The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition: Great Madhyamaka

It has now become possible to identify the specific school
or tradition of Buddhism in Tibet that represents the doctrinal
position of the Wisdom Tradition known today as Theosophy. It
is the “Great Madhyamaka” or “Great Middle Way” (in Tibetan,
dbu ma chen po)1
school or tradition. This tradition, preserved
for the last millennium in Tibet, has only become known to us
in recent years.
Theosophy is said to represent a secret Wisdom Tradition
that was once universal. But knowledge of its very existence long
ago disappeared from public consciousness. It became hidden,
or more colloquially, went “underground.” In recent centuries,
it is supposed to have been preserved by a secret brotherhood
located in Tibet. From two members of this brotherhood, H. P.
Blavatsky learned of the existence of this Wisdom Tradition.
Under their instruction, she made its existence known to the
world, and brought out some of its teachings. She called these
teachings Theosophy. They were greeted with much skepticism
when they came out in the late 1800s, as would be expected of
any allegedly secret teachings. Theosophy never claimed to be
Tibetan Buddhism; but many, among its critics and supporters
alike, thought that its teachings should be found therein.
The teachings found in Tibet are those of Mahåyåna or
Northern Buddhism. They are usually thought of in terms of
wisdom and compassion. Wisdom is the teaching of emptiness
(≈ünyatå), coming in the lineage of the bodhisattva Ma∆ju≈rî
through the teacher Någårjuna in the school or tradition called
Madhyamaka, the “Middle Way.” The teaching of compassion
(karuñå), comes in the lineage of the bodhisattva Maitreya
through the teacher Asa∫ga in the school or tradition called
Yogåcåra, “Practice of Yoga,” where yoga means meditation.
2 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
As the teachings of Tibet became accessible in the last few
decades of the twentieth century, it could be seen that these
agreed with those of Theosophy on the fundamental teaching
of compassion, but they did not agree on the basic doctrinal
teaching of emptiness. This basic Madhyamaka teaching was
accepted by all schools of Tibetan Buddhism as their doctrinal
position. Thus, even though all schools accepted the Yogåcåra
teachings on compassion, they did not accept as ultimately true
the Yogåcåra doctrinal position. This position was characterized
as Citta-måtra, “Mind-Only,” meaning that there is nothing but
mind. Rather, following the basic Madhyamaka teaching of
emptiness, Tibetan Buddhists held that the mind is empty of
any inherent or ultimate existence. Holding the Madhyamaka
doctrinal position, however, did not stop them in the least from
adopting and applying the Yogåcåra teachings on compassion.
Indeed, nowhere else on earth has compassion been developed
and cultivated to the extent it was in Tibet; so much so, that it is
seen as Tibetan Buddhism’s most characteristic feature.
Similarly, Theosophy’s basic platform is “brotherhood,”
the brotherhood of all humanity, a quite radical idea in the late
1800s when it was brought out. That this was based on the
Mahåyåna Buddhist idea of compassion, the bodhisattva ideal,
can be seen throughout the Theosophical writings, above all in
The Voice of the Silence.
2
This small treatise is said to have been
translated by Blavatsky from The Book of the Golden Precepts. These
precepts, she says, “are written variously, sometimes in Tibetan
but mostly in ideographs.”3
The language of these ideographs
she calls “Senzar,” describing it as a secret sacerdotal language.
From this language she also translated the “Stanzas of Dzyan,”
on the origin of the cosmos and of humanity, published in her
greatest work, The Secret Doctrine. She tells us that both of her
sources, The Book of Dzyan and The Book of the Golden Precepts,
form part of the same series.4
In her translation of parts of the
latter as The Voice of the Silence, we find the key term “Ålaya” used
eight times.5
In her translation of the “Stanzas of Dzyan” in The
Secret Doctrine, “Ålaya” is featured in the last verse of the first
stanza.6
This is a distinctive Yogåcåra doctrinal term.
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 3
The term ålaya, usually understood to stand for the fuller
ålaya-vij∆åna,
7
is the single most characteristic Yogåcåra term.
Ålaya-vij∆åna has been translated as “storehouse consciousness,”
“substratum consciousness,” “foundational consciousness,” or
“mind basis-of-all.” It is defined by Asa∫ga as citta, “mind,”8
as in
Cittamåtra, “Mind-Only,” the distinctive doctrinal position that
is usually held to characterize the Yogåcåra school or tradition.
We find further that the distinctive Yogåcåra doctrinal term
parinißpanna is also used in the “Stanzas of Dzyan,” twice.9
This is
one of three terms that together give the Yogåcåra description
of everything that is. Things partake of three characteristics
(lakßaña), or natures (svabhåva): the “imagined” (parikalpita),
which is unreal, the “dependent” (paratantra), which is partially
real, and the “perfected” (parinißpanna), which is real. Since
parinißpanna, like ålaya, is not used elsewhere, these provide us
with good evidence for tracing Theosophy’s doctrinal affiliation
to the Yogåcåra school or tradition of Buddhism.
However, Theosophy does not teach the doctrine of
“Mind-Only” (citta-måtra), or its other name, “ConsciousnessOnly” (vij∆apti-måtra). No, Theosophy clearly does not accept
an ultimate consciousness.10 So what Theosophy teaches cannot
be described as vij∆åna-våda, the “doctrine of consciousness”
[as ultimate reality]. These three terms are used to characterize
the Yogåcåra doctrinal position. Despite using Yogåcåra terms,
this is not the doctrinal position of Theosophy. No more than
the Mådhyamikas of Tibet does Theosophy accept the Yogåcåra
doctrinal position as ultimate. But neither can Theosophy be
identified with the widely known Madhyamaka or “Middle Way”
doctrinal positions, teaching emptiness (≈ünyatå).
In recent years there has come to be known in the West a
school or tradition that calls itself “Great Madhyamaka.” It is
different from the two well-known forms of Madhyamaka, the
Svåtantrika Madhyamaka and Pråsa∫gika Madhyamaka. When
the Madhyamaka teaching, the teaching of emptiness, first
reached Tibet from India, it was in the form of what later came
to be called Svåtantrika Madhyamaka, the Madhyamaka that
uses autonomous or independent inferences in its reasoning to
4 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
prove emptiness. This form of Madhyamaka comes down from
the teacher Någårjuna through the commentator Bhavya (or
Bhå[va]viveka). Then at the beginning of the twelfth century
C.E., through the work of the translator Pa-tsap Nyima Drak,
Pråsa∫gika Madhyamaka came into Tibet.11 This became the
dominant form of Madhyamaka there. It comes down from
Någårjuna through the commentators Buddhapålita and later
Candrakîrti. In its reasonings to prove emptiness it employs a
type of statement that shows the unwanted consequences of
whatever may be postulated by others. So both of these forms of
Madhyamaka prove emptiness, but by using different methods.
Such are the two kinds of Madhyamaka that are described in
the standard textbooks on tenets since the fifteenth century.12
There is no mention of a third kind, Great Madhyamaka.
Great Madhyamaka is described in the section on tenets of
The Treasury of Knowledge, written by the co-founder of the Ri-mé
or nonsectarian movement, Jamgon Kongtrul, in the latter part
of the nineteenth century. It draws on earlier works by the
Jonang teacher Tåranåtha and by the Sakya teacher Shakya
Chokden. An English translation of this section was published
in 2007.13 The work by Tåranåtha that it draws on, The Essence of
Other-Emptiness, was also published in English in 2007.14 Jamgon
Kongtrul first distinguishes the kinds of Madhyamaka, placing
the two well-known kinds, Svåtantrika and Pråsa∫gika, together
as Rangtong Madhyamaka, and calling the third kind Shentong
Madhyamaka. Great Madhyamaka is the original name for this
used by the Jonang teacher Dolpopa, who first prolumgated it
in Tibet in the fourteenth century. The Tibetan term Rangtong
(rang stong) means “self-empty”; Shentong (gzhan stong) means
“other-empty.” They are descriptive terms used to distinguish
the respective doctrines of emptiness.
Rangtong Madhyamaka, both Svåtantrika and Pråsa∫gika,
teaches the emptiness of “self-nature” (svabhåva), meaning real
existence, of all dharmas, the elements of existence that make
up the world, often translated as “phenomena.” They are “selfempty”; they do not ultimately exist. Shentong Madhyamaka
also accepts this emptiness, but says that this is not the whole
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 5
picture. It adds that in ultimate truth there is something that is
not empty of real or inherent existence, but that really exists.
It is empty of everything other than itself; it is “other-empty.”
Jamgon Kongtrul explains the differences between the two in
the Treasury of Knowledge, here quoted from Ringu Tulku’s 2006
book, The Ri-me Philosophy of Jamgön Kongtrul the Great.
For both Rangtong and Shentong Madhyamaka, all phenomena
included in the relative truth are emptiness, and there is the
cessation of all fabricated extremes in meditation. Their views
do not differ on these points. However, in relation to postmeditation, to clearly distinguish the tenet systems, merely in
terms of the way they use terminology, Shentong says that the
dharmata, or true nature, is there, and Rangtong says the
dharmata is not there. In the ultimate analysis, using the reasoning that examines the ultimate, Shentong says nondual primordial wisdom is truly established, and Rangtong says primordial
wisdom is not truly established. These two statements delineate
their main differences.15
He is saying that for both of them, all conventional phenomena,
our whole world, is empty, i.e., “self-empty,” and therefore does
not exist in the ultimate sense. For Shentong Madhyamaka,
however, the dharmatå, which is the inscrutable true nature of
all things or all phenomena (dharmas), and primordial wisdom
(j∆åna), do exist in the ultimate sense. They are “other-empty,”
i.e., empty of everything other than themselves. But these, for
Rangtong Madhyamaka, are “self-empty” like everything else;
hence they do not exist in the ultimate sense. As may be seen,
the doctrinal difference between the two is significant. In the
spirit of Ri-mé nonsectarianism, Ringu Tulku comments here:
So, their difference lies in the words they use to describe the
dharmata and primordial wisdom. Shentong describes the
dharmata, the true nature, as ultimately real, while Rangtong
philosophers fear that if it is described in that way, people might
understand it as the concept of a soul or atma. The Shentong
6 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
philosophers think there is a greater chance of misunderstanding if the enlightened state is described as unreal and void. Their
debates rest on how to phrase the teachings to have the least
danger of misinterpretation. Kongtrul finds the Rangtong presentation best for dissolving concepts, and the Shentong presentation best for describing the actual experience.16
It must be noted that the Shentong doctrinal position accepts
the Rangtong doctrinal position, but the Rangtong doctrinal
position does not accept the Shentong doctrinal position. The
debates on this in Tibet, therefore, were historically not very
conciliatory. For the numerically dominant proponents of the
Rangtong position, the Shentong position was akin to the nonBuddhist åtman or soul doctrine of the Hindus, and thus was
heretical. For them, i.e., for most Tibetan Buddhists, the same
would be true of the doctrinal position of Theosophy.
The Shentong or Great Madhyamaka doctrinal position,
like that of Rangtong Madhyamaka, and in agreement with that
of Theosophy, says the entire phenomenal universe is empty of
any inherent nature that would make it ultimately real, or exist
in the ultimate sense. But for Shentong the real ultimates for
which we have no adequate words do exist in the ultimate sense,
being empty of everything other than themselves. This teaching
is very much in agreement with what is taught in Theosophy. In
its most basic statement, “The Secret Doctrine establishes three
fundamental propositions,” the first of which is:
An Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless, and Immutable PRINCIPLE
on which all speculation is impossible, since it transcends the
power of human conception and could only be dwarfed by
any human expression or similitude. It is beyond the range
and reach of thought—in the words of Måñ∂ükya Upanishad,
“unthinkable and unspeakable.”17
Thus, both Great Madhyamaka and Theosophy are willing to
postulate something that is ultimately real beyond the dualities
of thought, beyond concepts.
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 7
Great Madhyamaka does not trace its origin to the teacher
Någårjuna, and hence to the bodhisattva Ma∆ju≈rî, as do both
Svåtantrika and Pråsa∫gika Madhyamaka, but rather traces it to
the teacher Asa∫ga, and hence to the bodhisattva Maitreya.18
This is of much significance to the present inquiry. It means
that Great Madhyamaka finds its origin in the five treatises of
Maitreya, and in the exegetical works thereon by Asa∫ga and his
brother Vasubandhu. These, of course, are Yogåcåra treatises.
But here they are understood as teaching Great Madhyamaka
rather than Cittamåtra, “Mind-Only.” Their Yogåcåra terms are
here used to teach Shentong, “other-empty.” We now see how
the “Stanzas of Dzyan” may use the distinctive Yogåcåra terms
ålaya and parinißpanna, and yet not teach “Consciousness-Only,”
but rather a boundless and immutable principle beyond the
range and reach of thought. Indeed, like Great Madhyamaka,
the origin of these stanzas, too, is traced to Maitreya.
The “Book of Dzyan,” from which stanzas are given in The
Secret Doctrine, is said by Blavatsky to be “utterly unknown to our
philologists, or at any rate was never heard of by them under its
present name.”19 This is because it is only a generic name, in
which “Dzyan” is a Tibetan phonetic rendering of the Sanskrit
term j∆åna, meaning “primordial wisdom.”20 As seen above, this
is distinguished as ultimately real in Great Madhyamaka. While
she gave us no clue of its actual name there in The Secret Doctrine,
she did write in an earlier private letter to A. P. Sinnett:
I have finished an enormous Introductory Chapter, or Preamble,
Prologue, call it what you will; just to show the reader that the
text as it goes, every Section beginning with a page of translation
from the Book of Dzyan and the Secret Book of “Maytreya
Buddha” Champai chhos Nga (in prose, not the five books in verse
known, which are a blind) are no fiction.21
The wording here could indicate either that the Book of Dzyan
and the Secret Book of Maitreya Buddha are the same book or
two different books, but the translation we have of the stanzas
does not show two different portions. She may be referring to
8 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
the combined ancient Senzar stanzas with later Sanskrit glosses
that she says she blended together in her translation.22 In any
case, she here identifies the Book of Dzyan with the Secret Book
of Maitreya, and distinguishes it from the known five books of
Maitreya in verse. With this we no longer have to merely infer
from the presence of distinctive Yogåcåra terms that the source
of her “Stanzas of Dzyan” is Maitreya. It is stated for us.
In conclusion, we now know that there exists a school or
tradition of Buddhism in Tibet known as Great Madhyamaka,
tracing its origin to Maitreya and using Yogåcåra terms to teach
an ultimate that is not consciousness, but is beyond it. It teaches
the ultimate existence of something that is Shentong, or “empty
of other,” and an ultimately existing primordial wisdom (j∆åna
or dzyan). We may reasonably identify this Great Madhyamaka
as the doctrinal position of the Wisdom Tradition known today
as Theosophy. We may say, in brief, that the doctrinal position
of Theosophy is Great Madhyamaka.
Confirmation from a Mongolian Lama
Confirmation of this has come from a quite unexpected
and independent source. Paul Brunton when visiting Angkor in
Cambodia in the 1930s met there a Mongolian lama who was
also visiting at that time. This Mongolian teacher told him of a
secret tradition that is the same as the Wisdom Tradition known
today as Theosophy. The information he gave came out in 1987
in Brunton’s posthumously published notebooks.
There is first a secret tradition which has combined and united
Hinduism, the religion of many Gods, and Buddhism, the religion without a God. There is next an unbroken line of sages who
held and taught this doctrine as being the real and final truth
about life. . . . The tradition itself was limited by the mental incapacity of the masses to the circle of a few sages and their immediate disciples. Vedanta and Mahayana are corruptions of this
pure doctrine, but of all known systems they come closest to it.23
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 9
Regarding this unbroken line of sages, Brunton asked him “if
they are the same adepts as those spoken of by H. P. Blavatsky.”24
The Mongolian lama then gave an account of how Blavatsky
came to study with them, and of her younger co-disciple, Lama
Dorzhiev, who we can infer was this Mongolian lama’s teacher.
About the adepts of Tibet, he said, “Their location was always a
secret; even most of the High Lamas never knew it.”25 What he
told Brunton about their doctrine, through a translator, was to
change his life. Brunton then gave out some of this to the world
in modern English as “mentalism.”
Through the services of an educated Chinese disciple who was
with him, we were able to converse about Buddhism and other
matters. He gave out a teaching which formed the basis of mentalism and which was occasionally so subtle that it went above my
head, but which I understood sufficiently to revolutionize my
outlook. Some of its tenets were incorporated in the mentalism
explained in my books The Hidden Teaching Beyond Yoga [1941],
and The Wisdom of the Overself [1943].26
Brunton carefully avoided using any Sanskrit terms when
formulating this teaching, since he believed that it had to be
given in modern terms.27 Nonetheless, through stray comments
he made, we are able to verify that the “mentalism” he derived
from this lama’s teachings is in fact Yogåcåra, or Cittamåtra,
“Mind-Only,” or Vij∆aptimåtra, “Consciousness-Only.”28 He did
not, however, regard mentalism as the ultimate truth, as he
makes clear in a few places.29 But when he wrote, in the 1940s,
nothing was known of any teaching like Great Madhyamaka
that used Yogåcåra terminology to teach something beyond
“Mind-Only,” or mentalism. He therefore took Yogåcåra as
“Mind-Only” and constructed his mentalism accordingly. It is
clear that the teaching he got from this Mongolian lama was
Yogåcåra based. This provides independent confirmation that
the doctrinal basis of the Wisdom Tradition known today as
Theosophy is a Yogåcåra teaching, a teaching that is ultimately
understood as Great Madhyamaka.30
10 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
Supplement: The Background of Great Madhyamaka
The Madhyamaka Background
The fact that Great Madhyamaka traces its lineage back to
Maitreya does not mean that it does not go back to Någårjuna.
Någårjuna is regarded by all as the founder of Madhyamaka, in
the sense of being the one who first formulated the Buddha’s
teachings given in the Perfection of Wisdom (praj∆å-påramitå)
sütras into a philosophical school or tradition, the Madhyamaka
or “Middle Way.” Emptiness (≈ünyatå) is the primary teaching
of this tradition, whether Svåtantrika Madhyamaka, Pråsa∫gika
Madhyamaka, or Great Madhyamaka. For its understanding of
emptiness as Shentong, or “other-empty,” Great Madhyamaka
utilizes the hymns of Någårjuna.31 It is in these hymns, they say,
that Någårjuna reveals the highest understanding of emptiness.
Någårjuna’s greatest work is the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå.
This is normally understood, even by Great Mådhyamikas, to
teach emptiness as Rangtong, or “self-empty.” This teaching,
that all things (dharma) are empty of any self-nature (svabhåva)
that would allow them to exist on their own, is considered in
Svåtantrika Madhyamaka and Pråsa∫gika Madhyamaka to be
the highest understanding of emptiness. This teaching is also
accepted in Great Madhyamaka, but as the next to highest. The
question of exactly what understanding of emptiness Någårjuna
ultimately intended is an open one. There is a brief text among
“The Hundred and Eight Guidebooks of the Jo nang pas” that
says Great Madhyamaka is the ancient tradition of Madhyamaka
following the original texts of Någårjuna and his spiritual son
Åryadeva, not yet divided into Svåtantrika and Pråsa∫gika.
Concerning the dBu ma chen po’i khrid [“The Guidance on the
Great Middle Way”]: it was received by the bodhisattva Zla ba
rgyal mtshan from the Newar Pe nya pa, one who belonged to
the lineage of Någårjuna, father and son [i.e., Någårjuna and
Åryadeva]. He taught it to rDzi lung pa ’Od zer grags pa, and
he to Gro ston, who propounded it widely. There are some
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 11
who hold that this was the lineage of the dBu ma lta khrid [“The
Guidance on the View of the Middle Way”] that came to the
venerable Red mda’ ba from mNga’ ris, in West Tibet, but that is
uncertain. This is [also] called the gZhung phyi mo’i dbu ma [“The
Middle Way according to the Original Texts,” i.e., of Någårjuna
and Åryadeva], and so is the ancient tradition, not yet divided
into Pråsa∫gika and Svåtantrika. That which is distinguished as
the special doctrine of Red mda’ ba, however, is the unblemished adherence to the Pråsa∫gika tradition, that follows the
texts of the glorious Candrakîrti.32
While Pråsa∫gika Madhyamaka was dominant in Tibet since the
fifteenth century, preceded by centuries when Svåtantrika held
the field there, these divisions did not exist previously in India.
There was simply Madhyamaka, with different teachers giving
different emphases. Only later and retrospectively were their
teachings classified as Svåtantrika and Pråsa∫gika. Moreover, in
the earlier centuries of the first millennium C.E., even Yogåcåra
and Madhyamaka were not yet separate schools of Buddhism.33
Indeed, we have Yogåcåra writers producing commentaries on
Någårjuna’s great work, the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå, including
even Asa∫ga. None of these were translated into Tibetan, but a
couple were translated into Chinese. Prof. Seyfort Ruegg writes:
It is to be noted that among the earlier commentaries on
Någårjuna’s writings there are some by important masters of the
Yogåcårin/Vij∆ånavådin school. . . . The existence of such commentaries on the MMK [Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå] by leading
authorities of the Vij∆ånavåda clearly indicates that Någårjuna’s
work was not considered to be the exclusive property of the
Mådhyamikas in the narrow sense of a particular school, and
that it was regarded as fundamental by Mahåyånist thinkers of
more than one tendency.34
So it is entirely possible that Great Madhyamaka was an
early tradition of Madhyamaka using the Yogåcåra terminology
employed by Maitreya and Asa∫ga to explain the original texts
12 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
of Nagårjuna and Åryadeva, before the time of Buddhapålita
and Bhå[va]viveka, who were later considered the founders of
the Pråsa∫gika and Svåtantrika divisions, respectively.
As for the question of what understanding of emptiness
Någårjuna ultimately intended, this will have to remain open.
Despite the repeated assertions of many Tibetan lamas today
that it is definitely the Pråsa∫gika understanding, and the fact
that this dominated in Tibet for the last six centuries, this was
not the dominant understanding in India. In Madhyamaka’s
original homeland the Svåtantrika understanding was equally
widespread, if not more so. Not only was Pråsa∫gika not the
dominant understanding of Madhyamaka in India, but even
Madhyamaka itself was not the dominant understanding of
Buddhism there, as it was in Tibet. In India, the Yogåcåra form
of Buddhism was equally widespread, if not more so. We learn
in standard histories of Buddhism that the pivotal Pråsa∫gika
teacher Candrakîrti was continually defeated in debate by the
Yogåcåra teacher Candragomin over several years at Nålandå
monastic university.35 We may recall here that the Yogåcåra
commentaries on Någårjuna’s Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå never
reached Tibet. All this serves to show that, historically speaking,
no one understanding of emptiness is clearly demonstrable as
being what Någårjuna ultimately intended. For this we will have
to await the discovery of Någårjuna’s own commentary.
It is a strange and inexplicable fact that Någårjuna’s own
commentary on his greatest work, the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå,
is apparently lost. The one attributed to him now found in the
Tibetan canon, titled Akutobhaya, is not authentic according to
Tsongkhapa and others.36 It is a brief commentary, consisting of
only 70 folios in its Tibetan translation as found in the Derge
edition of the Tengyur. Had this brief commentary actually
been by Någårjuna, they say, it would have been cited by all later
commentators. Yet it is not cited by any of them, even though
much of it is incorporated into Buddhapålita’s commentary.37
But the early biography of Någårjuna translated into Chinese by
Kumårajîva in 405 C.E. describes the Akutobhaya commentary,
the original one, as very extensive, of 100,000 verses measure.
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 13
He [Någårjuna] explains the Mahåyåna in detail and composes
the Upade≈a of 100,000 Gåthås. Besides, he writes the Splendid Way
of the Buddha of 5000 Gåthås, the great ˛åstra (textbook) on the art of
compassion of 5,000 Gåthås, the Madhyamaka-≈åstra of 500 Gåthås.
He causes the spreading of the Mahåyåna doctrine far into India.
He also composes the Akutobhaya-≈åstra with 100,000 Gåthås; the
Madhyamaka-Ōstra is contained therein.38
It would be easy for us to dismiss such seemingly extravagant
numbers as fantasy, except that Kumårajîva actually translated
the Upade≈a of 100,000 verses measure into Chinese, and this is
extant today.39 We therefore have reason to trust his very early
account that Någårjuna’s own original Akutobhaya commentary
on the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå, which Kumårajîva refers to as
the Madhyamaka-≈åstra of 500 Gåthås, consisted of the measure
of 100,000 verses. But inexplicably, it is lost.
What we can deduce from the earliest available sources is
that the basic understanding of the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå was
probably what later came to be called Pråsa∫gika, but that this
approach using negative dialectic was not seen as contradictory
to an approach using more positive language. That is, it was not
exclusively Pråsa∫gika, as it became in Tibet for the Gelugpas.
This may be deduced from the fact that the earliest available
commentary, the brief Chung lun translated by Kumårajîva into
Chinese along with the the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå in 402 C.E.,
takes a basically Pråsa∫gika approach.40 The Chung lun is closely
similar to the brief Akutobhaya commentary that was translated
into Tibetan five centuries later,41 although in China it was not
attributed to Någårjuna as it was in Tibet. It is now known that
fully a third of the Akutobhaya is incorporated verbatim into the
commentary by Buddhapålita.42 It is this commentary that came
to be seen as the source of the Pråsa∫gika understanding of
Madhyamaka, when Candrakîrti in his commentary defended it
against the method used by Bhå[va]viveka in his commentary,
later to become known as Svåtantrika. The Pråsa∫gika method
found in Buddhapålita’s commentary, then, can be traced back
to the Chung lun translated by Kumårajîva, our earliest extant
14 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
source. Kumårajîva obviously accepted it as correctly giving the
basic import of the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå. At the same time,
he also obviously accepted the lengthy Upade≈a translated by
him as correctly giving Någårjuna’s import, a text known for its
more positive approach to reality. Prof. Seyfort Ruegg writes:
Especially noteworthy are the references found in the *Upade≈a
to a positive theory of reality (dharmatå, tathatå, dharmadhåtu,
bhütako†i).43
It is this positive theory of reality that Great Madhyamaka finds
in Någårjuna’s hymns, especially the Dharmadhåtu-stava.
44 It may
be that Någårjuna’s original Akutobhaya commentary of 100,000
verses measure, like his Upade≈a of 100,000 verses measure, also
includes positive descriptions of reality. We know at least that
Kumårajîva apparently saw no conflict between the Upade≈a with
its positive characterization of reality and the Chung lun with its
use of the Pråsa∫gika dialectic of negations. This was before
Madhyamaka was divided into Svåtantrika and Pråsa∫gika, and
may reflect the ancient tradition of “The Middle Way according
to the Original Texts,” as Great Madhyamaka called itself. For
Great Madhyamaka, too, there is no conflict in using Pråsa∫gika
dialectic to negate the ultimate reality of all phenomenal existence, and using positive terms for an ultimate reality beyond
conception, as is done in some of the hymns of Någårjuna.45
If Great Madhyamaka is in fact the ancient tradition of
“The Middle Way according to the Original Texts,” it would
have drawn upon Någårjuna’s now lost Akutobhaya commentary
of 100,000 verses measure for its understanding of emptiness.
The custodians of the Wisdom Tradition claim to have access to
all such works as this one even now. Works of this importance
were not lost, they say, but were withdrawn.46 The fact that there
is full doctrinal agreement between the Wisdom Tradition and
Great Madhyamaka would point to this understanding being
the original one intended by Någårjuna. The time may soon
come when we once again have access to Någårjuna’s own
Akutobhaya commentary. Only then can we know for sure.
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 15
The Yogåcåra Background
Great Madhyamaka traces its lineage back to Asa∫ga and
Maitreya, as we learn from only recently available materials. In a
2007 Ph.D. thesis, Michael Sheehy provides a quotation from
Ngag dbang Blo gros Grags pa’s Lamp of the Moon: A History of the
Jonang Tradition on the origin of Great Madhyamaka.
With the arrival of the venerable Årya Asa∫ga (ca. 4th-5th cent.),
the chariot tradition of the Great Madhyamaka of definitive
meaning was elegantly distinguished and established within the
three planes of existence. This was the founding of the definitive
secret of the consummate intent of the victorious ones and has
been praised as the supreme distinction between the provisional
and definitive sections of the Mahåyåna sütras.47
Then, addressing a praise to Årya Asa∫ga for doing this,
Ngag dbang Blo gros Grags pa continues:
In particular, you transcribed the principal intended meaning
of the final turning from the Regent Maitreya, the tradition of
commentaries on the general intent of the sütra sections of the
Mahåyåna. These include the Uttaratantra, the two differentiations, and the two ornaments which together compose the Five
Treasures of Maitreya. When you studied with these masters, you
acquired each of the individual entrances of meditative concentration through merely studying the specific points of meaning.
Since these teachings of Maitreya are the intent of the victorious
one, they are the consummate definitive meaning composed
according to irreversible advice. Exactly as is, this is the vast
illumination of the view and meditation of the Gzhan stong
Great Madhyamaka.48
The writings received by Asa∫ga from Maitreya, then, form the
basis of the Great Madhyamaka school or tradition. As is well
known, these writings have always been described as Yogåcåra,
and have usually been thought to teach Mind-Only (citta-måtra).
16 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
If these texts really teach Great Madhyamaka, why are they
so widely believed to teach Mind-Only? According to sources
now available, the Mind-Only or Cittamåtra understanding of
Yogåcåra arose with 500 earlier teachers including Avitarka. As
explained in The Treasury of Knowledge by Jamgon Kongtrul:
The great exalted one of Jonang [Dolpopa] and his followers
maintain that Asa∫ga and his brother [Vasubandhu] were
Madhyamaka masters and that their system of philosophical
tenets is the Great Madhyamaka (dBu ma chen po).
You may wonder, in that case, who were the founding masters
of the Chittamåtra system? [The founders and promulgators of
the Chittamåtra system] were five hundred Mahåyåna masters,
great exalted ones of earlier times, such as Avitarka, and others.
“Others” means some of their followers and some later Proponents of Mere Cognition (Vij∆aptimåtra).49
Jamgon Kongtrul’s source for this is a text by Tåranåtha,
who there explains further:
It was well known that there were five hundred Yogåchåra
masters, such as the great venerable Avitarka, Jƌnatala, and
others. Their treatises were not translated into Tibetan, in the
same way that the treatises of the eighteen orders [were not
translated into Tibetan].50
Tåranåtha makes clear in his History of Buddhism in India
that these 500 teachers were the first Mahåyåna teachers, and
hence preceded Maitreya and Asa∫ga by centuries. He reports
that they were all followers of the path of Yogåcåra Cittamåtra.51
Thus, Mind-Only or Cittamåtra is not the teaching of Maitreya
and Asa∫ga, but arose earlier. Ngag dbang Blo gros Grags pa
writes:
Accordingly, after these three councils on the Hînayåna discourses had convened, it is said that five hundred teachers of
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 17
the dharma including the great honorable Avitarka and others
came about as adherents of the Mahåyåna. These scriptural
collections of the Mahåyåna including the La∫kåvatåra-sütra, the
Gañ∂avyüha-sütra and many of the Mahåyåna sütras were then
discovered in various regions, and these teachings were then
kept and diffused. From these, the Mahåyåna tradition of the
Cittamåtra system that asserts actual existence (dngos smra ba’i
sems tsam lugs) arose.52
This last statement refers to the tenet of the Mind-Only or
Cittamåtra system that consciousness (vij∆åna) is truly existent.
This is the source of the confusion. Great Madhyamaka does
not accept this tenet. Jamgon Kongtrul opens his chapter on
Cittamåtra tenets with this statement:
Chittamåtras state that consciousness is truly existent.53
The translator of Jamgon Kongtrul’s text points out that
according to him, this is the difference between Mind-Only or
Cittamåtra and Great Madhyamaka or Shentong Madhyamaka:
The opening verse is a concise statement of one of the
Chittamåtras’ main tenets: they assert consciousness to be truly
existent. According to Jamgon Kongtrul, this assertion distinguishes this tenet system from Shentong-Madhyamaka.54
Great Madhyamaka holds not that consciousness (vijƌna)
is truly existent, but rather that primordial wisdom (jƌna) is
truly existent. These two have often been confused, and thus
the Yogåcåra teachings of Maitreya, Asa∫ga, and Vasubandhu
have often been taken as teaching Mind-Only or Cittamåtra.
But, says Jamgon Kongtrul, this is a mistake.
This is simply the mistake of those who speak deviously by not
distinguishing between Vasubandhu’s assertion that primordial
wisdom is truly existent and the Chittamåtra system’s statement
that consciousness is truly existent.55
18 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
So the Great Madhyamaka tradition takes as its sources the
Yogåcåra works of Maitreya, Asa∫ga, and Vasubandhu, but it
does not understand them as teaching Mind-Only or Cittamåtra
like they are usually understood elsewhere.
The main point, then, is that Great Madhyamaka understands the Yogåcåra texts differently than Mind-Only. This is
true whether the Mind-Only understanding was taught by 500
early teachers including Avitarka or by some other teachers,
and whether these teachers preceded or came after Maitreya
and Asa∫ga. Granting this, it will still be worthwhile to see how
far the account of 500 early teachers including Avitarka from
Tåranåtha’s History of Buddhism in India can be verified.
The origin of Yogåcåra is normally thought to lie with
Maitreya and Asa∫ga. They lived, agreeably to both traditional
accounts and modern research, at least a couple centuries after
Någårjuna. Thus, when references to Yogåcåra ideas are found
in a work by Någårjuna, the authenticity of this work is called
into question. This work is the Bodhicitta-vivaraña, which gives a
sustained critique of Mind-Only ideas in its verses 22-56.56 But
the researches of Christian Lindtner, showing that this text is
quoted as a work of Någårjuna’s by many early Madhyamaka
writers, have provided convincing evidence that it is in fact an
authentic Någårjuna work.57 Now the question is where did the
Yogåcåra Mind-Only ideas critiqued in it come from.
Yogåcåra Mind-Only ideas are found in Mahåyåna sütras
such as the La∫kåvatåra-sütra. Tåranåtha’s account names this
and several other sütras as being brought out at the time of the
500 early teachers including Avitarka.58 Lindtner’s research
agrees that the La∫kåvatåra-sütra was sufficiently early to be
Någårjuna’s source for the Yogåcåra Mind-Only ideas that he
critiques, and in fact was.59 This answers the question of where
these ideas could have come from. But there is an important
weakness in this picture. It is unlikely that any Buddhist writer
would directly critique a sütra, supposed to contain the words of
the Buddha. They would only critique later Buddhist writers’
interpretations of a sütra. We are therefore practically obliged
to assume that some teachers were then teaching Mind-Only
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 19
based on these sütras. Thus some early teachers such as the 500
including Avitarka become not only plausible, but necessary.
Their works have been lost, just like the works of the eighteen
early Hînayåna orders that, as said by Tåranåtha above, were
not translated into Tibetan.60
Tåranåtha tells us that Avitarka was the teacher of Rahulabhadra, who was the teacher of Någårjuna.61 So the Mind-Only
ideas promulgated by these early teachers reached Någårjuna
directly. Någårjuna, after obtaining the Perfection of Wisdom
or Praj∆å-påramitå sütras from the Någas, and seeing the central
role of the teachings on emptiness in these sütras, was then in a
position to say that emptiness was the highest teaching of the
Buddha. So emptiness must also be what the Buddha primarily
intended in the La∫kåvatåra and other Mahåyåna sütras that
had come out earlier, even if Yogåcåra Mind-Only teachings are
also found in them. Thus, the earlier teachers were wrong in
taking Mind-Only as what these sütras ultimately teach, and this
needed to be countered. This Någårjuna did in his Bodhicittavivaraña. He did this a couple centuries before Asa∫ga arrived
on the scene. The Madhyamaka teaching, taking emptiness as
the primary teaching of all the Mahåyåna sütras, was thus in
place when Asa∫ga arrived.
Great Madhyamaka fully agrees with Någårjuna’s rejection
of Mind-Only, and his making emptiness the primary teaching
of the Mahåyåna. Någårjuna’s Madhyamaka was only furthered
by Asa∫ga and Maitreya, not opposed by them. Asa∫ga spent
twelve years in meditation trying to understand the import of
the Perfection of Wisdom sütras that Någårjuna brought out.62
Maitreya then showed Asa∫ga how the path to enlightenment
was hidden away in these Perfection of Wisdom sütras, teaching
him the Abhisamayålaµkåra, a book destined to become the
main textbook on the path used in all the Tibetan monasteries.
Maitreya also taught Yogåcåra treatises to Asa∫ga. Mahåyåna at
that time still remained a single tradition. It was not until later
that Madhyamaka and Yogåcåra were seen as separate branches
of Mahåyåna. Bhå[va]viveka was the first writer known to have
distinguished Madhyamaka and Yogåcåra as different schools,
20 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
specifically naming Asa∫ga and Vasubandhu with Yogåcåra,
and opposing it.63 Candrakîrti followed him in this, continuing
to distinguish the two, and continuing to oppose Yogåcåra.64
Thus the distinction of Yogåcåra and Madhyamaka coincided
with what was later viewed as the separation of the Svåtantrika
and Pråsa∫gika schools of Madhyamaka, of Bhå[va]viveka and
Candrakîrti respectively. Great Madhyamaka traces its lineage
back to before that separation, when the Yogåcåra treatises of
Maitreya were not regarded as conflicting with Madhyamaka,
but only as further explaining it.
Just as Någårjuna had furthered the Mahåyåna teachings
by showing that emptiness is their primary intent, rather than
Mind-Only, so Maitreya and Asa∫ga and Vasubandhu furthered
the Madhyamaka teachings by showing that other-emptiness or
Shentong is their ultimate intent, rather than self-emptiness or
Rangtong. Such is the Great Madhyamaka position. According
to this tradition, Vasubandhu wrote a great commentary on the
Perfection of Wisdom sütras that explained them by way of the
distinctive Yogåcåra teaching of the three natures (svabhåva):65
the “imagined” (parikalpita), the “dependent” (paratantra), and
the “perfected” (parinißpanna). These three natures were given
in slightly different terms in the “Questions of Maitreya” section
of the Perfection of Wisdom sütras in 18,000 lines and in 25,000
lines.66 This section was regarded by Dolpopa as the Buddha’s
own commentary, by which the sütras should be interpreted.67
Vasubandhu did so in his commentary. In this commentary it is
possible to distinguish emptiness in two different senses, said
Dolpopa.68 It is these that he widely promoted as self-emptiness
or Rangtong and other-emptiness or Shentong.
Great Madhyamaka was known as the meditative tradition
(sgom lugs) of the works of Maitreya, in contradistinction to the
analytical tradition (thos bsam gyi lugs).69 It was primarily an oral
tradition that was transmitted privately, and thus long remained
little known. This explains the lack of historical references to it
until its revival in India by Maitrîpa in the eleventh century, and
its subsequent transmission to Tibet, where Dolpopa spread it
widely in the fourteenth century.70
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 21
Notes
1. On Great Madhyamaka, see Stearns, The Buddha from Dolpo,
pp. 7, 49, 88, etc.; Tåranåtha, The Essence of Other-Emptiness, pp. 62 ff.;
and Dolpopa, Mountain Doctrine, pp. 6, 56, etc.
2. To give just one example from The Voice of the Silence, see p. 71:
Now bend thy head and listen well, O Bodhisattva—Compassion
speaks and saith: “Can there be bliss when all that lives must
suffer? Shalt thou be saved and hear the whole world cry?”
3. The Voice of the Silence, Preface, p. vii.
4. Ibid., p. vi.
5. Of these eight occurrences of “Ålaya” in The Voice of the Silence,
the first three are on p. 24:
Alas, alas, that all men should possess Alaya, be one with the
great Soul, and that possessing it, Alaya should so little avail
them!
Behold how like the moon, reflected in the tranquil waves, Alaya
is reflected by the small and by the great, is mirrored in the
tiniest atoms, yet fails to reach the heart of all. Alas, that so few
men should profit by the gift, the priceless boon of learning
truth, the right perception of existing things, the Knowledge of
the non-existent!
The fourth is on pp. 49-50:
Of teachers there are many; the MASTER-SOUL is one, Alaya,
the Universal Soul. Live in that MASTER as ITS ray in thee. Live
in thy fellows as they live in IT.
The next two are on p. 57:
Thou hast to saturate thyself with pure Alaya, become as one
with Nature’s Soul-Thought. At one with it thou art invincible;
in separation, thou becomest the playground of Samvriti, origin
of all the world’s delusions.
22 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
All is impermanent in man except the pure bright essence of
Alaya. Man is its crystal ray; a beam of light immaculate within,
a form of clay material upon the lower surface. That beam is thy
life-guide and thy true Self, the Watcher and the silent Thinker,
the victim of thy lower Self.
The seventh is on p. 67:
Know that the stream of superhuman knowledge and the DevaWisdom thou hast won, must, from thyself, the channel of Alaya,
be poured forth into another bed.
The last is on pp. 69-70:
Yet, one word. Canst thou destroy divine COMPASSION? Compassion is no attribute. It is the LAW of LAWS—eternal Harmony,
Alaya’s SELF; a shoreless universal essence, the light of everlasting Right, and fitness of all things, the law of love eternal.
In addition to these, Blavatsky uses it in her note on p. 88:
The “MASTER-SOUL” is Alaya, the Universal Soul or Atman,
each man having a ray of it in him and being supposed to be
able to identify himself with and to merge himself into it.
6. This verse of The Secret Doctrine, Stanza 1, verse 9, is:
But where was the Dangma when the Alaya of the universe was in
Paramartha and the great wheel was Anupadaka?
The ålaya is defined by Blavatsky here as “Soul as the basis of all,
Anima Mundi” (p. 47), explaining that “Alaya is literally the ‘Soul of
the World’ or Anima Mundi, the ‘Over-Soul’ of Emerson” (p. 48). So
the ålaya is “Cosmic Ideation, Mahat or Intelligence, the Universal
World-Soul” of her chart summary following the first fundamental
proposition of the Secret Doctrine (p. 16). It is the “Universal OverSoul” in the third fundamental proposition of the Secret Doctrine,
teaching “The fundamental identity of all Souls with the Universal
Over-Soul” (p. 17).
7. Great Madhyamaka makes a point to distinguish the ålaya
from the ålaya-vij∆åna, equating the former with the eternal j∆åna, or
primordial wisdom, and describing the latter as consciousness, or
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 23
vijƌna, which is ephemeral and is existent only conventionally, but
not ultimately. Certainly, the sixth occurrence of ålaya in The Voice of
the Silence shows this distinction where it says, “All is impermanent in
man except the pure bright essence of Alaya.” Similarly, Blavatsky says
in The Secret Doctrine, vol. 1, p. 48, “Alaya, though eternal and changeless in its inner essence on the planes which are unreachable by either
men or Cosmic Gods (Dhyani Buddhas), alters during the active lifeperiod with respect to the lower planes, ours included.”
8. Abhidharmasamuccaya: The Compendium of the Higher Teaching
(Philosophy), by Asa∫ga, translated into French by Walpola Rahula,
English version by Sara Boin-Webb, Fremont, Calif.: Asian Humanities
Press, 2001, p. 21.
9. The first occurrence of parinißpanna is Stanza 1, verse 6:
The seven sublime lords and the seven truths had ceased to be,
and the Universe, the son of Necessity, was immersed in
Paranishpanna, to be outbreathed by that which is and yet is not.
Naught was.
The other occurrence of parinißpanna is Stanza 2, verse 1:
Where were the builders, the luminous sons of Manvantaric
dawn? In the unknown darkness in their Ah-hi Paranishpanna.
The Producers of form from no-form—the root of the world—
the Devamatri and Svâbhâvat, rested in the bliss of non-being.
On the term parinißpanna, usually incorrectly spelled as paranishpanna
in The Secret Doctrine, but once correctly as parinishpanna (vol. 1, p. 23),
see also, “Book of Dzyan Research Report: Technical Terms in Stanza I,”
by David Reigle, found in Blavatsky’s Secret Books, pp. 73-81, or online at
www.easterntradition.org.
10. On this point, that Theosophy does not accept an ultimate
consciousness, see, for example, The Secret Doctrine, Stanza 1, verse 8:
Alone the one form of existence stretched boundless, infinite,
causeless, in dreamless sleep; and life pulsated unconscious in
universal space, throughout that all-presence which is sensed by
the opened eye of the Dangma.
The Mahatma Letters, letter #10, 3rd ed., p. 53:
24 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
If people are willing to accept and to regard as God our ONE LIFE
immutable and unconscious in its eternity they may do so and
thus keep to one more gigantic misnomer. . . .
“The Aryan-Arhat Esoteric Tenets on the Sevenfold Principle in Man,”
H. P. Blavatsky Collected Writings, vol. 3, p. 423:
Hence, the Arahat secret doctrine on cosmogony admits but of
one absolute, indestructible, eternal, and uncreated UNCONSCIOUSNESS (so to translate), of an element (the word being used
for want of a better term) absolutely independent of everything
else in the universe; . . .
11. The fullest account of this and the role of Pa-tsap Nyima
Drak (sPa-tshab Nyi-ma-grags) in it is found in “Spa-tshab Nyi-magrags and the Introduction of Pråsa∫gika Madhyamaka into Tibet,” by
Karen Christina Lang, in Reflections on Tibetan Culture: Essays in Memory
of Turrell V. Wylie, edited by Lawrence Epstein & Richard F. Sherburne,
Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press, 1990, pp. 127-141.
12. For an overview of textbooks on tenets, see “The Tibetan
Genre of Doxography: Structuring a Worldview,” by Jeffrey Hopkins,
in Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre, Essays in Honor of Geshe Lhundup
Sopa, edited by José Ignacio Cabezón and Roger R. Jackson, Ithaca,
N.Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 1996, pp. 170-186. To Jeffrey Hopkins
we are also indebted for a complete translation of the largest such
textbook, Maps of the Profound: Jam-yang-shay-ba’s Great Exposition of
Buddhist and Non-Buddhist Views on the Nature of Reality, Ithaca, N.Y.:
Snow Lion Publications, 2003. With Geshe Lhundup Sopa, Hopkins
translated a brief such textbook, dKon mchog ’jigs med dbang po’s
Precious Garland of Tenets, published in Practice and Theory of Tibetan
Buddhism, New York: Grove Press, 1976. This book was revised and
reissued as Cutting Through Appearances: Practice and Theory of Tibetan
Buddhism, Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 1989.
13. Elizabeth M. Callahan, trans., The Treasury of Knowledge, Book
Six, Part Three: Frameworks of Buddhist Philosophy.
14. Jeffrey Hopkins, trans., The Essence of Other-Emptiness.
15. Ringu Tulku, The Ri-me Philosophy of Jamgön Kongtrul the Great,
pp. 9-10. I quote this from Ringu Tulku’s book rather than Elizabeth
Callahan’s translation (see note 13 above) because I follow by quoting
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 25
Ringu Tulku’s comment on this passage. Callahan’s translation of it is,
pp. 258-259:
The Rangtong and Shentong [systems] do not differ over the
way that conventional [phenomena] are empty, nor do they
disagree that the extremes of conceptual elaborations cease
during meditative equipoise. They differ over whether, as a convention, dharmatå exists during subsequent attainment or not,
and over whether primordial wisdom is truly established at the
end of analysis or not. [The Shentong system] asserts that [if]
ultimate reality were simply a nonimplicative negation, whereby
its nature is not established, it would be an inanimate emptiness.
[Shentong Proponents] present [ultimate reality] as being primordial wisdom empty of dualism, as being reflexive awareness.
This is asserted to be the profound view linking the Sütra and
Mantra [systems].
16. Ringu Tulku, op. cit., p. 10.
17. H. P. Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine, vol. 1, p. 14.
18. See the opening few verses of Tåranåtha’s Supplication to the
Profound Zhentong Madhyamaka Lineage, at www.jonangfoundation.org.
See also on this: Tåranåtha, The Essence of Other-Emptiness, p. 62;
Jamgon Kongtrul, The Treasury of Knowledge, Book Six, Part Three: Frameworks of Buddhist Philosophy, p. 249; Ringu Tulku, The Ri-me Philosophy
of Jamgön Kongtrul the Great, p. 214.
19. H. P. Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine, vol. 1, p. xxii.
20. See on this, The Books of Kiu-te, or the Tibetan Buddhist Tantras:
A Preliminary Analysis, by David Reigle, San Diego: Wizards Bookshelf,
1983, pp. 46-47.
21. The Letters of H. P. Blavatsky to A. P. Sinnett, 1925; reprint,
Pasadena: Theosophical University Press, 1973, p. 195.
22. H. P. Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine, vol. 1, p. 23.
23. The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, vol. 10, The Orient: Its Legacy to
the West, Burdett, N.Y.: Larson Publications, 1987, chap. 4, section 7,
“The Secret Doctrine of the Khmers,” p. 199.
24. Ibid., p. 201.
25. Ibid., p. 201.
26. Ibid., p. 202.
26 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
27. Paul Brunton, The Hidden Teaching Beyond Yoga, new revised
edition, New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1942, pp. 99-100:
Although our unconventional presentation of this knowledge is
a modern and Western one, its original source is an ancient and
Indian one. Both silent texts and living voices which have informed our writing are mostly Indian, supplemented by some
Tibetan documents and a personal Mongolian esoteric instruction. A million men may gainsay the tenability of the tenets unfolded here but none can gainsay the fact that they are Indian
tenets, albeit little-known, without twisting the most authoritative ancient documents to suit their mediocre minds. If we do
not quote those texts here it is because our readers are primarily
Western and we do not wish to burden them with the troublesome necessity of exploring exhaustive glossaries for unfamiliar
Sanskrit names.
Paul Brunton, The Hidden Teaching Beyond Yoga, pp. 409-410:
This quality of the timelessness of truth thrust itself powerfully
into the present writer’s meditations one evening in a land of
steaming jungles and dense forests, where forgotten Indian sages
had carried their culture long ago. He sat amid the vast deserted
ruins of ancient Angkor, in Cambodian Indo-China, . . . Was it
not wonderful that the immemorial wisdom of these men, who
flourished and taught when Europe lay benighted in the dark
ages, could be known and studied today and would be known
and studied yet again when another two millenniums had once
more passed over this planet? Out of the burial-urn of the Past
this same wisdom has been extricated. But because it has here
been moulded in an ultra-modern form to suit both our time
and need, its authenticity or truth may not be plainly recognizable to its present-day Indian inheritors. Yet there is not a single
important tenet here which cannot be found phrased in the old
Sanskrit writings. We are only the inheritors and not the discoverers of this ever-ancient but ever-new lore.
Paul Brunton, The Wisdom of the Overself, New York: E. P. Dutton & Co.,
1943, pp. 13-14:
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 27
Hundreds of texts were examined in the effort to trace and collate basic ideas. . . . The Ariadne’s thread which finally led me
through this metaphysical maze was indeed placed in my hands
whilst visiting Cambodian China where I encountered amid the
deserted shrines of majestic Angkor another visitor in the person of an Asiatic philosopher. From him I received an unforgettable personal esoteric instruction . . . . All this is but a preamble
to the statement that with these volumes a doctrine is presented
which in all essential principles is not a local Indian tradition but
an all-Asiatic one. . . . It would have been much easier to emulate
a portentous academic parrot and merely write down what other
men had written or said as it would have been more self-flattering to parade the breadth of my learning by peppering both volumes with a thousand Sanskrit, Tibetan and Chinese quotations,
names or words. But life to-day points a challenging sword at us.
I was too sensitive to the iconoclastic spirit of our age, too
enamoured of the austere figure of truth rather than of her discarded robes, too troubled by what I had physically seen and personally experienced in this world-shaking epoch to be satisfied
with anything less than a fresh living reconstruction.
28. Paul Brunton, The Wisdom of the Overself, p. 26:
Mentalism derives its name from its fundamental principle that
Mind is the only reality, the only substance, the only existence;
things being our ideas and ideas finding their support in our
mind. Mentalism in short is the doctrine that in the last analysis
there is nothing but Mind.
This is obviously a straightforward statement of Yogåcåra understood
as Cittamåtra, or “Mind-Only.” While he carefully avoided using these
Sanskrit terms, we can derive them directly from his comment on the
mentalist schools of China and Japan. In The Notebooks of Paul Brunton,
vol. 13, part 3, p. 96, para. 214, he writes:
The mentalist schools of Chinese Buddhism existed only from
600 A.D. to 1100 A.D. They were named the Fa-hsiang and the
Wei-shih. The mentalist school of Japanese Buddhism was the
Hosso.
28 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
Fa-hsiang is the name of the Yogåcåra school in China. This school is
also known as Wei-shih, meaning vij∆apti-måtra, “consciousness only.”
Hosso is the name of the same school in Japan. Moreover, we can find
this in Angkor as well. In The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, vol. 13, part 3,
p. 2, he writes:
One thousand years ago the doctrine of mentalism was taught
at Angkor, according to an inscription of that time which I saw
there, the inscription of Srey Santhor. It likened the appearance
of the doctrine in the world of faith and culture to the sun bringing back the light.
See the inscription from Vat Sithor from about 968 C.E., concerning
a Buddhist prelate named Kîrtipañ∂ita, given in David Snellgrove’s
2004 book, Angkor—Before and After: A Cultural History of the Khmers,
Trumbull, Conn.: Weatherhill, and Bangkok: Orchid Press, p. 82:
“In him the sun of the doctrines of ‘Non-Self’ (nairåtyma),
‘Mind Only’ (cittamåtra) and the like, which have been eclipsed
in the night of false teachings, shone once again in full daylight.”
Snellgrove adds in a note on this (n. 17, p. 226):
The preferred school of Buddhist philosophy is thus that of
Yogacåra or ‘Mind Only’ (Cittamåtra), representing the latest
and ‘Third Turning’ of the Wheel of the Doctrine, as promulgated by the Bodhisattva Maitreya and the Sage Asanga . . . .
29. See on this, Paul Brunton, The Hidden Teaching Beyond Yoga,
pp. 362-363:
And we may now see the deep and practical wisdom of the early
Indian teachers who prescribed yoga to those whose intellectual
power was not strong enough to grasp the truth of mentalism
through reasoned insight, for thus these men were enabled to
arrive at the same goal through feeling, not through knowledge.
. . . Yet we must never forget that mentalism is only a step leading
to ultimate truth. . . . It is also a temporary ground which the
questing mind must occupy whilst consolidating its first victory,
the victory over matter. Once the consolidation is fully effected it
must begin to move onwards again; it must leave mentalism! The
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 29
ultimate reality cannot consist of thoughts because these are
fated to appear and vanish; it must have a more enduring basis
than such transiency. Nevertheless we may see in thoughts, to
which we have reduced everything, intimations of the presence
of this reality and apart from which they are as illusory as matter.
The further and final battle must lead to victory over the idea
itself. Both materialism and mentalism are tentative viewpoints
which must be taken up and then deserted when the ultimate
viewpoint is reached. Then alone may we say: “This is real.” . . .
Meanwhile it is essential to study well this basis of mentalism because upon it shall later be reared a superstructure of stupendous but reasoned revelation.
30. Further confirmation of this is found in “a work written in
Chinese by a Tibetan, and published in the monastery of Tientai,”
quoted by Blavatsky in, “The ‘Doctrine of the Eye’ & the ‘Doctrine of
the Heart,’ or the ‘Heart’s Seal,’” in H. P. Blavatsky Collected Writings,
vol. 14, pp. 450-451:
No profane ears having heard the mighty Chau-yan [secret
and enlightening precepts] of Wu-Wei-chen-jen [Buddha within
Buddha], of our beloved Lord and Bodhisattva, how can one
tell what his thoughts really were? The holy Sang-gyas-Panchen
never offered an insight into the One Reality to the unreformed
[uninitiated] Bhikkhus. Few are those even among the Tu-fon
[Tibetans] who knew it; as for the Tsung-men Schools, they are
going with every day more down hill . . . . Not even the Fa-hsiangTsung can give one the wisdom taught in real Naljor-chod-pa
[Sanskrit: Yogacharyå]: . . . it is all “Eye” Doctrine, and no more.
The loss of a restraining guidance is felt; since the Tch’-an-si
[teachers] of inward meditation [self-contemplation or Tchungkwan] have become rare, and the Good Law is replaced by idolworship [Siang-kyan]. It is of this [idol- or image-worship] that
the Barbarians [Western people] have heard, and know nothing
of Bas-pa-Dharma [the secret Dharma or doctrine]. Why has
truth to hide like a tortoise within its shell? Because it is now
found to have become like the Lama’s tonsure knife, a weapon
too dangerous to use even for the Lanoo. Therefore no one can
30 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
be entrusted with the knowledge [Secret Science] before his
time. The Chagpa-Thog-med have become rare, and the best
have retired to Tushita the Blessed.
Two sentences confirm this: “Not even the Fa-hsiang-Tsung can give
one the wisdom taught in real Naljor-chod-pa [Sanskrit: Yogacharyå]:
. . . it is all ‘Eye’ Doctrine, and no more.” “The Chagpa-Thog-med have
become rare, and the best have retired to Tushita the Blessed.” The
term Fa-hsiang-Tsung is the name of the Yogåcåra school in China.
The term Naljor-chod-pa is, as shown, the Tibetan translation of the
Sanskrit term Yogåcåra, or Yogacharyå. The term Chagpa-Thog-med is
the Tibetan translation of Årya Asa∫ga, the founder of the Yogåcåra
school. Its meaning in this sentence is apparently followers of Asa∫ga,
i.e., of the “real” Yogåcåra school. This would be, as we have seen, the
Great Madhyamaka school or tradition.
Great Madhyamaka teaches Shentong, or “other-emptiness.”
The Tibetan writer quoted here goes on to say, p. 452, that one should
ultimately be enabled to see, “the faithful reflection of Self . . . . First,
this; then Tong-pa-nyi, lastly; Sammå Sambuddha.” He here brings in
the Madhyamaka term Tong-pa-nyi, which is the Tibetan translation
of the Sanskrit term ≈ünyatå, “emptiness.”
31. See, for example, Dudjom Rinpoche, Jikdrel Yeshe Dorje,
The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism: Its Fundamentals and History,
Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1991, vol. 1, book 1, part 3, chapter 7,
“The Two Truths According to Great Madhyamaka,” p. 216, where
Någårjuna’s hymns are called eulogies:
One should know that the entire intention of the sütras and the
tantras, which are the scriptures of the Tathågata, is subsumed
in a single nucleus, just as butter is condensed from milk,
and cream from butter, so that the climax of the philosophical
systems, according to the causal vehicle of dialectics, is this
Great Madhyamaka, supreme among vehicles. Its meaning is
revealed in the texts of Maitreya, such as the Supreme Continuum
of the Greater Vehicle, and in the sublime Någårjuna’s Collection of
Eulogies, which subsume the essence of the definitive meaning
of both the intermediate and final promulgations of the transmitted precepts.”
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 31
32. From “gDams ngag: Tibetan Technologies of the Self,” by
Matthew Kapstein, in Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre, Essays in Honor
of Geshe Lhundup Sopa, edited by José Ignacio Cabezón and Roger R.
Jackson, Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 1996, p. 282. Bracketed
material is Kapstein’s.
33. On this, see Won ch’uk’s comments from his commentary
on the Saµdhi-nirmocana-sütra, quoted by Tsong kha pa in his Ocean of
Eloquence, translated by Gareth Sparham, Albany: State University of
New York Press, 1993, p. 49:
Since at that time [the time of Asa∫ga] the doctrine was of one
taste, there was no controversy between those asserting emptiness and those asserting existence (bhava). This is the reason
why Åcårya Nye ba’i ’od (=Bandhu-prabhå/ Prabhå-mitra) said:
“A thousand years ago the taste of Buddha’s teaching was one.
Thereafter, mindfulness (sm®ti) and wisdom (praj∆å) gradually
deteriorated and those asserting emptiness and those asserting
existence (bhava) spread widely in the world.”
“Those asserting emptiness” are those who follow Madhyamaka, and
“those asserting existence” are those who follow Yogåcåra. For a good
example of a text written before the separation of these two schools
took place, and so reflecting their harmony, see Kambala’s Ålokamålå,
translated by Chr. Lindtner, in Miscellanea Buddhica, Indiske Studier 5,
Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag, 1985; reprinted as A Garland of Light:
Kambala’s Ålokamålå, Fremont, Calif.: Asian Humanities Press, 2003.
Notice also that the full title of the famous Madhyamaka work by
Någårjuna’s spiritual son Åryadeva, the Catu˙-≈ataka, “Four Hundred
[Verses],” is Bodhisattva-Yogåcåra-Catu˙-≈ataka, where Yogåcåra clearly
refers to the “yoga practice” (yogåcåra) of a Bodhisattva, its original
meaning, and not to the later separated school of that name.
34. David Seyfort Ruegg, The Literature of the Madhyamaka School of
Philosophy in India, A History of Indian Literature, vol. 7, fasc. 1, p. 49,
Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1981. The part omitted by me in the
ellipsis is:
A portion of a commentary ascribed to Asa∫ga on the beginning
of the MMK is preserved in Chinese (Taishø 1565, translated
in 543); it refers to Råhulabhadra and comments also on the
32 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
preliminary stanzas to the MMK concerned with the eight
negative epithets applied to pratîtyasamutpåda. A commentary by
Sthiramati is also preserved in Chinese (Taishø 1567, translated
about 1000); it evidently knows Bhåvaviveka’s commentary on
the MMK. In addition, a commentary by Sthiramati’s master
Guñamati which is no longer extant is known to tradition; it
seems to have been known to Bhåvaviveka.
Tradition also knows a commentary on the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå
by the Yogåcåra master Dharmapåla that is no longer extant. See:
Leonard W. J. van der Kuijp, Contributions to the Development of Tibetan
Buddhist Epistemology, Alt- und Neu-Indische Studien 26, Wiesbaden:
Franz Steiner Verlag, 1983, p. 281, n. 146. Dharmapåla’s commentary
on Åryadeva’s Catu˙≈ataka, however, is extant, although in Chinese.
See John P. Keenan’s translation of its tenth chapter, Dharmapåla’s
Yogåcåra Critique of Bhåvaviveka’s Mådhyamika Explanation of Emptiness:
The Tenth Chapter of Ta-Ch’eng Kuang Pai-Lun Shih Commenting on
Åryadeva’s Catu˙≈ataka Chapter Sixteen, Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen
Press, 1997.
35. See, for example, Indian Buddhist Pandits, from “The Jewel
Garland of Buddhist History,” translated by Losang Norbu Tsonawa,
[Dharamsala]: Library of Tibetan Works & Archives, 1985, p. 24:
Chandragomî held the Cittamatrin view of Asanga and
Chandrakîrti held Någårjuna’s Pråsangika Mådhyamika viewpoint as explained by Buddhapalita. It is said that they debated
for seven years. The people witnessed the debate over the years
and those who understood some of the arguments and viewpoints they expounded made up a song:
Ah! Någårjuna’s texts,
For some people are medicine
But are poison for others.
But Maitreya and Asanga’s texts
Are medicine for everyone.
36. See Tsong Khapa’s Speech of Gold in the Essence of True Eloquence;
Reason and Enlightenment in the Central Philosophy of Tibet, translated by
Robert A. F. Thurman, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984,
pp. 265-266, regarding the Akutobhaya, “No Fear from Anywhere”:
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 33
As for the No Fear from Anywhere, in comment on the twentyseventh chapter, it cites evidence from the Four Hundred: “As the
revered Aryadeva declares: Very rarely does it happen that there
are teacher, listener, and that worth hearing. Hence, in short,
cyclic life is neither limited nor limitless!” This means that the
No Fear from Anywhere is not an autocommentary, as is also recognized from the fact that not even the smallest fragment of its
commentary is cited in the commentaries of Buddhapalita,
Bhavaviveka, or Chandrakirti.
See also Mkhas grub rje’s Fundamentals of the Buddhist Tantras, translated
by Ferdinand D. Lessing and Alex Wayman, The Hague: Mouton,
1968, reprinted under the changed title, Introduction to the Buddhist
Tantric Systems, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1978, p. 89:
This Akutobhaya is maintained by the older catalogs, and by many
persons following them, to have been composed by Någårjuna;
but that is certainly not so, because there is not a single instance
of its being quoted in the works of his disciples, and while commenting on the twenty-seventh chapter [of the Praj∆å-müla] it
says, quoting the Catu˙≈ataka (Toh. 3846), “Åryadeva also says.”
For a fuller statement of mKhas grub rje’s views on this, see A Dose of
Emptiness: An Annotated Translation of the sTong thun chen mo of mKhas
grub dGe legs dpal bzang, translated by José Ignacio Cabezón, Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1992, pp. 82-84.
37. See the study of the Akutobhaya by C. W. Huntington, Jr., “A
Lost Text of Early Madhyamaka,” Asiatische Studien/Études Asiatiques,
vol. 49, 1995, pp. 693-767. He there writes on p. 708:
BP [Buddhapålita’s commentary] has clearly incorporated lines,
phrases, lengthy passages and almost entire chapters from the
earlier commentary. We know that BP borrowed from ABh
[Akutobhayå], and not the reverse, because of the relative chronology of the two texts. When two translated texts are identical,
as are these two in so many places, then we must assume that the
original texts were also identical in these same places. In this
case, out of a total of 4,399 lines found in the present edition of
ABh, fully 1,437 were lifted verbatim and incorporated into the
34 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
body of BP. This means that almost exactly one third of ABh has
been reproduced verbatim in BP.
38. The Life of Någårjuna from Tibetan and Chinese Sources, by M.
Walleser, Delhi: Nag Publishers, 1979, p. 29. This book is a reprint of
the article published in Asia Major, Hirth Anniversary Volume, 1923,
pp. 421-455, where this quote occurs on p. 447. This passage was again
translated by Richard H. Robinson in Early Mådhyamika in India and
China, Madison: [University of Wisconsin Press], 1967, p. 26:
Explaining the Mahåyåna at great length, he wrote the Upade≈a
in 100,000 ≈lokas. He also wrote the Buddha-mårga-alaµkåra-
≈åstra (?) in 5,000 ≈lokas, the Mahåmaitri-upåya-≈åstra (?) in 5,000
≈lokas, and the Madhyamaka-≈åstra in 500 ≈lokas, and caused the
Mahåyåna doctrine to have a great vogue throughout India. He
also wrote the Akutobhayå-≈åstra (?) in 100,000 ≈lokas, out of
which the Madhyamaka-Ōstra comes.
39. The first part of the Upade≈a, or Mahåpraj∆åpåramitå≈åstra,
was translated from Chinese into French by Étienne Lamotte in five
heavily annotated volumes totaling 2451 pages, as Le Traité de la Grande
Vertu de Sagesse de Någårjuna (Mahåpraj∆åpåramitå≈åstra), Louvain,
1944-1980. For an English study of it, see Någårjuna’s Philosophy as
Presented in the Mahå-Praj∆åpåramitå-˛åstra, by K. Venkata Ramanan,
Tokyo, 1966. The latter part of the Upade≈a was not translated into
Chinese completely, but only summarized by Kumårajîva. Although
Lamotte later came to doubt that the Upade≈a was written by the same
Någårjuna who wrote the Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå, his reasons for this
were not convincing to other scholars, such as J. W. de Jong (see his
review of Lamotte’s vol. 3, in Asia Major, vol. 17, 1971, pp. 105-112).
Venkata Ramanan in his book listed above was not convinced either.
Since Kumårajîva probably lived only a century after Någårjuna, the
traditions of authorship in his time would carry much weight.
40. The Chung lun was translated into English by Brian Bocking,
Någårjuna in China: A Translation of the Middle Treatise, Lewiston, N.Y.:
Edwin Mellen Press, 1995.
41. Huntington, pp. 705-706: “Close comparison of the texts of
Abh and CL confirms that both commentaries stem from one original
Indic source.”
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 35
42. See note 37 above.
43. Seyfort Ruegg, p. 33. He here refers the reader to K. Venkata
Ramanan’s book (see note 39 above), pp. 16, 44-45, 251 sq.
44. English translations of Någårjuna’s Dharmadhåtu-stava have
recently become available. Donald S. Lopez, Jr., translated it under
the title, “In Praise of Reality,” in the book, Buddhist Scriptures, edited
by him, London: Penguin Books, 2004, pp. 464-477. Karl Brunnhölzl
has given us a whole book on this hymn of 101 verses, under the title,
In Praise of Dharmadhåtu, Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 2007. It
includes the commentary by the 3rd Karmapa. Here are verses 20-22
as translated by Lopez:
When a fireproof garment, stained by various stains, is placed in
a fire, the stains are burned but the garment is not. (20)
In the same way, the mind of clear light is stained by desire. The
stains are burned by the fire of wisdom; just that clear light is
not. (21)
All the sütras setting forth emptiness spoken by the teacher turn
back the afflictions; they do not impair the element. (22)
45. Besides the Dharmadhåtu-stava (see the previous note), in
which this is frequent, see, for example, Någårjuna’s Acintya-stava,
“Hymn to the Inconceivable [Buddha],” verses 37-39. As edited and
translated by Chr. Lindtner in his Nagarjuniana: Studies in the Writings
and Philosophy of Någårjuna, Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag, 1982;
reprint, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1987, pp. 152-153:
bhåvåbhåvadvayåtîtam anatîtaµ ca kutra cit |
na ca j∆ånaµ na ca j∆eyaµ na cåsti na ca nåsti yat ||
yan na caikaµ na cånekaµ nobhayaµ na ca nobhayam |
anålayam athåvyaktam acintyam anidar≈anam ||
yan nodeti na ca vyeti nocchedi na ca ≈å≈vatam |
tad åkå≈apratîkå≈aµ nåkßaraj∆ånagocaram ||
[That which] has transcended the duality of being and nonbeing without, however, having transcended anything at all;
that which is not knowledge or knowable, not existent nor nonexistent, not one nor many, not both nor neither; [that which is]
without foundation, unmanifest, inconceivable, incomparable;
that which arises not, disappears not, is not to be annihilated
36 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
and is not permanent, that is [Reality] which is like space [and]
not within the range of words [or] knowledge (akßaraj∆åna).
Någårjuna then goes on in verse 45 to describe this ultimate reality as
svabhåva, “inherent nature,” or “inherent existence,” prak®ti, “essential
nature,” or “(primary) substance,” tattva, “reality,” dravya, “substance,”
vastu, “a real thing,” and sat, “true being,” terms that are thoroughly
negated by him as applied to everything else. This is especially true of
the first one, svabhåva; the whole theme of Madhyamaka being that
everything is empty of svabhåva (svabhåva-≈ünya), inherent nature or
inherent existence.
This hymn, along with three others forming the Catu˙stava of
Någårjuna, has also been published in Sanskrit and English in the
book by Fernando Tola and Carmen Dragonetti, On Voidness: A Study
on Buddhist Nihilism, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1995.
46. See The Secret Doctrine, vol. I, p. xxiii:
The members of several esoteric schools—the seat of which is
beyond the Himålayas, and whose ramifications may be found
in China, Japan, India, Tibet, and even in Syria, besides South
America—claim to have in their possession the sum total of
sacred and philosophical works in MSS. and type: all the works,
in fact, that have ever been written, in whatever language or
characters, since the art of writing began; from the ideographic
hieroglyphs down to the alphabet of Cadmus and the
Devanågarî.
It has been claimed in all ages that ever since the destruction
of the Alexandrian Library, every work of a character that might
have led the profane to the ultimate discovery and comprehension of some of the mysteries of the Secret Science, was, owing
to the combined efforts of the members of the Brotherhoods,
diligently searched for. It is added, moreover, by those who
know, that once found, save three copies left and stored safely
away, such works were all destroyed.
47. Michael Sheehy, The Gzhan stong Chen mo, p. 66.
48. Michael Sheehy, The Gzhan stong Chen mo, p. 67.
49. Jamgon Kongtrul, The Treasury of Knowledge, p. 192. See also:
Tåranåtha’s The Essence of Other-Emptiness, p. 72.
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 37
50. Jamgon Kongtrul, The Treasury of Knowledge, p. 364, n. 593.
51. Tåranåtha’s History of Buddhism in India, trans. Lama Chimpa,
Alaka Chattopadhyaya, ed. Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, Simla: Indian
Institute of Advanced Study, 1970, pp. 98-100. The translators give the
Tibetan term in footnote 25, p. 100: rnal-’byor-spyod-pa-sems-tsam-pa.
52. Michael Sheehy, The Gzhan stong Chen mo, pp. 66, 111-112.
53. Jamgon Kongtrul, The Treasury of Knowledge, p. 176.
54. Elizabeth M. Callahan, Introduction, in Jamgon Kongtrul,
The Treasury of Knowledge, p. 37.
55. Jamgon Kongtrul, The Treasury of Knowledge, pp. 39, 191.
56. The Bodhicitta-vivaraña has been published in Tibetan and
translated into English by Chr. Lindtner in his Nagarjuniana: Studies in
the Writings and Philosophy of Någårjuna, pp. 180-217; verses 22-56 are
on pp. 192-201.
57. Chr. Lindtner, Nagarjuniana, p. 180.
58. Tåranåtha’s History of Buddhism in India, p. 98.
59. Christian Lindtner, “The La∫kåvatårasütra in Early Indian
Madhyamaka Literature,” Asiatische Studien/Études Asiatiques, vol. 46,
1992, pp. 244-279. The Bodhicitta-vivaraña is discussed on pp. 260-264.
60. The works of the eighteen early Hînayåna orders apparently
were lost long ago, as they were not translated into Chinese, either.
On these eighteen early orders, see Vasumitra’s Samaya-bhedoparacanacakra, translated by Jiryo Masuda as, “Origin and Doctrines of Early
Indian Buddhist Schools: A Translation of the Hsüan-chwang Version
of Vasumitra’s Treatise,” Asia Major, vol. 2, 1925, pp. 1-78.
61. Tåranåtha’s History of Buddhism in India, p. 102.
62. According to the traditional histories of Buddhism compiled
in Tibet, Asa∫ga was unable to understand the Perfection of Wisdom
sütras due to their great length and diffusiveness. After twelve years of
meditation, Maitreya appeared to him and taught him how the path to
enlightenment is found in them. This was then written in his book, the
Abhisamayålaµkåra. For a convenient account of this, summarized
from the histories by Bu-ston and Tåranåtha, see Geshe Wangyal’s
book, The Door of Liberation, 1973 ed., pp. 52-54; 1995 ed., pp. 31-33.
63. Bhå[va]viveka’s full critique of Yogåcåra is found in the fifth
chapter of his Madhyamaka-h®daya and his Tarka-jvålå commentary
thereon. At the beginning of the latter he specifically names Asa∫ga
38 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
and Vasubandhu. A more brief critique is found in his Praj∆å-pradîpa
commentary on Någårjuna’s Müla-madhyamaka-kårikå, as an appendix
to chapter 25. He also critiques Yogåcåra in the fourth chapter of his
Madhyamaka-ratna-pradîpa. Here is a bibliographic listing, by date of
publication, of these sources:
Lindtner, Christian. “Bhavya’s Controversy with Yogåcåra in the
Appendix to Praj∆åpradîpa, Chapter XXV.” In Tibetan and Buddhist
Studies Commemorating the 200th Anniversary of the Birth of Alexander
Csoma de Körös, edited by Louis Ligeti, vol. 2, pp. 77-97.
Bibliotheca Orientalis Hungarica, vol. 29. Budapest: Akadémiai
Kiadó, 1984 (gives critical edition of the Tibetan text).
Eckel, M. David. “Bhåvaviveka’s Critique of Yogåcåra Philosophy in
Chapter XXV of the Praj∆åpradîpa.” In Miscellanea Buddhica,
edited by Chr. Lindtner, pp. 25-75. Indiske Studier 5.
Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag, 1985 (gives English translation).
Lindtner, Christian. “Bhavya’s Critique of Yogåcåra in the
Madhyamakaratnapradîpa, Chapter IV.” In Buddhist Logic and
Epistemology: Studies in the Buddhist Analysis of Inference and
Language, edited by Bimal Krishna Matilal and Robert D. Evans,
pp. 239-263. Studies of Classical India, vol. 7. Dordrecht: D. Reidel
Publishing Company, 1986 (gives English translation).
Lindtner, Christian. “Materials for the Study of Bhavya.” In Kalyåñamitrårågañam: Essays in Honour of Nils Simonsson, edited by Eivind
Kahrs, pp. 179-202. Oslo: Norwegian University Press, 1986
(includes critical edition of the Tibetan text of Madhyamaka-ratnapradîpa, chap. 4).
Lindtner, Chr. “Bhavya’s Madhyamakah®daya (Pariccheda Five)
Yogåcåratattvavini≈cayåvatåra.” Adyar Library Bulletin, vol. 59, 1995,
pp. 37-65. Reprint, Adyar Library Pamphlet Series, no. 48, 1995.
Also found in his edition of the whole text: Madhyamakah®dayam
of Bhavya. Chennai: Adyar Library and Research Centre, 2001,
pp. 58-71 (in Sanskrit).
64. Candrakîrti’s critique of Yogåcåra is found in chapter 6 of his
Madhyamakåvatåra, verses 45-97, and his own commentary thereon.
This text is not yet available in Sanskrit, although a manuscript of it is
reported to exist in Lhasa. Its Tibetan translation, with commentary,
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 39
was published in the Bibliotheca Buddhica series, vol. 9, 1907-1912.
Both the root text and commentary of this critique are available in a
French translation, and the root text in several English translations.
There are also two articles summarizing the critique. Here follows a
bibliographic listing, by date of publication, of these sources:
La Vallée Poussin, Louis de. “Madhyamakåvatåra: Introduction au
Traité du Milieu, de l’Åcårya Candrakîrti, avec le commentaire
de l’auteur, traduit d’après la version tibétaine.” Le Muséon, n.s.,
vol. 8, 1907, pp. 249-317 (chaps. 1-5); vol. 11, 1910, pp. 271-358
(chap. 6, verses 1-80); vol. 12, 1911, pp. 235-328 (chap. 6, verses
81-165); unfinished (the Yogåcåra critique is found in the second
installment, pp. 324-358, and the third installment, pp. 236-255).
Olson, Robert F. “Candrakîrti’s Critique of Vij∆ånavåda.” Philosophy
East and West, vol. 24, 1974, pp. 405-411.
Fenner, Peter G. “Candrakîrti’s Refutation of Buddhist Idealism,”
Philosophy East and West, vol. 33, 1983, pp. 251-261 (includes
English translation of Madhyamakåvatåra, chap. 6, verses 45-77).
Batchelor, Stephen. In Echoes of Voidness, by Geshe Rabten. London:
Wisdom Publications, 1983, pp. 47-91 (gives English translation of
Madhyamakåvatåra, chap. 6).
Huntington, C. W., Jr., with Geshé Namgyal Wangchen. In The
Emptiness of Emptiness: An Introduction to Early Indian Mådhyamika.
Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989, pp. 143-196; notes to
this, pp. 218-267 (gives English translation of the whole
Madhyamakåvatåra).
Fenner, Peter. In The Ontology of the Middle Way. Studies of Classical
India, vol. 11. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1990,
pp. 209-302 (gives English translation of the whole
Madhyamakåvatåra, and includes Tibetan text).
Stöter-Tillmann, Jürgen, and Tashi Tsering. In Rendawa Shönnu
Lodrö’s Commentary on the ‘Entry into the Middle,’ Lamp which
Elucidates Reality. The Dalai Lama Tibeto-Indological Series,
vol. 23. Sarnath, Varanasi: Central Institute of Higher Tibetan
Studies, 1997 (includes English translation of the whole
Madhyamakåvatåra).
Padmakara Translation Group. Introduction to the Middle Way:
Chandrakirti’s Madhyamakavatara with Commentary by Jamgön
40 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
Mipham. Boston: Shambhala Publications, 2002.
Goldfield, Ari, et al. The Moon of Wisdom: Chapter Six of Chandrakirti’s
Entering the Middle Way, with Commentary from the Eighth Karmapa,
Mikyö Dorje’s Chariot of the Dakpo Kagyü Siddhas. Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow
Lion Publications, 2005 (includes Tibetan text).
65. Vasubandhu’s commentary is a combined commentary on
the 100,000 line, 25,000 line, and 18,000 line Perfection of Wisdom
sütras, called the ˛ata-såhasrikå-pa∆caviµ≈ati-såhasrikå߆åda≈a-såhasrikåpraj∆å-påramitå-b®ha†-†îkå. Tsongkhapa did not accept Vasubandhu’s
authorship of it, but said it was written by the much later Daµß†råsena
instead (see Tsong Khapa’s Speech of Gold in the Essence of True Eloquence:
Reason and Enlightenment in the Central Philosophy of Tibet, trans. Robert
A. F. Thurman, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984, pp. 247-
248). However, Daµß†råsena may only have revised Vasubandhu’s
work. There had to have been in existence an early interpretation of
the Perfection of Wisdom sütras by way of the three natures, since this
is exactly what Bhå[va]viveka refutes in his Madhyamaka-h®daya, where
his major refutation of Yogåcåra occurs. Here in chapter 5, verses 1-7,
the Yogåcåra position is stated, that he will go on to refute in verses 8
onward. In verses 5-6 the three natures are stated, and verse 7 says that
this is how the Perfection of Wisdom is understood in Yogåcåra. The
rest of the chapter is his refutation of the three natures.
Moreover, Vasubandhu’s disciple Di∫någa states clearly in his
Praj∆åpåramitå-piñ∂årtha-saµgraha (Collection of the Essential Meaning of
the Perfection of Wisdom) that the three natures are the basis for understanding the Perfection of Wisdom, and that in fact, there is no other
teaching than this in these sacred texts:
praj∆åpåramitåyåµ hi trîn samå≈ritya de≈anå |
kalpitaµ paratantraµ ca parinißpannam eva ca || 27 ||
nåstîty-ådi-padai˙ sarvaµ kalpitaµ vinivåryate |
måyopamådi-d®ß†åntai˙ paratantrasya de≈anå || 28 ||
caturdhå-vyavadånena parinißpanna-kîrtanam |
praj∆åpåramitåyåµ hi nånyå buddhasya de≈anå || 29 ||
27. In the Perfection of Wisdom, the teaching is based on the
three [natures]: the imagined, the dependent, and the perfected.
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 41
28. By the words, “it does not exist,” etc., all the imagined is
refuted. By the examples of [being] like an illusion, etc., [is
given] the teaching of the dependent.
29. By the fourfold purification [is made] the proclamation of
the perfected. In the Perfection of Wisdom there is no other
teaching of the Buddha.
The Sanskrit text quoted above may be found in the following
editions, both of which agree completely for these three verses. The
Tucci edition also includes Tibetan and English translations. I have
given a more literal translation rather than Tucci’s looser translation,
which was made before praj∆å-påramitå became standardly translated
as Perfection of Wisdom, due to the work of Edward Conze. Tucci
here translated it as the “gnosis.”
Tucci, Giuseppe. “Minor Sanskrit Texts on the Praj∆å-påramitå:
1. The Praj∆å-påramitå-piñ∂årtha of Di∫någa.” Journal of the Royal
Asiatic Society, 1947, pp. 53-75.
Frauwallner, Erich. In “Dignåga, sein Werk und seine Entwicklung.”
Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde Süd- und Ostasiens, und Archiv für
Indische Philosophie, vol. 3, 1959, pp. 83-164; Praj∆å-påramitåpiñ∂årtha-saµgraha on pp. 140-144.
66. The original Sanskrit text of this section was published in
“‘Maitreya’s Questions’ in the Praj∆åpåramitå,” by Edward Conze and
Iida Shotaro, Mélanges D’Indianisme a la Mémoire de Louis Renou, Paris:
Éditions E. de Boccard, 1968, pp. 229-242. An English translation may
be found in The Large Sutra on Perfect Wisdom, translated by Edward
Conze, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1975,
pp. 644-652. The terms for the three natures used there, p. 238, are
parikalpita, vikalpita, and dharmatå, translated by Conze, p. 648, as
“imagined,” “discerned,” and “dharmic nature.” The second one can
also be translated as “conceptualized” or “constructed by thought,”
and the third as “true nature.”
67. See Dolpopa’s Bka’ bsdu bzhi pa’i rang ’grel, folio 615, in The
Collected Works (Gsu∫ ’Bum) of Kun-mkhyen Dol-po-pa ˛es-rab-rgyal-mtshan
(1292-1361): Reproduced from eye copies of prints from the Rgyal-rtse Rdzo∫
blocks preserved at the Kyichu Monastery in the Paro Valley, Bhutan, vol. 1,
Paro, Bhutan/Delhi: Lama Ngodrup and Sherab Drimay, 1984. This
42 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
same text is also found in The ’Dzam-thang Edition of the Collected Works
(Gsung-’bum) of Kun-mkhyen Dol-po-pa Shes-rab Rgyal-mtshan, vol. 5 (yå),
collected and presented by Matthew Kapstein. Delhi: Shedrup Books,
1992, folios 269-329.
68. See the section, “Delineating well all emptinesses as the two,
self-emptiness and other-emptiness,” in Dolpopa’s Mountain Doctrine,
pp. 324-334, where Vasubandhu’s Perfection of Wisdom commentary
is quoted on p. 330. It may be helpful to note that the term translated
here by Jeffrey Hopkins as “non-entities,” is translated by others as
“non-existence.”
69. On these two traditions of the works of Maitreya, see The Blue
Annals, translated by George N. Roerich, 1949; reprint, Delhi: Motilal
Banarsidass, 1976, etc., pp. 347-350, for the account by ’Gos Lo-tså-ba
Gzhon-nu-dpal (1392-1481); Leonard W.J. van der Kuijp, Contributions
to the Development of Tibetan Buddhist Epistemology, From the eleventh to the
thirteenth century, Alt- und Neu-Indische Studien 26, Wiesbaden: Franz
Steiner Verlag, 1983, pp. 42-44, including the account by Gser-mdog
Pañ-chen ˛åkya-mchog-ldan (1428-1509); S. K. Hookham, The Buddha
Within: Tathagatagarbha Doctrine According to the Shentong Interpretation of
the Ratnagotravibhaga, Albany: State University of New York Press,
1991, pp. 269-271, for the account by ’Jam-mgon Kong-sprul Blo-grosmtha’-yas (1813-1899); Karl Brunnhölzl, The Center of the Sunlit Sky:
Madhyamaka in the Kagyü Tradition, Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 2004, pp. 461-462, for a summary of the meditative tradition
lineage up to the present; and Cyrus Stearns, “Dol-po-pa Shes-rab
rgyal-mtshan and the Genesis of the Gzhan-stong Position in Tibet,”
Asiatische Studien/Études Asiatiques, vol. 49, no. 4, 1995, p. 840, for a
note by Jo-nang Kun-dga’ grol-mchog (1507-1566) from a notebook
by Bstan kha-bo-che (b. 1021) quoting his teacher Sajjana, the source
of the two lines of transmission into Tibet.
70. Dolpopa believed that he was restoring the true teachings
from the bygone “Age of Perfection” (k®ta-yuga), or “Age of Truth”
(satya-yuga), called by other traditions the “Golden Age.” These had
been lost through the faulty interpretations of later commentators
who no longer had the true understanding of the Buddha’s teachings.
Corroboration of Dolpopa’s claims comes from a most unexpected
source, although one that may be doubted because of dating, namely,
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 43
from the Hindu sage Gau∂apåda. Gau∂apåda was the teacher of the
teacher of ˛a∫karåcårya, and hence his date depends on the date of
˛a∫karåcårya. ˛a∫karåcårya is generally placed around the seventh or
eighth century of the Common Era, and no doubt most of the now
extant writings attributed to him are from that time. However, there is
considerable evidence that the original ˛a∫karåcårya was born in the
year 509 B.C.E. (this evidence is gathered and presented in my paper,
“The Original ˛a∫karåcårya”). This would make his teacher’s teacher
Gau∂apåda a contemporary of the Buddha, following the traditional
dating of the Buddha’s death as 543 B.C.E.
It is now well known, thanks to the research of Vidhushekhara
Bhattacharya, that Gau∂apåda’s greatest work, the Måñ∂ükya-kårika,
uses Buddhist terminology and ideas liberally (see The Ågama≈åstra of
Gau∂apåda, University of Calcutta Press, 1943). These are found in the
fourth and last section of that book, which has every appearance of
being written at a later time than the first three sections. It has, for
example, an opening salutation like would normally be found at the
beginning of a work. This salutation, moreover, is addressed to the
“best of men,” a standard epithet of the Buddha. With all the other
evidence that Bhattacharya provided, we may infer that Gau∂apåda
wrote this after coming into contact with Buddhist ideas, or perhaps,
after coming into contact with the Buddha himself.
In the “Replies to Inquiries Suggested by ‘Esoteric Buddhism,’”
published in The Theosophist, vol. 5, 1883, is the section, “Sakya Muni’s
Place in History” (pp. 38-43), which draws on unpublished esoteric
records to give facts about the Buddha’s life and date. This section was
presumably written by Blavatsky’s teacher, Morya, and was reprinted
in the book, Five Years of Theosophy, and also in H. P. Blavatsky Collected
Writings, vol. 5, 1950, pp. 241-259. It is said therein (p. 256) that the
Hindu Brahmans expected the coming of the Buddha, and at that
time met him as an Avatar:
It is no better than loose conjecture to argue that it would have
entered as little into the thoughts of the Brahmans of noting the
day of Buddha’s birth “as the Romans, or even the Jews, [would
have] thought of preserving the date of the birth of Jesus before
he had become the founder of a religion.” (M. Müller’s History of
Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 263.) For, while the Jews had been
44 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
from the first rejecting the claim of Messiahship set up by the
Chelas of the Jewish prophet, and were not expecting their Messiah at that time, the Brahmans (the initiates, at any rate) knew
of the coming of him whom they regarded as an incarnation of
divine wisdom and therefore were well aware of the astrological
date of his birth. If, in after times in their impotent rage, they
destroyed every accessible vestige of the birth, life and death of
Him, who in his boundless mercy to all creatures had revealed
their carefully concealed mysteries and doctrines in order to
check the ecclesiastical torrent of ever-growing superstitions,
there had been a time when he was met by them as an Avatar.
Meeting him as an avatar, it would have only been natural for the
great Brahman sage, Gau∂apåda, to have sought out the Buddha and
received teachings from him. It may thus be that in Gau∂apåda’s text
we have the earliest direct record of the Buddha’s teachings to have
come down to us. Ironically, this text has come down to us within the
Hindu tradition. In the Buddhist tradition, what we have is the orally
passed down discourses of the so-called Hînayåna tradition, only later
written down. The discourses or sütras of the Mahåyåna tradition are
said by tradition to have disappeared forty years after the Buddha’s
passing, and then to have reappeared in later centuries. Proceeding
on the assumption that the Buddha in fact taught Mahåyåna ideas
during his lifetime, and that Gau∂apåda was there to hear and record
them, some interesting facts emerge.
Dolpopa goes against the standard received Yogåcåra teachings,
insisting that the second of the three natures is illusory just like the
first of them. It is not the case, says he, that the third or perfected
nature (parinißpanna) is the second or dependent nature (paratantra)
when freed of the first or imagined nature (parikalpita), as Yogåcåra is
normally thought to teach. Only the third or perfected nature is truly
existent. Neither the first nor the second are truly existent. This,
claims Dolpopa, is the true original understanding of the Buddha’s
teachings on this. Gau∂apåda says the very same thing.
Gau∂apåda’s Måñ∂ükya-kårikå, also known as the Ågama-≈åstra,
section 4, verse 73, reads:
yo ’sti kalpita-saµv®tyå paramårthena nâsty asau |
paratantrâbhisaµv®tyå syån nâsti paramårthata˙ || 73 ||
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 45
That which exists conventionally as the imagined does not exist
ultimately. [That which] may exist conventionally as the dependent [also] does not exist ultimately.
So Gau∂apåda, too, rejects the ultimate existence of the second or
dependent nature, just like Dolpopa does, and in opposition to the
standard Yogåcåra or Cittamåtra teachings as normally understood.
Dolpopa, utilizing the Great Madhyamaka understanding of Yogåcåra
to do this, believed that he was restoring the original teachings of the
Buddha. The evidence provided by Gau∂apåda may well corroborate
this claim of Dolpopa’s. Moreover, a verse quoted in The Secret Doctrine,
vol. 1, p. 48, also agrees with this.
“No Arhat, oh mendicants, can reach absolute knowledge
before he becomes one with Paranirvana. Parikalpita and
Paratantra are his two great enemies” (Aphorisms of the
Bodhisattvas).
It seems that all three, Dolpopa, Gau∂apåda, and The Secret Doctrine,
agree in this distinctive doctrine of rejecting the ultimate existence of
the second or dependent nature (paratantra), thus setting them apart
from standard Yogåcåra or Cittamåtra. We may assume, then, that this
Great Madhyamaka doctrine is a doctrine of the Wisdom Tradition.
46 The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition
Selected Bibliography on Great Madhyamaka
Dolpopa, translated by Jeffrey Hopkins. Mountain Doctrine;
Tibet’s Fundamental Treatise on Other-Emptiness and the BuddhaMatrix, by Dol-bo-ba Shay-rap-gyel-tsen. Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow
Lion Publications, 2006. (This is a complete translation of
Dolpopa’s greatest work, the Ri chos nges don rgya mtsho.)
Hopkins, Jeffrey. Tsong-kha-pa’s Final Exposition of Wisdom.
Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 2008. (Part Two is
“Comparing Dol-po-pa’s and Tsong-kha-pa’s Views”)
Hookham, S. K. The Buddha Within: Tathagatagarbha Doctrine
According to the Shentong Interpretation of the Ratnagotravibhaga.
Albany: State University of New York Press, 1991.
Kongtrul, Jamgon, Lodro Taye, translated by Elizabeth M.
Callahan. The Treasury of Knowledge, Book Six, Part Three:
Frameworks of Buddhist Philosophy, A Systematic Presentation of
the Cause-Based Philosophical Vehicles. Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion
Publications, 2007. (This is the only available text on tenet
systems that includes Shentong Madhyamaka.)
Ringu Tulku. The Ri-me Philosophy of Jamgön Kongtrul the Great:
A Study of the Buddhist Lineages of Tibet. Boston: Shambhala
Publications, 2006.
Sheehy, Michael R. The Gzhan stong Chen mo: A Study of Emptiness according to the Modern Tibetan Buddhist Jo nang Scholar
’Dzam thang mKhan po Ngag dbang Blo gros Grags pa (1920-75).
Ph.D. thesis, California Institute of Integral Studies, 2007.
Stearns, Cyrus. The Buddha from Dolpo: A Study of the Life and
Thought of the Tibetan Master Dolpopa Sherab Gyaltsen. Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1999; revised and enlarged edition, 2010. (This includes complete translations
of Dolpopa’s A General Commentary on the Doctrine, and his
last major work, The Great Calculation of the Doctrine Which
Has the Significance of a Fourth Council.)
The Doctrinal Position of the Wisdom Tradition 47
Tåranåtha, translated by Jeffrey Hopkins. The Essence of
Other-Emptiness, by Tåranåtha. Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion
Publications, 2007. (This is a concise work on Shentong
by the second most famous Jonangpa writer, Tåranåtha.)
[The foregoing article was written by David Reigle, and presented
as part of the program, “Theosophy’s Tibetan Connection,” at the
Annual Meeting of the Texas Federation of the Theosophical Society
in America, San Antonio, April 18-20, 2008.]