नरः सुखं धनेन न विन्दति
'Man does not find happiness through wealth.'
In the time since my last post I have largely been working through a different Sanskrit textbook (Maurer 'The Sanskrit Language' ) to the one I was previously using, and I have to say, the switch has made a world of difference. When I first started out in October/December, the Coulson 'Teach Yourself Sanskrit' book terrified me. That terror did not really subside the more time I spent with the book, I think in part because Coulson assumes that his readers already speak either Latin or (ancient) Greek - an assumption which, I am reliably informed, was a step too far even at the original date of publication in the Seventies! The end result of this is a propensity to gloss over the finer details of things such as the grammatical cases on the assumption that the reader will already be familiar with them via their studies of Latin and Greek. I wasn't, and subsequently I struggled a little more than I needed to have. Add to this the tiny typeface that makes reading the Devanagari very difficult once you get past chapter 6, plus his obtuse and inaccessible writing style, and you have a dense, difficult textbook.
In any case, this does not mean that the book is not useful. The one thing that the Coulson book does do very well is the stringent grammatical detail in terms of sentential construction and a hugely helpful declension glossary and (sort-of) dictionary. It also helps that he writes out the Devanagari (for the most part) in Roman script, too; of particular use when you come across a strange conjunct consonant symbol or you have forgotten what a given Devanagari symbol stands for. The Maurer book that I have switched to has no such comfort blanket, but the simple solution for budding Sanskritists is to just use both books in conjunction! Maurer provides more of a step-by-step logical progression through the language and gives helpful shortcuts to determining things such as the subject, object, active verb and gerunds in a sentence. Obviously, this allows for a more rapid progression with reading and writing even if it scrimps on the 'understanding' part in the earlier lessons. Perhaps the single best feature of the Maurer textbook is that the exercises are not random sentences plucked willy-nilly from a plethora of Sanskrit sources (seemingly to demonstrate the author's own mastery and knowledge rather than to provide a consistent thread for the student to follow), but that they are instead whole passages from Sanskrit texts. Each sentence relates to the last and to the next, there's a story to follow, even if it is as banal as Lesson 3's tale about a King riding around in his chariot. It makes it more interesting, less of an effort and as such, much more productive.
It was in lesson 2 of the Maurer book that I came across the quote that adorns the top of this post:
Transliterated, it amounts to 'naraḥ sukhaṃ dhanena na vindati' (for those remotely interested). I include it because aside from it being a mainstay of my own personal philosophy (I, of course, remain eternally grateful to the AHRC for providing me with a substantial grant that allows me to sit in a university philosophy department making such grand statements!), I think it is painfully apt in relation to our recent election results which places money - some say realistically and necessarily - at the top of both the public and private agenda. The government wants to spend less, make more and fill their coffers. The government also wants us to spend more, pay more VAT and fill their coffers. They want big business to make more because we spend more, and despite the cynic in me thinking that part of this is to swell their individual wealth (how many politicians have their fingers in big business?), the pragmatic side of me says that in a capitalist system, there is a need for businesses to make money in order that they might employ us proles so that we can spend lots of money on really important things like Samsung Smart TVs, iPhones and Land Rover Evoques. In this system then, happiness seems to be inextricably bound to money, and the more of it you have, the happier you are (or should be, at the very least!).नरः सुखं धनेन न विन्दति
From the Buddhist perspective, the problem here is both obvious and yet profound: we have an attachment to money. A fetish for capital. We are deluded. I don't want to be the guy that tries to teach his grannie to suck eggs (I don't know who is reading this, maybe you already know the Buddhist line on attachment to objects, maybe you don't!), but for the sake of clarity, let's break down why attachment to cash (even if this cash brings us enjoyment!) is invariably a source of profound suffering.
Pleasant experiences are only pleasant fleetingly; they are finite, short in length and do not satisfy us for any real period of time. However, these pleasurable experiences do cultivate at least one lasting result: attachment. So what can we say about cash/capital in this instance? Well, cash can provide us with opportunities to do or acquire more pleasurable things. I could buy every Shabba Ranks single in existence twice over if I only had ten million pounds in the bank! Whilst buying these records and listening to these records would make me happy for the ten to fifteen minutes or so that it takes to hear two radio edits and an extended cut (maybe a bonus track if I am lucky!), we'd be loathe to say that the records give me any lasting contentment or 'real' happiness. I doubt that I'd be sat in a monastery arguing that my life felt complete because I knew that I had in my CD rack every single Shabba single to exist. Instead, what I would find myself experiencing is a finite, fleeting, shallow sort of happiness that disappears very quickly. Nevertheless, upon buying and listening to my newly-acquired Shabba Ranks singles collection, I have cultivated attachment on a number of levels. Let's have a little look.
First, I have invested money into these physical objects. I am attached to them in virtue of perceiving them as 'mine': I worry about their being damaged, I worry about their theft, and I find myself wondering what I would do should the worst happen. A trivial sort of anxiety, but an anxiety nonetheless. Apply this same logic to your car - suddenly the anxiety seems a lot more credible, right? That's not all. Second, I am attached to how the records make me feel, both when I play them and merely in virtue of owning them. Perhaps when I can't play them, I feel a bit down, a bit sad - let's face it, who wouldn't be a tiny bit gutted at not being able to play 'Mr Loverman' on loop for the entire day? So I feel anxiety/frustration on not being able to replicate the circumstances under which I felt content (playing the records), and when I am able to replicate the circumstances and play my Shabba CDs, I am content only for a short period of time until the cycle begins anew.
It is very easy to see how this translates in terms of capital and being in the rat race chasing the acquisition of more capital. Additionally, we have all the anxieties illustrated above manifesting for near on every item we purchase as a result of our capital. The Buddhist solution then is not to simply get rid of capital (although that does happen should you enter the monastic life), but to get rid of attachments full stop (see my Academia.edu page for further reading on this; there is little space to thrash out every detail here). A radical solution, and one that I - being a philosophical sort - can advocate whilst (usually!) keeping a straight face. But it is hardly practical on a national level.
Obviously the entire nation is not going to become Buddhist overnight, and even if it did, we would still need an economy to function en mass. Even Buddhists need to eat, have somewhere to live and keep themselves in clothes. Buddhists need a functional NHS. But my hope here is to show that touting the acquisition of capital and money as an inextricable facet of happiness is not only false, but it is dangerous. We risk - should we buy into this rhetoric - becoming obsessed with the acquisition of material wealth, convinced that it is the highest good to be attained. It is not. It brings a host of anxieties and it breeds callousness in the face of poverty. An 'I'm all right, Jack' mentality is precisely what the Bodhisattvas dedicate their lives to eradicating! The mahāyāna method is dedicated to the alleviation of suffering and eventual liberation all beings, not a few rich ones - not even just the poor ones! The compassionate human clearly cannot hold the acquisition of wealth as their highest good, for it corrupts and brings anxiety; attributes that necessarily curtail compassion: how can one be compassionate to all beings if one is always trying to gain more than one's neighbour? How can compassion flourish in an atmosphere of proud individualism, where 'greed is good'?
Aristotle famously argued that whilst wealth does not bring happiness in and of itself, it allows one to pursue goals that do bring happiness. Aristotle presumably mean that some wealth allows you to pursue noble goals without the worry of making yourself destitute or wondering where the next meal is coming from. How sobering then, that under a government that ostensibly supports such a sentiment, the UK is seeing a rise in destitution, a rise in food bank usage, a rise in people unable to live their lives with the dignity that every person deserves. It certainly looks to me that man on the whole really does not find happiness through wealth; only some do. And that just isn't good enough.
