Creator in Buddhism

Damien Keown notes that in the Saṃyutta Nikāya, the Buddha sees the cycle of rebirths as stretching back "many hundreds of thousands of eons without discernible beginning."[9] Saṃyutta Nikāya 15:1 and 15:2 states: "this samsara is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not discerned of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving."[10]

According to Buddhologist Richard Hayes, the early Buddhist Nikaya literature treats the question of the existence of a creator god "primarily from either an epistemological point of view or a moral point of view". In these texts the Buddha is portrayed not as a creator-denying atheist who claims to be able to prove such a God's nonexistence, but rather his focus is other teachers' claims that their teachings lead to the highest good.[11]

According to Richard Hayes, in the Tevijja Sutta (DN 13), there is an account of a dispute between two brahmins about how best to reach union with Brahma (Brahmasahavyata), who is seen as the highest god over whom no other being has mastery and who sees all. However, after being questioned by the Buddha, it is revealed that they do not have any direct experience of this Brahma. The Buddha calls their religious goal laughable, vain and empty.[12]

Hayes also notes that in the early texts, the Buddha is not depicted as an atheist, but more as a skeptic who is against religious speculations, including speculations about a creator god. Citing the Devadaha Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 101), Hayes states, "while the reader is left to conclude that it is attachment rather than God, actions in past lives, fate, type of birth or efforts in this life that is responsible for our experiences of sorrow, no systematic argument is given in an attempt to disprove the existence of God."[13]

Narada Thera also notes that the Buddha specifically calls out the doctrine of creation by a supreme deity (termed Ishvara) for criticism in the Aṇguttara Nikāya. This doctrine of creation by a supreme lord is defined as follows: "Whatever happiness or pain or neutral feeling this person experiences all that is due to the creation of a supreme deity (issaranimmāṇahetu)."[14] The Buddha criticized this view because he saw it as a fatalistic teaching that would lead to inaction or laziness:

"So, then, owing to the creation of a supreme deity men will become murderers, thieves, unchaste, liars, slanderers, abusive, babblers, covetous, malicious and perverse in view. Thus for those who fall back on the creation of a god as the essential reason, there is neither desire nor effort nor necessity to do this deed or abstain from that deed."[15]

High gods who are mistaken as creator

Further information: Brahmā (Buddhism)

The high god Brahma is often seen as an object in devotion in Buddhism, but he is not seen as a creator nor does he have eternal life. This depiction of the deity is from the Erawan Shrine in Bangkok, Thailand.

According to Peter Harvey, Buddhism assumes that the universe has no ultimate beginning to it, and thus sees no need for a creator God. In the early texts of Buddhism, the nearest term to this concept is "Great Brahma" (Maha Brahma) such as in Digha Nikaya 1.18.[6] However "[w]hile being kind and compassionate, none of the brahmās are world-creators."[16]

In the Pali canon, Buddhism includes the concept of reborn gods.[17] According to this theory, periodically the physical world system ends and beings of that world system are reborn as gods in lower heavens. This too ends, according to Buddhist cosmology, and god Mahabrahma is then born, who is alone. He longs for the presence of others, and the others gods are reborn as his ministers and companions.[17] In Buddhist suttas such as DN 1, Mahabrahma, forgets his past lives, and falsely believes himself to be the Creator, Maker, All-seeing, the Lord. This belief, state the Buddhist texts, is then shared by other gods. Eventually, however one of the gods die and is reborn as human with the power to remember his previous life.[6] He teaches what he remembers from his previous life in lower heaven, that Mahabrahma is the Creator. It is this that leads to the human belief in Creator, according to the Pali Canon.[6]

A depiction of the Buddha's defeat of Baka Brahma, a brahma god who mistakenly believed he was all powerful creator. Wat Olak Madu, Kedah.

A similar story of a high god (brahma) who mistakes himself as all powerful Creator can be seen in the Brahma-nimantanika Sutta (MN 49). In this sutta, the Buddha displays his superior knowledge by explaining how a high god named Baka Brahma, who believes himself to be supremely powerful, actually does not know of certain spiritual realms. The Buddha also demonstrates his superior psychic power by disappearing from Baka Brahma's sight, to a realm that he cannot reach and then challenges him to do the same. Baka Brahma fails in this, demonstrating the Buddha's superiority.[18] The text also depicts Mara, an evil trickster figure, as attempting to support the Brahma's misconception of himself. As noted by Michael D. Nichols, MN 49 seems to show that "belief in an eternal, creator figure is a devious ploy put forward by the Evil One to mislead humanity, and the implication is that Brahmins who believe in the power and permanence of Brahma have fallen for it."[19]

Some stories in the Buddhist Jataka collections outline a critique of a Creator deity which is similar to the Problem of Evil.[20]

One Jataka story (VI.208) states:

If Brahma is lord of the whole world and Creator of the multitude of beings, then why has he ordained misfortune in the world without making the whole world happy; or for what purpose has he made the world full of injustice, falsehood and conceit; or is the lord of beings evil in that he ordained injustice when there could have been justice?[21]

The Pali Bhūridatta Jātaka (No. 543) has the bodhisattva (future Buddha) state:

"He who has eyes can see the sickening sight,

Why does not Brahmā set his creatures right?

If his wide power no limit can restrain,

Why is his hand so rarely spread to bless?

Why are his creatures all condemned to pain?

Why does he not to all give happiness?

Why do fraud, lies, and ignorance prevail?

Why triumphs falsehood—truth and justice fail?

I count you Brahmā one th'unjust among,

Who made a world in which to shelter wrong."[22]

In the Pali Mahābodhi Jātaka (No. 528), the bodhisattva says:

"If there exists some Lord all powerful to fulfil

In every creature bliss or woe, and action good or ill;

That Lord is stained with sin.

Man does but work his will."[23]

Adi Buddha Samantabhadra, a symbol of the ground in Dzogchen thought.

Some Vajrayana Buddhist teachings have been seen as being similar to theistic views by various writers.

B. Alan Wallace writes on how the Vajrayana concept of the primordial Buddha (Adi Buddha), who in some scriptures is viewed as one with the tathāgatagarbha, is sometimes seen as forming the foundation of both samsara and nirvana. This view, according to Wallace, holds that "the entire universe consists of nothing other than displays of this infinite, radiant, empty awareness."[34]

Furthermore, Wallace notes similarities between these Vajrayana doctrines and notions of a divine creative "ground of being". He writes: "a careful analysis of Vajrayana Buddhist cosmogony, specifically as presented in the Atiyoga tradition of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, which presents itself as the culmination of all Buddhist teachings, reveals a theory of a transcendent ground of being and a process of creation that bear remarkable similarities with views presented in Vedanta and Neoplatonic Western Christian theories of creation."[35] He further comments that the three views "have so much in common that they could almost be regarded as varying interpretations of a single theory."[36]

Eva K. Dargyay also notes that the Dzogchen tantra called the Kunjed Gyalpo ("All Creating King") uses symbolic language for the Adi-Buddha Samantabhadra which is reminiscent of theism.[37] However, Jim Valby notes that "Kunjed Gyalpo and Sattvavajra are not gods, but are symbols for different aspects of our primordial enlightenment. Kunjed Gyalpo is our timeless Pure Perfect Presence beyond cause and effect. Sattvavajra is our ordinary, analytical, judgmental presence inside time that depends upon cause and effect."[38]

Regarding the term Adi Buddha, Vesna Wallace notes:

when the Kalacakra tradition speaks of the Adibuddha in the sense of a beginningless and endless Buddha, it is referring to the innate gnosis that pervades the minds of all sentient beings and stands as the basis of both samsara and nirvana. Whereas, when it speaks of the Adibuddha as the one who first attained perfect enlightenment by means of imperishable bliss, and when it asserts the necessity of acquiring merit and knowledge in order to attain perfect Buddhahood, it is referring to the actual realization of one's own innate gnosis. Thus, one could say that in the Kalacakra tradition, Adibuddha refers to the ultimate nature of one's own mind and to the one who has realized the innate nature of one's own mind by means of purificatory practices.[39]

According to Alexander Studholme, the Kāraṇḍavyūhasūtra presents the great bodhisattva, Avalokiteśvara, as a kind of supreme lord of the cosmos. A striking feature of Avalokiteśvara in this sutra is his creative power, as he is said to be the progenitor of various heavenly bodies and divinities. Alexander Studholme, in his monograph on the sutra, writes:

The sun and moon are said to be born from the bodhisattva's eyes, Mahesvara [Siva] from his brow, Brahma from his shoulders, Narayana [Vishnu] from his heart, Sarasvati from his teeth, the winds from his mouth, the earth from his feet and the sky from his stomach.'[40]

Avalokiteśvara himself is seen, in the versified version of the sutra, to be an emanation of the first Buddha, the Adi Buddha, who is called svayambhu (self-existent, not born from anything or anyone) and the "primordial lord" (Adinatha).[41]