Nāgārjuna’s Twelve Gate Treatise

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xv

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2. Nāgārjuna and the Spread of His Teachings

   1. Nāgārjuna and the Spread of His Teachings

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 4-12

3. San-Lun Approaches to Emptiness

   1. San-Lun Approaches to Emptiness

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 13-26

4. The Nature and Value of the Text

   1. The Nature and Value of the Text

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 27-43

5. Nāgārjuna’s Twelve Gate Treatise

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 45-52

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   2. Causal Conditions

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 53-58

   3. With or without Effect

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      Pages 59-69

   4. Conditions

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 70-71

   5. Characteristics

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      Pages 72-78

   6. With or without Characteristics

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      Pages 79-80

   7. Identity or Difference

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 81-84

   8. Being or Non-Being

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 85-88

   9. Nature

      • Hsueh-li Cheng

      Pages 89-91

   10. Cause and Effect

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       Pages 92-92

   11. The Creator

       • Hsueh-li Cheng

       Pages 93-100

   12. The Three Times

       • Hsueh-li Cheng

       Pages 101-103

   13. Production

       • Hsueh-li Cheng

       Pages 104-107

6. Back Matter

   Pages 108-151

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MADHYAMIKA The hallmark of Miidhyamika philosophy is 'Emptiness', sunyata. This is not a view of reality. In fact it is emphatically denied that sunyata is a view of reality. If anybody falls into such an error as to construe emptiness as reality (or as a view, even the right view, of reality), he is only grasping the snake at the wrong end (Mk, 24.1 I)! Nftgfujuna in Mk, 24.18, has referred to at least four ways by which the same truth is conveyed: Whatever is dependent origination, we call it emptiness. That is (also) dependent conceptualization; that is, to be sure, the Middle Way. The two terms, pratitya samutpiida and upiidiiya prajnapti, which I have translated here- as 'dependent origination' and 'dependent conceptualization' need to be explained. The interdependence of everything (and under 'everything' we may include, following the Mftdhyamika, all items, ontological concepts, entities, theories, views, theses and even relative truths), i.e., the essential lack of independence of the origin (cf. utpiida) of everything proves or shows that everything is essentially devoid of its assumed essence or its independent 'own nature' or its 'self-existence' (cf. svabhiiva). Besides, our cognition of anything lacks independence in the same way. Our conception (cf. prajnapti) of something a essentially depends upon something b, and so on for everything ad infinitum.

• Chinese
• bibliography
• identity
• nature
• subject

• Dept. of Philosophy and Religious Studies, University of Hawaii at Hilo, USA

  Hsueh-li Cheng

Policies and ethics