Throughout Mahatma letter #16 (#68
in the chronological edition), the so-called “devachan letter,” are found
several quotations from Buddhist scriptures. These come from an 1871 book
titled, A Catena of Buddhist Scriptures
from the Chinese, by Samuel Beal. In this book (pp. 15-125), Beal
translated what he called “The Buddhist Kosmos” (Fah-kai-on-lih-to, in his transcription of the Chinese title, p. 12),
written by Jin-Ch’au, and published in 1573 C.E. The book by Jin-Ch’au includes
many quotations from the Buddhist scriptures. It is usually these quotations
that are given in the Mahatma letter. One of these quotations refers to the “dwelling
of Māra” (Mahatma Letters, 2nd ed. pp.
106-107; 3rd ed. p. 104, chronological ed. p. 195; from Beal’s Catena, p. 90). This Māra, says the
Mahatma letter, is the allegorical image of the mysterious “Planet of Death,” a
sphere located “between Kama and Rupa-lokas.”
The dwelling of Māra was referred to
a few pages earlier in Beal’s Catena
(p. 84) as the “abode of Māra.” The earlier quotation confirms the later
quotation, that this dwelling or abode of Māra is “between the Kama Loka
and the Rupa Loka” (p. 90); that is, between the kāma-dhātu or desire realm and
the rūpa-dhātu or form realm. However, no such place is known in the Buddhist
teachings that have become standard, such as are based on the Sanskrit Abhidharma-kośa or the Pali Abhidhammatha-saṅgaha. In the standard
Buddhist teachings, the kāma-dhātu ends with the sixth of six heavens, the para-nirmita-vaśavartin
heaven, after which begins the rūpa-dhātu with the first of seventeen or
sixteen higher heavens, the brahma-kāyika heaven (these have been translated as
“heavens” only because they are abodes of gods located above the human realm;
the Sanskrit text merely calls them “places, localities,” sthāna). There is no mention of any dwelling or abode in between. Indeed,
in the standard teachings Māra, the god of desire, dwells in the sixth and
highest heaven of the kāma-dhātu, the desire realm, not in some sphere between
the kāma-dhātu and the rūpa-dhātu. Where, then, does this teaching come from?
The text translated by Beal quotes it from what Beal transcribed as the
“Lau-Tan Sutra.”
The first step is to figure out what
is the “Lau-Tan Sutra,” as transcribed by Beal. He thought (p. 90) that it
might be the “Pinda-dhana Sûtra,” but no such sūtra shows up in our catalogues.
Fortunately, Beal himself prepared a catalogue of the Chinese Tripiṭaka, the
first ever in English, published in 1876: The
Buddhist Tripiṭaka, as It Is Known in China and Japan. A Catalogue and
Compendious Report. There, on p. 39, no. 6 is the Fuh-shwo-Lau-tan-king, i.e., the Lau-tan Sūtra. Several years later,
in 1883, Beal’s pioneering catalogue was improved upon by Bunyiu Nanjio with
his still used Catalogue of the Chinese
Translation of the Buddhist Tripitaka. From Beal’s description in his
catalogue, giving the translators, etc., we can see that the Lau-tan Sūtra is
no. 551, pp. 138-139, in Nanjio’s catalogue: the Fo-shwo-leu-thân-kiṅ. Nanjio
there tells us that it is one of three “earlier translations of No. 545 (30),
i.e. the Sûtra on the record of the world, in the Dîrghâgama.” From this
information, we can trace it to the now standard edition of the Chinese Tripiṭaka,
the Taishō edition, which was compiled and published 1922-1934. In the 1931 Taishō
catalogue, this sūtra is no. 23, the Ta
leou t’an king. In the once commonly used Wade-Giles system this is written
Ta lou t’an ching, or in the now more
standard pinyin system, Da lou tan jing.
The Lau-tan Sūtra, as Nanjio
informed us, is an earlier translation of the thirtieth sūtra in the Dīrghāgama.
The Dīrghāgama collection, originally in Sanskrit, consists of thirty sūtras in
the Chinese translation. The Sanskrit Dīrghāgama was long lost, but in recent
years an incomplete manuscript of it was discovered. In this manuscript, the Dīrghāgama
consists of forty-seven sūtras. Unfortunately, an original Sanskrit text of the
Lau-tan Sūtra is not among these (see: Jens-Uwe Hartmann, “Contents and
Structure of the Dīrghāgama of the (Mūla-)Sarvāstivādins,” Annual Report of the International Research Institute for Advanced
Buddhology at Soka University, vol. 7, 2004, pp. 119-137, especially pp. 125-128).
The Dīrghāgama is parallel to the Pali Dīgha-nikāya, which consists of
thirty-four suttas or sūtras. None of these, however, provides us with a parallel
to the Lau-tan Sūtra. So we still do not know the Sanskrit title of the Lau-tan
Sūtra. One surmise was the Loka-dhātu Sūtra; a later surmise was the Loka-prasthāna
Sūtra. The most plausible one is Loka-prajñapti Sūtra, found in an article on
the related Loka-prajñapti Śāstra (Siglinde Dietz, “A Brief Survey on the
Sanskrit Fragments of the Lokaprajñaptiśāstra,” Annual Memoirs of the Otani University Shin Buddhist Comprehensive
Research Institute, vol. 7, 1989, p. 80). More importantly, we do not have
a Sanskrit or Pali text of it to check for this “dwelling of Māra.”
The next step, then, is to see if another text can be found that refers to the “dwelling of Māra” located between the kāma-dhātu and the rūpa-dhātu. As already said, the texts that provide the standard Buddhist teachings on cosmography do not refer to any such place, including their commentaries such as the comprehensive Chim commentary on the Abhidharmakośa recently translated from Tibetan (by Ian James Coghlan, Ornament of Abhidharma, 2018). After a fruitless search of possible candidates, such as the Divyāvadāna (five descriptions of the heavens without it), the Mūla-sarvāstivāda-vinaya-vastu (four descriptions without it, all in its Saṅgha-bheda-vastu), the Dharma-skandha (five descriptions without it in the lengthy extant Sanskrit portions), the Loka-prajñapti-śāstra (several descriptions without it, searched via its Tibetan translation, none in the extant Sanskrit fragments), etc., I came to the Mahāvastu, an old vinaya text that never made it into mainstream Buddhism. There we find two references to such a place. The Mahāvastu refers to the dwelling (bhavana) of Māra, the abode (ālaya) of Māra, that is between the kāma-dhātu and the rūpa-dhātu. Before bringing in the Mahāvastu references, it will be useful to review the passage translated by Beal and quoted in the Mahatma letter, and the supporting passage translated by Beal showing that this place is in fact between the kāma-dhātu and the rūpa-dhātu.
The passage translated by Beal and
quoted in the Mahatma letter, from Beal’s Catena,
p. 90:
“The Lau-Tan Sutra says:1 ‘Between the Kama Loka and the Rupa Loka, there is a distinct locality, the dwelling of Mâra. This Mâra, filled with passion and lust, destroys all virtuous principles, as a stone grinds corn. His palace is 6,000 yojanas square, and is surrounded by a seven-fold wall.’”
“1
Pinda-dhana Sûtra.”
The supporting passage that is found
a few pages earlier briefly describes the six heavens of the kāma-dhātu, the
“World of Desires,” one by one. It is preceded by this note from the Chinese
Editor on its sources: “For bodily size we follow the Kosha; for the character
of the garments the Dirghâgama Sutra; for the duration of life the Kosha and
Abhidharma.” After the six heavens of the kāma-dhātu and before moving on to
the rūpa-dhātu, or “Rupa-loka,” it brings in the “Mâra-vasanam-Heavens,” the
“abode of Mâra.” It is from Beal’s Catena,
pp. 83-84:
“10. With respect to the six heavens of the World of Desires, the size of the bodies of the ‘Four Kings,’ is half a li, the weight of their garments half a tael (ounce), and fifty years of men equal one of their days and nights; they live 500 years.
“In the Trayastriñshas Heaven the size of the body is one
li, the weight of the garments six chu (one fourth of an ounce), one night and day
equal 100 years of men, and they live 1,000 of these years.
“In the Yama Heaven, the height of the body is one li and
a half, their garments three chu (scruples) in weight, one night and day equals
200 years of men, and they live 2,000 of these years.
“In the Tusita Heaven, height two li, weight two chu,
life 4,000 years, each year being 400 years of men.
“In the Nirmâna rati Heaven, height two and a half li, weight
one chu, duration of life 8,000 years, each year being equal to 800 years of
men.
“In the Parinirmita-vasavartin Heaven, the height is three
li, weight of garments half a scruple, and they live 16,000 years, each year of
which is equal to 1,600 years of men.
“In the Mâra-vasanam1-Heavens, the weight of
garments is 128th of an ounce, and the years of their life 32,000.
“In the Rupa-Ioka they use kalpas to measure the duration
of life, and they wear no garments, there being no distinction of sexes.”
“1. Mo-Io-po-seun, i.e., Mâra-vasanam, or abode of
Mâra; vide Burnouf, Introd., 617.”
This shows clearly that the dwelling
or abode of Māra is a distinct locality, with its own distinct weight of
garments and years of lifespan, beyond the para-nirmita-vaśavartin heaven, the
highest heaven of the kāma-dhātu, and before the rūpa-dhātu. It confirms the
quotation from the Lau-tan Sūtra. The later Chinese translation of the Lau-tan
Sūtra as found in the Dīrghāgama has now become available in a complete English
translation of the Dīrghāgama. This translation of the same passage quoted by
Beal’s author differs in some ways from Beal’s translation of it, but confirms that
the dwelling of Māra is a distinct locality between the para-nirmita-vaśavartin
heaven and the brahma-kāyika heaven. As translated by Shohei Ichimura in The Canonical Book of the Buddha’s Lengthy
Discourses, vol. 3, 2018, p. 155:
“Between Paranirmitavaśavartin
Heaven and Brahmakāyika Heaven is the palace of the lord of the evil ones, Māra,
an area of sixty thousand yojanas surrounded by sevenfold walls with
seven railings, seven ornamental nets, and seven lines of trees, and so on,
with innumerable birds singing harmoniously together, just as before.”
Another English translation of this
passage from the later Chinese translation of the Lau-tan Sūtra as found in the
Dīrghāgama, made by Angela Falco Howard, is found in her partial translation of
this sūtra from her 1986 book, The
Imagery of the Cosmological Buddha, p. 117:
“Between
the Paranirmita and Brahmā Heavens is the palace of Brahmā deva, which extends for six thousand yojanas in both directions. The palace’s walls are seven-fold with
seven balustrades, seven rows of trees with seven precious bells, and countless
birds singing harmoniously to each other.”
This translation differs from the
2018 translation in the number of yojanas in extent, six thousand instead of
sixty thousand, and more significantly, the palace of Brahmā rather than the
palace of Māra. However, this is almost certainly a slip on the part of Howard.
Later in this sūtra as translated by Howard, we see that it is indeed “Māra’s
Heaven” that is between the Paranirmitavaśavartin Heaven and the Brahmā
Heavens, p. 154:
“There
are twelve categories of sentient beings who belong to the Kamadhātu or World
of Desire. Which are they? They are [the denizens of] hell, the animals, pretas, men, asuras, the Four Heavenly Kings, [those who live in] the Trāyastriṃśa
Heaven, Yama Heaven, Tuṣita Heaven, Nirmāṇarati Heaven, Paranirmitavaśavartin
Heaven, Māra’s Heaven. There are twenty-two categories of sentient beings who
belong to the Rupadhātu or World of Form. They are [the beings living in] Brahmā’s
Heaven, in the Brahmakāyika Heaven, Brahmāpurohita Heaven, . . .”
This is in turn confirmed in
Ichimura’s 2018 translation of this same passage of the Dīrghagama, vol. 3, p.
244:
“There are twelve kinds of
sentient beings in the realm of desire. What are the twelve? They are (1) hell
beings, (2) animals, (3) hungry ghosts, (4) humans, (5) asuras, (6) the
guardian gods, (7) the Trāyastriṃśa gods, (8) the Yama gods, (9) the Tuṣita
gods, (10) the Nirmāṇarati gods, (11) the Paranirmitavaśavartin gods, and (12)
the evil ones (Pāpīyas). There are twenty-two kinds of sentient beings in the
realm of form: (1) the Brahmakāyika gods, (2) the Brahmapurohita gods, . . .”
Yet with all this, we were still
lacking a Sanskrit original to confirm the English translations of the Chinese
translations, until found in the Mahāvastu. The Mahāvastu, one of the earliest
Buddhist Sanskrit texts we have, is a text from the vinaya of the long-defunct
Lokottara-vādin Mahā-sāṃghika Buddhists. Two passages in this text refer to the
dwelling (bhavana) of Māra, the abode (ālaya) of Māra, and show clearly that
this dwelling or abode of Māra is a distinct locality between the
para-nirmita-vaśavartin heaven of the kāma-dhātu and the brahmā heavens of the
rūpa-dhātu. Here there can be no question, since we have the original Sanskrit.
The two passages from the Mahāvastu are:
śīlena
pariśuddhena cyavantaṃ paśyate naraḥ |
vimānaṃ ruciraṃ śreṣṭhaṃ apsaro-gaṇa-sevitaṃ ||
śīlena pariśuddhena cyavantaṃ paśyate naraḥ |
sumeru-mūrdhne rucire trāyastriśānam ālaye ||
śīlena pariśuddhena yāmāṃ paśyati devatāṃ |
taṃ caiva nagaraṃ divyaṃ apsarāhi parisphuṭaṃ ||
śīlena pariśuddhena tuṣitāṃ paśyati devatāṃ |
vimānāṃ paśyati teṣāṃ vicitrāṃ ratanāmayāṃ ||
śīlena pariśuddhena nirmāṇa-ratīṃ paśyati |
sunirmitāṃ deva-putrāṃ paśyati ca svalaṃkṛtāṃ ||
śīlena pariśuddhena devāṃ paśyati śobhanāṃ |
para-nirmita-vaśavartī vimāneṣu pratiṣṭhitā ||
śīlena pariśuddhena paśyate māram ālayaṃ |
maṇi-vitāna-saṃchannaṃ apsaro-gaṇa-sevitaṃ ||
śīle ābhogaṃ kṛtvāna brahmāṃ paśyati devatāṃ |
jāṃbū-nada-vimānaṃ ca maṇīhi pratimaṇḍitaṃ ||
śīlavāṃ paśyate bhikṣu devāṃ ca brahma-kāyikāṃ |
brahma-purohitāṃ devāṃ vimānehi pratiṣṭhitāṃ ||
(Le Mahâvastu, edited by É. Senart, vol. 2, 1890, pp. 359-360)
“Through his pure morality a man can
see one passing away to the highest brilliant mansion, the resort of throngs of
Apsarases.
“Through his pure morality a man can
see one passing away to the bright peak of Sumeru, the abode of the Trāyastriṃśa
devas.
“Through his pure morality he can
see the Yāma devas, and that celestial city which is crowded by Apsarases.
“Because of his perfectly pure
morality he sees the Tuṣita devas; he sees their bright bejewelled mansions.
“Because of his perfectly pure
morality he sees the Nirmāṇarati devas, the devas (named) Sunirmita, makers of
their own adornments.
“Because of his perfectly pure
morality he sees the shining Paranirmitavaśavartin devas standing in their own
mansions.
“Because of his perfectly pure
morality he sees the abode of Māra, covered with a canopy of jewels and crowded
by throngs of Apsarases.
“Through fixing his mind on morality
he sees the Brahmā devas and their mansion of Jāmbūnada gold begirt with jewels.
“The moral monk sees the devas in
Brahmā’s train, and the devas who are his priests, standing in their mansions.”
(The Mahāvastu, translated by J. J.
Jones, vol. 2, 1952, p. 327)
atīva cāturmahārājikānāṃ
devānāṃ bhavanāni pariśuddhāni paryavadātāni abhūṣi | atīva trāyastriṃśānāṃ
yāmānāṃ tuṣitānāṃ nirmāṇa-ratīṇāṃ para-nirmita-vasavartināṃ devānāṃ bhavanāni
pariśuddhāni paryavadātāni abhūṣi || atīva māra-bhavanāni dhyāmāni abhūnsuḥ |
durvarṇā niṣprabhāṇi dhvajāgrāṇi māra-kāyikānāṃ devānāṃ māro ca pāpīmāṃ duḥkhī
durmano vipratisārī dhyāmanta-varṇo anto-śalya-paridāgha-jāto || brahma-kāyikānāṃ
devānāṃ bhavanāni pariśuddhāni paryavadātāni abhūnsuḥ | śuddhāvāsānāṃ devānāṃ
bhavanāni pariśuddhāni paryavadātāni abhūnsuḥ |
(Le Mahâvastu, edited by É. Senart, vol. 2, 1890, p. 163)
“The abodes of the Cāturmahārājika
devas became exceeding bright and pure, and so did the abodes of the Trāyastriṃśa
devas, of the Yāma devas, of the Tuṣita devas, of the Nirmāṇarati devas, and of
the Paranirmitavaśavartin devas. The abodes of Māra became exceeding gloomy.
The standards of Māra’s companies became dulled and without lustre. And wicked
Māra became unhappy, discomfited, remorseful, dark-visaged and tortured by the
sting within him. The abodes of the Brahmā devas and of the Śuddhāvāsa devas
became exceeding bright and pure.”
(The Mahāvastu, translated by J. J. Jones, vol. 2, 1952, p. 158)
The probable reason why the teaching
of the dwelling of Māra between the kāma-dhātu and the rūpa-dhātu did not
become standard Buddhist doctrine is that it refers to an exceptional realm of
existence, not a normal realm of existence. The Mahatma letter has been
describing the states after death. It explains that the dwelling of this Māra
is the allegorical image of the sphere called the “Planet of Death,” where the
lives doomed to destruction disappear.
“Nor must you laugh, if
ever you come across Pindha-Dhana or any other Buddhist Sutra and
read: ‘Between the Kama-Loka and the Rupa-Loka there is a locality, the dwelling
of “Mara” (Death). This Mara filled with passion and lust, destroys all
virtuous principles, as a stone grinds corn.* His palace is 7000 yojanas
square, and is surrounded by a seven-fold wall,’ for you will feel now
more prepared to understand the allegory.”
“* This Mara, as you may
well think, is the allegorical image of the sphere called the ‘Planet of Death’
— the whirlpool whither disappear the lives doomed to
destruction. It is between Kama and Rupa–Lokas that the struggle
takes place.”
Earlier in the letter the “planet of
Death” is referred to for the first time. Besides the two references to it in
this letter, this mysterious place is referred to only one more time in the whole
of the primary Theosophical writings, only to say in reply to Sinnett’s query
about it, “A question I have no right to answer.” (Mahatma letter #23,
chronological #93). Then follows in this letter a lengthy description of how a
person may end up there. The letter concludes with the statement that this is
very rare, an exception rather than the rule.
“Every one but that ego which,
attracted by its gross magnetism, falls into the current that will draw it into
the ‘planet of Death’ — the mental as well as physical satellite of our earth —
is fitted to pass into a relative ‘spiritual’ condition adjusted to his
previous condition in life and mode of thought. To my knowledge and recollection
H.P.B. explained to Mr. Hume that man’s sixth principle, as something purely
spiritual could not exist, or have conscious being in the Deva-Chan,
unless it assimilated some of the more abstract and pure of the mental
attributes of the fifth principle or animal Soul: its manas (mind) and
memory. When man dies his second and third principles die with him; the lower
triad disappears, and the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh principles form the
surviving Quaternary. (Read again page 6 in Fragments of O.T.) Thenceforth it is a ‘death’ struggle between
the Upper and Lower dualities. If the upper wins, the sixth, having attracted
to itself the quintessence of Good from the fifth — its nobler
affections, its saintly (though they be earthly) aspirations, and the
most Spiritualised portions of its mind — follows its divine elder (the
7th) into the ‘Gestation’ State; and the fifth and fourth remain in association
as an empty shell — (the expression is quite correct) — to roam in the
earth’s atmosphere, with half the personal memory gone, and the more brutal instincts
fully alive for a certain period — an ‘Elementary’ in short. This is the ‘angel
guide’ of the average medium. If, on the other hand, it is the Upper Duality
which is defeated, then, it is the fifth principle that assimilates all
that there may be left of personal recollection and perceptions of its
personal individuality in the sixth. But, with all this additional stock, it
will not remain in Kama-Loka — ‘the world of Desire’ or our Earth’s
atmosphere. In a very short time like a straw floating within the attraction of
the vortices and pits of the Maelstrom, it is caught up and drawn into the
great whirlpool of human Egos; while the sixth and seventh — now a purely
Spiritual, individual MONAD, with nothing left in it of the late
personality, having no regular ‘gestation’ period to pass through (since there
is no purified personal Ego to be reborn), after a more or less
prolonged period of unconscious Rest in the boundless Space — will find itself
reborn in another personality on the next planet. When arrives the period of
‘Full Individual Consciousness’ — which precedes that of Absolute Consciousness
in the Pari-Nirvana — this lost personal life becomes as a torn
out page in the great Book of Lives, without even a disconnected word
left to mark its absence. The purified monad will neither perceive nor remember
it in the series of its past rebirths — which it would had it gone to the ‘World
of Forms’ (rupa-loka) — and its retrospective glance will not perceive
even the slightest sign to indicate that it had been. The light of Samma-Sambuddh
—
‘. . . that light which
shines beyond our mortal ken
The line of all the
lives in all the worlds’ —
throws no ray
upon that personal life in the series of lives foregone.
“To the credit of mankind, I must
say, that such an utter obliteration of an existence from the tablets of Universal
Being does not occur often enough to make a great percentage. In fact, like the
much mentioned ‘congenital idiot’ such a thing is a lusus naturae — an
exception, not the rule.”
It may be that this teaching of a
realm between the kāma-dhātu and the rūpa-dhātu, explained here as where the
lives doomed to destruction disappear, dropped away from the Buddhist teachings
for the same reason that it dropped away from the Theosophical teachings: as the
Mahatma said, “I have no right to answer” Sinnett’s question about this
mysterious “planet of death.” In the Theosophical teachings it pertains only to
exceptions, where the life was so devoid of any redeeming qualities that the principles
which make up the person go to annihilation without anything left to continue
on to rebirth, thus breaking the connection with the spiritual individual monad
that once animated that personality. In Buddhist terms, the series of sets of
skandhas that make up a person and form an unbroken causal continuum of rebirth
from life to life to life is broken. This is not something that the standard
Buddhist teachings speak of.
The dwelling of Māra referred to in
these early Buddhist texts, the Dīrghāgama and the Mahāvastu, would in
accordance with the Theosophical explanation refer to Māra as death, mṛtyu-māra;
thus the dwelling of Māra is the planet of death. This Māra is not the more
usual Māra of desire whose dwelling is the para-nirmita-vaśavartin heaven at
the top of the kāma-dhātu: Māra the god, deva-putra-māra, who as personified
desire has sway over the whole desire realm or kāma-dhātu. The Theosophical
teachings attempted to explain the allegorical Buddhist teachings in
straightforward language, thus giving out for the first time what was hitherto
esoteric information. The Buddhist teaching of sukhāvatī or devachan (Tibetan,
bde ba can), a pure buddha-field or pure land that Buddhists could aspire to go
to after death, was explained as the after-death state that most people go to. Those
who do not go to that state, the exceptions, had also to be accounted for. As
exceptions, it was not necessary, and apparently was not permissible, to say
much about them. Nonetheless, for the explanation of the after-death states to
be complete, the dwelling of Māra or the planet of death had to at least be
mentioned.
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