Chapter One
FIRST THERE IS A MOUNTAIN
On the morning of August 26, 1873, five thousand people gathered around a large platform in the town of Panadure, outside Colombo in Sri Lanka. The platform, constructed especially for the occasion, was divided into two sections. One side, with a table covered in white cloth and adorned with evergreens, was occupied by a group of Protestant clergymen. The other side was more richly decked, with tablecloths of damask and a canopy of red, white, and blue cloth. It was occupied by two hundred Buddhist monks in saffron robes. A debate would be held over the next two days. A reporter from the Ceylon Times described the scene:
The time appointed for commencing the discussion was eight o''clock in the morning, and long before that hour, thousands of natives were seen wending their way, attired in their gayest holiday suits, into the large enclosure in which stood the ample bungalow where the adversaries were to meet. By seven the green was one sea of heads.... Larger crowds may often be seen in very many places in Europe, but surely such a motley gathering as that which congregated on this occasion, can only be seen in the East. Imagine them all seated down and listening with wrapt attention to a yellow robed priest, holding forth from the platform filled with Budhist priests, clergymen, and Singhalese clad in their national costume, and your readers can form some idea-a very faint one indeed-of the heterogeneous mass that revelled in a display of Singhalese eloquence seldom heard in this country.
The coastal regions of the Buddhist kingdom of Sri Lanka had been conquered by the Portuguese in the early sixteenth century; in 1592, in order to escape the Portuguese, the royal capital was moved to Kandy in the highlands, the site of the most sacred relic on the island, a tooth of the Buddha. Roman Catholic missions were established, seeking to convert the Sinhalese in the lowlands. In 1638 the Portuguese were attacked by the Dutch, who eventually gained control of the entire island, apart from the kingdom of Kandy. They held the coastal regions until 1796, when they were displaced by the British. In the 1802 Treaty of Amiens between France and Britain, Napoleon (who controlled the Netherlands) formally ceded control of Sri Lanka to the British. By 1815, and after two bloody wars, the British controlled the entire island. Sri Lanka would remain the British crown colony of Ceylon until 1948. Under the British, a number of Protestant missions were established in the nineteenth century, seeking to convert the Buddhist populace to Christianity. They achieved a certain degree of success.
In 1862 a Buddhist monk named Gunananda founded the Society for the Propagation of Buddhism and established his own printing press, publishing pamphlets attacking Christianity. A number of Wesleyan clergymen responded to his charges, both from the pulpit and in print. And so in 1873, a public debate between Gunananda and a Christian representative, Rev. David da Silva (a Sinhalese convert), was arranged.
In their speeches (each party was allotted one hour in both the morning and the afternoon sessions each day), the adversaries sought to demonstrate the fallacies of the other''s doctrines and scriptures. The Reverend da Silva spoke first, making extensive references to the Pali suttas and what the reporter from the Ceylon Times called "the abstruse metaphysics of Budha." His first target was the doctrine of no self, that the person is only an aggregation of various impermanent constituents. According to Buddhism, he said, human beings have no immortal soul and are "on a par with the frog, pig, or any other member of the brute creation." Furthermore, if there is no soul there can be no punishment for sin and no reward for virtue in the next life, and thus no motivation to seek the good and shun evil. "What villain would not exult in the idea that he is not to suffer for what he does in this life!" Thus, "no religion ever held out greater inducements to the unrighteous than Buddhism did."
The Buddhist monk Gunananda then rose to speak. He was described by the Ceylon Times reporter as "a well-made man of apparently forty five or fifty years, rather short, very intellectual looking, with eyes expressive of great distrust, and a smile which may either mean profound satisfaction or supreme contempt." He declared that Rev. da Silva''s recitations of passages from the Buddhist scriptures were filled with blunders in pronunciation; there was little reason to expect that the reverend had understood something as profound as the Buddha''s teachings on the nature of the person. He then began to enumerate the contradictions that occur in the Bible. He noted that in Genesis, God regrets having created man and asked whether it was the omniscient creator or the fool who regrets his deeds. In Exodus God instructs the Hebrews to mark their doors with blood so that he will know which houses to pass over as he kills the firstborn of the Egyptians; "if he were omniscient, surely this was not necessary."
In response, his Christian opponent alluded to the story of Prince Vessantara, the famed apostle of the perfection of giving, who, in one of the most poignant scenes in Buddhist literature, gave away his children and then his wife. In his next life, Prince Vessantara was reborn as Prince Siddhartha, who became the Buddha. The clergyman asked the audience, "Were these meritorious acts? Was it meritorious to break the hearts of wives and children, and bring desolation and misery to a happy home? If it were, what actions will they enumerate under the head of demerits or sins?" And so the debate continued over to the afternoon and the next day. At the conclusion of the event, Gunananda was declared the winner by the acclamation of the audience.
The debate, and the history of its representation, are fascinating, and deserve far more attention than can be provided here. But I would like to note one other exchange between the two parties, who are identified in the Ceylon Times article as "the Priest" (that is, the Buddhist monk) and "the Catechist" (that is, the Protestant clergyman). On the afternoon of the second day, Rev. da Silva described Mount Meru, the square mountain that, according to the Buddha''s description, occupies the center of our universe. It is said to be 80,000 yojanas high, 80,000 yojanas wide, and 80,000 yojanas long. (A yojana was a unit for measuring distance in ancient India, derived from the distance that a pair of yoked oxen could travel in one day; it was apparently considered to be equal to approximately 16 miles in Sri Lanka in the nineteenth century.) Rev. da Silva asked, "How is it possible, that it [Mount Meru] could not be seen by the eyes of men?" According to one account, a Buddhist monk, presumably referring to the account in Genesis of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden, shouted from the crowd. "Climb to the top of the tall tree described in your sutras and you will definitely see it." After the laughter died down, Rev. da Silva held up a globe.
In this the shape of the earth, its dimensions, the great rivers and seas, and the positions of the countries, &c., are all represented. Now the circumference of the earth is 25,000 miles. This is admitted by all the civilized nations of the world. This fact is proved by every day''s experience. Therefore a mountain with such dimensions could not exist on this earth. Wherever it existed it must be seen, as this globe which now stands on this little inkstand, must be seen by all who are on the four sides of it. So likewise if there were a mountain of that kind it could not but be seen by all the inhabitants of the four quarters. Besides, man can know to a certainty within a few weeks whether there be such a mountain or not. Men at no period ever saw such a mountain, nor have they known by science that there could be such a mountain. One who said that there was such a mountain cannot be supposed to have been a wise man, nor one who spoke the truth.
The question of the location of Mount Meru specifically, and the Mount Meru cosmology more generally, is one that has vexed Buddhists, and their opponents, for centuries. Before hearing what "the Priest" said in response, let us briefly describe the standard Buddhist cosmology.
Classical Buddhist cosmology describes multiple universes that pass in and out of existence over four cosmic phases (each of which is twenty aeons in length), called nothingness, creation, abiding, and destruction. After a period of nothingness, the physical universe comes into being during the period of creation, which begins when the faint wind of the past karma of beings begins to blow in the vacuity of space at the end of the previous period of nothingness. Beings come to inhabit the world during the period of abiding. During the period of destruction, the physical universe is incinerated by the heat of seven suns. This is followed by a period of nothingness as the fourfold cycle begins again.
The various Buddhist traditions of Asia generally subscribe to a map of the world presented, among other texts, in the Abhidharmakosa (Treasury of Knowledge) by the fourth-century Indian scholar Vasubandhu. After the period of cosmic vacuity mentioned above, this is how a world (lokadhatu) forms: At its foundation is a vast circle of wind, surmounted by a vast circle of water, surmounted by a vast circle of golden earth. In the center of that earth is a great mountain, called Meru or Sumeru. It is surrounded by seven mountain ranges of gold, each separated from the other by a sea. At the foot of the seventh range, there is a great ocean, contained at the distant perimeter of the world by a circle of iron mountains. In this vast ocean, four island continents are situated in the four cardinal directions, each flanked by two island subcontinents. The northern continent is square, the eastern continent is semicircular, the southern continent is triangular, and the western continent is round. Although humans inhabit all four continents, the "known world" is the southern continent, called Jambudvipa, where the current average height is 4 cubits and the current life span is one hundred years; on the northern continent of Uttarakuru the average height is 32 cubits and the inhabitants live for one thousand years. The four faces of Mount Meru are flat, and each is composed of a different precious stone: gold in the north, silver in the east, lapis lazuli in the south, and crystal in the west. The substance determines the color of the sky for each of the four continents. The sky is blue in the southern continent of Jambudvipa because the southern face of Mount Meru is made of lapis.
According to Buddhist doctrine, the beings who wander in samsara, the realm of rebirth, are of six types: gods, demigods, humans, animals, ghosts, and hell beings, each of which has a place in this world system. Gods are of three types: those of the Realm of Desire (kamadhatu), those of the Realm of Form (rupadhatu), and those of the Formless Realm (arupyadhatu). There are six types of gods in the Realm of Desire, each with a different heaven. The gods of the Four Royal Lineages inhabit the upper reaches of the four slopes of Mount Meru. The gods of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three inhabit its summit. The other four types of gods in the Realm of Desire inhabit celestial realms at differing heights above Mount Meru. The Realm of Desire encompasses Mount Meru as well as the four heavens above it, the great ocean, the four continents, and the hells beneath (described below).
Above the Realm of Desire is the Realm of Form, a system of heavens reserved for those who have achieved deep states of concentration in their previous life. It is divided according to the level of concentration reached previously, and thus enjoyed in these heavens. There are four major divisions, called (in ascending order) the First Concentration, the Second Concentration, the Third Concentration, and the Fourth Concentration. Each has various divisions, three in each of the first three and eight in the fourth. The deities who inhabit these heavens experience only three of the five sense objects: those of visible form, sound, and touch.
Beyond the Realm of Form is the Formless Realm, not a place because it is not physical, but still a place of rebirth for those who have attained the deepest levels of concentration in their previous life. Here the beings have no bodies, only minds, which contemplate four objects that provide the names of the realms: Infinite Space, Infinite Consciousness, Nothingness, and Neither Existence nor Non-Existence.
Of the other five types of beings in samsara, the demigods (asura) inhabit the lower slopes of Mount Meru. Humans are found on the four islands surrounding it (although whether someone 32 cubits tall who lives for one thousand years is "human" would seem to be a question). Animals occupy the four continents, the skies above them, and the oceans that surround them. Ghosts are said to inhabit a realm beneath the ground as well as regions of the southern continent. Buddhist texts describe an elaborate system of eight hot hells and eight cold hells, as well as neighboring hells, all located at various depths beneath the surface of the earth; it is noteworthy that the hells are located not directly below Mount Meru, but beneath the southern continent, our continent, of Jambudvipa.
According to a widely known creation account, the first humans in the present period of abiding had a life span of eighty thousand years. They descended from the Formless Realm and the upper levels of the Realm of Form (which are not destroyed by the seven suns during the phase of destruction). Free from the marks of gender, they were able to fly and were illuminated by their own light; there was no need for a sun or moon. They also did not require food. At that time, the surface of the earth was covered by a white frothy substance. One of the beings descended to earth and dipped a fingertip into the substance and then touched the finger to its tongue. The taste was sweet. Soon all the beings began eating the white substance, which would naturally replenish itself. But the introduction of this food into their bodies soon caused them to lose their natural luster, and the sun and moon appeared to illumine the sky. The added weight of their bodies soon made it impossible for them to fly. The white substance evolved into a naturally growing huskless rice that would be ready to harvest again the day after it was picked. But as the beings ate more and more of the rice, it became necessary for them to somehow eliminate the waste that was accumulating in their bodies, and the anus and genitals developed. One couple soon discovered an additional use for the genitals and engaged in sexual intercourse for the first time. The others were scandalized, pelting them with mud. Soon, to hide their shameful activities, people began to build houses. Growing too lazy to pick the rice each day, they began to take more than they needed and hoard it in their houses. As a result, the rice developed husks and required more and more time to grow. Soon people began to steal from each other, requiring the election of a king who would enforce a system of laws. And this is how human society came into existence in this world.
Thus, setting aside for the moment the heavens above and the hells below-crucial though they are to Buddhist doctrine and practice-it can be said in summary that the human realm that Buddhist texts describe is a flat earth, or perhaps more accurately a flat ocean, its waters contained by a ring of iron mountains. In that ocean is a great central mountain, surrounded in the four cardinal directions by island continents.
This cosmography, with Mount Meru at its center, would provide the site for the first encounters between Buddhism and Science, encounters not of compatibility but of conflict. In 1552, more than three centuries before the Panadure debate, Francis Xavier described his mission to Japan:
And for the greater manifestation of God''s mercy, the Japanese are more subject to reason than any other pagan race that I have ever seen. They are so curious and importunate in their questioning and so eager to know that they never ceased asking us questions and telling others the answers which they had received from us. They did not know that the world was round, nor did they know the course of the sun. They asked about these and other things, for example, about comets, lightnings, rain and snow, and similar phenomena. They were very content and satisfied with our replies and explanations; and they deemed us to be learned men, something that was of some help in gaining credit for our words.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from BUDDHISM & SCIENCEby DONALD S. LOPEZ JR. Copyright © 2008 by The University of Chicago. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Wishlist
Share
Tweet
Feedback
