The Symbolism of the Stupa as a Whole

So far, I have assigned various symbolic meanings to the components of' the stupa. The dome, container of' the precious relics, can be seen to represent a pot full of' Dhamma, a Dhamma-wheel, a lotus flower, or the circle of the earth.

The stupa axis, as a yupa, symbolises the Dhamma (teaching, path and realizations) and all its "sacrifices," and, as bola-khila, sym-bolises the great stability of the Dhamma and the unshakeable nature of the mind full of' Dhamma; it also represents Mount Meru, home of the gods. On top of the stupa dome is a cool "top enclosure" and a yasli complete with honourific parasol-discs, equivalent to a Bodhi tree, symbol of a Buddha's enlight-enment and his enlightened mind.

While a stupa is worthy of' devotion clue to the relics it contains, it also serves to inspire because the symbols of its separate components unite together to make an overall spiritu-al statement. The whole symbolises the enlightened mind of a Buddha (represented by the yasti and parasol-discs as Bodhi tree symbols) standing out above the world of' gods and humans (represented by the axis and dome).

The symbolism shows that the enlightened mind arises from within the world by a process of spiritual growth (represented by the dome as a lotus symbol, or as a vase of plenty) on a firm basis of' the practice of' Dhamma (represented by the dome as a Dhamma-wheel).

This Dhamma (now represented by the axis) is also the path which leads up out. of the world of humans and gods to enlightenment (repre-sented by the ya,} li and parasol-discs, resting on top of the axis as its uppermost portion). A personality (the dome as a kuni.bha) full of such Dhamma is worthy of reverence and has an unshakeable mind (represented by the axis as inda-khila., with the ya.sti as its extension).

In brief, we could say that the stupa symbolises the Dhamma and the transformations it brings in one who practices it, culminating in enlightenment. It is not surprising, then, that at an early date, the various layers of' the st.upa's structure were explicitly seen as symbolising specific aspects of the Dhamma (teaching, path and culmination) and of a Buddha's nature.

Gustav Roth has translated, from their Ti-betan versions, two ancient Sanskrit texts which see the stupa as symbolising the Dharnrakaya in the sense of the 37 "requisites of' enlightenment" (bvdhipakiya-dharruas) and certain other spiritual qualities.';l'lrese texts are the first century A.D. Cal-tya-vibhaga-vrnayabhava Sritra., fragments of an unknown Vin-aya, and the second century A.I). Stupa-Iak.+Yara-karika-vivecana of the Lokottaravadin Vinaya. A scheme of' symbolic corre-

spondences identical with that outlined in the first of these texts is shown in figure 12. Each layer of the stupa's structure repre-sents a group of spiritual qualities cultivated on the path, while the spire represents the powers of a 'hathagata. '

Another interesting passage quoted by Roth, from the first century A.D. Mulasarvastivadin Vinaya Kyudraka-vastu, also links the stupa with the hodhipaksiyadharmas. The passage deals with the death of' Sariputra, at which Ananda-who has Saripu-tra's relics-evinces dismay to the Buddha. The Buddha con-soles him by asking him if Sariputra has taken with him the aggregates of silo, samadhi, prajna, vimukti, or vimuktijnu nadar-sana. He then asks if Sariputra has:

"taken away that which is the substance of my enlightened perception: the four applications of' mindfulness . . . (the b ~dhipal~siyadfulrrr a are Itstecl)

That is, though only the relics of Sariputra remain, in the phys-ical sense, the dharmas cultivated by him still remain; i.e., the Dharmakaya remains. With such passages in mind, it would have been very natural for Buddhists to look on the stupa not only as a container of' physical relics of' a Buddha or saint, but also as symbolising the essential Dhamma-qualities which such a person embodied, and which still exist, inviting others to em-body.

In the Pali passage on the death of Sariputta (S.IV.161-3), the bodhi-pakkhiyadhammas are not specifically mentioned, though Ananda says that he will bear in mind the strength-giving Dhamma of' Sariputta, and the Buddha recommends him, even after the Buddha's own parinihbana, to abide with himself and Dhamma as refuge.

"l'his is to be dome by way of the four catipatthanas, the first set of dhammas in the list of the 37 bodhipakkhiyadhammac. In two Pali passages on the death of the Buddha, however, there is reference to the bodhipakkhiyad-hammas (though not by this name).

At 1).II.120, in the Mahapa-rinibbana Sutta, the Buddha lists the 37 dhammas as those known and taught by him, which his disciples should master, meditate on and spread abroad so that the holy life will last long and there shall he good and happiness for many. He then re-fers to his pariuibbana as being in three months time, and ex-horts his monks, as he does on his death-bed:

"All conditioned phenomena are subject to decay; perfect yourselves with diligence."

At M.I1.243-5, Ananda asks the Buddha to ensure that when he dies, there will he no unseemly disputes among his disciples, or harm to the manyfolk, as he has heard that there have been at the death of Mahavira, the, Jain leader. In reply, the Buddha rhetorically asks Ananda whether any of his monks differ over what he has taught out of' his ubhinful, i.e., the 37 bodlup akkiya-dhamma.c. He goes on to imply that these comprise the essential magga and /aatipada; if' disputes arise after his death, they will only be on matters of' Vinaya, and be of' trifling importance.

"These passages all emphasize the idea that, even though a Buddha or Arahant dies, there still remains the essence of the path he taught and realized, in the form of' the 37 bodhipakkiya-dhammra.c, and that bearing these in mind, and practicing them, will be of great benefit to people. After the Buddha's prar-irub-br n a, while physical relics were important, the Dhamma is more so, as the Buddha emphasized to Vakkali when he said,

"He who sees the Dhamma sees me, he who sees me sees the Dhamma." It is not surprising, then, that the stupa, the primary focus of early Buddhist devotion, should not only contain the relics of the Buddha or a saint, but should also symbolise the Dhamma, or the Buddha in the form of his Dhummakdya.

Such a symbolic equation of the stupa with the Buddha is, in fact, reflected in the early Vinayas, in which, where a stupa is seen as having its own property (land and offerings), it is sometimes seen as "the property of the stupa," and sometimes as the "property of the Buddha."

As a final point, I would like to try to tie together the functions of the stupa as a reliquary with that of it as a Buddha-symbol, so as to show how the stupa may be seen to depict both the Buddha's physical and spiritual personality. The classical stupa contains relics of' the Buddha, i.e., some of the mahabhutas which composed his body, and should be placed "where four roads meet" (crtummahapatlze) (1).11. I 42).

Even ignoring the fact that the stupa dome came to be known as a kumbha, a common metaphor for the personality, these facts suggest that the stupa may originally have been intended as a model of the enlight-ened personality. This can be seen from a passage at S.I V. 194-

5. Mere, a simile is given in which a town stands for the kuya (the body, or perhaps the personality other than vin ,(i 1a), the "lord" of the town stands for vin uzna, the "lord" ol'the town sits "in the midst in a square (where four roads meet)" (na)jlte viirgluaakn), which represents the four walrahInhI(ly (extension, cohesion, heat and motion), and the "ford" receives a "message of' truth,,, representing Nibbana.

As the classical stip; contains the Coin- iiualurbltulas of the Buddha and stands at the meeting of four roads, its dome can be seen to represent his kuya (I)hp.v.40 sees the kuva as like a kumblia), the relics represent the essentials of his body, and the central va.vti and parasol-discs (and later the axis, too), represents his vilrtidua, which has received the "mes-sage" of Nihhana, and been transformed by it.

In this paper, I hope to have shown that, even prior to its complex symbolism in the Vajrayana tradition, the sttpa had developed, From simple beginnings, into system of inter-lock-ing and mutually supporting symbols representing the Uhanuna (teaching, path and realizations) and the enlightened personality embodying the culmination of' Uhanuna-practice.

NOTES

• First given at the Eighth Symposium on Indian Religions (British Associ-ation for the History of Religion), Oxford, April 1982.

1."The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis-The Archaeological Evidence," South Asian Archaeology 1977 (papers from the Fourth International Confer-ence of South Asian Archaeologists in Western Europe; Naples, Instituto Universitario Orientale Seminaro di Studi Asiatici, 1979) pp. 799-845; and "The Axial Symbolism of the Early Stupa-An Exegesis," in A.L. Dallapiccola (ed.) The Stupa-Its Religious, Historical and Archaeological Significance (Wiesba-den, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1980) pp. 12-38.

2.Elements of Buddhist Iconography, Cambridge, Mass., 1935, re-published by Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi.

3.The Psycho-Cosmic Symbolism of the Buddhist Stipa, Emeryville, Califor-nia, Dharma Press, 1976.

4."The Symbolism of the Buddhist Stupa," in A.L. Dallapiccola (ed.), op.

5.Hasting's Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics (Edinburgh, T. and T. Clark, 1910) Vol. III, p. 657.

6.Op. cit.

7.Ibid.

8.M. Monier-Williams, Sanskrit-English Dictionary, Delhi, Motilal Banar-sidass.

9.D. Mitra, Buddhist Monuments (Calcutta, Sahitya Samsad, 1971) p. 204.

10.B. Walker, Hindu World (London, George Allen and Unwin, 1968) Vol. II, p. 132.

I I. S. Yoe, The Burman, his Life and Notions (London, Macmillan and Co., 1910) pp. 158-9.

12.G. Roth, op. cit., p. 184, points out that in the Mutasarvaclivadin Vin-aya Ksudraka-vastu, it is said that a Tathagata's stupa should have 13 parasol-discs, that of Arahants should have 4, that of Non-returners 3, that of Once-returners 2, and that of Stream-enterers 1.

13.While the A.(vattha tree-now known as the Bodhi tree-was the species of tree under which Gotama is said to have become enlightened, the Mahapadana Sutta states that the six previous Buddhas were each enlightened under different species of tree (D.11.2-8). cit.

14.Early carved stone reliefs sometimes briefly depict the Buddha's life by showing symbols for the key events in his life: Bodhi tree (enlightenment), Dhamma-wheel (first sermon), and stupa (pannibbana). Examples of such reliefs, from the second and third centuries A.D. are illustrated in D.1.. Snell-grove (ed.), The Image of the Buddha (Paris, UNESCO, 1978), p. 38.

15."The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis."

16.S.P. Gupta, The Roots of Indian Art (Delhi, BR Publishing Corpora-tion, 1980) pp. 246-269.

17.The Stupa in Ceylon-Memoirs of the Archaeological Survey of Ceylon, Volume 5 (Colombo, 1946).

18.L. Ledderose, "Chinese Prototypes of the Pagoda," in A.L. Dallapic-cola (ed.), op. cit., p. 239

19.Ed. C.B. Cowell and R. Neil, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1886, p. 244.

20.J. Irwin, "The Axial Symbolism of the Early Stupa," p. 21 . 21.Up. cit., p. 38.

22.See note I.

23."The Axial Symbolism of the Early Stupa," pp. 14 and 28.

24.Ibid, pp. 22-3.

25."The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis," p. 826.

26.They can also be seen as equivalent to Indra's vajra. This is shown in the Apssamba Srautasutra VI1,10,3 (as cited by A. Gail, "Cosmic Symbolism of the Spire of the Ceylon Dagoba," in A.L. Dallapiccola, op. ci1., p.260), where it is stated that, when the Vedic yupa is raised, it is said: "Rend open the earth, split the heaven-cloud, give us rain water...."

27."7'he Stupa and the Cosmic Axis," p. 836.

28."'The Axial Symbolism of the Early Stupa," p. 18.

29."The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis," pp. 831-2.

30.Ibid., p. 826.

31.J. Irwin, "The Axial Symbolism of the Early Stupa," p. 21.

32.Given that "Indra's stake" is closely associated with, and probably mythologically synonymous with, lndra's thunderbolt-sceptre, or vajra (see note 26), it is also significant that, at A.1.124, an Arahant is described as having a citta like a vajira, a term which may mean diamond, or be equivalent to Sanskrit vajra.

33.M. Spiro, Buddhism and Society (London, George Allen and Unwin, 1971), p. 203 reports that in contemporary Burma, the stupa is often seen as representing Meru, with the three worlds (kama, rupa and arupa) represented by the plynth and two parts of the dome, with the spire representing the Buddha.

34.See note 4.

35.The diagram does not depici the rains canopy (vajra-sthatf, said to symbolise the Buddha's "great compassion." The details of the symbolism in the second text differ slightly, and it also sees the ground as symbolising .Ella, and the first platform as symbolising dana.

1.The Great Stupa at Sand, adapted from A. Volwahsen, Living Archi-tecture-India (London, Macdonald, 1969) p. 91.

2.Lotus medallion design, from a railing on Bharhut Stupa, second century B.C., in the Indian Museum, Calcutta.

3.Plan of the third century A.D. Nagarjunakonda Stupa, from G. Com-baz, "L'Evolution du Stupa en Asie. Etude D'Architecture Bouddhique," in Melanges Chinois et Bouddhiques (Bruxelles, L'Institut Beige des Hautes Etudes Chinoisses, 1933), Vol. 12 (1932-3), pp. 163-306, figure 71.

4.The Great Stupa at Anuradhapura, second century B.C., 54 metres high.

5.Shwe Dagon Stupa, Rangoon, 112 metres high, reputedly containing two hairs of Gotama Buddha, and belongings of three previous Buddhas; from G. Combaz, "L'Evolution du Stupa en Asie. Les Symbolismes du Stupa," in Melanges Chinois et Bouddhiques (Bruxelles, L'Institut Beige des Hautes Etudes Chinoisses, 1936), Vol.14 (1935-6),pp.1-126, figure 29.

6.Relief of a stupa supertructure on a drum slab, Amaravati, second century B.C., British Museum. Drawn from a photograph (figure 24) in J. Irwin, "The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis" (reference as in note I).

7.Relief medallion depicting a tree-temple (Bodhi-ghara). Mathura, sec-ond century B.C. Now in Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Taken from J. Irwin, "The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis," figure 27.

8.Stupa depicted on gateway of stupa no. 3, Sanci. Drawn by Margaret Hall, as in J. Irwin,"The Stupa as Cosmic Axis," figure 28.

9.Superstructure of the Great Stupa at Amaravati, as depicted on a relief slab originally encasing the stupa. Second century A.D., Government Museum, Madras.

10.Cross-section of Horyoji Pagoda, Nara, seventh century A.D. Figure 1 (p. 257) in D. Seckel, "Stupa Elements Surviving in East Asian Pagodas," in A.L. Dallapiccola (ed.) The Stupor (reference as in note 1).

11.Gold reliquary in the form of a stupa. From the Ruvanvali stupa, Anuradhapura, attributed to first century B.C. Figure 23 in J. Irwin, "The Stupa and the Cosmic Axis."

12."Cross section of the ideal Dagoba or Chorten" (showing correspon-dences to the 37 bodhipaksivadharmas), figure 13 in Lama Anagarika Govinda, The Psycho-Cosmic Symbolism of the Buddhist Stupa (Emeryville, California, Dharma Press, 1976).