The Buddha Before Buddhism

With The Buddha before Buddhism, Gil Fronsdal offers a fresh translation of the Aṭṭhakavagga (the “Book of Eights”), a collection of 103 verses belonging to the canonical Pali Sutta Nipāta. The Aṭṭhakavagga advances a largely apophatic outlook towards religious precepts and doctrine, admonishing its audience to “avoid attachment to views” (i.e., points of philosophical disputation) while advocating detachment from sensual pleasures and worldly pursuits. The absence of cornerstone Pali Buddhist formulations—such as the “Four Noble Truths,” the “Eightfold Path,” the “Twelvefold Conditions of Dependent Origination” (paticcasamuppāda)—has led some scholars to regard the text as an inchoate version of the Buddha’s teaching, or perhaps as a window into early Buddhist thought, prior to any extensive systematization. (This is sometimes referred to as “primitive” or “precanonical” Buddhism.) Fronsdal capitalizes on this assessment in order to draw readers in, recapitulating arguments for the probable antiquity of the Book of Eights on basis of style, references in other early Buddhist textual compendia, and the fact that it contains no mention of a settled monastic community.

Fronsdal offers an unprecedentedly readable version of the text, taking a “middle path” between the stylistic choices of previous translators (i.e., between the iambic verse of E.M. Hare [in Woven Cadences of Early Buddhists, Oxford University Press, 1945] and the literal, sometimes stiff prose of K.R. Norman). Fronsdal’s neat and parsimonious rendering is supplemented with footnotes glossing essential Pali words, explaining his translation choices, and cross referencing portions of the text that appear elsewhere in the Pali canon. Students of Pali will want to stick with Norman’s The Group of Discourses: Sutta Nipāta (PTS, 2nd edition 2001), which follows closely the original syntax and gives much more extensive notes (though occasionally Fronsdal’s concision in fact offers a more accurate rendering of the original, as for example at v. 772).

Since The Buddha before Buddhism does not represent an intervention on previous scholarship relating to the Aṭṭhakavagga, it must be assessed in terms of its appeal to general readers and potential as a teaching resource at the introductory undergraduate level. By this rubric the book fares quite well: Fronsdal delivers an engaging translation as well as a clear and compelling introduction to elementary Buddhist concepts through his commentary. There is a slight equivocation throughout the arc of the book, with Fronsdal first offering the tantalizing prospect that the Books of Eights represents the original teachings of the Buddha, only to subsequently counsel against preoccupations with text-critical studies in search of original doctrine. The quest for “what the Buddha taught,” we are reminded, is itself contrary to the spirit of the Book of Eights insofar as it constitutes grasping for “ultimate truth.” Fronsdal gives a balanced synopsis of arguments relating to the provenance of the text at the end of the book, admitting the likely possibility that the Aṭṭhakavagga arrived at its received form in the country of Avanti in Western India, “a region remote from the center of early Buddhism.”

While readers in the market for a strict scholarly assessment of the Aṭṭhakavagga may appreciate a more upfront appraisal of the text’s origins, within the context of the intended audience of The Buddha before Buddhism, Fronsdal’s inexactness may be viewed as the application of a classical Buddhist pedagogical strategy: Upaya or “skillful means in teaching” dictates that “ultimate truth” can be deferred for the sake of practical instruction.

Justin Henry is Instructor of Religious Studies at Loyola University, Chicago.

Justin Henry

Date Of Review:

February 21, 2018