I was in Tim’s Used Books the other day and picked up three books:

  • The Buddhist Tradition: In India, China and Japan edited by William Theodore de Bary
  • Why I Am Not a Buddhist by Evan Thompson
  • Spiritual Envy by Michael Krasny

At lunch today I read from The Buddhist Tradition, and now felt compelled to take some notes!

But first! The iiø V7 I△ voicing I practiced in all keys today:

Beat: 1       2       3       4

S    b5      b9 ->1   5
A     1       5 ----> 1
T     7 ----> 3       7
B     3       7 ----> 3

    iiø     (Vb9) V7  I△

As educational as it was to come up with the diagram, maybe there’s a way to write music in markdown (maybe using this?).

Arrows (-->) indicate pitch changes.

The voicing contains two suspensions relative to the V7 chord:

  • In the Tenor, 7 of the iiø == 4 of the V7; so we have a 4-3 suspension.
  • In the Soprano, 1 of the V7 == 5 of the I△; we have a b9-1 suspension into the V7, with the voice staying on the note into the I△, so perhaps it could also be seen as an anticipation.

Another way to think of the voicing is in 3 intervals (between the 4 voices):

Beat: 1       2       3       4

     TT      TT ->P4  P5
     M2      m3       m2
     P5      TT       P5

    iiø     (Vb9) V7  I△

Anyway, the notes from The Buddhist Tradition.

Essentials of Theravāda Buddhism

  • Much of the literature of other sects has been lost or only survives in Chinese or Tibetan translations; this one has been fully preserved in Ceylon (Sri Lanka). Written in Pali, a language related to Sanskrit, likely based on an ancient vernacular spoken in western part of India.
  • All things are composite.
    • Corollary: they are also transient — composition of aggregates is liable to change with time.
    • Things have no eternal Self or soul or abiding individuality.
  • Nature: sorrowful, transient, soulless.
  • There are 5 classes of things in the universe:
    • Form and matter (Rūpa)
    • Sensations (Vedanā)
      • Feelings arising from exercise of the 6 senses (mind being the sixth) upon sense-objects.
    • Perceptions (Sañña)
      • Cognitions of Sensations.
    • Psychic dispositions or constructions (Saṅkhāra)
      • Emotions, propensities, faculties, and conditions of the individual.
    • Consciousness or Conscious thought (Viññāṇa)
      • Arises from the interplay of the other psychic constituents.
  • The individual is a composite of some combination of the five components. Never the same from moment to moment. Constant flux.
  • Chain of Causation: the process by which life continues. Dependent Origination (Paṭiccasamuppāda).
  • Root Cause of process of birth and death is ignorance: the fundamental illusion that individuality and permanence exist.
    • Hence, various psychic phenomena, including desire.
  • Each act, word, or thought leaves its traces on the collection of the five constituents of the phenomenal individual.
    • Material and immaterial parts separated at death; immaterial parts (might be called soul in other systems) carry over (via karma, as in Hinduism) via transmigration/rebirth.
  • Process of rebirth can only be stopped by achieving Nirvāṇa.
  • One of the early schools (Sautrāntika) “emphasized the component elements of the chain——every instant a composite object disappeared, to be replaced by a new one which came into being as a result of the last. This view of the universe, which appears in the systems of other Buddhist sects in less emphatic form, is akin to the quantum theory of modern physics.”
  • “The total literature of Buddhism is so large that it is quite impossible for a single individual to master it in his lifetime.” - The canon is generally known as Tripiṭaka (“The Three Baskets”):
    • Conduct (Vinaya) - for monks and nuns.
    • Discourses (Sutta) - most important; attributed to the Buddha (though “none can be specified with certainty as being his own words”). Five sections.
    • Supplementary Doctrines (Abhidhamma) - collection of 7 works on Buddhist psychology and metaphysics; systematization of ideas in Discourses; came later.

The Four Noble Truths

From Saṃyutta Nikāya (i.e. “connected scripture”), the following is common to all schools of Buddhist thought and is part of the dharma which reflects the fundamental moral law of the universe (sidenote: I appreciate Rajiv Malhotra’s thoughts on this word: “Religion applies only to human beings and not to the entire cosmos; there is no religion of electrons, monkeys, plants and galaxies, whereas all of them have their dharma even if they carry it out without intention.”).

  • Two ends are not to be served by a Wanderer.
    • Pursuit of desires and pleasures thereof.
    • Pursuit of pain and hardship.
  • The Middle Way avoids both of those ends.
  • The Four Noble Truths:
    • Sorrow
      • Birth, age, disease, death; contact with unpleasant; separation from pleasant; unfulfilled wishes; all life essentially, including the five components of individuality (see below).
    • Arising of Sorrow
      • Craving (sensual pleasure, continued life, power) -> Rebirth -> Delight/Passion
    • Stopping of Sorrow
      • No passion remains.
    • The Way which Leads to the Stopping of Sorrow
      • The Noble Eightfold Path
        • Right Views
        • Right Resolve
        • Right Speech
        • Right Conduct
        • Right Livelihood
        • Right Effort
        • Right Mindfulness
        • Right Concentration