Presenting a Controversial Doctrine in a Conciliatory Way: Mkhan chen Gang shar dbang po's (1925–1958-59?) Inclusion of Gzhan stong ("Emptiness of Other") within Prāsaṅgika
From Buddha-Nature
Presenting a Controversial Doctrine in a Conciliatory Way: Mkhan chen Gang shar dbang po's (1925–1958-59?) Inclusion of Gzhan stong ("Emptiness of Other") within Prāsaṅgika
Article
Article
| Citation: | Mathes, Klaus-Dieter. "Presenting a Controversial Doctrine in a Conciliatory Way: Mkhan chen Gang shar dbang po's (1925–1958/59?) Inclusion of Gzhan stong ("Emptiness of Other") within Prāsaṅgika." Journal of Buddhist Philosophy 2, no. 1 (2016): 114–31. |
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Abstract
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
Positive descriptions of the ultimate, which are based on direct access to the luminous nature of one’s mind, as taught in the various traditions of Mahāmudrā or Great Perfection, look back upon a long history. Such systems found doctrinal support in the teachings of the third turning of the wheel of the dharma (dharmacakra), which is not only based on the doctrine of emptiness, but also distinguishes between the imputed and the real (i.e., phenomena and their true nature, or adventitious stains and buddha-nature).[1] Some took this third dharmacakra as a teaching of definitive meaning and went so far as to stress the need to define its distinction between the imputed and the real in terms of two modes of emptiness: being "empty of an own-being" (rang stong) and being "empty of other" (gzhan stong). The most prominent proponent of gzhan stong, Dol po pa Shes rab rgyal mtshan (1292-1561), takes relative truth as being empty of a true own-being, but the ultimate as not being empty of such an own-being.[2] In terms of the theory of three natures, Dol po pa equates this ultimate with the perfect nature. It alone is gzhan stong, that is, empty of the imagined and dependent natures.[3] Such an interpretation mainly follows the Extensive Commentary (Bṛhaṭṭīkā)[4] on the Discourses of the Perfection of Wisdom (while also drawing support from the teaching of a buddha-nature, if one equates the latter with the perfect nature and the adventitious stains with the imagined and dependent natures) and requires one to reinterpret the traditional Yogācāra formula according to which the perfect is the dependent empty of the imagined. In the final analysis, the Jo nang pas go so far as to restrict the perfect to its unchangeable nature, with the perfect in terms of its unmistaken aspect (i.e., as nonconceptual wisdom) being taken as the "pure dependent."[5] The basis of emptiness thus is the ultimate or the unchangeable aspect of the perfect nature, everything dependent being part of the negandum which includes the entire relative truth. It should be noted that the Jo nang pa variety of gzhan stong is based on a particular understanding of the relation between the two truths, which requires a clear-cut distinction between an existing transcendent ultimate and a relative that does not exist in this fundamental state.[6]
Notes
- According to Discourse Revealing the True Intention (Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra) VII.30, the Buddha taught the Four Noble Truths in the first dharmacakra. Both the second and the third dharmacakras he taught beginning with the lack of an own-being in phenomena, and going on to the fact that these latter neither arise nor pass out of existence, that they are quiescent from the beginning, and that they are naturally in a state of nirvāṇa—in other words, emptiness as taught in the Discourses on the Perfection of Wisdom (Prajñāpāramitāsūtras) and the analytical Madhyamaka works of Nāgārjuna. The third dharmacakra stands out, though, for the fine distinctions it offers, and for this reason alone it has—contrary to the first two—definitive meaning (nitārtha), and so outshines the second dharmacakra by an uncountable factor (SNS, 85; and Powers, Wisdom of the Buddha; The Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra, 138-41).
- Dol po pa: Bden gnyis gsal ba’i nyi ma, 41–3: "Any object of consciousness, that which is, from its own side, empty of a true own-being, this is the defining characteristic of relative truth. . . . Any object of the genuine wisdom of the noble ones, that which is, from its own side, not empty of its respective own-being, this is the defining characteristic of the ultimate." (rnam shes kyi yul gang zhig / gshis la rang gi ngo bo bden pas stong pa ni / kun rdzob bden pa'i mtshan nyid . . . ’phags pa’i ye shes dam pa’i yul gang zhig / gzhis la rang rang gi ngo bo bden pas mi stong pa ni / don dam pa’i mtshan nyid de /). See Mathes, "Vordergründige und höchste Wahrheit im gZan stoṅ-Madhyamaka," 459.
- Dol po pa: Jo nang ri chos nges don rgya mtsho, 1504–6: "Since it has been said that the dharmatā [or] perfect [nature], which is empty of the imagined and dependent [natures], ultimately exists, the ultimate is well established as being gzhan stong alone." (kun btags dang gzhan dbang gis stongpa’i chos nyid yongs grub don dam du yod par gsungs pa’i phyir don dam gzhan stong nyid du legs par grub po /).
- Derge Bstan ’gyur 3808, fol. 287a4–5: "The imagined nature [of phenomena] is that aspect [of them that leads to] form and the other [modes of] phenomena being called "form" and so forth. The dependent nature is that aspect [of them which], under the sway of ignorance and so forth, appears to consciousness as phenomena in a mistaken way. [Their] ultimate—perfect—nature is that ineffable aspect beyond characteristic signs, which is free from the [said] aspects of names and mistaken appearances." (de la gzugs la sogs pa chos rnams la gzugs zhes bya ba la sogs par mngon par brjod pa’i rnam pa gang yin pa de ni kun brtags pa’i ngo bo nyid do / ma rig pa la sogs pa’i dbang gis rnam par shes pa la chos rnams su phyin ci log tu snang ba’i mam pa gang yin pa de ni gzhan dbang gi ngo bo nyid do / gang ming dang /phyin ci log tu snang ba’i rnam pa de dang bred ba brjod du med pa / mtshan ma med pa’i rnam pa gang yin pa de ni don dam pa yongs su grub pa’i ngo bo nyid de /). See also my first discussion of this passage in Mathes, "Tāranātha's 'Twenty-One Differences with Regard to the Profound Meaning'—Comparing the Views of the Two gŹan stoṅ Masters Dol po pa and Śākya mchog Idan," 317.
- Mathes, "Tāranātha's Presentation of trisvabhāva in the gŹan stoṅ sñiṅ po," 218-20.
- Mathes, A Direct Path to the Buddha Within: Go Lotsāwa's Mahāmudrā Interpretation of the Ratnagotravibhāga, 79-80.
