Indian Madhyamaka Buddhist philosophy after Nagarjuna. Plain English translations and summaries of the essential works of Chandrakirti and Shantideva and two early Madhyamaka critiques of God

227 Pages·2012·0.87 MB·English

by  Richard H. Jones (Translator)

INDIAN MADHYAMAKA
BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY AFTER
NAGARJUNA Volume 2
__________
Plain English Translations of the Essential Works of
Chandrakirti and Shantideva and Two Early
Madhyamaka Critiques of God
__________
Translated with Notes and Commentaries by Richard
H. Jones
Jackson Square Books New York 2012
Printed and distributed by www.createspace.com
Printed in the United States of America
Copyright © 2012 Richard H. Jones
All Rights Reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Indian Madhyamaka Buddhism after Nagarjuna, volume 2 / translations with
notes and commentaries by Richard H. Jones
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-147-007-6382
ISBN-10: 147-007-6381
1. M~~
Contents
Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iv
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v
I. Translations
Chandrakirti . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Entering the Middle Way (Madhyamaka-avatara) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
The Clearly-worded Commentary (Prasannda-pada) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Shantideva . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Entering the Bodhisattva’s Path (Bodhicharya-avatara) . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Collection of the Teachings(Shiksa-samucchaya) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Two Early Madhyamaka Critiques of the Existence of God . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Nagarjuna (?), The Refutation of Vishnu as the One Creator . . . . . . . 166
Bhavaviveka, Verses on the Heart of the Middle Way 3.215-23, 3.247-250, 9.89-
113 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
II. Commentaries
Chandrakirti’s Innovations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Shantideva and the Factual Grounding of Morality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
The Madhyamaka Critiques of the Existence of God . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
References and Other Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
209 iii
Abbreviations
BC — Shantideva’s Entering the Bodhisattva’s Path (Bodhicarya-avatara) CS
— Aryadeva’s The Four Hundred Verses
( Catuh-shataka-shastra-karikanama)
HVNP — Aryadeva’s Hand Treatise (Hasta-vala-nama-prakarana) MA —
Chandrakirti’s Entry the Middle Way (Madhyamaka -avatara) MAS —
Bhavaviveka’s Summary of the Meaning of the Middle Way
(Madhyamaka-artha-samgraha)
MHK — Bhavaviveka’s Verses on the Heart of the Middle Way (Madhyamaka-
hridaya-karikas)
MK — Nagarjuna’s Fundamental Verses of the Middle Way (Mula-
madhyamaka-karikas)
MKV — Buddhapalita’s Commentary on Nagarjuna’s Fundamental Verses on
the Middle Way (Mula-Madhyamaka-karika-vritti)
Pr — Chandrakirti’s Clearly-Worded Commentary (Prasanna-pada)
R — Nagarjuna’s Jewel Garland of Advice (Ratnavali)
Sk — Shantideva’s Collection of the Teachings (Shiksa-samucchaya)
SS — Aryadeva’s One Hundred Verses (Shataka-shastra)
SSK — Nagarjuna’s Seventy Verses on Emptiness
(Shunyata-saptati-karikas)
VP — Nagarjuna’s Pulverizing the Categories (Vaidalya-prakarana)
VV — Nagarjuna’s Overturning the Objections (Vigraha-vyavartanti)
YS — Nagarjuna’s Sixty Verses on Argument (Yukti-shashtikas)
iv
Preface
This volume completes the presentation of selected texts of the Buddhist
Madhyamaka tradition in India. (This book presumes that the reader is familiar
with Volume 1 [Jones 2011] and Nagarjuna: Buddhism’s Most Important
Philosopher [Jones 2010].) It picks up the history two centuries after the last
works of the first volume, those of Bhavaviveka. Apparently, very little survives
from the period between then and the first author presented here, Chandrakirti.
There are other Madhyamaka texts in Sanskrit that survive from a later period,
but this ends the most creative period of Indian Madhyamaka thought.
Chandrakirti and Shantideva were “the last two major representatives of the
authentic Madhyamika doctrine” (Ricci 1988: 6).
This also was the end of any “pure” Madhyamaka schools in India. In the
generation after Shantideva, hybrids of Madhyamaka and the more prominent
Yogachara tradition developed, beginning with Shantarakshita and Kamalashila.
(See Eckel 1987 and Blumenthal 2004 for studies of two later Madhyamikas,
Jnangarbha and Shantarakshita.) The Yogachara tradition, also known as the
Chitta-matra (“nothing but mind”) and Vijnana-vada (“the doctrine of
consciousness”), took external objects to have no reality — for them,
extramental “objects” are merely projections of the mind, while the
Madhyamikas gave such objects conventional reality and characteristics. Some
later Madhyamikas adopted the Yogachara idea of an underlying
“storehouseconsciousness (alaya-vijnana)” to explain personal continuity. Like
“Prasangika” and “Svatantraka,” there was no Sanskrit labels for the resulting
hybrid Yogachara-Madhyamaka schools; all the labels were later Tibetan
inventions. Moreover, among the Indian Mahayanists, the divisions were fluid
and did not represent “schisms” as with the major divisions within Christianity.
Nagarjuna and the Madhyamaka tradition as a whole did not have the influence
in Indian Buddhism that it had in Tibet and East Asia, let alone the prominence it
is given in the West today, and so it is not surprising that in India the tradition
was absorbed by the dominant Yogachara tradition. Basically, “aside from a few
commentators on N~g~rjuna’s works, who identified themselves as
M~dhyamikas, Indian intellectual life continued almost
v vi Indian Madhyamaka Buddhist Philosophy After Nagarjuna
as if N grjuna had never existed” (Hayes 1994: 299). Other schools gave their
own definition to “emptiness (shunyata)” and described themselves as the
“middle way” between total nonexistence and eternal, permanent realities. Those
who noted the Madhyamikas at all only did so to reject them. Chandrakirti was
virtually totally ignored until many centuries after his death (Vose 2009: 18-20)
and only one Indian commentary on his work is known.
As with the earlier books, the translations from Sanskrit here are attempts to
make the works understandable to those within the general public who are
interested in philosophy. The basic texts, unlike the commentaries, were pithy
because they were designed to be chanted and memorized. (Chandrakirti’s
Entering the Middle Way and Shantideva’s Entering the Bodhisattva’s Path are
still chanted and memorized today.) Sometimes there is no verb in a Sanskrit line
but only nouns and ancillary words. In many lines, a pronoun is used to refer to a
word in a previous verse or to something that the listeners have been told but
that the translator must now supply — sometimes even a pronoun is omitted.
Words thus have often been added in English to fill out the terse verses —
including sometimes a subject or verb. Material has also been added in
parentheses to indicate my interpretation of what the text means or to offer
explanations. The texts were never meant to be understood independently of a
teacher or a tradition’s commentary — it was understood that there would be a
teacher there explaining the lines more fully. That the listeners would share a
common philosophical background and thus already know the meaning of many
of the technical terms also made it less necessary for the authors to expand their
thoughts.
Also as with the earlier books, the basic works have been reformatted here from
a series of verses into sentences and paragraphs grouped as the subject-matter
dictates. The grammar and syntax (e.g., changing a passive voice to active) has
also been changed when it helps clarify the meaning. Attempts to modernize the
works — e.g., translating a word that means “unreasonable” or “unacceptable”
as “illogical” or “logically contradictory” or “logically impossible” — have been
resisted because of the danger that they distort the original works and mislead
the modern reader. (One concession has been to change the experiential flavor of
verbs denoting “x is not found’ or “x is not seen” to the ontological claim “x does
not exist”or “there is no x.”) Certainly, overtly reading Western philosophy and
contemporary science into premodern Indian texts has been avoided.
*
I. Translations Chandrakirti
(fl. 600-650)
Chandrakirti probably came from South India. He supposedly used miracles to
convert others to the doctrine of emptiness (e.g., supplying the community of
monks with milk by milking a picture of a cow and passing his hand through a
pillar to show its lack of selfexistence). He ended up abbot of the great Buddhist
monastic university at Nalanda located near Rajgir in Bihar in northeast India.
There he clashed with the Sanskrit grammarian Chandragomin. But he became
the most prominent Madhyamika after Nagarjuna on philosophical matters —
indeed, the modern scholarly understanding of Nagarjuna is tightly shaped by
the understanding of Chandrakirti.
The first text presented here is Chapter 6 of his Entering the Middle Way. The
text is still used today in Tibetan monasteriesas the basic introduction to the
Madhyamaka school. He wrote it before the Clearly-worded Commentary. It is
composed in the same tense style that most of these texts were. It assumes
background knowledge and requires commentary; in fact, he wrote a
commentary to it after composing the Clearly-worded Commentary whose
contents suggests that he did not change his positions in the interim. The text is
no longer extant in Sanskrit, but the Sanskrit for this chapter has been
reconstructed from the Tibetan (Sastri 1929-32); this means that the new
Sanskrit may reflect a particular Tibetan understanding of the text.
The second text is his Clearly-worded Commentary on Nagarjuna’s
Fundamental Verses of the Middle Way (MK). (Verses from the MK are
indented and in italics; they are sometimes translated differently than in Jones
2010 to reflect Chandrakirti’s understanding of the text.) The entire text would
be over 600 pages in translation, but the basics of his teachings can be presented
with selections. The first selection — his commentary on MK 1 — in fact is
itself a summary of his teachings. (Some long quotations from other texts have
been omitted or abbreviated.) Also included are his commentaries on chapters
15, 24, part of 18, and 25. New topic headings have been added.
*
Entering the Middle Way (Madhyamaka-avatara)
Chapter 6
[1] On the stage of their path called “Directly Facing the Realm of Truth,”
bodhisattvas abide with a concentrated mind. They proceed toward the qualities
of a perfect buddha and perceive the nature of dependentarising. They dwell in
wisdom and thereby attain the cessation of rebirths. [2] A single person with
sight can easily lead a group of blind people to their desired destination, and so it
is with wisdom here: it takes the sightless virtues and guides them to victory. [3]
The noble Nagarjuna grasped the profound nature of things through reasoning as
well as through scriptural authority, and the approach to be advanced here is
inaccord with his way.
[4] When some ordinary persons merely hear about emptiness, great joy wells up
again and again. Their eyes fill with tears of joy, and the hair on their body stand
on end. [5] They have the seed of a perfect buddha and are receptive students for
the teaching of the true nature of reality. It is to them that reality from the
ultimate point of view should be taught since thereby they will receive the
qualities necessary for enlightenment. [6] They always embrace the code of
proper conduct, give generously, practice compassion, and cultivate patience.
They apply the merit of these practices toward their awakening for the liberation
of all living creatures. [7] They venerate the perfect bodhisattvas. Those people
who are expert inthis profound and vast way will, step by step, attain the stage
called “the Great Joy.” Those alone who yearn for this stage should listen to this
path.
The NonArising of Phenomena from Themselves or Others
[8] No entity arises from itself, but how can it arise from another? It does not
arise from both itself and another, but how can it arise without a cause? It would
be entirely pointless for an entity to arise from itself (since it must already exist
to arise). In addition, it is inadmissible to suggest that something that is already
arisen could be arise all over again. [9] If you think that what is already arisen
gives rise to further arisings, then either the production of, for example, a sprout
from a seed cannot occur in everyday experience (because the effect already
exists), or else its seed would produce sprouts again and again until the end of all
existence — for how could all these sprouts ever do away with the seed?