Written for the AQA syllabus by Upeksacitta (Robert Ellis), member of the Western Buddhist Order and a former Head of RS.
Buddhology and the Trikaya Doctrine
The term 'Buddhology' has been constructed by some scholars of Buddhism by analogy with the Christian term 'Christology'. Christology is the study of the nature and attributes of Christ, and likewise 'Buddhology' refers to the study of the nature and attributes of the Buddha. Theories about the nature of the Buddha developed increasing philosophical sophistication in the Mahayana, culminating in the Trikaya or 'Three Bodies' doctrine of the Yogacara School. Before we look at this, though, we will have to put the whole question of the nature of the Buddha into context.
The Buddha in Early Buddhism and Theravada
As you may already know, the Buddha can be seen either historically or symbolically. Historically, the Buddha was an individual who lived in a certain time and place, who is revered by Buddhists because he showed how it is possible to achieve enlightenment. Symbolically, though, the Buddha represents the potentiality in all of us to achieve enlightenment. The symbolic Buddha is a timeless figure who could still represent that potential even if it turned out not to be true that Siddhartha Gautama had achieved enlightenment historically.
After the death of the historical Buddha, the figure of the Buddha rapidly gained both these kinds of significance. The Buddha-figure of the Theravada still has both of these kinds of significance: however, the Theravada figure is still rooted in the idea of the historical Buddha, and the symbolic Buddha could be said to be subsidiary to it. It is possible for us to gain enlightenment because the Buddha showed the way to do so historically at a certain time and place.
This view of the Buddha is emphasised by the Theravada attitude to scriptures. The Pali Canon is believed to contain documents which record the Buddhavacana, the Word of the Buddha which shows the way to enlightenment.
The Pali Canon only gains its authority and legitimacy from this origin, and the belief that it has been transmitted uncorrupted (or at least largely so) from the time of the Buddha to the present. In reading the Buddha’s words in the Pali Canon, for the Theravadins we have a hotline to enlightenment. Any other useful texts in the Buddhist tradition gain their authority from the extent to which they reflect the truths uttered by the historical Buddha.
The Buddha in the Mahayana
However, as we have already seen, in the Mahayana the idea developed that all Buddhists should aim to become Buddhas. This means that in theory, any one of us could become a historical Buddha amongst a throng of such radiant beings. The significance of Siddhartha Gautama then changes profoundly: instead of being the single source of knowledge of enlightenment, and the single model of a fully enlightened being, Siddhartha now becomes merely one instance of many possible ones. It is now no longer the historical Buddha that decides the nature of the symbolic Buddha, but the symbolic Buddha, representing the potential of all beings to gain enlightenment, which provides the model for the historical Buddha.
This should not give the impression that the Mahayanists have ceased to revere the historical Buddha. Shakyamuni Buddha (the sage of the Shakya Clan), as he is known in the Mahayana, is still an important figure who is widely depicted in art, discussed and visualised. The story of the life of the Buddha is also still widely used in the Mahayana. However, it would also be fair to say that he is now one Buddha among many. The five symbolic Buddhas of the Five-Buddha Mandala: Akshobhya, Ratnasambhava, Amitabha, Amoghasiddhi and Vairocana are equally widely represented in the Mahayana to show enlightened qualities, each associated with a particular colour and direction and a host of other symbolic associations. Above the Buddha Mandala there is also Vajrasattva (illustrated here), the white Buddha representing the absolute purity of enlightenment. Tibetan Buddhists make widespread use of visualisation practices, but they are much more likely to visualise one of these symbolic Buddhas, or a Bodhisattva, or a Tara, or some other symbolic deity, than Shakyamuni.
This attitude to the Buddha figure is also reflected in the Mahayana attitude to scriptures. Although Mahayanists sometimes pay lip-service to the idea that their Sutras have come from the historical Buddha, and each one begins with a reference to a historical setting resembling those in the Pali Canon, this is not really a very credible claim, given the Mahayana Sutras were composed at least 500 years after the death of the Buddha, and neither is it the basis of their authority. Buddhavacana to a Mahayanist means whatever is helpful in leading beings towards enlightenment, and the Mahayana Sutras and other Mahayana scriptures ultimately base their authority on this usefulness (though tradition also plays a large role in deciding this practical value). Although translations of the same material as is found in the Pali Canon are also found in the Mahayana canons, the criterion for their inclusion is the same one of usefulness as that applied to the later Mahayana scriptures.
Not all the Mahayana Sutras even feature Shakyamuni, but where they do (for example, the Lotus Sutra), he is soon found to be in a fantastic, mythic and symbolic setting where anything can happen. Lotuses and jewels rain down from the sky, stupas erupt from the earth, and millions of Buddhas and bodhisattvas from across the universe appear and disappear. Historical realism is obviously not the basis of judgement here, but rather whether a true point is being made and whether it is also made in a way that inspires the imagination.
However, the development of this timeless symbolic Buddha raised questions in the Mahayana which the philosophers needed to settle. Which was the real Buddha, the historical one or the symbolic one? If the historical one was unreal, did this mean Siddhartha Gautama was now false, or at best completely irrelevant? And what exactly did this symbolic Buddha represent? How could he be outside time and space but still represented as sitting in a fantastic setting making it rain jewels: surely this was just a different kind of time and space?
Question for discussion
Given the Mahayana view that the historical Buddha depends on the symbolic one, do you think this makes the historical Buddha irrelevant? Should the Mahayana simply have forgotten about the historical Buddha?
First Answer: Two bodies
The first answer to these kinds of questions was found in Early Buddhism even before the Mahayana, and was based on a distinction between two different 'bodies' or 'persons' (kaya) of the Buddha. These two 'bodies' were really completely different ways of thinking about the Buddha’s existence: the Rupakaya or Form-body and the Dharmakaya or Truth-body. On the one hand, the Buddha had a particular form and personality, limited in time and space, but on the other, he could be thought of simply as the ultimate truth of the potentiality for enlightenment, existing beyond time and space and therefore having no form of any kind. According to the anatta doctrine, form does not really exist, at least in the way we tend to think about it, so from the enlightened point of view of ultimate truth the Buddha is simply timeless, abstract truth.
On this account, the Rupakaya does not ultimately exist, but then nor does any other form. It is the Dharmakaya that is ultimately real. However, this simple model of different ways of seeing the Buddha did not suit the Mahayana, as it offered no distinction between the symbolic and historical Buddhas, both of which were as ultimately unreal as each other. So it was that the Mahayana evolved a teaching which actually distinguished between three bodies of the Buddha.
Further answer: three bodies
The Mahayana answer was to split the Rupakaya into two bodies: the Nirmanakaya ('Transformation body') and the Sambhogakaya ('Enjoyment Body'). The Buddha can exist not only as a historical individual limited in time and space (the Nirmanakaya), and as a pure ultimate existence-but-not-as-we-know-it (Dharmakaya), but also as a symbolic form of enlightenment, beyond any particular time and place but still taking particular forms in the imagination. The Sambhogakaya was the Buddha as he is encountered in the Mahayana Sutras: in a particular imaginative form where he preaches the Dharma to an imagined assembly of arhats and bodhisattvas, but absolutely universal rather than situated in India in the 6th Century BCE.
Each of these bodies of the Buddha emanates from the one above it. The Nirmanakaya emanates from the Sambhogakaya, and the Sambhogakaya in turn emanates from the Dharmakaya. Particular existence depends on universal existence, and universal existence depends on ultimate existence (or non-existence).
The teaching of the three bodies, or Trikaya, is particularly associated with the Yogacara ('Practice of Meditation') School of the Mahayana. The Yogacara School was a philosophical school which took an idealist view that reality was mind-only. In other words, when we have overcome illusion and reached enlightenment, what we will discover behind it all is simply mind: not our mind specifically, but mind in general. The material universe beyond our minds is thus part of the illusion from a Yogacara perspective. It needs to be stressed that this is not the only possible interpretation of Buddhism, but it is an influential one.
From this standpoint the Yogacara thinkers (of whom the greatest were Asanga and Vasubandhu) considered the nature of the Buddha. It seemed clear to them that ultimately, only the Dharmakaya exists. However, within the imagined realm of samsara there are different degrees of illusion. If we can be aware of the fact that we are creating images of things, we are at least taking the first step towards the removal of illusion. For example, if I can see a mirage and be aware that it is a mirage, this is much better than being deceived by it, even though I am still seeing it. The same thought applies to the Buddha: if we can be aware of the fact that the historical Buddha is just a representation of the universal potentiality for enlightenment, and not fall into the trap of thinking that the historical Buddha is the Buddha, then we will be able to overcome the illusions we might otherwise fall into about the Buddha.
Explained in relation to a similar position in Christian Christology, this doctrine has been explained by some scholars as docetism: that is, the view that the historical Buddha does not really exist, but is a mere appearance created for the purpose of teaching. However, this is misleading if it gives you the idea of the Buddha’s disciples somehow being taken in by a hologram. The whole of the rest of samsara is just as much mere appearance from the standpoint of the Yogacara, and the Buddha is no more and no less so than everything else around him.
However, if we are able to step back from this illusion, understanding the Buddha as the Sambhogakaya is preferable. In a visualisation practice, for example, the meditator will start with a blue sky, then in that blue sky create an image of the Buddha for himself. He or she does this whilst reflecting on the fact that the image of the Buddha is his own creation, a product of the imagination which subsequently dissolves back into that blue sky. In this way the Yogacara doctrine of the three bodies gives philosophical justification to the Mahayana practice of depicting the Buddha as the Sambhogakaya, both in its scriptures and its art, in the very many and varied forms in which imagination may present the universal Buddha principle.
Read and take notes on Sangharakshita’s account of the Five Buddha Mandala and its significance in A Guide to the Buddhist Path p.51-59. You don’t need to cover the consorts and wrathful forms on p.59-65 unless you are particularly interested in doing so. Sangharakshita is basically describing the development of ideas of the Sambhogakaya here.
Discussion questions
1. Edward Conze on the Trikaya Doctrine: 'The Buddha’s humanity, always more or less unimportant, has become a mere figment or phantom.' Do you agree?
2. What criticisms do you think a Theravadin would make of the Trikaya doctrine? Would they be justified?
Further Reading
Cush p.113-4
Williams Buddhist Thought p.167-191
Williams Mahayana Buddhism ch.8
Past questions
Examine Mahayana teachings about Tri-kaya, and assess the claim that Mahayana Buddhism completes the teaching of the historical Buddha.