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On Being Buddha

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What is it like to be a Buddha? Is there only one Buddha or are there many? What can Buddhas do and what do they know? Is there anything they cannot do and cannot know? These and associated questions were much discussed by Buddhist thinkers in India, and a complex and subtle set of doctrinal positions was developed to deal with them. This is the first book in a western language to treat these doctrines about Buddha from a philosophical and thoroughly critical viewpoint.

The book shows that Buddhist thinkers were driven, when theorizing about Buddha, by a basic intuition that Buddha must be maximally perfect, and that pursuing the implications of this intuition led them into some conceptual dilemmas that show considerable similarity to some of those treated by western theists. The Indian Buddhist tradition of thought about these matters is presented here as thoroughly systematic, analytical, and doctrinal.

The book's analysis is based almost entirely upon original sources in their original languages. All extracts discussed are translated into English and the book is accessible to nonspecialists, while still treating material that has not been much discussed by western scholars.

(Source: back cover)

Citation	Griffiths, Paul J. On Being Buddha: The Classical Doctrine of Buddhahood. SUNY Series, Toward a Comparative Philosophy of Religions. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994.

Table of Contents About the Book Texts Translated Quotes

• Foreward by Frank E. Reynoldsxiii
• Prefacexvii
• Acknowledgementsxxi
• Chapter One: The Doctrinal Study of Doctrine
• 1.0 Prolegomena1
• 1.1 Primary Doctrines6
• 1.2 Secondary Doctrines12
  • 1.2.1 Rules of Recognition and Patterns of Derivation12
  • 1.2.2 Rules of Interpretation and Combination20
• 1.3 The Doctrinal Uses of Primary Doctrines21
• 1.4 Applying the Theory23
• Chapter Two: Buddhist Doctrine
• 2.0 Prolegomena27
• 2.1 The Doctrinal Digests27
• 2.2 The Authority of the Doctrinal Digests33
• 2.3 The Content and Subject-Matter of the Doctrinal Digests41
• 2.4 The Goals of the Doctrinal Digests43
• 2.5 Theories of Doctrine in the Doctrinal Digests46
  • 2.5.1 Rules of Recognition46
  • 2.5.2 Rules of Interpretation51
• Chapter Three: Buddhalogical Doctrine
• 3.0 Prolegomena57
• 3.1 Buddhalogy and Maximal Greatness58
• 3.2 Titles and Epithets of Buddha60
• 3.3 Properties of Buddha66
• 3.4 Analytical and Organizational Schemata75
• 3.5 Metaphysical Embeddedness and Systematic Location82
• Chapter Four: Buddha in the World
• 4.0 Prolegomena87
• 4.1 The Buddha-Legend87
• 4.2 Bodies of Magical Transformation90
• 4.3 Buddha's Perfections of Appearance in the World97
• 4.4 Buddha's Perfections of Action in the World101
  • 4.4.1 Spontaneity and Effortlessness103
  • 4.4.2 Endlessness and Omnipresence107
  • 4.4.3 Excursus: Buddha's Consumption of Food110
• 4.5 Buddha's Perfections of Cognition in the World115
  • 4.5.1 Omnilinguality116
  • 4.5.1 Awareness of What Is Possible and What Is Impossible118
• 4.6 One Body of Magical Transformation at a Time? A Controversy119
• Chapter Five: Buddha in Heaven
• 5.0 Prolegomena127
• 5.1 Ornamenting Heaven128
• 5.2 Bodies of Communal Enjoyment134
• Chapter Six: Buddha in Eternity
• 6.0 Prolegomena147
• 6.1 Epistemic Predicates151
  • 6.1.1 Awareness Simpliciter151
  • 6.1.2 Buddha's Awareness153
• 6.2 Metaphysical Predicates173
• Chapter Seven: Doctrinal Criticism
• Doctrinal Criticism181

• Notes203
• Glossary229
• Bibliography233
• Index253