Abhidhamma Papers

Essay: Cause and effect

If an event happens for no apparent reason we are most disturbed; if an action does not produce the effects we confidently expect, we are similarly disturbed. Our lives and sanity rely on our actions producing consistent, predictable and reproducible effects.

Cause is active, effect is passive, effects do not necessarily produce causes; this is because they lack impulsion. From a temporal viewpoint the present effects that we call reality have their causes in the past; any future effects have their causes in the present. This point is illustrated below:

PAST	PRESENT	FUTURE
Cause	Effect Cause	Effect

Time is not stationary and the present becomes the past and the future becomes the present, thus producing a continuous sequence of cause and effect. Past causes are actions carried out in a state of consciousness containing wrong knowing, and are motivated by that wrong knowing. This not only includes unskilful states of mind but also skilful states where wrong knowing remains dormant. Past causes are linked to present effects by the continuity of consciousness. Present effects are the five aggregates of matter, feeling, perception, mental states and consciousness - what we are and how we perceive the world.

Present causes are, once again, activities motivated by wrong knowing. Once action has occurred afresh, future effects occur to replace those in the present when the latter have come to fruition and eventually ceased. This cycle is shown diagrammatically below:

As the cause/effect cycle is continuous, closer examination must be in terms of one unit. The only one accessible is that in the present; this starts with the effects (the production of the five aggregates) produced by past actions.

The aggregates arise simultaneously with the consciousness which Iinks present effects with past causes. The aggregates are capable of interacting. When mind makes contact through the senses with matter, feeling (either pleasant, neutral or unpleasant) occurs as a result. This is the final resultant of past action.

When the feeling thus produced motivates (through wrong knowing in the form of craving and attachment) further action, another causal phase starts. It is between the passive and active phases that the cycle can be broken, but it can only be broken when wrong knowing has been eradicated.

Les

Discussion: Cause and effect

While this essay is concerned with the cycle of dependent origination, it avoids the traditional form. The first seven links, which are discussed in more detail in the next as well as in this essay, are as follows:

Wrong knowing (avijja)
Sankhara (not translated)
Regenerative consciousness (vinnana)
Mentality-materiality (nama-rupa)
Sense bases (salayatana)
Contact (phassa)
Craving (tanha)

At the beginning of the list, what is meant by wrong knowing? In the texts, the knowledge of the three marks of existence (impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, no-self), or insight, is often taken as the absence of wrong knowing. The usual translation of the word is 'ignorance' but in the Pall term avijja the prefix 'a-' is not negative in the same sense as the English 'un-'. Avijja is therefore not simply 'not knowing' but a kind of wrong or misdirected knowing. Another translation which is sometimes used is 'delusion' but in this case, a 'state of deludedness' is probably more accurate. in this book we have used the straightforward 'wrong knowing'.

The essay points out (paragraph three) that dependent origination includes not only unskilful (akusala) but also skilful (kusala) states of consciousness. So, strictly speaking, only those states of consciousness which realize nibbana (the so-called 'supramundane' ones) can break up the cycle completely (last paragraph). Despite this, the cycle may be modified or induced to follow a more skilful course. As pointed out, wrong knowing is suppressed in skilful states of consciousness, and these states can thus modify the action of the cycle.

It was also pointed out (paragraph two) that past causes are linked to present effects by the continuity of consciousness. This continuity does not imply that consciousness is continuous. According to abhidhamma, consciousness is a process of arising and falling away, while the falling away of consciousness conditions an arising. We tend, however, to misunderstand the nature of this conditioning. One tends to think of one state of consciousness as separate from others - following on the previous state and preceding the next. But if they are separate in this way, how can it be possible for one state to condition another? Clearly it is necessary to re-think what is meant by the 'continuity' of consciousness. It is easy to think of abhidhamma as portraying consciousness as an orderly series of separate states of consciousness, but this does not seem to be the meaning intended.

A similar problem arises with the relationship between the aggregates and action. Are these two aspects separate from one another? It may be more appropriate to say that the aggregates are action.