) ( IIT Kharagpur ), Cert.MTERM ( AIT Bangkok ), CEng(I), FIE, FACCE(I), FISH, FIWRS, FIPHE, FIAH, FAE, MIGS, MIGS — Kolkata Chapter, MIGS — Chennai Chapter, MISTE, MAHI, MISCA, MIAHS, MISTAM, MNSFMFP, MIIBE, MICI, MIEES, MCITP, MISRS, MISRMTT, MAGGS, MCSI, MMBSI
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Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism are at loggerheads with one another on the metaphysical issue of the Atman ( roughly translated as ‘soul’ ). Whereas Hinduism believes in the existence of the Atman or the Atman as the core reality of the human individual, Madhyamika Buddhism is famous for the theory of Nairatmya or denial of the existence of Atman. This is surely a radical ontological antinomy. But what is surprising is that despite such an ontological antinomy the philosophies have a more or less common ‘metaphysic of transcendence’ or a transformative teleology. They each believe in the possibility of ultimate human enlightenment or liberation. The ultimate enlightenment ( Nirvana ) of Madhyamika Buddhism and the ultimate liberation ( Moksha ) of Hinduism are in essence similar notions of attainment of salvation or final freedom from the quagmire of human bondage. How would one reconcile the fact that the two systems share a basically similar metaphysic of salvation with the fact that they are arch opponents on the issue of the ontology of the Atman?
What I have posed as a perplexing problem should be clear once it is realised that the question of the Atman is crucially related to the issue of ultimate liberation. If liberation is attained in the form of self-enlightenment or self-realisation, then whether one affirms or denies the existence of the Atman would seem to make a corresponding difference in respect of the possibility of ultimate liberation understood as self-liberation. The perplexity is that both Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism are nonetheless convergent on the idea of the possibility of ultimate self-enlightenment or self-liberation. Indeed, to converge on a common salvific teleology while the two philosophies hold onto the radically divergent ontological positions of Nairatmya and Atman is to open up a curious philosophical situation that demands closer scrutiny.
The Madhyamika Buddhist position admits the possibility of emancipation without admitting that there is any Atman. But we may pause here to reconsider the meaning of the concept of self as opposed to soul, Atman. Does the sense of perplexity rest on an ambiguity of the word ‘self’ as used by the opposing parties? Therefore, we would do well to examine whether there really is no sense of self-affirmation in the overall metaphysical stance of Madhyamika Buddhism.
The Hindu position on Atman also needs to be subjected to a closer scrutiny in relation to its Madhyamika Buddhist opponent. What needs to be examined closely is what really is affirmed when the Hindu affirms the existence of the Atman. What is the content of the Atman involved in Hindu liberation?
Why have I moved the matter towards a discussion of the content of the Hindu Atman in relation to the Nairatmya thesis of Madhyamika Buddhism? I have done so in view of the alleged dichotomy between the two philosophies. Hinduism is metaphysically Atman-oriented, specifically the true individual Atman which is ultimately identical with Brahman or the Absolute Reality. Madhyamika Buddhism is metaphysically oriented towards Shunyata so much so that Absolute Reality is identified with Absolute Shunyata. What I wonder is whether there can really be any substantive difference of specific content between a metaphysic of Brahman and a metaphysic of Shunyata, when both systems subscribe to an ultimate reality conceived in equally metaphysically absolutist terms. The metaphysical ‘sphere’ of absolute Brahman may coincide with that of absolute Shunyata and there may not be ‘internal’ content-specific difference between the two.
In keeping with the remark I just made, I would now like to take up the Madhyamika Buddhist notion of Shunyata for a careful analysis. Sheer impermanence and transitoriness of everything characterises reality for Buddhism. There is no thing and no Atman in such a reality of ceaseless flux. Hence, according to Buddhism, a right understanding of the world and us in it would be not to reify anything into enduring individual entities or Atmans. This is what gets expressed as the Nairatmya view. One is therefore advised to empty oneself of the illusory representation of oneself as an enduring and distinct Atman. Everything is devoid of any substantive essence in Madhyamika Buddhism. In a sense, everything in reality is empty.
It might be helpful to think of Shunyata, understood as Absolute Shunyata, as a cosmic ‘field,’ and reality ultimately identified with this field. Anything in reality would then be absolutely non-substantial which implies that there would be no non-illusory substantive Atman-representation in this field. Consciousness would be absolutely empty of any ego-centric Atman-representation. It would be ‘pure’ consciousness or consciousness per se.
Contrast this position of Madhyamika Buddhism with the Hindu depiction of reality. Phenomenal reality, which is what appears as the world of sensible apprehension in all its multiplicity, is held to be a false projection of cosmic illusion or Maya or Avidya. All relations between distinct individuals, the whole world as it appears to be distinct from oneself as subject in all its multifariousness, is unreal from the transcendental standpoint of Brahman. True reality is Brahman, which is one, indeterminate and all that there is. Brahman simply is. Each individual self is not really distinct from other individual selves (or from anything else whatsoever). As Atman, one is ultimately the same as with Brahman which is tantamount to being the same as reality as such.
According to Hinduism, not to realise this oneness with Brahman via the realisation of one’s true essence as Atman, is to remain spiritually blinded by Avidya. Liberation as self-realisation is the realisation of one’s ultimate identity with Brahman. No one is really an individual Atman but a universal self merging with the absolute universality of Brahman. To come to have this realisation is to attain Moksha.
As it stands, in Hindu metaphysics it is Atman, rather than Shunyata, which is clearly affirmed. The Atman is regarded to be the truest, and only enduring, reality. For Hinduism, there is a reality with a positive identity once the illusory projection of a phenomenal world is transcended. There is Atman-identical-with-Brahman to constitute Reality. By contrast, the Reality of Madhyamika Buddhism is seemingly gratuitous because sheer Shunyata is supposed to be coterminous with Reality. Lacking in any positive content or identity, the Reality depicted by Madhyamika Buddhism would seem to make no room for the possibility of an enduring experience to count as an experience of emancipation.
When Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism are thus juxtaposed in a comparative perspective, the two systems present themselves in the form of a mutually exclusive relation. An affirmation of the existence of Atman would presuppose a negation of the reality of Shunyata. Conversely, identifying reality with the field of Shunyata would entail a denial of the existence of Atman. So, either it is Atman without Shunyata or it is Shunyata without Atman.
We must recall the earlier discussion that both Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism with their opposing ontological commitments nevertheless converge on the issue of salvation. This means that Shunyata is no impediment to ultimate liberation. And, if the reality of Shunyata leaves no room for Atman, then it follows, by implication, that the non-existence of Atman is also no impediment to ultimate liberation. One might say here that the metaphysics of ultimate liberation is severely under-determined by the ontology of the Atman. But is the question of the Atman — its existence or non-existence — so very neutral with respect to the possibility of liberation?
My conclusion would be that true liberation or emancipation is as much grounded in a metaphysic of Shunyata as it is founded upon its counterpart metaphysic of Atman. But, then, I shall have to disentangle the knotty problem of the antinomy between Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism discussed in the beginning of this article.
I think that a reconciliatory philosophical reconsideration of the ancient debate between Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism would yield a picture in which the two philosophies would be seen as being complementary to each other. With this intent I shall start from the Hindu angle to show that the concept of Atman is compatible with that of Shunyata.
Granted the reality or existence of Atman, exactly in what form does it exist? Can we say that it exists as an individual entity of some sort? To so exist, it must satisfy certain criteria of individuation. But, admittedly, there are no such criteria. Not being Jiva, it is not an individual existing in relation to other individual entities. This is tantamount to saying that Atman is not really an individual at all. It has no relation except its relation to Brahman, which is, after all, a relation of identity characterising the non-duality between the two.
Can the Atman be described in terms of any attribute apart from its most general characterisation as something of the nature of pure consciousness? And pure consciousness — consciousness without any specific features — Atman is better grasped as being without attributes. It is as if we can get a grip on the concept of Atman by subtracting from the ‘content-laden’ concept of consciousness all contingent specificities attached to the concept. Atman is consciousness absolutely purged of all factual specificities — everything that consciousness accumulates during its involvement with the empirical world or Samsara.
If Atman is attribute-free pure consciousness, and attribute-free consciousness entails consciousness not centred on any ego-specific point of view, then it is a ‘decentred’ self inhabiting a ‘centreless’ world. Consciousness decentred is also consciousness universalised, and a self nourished by universalised, perspectiveless consciousness is evidently empty of all inner encumbrances that accrue to an Atman of centred consciousness. At least, part of attaining ultimate liberation is this freedom from the contingencies of ego-centred consciousness. One could say that one meaning of the Madhyamika Buddhism concept of Shunyata is the idea of the self’s emptying itself of accumulations of inner traits born of ego-specific consciousness.
Once we conceive of the idea of a decentred self as having its life in a centreless world of ego-neutral consciousness, we get closer to the idea of Atman as identical with the universal consciousness of Brahman. We may even think of the self’s progressive decentering of itself culminating in a form of transcendental subjectivity which is the perfection of centrelessness. Such a perfectly decentred consciousness would then be a mirror image of Atman. But a perfectly centreless consciousness would have to be absolutely devoid of perspectival partialities of ego-centric consciousness steeped in the ‘push and pull’ of Samsara. It would be emptied of the delimiting attributes of finiteness to the extent of experiencing the infinity. It would undergo a transformation of consciousness from its ego-specific substantial mode to an ego-neutral ‘non-substantial’ mode of Shunyata.
We now have a picture of Atman that depicts the Atman as consciousness without any content of limiting attributes. This picture also seems to be akin to the Madhyamika Buddhism idea of Shunyata. Atman-consciousness is a kind of consciousness-as-Shunyata in as much as it is empty of the attributes of ego-specific subjectivity. Transcendence from the life of a Jiva to that of true self requires that the self render itself into Shunyata as far as the perspectival subjectivity of the former mode of life is concerned. It would therefore be no travesty of truth to say that there is a great deal of Shunyata in the inner constitution of Atman. The so-called Hindu Atman is nourished by metaphysical Shunyata. It is therefore no wonder that Shankara, the greatest protagonist of Hinduism, has been described as a Buddhist in disguise.
Of course, one must not underplay the positive ontological connotation of Atman in a bid to overplay the metaphysical Shunyata of Atman-consciousness. While the Hindu Atman must negate all its ego-specific substantiality and transform into consciousness-as-Shunyata, it is precisely the fulfillment of this negation that the true affirmation of the positive existence or substantiality of the Atman as Atman consists in. Shunyata therefore is one side of the coin of the Hindu Atman, of which the other side is its ego-neutral or centreless substantiality. Indeed, the substantiality of Atman is at its most pronounced in its potentiality to attain Moksha.
What, on the other hand, about the alleged non-substantiality of ultimate reality as Shunyata? I think it would be equally wrong to overplay the negative connotation of the metaphysic of Shunyata to the point of losing sight of any affirmative connotation concealed behind that metaphysic. For one thing, the admission of the potentiality to attain and experience Nirvana is a clear indication of the substantiality of Shunyata-based existence. In this sense, Shunyata evidently has an ontic import and it even suggests an ontology of self akin to that of Hinduism. Buddhist ultimate liberation — the attainment of Nirvana — is a substantial unitary transition from the unenlightened condition to the state of enlightenment. The possibility of this transition bespeaks of the substantial presence of a shadowy self in the metaphysical vacuum of Shunyata.
Furthermore, Shunyata is not abhava or non-existence, but held to be the ultimate ground of everything, the utmost original condition of reality prior to all conceptualisation and phenomenal distortion. It is characterised as Shunyata and a vibrant void. Cast in terms of consciousness, Shunyata is a state of pure consciousness that one would revert to if one were able to empty oneself of any illusory construction of an unchanging or permanent reality, whether of a thing or of a person. This reversal to original subjectivity, which also has an ethical import, may be interpreted as one’s ‘becoming’ Shunya or empty. But ‘becoming’ Shunya does not mean going out of existence. Rather, one can truly be oneself, or become truly self-aware, only by ‘becoming’ Shunya. Otherwise, one continues to be in an unawakened state — to be under the spell of Avidya.
Can we not say, now, that the Madhyamika Buddhism awakening in ‘the field of Shunyata’ is most akin to the Hindu realisation of the ultimate identity of Atman with Brahman? And is not Brahman — the absolutely indeterminate (Nirguna) Ultimate Reality-itself more like a ‘field of Shunyata,’ the original ground of everything? It seems to me that these speculations about the ‘complementarity’ between Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism are on the right track. For such a reading of these philosophies helps us make more coherent sense of either position than what they seem to mean individually. What, then, is the complementary light of Madhyamika Buddhism on our understanding of Hinduism? It is essentially this: Shunyata is the only ground reality for the life of Atman. Atman without Shunyata would be like motion without energy.
In a similar vein, it can also be said that ‘becoming’ Shunya or being in (the field of) Shunyata is virtually the same thing as being or ‘becoming’ Atman. It is important that we recognise that the negative overtone of Shunyata has, as its counterpoint, an affirmative undertone. There is the negation of the unawakened self — the self centred in an individualised field of consciousness and shackled to the perspectives tied to it. This negation forms the basis for a spontaneous affirmation of becoming awakened or enlightened — becoming a decentred self. In essence, consciousness-as-Shunyata manifests itself in the form of consciousness-as-Atman.
What transpires from the above discussions is a thesis that is better characterised in terms of convergence of Madhyamika Buddhism and Hinduism than in terms of their complementarity to one another. Of course each is a complementary perspective to the other in so far as our making coherent sense of either position is concerned. What we gain from such a complementary understanding of the allegedly incompatible juxtaposition of these two philosophies is that their apparent difference betrays a profound underlying unity. We have intimations of a ‘hidden’ Atman of Madhyamika Buddhism on the one hand and of the ‘silent’ Shunyata in Hinduism on the other. A deeper study of the Hindu Atman-theory results in making the otherwise silent metaphysics of Shunyata resonate with a persuasive explanatory voice, much as a scrutinising look at the Madhyamika Buddhism Shunyata-theory manages to get a glimpse of the shadowy presence of a full-fledged Atman that explains the possibility of enlightenment.
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