Icchantika

icchantika (T. 'dod chen; C. yichanti 一闡提) is a term used in the Mahayana tradition to refer to a class of beings who have lost all potential to acheive enlightenment (nirvana) or buddhahood.

Robert Buswell states:

The notion of the icchantika (loosely rendered into English as “hedonist” or “dissipated”) is the closest Buddhism comes to a notion of damnation or perdition. Icchantika refers to a class, or “lineage” (Sanskrit, gotra), of beings who are beyond all redemption and lose forever the capacity to achieve nirvāṇa (Sanskrit, aparinirvāṇagotraka). The Nirvana Sutra defines the icchantika as one who “does not believe in the law of causality, has no feeling of shame, has no faith in the workings of karma, is unconcerned with the present or the future, never befriends good people, and does not follow the teachings of the Buddha.” The term is often employed polemically in Mahāyāna texts, as for example the Laṅkāvatārasūtra (Discourse of the Descent into Lanka), to refer to beings who are antagonistic toward the Mahāyāna canon. Their destiny is typically an eternity in the hells. Some bodhisattva icchantikas intentionally choose this spiritual lineage because they “cherish certain vows for all beings since beginningless time” (sattvānādikālapraṇidhānata), and they wish to help all beings gain nirvāṇa.

The icchantika doctrine has long been controversial in Mahayana because it seems to contradict an axiom of many strands of Buddhism: the innate presence of the buddha-nature, or tathāgatagarbha, in all sentient beings. The Chinese commentator Daosheng (ca. 360–434), for example, debunked the theory and even had the audacity to question the accuracy of passages in stra translations that mentioned the lamentable destiny of icchantikas. With the prominent exception of the Faxiang school, the Chinese branch of Yogacara, East Asian Buddhists resoundingly rejected the icchantika doctrine in favor of the notion that all beings, even the denizens of hell, retained the capacity to attain enlightenment.

Sources

• Buswell, Robert E.; Lopez, Donald S. (2014), The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, Princeton University 
• Buswell, Robert E. (2004), "Icchantiki", in Buswell, Robert E., Encyclopedia of Buddhism, Macmillan Reference USA 

Further reading

• Hodge, Stephen (2006), On the Eschatology of the Mahaparinirvana Sutra and Related Matters (PDF), lecture delivered at the University of London, SOAS 
• Karashima, Seishi (2007). Who were the Icchantikas?, Annual Report of The International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology at Soka University 10, 61-80
• Lai, Whalen (1982). Sinitic speculations on buddha-nature: The Nirvaana school (420-589), Philosophy East and West 32:2, p. 135-149
• Liu , Ming-Wood (1984). The Problem of the Icchantika in the Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra, Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 7 (1), 71-72
• Yamamoto, Kosho (tr.), Page, Tony (ed), (1999–2000). The Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra in 12 volumes. London: Nirvana Publications.
• Icchantika, Wikipedia