Question?

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

> >

> > This is a sharp contrast between advaita and madhyamaka buddhism. For
> > nAgArjuna, who is also a non-dualist in some sense, no view is right,
> > because every view entails an absolutist position, which is an extreme
> > to be avoided by the Buddhist middle path.
>

> That's not completely correct. Nagarjuna rejects ALL views, even an absolutist
> view. It's not as if that's an "extremist" viewpoint. Nagarjuna does not
> reject any view simply saying,"That's an extremist view and Buddha said

> extremism is to be avoided". Rather, he rejects views because they are

> "not evident" (na vidyate). Nagarjuna would never entertain the advaitic
 notion

> of avidya.

Maybe I should have been clearer in my reference to nAgArjuna. I have a tendency
 to look at every
philosophical school in the context of its history. Hence my use of "extreme" is
 not meant to be
evaluative, but descriptive. In the Pali Canon, the Buddha is is quoted as
 saying "that everything
exists is one extreme, that nothing exists is another; ours is the middle path."
 In fact, nAgArjuna
himself quotes this verse in a Sanskritized form in his mUla-madhyamaka kArikAs.


The notion that every view ultimately entails an absolutist notion of
 "everything exists" is first
found in nAgArjuna's kArikAs, and also later in gauDapAda's kArikAs. nAgArjuna's
 statement
that every view is to be rejected, is based partly on the prior rejection of an
 absolutist standpoint.
Thus it is that ALL views are rejected by him, including the ultimate rejection
 of even
pratItya-samutpAda, and SUnyatA. It is clear that nAgArjuna never intended
 SUnyatA to be
understood as if it were an absolute; in fact, he finds cause to quarrel with
 those schools of
vijnAnavAda buddhism that do. In spite of this, modern scholars like
 Venkateswaran,
Radhakrishnan, Schterbasky and others interpret SUnyatA as if it were just the
 buddhist's name
for brahman/Atman. In my opinion, these scholars are seeing madhyamaka buddhism
 itself through
vedAnta colored glasses. More discussion of this point, in the context of
 gauDapAda is at
http://www.cco.caltech.edu/~vidya/advaita/pre-sankara.html.



> In the book,"Empty Logic", Cheng makes it clear that, "Madhyamika philosophy
> is not absolutism. For Nagarjuna, all concepts, including the term shunyata,
> are incomplete symbols or provisionary names. They do not stand for entities
> ...he (Nagarjuna) warned,"...He who holds that there is an emptiness will be

> called incurable by all Buddhas"."

>

> I believe S.Radhakrishnan and others have understood the complete negation
> of Nagarjuna to be a parallel to the advaitic "neti, neti". But Cheng says,
> "But perhaps Nagarjuna's negation is quite different from Upanishadic
 negation.
> The latter assumes the existence of an inexpressible essential substratum, and
> the main aim is to describe, by negation, an absolute which cannot be
 expressed.
> The Madhyamika negations do not assume an inexpressible essential substratum,

> nor is their purpose to describe, by negation, this reality, rather to deny
>                                                            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> that there can be such a reality."
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Cheng is correct. The generation of late 19th-early 20th cent. philosophers have
 all been
misinterpreting nAgArjuna's true ideas. It is a fundamental mistake to interpret
 SUnyatA as an
absolute. nAgArjuna's negation is not at all the same as the upanishadic "neti,
 neti". Having fallen
prey to this basic misunderstanding, scholars like Schterbasky find fault with
 Sankara for his
alleged "misinterpretation of mahAyAna buddhism". They also think Sankara does
 this purposely,
in order to conceal his own indebtedness to madhyamaka buddhism. This is a
 result of a double
misconception. Sankara firmly upholds the absolutist brahman/Atman. His comment
 about the
"SUnyavAdins" is revealing. In the brahmasUtra bhAshya, he says, in effect, "to
 negate the
perceived reality, without accepting a higher reality as its substratum, is to
 be a nihilist". Now, of
course, nAgArjuna would point out that he is not a nihilist, as nihilism is yet
 another view that is
rejected by him. It is also the other "extreme" that he avoids as much as
 absolutism. But for any
vedAntin, including Sankara, not to be an absolutist of some kind is effectively
 being nihilist.


This brAhminical view is seen as early as in the taittirIya upanishad where it
 is said "He who
knows It to be existent, himself becomes existent; but he who knows It to be
 non-existent, himself
becomes non-existent." Thus anybody who denies that there is an "It", as
 nAgArjuna does, is a
nihilist in the eyes of a vedAntin. Before Sankara, gauDapAda had already
 pointed out that the
Absolute of vedAnta is untouched by the four-fold negation, "catushkoTi", by
 definition. This is
very penetrating logical argument, because the whole structure of madhyamaka
 philosophy is based
upon the scheme of four-fold negation (not X; not not-X; not both X and not-X;
 and not neither X
nor not-X.) nAgArjuna is very fond of saying that a thing is not sat, nor asat,
 nor sadasad, nor not
sat and not asat. gauDapAda takes his Absolue beyond all such categorization as
 sat or asat, as is
done in all vedAnta.


> Of course, there's always the problem of how there can be any knowledge of
> such an absolute. For the knowledge itself must be eternal, in which case we

> must either have that knowledge eternally or not at all...

In the advaita vedAnta tradition, this problem does not arise. In talking of
 knowledge of the
absolute, it is a fundamental mistake to suppose that there exists an Absolute
 out there which can
be an object of knowledge. It is not as if there can be any knowledge *of* that
 Absolute. This is not
to deny that the Absolute exists, but to deny that it is ever completely an
 object of knowledge. This
Absolute is itself defined to be the supreme "Knower", which cannot be known by
 any ordinary
means - vijnAtAram are kena vijAnIyAt? Therefore, it is because the Absolute
 exists, that any
lower kind of knowledge is possible. This Absolute is also never deniable.


gauDapAda has recourse to the turIya state described by the mANDUkya upanishad,
 to define the
Atman as this Absolute. He also points out that this state can be attained by
 "asparSa-yoga" -
where the fluctuations of citta and manas are stilled, and the Atman shines
 forth in its own nature.


S. Vidyasankar