Table Of Contenti
Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy
of Mind and Nature
ii
iii
Tibetan Buddhist
Philosophy
of Mind
and Nature
DOUGLAS S. DUCKWORTH
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1
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Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Duckworth, Douglas S., 1971– author.
Title: Tibetan Buddhist philosophy of mind and nature / by Douglas S. Duckworth.
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2019] |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018010436 | ISBN 9780190883959 (hardcover : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9780190883973 (epub) | ISBN 9780190883980 (online resource)
Subjects: LCSH: Buddhist philosophy. | Buddhism—China—Tibet Autonomous
Region—Doctrines. | Madhyamika (Buddhism)
Classification: LCC B162.D83 2019 | DDC 181/.043923—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018010436
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America
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For my dear mother and mothers everywhere
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Acknowledgments
Those who have contributed to this book are too numerous to enu-
merate. Yet I would like to acknowledge some of them here. A big thanks
goes to the late Aku Rapkyé, Chökyi Nyima Rinpoché, Drupön Thinley
Ningpo, Jeffrey Hopkins, Khenpo Sherap Dorjé, Khenpo Tsültrim Dargyé,
Thrangu Rinpoché, and Tulku Nyima Gyeltsen for teaching me about topics
in this book and more. Also, feedback on drafts of this book were invalu-
able, including the input of Marcus Bingenheimer, José Cabezón, George
Cardona, David Carpenter, Ryan Conlon, Catherine Dalton, Thomas
Doctor, Georges Dreyfus, Jay Garfield, Jeffrey Hopkins, Gerd Klintschar,
Karin Meyers, Gail Stenstad, Rolf Truhitte, and Philippe Turenne. I wish
to thank them all. Paul Hackett’s Buddhist Canon’s Research Database
has also been a wonderful resource for my work. Elizabeth Callahan and
Marcus Perman also assisted me in locating Tibetan texts. Research for
this book was enabled by a Humanities and Arts Research Program Grant,
as well as a College of Liberal Arts Research Award, both from Temple
University.
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1
Introduction
This book is a thematic survey of Tibetan Buddhist thought. It provides
a theoretic framework to introduce a wide range of intersecting ideas.
With many informed studies and translations of Tibetan traditions now
available in English, I feel that the time is right to survey the intellectual
terrain of Tibetan Buddhist thought with a wide- angle lens. What follows
is my attempt to provide this lens and to map the terrain both descriptively
and creatively. I do not base my framework around particular schools or
sectarian traditions, but attempt to focus on issues and themes that struc-
ture the philosophical conversations within and among the schools. While
doing so, I draw freely from European and American philosophical tradi-
tions to engage with and elaborate upon Buddhist thought and practice in
Tibet. A central theme of Tibetan philosophy I draw out is the intertwining
of mind, language, and world.
Understanding Buddhism in India is fundamental to understanding
Buddhism in Tibet. Tibetan Buddhists played an essential role in
preserving Indian Buddhist culture, not only by carrying on the traditions
of study and practice from India into the present, long after their demise
in India, but also by preserving Indian Buddhist texts in translation. Most
Buddhist texts of the mature era of Indian Buddhist literature (fifth to elev-
enth centuries) are no longer extant in any language other than in Tibetan
translation. Buddhist texts and traditions entered the Tibetan plateau from
India from the eighth to eleventh centuries, just before living Buddhist tra-
ditions died out on the Indian subcontinent under the weight of Muslim
incursions. After the eleventh century, Buddhist monastic institutions in
India were left in rubbles, and Buddhist popular traditions came to be as-
similated into Hindu traditions.
Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy of Mind and Nature. Douglas S. Duckworth, Oxford University Press
(2019). © Douglas S. Duckworth. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190883959.003.0001
2
2 TibeTan buddhisT PhilosoPhy of Mind and naTure
Given the importance of the Indian subcontinent for Tibetan
Buddhism, I begin with a fair amount of discussion of Indian sources. The
first chapter begins by looking to Nāgārjuna, an influential second- century
Indian Buddhist thinker, and his articulation of emptiness and interrela-
tion. Emptiness is the ultimate truth in Mahāyāna Buddhism: the truth
which, when known, sets you free. I highlight how the ultimate truth in
Mahāyāna Buddhism comes to be interpreted along two main lines: as in-
dicative of an inconceivable reality or as an absence of intrinsic nature. The
former interpretation characterizes what comes to be known as “Mind-
Only” in Tibet (or Yogācāra), while the latter characterizes Madhyamaka,
“the Middle Way.” These two traditions represent competing interpret-
ations of the ultimate truth and the Perfection of Wisdom (prajñāpāramitā)
Sūtras. Further, Tibetans hold Mind-O nly and Madhyamaka to represent
two main schools of interpretation elucidated within the two “great chariot
traditions” (shing rta chen po) of Mahāyāna Buddhism. While Tibetans
use these terms to characterize distinct strands of interpretation of the
meaning of the Buddha’s message, we should keep in mind that these
terms do not refer to individual schools or bounded canons of texts.
Also, what Tibetans refer to by the terms “Middle Way” and “Mind-
Only” can be quite different, with usages that are highly charged within
specific contexts of sectarian traditions and preferred interpretations of
one’s own school. In order to dislodge these terms from a single tradition’s
interpretive claims, for the purposes of this book I will use them differ-
ently. In my usage, “Mind-O nly” highlights a particular phenomenolog-
ical style of interpretation and orientation to contemplative practice. I use
Madhyamaka, “the Middle Way,” to highlight a critical orientation and
deconstructive ontology. These terms, and the “schools” associated with
them, are highly contested and polysemic, yet I appropriate them as a heu-
ristic and to convey an intimate relationship between two intertwined tra-
jectories of interpretation. I feel that the problems I create by continuing
to use these terms, with the distinctive meanings I have assigned them,
are less severe than the problems of avoiding them altogether or narrowly
constraining them to definitions tied into a single sectarian tradition’s
interpretation.
With the interplay of these two trajectories I attempt to sustain a ten-
sion between two contrasting readings of Buddhist thought, as both are
viable and widely attested interpretations of Mahāyāna Buddhist litera-
ture and practice. One reading is commonly found in the works of aca-
demic philosophers attuned to ontological analyses and the Madhyamaka
