An Eleventh-Century Buddhist Logic of ¿Exists¿

Ratnak¿rti¿s K¿a¿abha¿gasiddhi¿ Vyatirek¿tmik¿
Softcover Nachdruck of the original 1. Auflage 1969
ISBN: 978-94-010-3389-3
Verlag: Springer Netherlands

Buch, Englisch, Band 11, 89 Seiten, Paperback, Format (B × H): 160 mm x 240 mm, Gewicht: 175 g

Reihe: Foundations of Language Supplementary Series

I. RATNAKIRTI. HIS PHILOSOPHICAL CONGENERS AND ADVERSARIES Ratnakirti flourished early in the 11th century A. D. at the University of Vi­ kramasila, a member of the Yogacara-Vijnanavada school oflate Buddhist philosophy. Thakur characterizes Ratnakirti's writing as "more concise and logical though not so poetical" 1 as that of his guru, Jfianasrimitra, two of 2 whose dicta are focal points of the present work. From a translogical or absolute point of view, Ratnakirti endorses a form of 3 solipsistic idealism. The Sarhtdndntaradu$alJa, his proof of solipsism written from the standpoint ofthe highest truth (paramdrtha), concludes that an exter­ nal nonmental continuum is impossible. In ultimate reality the cognizing sub­ ject, its act of awareness, and the cognized object coalesce - all are fabrications superposed on what is really an indivisible evanescent now (svalak$alJa). 4 As Ratnakirti's predecessors have put it: There is neither an 'I' nor a 'he' nor a 'you' nor even an 'it'; neither the thing, nor the not-thing; neither a law nor a system; neither the terms nor the relations. But there are only the cognitive events of colourless sensations which have forms but no names. They are caught for a moment in a stream and then rush to naught. Even the stream is a fiction. That sensum of the moment, the purest particular, that advaya, the indivisible unit of cognition, that is the sole reality, the rest are all fictions, stirred up by time-honoured 5 convention of language which is itself a grand fiction.

Zielgruppe

Research

Autoren/Hrsg.

McDermott, A. C.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

I. Ratnak?rti. His Philosophical Congeners and Adversaries.- II. Notation.- III. Vy?pti.- Transliterated Text.- English Translation.- Notes.- Selected Bibliography.- Index of Sanskrit Technical Terms.