A Diachronic Study of the Consciousness Process (cittavīthi) in Theravāda Buddhism: Its Developmental History and Early Context of Formation

Starting with a seminal article of Lance Cousins (1981), the present article attempts to establish a preliminary account of the history of the consciousness process (cittavīthi) according to a number of important primary sources. In the pursuit of outlining the stages of development of the cittavīthi, the relationship between the doctrine of the consciousness process and the doctrine of momentariness will be discussed, with a particular focus on some aspects of the latter. Given that this article will try to establish how the doctrine of the consciousness process developed over time, I will begin by introducing the former studies on this doctrine, highlighting several scholarly tendencies (§ 2). Thereafter, key accounts concerning the analysis of the act of seeing through the lens of the consciousness process will be analysed, differentiating between ancient and more recent accounts (§ 3; § 4; § 5). Later, the original context of development of the doctrine of the consciousness process and the concept of citta-niyāma will also be analysed (§ 6; § 7). Finally, there will be an attempt to make distinctions between the accounts analysed in order to establish older and younger strata, and some considerations will be advanced of the possible reasons why the basic kernel of the doctrine of consciousness process changed over time (§ 8).