The Doctrine

On the night of his Awakening the Buddha had three principal insights: he had been reborn in many different forms and lives over the course of an inconceivably long period of time; that beings are traveling through saṁsāra (the round of births and deaths) according to their deeds, good and bad (karma-vipāka); and the insight into the four noble truths, which included as the fourth truth the eightfold noble path.

The teaching of karma-vipāka (deeds and their results) was therefore a fundamental insight for the Buddha, which provided the basis for his Awakening, and it has remained central to the teaching throughout the development of Buddhism in its various traditions.

In the original teachings deeds and their results are presented quite subtly, as everyone, of course, produces many millions of intentional deeds, both good and bad, over the course of their lifetime. And the deeds themselves are often motivated by a mixture of good and bad intentions, which are not purely one or the other.

In the later teachings these subtleties were often obscured by the didactic need to present the message in a clear and unambiguous way, and we find what is in essence a very complex teaching reduced to something rather simplistic: do this bad deed in this life, get a complimentary bad result in the next; do this good deed, get this good result.

Although things are not quite so simple as this, it does form the backdrop to many of the later texts and teachings in the Buddhist traditions, and provided simple explanations of events that could be utilised very successfully in stories which exemplified the centrality of causality in the working out of events in people’s lives. It is this theme that is elaborated on in this discourse, and the many stories that accompany it.

The Text

The text of Karma-vibhaṅga I have translated is essentially that included in Mahā-karma-vibhaṅga which was edited by Sylvain Lévi (Paris, 1932). I have repunctuated throughout, and changed the numbering system to Arabic. I have also divided it into sections, and added headings for easier navigation. The examples that illustrate the text, which were not always seperated, have been divided and renumbered on occasion.

Lévi’s edition is a monumental work having all known parallels, including Pāḷi, Chinese, Tibetan and Khotanese. It also includes extensive annotation and translation in French. As I am not a Chinese or Tibetan scholar, and am unable to check those texts myself, I have only referred to them occassionally, and have mainly focused on the Pāḷi and Sanskrit parallels.

The Karma-vibhaṅga (Kv) Lévi called it the Mahā-karma-vibhaṅga-sūtram, but there seems to be no textual support for the designation, and it refers to itself simply as Karma-vibhaṅgam and as Karma-vibhaṅga-sūtram. appears to be an expansion of a discourse similar to the Cūḷa-kamma-vibhaṅga-sutta found in the Pāḷi Majjhima-nikāya (MN 135), but only 14 states are explained there, the fourteen that make up the first section of the text here. There are then 66 more sections added to the list. They do not follow the same formula set up in these first 14, however, but have their own organising principles.

The discourse can be divided into six sections, there is a long, and rather repetitous Opening in which the scene is set for the discourse. The protagonist who occasions the discourse appears under the name Śuka Taudeyaputra, while in the Pāḷi discourses he is called Subha Todeyyaputta. Lévi points out in a footnote that the original form of the name was probably Sua, which has allowed for the development to Subha in Pāḷi and Śuka here. The same story regarding Śuka’s father that is outlined in the Opening below is also recorded in the Majjhima-nikāya-aṭṭhakathā, in the commentary on Subha-sutta MN 99; and this same Subha appears, after the Buddha’s parinirvāṇa, at DN 10 in discussion with Ven. Ānanda.

Then comes a section which in outline is similar to the Pāḷi discourse, asking fourteen questions. The replies, however, are much more elaborate than we find in the Pāḷi, and they are in a slightly different order. The second section asks similar questions, but related to specific causes for rebirth in various worlds. The third section asks a series of variant questions in which various factors are either present or absent, and which I have entitled Permutations.

The last two sections differ again, asking about unwholesome and wholesome deeds and their results. The major difference here is that whereas in the first sections many deeds led to one result, here one deed leads to many results, including, interestingly enough, effects on the environment, which is something we also see in the early discourses. See, for example, AN 4.70, where it is stated that when an unrighteous king rules it gives rise to the sun and moon going off course, the rains not falling, and the crops being corrupted.

Parallels

To this basic form have been added references to discourses and stories from the tradition. It appears from their absence in any of the many parallels that they are late additions to the fundamental text. A little under half of the teachings have no examples provided. Many parallels can be found in the Pāḷi texts.

The examples include stories from the discipline, the discourses, and also from such sources as the Jātaka and Avadāna stories. There are many discourses referenced, sometimes on multiple occasions, which we no longer have access to, but which show what a wealth of material was available to the ancients, which is now lost to us.

One of the sections, No 32, concerning results in another country has a remarkable amount of stories and references attached to it, and in somewhat of a jumble. Even the normal concluding statement appears twice, once in the middle and once at what is now the end. Despite the confusion which prevails in this section, the stories are also some of the most elaborate and interesting in the collection, and include an elaborate Avadāna concerning Maitrāyajña (Mittavindaka).

To better get an overview of these stories here is a synoptic table showing most of the sections, stories and their parallels from the Pāḷi and Sanskrit traditions, where known. I also include some of the people mentioned in these sections: As there are many references to people, places and discourses, etc. I have compiled an Index of Proper Names.

Here I give another table which orders the Pāḷi parallels in their traditional arrangement beginning with the Vinaya texts. I have placed commentarial parallels in italics:

There are a very few parallels in Sanskrit Mahāyāna works:

As we can see from the list of references in these tables, most of the teaching is aligned with the earliest form of the tradition, and this is borne out by the whole tenor of the discourse below. We only rarely find any specific sign of the later Mahāyāna teachings, for instance when Bodhicitta is mentioned in 7 & 8 below.

Here is a list of the discourses and stories that are named in the text, but do not seem to have a parallel in Pāḷi or Sanskrit, and are therefore presumably lost in those traditions:

Index of Proper Names

Numbers refer to section, and letters refer to sub-section, where relevant.

Acknowledgements

A few years ago, Handaka Vijjānanda of the Ehipassiko Foundation in Jakarta asked me to prepare a series of books about the great monument at Borobudur. The last in the series illustrates the Karma-vibhaṅga text. As there was no English translation to draw on, I decided to make my own. It is mainly thanks to Handaka’s encouragment in this work therefore that this translation was undertaken.

Here I must express my deep gratitude to Dr. Junko Matsumura, a long time friend, who took time off from seeing her Japanese translation of the complete Dhammapada Commentary through the press to help me by reviewing this work. With her usual perspicuity she has saved me from many a mistake, and helped me understand the text much better.

Any mistakes that remain of course are entirely my own fault.

Ānandajoti Bhikkhu
April, 2020

last updated: April, 2020