Hiriko
Nanasuci. The Hermit of Bundala:
Biography of
Nanavira Thera and Reflections on His Life and Work. IJssel,
Nederlands: Path Press, 2014.
The case of Harold Musson (1920-1965) presents two great challenges to the modern imagination. The first challenge is his life. A wealthy scion of a British military family, himself a World War II veteran, a captain, and a graduate in languages from Cambridge University, Musson became Nanavira Thera, a Theravada Buddhist monk and hermit in a Sri Lankan jungle.
The second
challenge is understanding a profound and original thinker and
meticulous writer of complex work melding Buddhist thought and
Western philosophy. Nanavira infuses existentialism and phenomenology
into the
content of the Pali canon and the historical Buddha's authentic suttas.
Furthermore, Nanavira's work raises controversy among more
orthodox-minded
Buddhists while at the same time stimulating modern intellectuals
to reflect more profoundly on the historical Buddha and his
thought.
Author Hiriko Nanasuci indicates in the Preface to this biography:
Nanavira encouraged his reader to develop "a vertical view straight down into the abyss of his own personal existence" and since this book is rather horizontal, looking for connections across space and time, the author must emphasize that the book should not be seen as a substitute for Bhante's Notes on Dhamma or indeed any other of his writings. ... The present book should be taken rather as an appendix, ... a collection of other pieces of information for those who are still curious... The author hopes this biography can at least inspire and encourage the reader to study this great man's writings more intensively.
The latter aspiration bears fruit in the reader seeking that course of thought reconciling East and West, ancient and modern, not in a popular or facile syncretism but in applying all the resources of reason and spiritual meaning, minus the lapse of time and memory, and minus the bias of culture and psychology.
What stirred controversy in traditional Buddhist circles, Theravada and beyond, was Nanavira's rigorous exploration of the Buddha's psychological and moral discoveries born of persistent practice and not out of mere extrapolation of texts or speculation, the latter representing all the doctrine and theologizing of the third tripata (the first two being morals and practice). Nanavira gives no credence to later manifestations of Buddhism, both Theravada and the entirety of Mahayana, only deeming the earliest suttas to be genuine, to reflect what the historical Buddha must have expressed. An analogy with Christianity is in the historical Jesus versus the accretions of scripture and doctrine, soon as well as long after the sage's death. The institutionalization that followed justified itself as a complex but hollow structure compared to the living historical thought. Yet the quest for the historical Jesus has little to work from compared to the depth of Buddhist thought available for the Western reader's analysis.
Harold Musson renounced a glittering world of independent wealth, of leisure and social status, in response to the existential experience of war and the course of the modern world. After moving to Ceylon, he first lived in the small monastic community of Island Hermitage, where his intense studies were launched, chiefly thorough reading and translation of the Pali canon (he already knew French, Italian, much German). Here he began to sketch out the first notes that would form his core work Notes on Dhamma. He became a Ceylon citizen, renouncing all ties to the West. Nanavira expanded his correspondence, retained by most to whom he wrote. After the conventional five years in community, he then moved to a kuti or hut in remote Bundala to become a classic hermit, further refining his intellectual work but increasingly pursuing solitude and pure meditative practice as his writing reached a cumulative point in his quest for sottapatti, "stream-entry."
The hermit dwelling and his life as a hermit are described in correspondence and by several visitors over the years. Nanavira had first tried living on a mountain but had difficulty procuring food. He then tried living in a cave but was soon displaced by spreading rice farm operations. The jungle of Bundala was close to a village and formidable enough to discourage casual visitors, with thickets harboring elephants, monkeys, and snakes. In 1957, villagers immediately volunteered in the effort to build a kuti described by the author as a:
one-room, mud-brick-and plaster building with a tile roof. ... It was big enough for a tall man -- the room was a box, twelve by eight feet, with a door leading out to the "cankamana, the walking path, which was thirty by three feet, with a concrete floor, and was very important for the practice of walking meditation. The walls were faded blue. ... It was furnished with two small (glassless) windows, with thick black-vertical bars set in them, giving a "prison" effect. The bed, raised two inches off the floor, would have been simply mud or a plank with a straw mat on top. The floor was hard concrete. A table was made from a packing-case with an oil-lamp on it; there was a chair, a chest, and a bookcase with a collection of Pali Suttas, dictionaries, and books related to existentialism and other literature that interested him. There were also two straw brooms and two umbrellas, and a small shaving mirror on the wall. ... Outside, Nanavira and Perera [a layperson contact and patron] build a latrine and a water storage structure.
Nanavira himself wrote that with regards to solitude, the hut was well situated according to the Buddha's own recommendation for practice in a place that should
not be crowded by day and should be silent at night, [and] ... easily approachable. I do not think it would be easy to find a better place for practice of Buddhadhamma. ...
The villagers, too, had arranged for the privacy of "their" hermit,
and also his food such that he need not make alms-rounds, bringing him
before
noon (since a bhikkhu does not eat after that hour) fruit, rice gruel,
tea, and whatever else they had prepared. This dependence on the
hygiene of food-preparers and local water supply may have played a role
in Nanavira's health, as will be seen.
Nanavira's intellectual explorations had begun promptly at Island Hermitage with his readings of the commentaries. Having no cultural bias to accept tradition at face value, he followed the Buddha's historical advice to investigate on one's own, and questioned all commentaries and "tidy" explanations. He concluded that standard texts like the famous Visuddhimagga of Bhuddhaghosa and the Milindapahha were of little value to the goal of meditation. Nanavira developed a short list of about a dozen works, within the Vinaya and the Sutta Pitakas, that he considered to reflect the original sentiment of the historical Buddha. He doubted
that the Buddha taught the Dhamma in such a way that it is impossible to apply any method to it, thereby turning it into a System -- a System can be accepted or rejected at will, but not the Dhamma.
Author Nanasuci shows that while Nanavira discovered the methods of existentialism and phenomenology useful in cutting through the various historical views of metaphysical, theoretical and scientific presuppositions, its advocates often wavered and fell back into ideologies or engagements with the world, failing the breakthrough that Nanavira maintained the Buddha had achieved with Dhamma. While the Western traditions confronted unanswerable questions, writes Nanavira, introducing his Notes on Dhamma,
the Buddha can and does go beyond this point: not, to be sure, by answering the unanswerable, but by showing the way leading to the final cessation of all questions about self and the world.
Just as the existentialists broke away from traditional systems to return to fundamental questions, Nanavira broke through traditional Buddhist adherence to commentaries and doctrines to recover the original and essential thought of the Buddha in those expressions concentrating on Dhamma. For most Buddhists in Nanavira's contemporary Ceylon and certainly elsewhere,
there are many things that they take far more seriously than the Dhamma, and when I show too plainly that I regard these as worthless trifles, offence is easily taken.
About this time, Nanavira's fellow bhikkhu Nanamoli (Osbert Moore),
an
English army veteran befriended in London who had joined Edward Musson
in
going to Ceylon to become a Buddhist monk, died unexpectedly. Nanamoli
resided in Island Hermitage but the two old friends had maintained a
regular correspondence over intellectual topics of mutual interest,
Nanamoli specializing in English translations of Pali classics. After
Nanamoli's death, Nanavira's correspondents broadened to include
interested laypeople. But the trial-and-error methods and practice
he had enjoyed discussing with Nanamoli seemed at an end. Nanavira's
"enlightenment" experience (he
preferred the term "awakening") changed his eager correspondence to a
deeper solitude. His Notes on Dhamma
are more focused
in this period, his less frequent correspondence keener and more
pointed. As author
Nanasuci puts it: "Nanavira's writings after 1960 express just this
kind
of certainty: no more groping in the dark, no more doubt and
speculative guessing."
At this point, Nanavira's lay supporters arrange to publish Notes on Dhamma. A separate section of Nanasuci's biography describes the varied responses to the published Notes, from positive to cautious to outright hostile among Ceylonese intellectuals and monks. Within this section -- some contributed by other writers -- are further assessments of Nanavira's legacy, and descriptions of key incidents in his interactions with others: the troubled disciple Sister Vajira, the prying journalist Robin Maugham (W. Somerset Maugham's nephew), simple and honest comments of Bundala villagers. These passages further document the life of Nanavira. But the compelling biographical narrative reaches its apex in describing the final days of Nanavira.
From his earliest days in Island Hermitage, Nanavira suffered from sciatic nerve damage, typhoid, and amoebiasis, the latter a parasitic gastro-intestinal disease that may manifest worsening symptoms years after initial contraction. Nanavira's case was severe. But in 1960 he additionally contracted filariasis, another parasitic infection, and had to be hospitalized in Colombo. Despite tests and drugs, little progress could be noted; Nanavira found the intense abdominal and gastro-intestinal pain a severe distraction for meditating. Two years later, a prescribed drug offering positive abatement of his worst symptoms had the unfortunate side effect of satyriasis, an unacceptable alternative to his parasitic diseases.
About this time Nanavira began discussing suicide in his letters to
trusted laypeople and monks. Colorfully put, he felt his diseases had
pushed him to only two options: "wife or knife." He refused to
disrobe, that is, to renounce his monastic vow and become a layperson.
He believed that because he had entered
the first stage of awakening, his suicide would not be a major
offense as it would be for a novice bhikku, and certainly for a
layperson, and especially for a disrobed monk. Nor did he believe his
suicide to be a product of depression or weakness, but, rather, would
be justified by the undeniable exhaustion of his capability to make
further
spiritual or mental progress -- or indeed by the worse possibility of
losing his hard-won progress. He explored these concerns in letters to
key laypersons and monks, who listened attentively but did not argue
with him.
The medical authorities had given up his case. Indeed, in 1963 Nanavira
developed arrhythmia, heartbeat irregularities, and his doctors
believed that the toll of diseases and prescriptions may have weakened
or damaged his heart. In sharp
contrast to earlier times, a photo of Nanavira at this time show an
exhausted gaunt figure with an uncertain world-weary expression.
Nanavira made one more visit to Colombo doctors, his symptoms
worsening. He was surrounded by well-meaning advisers, including one
British-born resident and patron who wanted the hermit to return to
England. But Nanavira would not jeopardize his progress. He returned to
his kuti, arranged his books
and papers, and successfully administered
a method of self-asphyxiation. Nanavira died at the age of 45.
Conclusion
Nanavira Thera can readily be counted a twentieth-century
philosopher waiting to be fully engaged by the West. His life was
essentially cut off early by disease and unfortunately would not have
produced more fruitful thinking and writing given his physical
condition. Nanavira links East and West, tradition and modern thought,
in his unique and challenging approach to vital questions. The
eremitism he embraced was a logical extension of his thinking and
practice, and in Nanavira can be seen much potential for reflection
on the great streams of influence that percolate through the grand
motif of the hermit. Nanavira compels a complete reassessment of what
Path Press (publisher of Nanavira material) calls existential Buddhism.
As mentioned above, biographer Nanasuci writes at the outset of the book: "The author hopes this biography can at least inspire and encourage the reader to study this great man's writings more intensively." Surely this goal is fulfilled, not only for the reflective thinker with an interest in Buddhism and the contemporary, but for casual readers attracted by an intriguing life effectively and affectionately documented.
¶