Post by Harry BaileyPost by Bill ReidDidn't this "Lacan" fellow apply "structuralism" to psychoanalysis
in the same way that Claude Levi-Strauss did for anthropology?
Your fondness for SCARE "quotes" is intriguing, the contents therein
being smugly dismissed as some kind of deluded phantasmatic
construction. As I already said, I don't wish to enter into that ego-
maniacal abyss of which you are so eager to defend, so instead I'll
just post here a reasonable "summary" of some of Lacan's principal
ideas, their connection or relevance to an analysis of EWS to follow
sometime again ...
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In his discussion of the absolute division between the unconscious and
the consciousness (or between id and ego), Freud introduces the idea
of the human self, or subject, as radically split, divided between
these two realms of conscious and unconscious. On the one hand, our
usual (Western humanist) ideas of self or personhood are defined by
operations of consciousness, including rationality, free will, and
self-reflection. For Freud and for psychoanalysis in general, however,
actions, thought, belief, and the concepts of "self" are all
determined or shaped by the unconscious, and its drives and desires.
Jacques Lacan is a French psychoanalyst. He was originally trained as
a psychiatrist, and in the 1930s and 40s worked with psychotic
patients; he began in the 1950s to develop his own version of
psychoanalysis, based on the ideas articulated in structuralist
linguistics and anthropology. You might think of Lacan as Freud +
Saussure, with a dash of Levi-Strauss, and even some seasoning of
Derrida. But his main influence/precursor is Freud. Lacan reinterprets
Freud in light of structuralist and post-structuralist theories,
turning psychoanalysis from an essentially humanist philosophy or
theory into a post-structuralist one.
One of the basic premises of humanism, as you recall, is that there is
such a thing as a stable self, that has all those nice things like
free will and self-determination. Freud's notion of the unconscious
was one of the ideas that began to question, or to destabilize, that
humanist ideal of the self; he was one of the precursors of post-
structuralism in that regard. But Freud hoped that, by bringing the
contents of the unconscious into consciousness, he could minimize
repression and neurosis--he makes a famous declaration about the
relation between the unconscious and conscious, saying that "Wo Es
war, soll Ich werden": Where It was, shall I be." In other words, the
"it," or "id" (unconscious) will be replaced by the "I", by
consciousness and self-identity. Freud's goal was to strengthen the
ego, the "I" self, the conscious/rational identity, so it would be
more powerful than the unconscious.
For Lacan, this project is impossible. The ego can never take the
place of the unconscious, or empty it out, or control it, because, for
Lacan, the ego or "I" self is only an illusion, a product of the
unconscious itself. In Lacanian psychoanalysis, the unconscious is the
ground of all being.
Where Freud is interested in investigating how the polymorphously
perverse child forms an unconscious and a superego and becomes a
civilized and productive (as well as correctly heterosexual) adult,
Lacan is interested in how the infant gets this illusion we call a
"self." His essay on the Mirror Stage describes that process, showing
how the infant forms an illusion of an ego, of a unified conscious
self identified by the word "I."
Central to the conception of the human, in Lacan, is the notion that
the unconscious, which governs all factors of human existence, is
structured like a language. He bases this on Freud's account of the
two main mechanisms of unconscious processes, condensation and
displacement. Both are essentially linguistic phenomena, where meaning
is either condensed (in metaphor) or displaced (in metonymy). Lacan
notes that Freud's dream analyses, and most of his analyses of the
unconscious symbolism used by his patients, depend on word-play--on
puns, associations, etc. that are chiefly verbal. Lacan says that the
contents of the unconscious are acutely aware of language, and
particularly of the structure of language.
And here he follows ideas laid out by Saussure, but modifies them a
bit. Where Saussure talked about the relations between signifier and
signified, which form a sign, and insisted that the structure of
language is the negative relation among signs (one sign is what it is
because it is not another sign), Lacan focuses on relations between
signifiers alone. The elements in the unconscious--wishes, desires,
images--all form signifiers (and they're usually expressed in verbal
terms), and these signifiers form a "signifying chain"--one signifier
has meaning only because it is not some other signifier. For Lacan,
there are no signifieds; there is nothing that a signifier ultimately
refers to. If there were, then the meaning of any particular signifier
would be relatively stable--there would be (in Saussure's terms) a
relation of signification between signifier and signified, and that
relation would create or guarantee some kind of meaning. Lacan says
those relations of signification don't exist (in the unconscious, at
least); rather, there are only the negative relations, relations of
value, where one signifier is what it is because it's not something
else.
Because of this lack of signifieds, Lacan says, the chain of
signifiers--x=y=z=b=q=0=%=|=s (etc.)--is constantly sliding and
shifting and circulating. There is no anchor, nothing that ultimately
gives meaning or stability to the whole system. The chain of
signifiers is constantly in play (in Derrida's sense); there's no way
to stop sliding down the chain--no way to say "oh, x means this," and
have it be definitive. Rather, one signifier only leads to another
signifier, and never to a signified. It's kind of like a dictionary--
one word only leads you to more words, but never to the things the
words supposedly represent.
Lacan says this is what the unconscious looks like--a continually
circulating chain (or multiple chains) of signifiers, with no anchor--
or, to use Derrida's terms, no center. This is Lacan's linguistic
translation of Freud's picture of the unconscious as this chaotic
realm of constantly shifting drives and desires. Freud is interested
in how to bring those chaotic drives and desires into consciousness,
so that they can have some order and sense and meaning, so they can be
understood and made manageable. Lacan, on the other hand, says that
the process of becoming an adult, a "self," is the process of trying
to fix, to stabilize, to stop the chain of signifiers so that stable
meaning--including the meaning of "I"--becomes possible. Though of
course Lacan says that this possibility is only an illusion, an image
created by a misperception of the relation between body and self.
But I'm getting too far ahead of where we're going.
the oral, the anal, and the phallic; it's the Oedipus complex and
Castration complex that end polymorphous perversity and create "adult"
beings. Lacan creates different categories to explain a similar
trajectory, from infant to "adult." He talks about 3 concepts--need,
demand, and desire--that roughly correspond to 3 phases of
development, or 3 fields in which humans develop--the Real, the
Imaginary, and the Symbolic. The Symbolic realm, which is marked by
the concept of desire (I'll explain this in more detail later) is the
equivalent of adulthood; or, more specifically for Lacan, the Symbolic
realm is the structure of language itself, which we have to enter into
in order to become speaking subjects, in order to say "I" and have "I"
designate something which appears to be stable.
Like Freud, Lacan's infant starts out as something inseparable from
its mother; there's no distinction between self and other, between
baby and mother (at least, from the baby's perspective). In fact, the
baby (for both Freud and Lacan) is a kind of blob, with no sense of
self or individuated identity, and no sense even of its body as a
coherent unified whole. This baby-blob is driven by NEED; it needs
food, it needs comfort/safety, it needs to be changed, etc. These
needs are satisfiable, and can be satisfied by an object. When the
baby needs food, it gets a breast (or a bottle); when it needs safety,
it gets hugged. The baby, in this state of NEED, doesn't recognize any
distinction between itself and the objects that meet its needs; it
doesn't recognize that an object (like a breast) is part of another
whole person (because it doesn't have any concept yet of "whole
person"). There's no distinction between it and anyone or anything
else; there are only needs and things that satisfy those needs.
This is the state of "nature," which has to be broken up in order for
culture to be formed. This is true in both Freud's psychoanalysis and
in Lacan's: the infant must separate from its mother, form a separate
identity, in order to enter into civilization. That separation entails
some kind of LOSS; when the child knows the difference between itself
and its mother, and starts to become an individuated being, it loses
that primal sense of unity (and safety/security) that it originally
had. This is the element of the tragic built into psychoanalytic
theory (whether Freudian or Lacanian): to become a civilized "adult"
always entails the profound loss of an original unity, a non-
differentiation, a merging with others (particularly the mother).
The baby who has not yet made this separation, who has only needs
which are satisfiable, and which makes no distinction between itself
and the objects that satisfy its needs, exists in the realm of the
REAL, according to Lacan. The Real is a place (a psychic place, not a
physical place) where there is this original unity. Because of that,
there is no absence or loss or lack; the Real is all fullness and
completeness, where there's no need that can't be satisfied. And
because there is no absence or loss or lack, there is no language in
the Real.
Let me back up a bit to explain that. Lacan here follows an argument
Freud made about the idea of loss. In a case study which appears in
Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Freud talks about his nephew,
aged about 18 months, who is playing a game with a spool tied with
yarn. The kid throws the spool away, and says "Fort," which is German
for "gone." He pulls the spool back in, and says "Da," which is German
for "here." Freud says that this game was symbolic for the kid, a way
of working out his anxiety about his mother's absence. When he threw
the spool and said "Fort," he replayed the experience of the loss of a
beloved object; when he reeled it in and said "Da," he got pleasure
from the restoration of the object.
Lacan takes this case and focuses, of course, on the aspect of
language it displays. Lacan says that the fort/da game, which Freud
said happened when his nephew was about 18 months old, is about the
child's entry into the Symbolic, or into the structure of language
itself. Lacan says that language is always about loss or absence; you
only need words when the object you want is gone. If your world was
all fullness, with no absence, then you wouldn't need language.
(Jonathan Swift, in Gulliver's Travels, has a version of this: a
culture where there is no language, and people carry all the objects
they need to refer to on their backs).
Thus in the realm of the Real, according to Lacan, there is no
language because there is no loss, no lack, no absence; there is only
complete fullness, needs and the satisfaction of needs. Hence the Real
is always beyond language, unrepresentable in language (and therefore
irretrievably lost when one enters into language).
The Real, and the phase of need, last from birth till somewhere
between 6 and 18 months, when the baby blob starts to be able to
distinguish between its body and everything else in the world. At this
point, the baby shifts from having needs to having DEMANDS. Demands
are not satisfiable with objects; a demand is always a demand for
recognition from another, for love from another. The process works
like this: the baby starts to become aware that it is separate from
the mother, and that there exist things that are not part of it; thus
the idea of "other" is created. (Note, however, that as yet the binary
opposition of "self/other" doesn't yet exist, because the baby still
doesn't have a coherent sense of "self"). That awareness of
separation, or the fact of otherness, creates an anxiety, a sense of
loss. The baby then demands a reunion, a return to that original sense
of fullness and non-separation that it had in the Real. But that is
impossible, once the baby knows (and this knowing, remember, is all
happening on an unconscious level) that the idea of an "other" exists.
The baby demands to be filled by the other, to return to the sense of
original unity; the baby wants the idea of "other" to disappear.
Demand is thus the demand for the fullness, the completeness, of the
other that will stop up the lack the baby is experiencing. But of
course this is impossible, because that lack, or absence, the sense of
"other"ness, is the condition for the baby becoming a self/subject, a
functioning cultural being.
Because the demand is for recognition from the other, it can't really
be satisfied, if only because the 6-to-18 month infant can't SAY what
it wants. The baby cries, and the mother gives it a bottle, or a
breast, or a pacifier, or something, but no object can satisfy the
demand--the demand is for a response on a different level. The baby
can't recognize the ways the mother does respond to it, and recognize
it, because it doesn't yet have a conception of itself as a thing--it
only knows that this idea of "other" exists, and that it is separate
from the "other", but it doesn't yet have an idea of what its "self"
is.
This is where Lacan's MIRROR STAGE happens. At this age--between 6 and
18 months--the baby or child hasn't yet mastered its own body; it
doesn't have control over its own movements, and it doesn't have a
sense of its body as a whole. Rather, the baby experiences its body as
fragmented, or in pieces--whatever part is within its field of vision
is there as long as the baby can see it, but gone when the baby can't
see it. It may see its own hand, but it doesn't know that that hand
belongs to it--the hand could belong to anyone, or no one. However,
the child in this stage can imagine itself as whole--because it has
seen other people, and perceived them as whole beings.
Lacan says that at some point in this period, the baby will see itself
in a mirror. It will look at its reflection, then look back at a real
person--its mother, or some other person--then look again at the
mirror image. The child moves "from insufficiency to anticipation" in
this action; the mirror, and the moving back and forth from mirror
image to other people, gives it a sense that it, too, is an integrated
being, a whole person. The child, still unable to be whole, and hence
separate from others (though it has this notion of separation), in the
mirror stage begins to anticipate being whole. It moves from a
"fragmented body" to an "orthopedic vision of its totality", to a
vision of itself as whole and integrated, which is "orthopedic"
because it serves as a crutch, a corrective instrument, an aid to help
the child achieve the status of wholeness.
What the child anticipates is a sense of self as a unified separate
whole; the child sees that it looks like what "others" look like.
Eventually, this entity the child sees in the mirror, this whole
being, will be a "self," the entity designated by the word "I." What
is really happening, however, is an identification that is a
MISRECOGNITION. The child sees an image in the mirror; it thinks, that
image is "ME". But it's NOT the child; it's only an image. But another
person (usually the mother) is there to reinforce the misrecognition.
The baby looks in the mirror, and looks back at mother, and the mother
says, "Yes, it's you!" She guarantees the "reality" of the connection
between the child and its image, and the idea of the integrated whole
body the child is seeing and identifying with.
The child takes that image in the mirror as the summation of its
entire being, its "self." This process, of misrecognizing one's self
in the image in the mirror, creates the EGO, the thing that says "I."
In Lacan's terms, this misrecognition creates the "armor" of the
subject, an illusion or misperception of wholeness, integration, and
totality that surrounds and protects the fragmented body. To Lacan,
ego, or self, or "I"dentity, is always on some level a FANTASY, an
identification with an external image, and not an internal sense of
separate whole identity.
This is why Lacan calls the phase of demand, and the mirror stage, the
realm of the IMAGINARY. The idea of a self is created through an
Imaginary identification with the image in the mirror. The realm of
the Imaginary is where the alienated relation of self to its own image
is created and maintained. The Imaginary is a realm of images, whether
conscious or unconscious. It's prelinguistic, and preoedipal, but very
much based in visual perception, or what Lacan calls specular
imaging.
The mirror image, the whole person the baby mistakes as itself, is
known in psychoanalytic terminology as an "ideal ego," a perfect whole
self who has no insufficiency. This "ideal ego" becomes internalized;
we build our sense of "self," our "I"dentity, by (mis)identifying with
this ideal ego. By doing this, according to Lacan, we imagine a self
that has no lack, no notion of absence or incompleteness. The fiction
of the stable, whole, unified self that we see in the mirror becomes a
compensation for having lost the original oneness with the mother's
body. In short, according to Lacan, we lose our unity with the
mother's body, the state of "nature," in order to enter culture, but
we protect ourselves from the knowledge of that loss by misperceiving
ourselves as not lacking anything--as being complete unto ourselves.
Lacan says that the child's self-concept (its ego or "I"dentity) will
never match up to its own being. Its IMAGO in the mirror is both
smaller and more stable than the child, and is always "other" than the
child--something outside it. The child, for the rest of its life, will
misrecognize its self as "other, as the image in the mirror that
provides an illusion of self and of mastery.
The Imaginary is the psychic place, or phase, where the child projects
its ideas of "self" onto the mirror image it sees. The mirror stage
cements a self/other dichotomy, where previously the child had known
only "other," but not "self." For Lacan, the identification of "self"
is always in terms of "other." This is not the same as a binary
opposition, where "self"= what is not "other," and "other" = what is
not "self." Rather, "self" IS "other", in Lacan's view; the idea of
the self, that inner being we designate by "I," is based on an image,
an other. The concept of self relies on one's misidentification with
this image of an other.
Lacan uses the term "other" in a number of ways, which make it even
harder to grasp. First, and perhaps the easiest, is in the sense of
self/other, where "other" is the "not-me;" but, as we have seen, the
"other" becomes "me" in the mirror stage. Lacan also uses an idea of
Other, with a capital "o", to distinguish between the concept of the
other and actual others. The image the child sees in the mirror is an
other, and it gives the child the idea of Other as a structural
possibility, one which makes possible the structural possibility of
"I" or self. In other words, the child encounters actual others--its
own image, other people--and understands the idea of "Otherness,"
things that are not itself. According to Lacan, the notion of
Otherness, encountered in the Imaginary phase (and associated with
demand), comes before the sense of "self," which is built on the idea
of Otherness.
When the child has formulated some idea of Otherness, and of a self
identified with its own "other," its own mirror image, then the child
begins to enter the Symbolic realm. The Symbolic and the Imaginary are
overlapping, unlike Freud's phases of development; there's no clear
marker or division between the two, and in some respects they always
coexist. The Symbolic order is the structure of language itself; we
have to enter it in order to become speaking subjects, and to
designate ourselves by "I." The foundation for having a self lies in
the Imaginary projection of the self onto the specular image, the
other in the mirror, and having a self is expressed in saying "I,"
which can only occur within the Symbolic, which is why the two
coexist.
The fort/da game that the nephew played, in Freud's account, is in
Lacan's view a marker of the entry into the Symbolic, because Hans is
using language to negotiate the idea of absence and the idea of
Otherness as a category or structural possibility. The spool,
according to Lacan, serves as an "objet petit a," or "objet petit
autre"--an object which is a little "other," a small-o other. In
throwing it away, the child recognizes that others can disappear; in
pulling it back, the child recognizes that others can return. Lacan
emphasizes the former, insisting that Little Hans is primarily
concerned with the idea of lack or absence of the "objet petit
autre."
The "little other" illustrates for the child the idea of lack, of
loss, of absence, showing the child that it isn't complete in and of
itself. It is also the gateway to the Symbolic order, to language,
since language itself is premised on the idea of lack or absence.
Lacan says these ideas--of other and Other, of lack and absence, of
the (mis)identification of self with o/Other--are all worked out on an
individual level, with each child, but they form the basic structures
of the Symbolic order, of language, which the child must enter in
order to become an adult member of culture. Thus the otherness acted
out in the fort/da game (as well as by the distinctions made in the
Mirror Phase between self and other, mother and child) become
categorical or structural ideas. So, in the Symbolic, there is a
structure (or structuring principle) of Otherness, and a structuring
principle of Lack.
The Other (capital O) is a structural position in the Symbolic order.
It is the place that everyone is trying to get to, to merge with, in
order to get rid of the separation between "self" and "other." It is,
in Derrida's sense, the CENTER of the system, of the Symbolic and/or
of language itself. As such, the Other is the thing to which every
element relates. But, as the center, the Other (again, not a person
but a position) can't be merged with. Nothing can be in the center
with the Other, even though everything in the system (people, e.g.)
want to be. So the position of the Other creates and sustains a never-
ending LACK, which Lacan calls DESIRE. Desire is the desire to be the
Other. By definition, desire can never be fulfilled: it's not desire
for some object (which would be need) or desire for love or another
person's recognition of oneself (which would be demand), but desire to
be the center of the system, the center of the Symbolic, the center of
language itself.
The center has a lot of names in Lacanian theory. It's the Other; it's
also called the PHALLUS. Here's where Lacan borrows again from Freud's
original Oedipus theory.
The mirror stage is pre-oedipal. The self is constructed in relation
to an other, to the idea of Other, and the self wants to merge with
the Other. As in Freud's world, the most important other in the
child's life is the mother; so the child wants to merge with its
mother. In Lacan's terms, this is the child's demand that the self/
other split be erased. The child decides that it can merge with the
mother if it becomes what the mother wants it to be--in Lacan's terms,
the child tries to fulfill the mother's desire. The mother's desire
(formed by her own entry into the Symbolic, because she is already an
adult) is to not have lack, or Lack (or to be the Other, the center,
the place where nothing is lacking). This fits with the Freudian
version of the Oedipus complex, where the child wants to merge with
its mother by having sexual intercourse with her. In Freud's model,
the idea of lack is represented by the lack of a penis. The boy who
wants to sleep with his mother wants to complete her lack by filling
her up with his penis.
In Freud's view, what breaks this oedipal desire up, for boys anyway,
is the father, who threatens castration. The father threatens to make
the boy experience lack, the absence of the penis, if he tries to use
his penis to make up for the mother's lack of a penis. In Lacan's
terms, the threat of castration is a metaphor for the whole idea of
Lack as a structural concept. For Lacan, it isn't the real father who
threatens castration. Rather, because the idea of lack, or Lack, is
essential to the concept of language, because the concept of Lack is
part of the basic structuration of language, the father becomes a
function of the linguistic structure. The Father, rather than being a
person, becomes a structuring principle of the Symbolic order.
For Lacan, Freud's angry father becomes the Name-of-the-Father, or the
Law-of-the-Father, or sometimes just the Law. Submission to the rules
of language itself--the Law of the Father--is required in order to
enter into the Symbolic order. To become a speaking subject, you have
to be subjected to, you have to obey, the laws and rules of language.
Lacan designates the idea of the structure of language, and its rules,
as specifically paternal. He calls the rules of language the Law-of-
the-Father in order to link the entry into the Symbolic, the structure
of language, to Freud's notion of the oedipus and castration
complexes.
The Law-of-the-Father, or Name-of-the-Father, is another term for the
Other, for the center of the system, the thing that governs the whole
structure--its shape and how all the elements in the system can move
and form relationships. This center is also called the PHALLUS, to
underline even more the patriarchal nature of the Symbolic order. The
Phallus, as center, limits the play of elements, and gives stability
to the whole structure. The Phallus anchors the chains of signifiers
which, in the unconscious, are just floating and unfixed, always
sliding and shifting. The Phallus stops play, so that signifiers can
have some stable meaning. It is because the Phallus is the center of
the Symbolic order, of language, that the term "I" designates the idea
of the self (and, additionally, why any other word has stable
meaning).
The Phallus is not the same as the penis. Penises belong to
individuals; the Phallus belongs to the structure of language itself.
No one has it, just like no one governs language or rules language.
Rather, the Phallus is the center. It governs the whole structure,
it's what everyone wants to be (or have), but no one can get there (no
element of the system can take the place of the center). That's what
Lacan calls DESIRE: the desire, which is never satisfied, because it
can never be satisfied, to be the center, to rule the system.
Lacan says that boys can think they have a shot at being the Phallus,
at occupying the position of center, because they have penises. Girls
have a harder time misperceiving themselves as having a shot at the
Phallus because they are (as Freud says) constituted by and as lack,
lacking a penis, and the Phallus is a place where there is no lack.
But, Lacan says, every subject in language is constituted by/as lack,
or Lack. The only reason we have language at all is because of the
loss, or lack, of the union with the maternal body. In fact, it is the
necessity to become part of "culture," to become subjects in language,
that forces that absence, loss, lack.
The distinction between the sexes is significant in Lacan's theory,
though not in the same way it is in Freud's. This is what Lacan talks
about in "The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious," on p. 741. He
has two drawings there. One is of the word "Tree" over a picture of a
tree--the basic Saussurean concept, of signifier (word) over signified
(object). Then he has another drawing, of two identical doors (the
signifieds). But over each door is a different word: one says "Ladies"
"A train arrives at a station. A little boy and a little girl, brother
and sister, are seated in a compartment face to face next to the
window through which the buildings along the station platform can be
seen passing as the train pulls to a stop. 'Look,' says the brother,
'We're at Ladies!' 'Idiot!' replies his sister, 'Can't you see we're
at Gentlemen.'"
This anecdote shows how boys and girls enter the Symbolic order, the
structure of language, differently. In Lacan's view, each child can
only see the signifier of the other gender; each child constructs its
world view, its understanding of the relation between sfr and sfd in
naming locations, as the consequence of seeing an "other." As Lacan
puts it (742), "For these children, Ladies and Gentlemen will be
henceforth two countries toward which each of their souls will strive
on divergent wings..." Each child, each sex, has a particular position
within the Symbolic order; from that position, each sex can only see
(or signify) the otherness of the other sex. You might take Lacan's
drawing of the two doors literally: these are the doors, with their
gender distinctions, through which each child must pass in order to
enter into the Symbolic realm.
So, to summarize. Lacan's theory starts with the idea of the Real;
this is the union with the mother's body, which is a state of nature,
and must be broken up in order to build culture. Once you move out of
the Real, you can never get back, but you always want to. This is the
first idea of an irretrievable loss or lack.
Next comes the Mirror stage, which constitutes the Imaginary. Here you
grasp the idea of others, and begin to understand Otherness as a
concept or a structuring principle, and thus begin to formulate a
notion of "self". This "self" (as seen in the mirror) is in fact an
other, but you misrecognize it as you, and call it "self." (Or, in non-
theory language, you look in the mirror and say "hey, that's me." But
it's not--it's just an image).
This sense of self, and its relation to others and to Other, sets you
up to take up a position in the Symbolic order, in language. Such a
position allows you to say "I", to be a speaking subject. "I" (and all
other words) have a stable meaning because they are fixed, or
anchored, by the Other/Phallus/Name-of-the-Father/Law, which is the
center of the Symbolic, the center of language.
In taking up a position in the Symbolic, you enter through a gender-
marked doorway; the position for girls is different than the position
for boys. Boys are closer to the Phallus than girls, but no one is or
has the Phallus--it's the center. Your position in the Symbolic, like
the position of all other signifying elements (signifiers) is fixed by
the Phallus; unlike the unconscious, the chains of signifiers in the
Symbolic don't circulate and slide endlessly because the Phallus
limits play.
Paradoxically--as if all this wasn't bad enough!--the Phallus and the
Real are pretty similar. Both are places where things are whole,
complete, full, unified, where there's no lack, or Lack. Both are
places that are inaccessible to the human subject-in-language. But
they are also opposite: the Real is the maternal, the ground from
which we spring, the nature we have to separate from in order to have
culture; the Phallus is the idea of the Father, the patriarchal order
of culture, the ultimate idea of culture, the position which rules
everything in the world.
Such a mish mosh of theory the Psychoanalysis school created....old
derivitive stuff too. Nothing new and no real practice.
Like Jung, Borrowed ideas from "Mind Only" School of
buddhism..........................theoretical meanderings attampt at being
like a "mind only" Buddhist school.
All been done before in far more depth and with far more direct experience,
for thousands of years.
"Yogaacaara Buddhism was first introduced into China
in the early sixth century through the effort of the
so-called Ti-lun masters(a) and She-lun masters(b),
who based their teachings on the
Da`sabhuumikasuutra-`saastra (Ti-lun) and
Mahaayaanasa.mgraha`saastra (she-lun) of Vasubandhu
and Asa^nga, respectively.(1) While these Ti-lun and
She-lun masters shared the general Yogaacaara
concern for the problem of the mind, their
understanding of the mind's nature, functions, and
role in the process of enlightenment differed
markedly from the original Indian model. In this
article we shall attempt to outline some of the main
features of the early Chinese Yogaacaara teaching of
the mind based on the works of Hui-yuan of the
Ching-ying Temple(c),(2) who had the distinction of
being the only Ti-lun master who had left behind a
wide assortment of writings,(3) which at present
constitute the single most important source for the
study of the early interpretation of Yogaacaara
thought in China.(4)
I. MIND-ONLY AS THE CENTRAL THEME OF MAHAYANA BUDDHISM
Among the many ways of classifying Buddhist texts
current in his time,(5) Hui-yuan favors the twofold
division into "the canon of the `sraavakas"
(sheng-wen tsang(d) ) and "the canon of the
bodhisattvas" (p'u-sa tsang(e)), which corresponds
to the traditional division of Buddhism into the two
branches of the Hiinayaana and the Mahaayaana. Of
the many ideas peculiar to the Mahaayaana group of
scriptures, Hui-yuan mentions in particular the
tenet of mind only:
In the teaching of the Mahaayaana, it is maintained
that all dharmas are merely beings of the mind, just
as appearances in dreams. When the mind arises,
dharmas [also] arise; and when the mind is
annihilated, dharmas are [also] annihilated. Since
[the activities of] the false mind will cease with
the attainment of nirvaa.na, all dharmas, being
appearances of the mind, will [also] come to an
end.(6)
Contrasting the Hiinayaana with the Mahaayaana
conceptions of the false consciousness, Hui-yuan
points out that while the Hiinayaanists realize the
mistake of attributing self-nature to dharmas, they
cannot comprehend that all dharmas are founded on
the mind:
As depicted in Hiinayaana [texts], the grasping and
the deluded mind erroneously regards dharmas outside
the mind as possessing self-nature, and does not
perceive that [all] nameable functions are without
[self-] essence. As depicted in the teaching of the
Mahaayaana, the false consciousness deceives and
hides the true essence, and wrongly considers
dharmas arising from itself as real.(7)
His conception of Mahaayaana Buddhism being such, it
is not surprising that Hui-yuan, a self-avowed
Mahaayaanist like most Chinese Buddhists, would come
to adopt the thesis of mind-only as the core of his
ontology. Thus, we often find in his writings such
statements as "All dharmas are produced by the one
mind,
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just as events in dreams are created by the mind in
slumber,"(8) "There exist at first false thoughts,
which conceive of [the existence of] dharmas outside
the mind, not realizing that dharmas owe their being
to the mind,"(9) and so forth. The idea that there
exist no mind-independent entities is central to
Hui-yuan's world view. So he remarks, "No realm [of
being] originates from itself, but is formed by the
mind."(10) Again he asserts, "One perceives that the
external world arises from the mind only. That there
exists no realm outside the mind is known as 'the
nature of no-form' (wu-hsiang hsing(f))."(11)
Quotation 6, preceding, mentions that dharmas
will come to an end when the false mind ceases to
exist, and quotation 7 declares that dharmas arise
out of the false mind. Both citations give the
impression that the mind constituting the ultimate
reality in Hui-yuan's ontology is defiled in nature.
However, Hui-yuan affirms very emphatically in the
Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin lun i-su(g) (Commentary on the
Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin lun(h), henceforth abbreviated
to Commentary) that to talk of things proceeding
from false thoughts is provisional, whereas in
truth, all dharmas evolve from the
true-consciousness (chen-shih(i)):
By "all dharmas", [the Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin lun]
refers to various dharmas [of the realm] of
samsaara. [The term "mind" in the phrase] "are
developed from the mind" refers to the
true-consciousness, As false [dharmas] do not exist
on their own but arise dependent on the true
[-mind], it is said that [dharmas] evolve from the
mind. [The term "false thoughts" in the clause] "are
produced by false thoughts" refers to the seventh
consciousness.(12) If we consider the immediate
[condition], dharmas pertaining to the samsaaric
[realm] are the products of false thoughts.(13)
In the same text, he outlines three ways of
apprehending the truth of mind-only, culminating in
the contemplation of the true-mind as the foundation
of all beings, including the false mind:
There are three kinds of contemplation:
1. The contemplation of false appearances:
It perceives that the three realms(14) are false
appearances proceeding from the mind only, just
like objects produced in dreams. Equipped with
the idea of nonexistence, [it comprehends that]
there is ultimately no dharma outside the mind.
2. The contemplation of false thoughts:
It perceives that what the false mind constructs
is without substance and comes into being
dependent on the true [mind], just as waves are
dependent on water....
3. The contemplation of the true [-mind]:
It perceives that all dharmas without exception
originate and are formed from the true [-mind],
and other than the true [-mind], there is
absolutely nothing which can give rise to false
thoughts. Since nothing [other than the
true-mind] can give rise to false thoughts, even
the false mind [to which common sense attributes
the production of false thoughts] is in truth
nonexistent.(15)
In one place, he speaks of the tathaagatagarbha, the
other name for the truemind, as the basis of our
everyday world of name and form.(16) In another
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instance, he refers to the tathaagatagarbha as the
"substance, " with the realms of sa.msaara and
nirvaa.na as its "functions."(17) All in all,
"mind-only" in Hui-yuan's system of thought denotes
in final analysis the ontological dependence of all
phenomenal beings whether physical or mental on the
intrinsically pure mind which every sentient being
originally possesses. This thesis, in Hui-yuan's
opinion, represents the most profound as well as the
most truthful interpretation of the nature of
reality in Buddhism.
II. THE SYSTEM OF EIGHT CONSCIOUSNESSES (1): THE
AALAYA-CONSCIOUSNESS OR THE EIGHTH CONSCIOUSNESS
In Hui-yuan's writings, the idea of mind-only is
couched in the framework of the theory of eight
consciousnesses, which testifies abundantly to the
Yogaacaara as well as the Ti-lun descent of his
teaching.(18) According to Hui-yuan, depending on
how one approaches the matter, the mind of each
sentient being can be viewed as one totality, or be
analyzed into two, three, four, and up to sixty or
even more aspects.(19) However, influenced by the
La^nkaavataara-suutra, Hui-yuan favors the scheme of
eight consciousnesses:
The idea of [the existence of] eight consciousnesses
comes from the La^naavataara-suutra. Thus, in the
sutra, [the Bodhisattva] Mahaamati addresses the
Buddha. "World-honored one! Do you establish [the
theory of] eight consciousnesses?" The Buddha says
"I establish it." (T, vol. 16, p. 496a, 11.21-22)
What we call "consciousness" is the other name for
"mental congnition" (shen-chih(j)). Examined from
[different] perspectives, the number of
consciousnesses become innumerable, but we now adopt
one interpretation, and discuss eight types [of
consciousnesses]. What are the names of these eight?
They are: (i) eye-consciousness, (ii)
ear-consciousness, (iii) nose-consciousness, (iv)
tongue-consciousness, (v) body-consciousness, (vi)
mind-consciousness, (vii) aadaana-consciousness, and
(viii) aalaya-consciousness.(20)
The nature of the eight consciousnesses can be
inferred from their names:
The first six of the eight [consciousnesses] receive
their names from the senseorgans [with which they
are associated], whereas the last two express
[different aspects of] the substance [of the mind].
The sense organs are namely eye, ear, nose, tongue,
body, and mind. When we apprehend consciousness from
these [six perspectives], we thereby come to have
[the first] six types [of consciousness]. Since the
substance [of the mind] includes [both aspects of]
the true and the false, it is further divided into
two.(21)
When the mind functions in connection with the six
organs of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and
mind,(22) it is known as the eye-consciousness,
ear-consciousness, nose-consciousness,
tongue-consciousness, body-consciousness, and
mind-consciousness, respectively. In itself, the
mind includes both aspects of the true and the
false, which make up the aalaya-consciousness and
the aadana-consciousness, respectively. Thus,
altogether, we come to have a scheme of eight
consciousnesses. In this section, we shall take up
the aalaya-consciousness first.
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The word "aalaya," judged from its Sanskrit root
a-/li (to adhere, to cling), suggests a propensity
for attachment and so denotes something which ought
to be transformed by proper religious practices.
Such is the conception of the aalaya found in such
standard Indian Yogaacaara works as the
Yogaacaaryabhuumi-`sastra, the
Mahaayaanasa.mgraha-`saastra, and the
Tri.m`sikaavij~napti-kaarikaa, in which the
aalaya-consciousness is given as the subject of
transmigration, the origin of the realm of samsaara,
and the repository of karmic effects both pure and
impure.(23) Hui-yuan, on the other hand, due to his
Ti-lun upbringing, considers the "aalaya" as
standing for the true aspect of the mind.(24)
Speaking on the meaning of the term "aalaya,"
Hui-yuan writes in the Ta-ch'eng i chang(k)
(Essentials of the Mahaayaana, henceforth
abbreviated to Essentials):
"AAlaya", rendered literally into our language,
means "never loses." That is, it never loses [its
true nature] even when [transmigrating] in [the
realm of] samsara.(25)
This definition is followed by a long list of names
considered by Hui-yuan to be equivalent to the
"aalaya":
When rendered freely according to its significance,
[the aalaya] is known by eight different names:
1. It is known as the tsang-shih(l)
(storehouse-consciousness) , for this
consciousness is the tsang (embryo, garbha) of
the tathaagata....(26)
2. It is known as the sheng-shih(m)
(holy-conciousness), for it is the basis of the
activities of the great sages.
3. It is known as the ti-i-i shih(n) (supreme
consciousness), for it is [in nature] the most
excellent....
4. It is known as the ching-shih(o)
(pure-consciousness), also as the wu-kou shih(p)
(nondefiled consciousness), for its substance can
never be soiled....
5. It is known as the chen-shih(q)
(true-consciousness), for it is in essence devoid
of falsehood....
6. It is known as the chen-ju shih(r)
(tathataa-consciousness), as is explained in the
[Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin] lun: "Since the essence of
the mind cannot be destroyed, it is known as
chen. Since [the mind is self-sufficient and
depends on the sustenance of nothing, it is known
as ju." (T, vol. 32, p. 576a, 11. 15-16)
7. It is known as the chia-shih(s)
(home-consciousness), also as the chai-shih(t)
(residence-consciousness), for it acts as the
support of false dharmas.
8. It is known as the pen-shih(u)
(root-consciousness) , for it constitutes the
ground of the false mind.(27)
From the above inventory of synonyms of the
aalaya,(28) it is evident that in Hui-yuan yuan's
system of thought, the aalaya-consciousness denotes
the tathaagatagarbha (1), that is, the intrinsically
pure consciousness (3, 4), which may be overlaid
with defilements but can never be soiled in essence
(5). This consciousness is eternal (6), and is the
origin of both the physical and mental aspects of
the phenomenal world (7, 8). As the basis of all
religious activities, it makes possible the
attainment of the supreme enlightenment (2). Every
sentient being possesses this immaculate principle,
as Hui-yuan emphasizes in the Commentary:
With respect to deeds, the common man and the sage
are different, each [creat-
P355
ing] his own causes and [reaping] his own fruits.
With respect to [inner] principle, however, they are
the same and [are of] one flavor. This principle
does not diminish in the case of the two vehicles
[the `sraavakas and the pratyekabuddhas), nor does
it augment in the cases of the buddhas and
bodhisattvas.(29)
In his discussion of the true-consciousness
which is the aalaya, Hui-yuan follows the Ta-ch'eng
ch'i-hsin lun, and analyses it into the three
aspects of substance (t'i(v) ) , characteristics
(hsiang(w)), and function (yung(x)):(30)
Regarding the true-consciousness, it can be divided
into three aspects, that is, substance,
characteristics, and function. With respect to
"substance," the true-consciousness is known as the
tathataa, which is profound, tranquil, and equal.
Being the final reality (ju-ju(y)) which is of one
flavor, it remains self-same whether when hidden or
when manifested, whether amidst defilements or [the
state of] purity. It remains placid at all times,
and falls neither under [the category of] cause nor
under [the category of] effect. With respect to
"characteristics, " this consciousness is the
cognitive mind pertaining to [the realm of] the
tathaagatagarbha, and is constituted of
buddha-dharmas [as numerous as] the sand of the
Ganges; just as the cognitive mind pertaining to
[the realm of] worldly dharmas is constituted of
[the features of] pain and impermanence. When this
true mind is in [the state of] falsehood, its
[excellent] characteristics are obscured and [so] is
described as "defiled." When it is freed from the
bonds of defilement, it is counted as "pure." When
its pure characteristics are not yet fully
[restored], it is known as the "cause." When its
pure characteristics are perfected, it is known as
the "effect".... As for "function, " when the
true-consciousness is in a defiled state, it is
allied to false thoughts and produces [the realm of]
sa.msaara. When it is in a pure condition, it
produces [various] deeds of virtue in response to
[the vices it is trying to] eliminate. When the
deeds of virtue are not yet perfected, this mind is
known as the "cause" of expedient acts. When the
deeds of virtue come to final completion, it is
known as the "effect" of expedient acts.(31)
By the aspect "substance, " Hui-yuan means the
true-consciousness as it is in itself. As such, it
is the "final reality" which is "profound, tranquil,
and equal." Being eternal and immutable, it is above
all distinctions, and so the appellations "cause"
and "effect" are not applicable to it. By the aspect
"characteristics," Hui-yuan refers to the manifested
features of the true-consciousness when it is in
interaction with worldly dharmas. Unlike worldly
dharmas which are stamped with the marks of pain and
impermanence, the true-consciousness possesses all
the excellent attributes of the tathaagatagarbha.
When these excellent attributes are obscured by
worldly dharmas, the true-consciousness is described
as "defiled" or the "cause." When all impure
influences are removed, the true-consciousness is
described as "pure" or the "fruit." So, it comes
about that such terms as "defiled," "cause," and
"effect" can be used to represent the
true-consciousness in its relation with the mundane
world, even when it is understood that they are not
appropriate descriptions of the true-consciousness
as it is in itself. By the aspect "function,"
Hui-yuan alludes to the true-consciousness as the
ontological ground of both the realms of sa.msaara
and nirvaa.na. When the true-consciousness is allied
to false thoughts, it is the source of the
origination of mundane existences. When considered
in connection with
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virtuous deeds, it constitutes the "cause" as well
as the "effect" of opportune religious practices.
Besides telling us what the true-consciousness
or the aalaya is, Hui-yuan also informs us what the
true-consciousness or the aalaya is not. Hui-yuan
mentions several misconceptions of the nature and
functions of the aalaya, which he classifies into
two categories: those connected with the notion of
"being" (yu(z)), and those connected with the notion
of "nonbeing" (wu(aa)).(33) Under the first heading,
he mentions the following errors:
1. There are those who, on hearing that the
true-consciousness is the "self," identify it
with the eternal soul or aatman taught by the
non-Buddhists. To counteract this
misunderstanding, Hui-yuan declares that "the
tathaagatagarbha is neither the aatman, nor
sentient beings, nor [the force of] life, nor the
pudgala."(34)
2. There are those who, on hearing that both the
realms of sa.msaara.a and nirvaa.na originate
from the true-consciousness, think that the
true-consciousness is composed of defiled as well
as nondefiled elements. Quoting the Ta-ch'eng
ch'i-hsin lun, Hui-yuan stresses that "the
tathaatagarbha is intrinsically pure. It contains
from the beginning only pure buddha-dharmas [as
numerous as] the sand of the Ganges, and is never
soiled."(35)
3. There are those, who, on hearing that the
true-consciousness is resplendent in excellent
qualities, imagines that it is composite in
nature. Again citing the Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin lun,
Hui-yuan reminds us that the tathataa which is
the true mind transcends all differences, even
including the difference of tran-scendence and
nontranscendence. We described the
true-consciousness as endowed with myriads of
merits in order to contrast it with the everyday
world of defilements, whereas in truth, all
excellent qualities give up their individuality
to constitute one nature in the pure mind, so
much so that no distinction can be made of them
any longer.(36)
4. There are those who, on hearing that the
tathaagatagarha is the ground of sa.msaara,
thinks that there is a particular point in time
at which the pure-consciousness begins to give
rise to the sa.msaaric realm. Furthermore, they
reason that this tendency of the
pure-consciousness to give rise to the realm of
sa.msaara does not cease with the attainment of
nirvaa.na, and when it is again in operation, the
nirvaa.na once reached will come to an end. Once
more drawing upon the Ta-ch'eng ch'i hsin lun,
Hui-yuan underlines that the tathaagatagarbha
"has neither a beginning nor an end, " and
explains: Since the tathaagatagarbha has no
beginning and is the ground of sa.msaara,
sa.msaara [also] has no beginning....Since the
tathaagatagarbha has no end and is the ground of
nirvaa.na, nirvaa.na [also] has no end.(37)
By the misconception connected with the notion of
"nonbeing," Hui-yuan refers to the thesis that the
concept "tathaagatagarbha" denotes nothing more than
the truth of the empty nature of all beings:
There are people who declare that the truth of the
empty [nature] of dharmas is the true-consciousness.
To correct this error, we assert that the
tathaagatagarbha is truly nonempty. As the
[true]-consciousness embodies buddha-dharmas [as
numerous as] the sand of the Ganges, how can it be
taken as [totally] empty? .... When the
La^nkaavataara-suutra applies [the concept of]
no-self to the tathaagatagarbha (T, vol. 16, p.
489b) . it alludes to the fact that the
tathaagatagarbha is called empty because it is
without false discriminations,
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[without implying that] there exist no true dharmas.
So the Vij~naptimaatrasiddhi maintains that in order
to put an end to the non-Buddhists' attachment to
[the idea of] the self and things pertaining to the
self, it is taught that matter and all kinds of
dharmas are empty, but this does not mean that the
"realm of reality" (ju-shih ching(ab) ) which
transcends common speech is empty as well.(38) The
"realm of reality" is the sphere of the buddhas and
tathaagatas, in which no consciousness other than
the storehouse-consciousness (the aalaya)
exists.(39)
Unlike the Maadhyamikas who are skeptical of
metaphysical speculation and do not acknowledge any
entity as ontologically primary, the Yogaacaarins
propound a philosophy of ideation-only, in which all
phenomenal beings are regarded as projections of the
original mind. While Hui-yuan departs from orthodox
Indian Yogaacaarism in his understanding of the
moral species and functions of this original mind,
the Yogaacaara descent of his teaching comes out
conspicuously in the above criticism of the
interpretation of the concept of
"true-consciousness" as the truth of emptiness, an
interpretation with a distinct Maadhyamika
undertone. In opposition to this non-Yogaacaara
understanding of the teaching of mind-only, Hui-yuan
upholds that "emptiness" when connoting
"nonexistence" is appropriate only in reference to
beings of the realm of sa.msaara. When applied to
the true-consciousness or the tathaagatagarbha,
"emptiness" merely alludes to the freedom from all
false discriminations of the true mind, and does not
carry any sense of denial of its existence:
Some people expound that the true-consciousness does
not denote [an actual] consciousness but only
[stands] for the principle of emptiness. [Since
emptiness] is the essence of consciousness, we call
it by the name "consciousness" by way of inference.
Such a view is the extreme of absurdity, and should
not be accepted. It is the real, cognitive mind
which is called the [true]-consciousness. How can it
be said that [the mind] is totally empty?(40)
That the tenet of the "true-consciousness" is not
merely a soteriological device or a more picturesque
way of expressing a general truth, but actually
stipulates the existence of a veritable entity, is a
point which Hui-yuan returns to again and again in
his writings. When discussing the question of
"extinction" and "nonextinction" of the true-mind,
Hui-yuan observes:
When false [dharmas] are completely annihilated, the
[activities of the] true [mind] also come to an end,
and will never arise again. So it is said that the
[true-mind] is extinct. [However], since the
substance of the true [mind] will abide forever, we
[also] say that the true [mind] is not extinct.(41)
Commenting on the remark of the Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin
lun that "When we speak of cessation [of the mind,
we refer to] the cessation of its marks (hsiang(w)),
not the cessation of its substance (t'i(v)),"(42)
Hui-yuan writes in the Commentary:
By "When we speak of cessation of the mind, we refer
to the cessation of its marks," [the `Saastra]
alludes to [the cessation of] the false
consciousnesses. By "not to the cessation of its
substance, " [the Saastra] alludes to [the
non-cessation of] the true-consciousness. The fact
that the false consciousnesses can be completely
destroyed does not prevent the [true]-consciousness
from existing
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[eternally], Since the true-consciousness exists
eternally, sentient beings are not annihilated [with
the extinction of the false consciousnesses]. Since
the false consciousnesses will eventually be
extirpated, sentient beings [will sooner or later]
fulfill the true [end of Buddhahood].(43)
III. THE SYSTEM OF EIGHT CONSCIOUSNESS (2): THE
AADAANA-CONSCIOUSNESS OR THE SEVENTH CONSCIOUSNESS
Besides the aalaya or the eighth consciousness,
Hui-yuan also mentions the aadaana-consciousness as
a distinctive element in the picture of reality of
Mahaayaana Buddhism. Hui-yuan defines the term
"aadaana" as follows:
"AAdaana," rendered literally into our language,
means "not [yet] emancipated" (wu-chieh(ac)). That
is, it is essentially an ignorant and deluded
mind.(44)
This definition concurs with the meaning of the
Sanskrit root of aadaana: a-/daa (to take, to seize,
to draw near to oneself), and is similar to the
explanations given of the term in the
Sa.mdhinirmocan-suutra, the
Mahaayaanasa.mgraha-`saastra, and the Ch'eng
wei-shih lun(ad).(45) However, in the aforementioned
works, the aadaana is considered as the other name
for the aalaya, denoting primarily the latter's
roles as the support of the material organs and the
repository of karmic effects.(46) Since in
Hui-yuan's ontological scheme, the aalaya has been
transformed into a pure consciousness, the term
aadaana, with its derogatory sense of "to hold" and
"to grasp," is clearly no longer appropriate as its
designation. Thus, following the precedence of
Paramaartha (499-569), the founder of the She-lun
School,(47) Hui-yuan uses the term "aadaana" to
refer to the seventh consciousness. As with the
aalaya, Hui-yuan's conception of the aadaana or the
seventh consciousness can be discerned from his
exposition of its synonyms:
When rendered freely according to its significance,
[the aadaana] is known by eight different names:
1. It is known as the ignorant consciousness
(wu-ming shih(ae)), for it is in essence the
ground of the original ignorance.(48)
2. It is known as the activity-consciousness
(yeh-shih(af)), for owing to [the functioning of]
the ignorant mind, false thoughts [pertaining to
the realm of] nonenlightenment are suddenly set
in motion.
3. It is known as the evolving-consciousness
(chuan-shih(ag)), for owing to [the functioning
of] the aforementioned activity-consciousness, it
gradually assumes gross characteristics, giving
rise to external phenomena which it [in turn]
discriminates and lays hold of.
4. It is known as the reproducing-consciousness
(hsien-shih(ah)), for the false objects [the
evolving-consciousness] give rise to reproducing
[the defiled state of] the mind itself, just as a
bright mirror reproduces the appearances of object
[placed in front of it]
5. It is known as the
congnitive-consciousness(chih-shih(ai)), for it
distinguishes between the defiled and the
nondefiled, the disagreeable and the agreeable
[and so forth] among objects reproduced by the
above-mentioned "reproducing-consciousness."
"Cognition" here denotes [a kind of] dull, false
discernment, not wisdom [which is conducive to]
understanding and deliverance.
6. It is known as the continuous-consciousness
(hsiang-hsu shih(aj), for en-
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chained by false appearances, it complies with
the world of objects and grasps at it
incessantly. Furthermore, it can retain karmic
effects good or evil.
7. It is known as the false-consciousness
(wang-shih(ak) ) , for the six forms [of
consciousness](l-6) mentioned above are all [in
nature] untrue.
8. It is known as the clinging-consciousness
(chih-shih(al)), for it clings to [the idea of]
the self, and also clings to all false
appearances.(49)
According to the account just given, the
aadaana-consciousness, being "the ground of the
original ignorance" (1) and the cause of the
production of "false thoughts" and "false objects"
(2, 3, & 4), is the source of defilements and
nonenlightenment (7) . Its function is to
discriminate (5), and it clings to the idea of the
self and false appearances (6 & 8) . As the
repository of karmic effects good or evil (6), it
ensures the never failing operation of the law of
retribution and is the subject of
transmigration.(50)
Of the many analyses Hui-yuan makes of the
aadaana or the seventh con-sciousness, the division
into the four characteristics of "function," "self,"
"ignorance," and "principle" is among the most
illuminating. By the characteristic "function, "
Hui-yuan has in mind the aadaana as the direct cause
of the arising of the first six consciousnesses
(eye-consciousness, ear-consciousness,
nose-consciousness, tongue-consciousness,
body-consciousness, and mind-consciousness) and
their corresponding sense-organs (eye, ear, nose,
tongue, body, and mind) and sense-objects (color,
sound, smell, taste, touch, and ideas):
Regarding the four [characteristics] of the
"false-[consciousness] (the aadaana), the first is
the characteristic "function," which is [connected
with] the [first] six consciousnesses. The false
mind generates the [six] sense-organs, [six]
sense-objects, and [six] consciousnesses, just like
the appearances created in dreams. In this respect,
the false-[consciousness] gives rise to the [first]
six consciousnesses, which, with the six
sense-organs arising from the same mind [as
support], apprehend the six sense-objects [likewise]
arising from this same mind, and so is described as
"function."(51)
The characteristic "self" indicates the aadaana's
erroneous tendencies to regard objects originating
from its own activities as possessing independent
essences and to draw a fast line between itself and
other sentient beings.(52) "Ignorance" intimates in
general the deluded essence of the aadaana:
The third is the characteristic "ignorance," which
refers to [the false-consciousness as] the ground of
ignorance. As the nonenlightened mind, it fails to
realize the tathataa and also can not comprehend
that [all] productions of the false mind are
illusory and nonexistent.(53)
The characteristic "principle" represents the
aadaana-consciousness as it actually is: "neither
being nor nonbeing":
As for the fourth characteristic, "principle," it
refers to [the fact that the false-consciousness,
which is endowed with] the aforementioned three
characteristics, is [in essence] "neither being nor
nonbeing." [The false-consciousness] is said to be
"neither being," for [all] false forms are without
substance. It is said to be "nor nonbeing," for it
generates all sorts of false affections. Again, it
is called "neither being, " for the [six]
sense-organs, [six] sense-objects and [six]
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consciousnesses originating from this [false] mind
[are ephemeral and] do not exist apart from the
mind. It is called "nor nonbeing," for this false
mind has [the six sense-organs, six sense-objects,
and six-consciousnesses] as its illusory
manifestations.(54)
The aadaana or false-consciousness can be denoted as
"nor nonbeing," for it is the origin of "false
affections" and the cause of the appearance of the
six senseorgans, six sense-objects, and the six
consciousnesses. Yet, it can also be designated as
"neither being," for like all "false forms," it
relies entirely on the ture-consciousness or the
aalaya for its existence, and the sense-organs,
sense-objects, and consciousnesses which it gives
rise to also enjoy no independent being outside the
true mind. Lest anyone on reading such passages as
quotations 49 and 51 preceding would misunderstand
that the aadaana-conscoiousness is the first reality
and can generate the entire phenomenal world on its
own, Hui-yuan is especially careful to remind us of
this "neither being" aspect of the aadaana. So he
declares that "the false self (aadaana) arises
dependent on the true self (aalaya),"(55) and that
the false-consciousness is ultimately speaking as
much a phenomenal entity as the objects it helps to
create, being itself "a transient dharma" dependent
on the true-consciousness for its being.(56)
Again, as in the case of the aalaya, as much can
be learned of the aadaana-consciousness from what
Hui-yuan says it is not, as from what he says it is.
Hui-yuan enumerates six principal misconceptions
regarding the aadaana-consciousness:(57)
1. There are those who, on hearing that there are
only the six sense-organs eye, ear, nose, and so
forth, conclude thereby that there can only be
six consciousnesses, and that there can exist no
other consciousness to which no senseorgan
corresponds. Against this view, Hui-yuan argues
that there ought to be a seventh consciousness
besides the first six consciousnesses, for if it
were not so, the `sraavakas and pratyekabuddhas
would achieve full buddhahood when they enter the
"nirvaa.na without residue," for or at the time
they reach this state, their six consciousnesses
would be completely annihilated, and there would
remain no impure element to bind them to the
domain of samsaara. As no Mahaayaanists would
ever grant the fulfillment of the supreme
enlightenment to these Hiinayaana saints, so it
should be admitted that other than the six
consciousnesses, there subsists a further impure
consciousness, that is, the aadaana, which
explains why the `sraavakas and pratyekabuddhas
remain rooted in the course of mundane
existence, even while they have already put an
end to the defilement-generating activities of
the first six consciousnesses.
2. There are those who, on hearing that there is a
seventh consciousness, conclude thereby that it
is a self-sufficient entity. Against this view,
Hui-yuan argues that this false-consciousness
represents merely the nonenlightened and
discriminating aspect of the mind, and possesses
no substance of its own. To illustrate the case,
Hui-yuan resorts to the much cited metaphor of
the rope mistaken as a snake. Just as the snake
so envisaged is constructed from the rope and is
illusory, the same is true of the aadaana, which
is constructed from the true mind and is
ephemeral like dreams.
3. There are those, who, on hearing that the
seventh consciousness is also known as the manas
(mind), identify it with the manas-indriya (mind
sense-
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organ),(58) which, together with the first six
consciousnesses, are known as the "seven mental
realms" in Hiinayaana Buddhism. Hui-yuan rejects
this view for the same reason he gives in (1):
that is, if what is maintained is true, the
`sraavakas and pratyekabuddhas would be able to
reach the supreme enlightenment, for it is
commonly agreed that the manas-indriya is
destroyed along with the six consciousnesses when
the "nirvana without residue" is attained.
4. There are those who think that the term "seventh
consciousness" represents only the failure of the
first six consciousnesses to perceive that all
phenomena are without self-nature, and nothing
more. Against this view, Hui-yuan argues that the
failure to comprehend the absence of self-nature
of phenomena is the more apparent sort of
ignorance allied to the first six
consciousnesses, whereas there is a more
fundamental and subtle kind of ignorance
connected with the attachment to the idea of the
self and the nonapprehension of the truth of
mind-only, which the "seventh consciousness"
stands for.
5. There are those who maintain that the seventh
consciousness is transient and subjected to
changes only when the final truth is not yet
comprehended; but it will be transformed into an
eternal and immutable entity once enlightenment
is attained. Against this view, Hui-yuan argues
that "the seventh consciousness is a false mind.
It is characterized by nothing but delusions, and
consists of nothing but discriminations."(60)
Since all delusions would vanish and all
discriminations would be forsaken on the
fulfillment of the supreme enlightenment, how can
there remain a seventh consciousness devoid of
all its essential properties? Thus, Hui-yuan
concludes that "When people say that the essence
of wisdom is immutable, what they refer to by the
immutable essence is the true mind, not the
seventh consciousness."(61)
6. There are those who, on hearing that the seventh
consciousness will eventually be destroyed,
judge that it is a total nonetity with no
specific function. Against this view, Hui-yuan
insists that it is solely due to the permeation
of the aadaana that the aalaya or the eighth
consciousness gives rise to the phenomenal
world.
IV. THE SYSTEM OF EIGHT CONSCIOUSNESSES (3): THE
FIRST SIX CONSCIOUSNESSES
If the aalaya-consciousness and the
aadaana-consciousness are concepts peculiar to
Yogaacaara Buddhism, and Hui-yuan's incorporation of
them into his ontological scheme is a clear
indication of the Yogaacaara background of his
thought, the first six consciousnesses, that is,
eye-consciousness, ear-consciousness,
nose-consciousness, tongue-consciousness,
body-consciousness, and mind-consciousness, on the
other hand already appeared frequently in the early
Nikaayas as six of the eighteen dhaatus, and as such
they are concepts common to all Buddhist schools,
Hiinayaana and Mahaayaana alike. The following is
Hui-yuan's explanation of how the first six
consciousnesses get their respective names:
With respect to the first six [of the eight
consciousnesses], the [sense-organ] corresponding
with "color" is known as the "eye," and so forth,
[the sense-organ] corresponding with "dharma" is
known as the "mind." Since the mind which arises
with these [sense-organs] as the basis are capable
of discernment, it is called the eye-consciousness,
and so forth, down to the mind-consciousness.(62)
Hui-yuan often calls the first six consciousnesses
as a group the "phenomenal
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consciousnesses" (shih-shih(am)), in the same way as
he often designates the aadaana "the
false-consciousness'' and the aalaya "the
true-consciousness"; and has the following to say
about them in the Essentials:
What is called "phenomenal consciousnesses" [here]
are known as the "evolving consciousnesses"
(chuan-shih) in the La^nkaavataara-suutra (T, vol.
16, p. 463b, 1.1.), and the "manas [dependent]
consciousnesses" (i-shih(an)), the "discriminating
manas [-dependent] consciousnesses" (fen-pieh
i-shih(ao)), the "differentiated consciousnesses"
(li-shih(ap) ) , or the "phenomena-discriminating
consciousnesses" (fen-peih-shih-shih(aq)), in the
[Ta-ch'eng] ch'i-hsin lun. (T, vol. 32, p. 577b,
11.24-27)
They are called the "evolving consciousnesses"
because they evolve together with the six
sense-objects; unlike the false-consciousness
(aadaana), which is called "evolving consciousness"
because it produced the external world. They are
called the "manas" [-dependent] consciousnesses,"
because in the [Ta-ch'eng] ch'i-hsin lun, the eighth
true-consciousness is given the name citta, and the
seventh [false-consciousness] is given the name
manas. Since [the first six phenomenal
consciousnesses] arise with the manas [as their
immediate cause], they are [thereby] referred to as
the "manas [-dependent] consciousnesses." Since the
[manas] dependent consciousnesses discriminate the
[external] world of six sense-objects, they are also
known as the "discriminating manas [-dependent]
consciousnesses." Since they are differentiated into
six, corresponding to the [six] sense-organs and
[six] sense-objects, they are known as the
"differentiated consciousnesses." Since they
discriminate the phenomenal world of six
sense-objects, they are also known as the
"phenomena-discriminating consciousnesses."(63)
This list of synonyms of the term "phenomenal
consciousnesses" shows the following facts of the
first six consciousnesses:
1. The name "manas-dependent consciousnesses"
suggests that the first six consciousnesses are
dependent on the seventh consciousness (and so
ultimately on the eighth consciousness) for their
being. So Hui-yuan remarks a little later in the
Essentials:
The false self (seventh consciousness) arises
dependent on the true self (eighth
con-sciousness), for attachment to the self comes
into being when the true [mind] is permeated by
false [thoughts].(64) The phenomenal self (first
six consciousnesses) [in turn] arises dependent
on the false self (seventh con-sciousness) ,
resulting in a further deepening of fatuous
discrimination. It is so because the phenomenal
self regards sense-organs and sense-objects as
things with determinate nature. It is so also
because the phenomenal self wrongly attributes
[the ideas of] "self" and "properties pertaining
to the self" to skandhas originating from the
false mind (seventh consciousness).(65)
2. The name "evolving-consciousnesses" suggests that
the first six consciousnesses "evolve" only in
the presence of the six sense-objects color,
sound, smell, and so forth. From this fact, we
can further infer that the first six
consciousnesses, unlike the seventh and eight
consciousnesses, are not always in operation, for
experience shows that the six sense-objects are
seldom available all at once. The Essentials
specifies in detail the various conditions that
have to be satisfied before the first six
consciousnesses will function:
The first six phenomenal consciousnesses are
called "distinct" (pieh(ar)), while the seventh
and eighth [consciousnesses] are called "common"
(t'ung(as)). The first six [consciousnesses] are
known as "distinct," for each has its specific
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object, and arises one after the other. The
seventh and eighth consciousnesses are known as
"common," for they exist always.
It is asked, "Why do the first six
[consciousnesses] arise one after the other [and
do not come into being together]? " [It is
replied, ] "In the case of the first six
[consciousnesses], the mind and its object are
[conceived of as] distinct entities. Being
difficult to apprehend, we know their presence
only by the thoughts they give rise to. Since the
thoughts they give rise to are diverse, [we
conclude thereby that] the [first] six
[consciousnesses] arise separately and not all at
once.
Furthermore, the first six consciousnesses are
produced on the satisfaction of four conditions,
that is, causal condition (hetu-pratyaya) ,
consequent condition (samanantara-pratyaya) ,
cooperating condition (aalambana-pratyaya), and
efficient condition (adhipati-pratyaya) , [With
respect to the first six consciousnesses,] the six
sense-organs are the efficient condition, the six
sense-objects are the cooperating condition, the
preceding moments of thought which [by ceasing]
facilitate the emergance of the subsequent [moments
of thought] are the consequent condition, and the
homogeneous [cause] (sabhaagahetu) , associated
[cause] (samprayukta-hetu), and simultaneous [cause]
(sahabhuu-hetu) , and so forth are the causal
condition.(66) Since it is impossible that [all the
conditions for the production of the] six types [of
consciousness] are present at one time, [we know
thereby that the first six consciousnesses] are the
consequent conditions [of each other] and cannot
arise simultaneously."(67)
The first six consciousnesses are mental
functions which come into play only on the
realization of four conditions, that is, causal
condition, consequent condition, cooperating
condition, and efficient condition. For example,
the eye-consciousness only comes into being when
there exists the sense-organ "eye" as its inner
support (efficient condition) and the sense
object "color" as its outer support (cooperating
condition). Furthermore, there must also be the
presence of light to illuminate the color
sense-object (causal condition), as well as the
nonpresence of the other five consciousnesses
which would obstruct its operation (consequent
condition). Since these conditions are not always
fulfilled, the eye-consciousness, unlike the
seventh and eighth consciousnesses, does not
abide permanetly, but comes and goes as
circumstances change. And the same is true of the
ear-consciousness, nose-consciousness,
tongue-consciousness, and so forth.
3. The names "discriminating manas-dependent
consciousnesses, " "differentiated
consciousnesses," and "phenomena-discriminating
consciousnesses" suggest that the first six
consciousnesses are concerned with the
discernment of sense-objects and the attribution
of definite nature to them despite their
mind-dependent character. This tendency of the
first six consciousnesses to ascribe determinate
being to phenomena is dwelt on repeatedly in the
Essentials. Thus, in explaining why the first six
consciousnesses and the seventh consciousness are
likewise depicted as "false," Hui-yuan writes:
With respect to the false [aspect of the mind],
the first six [consciousnesses] are deceived by
conditioned and illusory dharmas, and wrongly
consider them [as entities] with determinate
nature. So they are described as "false." The
seventh false-consciousness wrongly considers
[dharmas] as possessing definite characteristics,
even though there [actually] exists no dharma
outside the mind. So it is [also described as]
false.(68)
The seventh consciousness is described as
"false," for it stands for the general failure of
sentient beings to realize the truth of
mind-only, which leads to the false belief in the
reality of the phenomenal. The first six consci-
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ousnesses are also described as "false," for
under the influence of the false belief formet by
the seventh consciousness, they seize on objects
appearing in their particular fields of
perception as entities possessing independent
being, and attribute names and get attached to
them. The result naturally is the production of
defiled karma and bondage to the realm of
samsaara. So, quoting the Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin
lun, Hui-yuan imputes the four features of
"sepculating on names," "attachment," "producing
karma," and "suffering owing to bondage to karma"
to the first six consciousnesses:
As for the four aspects of the phenomenal
consciousnesses, they are as mentioned in the
[Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin] (T, vol. 33, p. 577a):
(1) The feature of attachment: This feature is
also called "the taint which is related to
attachment" in the [Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin] lun.(69)
It refers to that basic ignorance which holds on
to [everchanging phenomena as objects with]
determinate nature.
(2) The feature of speculating on names: [This
feature is connected with] the so called ten
fundamental defilements.(70) Following the
suggestion of names, [the ideas of] the self,
sentient beings, and so forth, and give rise to
various bonds. So they are said to have the
feature of speculating on names.
( 3) The feature of producing karma: Owing to its
defiled [activities], [the phenomenal
consciousnesses] produced all sorts of [evil]
karma.
(4) The feature of suffering owing to bondage to
karma: [The phenomenal consciousnesses] receive
the fruit [of suffering] according to the karma
[they create].(71)
Again, as in the case of the aalaya and aadana,
Hui-yuan tries to define his conception of the first
six consciousnesses by referring to the
misconceptions of them. Altogether, Hui-yuan lists
eight erroneous views regarding the first six
consciousnesses, which he classifies into four pairs
of thesis and antithesis.(72) We shall outline the
first three pairs which are of immediate relevance
to our present purpose:
1. There is the opinion that the first six
consciousnesses are of one essence, and there is
also the opinion that the first six
consciousnesses are of different essence. Against
the former view, Hui-yuan argues that the first
six consciousnesses can not be absolutely one,
for the sense-organs and sense-objects they are
dependent on are diverse. Against the latter
view, Hui-yuan argues that the first six
consciousnesses are not absolutely different, for
if they were so, they would not hinder the
working of each other and would coexist at all
time, which is obviously not the case in actual
life.
2. There is the opinion that since the notion of an
enduring mind is necessary to the concepts of
transmigration and retribution, the first six
consciousnesses should be considered as
permanent. There is also the opinion that since
the Buddha has taught that all mental functions
are transitory, the first six consciousnesses
should be considered as impermanent. Against the
former view, Hui-yuan argues that the first six
consciousnesses can not be definitely permanent,
for the six consciousnesses of gods, men,
animals, hungry ghosts, and beings in hell are
heterogeneous, so that a sentient moving from one
of these forms of rebirth to another could not
have their first six consciousnesses remain
unchanged. Agains the latter view, Hui-yuan
argues that the first six consciousnesses can not
be definitely impermanent, for if the mind were
annihilated from moment to moment, who is to reap
the fruit of past deeds after all?(73)
3. There is the opinion that the first six
consciousnesses are definitely existent,
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and there is also the opinion that the first six
consciousnesses are absolutely empty. Against the
former view, Hui-yuan argues that the first six
consciousnesses can not be definitely existent,
for it is taught in the holy texts that
consciousnesses are subject to the four signs of
birth, subsistence, decay, and destruction.
Against the latter view, Hui-yuan argues that the
first six consciousnesses can not be absolutely
empty, for if there were not the first six
consciousnesses, how come there to be the
awareness and cognition of external objects? How
come there to be the production of good and evil
karma, and the experience of pleasure and pain
thereof?
V. THE RELATION BETWEEN THE TRUE AND THE FALSE: SOME
PROBLEMS OF THE MIND-ONLY TEACHING OF HUI-YUAN
In the preceding discussion, we have several times
indicated that it is Hui-yuan's belief that the
first seven consciousnesses and their objects, that
is, the entire defiled phenomenal world, owe their
being to the eighth consciousness, that is, the
intrinsically pure aalaya or the tathaagatagarbha.
That the defiled is ontologically dependent on the
pure can be inferred from the general thesis of
mind-only as outlined in section I, and it is a
truth which Hui-yuan repeatedly stresses in his
writings. So, commenting on the remark of the
Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin lun that "[Nonenlightened]
thoughts are not self-sufficient and do not exist
apart from the original enlightenment,"(74) Hui-yuan
observes in the Commentary:
That is to show that false dharmas do not exist on
their own, and are formed on the support of the true
[mind]. Without the true [mind], false [dharmas]
will not come into being.(75)
He further states in the Commentary that "the true
and the false are not separate from each other":
Question: The true and the false are in nature
different from each other. Why is it said that in
disciplining the false [consciousnesses], the true
[mind] is also permeated?
Answer: It is because the true and the false are not
separate from each other. Thus, when the false
[consciousnesses] are soiled, [the true mind] also
becomes soiled. When the false [consciousnesses] are
pure, [the true mind] also becomes pure....(76)
And this union of the true mind and false dharmas is
cited by Hui-yuan as exemplifying the Buddhist ideal
of nonduality:
As samsaara and nirvaa.na arise and are formed from
the true mind, "functions" (yung(g) , that is,
samsaara and nirvaa.na) do not exist apart from
"substance" (t'i(v), that is, the true mind). This
perfect harmony of "substance" and "function" is
known as [the truth of] nonduality.(77)
In this section, we shall try to see what arguments
Hui-yuan has offered to justify his idea of the
origination of the false from the true. Based on the
understanding so reached, we shall further attempt
to define what exactly the nonduality of the true
mind and false dharmas could mean in Hui-yuan's
teaching of mind-only.
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Thus, it may be asked how, if the
aalaya-consciousness is intrinsically pure, it could
ever come about that it would give rise to the
aadaana-consciousness, the first six
consciousnesses, and their respective objects, which
are defiled in nature. In explaining the derivation
of the impure from the pure, Hui-yuan brings in the
traditional Buddhist concept "ignorance."
"Ignorance," in Hui-yuan's own words, "is a deluded
and benighted [state of] mind. Since it is devoid of
(wu(at) the light (ming(au)) of wisdom, it is known
as ignorance (wu-ming(av) ) ."(78) This ignorance
permeates the pure mind, and brings about the
formation of defiled phenomena. So it is said:
[When the Ta-ch'eng ch'i-hsin lun writes that] "It
is solely due to false thoughts that
differentiations come about" (T, vol. 32, p. 576a,
11.9-10), what [the term] "false thoughts" refers to
is "ignorance." Due to the deluding influence of
ignorance on the tathataa (the pure mind in itself),
there comes to be [the origination of