Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains (lhag ma, avaśiṣṭa)

The question of what, if anything, remains for the yogin who realizes emptiness gave post-classical Bka’ brgyud exegetes a fruitful hermeneutical instrument for differentiating between affirmative (cataphatic) gzhan stong and negative (apophatic) rang stong strains of Buddhist thought. The wide-ranging Buddhist philosophical interpretations of the remainder, which all turned on a famous passage from the Cūḷasuññatasutta (The Lesser Discourse on Emptiness) of the Pāli Canon, and the divergent Tibetan assimilations of them, provided the raw materials for Bka’ brgyud exegetes to evaluate different lines of response to an overlapping set of key soteriological problems that had long been discussed and hotly debated by Buddhist scholars. Paramount among the issues were [1] whether phenomena are best deemed to be empty of own [nature] (rang stong) or empty of other (gzhan stong), [2] whether a buddha can be said to have any cognition or wisdom at all, [3] what happens during states of cessation (nirodhasamāpatti), particularly the cessation of mind (cittanirodha), and [4] whether realization is ineffable and in what sense. This paper explores the broad range of Indian and Tibetan views of the remainder considered by the Eighth Karmapa Mi bskyod rdo rje and shows how he presented and defended his own tradition’s view in relation or reaction to these.

Mahāmudrā in India and Tibet Edited by Roger R. Jackson Klaus-Dieter Mathes LEIDEN | BOSTON For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Contents Notes on Contributors vii Introduction 1 Klaus-Dieter Mathes and Roger R. Jackson 1 The Samādhirājasūtra and “Sūtra Mahāmudrā”: A Critical Edition and Translation of Verses 1–118 from Chapter 32 of the Samādhirājasūtra 10 Paul Thomas 2 The Seven Siddhi Texts (Grub pa sde bdun): Remarks on the Corpus and Its Employment in Sa skya-Bka’ brgyud Mahāmudrā Polemical Literature 90 Adam C. Krug 3 Mahāmudrā and Samayamudrā in the Dunhuang Documents and Beyond 123 Jacob P. Dalton 4 A Neglected Bka’ brgyud Lineage: The Rngog from Gzhung and the Rngog pa Bka’ brgyud Transmission 142 Cécile Ducher 5 ’Jig rten gsum mgon’s Dgongs gcig on the Relation between Mahāmudrā and the Six Yogas of Nāropa 170 Jan-Ulrich Sobisch 6 The Definitive Meaning of Mahāmudrā according to the Kālacakra Tradition of Yu mo Mi bskyod rdo rje’s Phyag chen gsal sgron 185 Casey A. Kemp 7 Mahāmudrā as the Key-Point of the Third Dharmacakra according to the Sixty Verses on Mahāmudrā by Zhwa dmar Chos grags ye shes 204 Martina Draszczyk 8 Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains (lhag ma, avaśiṣṭa) 237 David Higgins For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV vi Contents 9 Maitrīpa’s Amanasikāra-Based Mahāmudrā in the Works of the Eighth Karma pa Mi bskyod rdo rje 269 Klaus-Dieter Mathes 10 Assimilating the Great Seal: the Dge lugs pa-ization of the dge ldan bka ’brgyud Tradition of Mahāmudrā 302 Roger R. Jackson Index 329 For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Chapter 8 Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains (lhag ma, avaśiṣṭa) David Higgins 1 Introduction What, if anything, remains upon ascertaining emptiness (Pāli: suññatā, Skt.: śūnyatā) – the lack of intrinsic essence of all phenomena – and what is this remainder like? The problem of the remainder (Skt.: avaśiṣṭa; Tib.: lhag ma) has preoccupied Buddhist thinkers from the time of the Pāli canon down to the present day.1 There are also a number of longstanding subjects of disputation that may be viewed as extensions of the remainder problem, including the following: (1) whether phenomena are best deemed to be empty of own [nature] (rang stong) or empty of other (i.e., extraneous factors) (gzhan stong), (2) whether a buddha can be said to have knowledge ( jñāna),2 (3) what happens during states of cessation (nirodhasamāpatti), particularly the cessation of mind (cittanirodha),3 and (4) whether goal-realization is best described by negative determinations (rnam bcad), positive determinations (yongs gcod), or no determinations or theses (dam bca’, pratijñā) at all.4 Each of these topics has generated considerable discussion and controversy amongst Buddhist scholars past and present, their varying responses in each case hinging on insights or speculations about what is “left over” upon realizing emptiness. If answering this question has traditionally exposed a scholar’s primary religio-philosophical affiliations, it has also revealed his or her deepest ontological and soteriological commitments regarding the nature and scope of goal-realization. It is for this reason hardly surprising that the subject of the remainder has long been a touchstone for inter-sectarian dialogue and debate on some of the central issues of Buddhist thought and practice. 1 Several contemporary treatments are taken up in this essay. 2 See Almogi 2009 for a comparative study of this issue with a focus on the contributions of Rong zom Chos kyi bzang po (11th cent.). 3 For an illuminating study of cessation of mind (cittanirodha) theories in Indian Buddhism, with particular attention to Abhidharma and Yogācāra meditative systems, see Griffiths 1991. 4 See the third chapter of Higgins and Draszczyk 2016, on Mi bskyod rdo rje, where these points are examined in light of traditional Indian Buddhist views on the remainder. © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | doi:10.1163/9789004410893_010 For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 238 Higgins In Indian Mahāyāna circles, competing accounts of the remainder fueled Madhyamaka (Middle Way) and Cittamātra (Mind Only) disagreements over the status of the ultimate. Such disputes continued in Tibet and began to intensify during the fourteenth century with the polemically heated inter-sectarian debates that erupted between proponents of Empty of Own-nature (rang stong) or Empty of Other (gzhan stong) schools of Buddhist thought. Although scholars of all Tibetan schools joined the fray in one way or another, the opposing positions came to be associated, often in caricatural fashion, with the Dge lugs and Jo nang schools, respectively.5 The viewpoints of these schools could hardly be more divergent. For the Jo nang pa, what remains is truly established buddha nature empty of the extraneous (gzhan stong) adventitious stains; for the Dge lugs pa what remains is emptiness of what is truly established, the emptiness of own [nature] (rang stong). Looking back on such developments, we note that a number of post-classical thinkers deployed the idea of the remainder to distinguish, and attempt to reconcile, these affirmative (cataphatic) and negative (apophatic) strains of Buddhist thought.6 The remainder is a recurrent theme in the Eighth Karma pa Mi bskyod rdo rje’s (1507–1554) philosophical writings, where he treats it not as an established Buddhist principle but rather as a hotly debated philosophical problem, eliciting widely differing views and therefore demanding careful and nuanced consideration. Because the conflicting Buddhist interpretations of the remainder reflect a tension at the heart of the views of the ultimate advocated by Mi bskyod rdo rje and his Karma Bka’ brgyud tradition, it was not a problem he could simply ignore. The tension arises over the apparent discrepancy between positive and negative ways of relating to, and characterizing, the ultimate, each of which finds expression in one or another of the exoteric and esoteric Buddhist systems of exegesis (bshad lugs) and praxis (sgrub lugs) advocated by the Eighth Karma pa. Because he regarded all these systems to be authoritative and indispensable avenues for realizing the Buddhist goal of awakening, he considered their contrasting affirmative and negative modes of thought and discourse to be complementary rather than contradictory. On this basis, he was insistent that the tension between them signaled the need to strike a viable balance between these two approaches rather than privilege one to the exclusion of the other. We have elsewhere noted that Mi bskyod rdo rje’s persistent attempts to negotiate a balance between affirmative and negative currents of Buddhist 5 For an account of the Jo nang gzhan stong position and some of its Dge lugs criticisms, see Seyfort Ruegg 1963. 6 Some of these are taken up in Higgins and Draszczyk 2016. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 239 thought attest to his mastery not only of dialogical thinking, characterized by the consideration and careful weighing of multiple points of view, but also dialectical thinking, which emphasizes the coordination and reconciliation of opposing perspectives.7 On the one hand, his allegiance to affirmative Mahāmudrā, Tathāgatagarbha, and Vajrayāna paradigms led him to acknowledge some kind of remainder, a ground or continuum of experience that endures when the conceptual structures erected upon it have collapsed. A case in point is his account of the “ground of the clearing process” (sbyang gzhi), equivalent to buddha nature, the tantric causal continuum (rgyu rgyud), and ground Mahāmudrā (gzhi phyag rgya chen po), which he defines as that which will remain (lhag ma) when what has obscured it has been purified away.8 On the other hand, the belief in some residual cognitive or ontological entity was taken by Mi bskyod rdo rje to be an untenable postulate of the Cittamātra tradition that had been rejected root and branch not only by the Consequentialist (Prāsaṅgika) Madhyamaka tradition of Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti but also by the Non-foundationalist (Apratiṣṭhāna) Madhyamaka9 tradition espoused by many late Indian Buddhist tāntrikas, such as Maitrīpa and his circle. In Maitrīpa’s tradition, emptiness is luminosity, but this is in no way to be regarded as a real entity, be it material or mental.10 The Karma pa’s own affiliations with this tradition and the equally anti-essentialist Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka tradition consequently led him to deny this remainder any ontological status whatsoever. What remains is completely beyond discursive constructs (spros 7 8 9 10 See Higgins and Draszczyk 2016: vol. 1, 241. We there identify this dialectical mode of thought (especially in regard to the reconciliation of affirmative and negative modes of thought and discourse) as a hallmark of post-classical Bka’ brgyud exegesis. On the difference between dialogical and dialectical thinking, see Sternberg, Jarvin, and Reznitskaya 2008: 47. See Higgins and Draszczyk 2016: vol. 1, 266. Maitrīpa and his disciple Rāmapāla take apratiṣṭhāna in the sense of non-abiding. In the Sekanirdeśapañjikā on verse 29ab (“Non-abiding in anything is proclaimed to be the Great Seal”; sarvasminn apratiṣṭhānaṃ mahāmudreti kīrtyate) we thus find (English translation of the root text and commentary by Isaacson and Sferra 2014: 311): “ ‘In anything’ means ‘in dependently arisen skandhas, dhātus, āyatanas and so on, which are all dependently originated. ‘Non-abiding’ [means] not becoming mentally engaged, [i.e.,] absence of superimposition.” (sarvasminn iti pratītyasamutpannaskandhadhātvāyatanādau | apratiṣṭhānam amanasikāro ’nāropaḥ [Isaacson and Sferra 2014: 192.3–6]). To translate apratiṣṭhāna as “without foundation” is also permissible. From the object side, everything is without a foundation; from the subject side, i.e., when glossed as amanasikāra, apratiṣṭhāna is best taken in its primary sense of “non-abiding.” For example, Rong zom Chos kyi bzang po defines rab tu mi gnas pa in the sense that all phenomena lack any ontic or epistemic foundation. See Higgins and Draszczyk 2016: vol. 1, 33–34, and Mathes in this volume. See Mathes 2015: 317–318. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 240 Higgins bral). It is clear that for the Karma pa, this remainder is not something but neither is it nothing whatsoever (ci yang med pa). It is beyond imputations of existence and nonexistence, beyond the extremes of eternalism and nihilism. In this essay, I will look at how Mi bskyod rdo rje conceived of this remainder and how he used it to reconcile the affirmative and negative strains of Buddhist thought and praxis. Specifically, I will look at how he sought to accommodate within his non-foundationalist Madhyamaka philosophical orientation an affirmative account of what remains. As an advocate of the Apratiṣṭhāna Madhyamaka view, Mi bskyod rdo rje took its synthesis of Mantrayāna and Madhyamaka as a prototype for his own efforts to unite the affirmative Mahāmudrā dohā discourses of Saraha and the tantras with the negative Madhyamaka discourses of Nāgārjuna and his successors, in order to make room for a view of the remainder that avoids the eternalist and nihilist extremes of existence and nonexistence. In the final analysis, he proposes that this discernable yet strangely elusive continuum is best described as a “groundless ground,” an enduring mode of being and awareness that is available to first-hand experience yet irreducible to postulates of existence and nonexistence and the related views of eternalism and nihilism. As a prelude to considering Mi bskyod rdo rje’s conciliatory approach to the remainder problem, it may be worthwhile to sketch in broad strokes the doctrinal background of the problem in India and Tibet. 2 Origins of the Remainder The idea of the remainder has traditionally been traced to one of the earliest recorded discourses on emptiness attributed to the historical Buddha, the Cūḷasuññatasutta (abbreviated as CS) of the Majjhimanikāya (no. 121) of the Pāli Canon. More specifically, it may be traced to a famous refrain that the Buddha repeats eight times to Ānanda in the course of delineating progressive stages in the meditation on emptiness, ranging from the material to the immaterial spheres: It is perceived that when something does not exist there, then “that [place] is empty of that [thing].” Further it is comprehended of what remains there that “that exists in that [place]” as a real existent.11 11 AN, Majjhimanikāya, sutta no. 121 et passim: iti yaṃ hi kho tattha na hoti, tena taṃ suññaṃ samanupassati, yaṃ pana tattha avasiṭṭhaṃ hoti, taṃ santaṃ idam atthīti pajānāti |. Tib. D (Dpe sdur ma ed.) vol. 71, 662.15–18: … gang la gang med pa de des stong ngo zhes bya bar For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 241 This locus classicus for the idea of the remainder has lent itself to widely varying interpretations by Buddhist scholars through the ages, not least of all because of difficulties in working out the referents of its numerous pronouns. As one of the few Pāli suttas to be translated into Tibetan and included in the Bka’ ’gyur, it also represents, in the words of Lobsang Dargay, “one of the extremely rare cases where the same sūtra is part of Theravāda tradition as well as of the Tibetan Mahāyāna heritage.”12 The passage has attracted the notice of a number of contemporary scholars of Buddhism including D. Seyfort Ruegg, G.M. Nagao, S. Yamaguchi, H. Urban and P. Griffiths, L. Dargay, K.-D. Mathes, and Bhikkhu Anālayo.13 Taken collectively, their research pointedly reveals the extent to which the passage was excerpted from its original context and tailored to fit the aims and presuppositions of different, and at times divergent, scholastic lines of interpretation. According to the Cūḷasuññatasutta itself, the progressively deepening stages of meditation on emptiness, from material to immaterial spheres, leads finally to the “supreme emptiness,” a state that is empty of reifications and contaminations (Pāli āsavas) but not empty of the six “sense fields that, conditioned by life, are grounded in the body itself.”14 According to Bhikkhu Anālayo, “[w] hat remains, after this supreme accomplishment in emptiness, is simply the continuity of life, exemplified by the body and the senses together with the life faculty.”15 In short, in the absence of the contaminations, there still remains a basic sentience that operates through the six modes of cognition and their respective domains. This basic psychophysical mode of existence is said to survive the Arhat’s realization of supreme emptiness as a kind of disturbance or angst (daratha) that is presumably only relinquished with the final liberation of buddhahood. 12 13 14 15 yang dag par rjes su mthong yang | de la lhag ma gang yod pa de de la yod do zhes bya bar yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin du rab tu shes te | [kun dga’ bo stong pa nyid la ’jug pa ’di ni yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin te phyin ci ma log pa yin no |]. See Mathes 2012. Dargay 1990: 82. In Tibetan canonical versions, the sūtra is entitled Great Discourse on Emptiness (Mdo chen po stong pa nyid ces bya ba; Śūnyatānāmamahāsūtra). P 956, 274b2– 278a7; D 290, 253b2–253b2. Passages from Pāli, Chinese, and Tibetan editions of the text are compared in Schmithausen 1981: 232–239. See also Skilling 1997: 335–363, where he traces (338) the Tibetan version(s) to the Madhyamāgama of the Mūlasarvāstivāda. Tibetan and Pāli texts are critically compared in Skilling 1994: 146–181. Yamaguchi 1941; Seyfort Ruegg 1969: 319ff.; Nagao 1991: 51–60 (reprint of 1978 essay); Dargay 1990; Urban and Griffiths 1994; Mathes 2009, 2012; and Anālayo 2012. Cūḷasuññata (CS) as quoted by Nagao 1991: 52. Anālayo 2012: 345. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 242 3 Higgins Madhyamaka and Cittamātra Interpretations Let us now consider some influential examples of how the formulation was later appropriated by Mahāyāna scholars and redeployed to support their differing theories regarding the existence or nonexistence of any residual factor after the realization of emptiness. In general, Yogācāra-Cittamātra thinkers used the Pāli passage to support the view that something does remain following meditation on emptiness, though their accounts of what this something is and how it is best characterized were far from homogeneous. They variously interpreted the remainder in language reminiscent of the above-cited CS passage, but with very different philosophical aims and assumptions. To summarize, (1) In the Bodhisattvabhūmi (BBh)16 what remains is an unfathomable locus (āśraya) for the postulation (prajñapti) of “forms” (rūpa), which are empty constructs. (2) In the Madhyāntavibhāga (MAV 1.1–2 and commentary)17 the remainder is unreal imaginings (abhūtaparikalpa), which persist following the realization of emptiness. In other words, abhūtaparikalpa remains in the emptiness of duality, but when this emptiness is realized by nirvikalpajñāna, paratantra stops being abhūtaparikalpa, being thenceforth empty of subject and object. (3) In the Abhidharmasamuccaya (AS),18 what remains is the selflessness of the eighteen psychophysical elements (dhātus), which are empty of I and mineness. Finally, (4), in the Ratnagotravibhāga (RGV)19 it is the buddha nature (tathāgatagarbha), which is empty of adventitious stains (āgantukamala). Against the background of these Yogācāra and Tathāgatagarbha ideas of the remainder, we can better understand the target of Mi bskyod rdo rje’s remark that … since even the clinging to the experience of some mere clarity and mere awareness as emptiness is like the birth and subsequent death of a child in a dream, one should not cling to the awareness and clarity as an intrinsic essence and as a mode of being. This is how the so-called 16 17 18 19 See Nagao 1991: 55 and 240 n. 21. See Griffiths and Urban 1994: 19: “A strong case can be made, then, for the conclusion that phenomenally rich mental images – designated by vijñapti, pratibhāsa, nimitta, or abhūtaparikalpa – do remain in emptiness but that these cannot have been subject to the constructive activity denoted by vikalpa.” The idea of a nondual unreal imaginings (these normally predicated on the dualism of subject and object) that survive the realization of emptiness is, of course, problematic and especially vulnerable to the anti-foundationalist critiques of Maitrīpa et al. AS, 40. See Nagao 1991: 55–56, Seyfort Ruegg 1969: 321–322. RGV I.157–158. See Nagao 1991: 58–60. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 243 “ultimate truth,” “the perfect nature,” which is left over as a remainder (lhag ma; avaśiṣṭa) – namely, the wisdom empty of the duality of subject and object [maintained by the] Alīkākāravāda Cittamātra – is ascertained as being beyond discursive elaborations.20 The closing comment that “what remains” is beyond discursive elaborations was interpreted by Mi bskyod rdo rje along broadly Madhyamaka lines. This tradition took seriously the dictum “everything is empty” (sarvaṃ śūnyam), concluding that no intrinsic essences or real entities can withstand critical assessment or survive the ascertainment of emptiness and dependent arising. Candrakīrti twice refers to a specific formulation of the remainder thesis that is advanced in certain Yogācāra works, and deems it to be a misguided conception of emptiness. The construal in question has the logical form “the y of which x is empty is nonexistent, whereas the x that is empty of y is existent.”21 According to Madhyamaka thinkers, this logic of emptiness was invoked by realists of different stripes to vindicate the existence of one aspect of reality to the exclusion of another. In his auto-commentary to Madhyamakāvatāra VI.47, Candrakīrti cites the Yogācāra construal of the remainder thesis as a mistaken interpretation of emptiness invoked by the school’s adherents to support the mental realist position that the relative (paratantra) nature is the cause of the imagined (parikalpita) nature and is therefore what remains in its absence as something substantially existent.22 In his Pañcaskandhaprakaraṇa (PSP), Candrakīrti similarly criticizes the Yogācāra use of the remainder thesis as rational and scriptural proof for their position that the dependent (paratantra) exists whereas the imagined (parikal pita) does not exist.23 Here, he argues that a more correct and metaphysically 20 21 22 23 Ma hā mu drā’i man ngag lnga bcu pa, MKsb vol. 19, 630.2–4: rig tsam gsal tsam zhig stong nyid du myong bar zhen pa yang rmi’i lam du bu skyes nas shi ba dang ’dra ba yin pas rig gsal la ngo bo dang gnas tshul du mi ’dzin pa’o | ’di ni sems tsam rnam rdzun pa’i gzung ’dzin gnyis stong gi ye shes lhag mar lus pa’i yongs grub don† dam pa’i bden pa zhes bya ba de spros bral du gtan la dbab pa yin no |. †text: do. See for example Asaṅga, Yogācārabhūmi, Tattvārthapaṭala: yena hi śūnyaṁ tadasadbhāvāt, yac ca śūnyaṁ tadsadbhāvāc chūnyatā yujyeta |. (“The y of which x is empty does not truly exist, but the x which is empty [of y] truly exists. Emptiness makes sense in this way.”) As cited in Salvini 2015: 68. Translation my own. See La Valleé Poussin 1912: 139. The remainder formulation is quoted at 139.11–14. See Pañcaskandhaprakaraṇa, Lindtner 1979 ed.: 115.15–16: brtags pa’i ngo† bo med pa dang‡ | gzhan gyi dbang ni yod pa nyid | sgro ’dogs pa dang skur ’debs pa’i | mtha’ la rtog pa brlag par ’gyur |. † PSP Derge ed.: dngos; ‡ PSP Derge ed.: ste. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 244 Higgins austere conclusion is reached by reasoning that all phenomena arise dependently through mutual interactions (phan tshun bltos nas ’byung ba) – citing the example of a mirror image – and hence nothing can be established as having an independent intrinsic essence. This, he says, applies not only to things perceived but also the mental factors that perceive them. Hence, the person who imputes reality to phenomena, whether material or mental, is mistaken.24 Candrakīrti contends that those who cite the remainder formulation as rational or scriptural proof for the existence of some substantially real essence (rdzas su bden pa’i ngo bo nyid)25 can be refuted on their own grounds. Stated 24 25 I was unable to locate this passage in LAS, though it is ascribed to this sūtra in Abhayākaragupta’s Āryāṣṭasāhasrikāprajñāpāramitāvṛttimarmakaumudī, D 3805, 210b5. PSP, Lindtner 1979 ed.: 115.18–27: “Moreover, to the extent that the great elements arise in mutual dependence, none are established as having an intrinsic essence. Likewise, since mental factors are also present on the basis of mutual influence, none are established as having an intrinsic essence. These are [both] like mirror reflections, nothing more. The same [conclusions] should be applied to their defining characteristics. In this regard, all phenomena are without entitative existence and it is erroneous for anyone to superimpose real existence on them. Entities exist by virtue of something else, and to grasp phenomena as otherwise is like trying to grasp the water in a mirage.” (gzhan yang ji ltar ’byung ba chen po rnams phan tshun bltos nas ’byung ba nyid kyis rang gi ngo bor grub pa ni med pa de bzhin du sems las ’byung ba rnams kyang phan tshul gyi stobs la brten nas grub pa nyid kyis rang gi ngo bor grub pa med pa nyid de gzugs brnyan lta bu nyid las mi ’da’o || de bzhin du de dag gi mtshan nyid rnams la yang sbyar bar bya’o || de lta bas na chos thams cad dngos po med pa yin la | gang gis dngos po bden par sgro ’dogs pa de ni phyin ci log yin te | dngos po ni gzhan du gnas la | chos ni gzhan du gzung ba nyid kyis smig rgyu la chur ’dzin pa lta bu’o ||.) Candrakīrti presents the opponent’s mental realist position as follows. Pañcaskandha prakaraṇa, Lindtner 1979 ed.: 115.32–116.13: “For these [realists], in establishing that things have real intrinsic essences, they employ proofs by means of scripture or reasoning. In this regard, some cite as scriptural authority the passage ‘Therefore, Ānanda, when something does not exist somewhere, then that [place] is empty of that [thing].’ And what remains there is existent. It is understood in this statement to be truly existent. This is described as an unmistaken understanding of emptiness. Accordingly, [they say,] some mendicants and Brahmins do not accept emptiness of something but also do not accept that which is empty of something [else]. An emptiness of this sort is held to be flawed. Why is that? Since that of which something is empty is nonexistent, whereas that which is empty of something is existent, the term ‘emptiness’ makes sense. If everything is nonexistent, then it would be empty of each and every thing. It would therefore not make sense for that to be empty. In this regard, [one] would hold a flaw[ed conception of emptiness]. How then should one properly grasp emptiness? ‘It is perceived that when something does not exist there, then “that [place] is empty of that [thing].” Further it is comprehended that what remains exists as a real existent.’ ” (de dag gis rdzas† bden pa’i ngo bo nyid du rab tu sgrub pa na lung gis sam | rigs pas sgrub par byed do || de la re zhig lung ni ’di yin te | de lta bas na kun dga’ bo gang na gang med pa de ni des stong pa nyid yin la | lhag ma gang yin pa de ni yod pa nyid do || zhes shes pa ni yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin du shes pa’o || For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 245 concisely, in accepting the nonexistence of the imagined nature (parikalpita) and nominal (prājñāpti) entities in general, the Yogācāra should eo ipso reject any superimpositions of true existence (bden par yod pa), including the imputed true existence of paratantra. This fits with the view of Candrakīrti and his tradition that all phenomena across the board are comprehensively empty, that no essences or real entities are left standing when critical reasoning has concluded its analytical process of elimination. In short, Candrakīrti rejects a principle of emptiness that allows some truly existent substance (rdzas pa bden par yod pa) to survive the discernment of emptiness. This raises the question whether the emptiness Candrakīrti criticizes with reference to the remainder formulation is the same as the “emptiness of one from the other” (itaretaraśūnyatā; gcig gis gcig stong pa nyid) that is counted in the Laṅkāvatārasūtra (LAS) as the seventh of seven types of emptiness and dismissed as an inferior view that should be abandoned. As Mathes has shown, the itaretaraśūnyatā criticized in LAS26 is a relative view of emptiness, which establishes only the absence of certain things in a certain place without denying the existence of either. Thus, the LAS passage gives as an example of itaretaraśūnyatā the nonexistence of certain animals (i.e., elephants, cows, and goats) in a certain place (i.e., the mansion of the mother jackal) without negating the existence either of these animals (which presumably live elsewhere, away from the mansion) or of what remains (the mansion and its monks).27 In other words, the LAS rejects this inferior itaretaraśūnyatā precisely because its own Yogācāra “remainder account” of emptiness does posit the nonexistence of what x is empty of and the existence of x. This is clear from its acknowledgement of the existence of paratantra and nonexistence of parikal pita. Moreover, in its introduction to the passage with the sevenfold emptiness, the LAS restricts emptiness to parikalpita.28 In short, the view of emptiness 26 27 28 zhes de skad brjod pa ni phyin ci ma log par‡ stong pa nyid rtogs pa’o || zhes bya ba dang | de bzhin du dge sbyong dang bram ze kha cig gang stong pa de yang mi ’dod la | gang gis stong pa de yang mi ’dod pa de lta bu’i rnam pa’i stong pa nyid nyes par bzung ba yin no || de ci’i phyir zhe na | gang gis stong pa de ni med pa nyid yin la | gang stong pa de ni yod pa nyid yin pas stong pa nyid ces rigs so | thams cad med na gang gang gis stong par ’gyur | de nyid des stong par ni rigs pa ma yin no || de lta bas na nyes par bzung bar ’gyur ro || ji ltar na stong pa nyid legs par bzung ba yin zhe na | gang na gang med pa de ni des stong pa nyid do zhes yang dag par mthong la | lhag ma yod pa nyid de zhes yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin du rtogs pa’o ||.) † D addit. su; ‡ Lindtner ed. pa. Laṅkāvatārasūtra, 75.10–19. Mathes 2012: 195–198. LAS 74.1–5: “The illustrious one said this: ‘Emptiness – what is called emptiness – Mahāmati, is a word for the imagined nature. Again, Mahāmati, since [you people] obstinately For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 246 Higgins espoused in the LAS (and many other Yogācāra and Tathāgatagarbha works) and criticized by Candrakīrti is one that establishes the existence of one thing (tathāgatagarbha, paratantra) in denying the existence of something else (āgantukamala, parikalpita). 4 Tibetan Gzhan stong and Rang stong Assimilations Turning to Tibetan assimilations of the remainder problem, we will examine how it figured in formative classical and post-classical Tibetan debates over the status of emptiness and ultimate reality, as affirmative Mahāmudrā and Mantrayāna discourses espousing the abiding nature of mind, reality, and buddhahood faced anti-foundationalist Madhyamaka critiques. While the former discourses retained the idea of an invariant continuum of human reality that is amenable to positive descriptions, the latter rejected the ontological possibility of any metaphysical residue – any knowable entity or knowing cognition – following the ascertainment of emptiness, and on this basis ruled out all positive determinations. Mi bskyod rdo rje’s varied treatments of this related set of issues cover a characteristically broad spectrum of viewpoints. Our aim here is to determine how he sought to align his unifying Madhyamaka-Mahāmudrā orientation with the dominant views of his day. We may recall that the positive and negative ends of the spectrum of Tibetan remainder accounts had, by the post-classical period, become associated in the minds of many scholars with the Jo nang pa and Dge lugs pa schools respectively. Geshe Lobsang Dargay has shown that Dol po pa (1292–1361) took the standard formulation of the remainder, as it had been interpreted in texts such as the Śrīmālādevīsūtra and Madhyāntavibhāga, as confirmation for the Gzhan stong view. On this view, although empty phenomena are nonexistent vis-à-vis the basis of emptiness, one correctly sees that some basis of emptiness (stong pa’i gzhi) wherein empty phenomena do not exist is [thus] empty of those phenomena. Hence, one fully comprehends that the remainder that is empty of those [nonexistent] phenomena is the basis of emptiness, i.e., the perfect cling to the imagined nature, we [must] talk about emptiness, non-arising, non-duality, and the nature of essenceless.’ ” (bhagavān etad avocat | śūnyatā śūnyateti mahāmate parikalpitasvabhāvapadam etat | parikalpitasvabhāvābhiniveśena punar mahāmate śūnyatānutpādābhāvādvayaniḥsvabhāvabhāvavādino bhavanti |) (Translation by Mathes 2012: 197). For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 247 nature (chos nyid yongs grub), which exists eternally (nam yang)29 there, as the truly real.30 This interpretation is then used by Dol po pa to support his Gzhan stong view that “empty phenomena are understood to be empty of an own-nature (rang stong) and the basis of emptiness (stong pa’i gzhi) is understood to be empty of other (gzhan stong).”31 But this view, from another angle, can be seen as a textbook example of the remainder formulation of emptiness Candrakīrti had rejected: “the y of which x is empty is nonexistent, whereas the x that is empty of y is existent.” Indeed, it was along precisely these lines that the Dge lugs pas tried to reject the Jo nang pa view of an ontological remainder. Tsong kha pa, in his MA commentary, Dbu ma dgongs pa rab gsal, is critical of the Yogācāra view of what remains, particularly its three-nature view, according to which the perfect (pariniṣpanna) is empty of the imagined (parikalpita) and based on (or, in some cases, also empty of) the dependent (paratantra). In this regard, it may be noted that Tsong kha pa characterizes Yogācāra as holding that the perfect is the dependent empty of the imagined, though not the alternative Yogācāra view that the perfect is empty of the dependent and imagined. In any event, he goes on to explain, with good reason, that the Yogācāra view of the remainder found in treatises such as the BBh and MAV is totally dissimilar to the RGV I.154–155 passage that Asaṅga, in his RGVV, had explained in terms of the standard formulation of the remainder.32 RGV I.154–155 reads as follows: 29 30 31 32 This follows the Tibetan (D, P) of the CS, which has de la rtag par yod, “exists permanently there.” Ri chos nges don rgya mtsho (Pecing ed. 1998), 147.1–3: stong pa’i gzhi gang la stong pa’i chos gang med pa de chos des stong par yang dag par rjes su mthong ste | ’di la chos des stong pa’i lhag ma stong pa’i gzhi gang yin pa chos nyid yongs grub de ni ’dir nam yang yod pa’o || zhes yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin du rab tu shes so ||; as quoted in Dargay 1990: 90–91 n. 14. (translation my own) Terms from Tibetan version of CS indicated with bold lettering. Ri chos nges don rgya mtsho, quoted in Dargay 1990: 91 n. 15. The translation is my own. Dbu ma dgongs pa rab gsal, 309.3–4: “The meaning of the passage ‘… when something does not exist there, [the latter is empty with regard to the former],’ etc., as interpreted in the Rgyud bla ma [RGV] commentary, is not at all comparable to the previous two [Yogācāra works, i.e., BBh and MAV], but it does exist in the Madhyamaka commentarial method. I will not write [about it here] for fear of prolixity”; (rgyud bla ma’i ’grel bar gang zhig gang na med pa de ni zhes sogs kyi don bkral ba ni | snga ma gnyis dang gtan mi ’dra bar dbu ma’i ’grel tshul du yod de mangs bas ’jigs nas ma bris so |.) The passage is quoted in Dargay 1990: 91 n. 21. The translation is my own. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 248 Higgins There is nothing to be removed from it and nothing to be added. The real should be seen as real and, seeing the real, one is liberated. (RGV I.154) The [buddha] element is empty of adventitious [stains], which have the characteristic of being separable; But it is not empty of unsurpassable qualities, which have the characteristic of not being separable.33 (RGV I.155) Commenting on this passage, the author of the RGVV34 adopts the same formulation – as for example it occurs the Śrīmālādevīsūtra – to explain that when one recognizes that buddha nature is “not empty of inconceivable buddha qualities, which are inseparable [in that it is impossible] to recognize [them] as something disconnected, and which surpass in number the grains of sand of the river Gaṅgā,” then “one thus perceives that ‘when something that does not exist in that [place],’ then ‘that [place] is empty of that [thing]’ and thus one ‘comprehends that something that remains exists [permanently]’35 there as a real existent.”36 It is unfortunate that Tsong kha pa declines, for fear of prolixity, to specify how this RGVV interpretation of the remainder is “not at all consistent” with that outlined in the two Yogācāra works. Yet it is not hard to fathom why he would be struck by the patent difference between (1) the relatively weak CS, BBh and MAV remainder interpretations, which maintain that after realizing emptiness some vestige of conditioned existence survives – be it the continuity of corporeal life (CS), an inscrutable substrate for the imputation of materiality (BBh), or unreal imaginings (abhūtaparikalpa) and emptiness (MAV) – and (2) the strong RGVV version, which construes the remainder as buddha nature that is completely devoid of adventitious stains (i.e., the conditioned), which do not exist at all. In the RGV, the unreal imaginings are part of adventitious stains (āgantukamala) and thus cannot be part of the remnant.37 In the strong version, the remainder is all that exists, as in an arithmetic remainder 33 34 35 36 37 RGV 1.157–158 (J 1.154–55): RGVV, 76.1–4: nāpaneyam ataḥ kiṃcid upaneyaṃ na kiṃcana | draṣṭavyaṃ bhūtato bhūtaṃ bhūtadarśī vimucyate || śūnya āgantukair dhātuḥ savinirbhāgalakṣaṇaiḥ | aśūnyo ’nuttarair dharmair avinirbhāgalakṣaṇaiḥ ||. The authorship of RGVV is uncertain. Tibetans attribute the work to Asaṅga. The Tibetan versions (D, P) have de la rtag par yod, “exists permanently there.” RGVV, 76.6–7: aśūnyo gaṅgānadīvālikāvyativṛttair avinirbhāgair amuktajñair acintyair buddhadharmair iti | evaṃ yad yatra nāsti tat tena śūnyam iti samanupaśyati | yat punar atrāvaśiṣṭaṃ bhavati tat sad ihāstīti yathābhūtaṃ prajānāti |. Compare with the Cūḷasuññata passage, Majjhimanikāya, sutta no. 121. See Mathes 2009; 2012. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 249 or difference left over after performing a subtraction,38 whereas what is subtracted from the original is entirely nonexistent. It was left to Tsong kha pa’s disciple Rgyal tshab Dar ma rin chen (1364–1432) to reinterpret the relevant RGV I.154–155 statement in line with his master’s *Prāsaṅgika-Madhyamaka philosophical orientation. On this interpretation, the statement that buddha dhātu is “empty of adventitious stains … but not empty of unsurpassable qualities” is taken as support for the thesis that what remains is that which is empty of intrinsic essence and it is that which “exists permanently” (lhag mar gyur pa rang bzhin gyis stong pa de ni de la rtag par yod). On this reinterpretation, there indeed is a remainder (rather than no remainder at all) but it consists in things as they really are (yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin, yathābhūtam) when all reifications are removed, namely, that which is empty of intrinsic essence (rang bzhin gyis stong pa). This enables him to identify the remnant buddha nature in terms of a nonaffirming negation. As Rgyal tshab explains: Because this tathāgata element is by nature thoroughly pure inasmuch as there are [no] defilements that were previously existent and are currently to be removed, the two kinds of self that were the object or the reason for believing in a self of persons and phenomena do not exist at all. This is so because freedom from inherently existent (rang bzhin gyis grub pa) adventitious stains is the nature of this element. When, according to this [Ratnagotravibhāga], being empty of inherent existence (rang bzhin gyis grub pa), empty of existence by its own characteristics (rang gi mtshan nyid kyis grub pa), and empty of existence by its own nature (rang gi ngo bo nyid kyis grub pa) are taught as the ultimate truth, one should know that the presentation of this system of two truths is shown to have the same meaning as the doctrine of Lord Nāgārjuna…. In this regard, the insight that directly understands selflessness perceives correctly that “when something does not exist there” – i.e., some inherently existent phenomena as a basis – “then that [place] is empty of that [thing]” (de ni des stong ngo). However, “something that remains” is that emptiness of intrinsic essence, and it is “that which exists permanently there.” It is comprehended, in the context of the post-meditation state (rjes kyi skabs), as reality just as it is (yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin; yathābhūtam).39 38 39 Nagao notes that the RGV remainder is akin to the arithmetic remainder (or, more precisely, the difference) that is left over after performing a subtraction. Theg pa then po rgyud bla ma’i ṭīka, 324.5–325.6: gang gi phyir rang bzhin gyis yongs su dag pa de bzhin gshegs pa’i khams ’di la sngar yod gsar du bsal bar bya ba kun nas nyon mongs For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 250 Higgins It is evident from the two foregoing accounts of the remainder that the Jo nang pa and Dge lugs pa arrive at diametrically opposed interpretations of the same RGV passage on the remainder, and that these are used to support divergent views of buddha nature. For the Jo nang pa, buddha nature, with its inseparable qualities, constitutes an intrinsic essence (rang gi ngo bo; svabhāva). For the Dge lugs pas, buddha nature is the mind’s emptiness of being an inherently existing mind; and the inseparability of buddha qualities is interpreted, along the lines of Rngog Blo ldan shes rab, to mean that they emerge when meditating on the emptiness of mind. In short, for the Jo nang pa, buddha nature is existent and its qualities are innate, whereas for the Dge lugs pas, buddha nature is a nonaffirming negation and its qualities are emergent or acquired. On the basis of their divergent views of buddha nature, the Jo nang pas use the idea of the remainder to support the determination of a permanent metaphysical perfect nature (chos nyid yongs grub) construed as a basis of emptiness (stong gzhi) that is empty of adventitious stains, whereas the Dge lugs pas use it to support the determination of reality just as it is, viz., as empty of intrinsic essence, a stance that allows no room for any residual basis of emptiness (stong gzhi). 5 Mi bskyod rdo rje’s Non-Foundationalist Unity Standpoint Turning to Mi bskyod rdo rje’s own treatments of the remainder problem, we find him attempting in different ways to navigate the middle ground between these contrasting lines of thought. The main sources for his treatment are found in his Madhyamakāvatāra (MA) and Dgongs gcig commentaries, which we can assign to roughly the same period based on colophonic information pa gang zag dang chos kyi bdag tu ’dzin pa’i rgyu mtshan te dmigs pa bdag gnyis ’ga’ yang med de | glo bur ba’i dri ma rang bzhin gyis grub pa dang bral ba ni khams ’di’i rang bzhin yin pa’i phyir ro || ’dis rang bzhin gyis grub pas stong pa dang | rang gi mtshan nyid kyis grub pas stong pa dang | rang gi ngo bo nyid kyis grub pas stong pa don dam pa bden par bstan pa na | bden pa gnyis kyi rnam bzhag mgon po klu sgrub kyi bzhed pa dang don gcig tu bstan par shes par bya’o ||… de ltar na rang bzhin gyis grub pa’i chos gang zhig gzhi gang na med pa de ni des stong ngo zhes bdag med mngon sum du rtogs pa shes rab kyis yang dag par rjes su mthong la | gang zhig de la lhag mar gyur pa rang bzhin gyis stong pa de ni de la rtag par yod do zhes | rjes kyi skabs su yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin du shes so | zhes so ||. Wording from Tibetan edition of RGVV (D) indicated in bold face lettering. For an English translation of Rgyal tshab’s Theg pa then po rgyud bla ma’i ṭīka, see Jiang 2017. The above passage is quoted on p. 463. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 251 and intertextual cross-references.40 The author’s interpretive method in these works is to rigorously apply the Madhyamaka principle of freedom from extremes: “according to the Madhyamaka of sūtra and mantra [traditions], the real objects of refutation are the two great extremes of eternalism and nihilism,41 because there are no other extremes that are not subsumed under these.” And, once liberated from these extremes, “there is left behind not the slightest remainder of any belief in extreme [positions].”42 Note that Mi bskyod rdo rje here qualifies the absence of remainder to pertain to beliefs, leaving the question of the ontological status of the remainder open. For the Karma pa and the Madhyamaka tradition he follows, the principal object of refutation is the grasping for or belief in reality (bden ’dzin) that is at the root of reification and ignorance. The Karma pa investigates the remainder issue in a section of Dgongs gcig ’grel pa V devoted to clarifying ’Jig rten gsum mgon’s eleventh adamantine precept from the first section of his Dgongs pa gcig pa (GC I.11), which states that “the teachings of Cittamātra reveal the Madhyamaka free from extremes.”43 Mi bskyod rdo rje’s excursus to some extent follows the Sa skya master Stag tshang lo tsā ba Shes rab rin chen’s arguments for the superiority of Madhyamaka over Cittamātra, which are advanced in his Grub mtha’ kun shes auto-commentary.44 At any rate, in clarifying the sense of ’Jig rten gsum mgon’s precept, it is evident that the Karma pa wishes to emphasize not only that Cittamātra and Madhyamaka traditions are complementary, but that the latter marks a definite advance beyond the former’s idealistic standpoint. It should be noted that this interpretation underscores the superiority of Madhyamaka over Cittamātra, in contrast to ’Jig rten gsum mgon’s precept, as well as its interpretation by one of his ’Bri gung commentators, Chos kyi grags pa (1595–1659), who had rather stressed the compatibility of their views, as evident in the latter’s remark: “the precept [I.11] teaches that all entities are not established as other than mind. Since mind, too, is free from the extremes of existence and nonexistence, who 40 41 42 43 44 The Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta and Dgongs gcig works each contain references to one another that will be documented in a forthcoming publication on Mi bskyod rdo rje’s buddha nature views. The view of ucchedavāda, “annihilationism,” rejected by Buddhists maintains that something which has come into existence ceases to exists. It is rather loosely translated in this essay as “nihilism” (a term which itself has many meanings in Western philosophy and theology). Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 22.9–11: mdo sngags kyi dbu ma mtha’ dag gis dgag par bya ba’i don po rtag chad kyi mtha’ chen po ’di gnyis yin te | ’dir ma ’dus pa’i mtha’ gzhan med pa’i phyir te | … mthar ’dzin gyi lhag ma cung zad kyang lus pa’i phyir |. Dgongs pa gcig pa, 165.12: sems tsam bka’ yis mtha’ bral dbu ma ston ||. See Grub mtha’ kun shes rtsa ’grel, 10ff. (root text) and 140ff. (auto-commentary). For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 252 Higgins would expound a Madhyamaka different from that? Take the training in the nonduality of manifestation and mind as [your] basis.”45 Mi bskyod rdo rje, for his part, begins by explaining that “although in Mahāyāna teachings, there are scriptural passages by Cittamātra teachers cited as support for the establishment of cognition (rnam rig pa’i grub pa), the final intent must be based solely on the interpretations by the Great Ācārya Nāgārjuna.46 It is of course this Indian master’s teaching on emptiness that is taken by the Karma pa to be the core insight and indisputable axiom of Buddhist philosophical thinking. In general, although it is not declared in all the buddha’s teachings that there is no distinction between provisional and definitive meaning, in the case of canonical writings of both the middle and final turnings, which teach the selflessness of phenomena, it is indisputable that in teaching profound emptiness as it is, they did not teach that there are profound differences [between] superior and inferior [kinds].47 In other words, there is only a single, comprehensive emptiness, which admits of no gradations. He then quotes a passage from the Samādhirājasūtra (SRS) that proclaims the emptiness of phenomena to be the single meaning (don gcig) common to all the varied buddhavacana. He concludes that “here in Tibet in particular, even among those sūtras that profess to teach the Vijñāpti[mātra] (Cognition [Only]), it is abundantly clear that this Vijñāpti[mātra] doctrine is shown as not being the superior one.”48 In this connection, Mi bskyod rdo rje quotes the following passage from the Laṅkāvatāra (LAS): Once one has relied on [the notion of] Mind Only, External objects should not be imagined. 45 46 47 48 Dgongs pa gcig pa dka’ ’grel, 165.13–17: gsungs pa dngos kun sems tsam las gzhan du || ma grub sems kyang yod med mtha’ bral pas|| de las gzhan pa’i dbu ma su yis bshad || skrang sems gnyis med nyams len rta bar gzung ||. Translation my own. Dgongs gcig ’grel pa V, ’Bri gung bka’ brgyud chos mdzod chen mo, vol. 80, 194.4–5: theg pa chen po’i bka’ ni sems tsam pa’i slob dpon dag gis rnam rig pa’i grub pa’i rgyab tu ’dren yang | mthar thug gi dgongs pa slob dpon chen po nā ga rdzu nas bkral ba nyid kho nar gnas bya ba yin |. Dgongs gcig ’grel pa V, ibid., 194.6–195.1: spyir bde bar gshegs pa’i bka’ thams cad la drang nges kyi rnam dbye med par mi smra yang | ’khor lo bar mthar chos kyi bdag med ston pa’i gsung rab la ni | zab mo stong pa nyid kyi rang ldog bstan pa la mchog dman nam zab khyad yod par ma bstan par gor ma chag ste |. Ibid., 195.4: khyad par bod ’dir rnam rig bstan par ’dod pa’i mdo dag las kyang | chos rnam rig pa’i lugs de mchog ma yin par bstan pa ni ches gsal te |. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 253 Based on the apprehension of suchness, One should also pass beyond Mind Only. (LAS X.256) Having passed beyond Mind Only, One should pass beyond a state that is without appearances. A yoga practitioner who is established in a state without appearances Sees the Mahāyāna.49 (LAS X.257) The author at this point turns his attention to the question of the remainder: Now, some teachers who cling to a Cittamātra position [say] that a truly established cognition (rnam rig, vijñapti) is shown by the final turning [scriptures] to be of definitive meaning. From the Sūtra on Ultimate Emptiness (Don dam pa stong pa nyid kyi mdo50): When something does not exist there, then that [place] is empty of that [thing]. Further it is comprehended that something that remains there does exist there. This is the nonerroneous, correct view regarding emptiness, the Middle Way.51 In clarifying the intent behind this statement, the Karma pa first explains that the Buddhist teachings were unlimited both in content and modes of expression because they functioned as skillful means tailored to each of the multifarious mind-sets of individuals. After outlining some of the hermeneutical devices employed in interpreting and translating the buddha-word, the Karma pa turns to the RGV’s special 49 50 51 LAS 298.15–299.1: cittamātraṃ samāruhya bāhyam arthaṃ na kalpayet | tathatālambane sthitvā cittamātram atikramet || cittamātram atikramya nirābhāsam atikramet | nir ābhāsasthito yogī mahāyānaṃ sa† paśyati ||. †According to Tibetan in Nanjio 1923: 299 n. 1. Nanjio proposes to read na. Mi bskyod rdo rje quotes only the first stanza, but the second is included here for context. This title is not found in the Tibetan canon. It may be noted that the Tibetan title of the CS is Mdo chen po stong pa nyid. The quotation resembles the CS passage on the remainder with the exception of the last line. The same sūtra is also quoted in the Vyākhyāyukti, on which see Mathes 2007: 335. Stag tshang lo tsā ba Shes rab rin chen quotes the same passage and under the same title Don dam pa stong pa nyid kyi mdo in his Grub mtha’ kun shes auto-commentary, 141.13–16. Dgongs gcig ’grel pa V, ’Bri gung bka’ brgyud chos mdzod chen mo vol. 80, 195.5–196.1: yang sems tsam gyi phyogs ’dzin pa’i slob dpon kha cig || ’khor lo tha mas rnam rig bden grub pa zhig nges don du bstan pa yin te | don dam pa stong pa nyid kyi mdo las | gang na gang med pa de ni des stong pa nyid yin la | ’di la lhag ma gang yin pa de ni ‘dir yod pa ste | ’di ni dbu ma’i lam stong pa nyid la lta ba yang dag par phyin ci ma log pa’o…. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 254 Higgins interpretation of the “remainder” as buddha nature that is empty of adventitious stains: When it comes to the meaning of the [above] quotation, the esteemed teacher Asaṅga stated that uncontaminated awareness (zag med kyi shes pa), operative since time without beginning, which is the cause of perfect buddhahood (rdzogs sangs) free from obscurations, was termed “buddha nature.” Since it is not possible for its mode of being to mingle with the nature of all obscurations, [the latter] exist as something separable. However, since [buddha nature] is the cause that generates qualities such as the powers on the level of buddhahood, since beginningless time it has not been known to be separable. Hence, it appeared to be explained in the sense of not being empty [of buddha qualities].52 The author concludes by quoting the above-cited passage from Asaṅga’s RGVV to substantiate the view that the remainder is buddha nature, which is said in RGV to be inseparable in the sense of not being empty of unsurpassed buddha qualities but devoid of adventitious stains that are characterized as separable because they are superfluous and can be removed through spiritual praxis. Surveying a number of the Karma pa’s treatments of the remainder problem, it becomes evident that his aim is to avoid extremes of existence and nonexistence while at the same time balancing affirmative and negative modes of discourse. We have proposed that his Mahāmudrā and Tathāgatagarbha orientations prompted him to acknowledge a remainder of some kind – buddha nature, the nature of mind, the nature of reality, while his allegiance to *Prāsaṅgika and Apratiṣṭhāna views led him to disavow any hypostatization of this remainder as an established basis (gzhi grub). This helps to explain his emphasis, increasingly conspicuous in his later writings, on the need to ascertain an emptiness free from any residual beliefs in the extremes of existence and nonexistence. In this regard, despite indications of his preference for Gzhan stong-like affirmation of the basis of emptiness over the Rang stong-based denial of such a basis, his later works, such as the MA and Dgongs gcig commentaries, endorse the metaphysically disinclined stance of the anti-foundationalist Madhyamaka traditions. In his MA commentary, 52 Ibid., 196.3–5: … lung de’i don ni slob dpon thogs med zhabs kyis | thog ma med pa’i dus can gyi zag med kyi shes pa bden par med bzhin du sgrib bral rdzogs sangs kyi rgyu bde gshegs snying po’i ming can la | sgrib pa thams cad kyi rang bzhin de’i gnas tshul dang ’dre mi rung bas dbyer yod la | sangs rgyas kyi sa’i stobs sogs kyi chos bskyed pa’i rgyus ni thog med nas ’bral mi shes pas mi stong ba’i don du ’chad par snang gi…. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 255 he determines that among the extensive ways of teaching emptiness found among innumerable Madhyamaka, Cittamātra, and tantric sources, those presented within Madhyamaka teachings and treatises are “most lucid” (ches gsal ba) because “by teaching an emptiness that leaves behind not even the slightest remainder of discursive elaborations and characteristics (spros mtshan gyi lhag ma), this tradition takes the remaining emptiness to be fully comprehensive in scope.”53 Stated succinctly, this tradition’s profound emptiness, which leaves behind no ontological residue in the form of reifying superimpositions, is deemed to be the most far-reaching and soteriologically efficacious. Later in his MA commentary, the Karma pa remarks that the Jo nang pa had forsaken this comprehensive emptiness of the Madhyamaka tradition in subscribing to an “emptiness of other” (gzhan stong) position predicated on the belief in a permanent, unconditioned ultimate reality that is fundamentally separate from dependent arising. To this extent the Jo nang school is said to be vulnerable to the criticism of advocating an extreme of eternalism. Yet this is a view, Mi bskyod rdo rje contends, that also leads inescapably to the opposite extreme of nihilism: Hence, you take the real Gzhan stong ultimate truth to be something unconditioned and permanent. Thus, since what is permanent would perforce be devoid of activity (bya ba med pa), the triad of object, agent, and action (bya byed las) stemming from ultimate truth would stop functioning. And were that to stop, then liberation stemming from realizing that ultimate truth would [also] stop. Were that to stop, then saṃsāric phenomena would also stop functioning. Hence, anyone who claims that the conventional, i.e., saṃsāra, is erroneous due to delusion regarding the ultimate, i.e., nirvāṇa, is required to assert the qualification that it is impossible for the ultimate, nirvāṇa, to exist. And if there is no nirvāṇa, then there is also no saṃsāra as its counterpart, and thus there is no alternative but to assert nihilism.54 53 54 Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 5.19–6.3: lugs ’dir ni spros mtshan gyi lhag ma cung zad kyang ma lus par stong nyid du bstan nas stong pa nyid kyi lus yongs su rdzogs par mdzad pa’i phyir |. Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 22.14–21: des na khyed cag dngos su gzhan stong don dam bden pa ’dus ma byas rtag pa la byas pas | de’i dbang gis rtag pa la bya ba med pas don dam bden pa las brtsams pa’i bya byed las gsum rgyun chad par ’gyur zhing | de chad na don dam bden pa rtogs pa las brtsams pa’i rnam grol rgyun chad par ’gyur la | de chad na ’khor ba’i chos kyang rgyun chad par ’gyur te | ’khor ba kun rdzob pa ni don dam myang ’das la ’khrul nas phyin ci log tu byung bar ’dod pa gang zhig | don dam myang ’das ni yod du mi rung ba’i khyad par khas len dgos byung zhing | myang ’das med na der bltos kyi ’khor ba yang med pas chad par khas mi len ka med du ’gyur ba’i phyir |. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 256 Higgins The Karma pa here tactfully redeploys Nāgārjuna’s argumentation (e.g., in MMK chapter 24) for why emptiness – i.e., the lack of inherent, independent existence in all phenomena – is a precondition for conditioned, transitory, dependently arisen, phenomena. The latter had on this basis maintained (MMK XXIV.18) that emptiness (śūnyatā) is equivalent to dependent arising (pratītyasamutpāda). Against a rival substance realist (vastuvādin) who had contended that emptiness, if true, would render spiritual realization impossible, Nāgārjuna responded that, on the contrary, emptiness, the lack of inherent existence, is a necessary condition for any kind of activity and change, spiritual progress and realization included. It was rather his opponent’s view of independently and inherently existent entities that would render such progress impossible, since permanence and independent existence preclude activity, causality, and change. Arguing along similar lines, the Eighth Karma pa demonstrates how belief in a metaphysical ultimate outside of space and time and disconnected from causally dependent processes commits one to the view that soteriological activity such as the cultivation of virtue and wisdom are pointless.55 In his Dgongs gcig ’grel pa, Mi bskyod rdo rje extends this line of criticism to Tsong kha pa’s account of the realization of emptiness, which leaves as its remainder a true reality, “the way things really are” (yathābhūtam) ultimately, that is, empty of any established nature.56 The Karma pa poses the question: “How, according to the account of emptiness advanced by you, Tsong kha pa, can [you] establish an entity that is not the entity of the negandum (dgag bya)?”57 The question follows a lengthy interrogation of Tsong kha pa’s acceptance of a non-reified true reality (yathābhūtam) by exposing it to Candrakīrti’s unequivocal repudiation of substance realist vastuvādin (dngos po smra ba) views. Coming to the gist of his criticism, Mi bskyod rdo rje states “If the general idea of a real entity is not established even conventionally by Mādhyamikas, then how could it be established ultimately!”58 The answer would be, it can only be established ultimately, because conventionally everything is unreal. To sharpen his criticism, the Karma pa draws the surprising, and rather uncharitable, conclusion that Tsong kha pa’s account of emptiness 55 56 57 58 See, for example, his remarks on the Jo nang pa view of the ultimate in Higgins and Draszczyk 2016: vol. 1, 257–258. Compare with Dol po pa who maintained that it is the permanent which makes the impermanent possible. See Stearns 1999: 215. On this matter, see Williams 1983 and Broido 1988. Dgongs gcig ’grel pa Ia, MKsb vol. 4, 445.5–6: ci tsong kha pa khyed bzhed pa’i stong nyid kyi tshul la chos can dngos po dgag bya’i dngos po min pa’i dngos po sgrub tshul de ni |. Dgongs gcig ’grel pa Ia, MKsb vol. 4, 445.2–3: dbu ma pas dngos po’i spyi tsam kun rdzob tu yang ma grub na don dam par grub par lta ga la zhig … For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 257 is no different from the account of emptiness as a real, existent remainder given in the Abhidharmasamuccaya (AS).59 This is so, the Karma pa argues, because “since your account of emptiness amounts to one real entity being empty of another real entity, and therefore does not establish that the entire spectrum of phenomenal entities is empty, what [view] could be lower than that?”60 Here he echoes Candrakīrti’s rejection of a type of emptiness that posits the existence of one aspect of reality to the exclusion of another. Turning the table on his opponent, he accuses the Dge lugs pa of employing the partial emptiness (prādeśikaśūnyatā, nyi tshe ba’i stong pa nyid) that had been criticized in the Samādhirājasūtra (SRS) IX, 47. This he takes to be none other than the Yogācāra remainder formulation of emptiness. The specific sense in which Tsong kha pa’s account of emptiness can be refuted as an instance of this contested type of emptiness is clarified in the Karma pa’s MA commentary: “In [this] account of emptiness, according to which all phenomena are empty of an own-nature, a pot is not empty of a pot in the sense that a pot that is empty of reality is said to be a pot that is empty of own-nature.”61 By way of summary, to declare that a pot that is empty of a truly established (bden grub) nature survives as a remnant on the ultimate level is to endorse a type of object realism predicated on an emptiness consisting in one thing being empty of another. Mi bskyod rdo rje considers Tsong kha pa’s logic of emptiness to be at least formally identical to the rival position (phyogs snga) that posits something existent that is empty of something nonexistent, and that had been criticized by a wide range of Madhyamaka canonical texts as being antithetical to the principle of profound all-inclusive emptiness that leaves no remainder. As he explains: 59 60 61 AS, D 4049, 152.3–4: “What is the defining characteristic of emptiness? ‘It is perceived that when something does not exist there, then that [place] is empty of that [thing]. It is further comprehended that ‘something that remains there exists there’ [and that] it is the truly real.’ This is the view of the real that is the entry into emptiness; it is described as ‘nonerroneous’.” (stong pa nyid kyi mtshan nyid gang zhe na | “gang la gang med pa de ni de stong par yang dag par rjes su mthong ba ste | ’di la lhag ma gang yin pa de ni ’dir yod pa’o zhes yang dag pa ji lta ba bzhin du rab tu shes so” | ’di ni stong pa nyid la ’jug pa yang dag pa’i lta ba ste | phyin ci ma log pa zhes bya’o |.) Dgongs gcig ’grel pa Ia, MKsb vol 4., 445.5–6: khyod kyi stong tshul de ni dngos po gzhan la dngos po gzhan gyis stong tshul du song ba’i phyir dngos chos mtha’ dag stong par mi ’grub pas de las tha shal ba ci zhig yod |. Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 343.19–21: chos thams cad rang gi ngo bos stong pa’i stong tshul la bum pa bum pas mi stong la | bum pa bden pas stong pa bum pa rang stong pa’i don yin ces smras pa…. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 258 Higgins The claim that the partial emptiness is a [valid] principle of emptiness is refuted as follows. For example, the Cittamātra propounds within the framework of dependent cognition (gzhan dbang rnam rig) an emptiness that is empty of the imagined subject and object (gzung ’dzin kun brtags), but nevertheless proclaims that it is not empty of the nature of dependent cognition. As the principle of emptiness you maintain is like that, it follows that it is not that final emptiness (stong pa nyid dpyis phyin) encompassing all phenomena. This is because amidst the two truths, there is ultimately left behind as a remainder some phenomenon that is not empty. Thus, we declare [that you] propound partial emptiness. While proponents of real entities (vastuvādins) are [on this same basis] ruled out [by you] as mistaken, in the case of the Madhyamaka tradition you subscribe to, the accusation directed at the realists such as the Cittamātra rebounds to your side.62 6 Concluding Remarks: On the Prospect of a Groundless Ground Mi bskyod rdo rje’s analysis of opposing Tibetan Buddhist “remainder” positions attempted to demonstrate the extent to which the Jo nang pa Other-emptiness and Dge lugs pa Own-emptiness accounts of emptiness were predicated on the same logic of salvaging one aspect of reality at the expense of another. The principal difference is that Jo nang pa remainder is an enduring yet atemporal metaphysical reality whereas the Dge lugs pa remainder is non-reified external phenomena. Now, for the Karma pa, neither of these views satisfies the condition of being an all-inclusive emptiness that leaves behind no ontological residue. But is Mi bskyod rdo rje’s own viewpoint able to meet this stringent requirement? In other words, can he retain his Mahāmudrā tradition’s central teachings on recognizing the nature of mind (sems nyid) or natural awareness (tha mal gyi shes pa) by means of unmediated yogic direct perception (rnal ’byor pa’i mngon sum) and mental nonengagement (yid la mi byed pa) without recourse to realist and foundationalist aspirations and assumptions? 62 Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 344.5–9: ’dis nyi tshe ba’i stong nyid stong pa nyid kyi tshul du smra ba ’gog pa ni | dper na | sems tsam pas gzhan dbang rnam rig gi steng du gzung ’dzin kun brtags kyis stong pa’i stong nyid smra yang | gzhan dbang rnam rig gi ngo bos mi stong par ’dod pa la | khyod ’dod pa’i stong nyid kyi tshul de lta bu de chos thams cad la khyab pa’i stong pa nyid dpyis phyin de ma yin par thal | bden pa gnyis las don dam par mi stong pa’i chos shig lhag mar lus pas stong nyid nyi tshe bar smra ba’i phyir zhes dngos por smra ba la nongs pa phar la bskur bar mdzad pa yin la | khyed ’dod pa’i dbu ma’i lugs de ltar na | sems tsam pa sogs dngos smra ba la nongs pa phar la bskur ba de tshur la log par ’gyur te |. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 259 This question brings us to the heart of the Karma pa’s middle path, a path that opens onto the discernable but elusive nature of mind and reality described in Mantrayāna, Mahāmudrā, and Tathāgatagarbha discourses while steering clear of illegitimate imputations. It is a path, that is, that brings into view what he sometimes calls a groundless ground (gzhi’i gzhi med) or foundationless foundation (gnas med gnas). Its discovery must be a matter of yogic direct perception, an attestation of reality in its most ontologically primitive condition, but one that avoids construing what is uncovered as a foundation, some shovelstopping bedrock on which all depends but that itself depends on nothing.63 The Karma pa thus finds himself in the difficult position of having to clarify and justify how there is available to the Mahāmudrā practitioner some basic and invariant ground (gzhi) of human experience that is itself without any still deeper source or grounding (gzhi med rtsa bral) and therefore exempt from Madhyamaka charges of realism and foundationalism. To articulate the possibility of a non-foundationalist ground of experience, the Karma pa must first acknowledge the presence of a basic nondual mode of awareness that, however elusive, is nonetheless accessible and discernible within the experiential continuum. He must also specify how it is structurally separate from the concurrent adventitious streams of dualistic cognition. In this regard, it is imperative for him to clarify that the former can never be a transformed aspect of the latter – that is to say, nondual wisdom cannot be merely an altered state of mundane consciousness. Rather, nondual wisdom is what reveals itself when the imputed and adventitious modes of consciousness are purified out of existence, leaving in their wake no remainder, no residual reifications: In this [Karma Bka’ brgyud] tradition, according to the Prāsaṅgika Mādhyamikas, if investigated, all the constellations of consciousness are of the nature of adventitious stains, so it is not possible for them to be fundamentally transformed into the essence of stainless wisdom. This is so because, were this possible, then [wisdom] would have to possess error (’khrul pa) since an effect must be concordant with its cause. For this reason [the Prāsaṅgika] do not accept that on the level of buddhahood even the wisdom of fundamentally transformed consciousness [exists]. And consequently, a truly established mind empty of both subject and object is not endorsed by any Mādhyamika. That said, there are some Svātantrikas who explain that, conventionally, the mind empty of duality, luminosity, and wisdom exists in the meditative equipoise of noble 63 Dgongs gcig ’grel pa Ia, MKsb vol. 4, 497.1. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 260 Higgins bodhisattvas and perfect buddhas. However, the Prāsaṅgikas do not maintain the existence of the functioning of mind and wisdom at all, even conventionally. Hence, in the case of the six or eight constellations of consciousness, some remnant (lhag ma) mind empty of subject and object would [have to] be covert, unable to produce the overt cognitions (rnam rig, prajñapti) of subject and object. The stream of consciousness (rig rgyun) that has entered the sphere without remainder [in the case] of śrāvaka and pratyekabuddha saints is not explicitly manifest; [yet] this cognition or mind that is not modified by objects and in which dualistic appearances have vanished is not at all the same as the buddha nature of ground, path, and fruition explained in the Uttaratantra [RGV] and the nondual wisdom of ground, path and fruition explained in the Mantra[yāna] because were it the same, then one would be forced to conclude that even the goals of buddhahood of the sūtras and tantras are not at all the same … and the buddha[hood] of sūtras and tantras [would] be subdivided into superior and inferior [types].64 The author is here emphatic that the invariant nondual wisdom or buddha nature that is progressively revealed in all its dynamism by the Buddhist sūtric and tantric paths is fundamentally different from consciousness as variously classified in Buddhist Abhidharma and Yogācāra sources, as well as the śrāvaka and pratyekabuddha “stream of consciousness” that enters the sphere without remainder. As he explained in his Reply to Bla ma Khams pa, it may be observed that the flow of adventitious mind (glo bur gyi sems) is concurrent but 64 Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 48.13–49.11: lugs ’dir dbu ma thal ’gyur bas dpyad pa na rnam shes kyi tshogs thams cad glo bur dri ma’i bdag nyid can yin pas de nyid dri bral ye shes kyi ngo bor gnas ’gyur du mi rung ste | rung na ’bras bu rgyu’i rjes su ’gro bas ’khrul bcas su ’gyur ba’i phyir | sangs rgyas kyi sar rnam shes gnas gyur gyi ye shes kyang mi ’dod la | des na gzung ’dzin gnyis kyis stong pa’i sems bden grub pa dbu ma thams cad kyis mi bzhed kyang | tha snyad du rang rgyud pa kha cig | gnyis stong gi sems ’od gsal ba dang | ye shes byang ’phags dang rdzogs sangs kyi mnyam gzhag na yod par ’chad cing | thal ’gyur bas ni tha snyad du’ang der sems dang ye shes kyi rgyu ba gtan yod par mi bzhed la | des na rnam shes kyi tshogs drug gam brgyad la gzung ’dzin gyis stong pa’i sems lhag ma gzung ’dzin mngon gyur ba’i rnam rig bskyed mi nus kyi bag nyal | nyan rang dgra bcom lhag med kyi dbyings su zhugs pa’i rig rgyun mngon par mi gsal ba yul gyis kha ma bsgyur cing gnyis snang nub pa’i shes pa’am sems de ni rgyud bla mar bshad pa’i rgyu lam ’bras bu’i bde gshegs snying po dang | sngags su bshad pa’i gzhi lam ’bras gsum gyi gnyis med ye shes dang gtan mi gcig ste | gcig na mdo sngags kyi ’bras bu sangs rgyas kyang mi gcig ka med du ’ong zhing |… mdo sngags kyi sangs rgyas la mchog dman gyi khyad par ’byed pa’i phyir |. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 261 nonconvergent (ma ’dres pa) with the flow of innate mind (gnyug ma’i sems).65 This phenomenological observation allows Mi bskyod rdo rje to conclude that “consciousness” both in its sixfold (non-Yogācāra) and eightfold (Yogācāra) classifications is a cover term for a complex and heterogeneous set of phenomena that are epiphenomenal, having no independent existence apart from the nature of mind and reality. Unconditioned wisdom is what remains when the conditioned ālayavijñāna and its dualistic operations have ceased. The nondual wisdom revealed is therefore not the same as the residual nondual mind left behind when duality ceases, if this latter is taken as a foundational construct to support a particular theory of mind. The point is that, to be attested, this wisdom needs to be personally experienced (so sor rang rig gi ye shes); methods of rational justification, such as deductive or inductive inference, are insufficient for verifying its presence. To be sure, the possibility of human beings attaining this buddhajñāna can scarcely be denied without rendering the entire edifice of Buddhist soteriology incoherent and pointless. Nondual primordial awareness is both the point of the Buddhist path and what makes it possible. Nor can the view be rejected that there remains a nondual mode of awareness – however elusive to deluded minds – when all that obscures and obstructs it is dispelled, without begging the question of what distinguishes Buddhist goal-realization from the kind of voluntary stupefaction or blank-mindedness that was so sharply criticized by Mahāyānists. In this regard, the Karma pa underscores the soteriological significance of Buddhist ideas concerning mind’s luminous nature, which, whether described implicitly (in the sūtras) or explicitly (in the tantras), were taught in order to draw attention to immanent buddhahood that may be realized through these exoteric or esoteric paths: Now, among the middle turning [scriptures], etc., intending as [their] underlying intentional reference (dgongs gzhi)66 the luminous mind (sems ’od gsal) that is explicated in Mantra [scriptures], there were statements that the very essence of the six or eight constellations of consciousness 65 66 See the translation of this text, Bla ma khams pa’i dris lan mi gcig sems gnyis, in Higgins and Draszczyk 2016: vol. 2, 117–122. In Tibetan Buddhist hermeneutics, a statement, teaching, or scripture that is deemed to be of provisional meaning (neyārtha; drang don), i.e., in need of further interpretation to arrive at a definitive sense (nītārtha; nges don), must meet three criteria: (1) it has a fundamental or underlying (deep or hidden) intentional reference (abhiprāya; dgongs pa/dgongs gzhi), (2) it has a motive or necessity (dgos pa, prayojana), and (3) it contradicts reality if taken literally (dngos la gnod byed; mukhyārthabādha). On this three-fold scheme as formulated in Tibet by Sa skya Paṇḍita, see Seyfort Ruegg 1985: 198. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 262 Higgins is luminosity with the purpose (dgos pa) of making [people] thereby understand the buddhahood of the sūtras and tantras, which is attained by means of the paths of sūtras and tantras. Hence the statement, “mind is no mind; the nature of mind is luminous,”67 was explained in terms of that most expansive mind and wisdom that is not the mind consisting in the apprehending [subject] and apprehended [object]. Having this meaning in mind, the noble Maitreya also stated:68 “It is declared that there is no other mind apart from the mind of reality (dharmatācitta), which is naturally luminous.”69 In an exposition on tantric practice in his Explanation of the Direct Introduction to the Three Kāyas (Sku gsum ngo sprod rnam bshad) commentary, Mi bskyod rdo rje characterizes the nature of that mind that is thoroughly acquainted with the supremely incomprehensible70 domain of the buddhas but is not the domain of logicians (rtog ge ba), as being devoid of any source (rtsa ba med pa), foundation (gnas pa med pa), ground (gzhi med pa), characteristics (mtshan ma med pa), or shapes and colors (dbyibs dang kha dog med pa), and also as transcending the sense faculties (dbang po las ’das pa).71 Thus, what is truly established as the unchanging and luminous features of ordinary mind cannot be equated with the ultimate tantric luminosity of mind (sems kyi ’od gsal) because the former are simply reified images of the mind. 67 68 69 70 71 Aṣṭasāhasrikaprajñāpāramitā (ASP), D 12: 5b1–2. The corresponding passage from the Sanskrit is given in Schmithausen 1977, 41 as lines E.b.1–2 tathā hi tac cittam acittam | prakṛtiś cittasya prabhāsvarā ||. See n. 173. MSA XIII.19 (Sylvain Lévi ed., 88): na dharmatā cittam ṛte ’anya cetsaḥ prabhāsvaratvaṃ prakṛtyā (text: prakṛtau) vidhīyate ||. Dwags brgyud grub pa’i shing rta, 49.11–19: des na ’khor lo bar pa sogs las dgongs gzhi sn gags nas bshad pa’i sems ’od gsal la dgongs nas | dgos pa mdo lugs kyi lam gyis mdo lugs kyi sangs rgyas thob par shes pa’i ched du rnam shes kyi tshogs brgyad dam | drug gi rang ngo ’od gsal bar gsungs pa yod de | “sems ni sems ma mchis pa ste sems kyi rang bzhin ’od gsal ba’o” zhes gzung ’dzin gyi sems ma mchis pa’i sems dang ye shes ches rab ’byams su bshad cing | don de la dgongs nas rje btsun byams pas kyang | chos nyid sems las gzhan pa’i sems gzhan ni || ’od gsal ma yin rang bzhin la brjod do ||. The Skt. of MSA XIII.19a–d, according to Lévi (MSABh, 88.9–10) is as follows: [mataṃ ca cittaṃ prakṛtiprabhāsvaraṃ sadā tad āgantukadośadūṣitaṃ |] na dharmatācittam ṛte ’nyacetasaḥ prabhāsvaratvaṃ prakṛtyā (text: prakṛtau) vidhīyate ||. “[The mind is taken to be luminous by nature; it is [only] tainted by adventitious faults.] A natural luminosity of (i.e., consisting of) another [dependent] mind (cetas), different from the mind as true nature (dharmatā) is not taught.” As referenced and quoted in Mathes 2008: 487–488 n. 966. The expression mchog tu bzung bar dka ’bar literally means “supremely difficult to grasp.” Sku gsum ngo sprod rnam bshad, MKsb vol. 22, 260.4–5. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 263 One’s own mind has been described by the illustrious Dwags po Bka’ brgyud pas as “great primordial freedom without ground or source” (gzhi med rtsa bral), which is free from all limits of discursive elaborations. Though established in that way, it is not possible that [what is] truly established as the unchanging permanence of mind and the luminosity of cognizing mind constitutes the luminosity of mind of the Mantra[yāna] that is the limit of reality (bhūtakoṭi) [i.e., ultimate truth] because these are not free from mental imagery involving elaborations.72 The idea that the nature of mind is without ground or source (gzhi med rtsa bral) has been a recurrent theme in Tibetan doctrinal history and was already well attested in the earliest Rdzogs chen traditions.73 Mi bskyod rdo rje resurrects this idea in his Dgongs gcig commentaries, observing that in Buddhist teachings on the lack of intrinsic essence of all phenomena, “inasmuch as the nature of all phenomena is without foundation, it was not demonstrable in terms of any linguistic imputation of a ‘foundation.’ ”74 Yet, emptiness, the lack of intrinsic essence, had been described by the buddha as a foundationless foundation (gnas med gnas yin), since it is of the nature of nonreification or nonsuperimposition. Already in the twelfth century, Bla ma Zhang brtson ’grus grags pa (1122–1193) had provocatively declared that characterizing the absolute without ground and devoid of a source (gzhi med rtsa bral) is deeply mistaken given that “the basis of designation, the designation, and the terms themselves” are without ground or source. The absolute is neither a ground nor groundless, neither a source nor sourceless. Mi bskyod rdo rje comments that if one is to fully comprehend the comprehensive Madhyamaka mode of emptiness that is not one thing’s dialectical emptiness of another thing, it is necessary to realize that the entire range of phenomenal entities are without any ground or source (gzhi med rtsa bral). However, he proceeds to quote the 72 73 74 Sku gsum ngo sprod rnam bshad, 260.5–261.1: dpal ldan dwags po bka’ brgyud pa dag gi rang sems gzhi med rtsa bral spros pa’i mtha’ thams cad dang bral ba’i ye grol chen po zhes bshad pa de nyid du grub la | sems ’gyur med kyi rtag pa dang rnam rig pa’i sems ’od gsal bden grub la | sngags kyi sems kyi ’od gsal yang dag mthar mi rung | de dag gis ni spros pa’i mtshan ma las ma grol ba nyid kyi phyir ro |. See Higgins 2013: 172f. Dgongs gcig ’grel pa Ia, MKsb vol. 4, 496.4–5: chos rnams kyi rang bzhin ni gnas pa med pa la gnas pa’i sgras sgro btags nas bstan ma yin te |…. The author quotes an unidentified sūtra, which states “these phenomena, these things which are not grounded, do not have a foundation. Although the foundationless is described in terms of a foundation, an intrinsic essence is not discovered.” (chos ’di dag ni mi gnas pa’i ’di dag la ni gnas yod min || gnas med gnas pa’i sgras brjod kyang || rang gis ngo bo’o rnyed ma yin ||.) For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV 264 Higgins relevant passage of Bla ma Zhang, which concludes by stressing the absurdity of declaring the absolute to be groundless: Even concerning the absolute imputed by the scholars, The basis of designation, the designation, and the terms themselves Are [said to be] without ground and devoid of source. [But] being neither ground nor groundless, Those who call it “groundless” are mistaken. [And] being neither a source nor devoid of source, There being no deeper supporting ground, Those who label it as “devoid of source” are deeply mistaken!75 In sum, the eighth Karma pa’s recourse to paradoxical-sounding Buddhist formulations such as “groundless ground”76 may be viewed as an attempt to articulate an invariant continuum of being and awareness that is available to first-hand experience but cannot be reduced to the oppositional categories of existence and nonexistence and the extreme views of eternalism and nihilism based on these. From the Karma pa’s Middle Way perspective, it is a fallacy, in this instance as in so many others, to force upon the mind a choice between existence and nonexistence, as though such exclusive options exhausted the range of possibilities. To take either side is to impute either more or less to phenomena than experience can deliver. We might add that it is precisely because human experience is as heterogeneous and hierarchically stratified as it is that it remains radically underdetermined by what we make of it, lending itself to multiple descriptions without being definitively captured by any of them. Acknowledgements This essay is the result of research that was generously funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF Project number P23826-G15). Many friends and colleagues helped me to rethink and refine the material presented in this essay. I am especially grateful to Klaus-Dieter Mathes and Roger Jackson for their many useful comments and suggestions. 75 76 As quoted in Dgongs gcig ’grel pa Ia,’Bri gung bka’ brgyud chos mdzod chen mo vol. 77, 445.3–5: mkhas pa’i mthar thug sus btags kyang || gdags gzhi dang ni ’dogs byed dang || ming nyid gzhi med rtsa bral te || gzhi dang gzhi med mi ’dug par || gzhi med ces su btags pas ’khrul || rtsa ba med cing rtsa bral med || gtad sa gting nas mi ’dug par || rtsa bral zhes btags shin tu ’khrul ||. This passage belongs to a section that is missing from MKsb. See Braver 2012: 177. For use by the Author only | © 2020 Koninklijke Brill NV Mi bskyod rdo rje on the Question of What Remains 265 Bibliography Primary Indic Sources AN: AS: ASP: BBh: CS: LAS: MAV: MMK: MSA: PSP: RGV: RGVV: SRS: Aṅguttaranikāya (part I). Ed. R. Morris; 2nd ed. rev. by A.K. Warder. London: Pali Text Society, 1923. Asaṅga. Abhidharmasamuccaya. Ed. Pralhad Pradhan. 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