Conclusion

The relationship between Madhyamaka and Mind-Only is configured in different ways among Tibetan traditions, and how their relationship is configured informs the shape of the distinct contemplative practices there. The conclusion here reiterates how understanding the interplay of these two traditions, in conversation with the discourses of ontology and phenomenology, can illuminate some of the issues at stake in Tibetan thought and connect them to contemporary issues. Like Mind-Only and Madhyamaka, ontology and phenomenology represent divergent modes of thought and practice that can be seen to offer unique lenses on the world, yet they can also be seen to overlap, or even mutually entail each other.

Between Construction and Immediacy

This chapter begins with a discussion of emptiness and introduces two broad streams of interpretation of the import of negation. The “enframed” interpretation emphasizes the value of language and thought in the discovery of ultimate truth, while the “unenframed” interpretation emphasizes the way that language and thought impede this discovery. Both interpretations claim to represent the view of Madhyamaka, the middle way between the extremes of essentialism and nihilism. The Geluk tradition of Madhyamaka emphasizes the interpretation of emptiness as an absence of true existence, yet its meaning is also participatory and performative, since the meaning of emptiness is to be cultivated through meditation. In Mind-Only and Yogācāra-inflected traditions like the Kagyü and Nyingma, the experiential or phenomenological dimension of emptiness is emphasized, whereby emptiness is inclusive of a participatory (or cognitive) orientation and is not typically framed as an object or solely the (object-ive) nature of things.

Radical Phenomenology

This chapter considers tantra, and the contemplative practices in Tibet informed by Mind-Only and Madhyamaka, where language plays a more explicitly creative and liberating role. Tantric traditions, including the Great Perfection and Mahāmudrā, resonate deeply with Mind-Only. In significant ways, these traditions can even be said to be iterations of Yogācāra, as extensions of its contemplative (yoga) practice (ācāra). This chapter discusses the “radical phenomenology” of these traditions, as extensions of Mind-Only. It describes how the guiding principle of emptiness, a Madhyamaka forte, is embedded in these traditions as well. Indeed, the “three greats” of the Great Madhyamaka, the Great Seal (Mahāmudrā), and the Great Perfection explicitly incorporate features of Madhayamaka.

Nonduality of Madhyamaka and Yogācāra

This chapter shows the ways that Madhyamaka and Mind-Only can be seen to offer distinct depictions of the world, framed in terms of a relationship between ontology and phenomenology. The perspectives offered by ontology and phenomenology can be understood as taking their starting points in object-oriented and subject-oriented modes of inquiry, respectively. Mind-Only highlights the subjective orientations to a world; Madhyamaka undermines the finality of any object-ive world picture by highlighting the contingency of all object-ifying constructions. It will be shown how these perspectives are mutually entailed and thus can be seen to share a common ground.

Introduction

There is a tension between two contrasting readings of Buddhist thought, and both are viable and widely attested interpretations of Mahāyāna Buddhist literature and practice. One reading is commonly found in the works of academic philosophers attuned to ontological analyses and the Madhyamaka tradition of the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism. Another interpretation is a phenomenological reading that appeals to the irreducibility and inexpressibility of the lived world as experienced. The term “phenomenology” is used here to represent this latter trajectory of interpretation, and while it may not be a perfect fit, the style of doing philosophy in phenomenological traditions clearly resonates, and it certainly shares a family resemblance with an important dimension of Mind-Only, as will be highlighted in this introduction.

Concepts and the Nonconceptual

This chapter discusses two theories of Buddhist knowledge: one based in a Yogācāra tradition inspired by Dharmakīrti and one based in a Madhyamaka tradition stemming from the works of Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti. In Dharmakīrti’s epistemology, rather than linguistic entities or objects of thought, perceptual experience is emphasized as the primary medium of undistorted truth. Inference also plays a key role, particularly as we see in Madhyamaka’s critical ontology—where analysis, not pre-reflective self-awareness, leads the way to liberating knowledge. In Yogācāra and Madhyamaka, both inference and perception have important roles to play, so we can see once again how both traditions interpenetrate, as each of them has phenomenological and ontological modalities or contexts where inference or perception is paramount.

Self-Awareness and the Subject-Object

This chapter discusses various interpretations of self-awareness, including its meaning as the beginning and culmination of Mind-Only’s phenomenological analysis. It also discusses the ways this notion has been criticized as simply another conceptual construct. Self-awareness can refer to an intransitive cognition and an intrinsic property of all awarenesses. It can also take the form of an objective or absolute idealism, as a metaphysical claim. Self-awareness has an important place in the Yogācāra tradition of Dignāga and Dharmakīrti, and it functions as a precondition for knowledge. Some Tibetans like Śākya Chokden took up this trajectory of Buddhist epistemology to affirm self-awareness as ultimate gnosis, the ultimate source of knowledge. In contrast, Tsongkhapa followed Candrakīrti in denying self-awareness. He did not build his Buddhist system upon this kind of epistemology or phenomenology. Rather, his system is driven by the critical ontology of Madhyamaka.