V o l . XXXIV, No. 1 J o u r n a l o f A s i a n S t u d ie s N o v e m b e r 1974

Review Articles

U n d e r s t a n d i n g T a n t r i c B u d d h i s m : S o m e Q u e s t i o n s o f M e t h o d *

Toward the end of the last century, the eminent Buddhologist T. W. Rhys- Davids spoke for his generation when he characterized the Buddhist Tantras as “miserable in respect of form, as they are odious and degrading in respect of meaning.”1 Times have changed and, in this century, Western scholarship has gradually learned to take a second and more appreciative look at the Vajrayana. But the past has not been left completely behind, and today the study of the Tantric vehicle labors under a heavy legacy. In fact, it is no exaggeration to say that serious examination of this tradition has only just begun. The scholar working in this field is largely on his own, with very little to rely on in the way of the established methods or facts, translated or edited texts, or even reliable dictionaries that are available to the student of earlier Buddhism. When one considers that Tantric Buddhism is by far the most abstruse and complex as well as the least standardized of the major Buddhist traditions, one can begin to appreciate the herculean tasks confronting the Vajrayana scholar.

It is within this context that Professor Alex Wayman has brought forth The Buddhist Tantras, his first volume of secondary studies on the Vajrayana, an offering important both because there is so little published material on this tradition and because Wayman is one of the few contemporary scholars with credentials in the field. The book itself, intended mainly for the specialist, is a collection of individual essays, some appearing here for the first time and others being reprinted from sometimes nearly inaccessible journals and collections. The three sections of the volume reflect the varying level of specialization of the topics treated. Part I, “Introductions,” covers general themes such as the relationship of the Vajrayana to the Mahayana, the history of the Buddhist Tantras and the specific nature of the Tantric Buddhist tradition. The second part, “Foundations of the Buddhist Tantras,” treats some of the basic motifs of the religion including abhise\a (Tib. dbang.bs\ur.ba, ‘initiation’), the tantric pantheon, the mandala (d\yiLh\hor, ‘sacred circle’), and the paraphernalia of Tantric ritual. The final section, entitled “Special Studies,” contains essays on topics of a more technical nature, such as the ‘nine orifices of the body,’ of special importance in the Tantric rite of sam\ranti (hpho.ba, ‘consciousness transference’). The arrangement and topics of Wayman s book cannot help but generate considerable expectation among those with scholarly interest in the Vajrayana. The extent to which these expecta­tions are met is another question again, and an answer to this will be found readily

* The B uddhist Tantras: L igh t on Indo-Tibetan 1 T. W . Rhys-Davids, B uddhism (London: So- Esotericism. By Alex Wayman. N ew York: Samuel ciety for Promoting Christian Knowledge, revised

Weiser, 1973. xiii, 247, pp. Tables, Plates, Draw- edition, 1894 [first edition, 1 8 7 7 ]) , p. 207.

ings, Index. $12.50.

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enough through an examination of Wayman’s methods of procedure and the results they produce.

The essays in The Buddist Tantras are executed according to a definite and consistent two-fold methodology. The first point, spelled out explicitly in the preface, is that the author is concerned to interfere with the Tantric texts as little as possible, and will rather let them speak for themselves. Wayman tells us that the essays of this collection, along with his other writings, “have a common method which is the subordination of personal opinion about the Tantra to authoritative explanations by the proficients of this cult . . .” (xii) As we shall see, this determination to let the documents speak for themselves is carried out with rigor, and much of the book is composed either of quotations (sometimes several pages in length) from the texts or of paraphrases or synopses of their contents.

The second part of Wayman’s method, not presented explicitly but easily deducible from an examination of his sources, is the practice of attempting to elucidate the Vajrayana by relying almost exclusively on the Sanskrit and Tibetan commentaries and later Tantric handbooks. The reason for this procedure would appear to be a now well accepted principle in Tantric Buddhist studies: since the basic Tantras themselves are complex, epigrammatic, ritual documents which are far from being self-explanatory, one can hazard an interpretation of them only after a careful examination of the relevant explanatory literature of the tradition.2 In line with this position, one finds that the great weight of Wayman’s citations and quotations are from the Tantric commentaries. Among these, par­ticularly heavy use is made of a limited and relatively homogeneous body of literature, specifically the writings of the later Tibetan authors Tsong.kha.pa (1357- 1419) and his chief Tantric pupil Mkhas.grub.rje (1385-1438). At the same time, with only a few exceptions, Wayman allows the Tantras themselves to stand in the background.

There are some special strengths to Wayman’s book and these proceed directly from his two part methodology. First, his interest in letting the texts speak for themselves represents a welcome departure from a distressing tendency in many past Vajrayana studies to become absorbed in extensive interpretation at the expense of a constant contact with texts, dates and facts. In the disposition of his work, Wayman refreshingly insists that a responsible and sustained contact with the facts of the tradition must precede any effort at interpretation. Accord­ingly, on page after page of the book, we are confronted with the texts them­selves and with their comments on the Vajrayana. The second part of Wayman’s method, the heavy reliance on commentaries, also has value for the sometimes considerable light they can shed on obscure parts of the Tantras themselves. As noted above, the Buddhist Tantras are often deficient or wholly lacking in explanation of their practices. The commentaries can often fill in the gaps and occasionally what they have to say is positively illuminating. Finally, of special interest is Wayman’s extensive quotation from his favorite authors, particularly Tsong.kha.pa and Mkhas.grub.rje. As a matter of fact, in some places the book comes close to being a compendium of their views and interpretations of the

2 Cf. David Snellgrove’s able articulation of this Oxford University Press, 1 9 5 9 ) , Vol. I , pp. 8 - 1 1 .

principle in his H evajra Tantra (2 vols., London:

UNDERSTANDING TANTRIC BUDDHISM 171

Buddhist Tantras. Thus, in some four dozen, sometimes multipage citations and quotations from Tsong.kha.pa’s works, we learn what this figure has to say about everything from a Tantric reading of the Buddhist creation story (3) and the five mandala Buddhas (47), to Tantric initiation procedure (57-59) and the ritual of “Consciousness Transference” (145-149). The references and quo­tations from Mkhas.grub.rje’s works are equally as numerous and diverse. Since there is little published information on either of these two important Tantric writers, the material presented in The Buddhist Tantras is welcome.

However, in spite of its obvious utility, Wayman’s methodology is not wholly successful. On the contrary, it is applied in much too extreme a form and this creates a book that is, on the whole, difficult and confusing and sometimes actually misleading. To begin with the first part of the author’s method, closer attention to the Tantric texts is commendable. But a crucial question must be asked: just how far can the texts be left to “speak for themselves” ? Wayman believes that they can be left largely on their own and consequently his textual citations, summaries and quotations are generally not supported by secondary informa­tion. Specifically, the reader is given neither background and explanatory infor­mation on the Varjrayâna system itself nor material on the historical context of treated authors and topics. Either one of these lacunae taken alone would be telling enough, especially in view of the unfamiliar and complex nature of Tantric Buddhism and of the specialized nature of the book. But when they are taken together, as the following examples will suggest, their impact is serious indeed.

Let us first consider the lack of background explanation of the Vajrâyàna system. This religious tradition is, to say the least, not well known in the West, and this is true not only of the interested public, but frequently also of specialists in other areas of Asian religions and even of Buddhism itself. Considering the highly technical nature of much of The Buddhist Tantras, a minimum amount of explanation of Vajrayâna terms, ideas and practices would seem to be essential. Yet, although in this volume the obscure and complex Tantric soteriology surfaces in full array, rarely if ever are its technical terms or its symbolic and ritual under­pinnings explained. Beyond this, when a term such as abhise\a arises in multiple contexts with various meanings referring to different rituals (cf., e.g., 47, 61-63, 66, 97, 192-194, passim), the confusion of diversity is simply allowed to stand, without any attempt at ordering or clarification. In addition, items are too fre­quently mentioned without any background or setting. To give just one of many possible examples, in the subsection of Chapter 6 entitled “Âdi-buddha,” a summary of names traditionally applied to this figure is given (53). But just who this deity is or what the possible significance of the multiple appellations might be is not discussed. Four different texts from four different periods with four quite different things to say on the topic are quoted, but the question of the meaning of the differences is not raised, let alone answered.

It might be claimed that since The Buddhist Tantras is clearly intended for the specialist, such explanations are not necessary. One would reply that the number of experts able to fill in this type of information for themselves is very small indeed. And, in any case, at this point even such a hypothetical expert would be almost as frustrated as the more general reader. For here, as too often elsewhere in the book, there is neither a clarification of the issue under discussion

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nor reference to scholarly debate on the topic nor even the minimal contextual information which would enable him to construct his own hypotheses. It would appear, in short, that if one is going to let the texts speak for themselves, he is under the obligation to provide the reader with the necessary tools to understand what is being said. The lack of background material on the Vajrayana system, on either an elementary or an advanced level, places serious limitations on just who may adequately understand the material presented in the book.

The second serious drawback of The Buddhist Tantras is that quoted Tantric authors and texts are usually not set in historical context. The Vajrayana history from which Wayman draws his references extends for some thousand years and spans the cultures of India and Tibet. In the course of this history, several different major interpretations of Tantric Buddhism were developed and many individual text cycles grew out of these, not to speak of the different schools of interpretation spawned by the cycles or the individual authors within the schools. These facts, combined with a general lack of interest in standardization among Vajrayanists, means that on any given topic there will be a substantial variety of opinion. For example, as Wayman himself notes, the same text might be understood and practiced differently by different Tantric groups (64), there are many contradictions in the corpus of Vajrayana literature on individual points (11, 124), different authors use different systems of interpretation (124), even the same tradition will not always speak with unanimity on a given topic (142, 189, 197) and different traditions will show even more variation (17, 124). In another context, we are furthermore told that “no matter how much a single researcher collects materials on these topics from various books in the Tibetan canon or elsewhere, he cannot bring together the strands to form a unified picture.. . . ” (145)

In light of such facts, which must be respected, it appears clear that whenever a text of a particular author is quoted on a given topic, certain fundamental issues must receive treatment such as the historical period of the writer, his lineage, the particular traditions he follows, the nature of the quoted text, its relation to his total work, how he is related to and set off from other authors who have addressed themselves differently to the same topic and the significance of what he has to say for our understanding of the Vajrayana. Unfortunately, in The Buddhist Tantras, information of this sort is rarely given. Instead, quotations are presented without backdrop, as if the Vajrayana spoke with one voice, which it most assuredly does not. Even in the case of the constantly quoted authors Tsong.kha.pa and Mkhas.grub.rje (not to speak of the some three dozen others who are cited with less frequency), little if any information is given about individual backgrounds or training, works or ideas, or about the historical period in which the author wrote. For Tsong.kha.pa and Mkhasgrub.rje, as for the other writers cited in the book, the texts may speak, but the reader has no way of knowing where they come from, how to interpret what they have to say or what their comments might mean in the larger context of Vajrayana history.

Another entire range of problems with The Buddhist Tantras comes into view when we consider the second part of the author’s methodology, namely his almost exclusive reliance on the commentaries for an explanation of the Vajrayana. These problems all revolve around the question of the exact nature of these documents as a literary genre and their utility as prima facie evidence of the Vajrayana. When

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the Tantric vehicle first began to be studied in earnest by Western students earlier in this century, the Buddhist Tantras were generally examined by themselves and this often led to serious misunderstanding. We have suggested above the way in which it has become commonly accepted procedure for the Tantras to be clarified by a concommitant study of their respective commentaries. In The Buddhist Tantras, Wayman takes the matter a step further and seeks to explain the Vajrayana mainly through reference to the commentaries alone.

This procedure raises the serious question of whether such a method can really yield a proper understanding of the Vajrayana. In the first place, it is the Tantras themselves and not the commentaries that have always stood at the heart of the Vajrayana cult. The Tantras embody what the practitioners actually do. Here, the sacred symbols to be visualized are described in detail, the yogic practices are set out, the actions of yogin and yoginl are portrayed and the ritual utterances are given. And, most important, elements such as these are not presented in abstraction, but are rather described in the unified context of those specific rituals, as actually performed by the Tantrics, that are the real basis of this Buddhist cult. The com­mentaries, by contrast, provide us with a secondary, frequently detached, sometimes scholastic view of the essential practices. Just what is happening in the Tantras is often not clear and for this the commentaries can, in given instances, prove extremely helpful. But our understanding of the Vajrayana cult itself must always be based on a study and interpretation of the Tantras themselves. Without this basis, and one feels the acute lack of it in The Buddhist Tantras, one has lost the real foundation of Tantric Buddhism.

Secondly, the commentaries themselves were never intended to be removed from context and taken alone, but always assumed an intimate familiarity with the Tantra upon which they commented. Without a thorough knowledge of the tradition and contents of the basic Tantra, it would seem difficult to understand and evaluate properly a commentatorial explanation. For example, what a given commentary has to say about a certain mandala is properly understood only when it is seen in relationship to the concrete image that forms the basis of the corre­sponding Tantra. When the commentaries are not seen in direct relationship to the individual Tantras and their practices, as too often happens in Wayman’s book, sight is lost of what the commentaries are really about. Beyond that, the Vajrayana appears as essentially doctrinal and scholastic, and not as the highly ritualized and subtle meditative tradition that it really is.

Finally, the commentaries do not purport to analyze or explain in a Western sense the practices, doctrines or symbolism of Tantric Buddhism. In fact, most of the types of information of special interest to the scholar attempting to understand the Vajrayana are excluded from direct treatment in the commentaries for a variety of reasons. Some of the things that we should most like to know are simply pre­supposed by the authors as part of their cultural heritage. Other things are too well known to be considered worthy of attention. Still others are given in the Tantras themselves and so not repeated. Others again are excluded because they were traditionally transmitted orally. And finally, material is excluded simply because it is of no particular interest to the authors. These facts explain why, even when Wayman quotes commentary after commentary on a given point, the reader is left in doubt as to what, exactly, has been clarified.

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All of this suggests that what is true of the Tantras themselves is also true of the commentaries: they are a highly idiosyncratic type of literature and are far from being self-explanatory. Beyond a competent philological method, the commentaries need considerable analysis and interpretation before they can yield illumination of the Vajrayana. Unfortunately, little of this work is carried out in The Buddhist Tantras and so the utility of much of the material in the book must remain in doubt. Had Wayman intended to give us a book about the Tantric commentaries (and particularly those of his favorite authors), he would have been nearer to what he has actually done. But in purporting to offer us a book on the Buddhist Tantras themselves and their practice, he has misrepresented himself and what is best in his work.

Lastly, and perhaps most important, one misses in Wayman’s book any real attempt at an interpretation of the Vajrayana. Let us note that this problem, like the others already discussed, can be seen as a product of the author’s two-fold methodology. Clearly, if one intends to avoid expressing one’s own views of the Tantra and will rather allow the commentaries to do the explaining, any extensive project of interpretation is not in order. Yet as should be clear by now, there is simply too much of a gap in both a narrowly linguistic and a broader cultural sense, between the Buddhist Tantric literature and the contemporary (even scholarly) Western reader for this to work. Instead of getting interpretations from the tradition itself, what we usually get is no interpretation whatever. Indeed, in a discussion of a particularly esoteric ritual, the author comments that “the problem remains of why the Buddhist Tantra is doing this at all.” (2-7) This is indeed a problem of major proportions and unfortunately, here as elsewhere in the book, no satis­factory answer is given. In fact, throughout the extensive amount of material that is presented to the reader, the vague question hangs in the air as to why the Tantrics would trouble themselves with such strange and complicated things in the first place. Wayman is no doubt right to shun the elaborate and often fanciful style of interpretation of past generations. But without some attempt to indicate the meaning of the Buddhist Tantra in human terms, one is not quite clear as to the point of the quotations and facts given in the book.

All of the above mentioned problems are serious, and together they leave us with a work whose value is, at best, mixed. But, at the same time, it would be an error to suppose that all of these difficulties could have been avoided by greater methodological care on the part of the author. On the contrary, given the incipient state of Vajrayana scholarship as well as Wayman’s intent to quote from a variety of Tantric Buddhist traditions and periods on so many different topics, it appears to this reviewer that some degree of failure was unavoidable. Until the major sources of the tradition have been analyzed and critically evaluated (and first they must be read!), we will not be able to sort out the different stands of the Vajrayana, nor their relationship to one another. And only when this work has been done, will we be ready for a substantially fuller definition of Tantric Buddhism and for the kind of historical overview on selected topics demanded by Wayman’s scope of references.

At the same time, while excusing the existence of some of the larger problems in The Buddhist Tantras, one cannot be so benign about the way in which the author attempts to deal with them. In determining to let the texts and, moreover,

UNDERSTANDING TANTRIC BUDDHISM 175

the commentaries speak for themselves. Wayman tries to avoid the enormous his­torical, definitional and hermeneutical problems facing contemporary Vajrayana scholarship. In the long run, as we have tried to suggest, such a procedure only exacerbates existing difficulties. Instead of attempting to by-pass these, perhaps more service would have been rendered had the author used these essays as a forum for locating and describing the formidable problems that exist. Such discussions of concrete methodology are rare in this area of scholarship and are sorely needed. To be sure, such an approach might well have forced the author into a substantial limitation of the scope and aims of his work. But, in this case, the reader’s expecta­tions would have been reduced and the achievements of the book would have been more clear and more solid.

R e g i n a l d R a y

Indiana University