The Root Stanzas of the Middle Way
Page 5
Not arisen and not ceased,
The nature of phenomena is like nirvana.
8
All is real; all is unreal;
All is both unreal and real;
All is neither real nor yet unreal:
Thus by steps the buddhas taught.
9
It is not known through other sources; it is peace;
And not through mind’s construction can it be constructed;
It is free of thought; undifferentiated:
This describes the character of suchness.
10
What arises in dependence on another
Is not at all that thing itself.
But neither is it something else—
There is no annihilation, there’s no permanence.
11
This is the teaching—the draught of immortality—
Of all the buddhas, guardians of the world:
There is no identity and there’s no difference—
There is no annihilation, there’s no permanence.
12
When the perfect buddhas do not manifest,
And even when the shravakas have disappeared,
The primal wisdom of pratyekabuddhas,
Though there be no teacher, manifests completely.
19
An Examination of Time
If the present and the future
Depend upon the past,
Then both the present and the future
Are existent in the past.
2
If the present and the future
Are not present then,
How could the present and the future
Be dependent on it?
3
If they are not dependent on the past,
Then both are unestablished.
Thus the present and the future time
Do not exist.
4
To the two remaining times, it should be understood,
This same procedure is applied.
And likewise it applies to high and low and medium,
And to the singular and so forth.
5
Time that does not stay we cannot grasp;
And time that could be grasped
Does not remain. So how can time,
Ungraspable, be said to be?
6
If time depends on things,
Then how can there be time if things do not exist?
And since there are no things at all,
How can time exist?
20
An Examination of the Confluence of Causes and Conditions
If the result arising from the confluence
Of causes and conditions
Is within that confluence,
How can it arise from such a confluence?
2
If the result arising from the confluence
Of causes and conditions
Is not within the confluence,
How can it arise from such a confluence?
3
If the result is in the confluence
Of causes and conditions,
It should be detectable within that confluence.
But in the confluence it’s not detectable.
4
If the result is not within the confluence
Of causes and conditions,
Then these causes, these conditions
Are equal to noncauses, nonconditions.
5
If, giving to the fruit its causal strength,
The cause comes to an end,
The cause will have two natures:
One as giving, one as ceasing.
6
And if the cause came to an end
Without imparting to the fruit its causal strength,
The fruit that came from such an ended cause
Would be in fact without a cause.
7
If the fruit arises
In the selfsame moment as the confluence,
It follows that producer and produced
Are simultaneous.
8
If the fruit arises
Prior to the confluence,
This fruit would be uncaused,
Its causes and conditions being absent.
9
If the cause, on ceasing,
Is transferred into the fruit,
It follows that this cause,
Which previously was born, is born again.
10
How can something that has ceased and disappeared
Engender the effect produced?
How can a cause engender its result
When still existent and conjoined with it?
11
But if the cause and fruit are not connected,
What fruit is it that is engendered?
Whether it can or cannot “see” them,
A cause does not produce effects.
12
There can never be
A meeting of the past effect
With a cause that’s past,
That has now arisen, or is yet to come.
13
There can never be a meeting
Of the effect that’s now arisen
With a cause not yet arisen,
Or that’s past or else is now arisen.
14
There can never be a meeting
Of an effect not yet arisen
With a cause that’s now arisen,
Or is yet to come, or is already past.
15
If there is no meeting,
How is a result engendered by a cause?
But even if there is a meeting,
How is a result engendered by a cause?
16
How can a cause that’s empty of effect
Bring about this same effect?
How can a cause not empty of effect
Bring about this same effect?
17
An effect that is not empty cannot come to be.
An effect that is not empty cannot cease to be.
Since it is not empty,
It’s unceasing and unborn.
18
But how can what is empty come to be?
And how can what is empty cease to be?
It follows too that what is empty
Is unceasing and unborn.
19
That cause and fruit are one
Is never tenable.
That cause and fruit are different
Is never tenable.
20
If cause and fruit are one,
The product and producer are identical.
If cause and fruit are different,
Then cause and non-cause are equivalent.
21
If the effect possesses an existence in and of itself,
What is it that the cause produces?
If the effect has no existence in and of itself,
What is it that the cause produces?
22
What is not productive
Is not tenable as cause.
But if the cause is inadmissible,
From what will the effects derive?
23
Since the confluence
Of causes and conditions
Is not self-produced,
How can it produce effects?
24
Thus a confluence does not produce effects;
And neither are effects produced from what is not a confluence.
Since therefore there are no effects,
Where is the confluence of causes and conditions?
21
An Examination of Arising and Destruction
Without or with arising,
There is no destruction.
Without or with destruction,
There is no arising.
2
How could there be destruction
In the absence of arising?
For then there wo
uld be death when there’s no birth.
There’s no destruction, therefore, when there’s no arising.
3
How could destruction happen
Together with arising?
Death and birth do not take place
Within a single instant.
4
How can there be arising
In the absence of destruction?
For from all things
Impermanence is never absent.
5
How could arising happen
Together with destruction?
Birth and death do not take place
Within a single instant.
6
Since these can be established
Neither as occurring at the same time,
Nor as not occurring at the same time,
How are they to be established?
7
For that which has subsided, there is no arising;
For what has not subsided, there is no arising either.
For that which has subsided, there is no destruction;
For what has not subsided, there is no destruction either.
8
Without existent things,
There’s no arising or destruction.
Without arising or destruction,
There are no existent things.
9
For something that is empty,
Arising and destruction are not tenable.
And even for what is not empty
Arising and destruction are not tenable.
10
That arising and destruction
Should be one thing and the same is inadmissible.
That arising and destruction
Should be different—this too is inadmissible.
11
“I see arising and destruction,”
If such a thought occurs to you—
Only through confusion
Are arising and destruction seen!
12
From things that are existent, existent things do not derive;
Existent things do not derive from nonexistent things.
Nonexistent things do not derive from nonexistent things;
And from existent things derive no nonexistent things.
13
A thing is not born from itself,
Nor from another is it born.
It is not born from self and other,
How therefore is it produced?
14
To say that things exist entails
The view of permanence or of annihilation.
For it signifies that things
Are permanent or transient.
15
One might claim that things exist—
That there is neither permanence nor yet annihilation.
For existence is a continuity
Of causes and effects that rise and then subside.
16
But if existence is a continuity
Of causes and effects that rise and are destroyed,
Since what has been destroyed does not arise again,
It follows that the cause has been annihilated.
17
If a thing exists by its intrinsic being,
It’s impossible that it should cease to be.
At nirvana there must be annihilation
Since the existential stream is brought completely to an end.
18
If the last point [of existence] ceases,
The first point [of the next existence] makes no sense.
When the last point [of existence] has not ceased,
The first point [of the next existence] makes no sense.
19
If, as the last point is subsiding,
The first point is arising,
That which is subsiding would be one thing,
That which is arising would be something else.
20
If it is absurd to say
That what is ceasing coincides with what’s arising,
Are [we ask] the aggregates in which one dies
The ones in which one takes one’s birth?
21
Spanning the three times therefore
There is no existential stream.
But how can that which does not span the three times
Be an existential stream?
22
An Examination of the Tathagata
He is not the aggregates; nor other than the aggregates;
No aggregates are there in him, and in the aggregates he is not found.
The Tathagata is not the owner of the aggregates.
What then is the Tathagata?
2
If the Buddha is dependent on the aggregates,
He does not exist by virtue of his own intrinsic being.
How can what does not exist through its intrinsic being
Exist by virtue of another thing?
3
Whatever is dependent upon something else
Cannot be said to have existence in itself.
And how can what has no existence in itself
Become the Tathagata?
4
If there’s no intrinsic being [of the Tathagata],
How can there be otherness [of the aggregates]?
And aside from an intrinsic being and otherness,
What Tathagata will there be?
5
Even if the Tathagata
Existed independent of the aggregates,
He would become dependent afterward
And thus he would exist dependently.
6
Without depending on the aggregates,
No Tathagata can exist in any sense.
And if without depending on them, he does not exist,
How can he then appropriate the same?
7
Why does he not appropriate
What is not appropriated?
The Tathagata who does not appropriate
Does not exist at all.
8
If looked for in the fivefold way,
The Tathagata is not one with,
Nor is other than [the aggregates].
How can he be described as their “appropriator”?
9
Whatever is appropriated
Lacks intrinsic being.
That which does not have intrinsic being
By no means can exist by virtue of another thing.
10
Appropriated therefore and appropriator
Are in all their aspects empty.
This being so, the Tathagata too is empty;
Therefore how shall we affirm him?
11
Do not say that he is empty.
Do not say that he is not empty.
Don’t say both and don’t say neither—
Use such terms for the sake of indication.
12
Permanence, impermanence—all the four alternatives:
Where are they in the Peaceful One?
Finite, infinite—all the four alternatives:
Where are they in the Peaceful One?
13
Those who crudely think:
“The Tathagata does exist,”
Will think, regarding his nirvana,
“He does not exist.”
14
Regarding Buddha, who is empty of intrinsic being,
It’s untenable to think
That, having gained nirvana,
He exists or else does not exist.
15
Those who have conceptions of the Buddha,
Who, beyond conception, is unbounded,
Are blinded by those very concepts;
They do not behold the Tathagata.
16
The nature of the Tathagata
Is the nature of this world of beings.
The Tathagata is without intrinsic being;
This world of beings is without intrinsic be
ing.
23
An Examination of Mistakes
Desire, aversion, ignorance
Derive, the teachings say, from thought—
Arising in dependence upon that which is attractive,
Unattractive, and mistaken.
2
Since what arises in dependence
On the attractive, unattractive, and mistaken
Does not exist by its intrinsic nature,
Defilements are devoid of real existence.
3
In no way has the existence
Or the nonexistence of the self been proved.
And without the self, how is the existence
Or the nonexistence of defilements proved?
4
Defilements must be someone’s,
But this “someone” is not proved.
In the absence of this “someone”
Defilements do indeed belong to none.
5
As with the view of one’s own body,15
In five ways defilements are not found in the defiled.
As with the view of one’s own body,
In five ways the defiled is not found in defilements.
6
If the attractive, unattractive, and mistaken
Don’t exist by their intrinsic being,
What defilements are there that depend
On the attractive, unattractive, and mistaken?
7
Form and sound and taste and touch,
Odor and the objects of the mind.
These six are thought of as the basis
Of desire, aversion, and confusion.
8
Yet form and sound and taste and touch,
Odor and the objects of the mind
Are like the cities of gandharvas;
They’re like mirages and dreams.
9
In those who are like phantom beings,
In [objects] that are like reflections,
How could the attractive and the unattractive