_Lucid Exposition of “the Middle Way The Essential Chapters from the Prasannapada of Candrakirti Translated from the Sanskrit by Mervyn Sprung etal a T.RV.Murtiond US. is ee sul 1974 1416534 Praja Press Boulder 1979Prajna Press Great Easter Book Company 1123 Spruce Street Boulder, Colorado 80302 ©1979 GMC. Sprung Printed in Great Britain Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Canetrakirc. Lucid exposition of the middle way. Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. Nagirjuna, Siddha. Madhyamakakarika, 2, Madhyamika (Buddhism). Sprung, Mervyn, Y. Murti, Tirepattar Ramaseshuy yer Venkarachala, I, Vyas, U.8. IV. Title BQ2868.E5566 1979 294.38 79-13033 ISBN 087773 7118 Contents Preface: Text and Translation Acknowledgments ‘The Thought of the Middle Way: Translator’s Introduction Lucid Exposition of the Middle Way Candrakirti’s Salutetion to Nagarjuna ‘Concer, Method and Assumptions of the Middle Way Philosophy Attack on the Possibility of Knowledge: Controversy ‘with a Buddhist Epstemologst Enquiry into Concitions Motion and Rest Vision and the Other Sense Faculties Material Objects and the Other Factors of Personal Existence ‘The Primal Elements or Character and Characteristic Desire and the Other Afflctions The Agent Subject and his Doing Self as Subject of Perception Fire and Fuel The Absence of Being in Things Self-Existence Self and the Way Things Really Are Time ‘The Perfectly Realized One ‘The Basic Affictions and the Four Misbeliefs xvi 1 31 32 33 65 16 o1 98vi CONTENTS XVII The Four Buddhist Truths 223 XIX Mndpe 247 - Glossary 265 Preface: Text and Translation Bibliography 279 ‘This translation of the essertisl chapters from the Prasannapadd rests fon the work of several scholars in different ways. The English of the twanslation fs, throughout, my own, but the reading of the Sanskait is very much the result of close and repeated collaboration with Indian and Japanese scholars. During the winter of 1965, after reading the Baghavad Ghd with my Sanscit tutor, U.S. Vyas, happened on some passages from the Prassnnapodd which concerned the mystifying Mashyamika theory of two truths, and read several pages with ‘Tervyoshi Tangi of Kyoto, at that time a fellow student at Banaras Hindu University. A year or two later, still pursuing philosophical ideas and without the remotest thought of translation, I read the whole of ‘the chapter on the ‘Four Buddhist Truths’ with Professor T. R. V. Murti ‘of Banares while he was 2 visiting professor at Brock University. This Jed on to a reading of the Nivdna chapter with him the following year and I became strangely seized with the way of thinking of Candrakirii ‘and Nagéxjuna, By tho time I rotumed to india in 1970 the thought of ‘ ‘translating, and not just reading, the Prasannapadi had occurred to me, Tread the chapter on “The Perfectly Realized One’ with Professor Murti : and, with my former tutor, U. S, Vyas, who was now at the Buddhist Research Institute in Nilandi, I read the chapters on ‘Vision and the Other Sense Faculties, “The Factors of Porsonal Existence’, and ‘Self- Existence’, In the spring of 1971, in Kyoto, for two months Professor G. Nagao and Dr N, Aramaki painstakingly end enjoyably worked ‘through the chapter on ‘Self and the Way Things Really Are’ with me. In the summer of 1975, again in Banaras, I read the chapter on ‘Motion and Reit, the most difficult of all to translate, with Professor Mucti, : and the chapters on ‘Time’, “Fire and Fuel, ‘The Agent Subject and his Doing’ and “The Absence of Being in Things’ with U. S. Vyas in Simla and Nalanda. The remaining chapters given here I struggled with on my own, Even so the fine translations available in French and German were always a help. The Douze Chapitres of Jacques May was the best model. The sometimes quixotic, but always inspired transla- tons of T. Sicherbetsky were more than a help: I must regard him as « tutor, Without his pioneer work in Buddhist logic 1 do not believe