Upādāna is ādāa Sanskrit and Pali word that means "fuel, material cause, substrate that is the source and means for keeping an active process energized". It is also an important Buddhist concept referring to "attachment, clinging, grasping". It is considered to be the result of taṇhā (craving), and is part of the dukkha (dissatisfaction, suffering, pain) doctrine in Buddhism.
Buddhism
Upādāna is the Sanskrit and Pāli word for "clinging", "attachment" or "grasping", although the literal meaning is "fuel". Upādāna and taṇhā (Skt. tṛṣṇā) are seen as the two primary causes of dukkha ('suffering', unease, "standing unstable"). The cessation of clinging is nirvana, the coming to rest of the grasping mind.
Types of clinging
In the Sutta Pitaka, the Buddha states that there are four types of clinging: sense-pleasure clinging (kamupadana) all views clinging (ditthupadana) rites-and-rituals clinging (silabbatupadana) self-doctrine clinging (attavadupadana). The Buddha once stated that, while other sects might provide an appropriate analysis of the first three types of clinging, he alone fully elucidated clinging to the "self" and its resultant unease.
The Abhidhamma and its commentaries provide the following definitions for these four clinging types: sense-pleasure clinging: repeated craving of worldly things. view clinging: such as eternalism (e.g., "The world and self are eternal") or nihilism. rites-and-rituals clinging: believing that rites alone could directly lead to liberation, typified in the texts by the rites and rituals of "ox practice" and "dog practice." self-doctrine clinging: self-identification with self-less entities (e.g., illustrated by MN 44, and further discussed in the skandha and anatta articles). According to Buddhaghosa, the above ordering of the four types of clinging is in terms of decreasing grossness, that is, from the most obvious (grossest) type of clinging (sense-pleasure clinging) to the subtlest (self-doctrine clinging).
Interdependence of clinging types
Buddhaghosa further identifies that these four clinging types are causally interconnected as follows:
This hierarchy of clinging types is represented diagrammatically to the right.
Thus, based on Buddhaghosa's analysis, clinging is more fundamentally an erroneous core belief (self-doctrine clinging) than a habitualized affective experience (sense-pleasure clinging).
Manifestations of clinging
In terms of consciously knowable mental experiences, the Abhidhamma identifies sense-pleasure clinging with the mental factor of "greed" (lobha) and the other three types of clinging (self-doctrine, wrong-view and rites-and-rituals clinging) with the mental factor of "wrong view" (ditthi). Thus, experientially, clinging can be known through the Abhidhamma's fourfold definitions of these mental factors as indicated in the following table:
To distinguish craving from clinging, Buddhaghosa uses the following metaphor: "Craving is the aspiring to an object that one has not yet reached, like a thief's stretching out his hand in the dark; clinging is the grasping of an object that one has reached, like the thief's grasping his objective.... [T]hey are the roots of the suffering due to seeking and guarding." Thus, for instance, when the Buddha talks about the "aggregates of clinging," he is referring to our grasping and guarding physical, mental and conscious experiences that we falsely believe we are or possess.
As part of the causal chain of suffering
In the Four Noble Truths, the First Noble Truth identifies clinging (upādāna, in terms of "the aggregates of clinging") as one of the core experiences of suffering. The Second Noble Truth identifies craving (tanha) as the basis for being at unease. In this manner a causal relationship between craving and clinging is found in the Buddha's most fundamental teaching.
In the twelve-linked chain of Dependent Origination (Pratītyasamutpāda, also see Twelve Nidanas), clinging (upādāna) is the ninth causal link:
Upādāna (Clinging) is dependent on (Craving) as a condition before it can exist. "With Craving as condition, Clinging arises".
Upādāna (Clinging) is also the prevailing condition for the next condition in the chain, Becoming (Bhava). "With Clinging as condition, Becoming arises."
According to Buddhaghosa, it is sense-pleasure clinging that arises from craving and that conditions becoming.