A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy

by Wing-Tsit Chan

  Thus there are truly reasons why things are nonexistent and why they are not nonexistent. As there are reasons why they are not existent, therefore although they [appear to] exist, they are really not existent, and as there are reasons why they are not nonexistent, therefore although they [appear to] be nonexistent, they are really not nonexistent. Since things [appear to be] nonexistent but are really not nonexistent, the nonexistence is not absolutely vacuous, and since things [appear to be] existent but are really not existent, the existence is not true (absolute) existence. Since the existent as it is is not true and the nonexistent is not entirely obliterated without any trace, although they are called differently, their ultimate meaning is the same.

  Therefore the youth [in the Scripture Spoken by Vimalakīrti] says with a sigh of admiration, “[The Buddha] has said that dharmas are neither existent nor nonexistent, because they are produced by causes.”46 The Ying-lo ching (Necklace Scripture) says, “When [the bodhisattva] turns the Wheel of Law [to preach], there is neither turning nor no turning. This means to turn where there is nothing to be turned.”47 These are the subtle words of various scriptures.

  What shall we say? Shall we say that things are nonexistent? Then the heterodox view [that things are annihilated] would not be erroneous. Shall we say that things are existent? Then the view that things are eternal would be correct. Because things are not nonexistent, the heterodox view is therefore erroneous, and because things are not existent, therefore the eternalist’s view is incorrect. Thus the true words of the absolute truth are that things are neither existent nor nonexistent.

  The Tao-hsing ching says, “The mind is neither existent nor nonexistent.”48 The Chung lun says, “Things are nonexistent because they originate from causes, but because they arise through causation, they are not nonexistent.”49 If we pursue the truth, we shall find these to be true.

  The reason for this is this: If the existence of things is true (absolute) existence, this existence should be eternal by its own nature and should not depend on causes to be existent. If the nonexistence of things were absolute nonexistence, it should be eternal nonexistence by its own nature and should not depend on causes to be nonexistent. If existence is not existence by its own nature but depends on causes to be existent, we know that although it [appears to] exist, it has no true existence. Since it has no true existence, it cannot be called existence in the real sense although it exists.

  As to [what the scriptures describe as] not nonexistent, what is nonexistent is tranquil and does not move, and may be called nonexistent. If the myriad things were nonexistent, they should not originate (rise). If they arise, they are not nonexistent. It is clear that “because things arise through causation, therefore they are not nonexistent.”

  The Mo-ho-yen lun says, “Since all dharmas arise through causation, therefore they should have [only relative] existence. [Likewise] since all dharmas arise through causation, therefore they should not have [absolute] existence. Since all nonexistent dharmas arise through causation, they should have [only relative] existence. And since all existent dharmas arise through causation, they should have no [absolute] existence.”50 As we think about it, are these words about existence and nonexistence merely intended for disagreement?

  If by saying that a thing “should have existence” is meant that it actually has existence, then it should not be said that it is nonexistent. If by saying that a thing “should have nonexistence” is meant that it is actually nonexistent, then it should not be said that it is actually existent. The reason why it is said to be existent [or nonexistent] is to make clear, by employing the concept of existence, that it is not nonexistent, and by employing the concept of nonexistence, that it is not existent. Here the fact51 is one but the statements are two. The expressions seem to be different, but if we appreciate their identical points, there are no differences which are not the same.

  Thus there are reasons why all dharmas are nonexistent and therefore cannot be considered to be existent, and there are reasons why they are not nonexistent and therefore cannot be considered to be nonexistent. Why? Suppose we say that they are existent. Such existence is not true (or absolute). Or suppose we say that they are nonexistent. But phenomena have already taken shape. Inasfar as things have already taken shape, they cannot be said to be nonexistent, and since they have no true existence, they cannot be said to be really existent. From this, the principle of the emptiness of the unreal should become clear.

  Therefore the Fang-kuang ching says, “All dharmas are temporary names and not real. They resemble a man produced by magic.”52 This man is not nonexistent, but it is a man produced by magic and not a real man.

  If we look for a thing through a name, we shall find that there is no actuality in that thing which would correspond to the name, and if we look for the name through a thing, we shall find that the name is not capable of helping us to discover a thing. A thing that has no actuality corresponding to a name is not a thing, and a name that is not capable of discovering a thing is not a name. Consequently, a name does not correspond to an actuality and an actuality does not correspond to a name. As name and actuality do not correspond to each other, where do the myriad things exist?

  The Chung lun says, “Things are neither this nor that.”53 But one man will consider “this” to be “this” and “that” to be “that,” while another man considers “this” to be “that” and “that” to be “this.” Thus “this” and “that” do not definitely refer to a particular name, but deluded people would believe that they necessarily do. This being the case, [the distinction] between “this” and “that” is from the beginning nonexistent, but to the deluded it is from the beginning not nonexistent. If we realize that “this” and “that” do not exist, is there anything that can be regarded as existent? Thus we know that things are not real; they are from the beginning only temporary names. This is why the Ch’eng-chü ching utters the expression that names are given perforce,54 and the Chuang Tzu resorted to the similes of marks and horses [which are but names].55 Thus profound doctrines [about the relationship between existence and nonexistence] can be found anywhere.

  The sage moves within the thousand transformations but does not change, and travels on ten thousand paths of delusion but always goes through. This is so because he leaves the vacuous self-nature of things as it is and does not employ the concept of vacuity to make things vacuous. Therefore the scripture says, “Marvellous, the World-Honored One (Buddha). You establish all dharmas in their places without disturbing Reality.”56 He does not depart from reality in order to establish them in their places; reality is right where they are established. This being so, is the Way far away? Reality is wherever there is contact with things. Is the sage far away? Realize him in one’s life and there will be spiritual intelligence, (tsd, 45:152-153)

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  THE PHILOSOPHY OF EMPTINESS: CHI-TSANG OF THE THREE-TREATISE SCHOOL

  The Three-Treatise School and the Consciousness-Only School represented the two major developments of Mahāyāna or Great Vehicle philosophy in India. The former insists that dharmas (elements of existence)1 and their causes are unreal and has therefore been known as the School of Non-being, while the latter insists that they are real and has therefore been known as the School of Being. Both were introduced into China by outstanding philosophers. Both had something profound and subtle to offer which China had never known. Both lasted for several centuries. But both failed to exert lasting influence on Chinese thought. It is important to understand why this has been the case.

  The Three-Treatise School, called Mādhyamika (Middle Doctrine) in Sanskrit, was founded in India by Nāgārjuna (c. 100–200 a.d.). Kumārajīva (344-413) introduced it into China by translating Nāgārjuna’s two most important treatises, the Mādhyamika śāstra (Treatise on the Middle Doctrine)2 and the Dvādaśanikāya śāstra (Twelve Gates Treatise) and his disciple Āryadeva’s Śata śāstra (One Hundred Verses Treatise).3 Hence the school is called the Three-Tr
eatise School.4

  The central concept of the school is Emptiness (Śūrryata) in the sense that the nature and characters of all dharmas, together with their causation, are devoid of reality. Thus all differentiations, whether being or non-being, cause or effect, or coming-into-existence or going-out-of-existence are only “temporary names” and are empty in nature. The only reality is Emptiness itself, which is the Absolute, Ultimate Void, the Original Substance, or in Chinese terminology, the correct principle (cheng-li). As such it is equivalent to Nirvāṇa and the Dharma-body.5

  The doctrine was transmitted in China through Kumārajīva’s pupil Seng-chao (384-414) and played a dominant role there from the fourth to the seventh century. It had a tremendous attraction for the Chinese because its philosophy of Emptiness suited the temper of Chinese intellectuals of Wei-Chin times (220-420), who were then propagating the Taoist doctrine of non-being. Its highly developed and systematic method of reasoning was a stimulating novelty to the Chinese. Its spirit of criticism and refutation gave the rebellious Chinese philosophers, including the Neo-Taoists, a sense of emancipation. Its nominalism reinforced the Chinese opposition to the Confucian doctrine of ranks and names, especially in the sixth century. In addition to all this, it had the great fortune of having as its systematizer the outstanding figure, Chi-tsang (549-623).

  This thinker, who had a Parthian father and a Chinese mother, joined the Buddhist order when he was seven, and eventually became one of the greatest systematizers of Chinese Buddhist thought and one of the most outstanding Chinese commentators on Buddhist texts. In him the Three-Treatise School reached its highest development. He wrote in excellent prose. His literary activity, including commentaries on the three treatises, is unparalleled in his age or before, and it is remarkable that all this was achieved during a period of continuous warfare.6

  Ironically, Chi-tsang’s success was at the same time the failure of his school, for it became less and less Chinese. As mentioned before,7 Seng-chao was still a bridge between Taoism and Buddhism. He combined the typical Chinese concept of identity of substance and function, for example, with the Buddhist concepts of temporary names and Emptiness. In Chi-tsang, substance and function are sharply contrasted instead. In that, he was completely Indian in viewpoint, although he quoted Taoists. As a systematizer and transmitter of Indian philosophy, he brought about no cross-fertilization between Buddhist and Chinese thought. And it happened that the Indian thought which he promoted was so utterly unacceptable to the Chinese that the school declined in the ninth century. It was introduced into Japan in 625 where it has never existed as an independent school, although its doctrine has remained an important object of learning even to this day.

  The reason for its decline is not so much its metaphysics as its approach to it. Its goal of Emptiness is not essentially different from that of other Mahāyāna schools. Its distinction rather lies in its three basic doctrines, namely, the Two Levels of Truth, refutation of erroneous views, and Eightfold Negation. According to the theory of Two Levels of Truth, it is worldly truth (laukikasatya) or common or relative truth that things exist provisionally as dependent beings or temporary names, but it is absolute truth (paramārthasatya) that all dharmas are empty.8 The doctrine is by no means unique to this school. What distinguishes it is that while the Consciousness-Only School, for instance, affirms dependent existence as real, this school insists that it is unreal. Actually this school denies both existence and nonexistence, for both are results of causation and as such are regarded as empty. The theory of being is looked upon as one extreme and that of non-being is looked upon as another. This opposition must be synthesized but the synthesis itself is a new extreme which has its own antithesis. At the end only the highest synthesis, the True Middle, or Emptiness, is true. Hence the school was originally known as Mādhyamika or the Middle Doctrine School.

  This is the inevitable outcome of the logical methods developed by the school, namely, those of refutation and negation. To this school, refutation of erroneous views is essential for and indeed identical with the elucidation of right views. But when a right view is held in place of a wrong one, the right view itself becomes one-sided and has to be refuted. It is only through this dialectic process that Emptiness can be arrived at, which alone is free from names and character and is “inexplicable in speech and unrealizable in thought.” The specific method in this dialectic process is Nāgārjuna’s Middle Path of Eightfold Negations, which denies that dharmas come into existence or go out of existence, that they are permanent or come to an end, that they are the same or different, and that they come or go away. The basis of all arguments is the so-called Four Points of Argumentation. By the use of this method of argument, a dharma as being, as non-being, as both being and non-being, and as neither being nor non-being are all refuted and proved to be untrue. Chi-tsang illustrates this method fully in his refutation of causation.

  It is obvious that this approach is as nihilistic as it is destructive. The school had little new substance to offer and nothing constructive. It is true that Emptiness as the Absolute is as pure and perfect as anything conceivable, but being devoid of specific characters and divorced from mundane reality, it becomes too abstract for the Chinese. It might be hoped that its novel and radical method of reasoning at least aroused the Chinese mind and led to a new approach to life and reality, but it did not. That opportunity was left to the Zen (Meditation, Ch’an) School.

  The writings of Chi-tsang are extremely schematic in presentation and highly summary in content, without thorough discussion or sustained argumentation. They do, however, represent the essence of the doctrines of this school. The following are from two of his most important works, a selection from his Erh-ti chang (Treatise on the Two Levels of Truth), a short essay in three parts, and several selections from his San-lun hsüan-i (Profound Meaning of the Three Treatises), a longer work in two parts.

  TREATISE ON THE TWO LEVELS OF TRUTH

  1. The Two Levels of Truth

  The three kinds of Two Levels of Truth all represent the principle of gradual rejection, like building a framework from the ground. Why? Ordinary people say that dharmas, as a matter of true record, possess being, without realizing that they possess nothing. Therefore the Buddhas propound to them the doctrine that dharmas are ultimately empty and void.

  When it is said that dharmas possess being, it is ordinary people who say so. This is worldly truth, the truth of ordinary people. Saints and sages, however, truly know that dharmas are empty in nature. This is absolute truth, the truth of sages. This principle [of worldly versus absolute truth is taught] in order to enable people to advance from the worldly to the absolute, and to renounce [the truth of] ordinary people and to accept that of the sages. This is the reason for clarifying the first level of twofold truth.

  Next comes the second stage, which explains that both being and non-being belong to worldly truth, whereas non-duality (neither being nor non-being) belongs to absolute truth. It shows that being and non-being are two extremes, being the one and non-being the other. From these to permanence and impermanence, and the cycle of life-and-death and Nirvāṇa these are both two extremes. Because the absolute [truth of non-being] and the worldly [truth of being] and the cycle of life-and-death and Nirvāṇa are both two extremes, they therefore constitute worldly truth, and because neither-the-absolute-nor-the-worldly, and neither-the-cycle-of-life-and-death-nor-Nirvāṇa are the Middle Path without duality, they constitute the highest truth.

  Next comes the third stage in which both duality and non-duality are worldly truth, whereas neither-duality-nor-non-duality is the highest truth. Previously it has been explained that the worldly and the absolute and the cycle of life-and-death and Nirvāṇa are two extremes and onesided and therefore constitute worldly truth, whereas neither-the-worldly-nor-the-absolute and neither-the-cycle-of-life-and-death-nor-Nirvāṇa are the Middle Path without duality and therefore constitute the highest truth. But these two are also two extremes. Why? Duality is one-
sided while non-duality is central. But one-sidedness is an extreme and centrality is also an extreme. One-sidedness and centrality, after all, are two extremes. Being two extremes, they are therefore called worldly truth. Only neither-one-sidedness-nor-centrality can be regarded as the Middle Path or the highest truth. (Erh-ti chang, pt. 1, tsd, 45:90-91)

  Comment. The similarity of this dialectic is strikingly similar to that of Hegel and Chuang Tzu.9 With Chuang Tzu, both the right or the wrong, or the “this” or the “that” are infinite series and are to be synthesized in the all-inclusive Tao. It has been said that while the dialectic of Hegel includes all in the Absolute, that of Nāgārjuna excludes everything from Emptiness. This is not correct, for worldly truth is not denied but accepted as such. However, like Hegel, every new synthesis is regarded as higher, and worldly truth is therefore considered inferior. In this respect, Taoism is different from both of them, for Taoism grants equality to all things, whether worldly or not.

  PROFOUND MEANING OF THE THREE TREATISES

  2. Causes and Effects

  Question: What does it mean to say that there are erroneous causes and erroneous effects?

  Answer: Some heterodoxical schools say that the Great Lord of Heaven10 can produce the myriad things, and that when they perish, they return to the original Heaven. Therefore they say that if the Great Lord is angry, all the four kinds of living beings11 will suffer, and if the Great Lord is pleased, there will be happiness in all the Six Stages of Existence.12 But Heaven is not the cause of things and things are not the effects of Heaven. They are imagined by an erroneous mind and are therefore called erroneous causes and erroneous effects.