18.9 Of the Eye and Seeing (KV18.9)

Controverted Point: That we see visible objects with the eye.

Theravādin: Then you hold that we see matter by matter … You deny. But think! And if you now assent, you imply that matter is able to distinguish matter. You deny. But think! And if you now assent, you imply that matter is mind … .

Again, you are implying that the eye can “advert” or reflect, co-ordinate, will, etc., albeit you agree that the contrary is true.

These arguments hold good for similar claims put forward by you for the other four senses.

Mahāsaṅghika: But was it not said by the Exalted One:

“Here, bhikkhus, a bhikkhu sees objects with the eye, hears sounds, and so on”?

Hence surely we see visible objects with the eye and so on.

The Points of Controversy, an English translation of the Pali Abhidhamma Kathāvatthu. Translated by Shwe Zan Aung and C.A.F. Rhys Davids. First published by Pali Text Society, 1915.

This SuttaCentral edition was prepared by Manfred Wierich and Ven. Vimala and proofread by Josephine Tobin. Some changes were introduced:

Abbreviations, i.e., those of cited works and the participants in the controversies, were expanded.

Cross-references were linked.

Some typographic changes were introduced, among others, i.e.: the phonetic symbol “ŋ” was changed to the Pāli diacritical letter “ṃ”, “ô” to “o”, single quotes to double quotes, and “:—” to “:”.

Letter-spacing with fixed spaces was replaced with bold font.

The corrigenda were merged into the text. Some could not be resolved, though.

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