Dorji Wangchuk: Rongzompa and His Position on Buddha-Nature

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Sources Mentioned

Text
Maitreya, Asaṅga: Ratnagotravibhāga Mahāyānottaratantraśāstra
The Ratnagotravibhāga, commonly known as the Uttaratantra, or Gyu Lama in Tibetan, is one of the main Indian scriptural sources for buddha-nature theory. It was likely composed during the fifth century, by whom we do not know. Comprised of verses interspersed with prose commentary, it systematizes the buddha-nature teachings that were circulating in multiple sūtras such as the Tathāgatagarbhasūtra, the Mahāparinirvāṇasūtra, and the Śrīmaladevisūtra. The Tibetan tradition attributes the verses to the Bodhisattva Maitreya and the commentary to Asaṅga, and treats the two as separate texts, although this division is not attested to in surviving Indian versions. The Chinese tradition attributes the text to *Sāramati (娑囉末底), but the translation itself does not include the name of the author, and the matter remains unsettled. It was translated into Chinese in the early sixth century by Ratnamati and first translated into Tibetan by Atiśa, although this text is not known to survive. Ngok Loden Sherab translated it a second time based on teachings from the Kashmiri Pandita Sajjana, and theirs remains the standard translation. It has been translated into English several times, and recently into French. See the Ratnagotravibhāgavyākhyā, read more about the Ratnagotravibhāga, or take a look at the most complete English translation in When the Clouds Part by Karl Brunnholzl.

Secondary Publications Mentioned

Article
Rong-zom-pa’s Ontological Abyss
With an intention to contribute a little to gaining a fuller and more accurate picture of the intellectual agenda and philosophical edifice of Rong-zom Chos-kyi-bzang-po (henceforth: Rong-zom-pa), an eleventh-century Tibetan scholar, I wish to address in this article merely one question, namely, how Rong-zom-pa interprets what we shall call the positivistic ontology of the Tathāgatagarbha school'"`UNIQ--ref-00003CC4-QINU`"' while he himself undoubtedly proposes a radically negativistic ontology of a Madhyamaka sub-school called Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda. To be sure, the word ontology is used here in the sense of the philosophical theory about the true or ultimate reality of phenomena (according to any given Buddhist system).'"`UNIQ--ref-00003CC5-QINU`"' In particular, the idea that the "root-less-ness" of the mind (or, the rootless mind) is the "root" of all phenomena, or ideas similar to it, is explicit in a number of textual sources that are de-facto considered the literature of the Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda by Rong-zom-pa.'"`UNIQ--ref-00003CC6-QINU`"' (Wangchuk, prologue, 87–89)
Wangchuk, Dorji. "Rong-zom-pa’s Ontological Abyss: Where the Positivistic Ontology of the Tathāgatagarbha School and the Negativistic Ontology of the Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda School Meet." Critical Review for Buddhist Studies 21 (2017): 85–107.

People Mentioned

Rongzom Chökyi Zangpo
1042 ~ 1136
Dölpopa Sherab Gyaltsen
1292 ~ 1361

About the video

Featuring Dorji Wangchuk, Karma Phuntsho
Creator Tsadra Foundation
Director Perman, M.
Producer Tsadra Foundation
Event Buddha by Nature or Buddha by Nurture: Deliberations on the Buddha-Nature Theory in the Nyingma Tradition by Dorji Wangchuk: Conversations on Buddha-Nature (31 July 2021)
Related Website Buddha-Nature
Creation Date 31 July 2021
Citation Wangchuk, Dorji. "Rongzompa and His Position on Buddha-Nature." Conversations on Buddha-Nature with Lopen Dr. Karma Phuntsho. Produced by the Tsadra Foundation Research Department, July 31, 2021. Video, 10:03. https://youtu.be/yj6k07_8gIU.

An important sūtra source for the Ratnagotravibhāga, particularly for its discussion of the nine examples that illustrate how all sentient beings possess buddha-nature.

"This sūtra became an important scriptural source for the discussion of buddha-nature in China and is famous for associating the term buddhadhātu with tathāgatagarbha.

Bodhisattva - A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to Buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have Bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses. Skt. बोधिसत्त्व Tib. བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའ། Ch. 菩薩

byams chos sde lnga - This refers to a series of five texts that, according to the Tibetan tradition, Asaṅga received directly from Maitreya in the pure realm of Tuṣita. Tib. བྱམས་ཆོས་སྡེ་ལྔ་

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