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Abhiniveśa

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Abstract

Abhiniveśa appears in Yogasūtras (YS) 2.9 as the designation of the last of the five kleśas or afflictions listed in YS 2.3. This paper will examine four questions: What is the deep history of the word abhiniveśa? What were the historical sources of Patañjali’s term? Does it have a meaning in the YS distinct from the explanation given by Vyāsa in his commentary on this sūtra, which is followed with very little deviation by legions of translators? And, does looking at this sūtra in the context of its historical sources help us to determine the relationship between Patañjali and Vyāsa, a highly contested topic in present-day study of the Yogasūtras? The history of abhiniveśa will be examined as it appears in Indian classical literature, in Āyurveda, in the Upaniṣads, classical Vedānta, the Mahābhārata, and in Buddhist texts, especially and most tellingly in Yogācāra. This general history of the early semantics of abhniveśa will conclude with a more exact signification of the parameters of this elusive term in the YS.

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Notes

  1. This is also recognized by Acri (2012, p. 272).

  2. Maas comments on Deussen’s “ahistorical approach to his study of yoga” (2013, p. 54). See Steiner (2011) for a well-presented online comparison of several translations, including his own in German, even if his translation of abhiniveśa as “Todesangst” must be summarily discarded.

  3. Balslev writes: “Abhiniveśa is afflictive dread, which, it is said, the learned share with the ignorant. Unlike the sukha-duḥkha or pleasure-pain traces, of which examples are easily found in this life itself, the saṃskāra of fear and anxiety concerning death cannot be so accounted for, there being no such experiences in this life. The idea of ‘previous death’ comes into play. This anguish is described as svarasavahī; it arises naturally and spontaneously from the accumulated traces” (1991, pp. 80–81). Like nearly all translators and commentators working within scholastic Yoga traditions, Balslev writes this with Vyāsa as her only source, without attending to the antecedents of the YS, in this case Yogācāra, as we shall see below.

  4. Acri profitably mentions the precedence of Pines and Gelblum’s citation of al-Bīrūnī’s translation of the second chapter of the YS, supporting his own observations that the word abhiniveśa in 2.9 refers to the two preceding sūtras, which mention rāga and dveṣa as kleśas. In translating abhiniveśa definitively as “obsession” (following Filliozat, 1974, p. 147) however, Acri conveys only part of the semantics of this term. I shall expand on his laudable efforts here. Also see the perceptive comments of Valdina on the forces behind early translations of the YS (2013, esp. pp. 93–107). One further article has been written on abhiniveśa (Raveh 2019), but that is entirely different in intent and perspective than this one.

  5. David Gordon White notes that by the year 2013 the YS had been translated into 46 languages (White, 2014, p. 235). It is clearly impossible to go through every translation in every one of these 46 languages.

  6. See note 7 below for a more complete citation of Vyāsa’s bhāṣya. Pradeep Gokhale asks, “Why make a separate rubric for fear of death and not simply list it under dveṣa or aversion, marking death as the most undesirable?” (2014–2015, p. 7). Indeed, the usual translations beg this question.

  7. In the case of this sūtra, as I will more clearly delineate later, I would support Bronkhorst’s view (1985), rather than Maas’s wholesale identification of the two (2010) as Patañjali. See a summary of this debate in White (2014, pp. 226–234). In these pages, White summarizes the argument of Angot that Patañjali wrote the first three pādas of the YS as a Buddhist work no later than the first century CE. The fourth pāda, Angot asserts, was written by a Hindu called Vyāsa half a millennium or so later (Angot, 2012, pp. 24–26).

  8. As they do for āveśa, which I dealt with extensively in an earlier work, Smith (2006).

  9. The number of translations and understandings of the resistant term kriyā yoga are as many as there are commentaries and (especially) translations, which is to say nearly innumerable. It appears to indicate a plan of action in the sense of how to go about practice in the light of understanding afflictions (kleśa YS 2.3–9) that are common to everyone, but that must be overcome. These are necessarily different than the obstacles (antarāya) to yoga that are discussed in YS 1.30–39.

  10. These doubts were catalyzed a few years ago on reading a text of an entirely different order, namely Pamuk’s account of the Turkish term hüzün. In his sensitive and moving book Istanbul: Memories and the City (2004), Pamuk cites Robert Burton’s 1621 The Anatomy of Melancholy, which describes “black pain” as (to quote Pamuk) “fear of death, love, defeat, evil deeds.… He advises his readers to seek relief in reason, work, resignation, virtue, discipline, and fasting.” In other words, Burton, followed by Pamuk, recommends the cultural equivalents of yoga as a panacea to human malaise. What this further confirmed to me was the understanding that abhiniveśa as a term with cross-cultural resonances indicates deep engagement, immersion, or involvement that is not only physical but psychic as well.

  11. Vyāsa’s commentary reads in its entirety: sarvasya prāṇina iyam ātmāśīr nityā bhavati mā na bhūvaṃ bhūyāsam iti | na cānanubhūtamaraṇadharmakasyaiṣā bhavaty ātmāśīḥ | etasyā ca pūrvajanmānubhavaḥ pratīyate | sa cāyam abhiniveśaḥ kleśaḥ svarasavāhī kṛmer api jātamātrasya pratyakṣānumānāgamair asaṃbhāvito maraṇatrāsa ucchedadṛṣṭyātmakaḥ pūrvajanmānubhūtaṃ maraṇaduḥkham anumāpayati | yathā cāyam atyantamūḍheṣu dṛśyate kleśas tathā viduṣo ’pi vijñātapūrvāparāntasya rūḍhaḥ | kasmāt | samānā hi tayoḥ kuśalākuśalayor maraṇaduḥkhānubhavād iyaṃ vāsaneti |

  12. Among all the books on the first two pādas of the YS, this one contains the best distillation of the commentaries.

  13. dṛśyate cātmana eva sato dehādisaṃghāte ’nātmany ātmatvābhiniveśo mithyābuddhimātreṇa pūrvapūrveṇa |

  14. It is also possible, as one of the outside readers suggests, that this compound can be a dvandva, meaning both strong adherence (abhiniveśa) and knowledge of truth or categories of truth (tattva).

  15. Maas currently dates the YS to approximately 400 CE (Maas 2013, p. 65, 2020b, p. 968). Tempting though it might be, I will not dive deeply into the dense waters of authorship of the designated sūtras addressed here except as they might bear directly on the topic at hand.

  16. Cf. also Mālavikāgnimitram 3.1 saṃkalpayo … viṣayeṣv abhiniveśya tathā…

  17. See, e.g., the articles by Fitzgerald and Malinar in White (2014).

  18. In this context, niviṣṭa-, with the general sense of “intent on” or “settled on,” appears to be abbreviated from of abhiniviṣṭa-, with a slightly milder degree of intensity.

  19. Derivations of abhi-ni-√viś occur 22 times in the BhP. Eighteen of these bear the significance of “absorption”: 1.18.45, 3.2.24, 3.8.13, 4.12.22, 4.29.54, 5.1.2, 5.1.37, 5.8.27, 5.14.8, 6.15.20, 7.2.48, 7.2.60, 7.6.15, 10.1.41, 11.2.37, 11.21.22, 11.22.39, 11.28.2; but also verbal or nominal derivatives indicating simple entrance: 5.8.4, 5.17.5, 5.26.14; “bestow” (abhiniveśayet, “cause to become absorbed”): 7.12.28. Thus, by this date, the form and function, as distinguished above, were both present, even if the functional meaning was beginning to gain the upper hand. The Bhaktivedānta database is extremely helpful in identifying these passages: https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/.

  20. Also see Kumar et al. (2015) and Rai and Deepshika (2016).

  21. For a more explicit view of Caraka’s statements on yoga, see Wujastyk (2014). On the realm of dissociation, relevant here, see Cardeña (1989, 1994) and Smith (2006, 45ff).

  22. Cf. Caraka Sūtrasthāna 7.1-30 for suppression of natural desires (vegavidhāraṇam), diseases based on them (veganigrahajā rogāḥ) and the consequences of this suppression. These are the urges to urinate, defecate, release semen, fart, vomit, sneeze, burp, yawn, eat when hungry, drink when thirsty, release tears when one has the urge to cry, sleep, and breathe deeply when undertaking heavy physical exertion. See MBh 14.17.11 (Anugīta), Smith (2007, pp. 92, 95); also Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa 11.187 (vol. 1), in a slightly different, but not entirely unrelated context: tadā bhave tu binmantrī kuryāt pūticchoraṇam | ta mantrajāpī kālajño kuryād vegavidhāraṇam ||

  23. For pañcagavya, a paste consisting of of the “five products of the cow” (ghee, milk, yogurt, cow’s urine, and cowdung), see Smith (2006, p. 540) and notes.

  24. Convolvulus pluricaulis, used as a purgative and detoxification agent in Ayurveda, often to purge disease-producing spirits (when such a diagnosis is made) and detoxify the system after such a diagnosis.

  25. śuśrūṣave vacaḥ śrutvā śiṣyāyāha punarvasuḥ | mahāgadaṃ saumya śṛṇu sahetvāibheṣajam || 56 || malināhāraśīlasya vegān prāptān nigṛhṇataḥ | śītoṣṇasnigdharūkṣādyair hetubhiś cātisevitaiḥ || 57 || hṛdayaṃ samupāśritya manobuddhivahāḥ sirāḥ | doṣāḥ saṃduṣya tiṣṭhanti rajomohāvṛtātmanaḥ || 58 || rajastamobhyāṃ vṛddhābhyāṃ vṛddhau manasi cāvṛte | hṛdaye vyākule doṣair atha mūḍho ’lpacetanaḥ || 59|| viṣamāṃ kurute buddhiṃ nityānitye hitāhite | atattvābhiniveśaṃ tam āhur āptā mahāgadam || 60 || snehasvedopapannaṃ taṃ saṃśodhya vamanādibhiḥ | kṛtasaṃsarjanaṃ medhyair annapānair upācaret || 61 || brāhmīsvarasayuktaṃ yat pañcagavyam udāhṛtam | tat sevyaṃ śaṅkhapuṣpī ca yac ca medhyaṃ rasāyanam || 62 || suhṛdaś cānukūlās taṃ svāptā dharmārthavādinaḥ | saṃyojayeyur vijñānadhairyasmṛti-samādhibhiḥ || 63 ||

  26. Chalmers (1899, pp. 234–235); see Lamotte (1988, p. 553) (which notes the parallel passage in the Chinese canon: T 26, ch. 43, p. 703a). It is noteworthy that the middle way here might necessitate relinquishing one’s local language, even if one resorts to local speech customs to facilitate more surefooted understanding. This Majjhima Nikāya passage, in the section called Araṇavibhaṅgasuttaṃ, repeats the theme several times (p. 235): iti yathā yathā naṃ tesu tesu janapadesu sañjānanti, tathā tathā thamasā prāmassa abhinivissa voharati… evam kho, bhikkhave, janapadaniruttiyā ca abhiniveso hoti samaññāya ca atisāro. kathaṃ ca bhikkhave janapadaniruttiyā ca anabhiniveso hoti samaññāya ca anatisāro. This discussion on proper speech likely predates Patañjali’s much better known and more elaborate discussion in his Mahābhāṣya on what may be considered proper and intelligible speech.

  27. Engle translates it accordingly from Vasubandhu as “attachment to bad view” (2009, p. 302), supplying the Sanskrit: asaddṛṣṭyabhiniveśasaṃniśrayadānakarmakaḥ (485n333).

  28. Modified from Trenckner (1888, p. 251), Cūḷataṇhāsaṅkhayasuttam: tasmiṃ {aneka-dhātu}-{nānā-dhātusmiṃ} loke yaṃ yad eva sattā dhātuṃ abhinivisanti taṃ tad eva thāmasā parāmassa abhinivissa voharanti. Sakka-pañha Suttanta (Rhys Davids & Carpenter, 1903, p. 281). Note that this is the same issue addressed in the Majjhima Nikāya passage.

  29. This reads, in Leví’s 1907 edition: abhāvabhāvādhyapavādakasya ekatvanānāsvaviśeṣakalpāḥ | yathārthanāmābhiniveśakalpāḥ jinātmajaiḥ saṃparivarjanīyāḥ ||

  30. abhāvabhāvādhyapavādakalpa ekatvanānāsvaviśeṣakalpāḥ | yathārthanāmābhiniveśkalpāḥ jinātmajaiḥ saṃparivarjanīyāḥ || (Levi, 1907, p. 76).

  31. P. L. Vaidya ed., 1963, accessed on the Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon website: http://www.dsbcproject.org/.

  32. This probably refers to the fivefold pathways of the mind. For this, see http://www.berzinarchives.com/web/en/archives/sutra/level4_deepening_understanding_path/path/five_pathway_minds_five_paths/5_pathway_minds.html.

  33. Paraphrase of: punar aparaṃ mahāmate aniruddhā anutpannāḥ prakṛtiparinirvṛtās triyānam ekayānaṃ ca pañcacittasvabhāvādiṣu yathārutārthābhiniveśaṃ pratītya abhiniveśataḥ samāropāpavādadṛṣṭipatito bhavati.

  34. See Szántó and Griffiths (2020) on the related Sarvabuddhasamāyogaḍākinījālaśaṃvara. Following them, this might also be rendered “Secret of the Vow (or Supreme Bliss of the Ḍākinī’s Magic.” Hartzell, (2012, p. 68), mentions this text in his survey of “Buddhist Sanskrit tantras that existed prior to or contemporaneous with the systematic translation of this material into Tibetan” (2012, p. 63). Sanderson (2009, pp. 166–169) (esp. 167n391) explains that the ḍākinī here refers to Heruka, although more deeply considered, citing Bhavabhaṭṭa’s Cakrasaṃvarapañjikā, it is identified as emptiness (ḍākinī śūnyatā).

  35. This apparent oxymoron makes sense only if the cognition of śūnyatā was mistaken, overlaid by a limiting condition.

  36. Paraphrased from: tasyām api tasyām api sarvākāravaropetāyāṃ śūnyatāyāṃ yady abhiniveśaḥ syāt, idam eva tattvasāram ity ākāreṇa, so ’pi dṛṣṭer narakagamanahetur iti | tathā coktam yaś ca śāntamatiḥ sattvadharmasamatāṃ jānāti, na sa dharmān vā adharmān va abhiniveśa (viśe) ta | anabhiniveśo dharmāṇām arthaḥ |

  37. For a study somewhat analogous to the present one, see O’Brien-Kop (2020) on dharmameghasamādhi (YS 4.29). Based on careful dating, usage, the study of metaphor, and early Yogācāra works, including the early first millennium Saddharmapuṇḍarīkasūtra and Daśabhūmikasūtra, and Asaṅga’s slightly later Yogācārabhūmiśāstra, which is roughly contemporaneous with the YS, O’Brien-Kop clearly demonstrates that the usage in YS is drawn from Yogācāra, possibly from Asaṅga. Much of this earlier essay has been absorbed into O’Brien-Kop (2021). This is in agreement with Deleanu, who also dates Asańga’s Yogacārabhūmi to the latter half of the fourth century CE (Deleanu 2013, p. 887). Deleanu cites the following passage from this text: asaṃjānaṃ samāropato nābhiniveśet, anabhiniveśan nābhilapet (896n37). He translates this awkwardly, but with the correct assumptions: “Not [being able to] conceive [/perceive], [people] would not become attached [to things] due to [their] superimposition [of values, etc.]. Not becoming attached, [people] would not [try to] express [things]” (896).

  38. These attestations can be found throughout Lamotte’s great work.

  39. The English translation of Lamotte’s complete Le traité de la grande vertu de sagesse by Gelongma Karma Migme Chödrön is dated 2001 but appears to be unpublished, even if it is available on archive.org. This creates a bit of confusion, because some of this appears to be Chödrön’s commentary on Lamotte. However, due to Chödrön’s attribution of this very long English translation to the French of Lamotte, it must appear bibliographically as Lamotte (2001).

  40. On dṛṣṭi as “wrong view,” see Jaini (1977) and Gethin (2004).

  41. nāmarūpābhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ, tathā hi nāmarūpaṃ vastulakṣaṇena na saṃvidyate (9); pañcaskandhābhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ (10); aṣṭādaśadhātvabhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ (11); dvadaśāyatanābhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ, tathā ho te dharmāḥ svabhāvena na saṃvidyante (12); traidhātuke ‘bhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ (13); buddhaniśrayadṛṣṭyabhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ, tathā hi na buddhadṛṣitiniśrayād buddhadharśanam utpadyate (17); dharmaniśrayadṛṣṭyabhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ, dharmasyādṛṣṭatvāt (18); saṃghaniśrayadṛṣṭyabhiniveśo na kartavyaḥ, saṃghanimittasyāsaṃskṛtatvād aniśrayatvāc ca (19); śīlaniśrayadṛṣṭyabhimiveśo na kartavyaḥ, āpattyanāpattitām anabhiniveśāt (20). Lamotte (1980, pp. 2421–2422):

    9. Ne pas s’attacher aux noms et à la forme. — En effet les noms et la forme n’existen pas réellement. 10. Ne pas s’attacher aux cinq agrégats. 11. Ne pas s’attacher aux dix-huit élémens. 12. Ne pas s’attacher aux douze bases de la connaissance. — En effet ces dharma n’existent pas en nature propre. 13. Ne pas s’attacher au Triple Monde. 17. Ne pas s’attacher à la vue du recourse n Buddha. — En effet ce n’est pas de cette vue provient la [vraie] vision des Buddha. 18. Ne pas s’attacher à la vue du recourse en Dharma. — Car le Dharma est invisible. 19. Ne pas s’attacher à la vue de recourse en Sangha. — Car le Sangha est en soi inconditionné et ne constitue pas un support. 20. Ne pas s’attacher à la vue du recours dans les [hautes] moralités. — Car le Bodhisattva ne s’attache pas [à distinguer arbitrairement] la culpabilité de l’innocence.

    The translation of abhiniveśa in these sūtras is debatable. Attachment (attacher) is no closer than “cling to,” “adhere to,” “become exclusively engrossed in,” (which brings abhiniveśa into the realm of āveśa; cf. Smith (2006) and Veda Bharati (2004, p. 103)), etc. This translation follows, with considerable variation, that of Lamotte (above) and Chödrön in Lamotte (2001, p. 2010). Lamotte notes (1980, p. 2370) that this section appears in Kumārajīva’s Chinese translation (T 223, k. 6, pp. 256c-259c), Chapter XX of the Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikā, titled Fa-ts’iu p’in or Saṃprastānaparivarta (“Setting out on the Mahāyāna”). See also Kritzer’s citation of part of the introduction to the pratītyasamutpāda section of the Abhidharmasamuccayabhāṣya: ātmadharmahetukeśvarādihetukābhiniveśatyajanārtham; “[There is an investigation into that which has originated conditionally] for the purpose of renouncing attachment to the ātman and to [the idea that] dharmas originate without cause or from inconsistent causes, such as Īśvara, etc.” (1999, pp. 23–24). This is also in substantial agreement with the intent of YS 2.9, absent Vyāsa’s interpretation.

  42. Gold (2015, p. 192), citing Vasubandhu’s Abhidharmakośabhāṣya 3.26.

  43. Schmithausen observes that abhiniveśa and upādāna “may, of course, also be used as quasi-synonyms” (1987, 351n535), even if upādāna is specifically “spiritually negative” (1987, p. 74). In his notes to this passage, Schmithausen observes that the Viniścayasaṃgrahaṇī 4.5 (1987, 299n226)) replaces prapañca, “the process of proliferation, especially conceptual proliferation, or even of (emotionally involved) proliferating or diversifying conceptual activity” with abhiniveśa, that which “gives relief to and corroborates the aspect of an emotionally involved mental activity or attitude” (1987, 356-57n510). Kochimuttom describes how Yogācāra distinguishes abhiniveśa, tṛṣṇa, and upādāna, that they are products of distinctions in the saṃsara between what is graspable (grāhya) and the grasper (grāhaka) (1982, p. 12). Lusthaus render upādāna as “appropriation” (2002, pp. 29, 65–66). He writes: “Whereas desire (trsna) affectively establishes goals and objectives, appropriation (upädāna) actively grasps and clings to them. Appropriation is the behavioral correlate to desire” (2002, p. 66) Bronkhorst shows that the distinction between tṛṣṇa, thirst/desire, and upādāna, grasping, can be traced to Vaiśeṣika (2000, p. 59).

  44. Vyāsa comments: te pañca kleśā dagdhabījakalpā yoginaś caritādhikāre cetasi pralīṇe saha tenaivāstaṃ gacchanti. “Arrayed like parched seeds, these five afflictions have disappeared into the mind of a yogin who has become eligible for this through his practice. In this way afflictions wane like the setting sun.”

  45. Schmithausen translates this, somewhat awkwardly, as “lmpression(s) of Sticking to the Imagined Character [of reality]” (1987, p. 76). For a useful, if brief, discussion of vāsanā and saṃskāra in relation to karma, see Kritzer (1999, 97ff). Yamabe cites the Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra (his Sanskrit reconstruction of it together with Noritoshi Aramaki): tatrādhyātmam upādānaṃ parikalpitasvabhāvābhiniveśavāsanā sādhiṣṭhānaṃ cendriyarūpaṃ tac ca rūpidhator ārūpye tu vāsanopādānam eva. “Of these, inner appropriation (appropriated elements) is the vāsanā of attachment to parikalpitasvabhāva (‘conceptualized nature’) and physical sense faculties with their bases. This is in the material realm. In the immaterial realm, there is only appropriation of vāsanā” (Yamabe, 2021, p. 480).

  46. On Sthiramati, see Nguyen (1990).

  47. Salvini (2015, pp. 55–56). This is to be distinguished from paratantrasvabhāva, the nature or essence of a thought or entity as it is dependent, and niṣpannasvabhāva, the “perfect nature” of an entity, which is tathatā, defined as abiding outside any concept of self (nairātmya), even as it continues to abide within the aggregates (skandha).

  48. A few other sources, heretofore not mentioned, help contextualize this connection. Noteworthy are Bronkhorst (2000, pp. 54–76), on the sources of Buddhist idealism in Vasubandhu and early Yogācāra); also Lamotte (1934–1935), Nedu (2018, 2019), Schmithausen (2014), Szántó and Griffiths (2020), Waldron (2003), and Yamabe (2021). This is not an exhaustive survey.

  49. I am grateful to Johannes Bronkhorst for the suggestion of cutting to the chase on this. Also see Das (1938, p. 21).

  50. Indeed, the only translator cited above that appears to recognize and sanction both the literal meaning of abhiniveśa and the interpretation taken by the bulk of the translations, based on Vyāsa, is Jha, “Attachment (or Tenacity of Life)” (1907, p. 53). It is also not without interest that Böhtlingk and Roth (1855, Vol 1: 338.2) and Monier-Williams (1899, 64.2) give a fair, if understandably brief, accounting of this word. Much more fulsome is the Wisdom Library’s entry on abhiniveśa: https://www.wisdomlib.org/definition/abhinivesa. See Hopkins (2016) for the Tibetan terms used for abhiniveśa. A word search through the online version reveals a number of different words and terms in Tibetan. Because this is for a study of later Tibetan translation and interpretation, it will not add to our knowledge of the pre-YS usages of the word or its derivations.

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Smith, F.M. Abhiniveśa. J Indian Philos 51, 343–363 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10781-023-09537-5

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