What the Buddha Thought (OXFORD CENTRE FOR BUDDHIST STUDIES MONOGRAPHS) [Paperback]

Richard Gombrich (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 24, 2009 | ISBN-10: 1845536142 | ISBN-13: 978-1845536145

This book argues that the Buddha was one of the most brilliant and original thinkers of all time. While the book is intended to serve as an introduction to the Buddha's thought, and hence even to Buddhism itself, it also has larger aims: it argues that we can know far more about the Buddha than it is fashionable among scholars to admit, and that his thought has a greater coherence than is usually recognised. It contains much new material. Interpreters both ancient and modern have taken little account of the historical context of the Buddha's teachings; but relating them to early brahminical texts, and also to ancient Jainism, gives a much richer picture of his meaning, especially when his satire and irony are appreciated. Incidentally, since many of the Buddha's allusions can only be traced in the Pali versions of surviving texts, the book establishes the importance of the Pali Canon as evidence. Though the Buddha used metaphor extensively, he did not found his arguments upon it like earlier thinkers: his capacity for abstraction was a breakthrough. His ethicising older ideas of rebirth and human action (karma) was also a breakthrough for civilisation. His theory of karma is logically central to his thought. Karma is a process, not a thing; moreover, it is neither random nor wholly determined. These ideas about karma he generalised to every component of conscious experience except nirvana, the liberation from that chain of experience. Morally, karma both provided a principle of individuation and asserted the individuals responsiblity for his own destiny.

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About the Author

Richard Gombrich is founder and Academic Director of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, and Chairman of the UK Association for Buddhist Studies. Before his retirement in 2004, he held the Boden Chair of Sanskrit at Oxford University and a Professorial Fellowship at Balliol College for 28 years. He supervised nearly 50 theses on Buddhist topics, and is the author of 200 publications. He continues to lecture and teach at universities round the world.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Equinox Publishing (July 24, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1845536142
• ISBN-13: 978-1845536145
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #156,775 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How to read the suttas critically, December 13, 2009

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Linda Blanchard (Midland, TX USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: What the Buddha Thought (OXFORD CENTRE FOR BUDDHIST STUDIES MONOGRAPHS) (Paperback)

This book is a terrific read for anyone who is interested in coming to a fresh understanding of not just what the Buddha thought, but the way his mind worked. It demonstrates how and why one should read the suttas critically. Gombrich is not a Buddhist himself, but has been a professor of Sanksrit and Pali at Oxford in England for decades. This book can serve, as well, as an overview of what the Buddha taught, but as the title indicates, it's more about what and how the Buddha thought -- which is often in metaphors. The author gives evidence for several ways in which the suttas have been misunderstood when we have interpreted the words literally, shorn of their context in poking fun at Brahmins and Vedic beliefs. He covers self-as-process; fire as an analogy; and presents the argument that Theravadin Buddhism has misinterpreted a playful metaphor about "being with Brahma" in a way that has caused us to lose understanding of the Buddha's teaching that development of the four immeasurables (lovingkindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity) can be a path to nirvana. The book supports the traditional Buddhist view that the Buddha taught karma as part of a literal ("after the breakup of the body") rebirth process and Gombrich even argues that without this, the Buddha's philosophical system falls apart. The evidence he presents on this falls far short of convincing me, but since the Professor has not had a chance to practice what the Buddha taught and has studied Buddhism primarily from the Theravadin perspective it's not surprising that he misses the many ways in which the evidence he presents throughout the book supports an alternative understanding. Overall this is a wonderful read, both as a bare introduction to Buddhism, to the Buddha's thought, and to the issues of Buddhist scholarship. Highly recommended.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Elephant burgers and the path to Jesus, February 7, 2011

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Daiho - See all my reviews
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This review is from: What the Buddha Thought (OXFORD CENTRE FOR BUDDHIST STUDIES MONOGRAPHS) (Hardcover)

In "What the Buddha Thought" Pali-Sanskrit scholar Richard Gombrich demonstrates why understanding the Buddha's message requires first understanding something about the culture in which the Buddha taught.

Using the example of an advertisement for a "jumbo hamburger," Gombrich illustrates the pitfalls in our own common metaphor. We all know the "jumbo" claim is to largeness, but jump ahead two thousand years and we may find that scholars have not only missed out on the possible pun intended by the advertisement writer, but may also have attributed a literal interpretation distorting the historical reality. Imagine a 22nd century anthropologist claiming on the basis of the above advertisement that fast food chains served elephant meat sandwiches. These are the kinds of difficulties facing those who wish to unlock the message of the Buddha as preserved in the Pali cannon.

In fact this kind of example is more simple and straightforward than many of those Gombrich discusses, which depend on a knowledge of abstract concepts (such as consciousness, mind, nirvana) in propositions often conveyed through metaphor (fire for consciousness, for example) in ancient languages (Pali and Sanskrit) and presented to the reader in English. If it does nothing else, the book will impress on you the monumentally difficult task of the modern scholar of Buddhism.

Gombrich stresses at several points throughout the text that we can make sense of Buddha's teaching only within the framework of his audience. What did they know or believe about the world? How could the Buddha best relate his message to these people? Just as a modern western Buddhist might make a presentation using words and concepts borrowed from Christian theology and cosmology, so too the Buddha borrowed from Brahmanical sources. To understand one requires some understanding of the other.

One important example Gombrich covers in some detail is the Tevijja Sutta, in which the Buddha converses with two young brahmins about the path to salvation. Using their own ideas and terminology, the Buddha assures them that in following his rules of morality and conduct and in practicing kindness, compassion, empathetic joy and equanimity they can achieve the qualities of Brahma and thereby join Brahma at death. Essentially, the Buddha is telling them they don't have to abandon their spiritual goals, as if telling modern Christians that if they practice the Buddha's method they can achieve the qualities of Jesus and even join Jesus when they die. The young brahmins are convinced and enter the Buddha's monastic community. Years later a scholar puzzles over this sutta and is convinced that since the Buddha promised these young men, there must be a plane of Brahmas somewhere in the Buddhist cosmology. And so one was invented - and exists to this day. Gombrich argues that the Buddha was simply being practical. He used metaphors and ideas to which his audience could relate. In this instance Gombrich sees the metaphor as quite crude, as Brahma the creator god, rather than as brahma the substance of the universe. More importantly for the Buddha (and for us), it didn't matter that these young men imagined they were going to meet Brahma; what was important was that they practiced morality and loving kindness. Unfortunately for the sangha, the literal interpretation led to the conclusion that practicing kindness, compassion, empathetic joy and equanimity (known as the brahma-vihara) could take a practitioner only as far as the Brahma plane. Gombrich believes that the Buddha's message was that practicing the brahma-vihara was itself a path to enlightenment.

There are other such case studies in this text, and I'm still puzzling over some of them, even after reading through selected sections twice. Gombrich claims in the introduction that the book is intended for a general audience familiar with the basics of Buddhism, but the water gets pretty deep pretty quickly. Nevertheless, this an enlightening book that will enrich the view of anyone interested in Buddhist studies. Those who haven't yet might like to start their reading with How Buddhism Began, an earlier volume by the same author introducing much the same themes (with different examples) and to which Gombrich refers on more than a few occasions.

For a couple of academic reviews of "What the Buddha Thought" search online for:
1. Dhivan Thomas Jones in Volume 5 of the Western Buddhist Review
2. Jay L. Garfield in Volume78: Issue3 of the Journal of the American Academy of Religion

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vital context for the teachings of the Buddha, November 8, 2009

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S. C. Talbott "5cat" (Barre, MA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: What the Buddha Thought (OXFORD CENTRE FOR BUDDHIST STUDIES MONOGRAPHS) (Paperback)

A distinguished scholar of the Pali Canon, the earliest texts about the Buddha's teaching, has turned a series of public lectures he gave into the best summary of the context of those teachings. Only by understanding the metaphors and thoughts of the times can one apppreciate what the Buddha was saying--and *not* saying. As one who has studied these texts in translation for some time, I found it extremely valuable. Highly recommended.