DOUBT

Doubt (Sanskrit, vicikit??; Chinese, yi) serves in different Buddhist traditions as either a hindrance to spiritual development or a catalyst for contemplative insight. In the mainstream Buddhist schools of South Asia, doubt refers to skepticism about claims made within the tradition regarding such cardinal teachings as conditionality, the constituents of spiritual cultivation, or the Buddha, dharma, and sa?gha. Thus, doubt obstructs confidence in and tacit acceptance of the religion's teachings, and it hinders the development of prajÑ? (wisdom).

Doubt was the fifth of the five hindrances (niv?ra?a) to dhy?na (trance state)—along with sensual desire, ill-will, sloth and torpor, and restlessness and worry—and it had no constructive role to play in Indian Buddhist meditation. Doubt was rather an obstacle to overcome through prajñ?, sustained thought (vic?ra), and the investigation of dharmas (dharmapravicaya). Doubt could be temporarily allayed on the second stage of dhy?na and overcome permanently at the first stage of sanctity (i.e., stream-entry).

By the time East Asian Buddhists fully appraised doubt, this debilitating skepticism had been transformed into a principal force driving the meditator toward enlightenment. In the k?an meditation of the Chan school, for example, the "sensation of doubt" (Chinese, yiqing) became the principal catalyst to contemplation by provoking a profound existential quandary. Doubt generated through inquiry into the keyword or critical phrase (Chinese, huatou) of the k?an grows to take in all perplexities and uncertainties that one confronts in everyday life. Doubt eventually creates such tremendous pressure in the mind of the meditator that it "explodes" (Chinese, po), destroying in the process the conventional point of view that constitutes the ego, and freeing the mind to experience the multivalent levels of selfless interrelationships that characterize enlightenment in the Chan school.

See also:Meditation; Path; Psychology

Bibliography

Buswell, Robert E., Jr. "The Short-Cut Approach of K'an-hua Meditation: The Evolution of a Practical Subitism in Chinese Ch'an Buddhism." In Sudden and Gradual: Approaches to Enlightenment in Chinese Thought, ed. Peter N. Gregory. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1987.

Buswell, Robert E., Jr. "The Transformation of Doubt (Yiqing) in Chinese Buddhist Meditation." In Love and Emotions in Traditional Chinese Literature, ed. Halvor Eifring. Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2003.

Jayatilleke, Kulatissa Nanda. Early Buddhist Theory of Knowledge. London: Allen and Unwin, 1963.

Nyanaponika Thera, trans. and comp. "The Five Mental Hindrances and Their Conquest: Selected Texts from the Pali Canon and the Commentaries." Wheel Series 26 (1947). Reprint, Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1961.

Robert E. Buswell, Jr.