Causality: Eternal or Momentary?

Abstract

THIS PAPER will concern itself with two variant types of causal theory found in Indian philosophy in the eighth and ninth centuries. One of these is Hindu, that of Sarhkara, the great commentator of Veddnta. The other is that of two Buddhist dialectical logicians, Sgntarakqita and his disciple-commentator Kamalasila, who in their general position are somewhere in the idealist Yogdcara and nihilist Mddhyamika vicinity. One of the interesting features of the two positions is their sharp difference on some points and yet a curious likeness in others. No doubt their common-though-differently-interpreted heritage from Indian philosophicalreligious thought-for Buddhism is a Hindu heresy-accounts for this in general. In particular, it is sometimes suggested' that Antaraksita-Kamalasila may well have influenced the method of Sarihkara's exposition and perhaps his thought. At any rate, he was accused of being a crypto-Buddhist despite his attempts to confute the Buddhist position.2 D.H.H. Ingalls3 has construed this confusing likeness-and-difference relation in the following way: Sarhkara's version of the Vedanta proceeds from his basic conviction of the sole reality of the Cosmic Self (Brahman) toward the unreality of the phenomenal world. The Buddhists, on the other hand, begin with their characteristic emphasis upon the evanescence of the phenomenal world and move on from there toward a denial of all substantiality, both in the phenomenal order and in selfhood. Thus, when arihkara arrives at his emphasis on the unreality of the phenomenal world, he speaks much as a Buddhist. But obviously the two denials of phenomenal reality are from opposed viewpoints. The point of the encounter to be taken up here, as noted above, is in respect to causal theory. This is a crucial point, since, so far as the Veddnta