Perception

This chapter provides an overview of Buddhist accounts of perceptual knowledge as articulated by Dignāga and Dharmakīrti. It identifies the key features of these two epistemologists’ accounts of perception and discusses the important ways in which these two thinkers’ accounts differ from one another. The second half of the chapter explores the question of how far the scope of perceptual knowledge can be extended and looks at the various subtypes of perception that are adopted by Buddhist epistemologists including reflexive perception, mental perception and yogic perception. The chapter concludes by exploring how perceptual cognitions differ from instances of illusion and hallucination.

The Epistemology of Yogic Perception: Dignāga – Dharmakīrti’s School

One of the specific features of Indian philosophical thought in comparison with Western tradition is its addressing the subject of yogic and contemplative prac­tices. The article focuses on the interpretation of yogic experience in terms of Buddhist epistemology (pramāṇavāda – the teachings on the instrument of valid cognition). The concept of yogic perception (yogipratyaksha), which dates back to the Buddhist philosopher Dignāga, later becomes the subject of pan-Indian philosophical debates. The author analyzes the Buddha’s teachings on the Four Noble Truths as an object of yogic perception. If, according to Dignāga, yogic perception grasps its object directly, beyond its verbal elucidation by teachers, while the Noble Truths are transmitted through the Buddha’s word, the question arises as to how can they constitute the object of direct apprehension? The article proposes to understand yogic perception in the light of the three stages of under­standing in Buddhism: 1) śrutamayī (consisting in hearing) – the memorization from the words of teacher; 2) cintāmayī (consisting in reflection) – a critical ana­lytical discourse about the form and meaning of what was learned at the previous stage; and finally, 3) bhāvanāmayī (consisting in contemplation) – an individual appropriation of the ideas analyzed at the previous stage in meditation. The author argues that, according to this algorithm, only the intellectual mastering of Buddha’s teachings can shape a mindset that brings forth yogic liberating in­sight – the goal of the Buddhist soteriological aspirations

Dissenting Yogis: The Mīmāṁsaka-Buddhist Battle for Epistemological Authority

While dissent connotes a type of split or departure, it can bind as much as it separates. This paper traces a millennium-long history of debate between Buddhists and other religionists who championed the Vedic authority rejected by the Buddha, a camp that came to be known as “Mīmāṁsā.” My analysis illustrates dissent can have the paradoxical feature of forging strong relationships through its seeming antithesis: opposition. Specifically, I explore Mīmāṁsaka-Buddhist debate on meditation. Buddhists argued that meditation could yield authoritative spiritual insight once a meditator had honed their yogic perception (yogipratyakṣa). Mīmāṁsakas rejected yogic perception, arguing only the scriptural corpus of the Vedas had authority. By undermining yogic perception, Mīmāṁsakas aimed to defang religious movements, like the Buddhists’, who appealed to meditative experience as legitimate grounds for dissent. Counterintuitively, such exchanges were essential for the construction of each faction’s identity and were continually mutually formative over the long history of their interaction.

Seeing as Cognizing: Perception, Concepts and Meditation Practice in Indian Buddhist Epistemology

As Buddhist literature makes abundantly clear, the Buddha’s knowledge is an instance of yogic perception; it radically differs from the ordinary cognition of empirical objects and results from a special training that includes ascetic toil and meditative practices. This essay aims to explore the role of special cognitive processes – in particular the Buddha’s vision of the Truths and cognitive processes relating to meditation practices – in the Buddhist epistemological tradition of South Asia. It argues that, given the Indian philosophical context, an epistemology with Buddhist presuppositions had to consider why and how meditation practices can make a difference as regards the results of cognition. Passages from Dharmakīrti’s work will be examined that show how Dharmakīrti represents yogic perception and the function of meditation practices (especially visualization) in transforming habitual processes of conceptualization.

The School of Diṅnāga and Dharmakīrti

The chapter begins with an account of the lives and works of Diṅnāga and Dharmakīrti, the key thinkers of the so-called ‘logico-epistemological school’. Following sections discuss the most important themes of their philosophy: epistemology, metaphysics, inference, and language. The discussion then turns to two specific epistemological problems, the status of scriptural authority and the role of meditatively trained, ‘yogic’ perception. The next section deals with the complex issue of how the school of Diṅnāga and Dharmakīrti relates to the other Buddhist schools, followed by a discussion of its debate with Mīmāṃsā, with particular emphasis on Mīmāṃsā epistemology, theory of language, and historiography. A final section treats the end of Buddhist scholastic philosophy in India, looking at two important thinkers from the times after Diṅnāga and Dharmakīrti, Śāntideva and Atiśa Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna.