From criticism to approval: A reconsideration of Ji’s Yogācāra position on Madhyamaka

Madhyamaka and Yogācāra are two Mahāyāna schools which have distinct systems. In the seventh century East Asia, the doctrinal distinction between the two schools was received as doctrinal contrast in the polemic circumstance of Emptiness-Existence (C. kongyou 空有) controversy. In this context, Ji 基 (632–682), the putative founder of East Asian Yogācāra school, has been normally considered by scholars to have advocated ‘Existence’ (viz., Yogācāra) in opposition to ‘Emptiness’ (viz., Madhyamaka). It is problematic, however, to brand Ji’s Yogācāra position simply as anti-Madhyamaka. Although Ji evidently expresses evident criticism on such a Madhyamaka exegete as Bhāvaviveka (ca. 500–570) in some of his works, he also describes Bhāvaviveka in an amicable or even respective way in other works. By analyzing Ji’s extant works, this article argues that Ji’s scholastic attitude toward Madhyamaka changed from criticism to approval.     

From Yogācāra to Philosophical Tantra in Kashmir and Tibet

This paper outlines a shift in the role of self-awareness from Yogācāra to tantra and connects some of the dots between Yogācāra, Pratyabhijñā, and Buddhist tantric traditions in Tibet. As is the case with Yogācāra, the Pratyabhijñā tradition of Utpaladeva (10th c.) maintains that awareness is self-illuminating and constitutive of objects. Utpaladeva’s commentator and influential successor, Abhinavagupta (10th–11th c.), in fact quotes Dharmakīrti’s (7th c.) argument from the Pramā?avini?caya that objects are necessarily perceived objects (sahopalambhaniyama). That is, everything known is known in consciousness; there is nothing that can be known outside or separate from consciousness. This aspect of Pratyabhijñā thought is shared with Yogācāra. While Utpaladeva drew upon Yogācāra epistemology to formulate a differential construction of objects (via apoha), he departed from this theory to develop a distinctive monistic framework for the interpretation of subjectivity. By appealing to the ultimate reality of a singularly nonconceptual, transcendental subject rather than a plurality of (non)conceptual particulars, Utpaladeva appropriated Dharmakīrti’s epistemological model while turning it on its head. That is, Utpaladeva critiqued Dharmakīrti in one context (his external realism) while he is indebted to him in another (his epistemic idealism) to establish the framework for his own absolute idealism, where everything happens in and through the absolute self that is ?iva. Utpaladeva extended (or made explicit) the place of self-awareness in Yogācāra to formulate an absolute idealism that is the theoretic foundation for philosophical tantra. In this paper, I will chart a trajectory of this development, from Yogācāra to Pratyabhijñā, and show how a parallel development took place in tantric assimilations of Yogācāra in Tibet.     

Reflexivity,Subjectivity, and the Constructed Self: A Buddhist Model

The aim of this article is to take up three closely connected questions. First, does consciousness essentially involve subjectivity? Second, what is the connection, if any, between pre-reflective self-consciousness and subjectivity? And, third, does consciousness necessarily involve an ego or self? I will draw on the Yogācāra–Madhyamaka synthesis of ?āntarak?ita (eighth century common era) to develop an account of the relation between consciousness, subjectivity, and the self. I will argue, first, that phenomenal consciousness is reflexive or self-illuminating (svaprakā?ya). Second, I will argue that consciousness necessarily involves minimal subjectivity. Third, I will argue that neither the reflexivity nor the subjectivity of consciousness implies that there is any entity such as the self or ego over and above reflexive consciousness. Fourth, I will argue that what we normally think of as ‘the self’ is best understood as a complex, multi-layered process (aha?kāra, ‘I-making’) that emerges within the pre-egoic flow of subjective consciousness.     

From Buddha's speech to Buddha's essence: philosophical discussions of Buddha‐vacana in India and China1

This is a comparative study of the discourses on the nature of sacred language found in Indian Abhidharma texts and those written by 7th century Chinese Buddhist scholars who, unlike the Indian Buddhists, questioned ‘the essence of the Buddha’s teaching'. This issue labeled fo‐chiao t'i lun, the theory of ‘the essence of the Buddha’s teaching', was one of the topics on which Chinese Yogācāra scholars have shown a keen interest and served as the inspiration for extensive intellectual dialogues in their texts. It is in Hsüan‐tsang's massive and organized translation works, begun in 648, that various previous translations of the term buddhavacana from Indian Abhidharma texts were given the unified translation of fo‐chiao. (Fo‐chiao literally means “the Buddha's teachings,” and is the term used in the modern period for “Buddhism.”) By combining fo‐chiao with the term t'i, meaning ‘essence’ or ‘substance’ throughout his translations, Hsüan‐tsang attempted to define ‘the essence of the Buddha’s teaching'. In Indian Abhidharma texts, the nature of the Buddha's word was either ‘sound’ (?abdha), the oral component of speech, or ‘name’ (nāma), the component of language that conveys meaning, or some combination of the two. From the time of Hsüan‐tsang's translation, however, discourse on the nature of sacred language was no longer relegated to the category of language or of epistemological investigation, but became grounded in the Chinese discussion investigating the ‘essence’ or ‘substance’ of the Buddha's teaching, and even of ‘Buddhism’ itself. As such, it sought to transcend the distinction between language and meaning. This gradual but explicit process of inquiry into the nature of ‘the Buddha’s word' was a necessary antecedent to the transition to a ‘Chinese’ Buddhism.     

Vijñaptimātratā and the Abhidharma context of rarly Yogācāra

Contemporary accounts of early Mahāyāna Buddhist schools like the Madhyamaka and the Yogācāra tend to portray them as generally antithetical to the Abhidharma of non‐Mahāyāna schools such as the Theravāda and the Sarvāstivāda. This paper attempts to locate early Yogācāra philosophical speculation firmly within the broader context of Abhidharma debates. Certain key Yogācāra concepts such as ālayavijñāna, vijñapti‐mātratā and citta‐mātra are discussed insofar as they relate to pre‐existing concepts and issues found in the Vaibhāsika and Sautrāntika schools, with specific reference to the Abhidharmako?a and the corresponding bhāsya of Vasubandhu. Finally, some remarks are made about the, benefits of approaching the history of religious ideas without the benefits and distortions of hindsight, particularly as this relates to the attribution of an idealistic position to the early Yogācāra literature.     

The Significance of the Buddhist 10-Membered Formula of Dependent Origination

The dynamic process of karmic activity is one of the key philosophical concepts of the Buddhist doctrine, and is traditionally explained as the operation of a chain of 12 mutually interlinked members of dependent origination (pratītyasamutpāda). Textual research, however, reveals that a series of alternative chains of members of dependent origination coexisted prior to the systematization of this earlier textual material into the standardized list of 12 members. Such an alternative list consists of 10 members. This article examines the importance of this particular list of 10 members in the development of Yogācāra Buddhist philosophy. This philosophy, the basic interpretation of the mundane world of which is that the world around us only xists as the working of the human mind, i.e. the domain of perceptual consciousness (vijñāna), matured in the late fourth–early fifth century CE. This examination of the 10-fold formula of dependent origination also adds to our knowledge of the region of origin of Yogācāra philosophy, and thus on the geographical diversities within the development of Buddhist philosophy.     

The Buddhist Roots of Watsuji Tetsurô's Ethics of Emptiness

Watsuji Tetsurô (1889–1960) is famous for having constructed a systematic socio‐political ethics on the basis of the idea of emptiness. This essay examines his 1938 essay “The Concept of ‘Dharma’ and the Dialectics of Emptiness in Buddhist Philosophy” and the posthumously published The History of Buddhist Ethical Thought (based on lectures given in the 1920s), in order to clarify the Buddhist roots of his ethics. It aims to answer two main questions which are fundamentally linked: “Which way does Watsuji's legacy turn: toward totalitarianism or toward a balanced theory of selflessness?” and “Is Watsuji's systematic ethics Buddhist?” In order to answer these questions, this essay discusses Watsuji's view of dharma, dependent arising, and morality in Hīnayāna Buddhism. It then proceeds to Watsuji's fine‐tuning of the concept of emptiness in Mādhyamika and Yogācāra Buddhism. Finally, this essay shows how Watsuji's modernist Buddhist theory connects to his own systematic ethical theory. These two theories share a focus on non‐duality, negation, and emptiness. But they differ in their accounts of the relations between the individual and the community, between the “is” and the “ought,” and between hermeneutics and transcendence. These findings give us hints as to Watsuji's origins, pitfalls, and possibilities.     

Buddhist idealism and the problem of other minds

This essay is concerned with Indian Yogācāra philosophers’ treatment of the problem of other minds in the face of a threatened collapse into solipsism suggested by Vasubandhu’s epistemological argument for idealism. I discuss the attempts of Dharmakīrti and Ratnakīrti to address this issue, concluding that Dharmakīrti is best seen as addressing the epistemological problem of other minds and Ratnakīrti as addressing the conceptual problem of other minds.     

From Etymology to Ontology: Vasubandhu and Candrakīrti on Various Interpretations of Pratītyasamutpāda

The main body of this article presents Vasubandhu’s and Candrakīrti’s discussion on the etymology of pratītyasamutpāda and its meaning(s) as it appears in the Bhā?ya to Abhidharmako?a 3.28ab and Prasannapadā 4.5–9.27, respectively. Both authors put forward and critically examine various Buddhist grammatical analyses and interpretations of the term. Many passages in the indicated sections parallel or nearly parallel to each other suggest that Buddhist discussions on pratītyasamutpāda were held in a very specified manner during the mature phase of Buddhist philosophy in India. In the conclusion of the article, an attempt is made to discern the reason for Buddhists’ mutually competing analyses of the term, showing that their seemingly objectively conducted discussions (i.e. argumentations) regarding pratītyasamutpāda are actually rooted in their ontological (doxic) presumptions. Thus, for example, the nearly identical etymological analyses of the term (and of the meaning of the word-formation) provided by Vaibhā?ika and Candrakīrti resulted in a completely different understanding of the ‘doctrinal’ meaning (artha) of the term. This situation seems to corroborate certain views of some ancient Indian (Buddhist included) philosophers of language, according to whom there is no internal or ‘inborn’ connection between words or word-formation and their meanings, the latter being purely mental (and hence non-verbal) and dependent on the speaker’s intention (vivak?ā).     

Dynamic and Syncretic Dimensions to Śāntarakṣita's Presentation of the Two Truths

It is common for philosophers from the Madhyamaka school of Indian Buddhist thought to offer a presentation of the two truths, ultimate truth (paramārthasatya) and conventional truth (sa?v?tisatya), as a vehicle for presenting their views on the ontological status of entities. Though there is some degree of variance, generally ultimate truths are described as objects known by an awareness of knowing things as they are. Conventional truths are objects as conceived by a mistaken awareness, one that superimposes a mode of existence onto objects that is not actually there. These two truths are contrasted (one is accurate; one is not) and used as a vehicle for understanding the ontological status of phenomena and the means by which they are known. ?āntarak?ita (725–788 CE) was among the most important Madhyamaka thinkers in Indian Buddhist history, yet his presentation of the two truths has several features that signal its uniqueness. This paper will discuss two particular unique dimensions to ?āntarak?ita's views on the two truths: his integration of aspects of Cittamatra/Yogācāra thinking, including the rejection of external objects, into his presentation of conventional truths, and the dynamic way in which conventional truths are not merely presented as objects of a mistaken awareness, but rather as an important soteriological step in the process of realizing the ultimate. This syncretic and dynamic integration of Yogācāra thought, where its ideas are fully engaged and incorporated into an over-arching Madhyamaka philosophical system is a key component to the thought of one of the most important, influential, and innovative figures in the late period of Indian Madhyamaka, and one which has yet to be fully acknowledged in secondary literature.     

Mental Pain in the Mahābhārata

International Journal of Hindu Studies - A number of passages in the Mahābhārata draw the distinction between bodily pain (?ārīra? du?kham) and mental pain...     

Is Adhikāra good enough for ‘rights'?

The paper considers the question of whether ‘rights’ as we have it in modern Western thinking has an equivalence within the Indian framework of Dharma. Under Part I we look at purusārthas to see if the desired human goals imply rights by examining the tension between aspired ‘values’ and the ‘ought’ of duty. Next, a potential cognate in the term ’adhikāra’ is investigated via the derivation of a refined signification of ‘entitlements’, especially in the exegetical hermeneutics of the Mimāmsā. Finally, adhikāra's re‐emergence in the Bhagavadgitā is considered. We suggest that while the boundary is significantly extended, the Gitā too appears to be circumspect in opening up the discourse in the more abstract and absolute sense which the term ‘rights’ nowadays enjoys.     

WORLDLY AND UNWORLDLY FEELINGS,FABRICATION AND LETTING GO

ABSTRACT

This paper proposes a framework for understanding vedanā and emotion in relation to each other, and both of them in relation to awakening. The vedanā (or feeling tone) that arises in mental experience will be shown to be central to emotion. Western views of emotion will be examined alongside some of the Buddha’s teachings on vedanā. The paper will show mental vedanā, and human emotion in the context of the two psychological orientations of ‘fabrication’ and ‘letting go’, which are then correlated with the Buddha’s notions of ‘worldly’ and ‘unworldly’ feelings. The paper proposes that such contextualisation is useful towards the development of a clear intellectual understanding of the nature of feelings, while (more importantly) it could support practitioners in a process of meditative inquiry and transformation.     

The early Yogācāra theory of no-self

ABSTRACT

I reconstruct early Yogācāra theory of no-self based on works by Asa?ga and Vasubandhu. I introduce the idea of the cognitive schema (CS) of the self, a conception borrowed from the developmental psychologist, Jean Piaget. A fundamental CS is a psychological function that guides the formation of perceptions. I propose that Manas can be understood in terms of being the CS of the self, a psychological mechanism from which perceptions of external objects are formed. In addition, I argue that non-imaginative wisdom can be regarded as an experience during which the CS of the self does not function, such that one only possesses pure sensations without perceptions of external objects. After the repeated experience of non-imaginative wisdom, the CS of the self is changed to the purified CS of no-self. It still supports interactions with the external world, but in a way that does not allow the four afflictions (self-delusion, self-belief, self-conceit, and self-love) to arise.

Abbreviations: MS: Mahāyānasa?graha; TS: Tri??ikā-kārikā; TSN: Trisvabhāvanirde?a; VVS: Vi??atikā Vijñaptimātratāsiddhi     

Unconscious phantasy: Some historical and conceptual dimensions

This paper seeks firstly to grasp both conceptually and historically the different phenomenologies that are captured by the term ‘Unconscious Phantasy’. The term is shown to refer to a number of distinct though overlapping conceptual domains. These include: phantasy as scene, phantasy as representation of drive, phantasy as representation of wish as its fulfilment, phantasy as split off activity of the mind functioning under the aegis of the pleasure principle; phantasy as representation of the minds own activities (which Wollheim calls’ the way “the mind represents its own activities to itself’’). Lastly unconscious phantasy is understood as being the basic foundation of all mental life, including drives, impulses, all anxiety situations and defences. Having mapped out this territory through following the development of the concept in the work of Freud and Klein, the author draws on the work of the philosopher Richard Wollheim who, the author contends, has made a fundamental contribution to our conceptual understanding of unconscious phantasy. In the last section of the paper, the author draws a distinction between what he terms ‘objects’ (namely psychic objects) and what he terms ‘facts’. It is suggested that this distinction, though implicit in much of our work, benefits from being made explicit and that in so doing an important dimension of analytic work is illuminated. We aim to help the patient to discover what he is like, to understand the ways in which he conceives and misconceives himself, to unravel the fact‐ness of himself and his world from its ‘object qualities’, to differentiate between unconscious phantasy and reality.     

Buddhist Meditation and the British Colonial Gaze in Nineteenth-Century Sri Lanka

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that the multiple orientalist expressions that flowed from British pens in nineteenth century Sri Lanka are of use to the scholar of Buddhism, in that they can not only shed light on the growth of Buddhist modernism and the use of the term ‘meditation’ within it, but also on Sri Lankan Buddhist practice on the ground. It first surveys the preconceptions of the British about the concept of ‘meditation’. It then examines the writings of a representative selection of scholar civil servants and Christian missionaries who were resident in Sri Lanka within the century. This data reveal that a vibrant culture of Buddhist devotion and preaching existed throughout the century, together, among the laity, with the practice of ‘meditation’ on objects related to insight into reality. Additionally, it suggests that the jhānas, although hard for westerners to understand, were an important part of Buddhist self-understanding. The paper, therefore, argues that the priority given to vipassanā as the essence of meditation within Buddhist Modernism is a reduction of the diversity within traditional practice and a distortion of the traditionally recognised interrelationship between the jhānas and other forms of mental culture.     

Bad gifts,community standards,and the disciplining of Theravāda monks

ABSTRACT

The act of giving is among the most fundamental acts within the Buddhist world, particularly in the Theravāda communities of Southeast Asia. In many of these communities, lay followers give food and other dāna (merit-making gifts), providing monastics with the ‘requisites’ that they need to survive. Yet there is relatively little discussion within Buddhist or scholarly communities about what should be given, with formulaic lists representing the majority of discussions about these gifts. However, sometimes, the gifts given to monastics are not always appropriate, even bad. What to do in those cases is not always clear. In this article, I explore the ways in which monks in Thailand and Southwest China think about gifts that are not good. What becomes clear is that, despite the prevailing view that discipline is a universal process based on the vinaya (disciplinary code of Buddhism), monks have different views about what constitutes a ‘bad gift’ and what to do about it. I argue that paying attention to bad gifts allows us to see that lay communities have significant voice—although this is often implicit rather than explicit—about what constitutes ‘proper’ monastic behavior.     

Buddhist Conceptual Rhyming and T.S.Eliot's Crisis of Connection in TheWaste Land and ‘Burnt Norton’

In this essay, I elaborate a reading of the Buddhist allusions throughout T.S. Eliot's poetry as being not confessions of Buddhist faith or merely syncretic experiments, but rather ‘conceptual rhymes’ with the crisis of personal connection that preoccupies Eliot across multiple texts. In the Buddhist concepts of pratītya-samutpāda, ?ūnyatā, sa?sāra, and the pretas, Eliot finds thematic resonances with his own emotional and psychological concerns and so alludes to these concepts in ‘The Fire Sermon’ section of The Waste Land and ‘Burnt Norton’ of Four Quartets as part of his characteristic poetic collage. By examining the connection between Eliot's personal poetic practice and the cross-cultural traditions upon which he drew, my argument intervenes in a long-standing debate regarding the meaning of Asian religio-philosophical influences in the poet's key texts. Moreover, by close reading the third movement of ‘Burnt Norton’ for Buddhist allusions, I attempt to refocus scrutiny of Buddhism in Eliot from the oft-discussed ‘Fire Sermon’ section of The Waste Land to Eliot's later Four Quartets, which remains under-examined for its Buddhist influences by scholars who instead attend to the latter text's more pronounced Vedic references.     

Buddhism: Mistranslations,misconceptions and neglected territory

Ajaan Sujin, a prominent Thai lay teacher of Theravada Buddhism, interprets abhidhammic theory in a manner that, in my view, approaches the teachings of Emptiness as presented in the Prajñā-pāramitā-sūtras and in the Madhyamaka-kārikā. This paper presents an overview of Ajaan Sujin's teachings and compares them with Emptiness as expressed in the Diamond Sūtra, the Heart Sūtra, and the Madhyamaka-kārikā, as well as from a few well-known secondary sources. Core distinctions between the two theories do remain, primarily that for Ajaan Sujin dhammas do have characteristics and nibbāna is distinct from samsāra; thus I have termed Ajaan Sujin's teachings ‘Theravada Emptiness’. While it may seem that these distinctions are too great to overcome in bridging the gap between abhidhammic theory and Emptiness, a direct comparison between the wording of certain sections and the overall correspondence of vocabulary, practice, and other conceptions, serves to narrow the divide created by these distinctions.     

A Gricean Interpretation of Nāgārjuna’s Catuṣkoṭi and the No-Thesis View

Nāgārjuna (c. 150–250 CE), the famous founder of the Madhyamika School, proposed the positive catu?ko?i in his seminal work, Mūlamadhyamakakārikā: ‘All is real, or all is unreal, all is both real and unreal, all is neither unreal nor real; this is the graded teaching of the Buddha’. He also proposed the negative catu?ko?i: ‘“It is empty” is not to be said, nor “It is non-empty,” nor that it is both, nor that it is neither; [“empty”] is said only for the sake of instruction’ and the no-thesis view: ‘No dharma whatsoever was ever taught by the Buddha to anyone’. In this essay, I adopt Gricean pragmatics to explain the positive and negative catu?ko?i and the no-thesis view proposed by Nāgārjuna in a way that does not violate classical logic. For Nāgārjuna, all statements are false as long as the hearer understands them within a reified conceptual scheme, according to which (a) substance is a basic categorical concept; (b) substances have svabhāva, and (c) names and sentences have svabhāva.