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Discovered, Not Invented

SN 12.20, the Paccaya Sutta — set 4, Not-Self and Dependent Arising

Reading time: about 4 min · 572 words

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Before you read

This short talk makes a distinction that is easy to miss and hard to unsee once you have it. There is the pattern by which one thing depends on another, and there are the things the pattern runs through. They are not the same, and the Buddha here teaches them separately.

The first half says something unusual: the pattern holds whether or not anyone ever discovers it. A teacher does not invent it. He wakes up to it, and then points at it and says "Look." That is why the teaching is meant to be checked rather than believed.

The second half stops the first half from becoming a metaphysics. Every single item in the sequence—including ignorance, and including knowing—is impermanent and on its way out. Nothing in the list is permanent, and the stable pattern is not some further thing standing behind the list.

The ending is practical. Someone who has actually seen this has no use for the questions "What was I? What will I be? What am I?" There is nothing left for them to be about.

Translation

What Dependent Arising Is

At Sāvatthī, the Buddha said:

"Bhikkhus, I will teach you dependent arising, and I will teach you the things that arise dependently. Listen and pay close attention. I will speak."

"Yes, Bhante," the bhikkhus replied.

The Buddha said this:

"And what is dependent arising?

With birth as condition, bhikkhus, ageing and dying.

Whether Tathāgatas arise or not, that element still stands: the stability of the pattern, the regularity of the pattern, conditionality. A Tathāgata awakens to this and breaks through to it. Once he has, he tells it, teaches it, makes it known, sets it out, reveals it, breaks it down, and makes it plain. And he says: 'Look—with birth as condition, ageing and dying.'

The same holds at every other step:

  • with becoming as condition, birth
  • with taking personally as condition, becoming
  • with ignorant wanting as condition, taking personally
  • with felt experience as condition, ignorant wanting
  • with contact as condition, felt experience
  • with the six fields of experience as condition, contact
  • with name-and-form as condition, the six fields of experience
  • with knowing as condition, name-and-form
  • with putting things together as condition, knowing
  • with ignorance as condition, putting things together

Of each one of these it is the same. Whether Tathāgatas arise or not, that element still stands: the stability of the pattern, the regularity of the pattern, conditionality. A Tathāgata awakens to it and breaks through to it. Once he has, he tells it, teaches it, makes it known, sets it out, reveals it, breaks it down, and makes it plain. And he says: 'Look—with ignorance as condition, putting things together.'

So, bhikkhus: the suchness of it, that it is not otherwise, that it does not become something else, this conditionality—this is what is called dependent arising.

What Arises Dependently

And what are the things that arise dependently?

Ageing and dying, bhikkhus, are impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, bound to wear away, bound to pass away, bound to fade, bound to quench.

So is every other item in the sequence:

  • birth
  • becoming
  • taking personally
  • ignorant wanting
  • felt experience
  • contact
  • the six fields of experience
  • name-and-form
  • knowing
  • putting things together
  • ignorance

Each of these too, bhikkhus, is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, bound to wear away, bound to pass away, bound to fade, bound to quench.

These are called the things that arise dependently.

Nothing Left to Ask About Yourself

When a noble disciple has clearly seen, with right discernment as they have come to be, both this dependent arising and these things that arise dependently, then for them to run back to the past—

'Was I in the past? Was I not in the past? What was I in the past? How was I in the past? After being what, what did I become in the past?'

—or run ahead to the future—

'Will I be in the future? Will I not be in the future? What will I be in the future? How will I be in the future? After being what, what will I become in the future?'

—or be inwardly unsure about the present—

'Am I? Am I not? What am I? How am I? Where has this being come from, and where will it go?'

—that is impossible.

Why is that? Because a noble disciple has clearly seen, with right discernment as they have come to be, both this dependent arising and these things that arise dependently."

The tenth discourse is finished.

Words used in this translation (24)
ageing and dying
Growing old and dying, treated in these texts as one linked process and as the end point of the dependent-arising sequence.
becoming
This project's rendering of "bhava" -- the settling of experience into a way of being that feels like somebody being something. Often translated "existence."
Bhante
A respectful way of addressing a senior monastic, roughly "venerable sir." Left untranslated because English has no natural equivalent.
bhikkhus
Buddhist monks -- those who have left household life to practise full time. The Buddha's usual way of addressing the assembly, roughly "friends" in force.
birth
This project's rendering of "jāti": birth, coming into being. In the dependent-arising sequence, ageing and dying depend on it. In MN 141 the word appears once in its everyday sense instead, in a simile about a mother.
conditionality
This project's rendering of "idappaccayatā" -- the bare principle that when this is present, that follows. Dependent arising is this principle applied to how dissatisfaction comes about.
conditioned
This project's rendering of "saṅkhata" -- anything that came about because other things did, and that stops when they stop. Nearly everything is.
contact
This project's rendering of "phassa" -- the meeting of a sense, its object, and the knowing of it. A technical link in the dependent-arising sequence, not physical touch specifically.
dependent arising
The teaching that experience -- and the dissatisfaction in it -- comes from conditions rather than from any fixed self or essence. Each link depends on the one before it, which is why removing a condition stops what follows.
dependently arisen
Having come about because something else was in place. Said of the individual items in the sequence, as distinct from the pattern they follow.
felt experience
This project's rendering of "vedanā", often translated "feeling". It is the immediate pleasant, painful, or mixed tone of an experience, before any story we build on top of it.
ignorance
This project's rendering of "avijjā" -- not general stupidity, but specifically not seeing how dissatisfaction works and how it ends. The first link in the dependent-arising sequence.
ignorant wanting
Wanting something you can't have right now. This project's rendering of "taṇhā", often translated "craving". We call it ignorant because it comes from not seeing clearly; ordinary, sensible wanting is something else.
knowing
This project's rendering of "viññāṇa" (often translated "consciousness") -- bare awareness of an object through one of the senses or the mind.
name-and-form
The mental and physical sides of experience taken together: roughly, whatever you can name plus whatever has shape. One link in the dependent-arising sequence.
noble disciple
Someone who has had the breakthrough into the path and so is no longer merely an ordinary person. It does not mean noble by birth, and does not require being a monastic.
putting things together
This project's rendering of "saṅkhāra": the ongoing activity of assembling experience, and also what that activity assembles. Context shows which of the two the text means. Other translations often say "formations" or "fabrications", which this project avoids as needlessly opaque.
regularity of the pattern
That the same conditions reliably lead to the same results. Paired with the phrase above; the two say one thing from two sides.
right discernment
Seeing accurately how something actually came about, rather than holding a correct opinion about it.
six fields of experience
The six channels through which you experience anything at all: seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, and thinking. Other translations often say "sense bases".
stability of the pattern
That the way conditions give rise to results holds steady. It names a reliable regularity, not a permanent thing standing behind events.
suchness
This project's rendering of "tathatā": things are just as they are, and not otherwise. The word stops anyone turning the pattern into a hidden essence.
taking personally
This project's rendering of "upādāna" -- treating some piece of experience as "me" or "mine" and holding on to it. Usually translated "clinging" or "attachment."
Tathāgata
A title for the Buddha, traditionally left untranslated. It means roughly "the one who has arrived at things as they truly are."
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