I've recently been reading more works by Tibetan Buddhist masters and have heard some things about the viewpoints of Tsongkhapa, who I've generally taken a liking to, that seem a bit peculiar. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure the relevant works are only available in English for pretty high prices. I thought might be able to get a more straightforward answer here anyways. A lot of his words would go completely over my head if I read his more complicated works directly, if I'm honest.
I've heard that Tsongkhapa was not opposed to the Yogacara system of thought, but that he rejected any interpretation of it that would deny the existence of the conventional world. Of course, no fair reading of the Yogacara texts would lead to the conclusion that there is no such thing as a real world. But I have always been a pretty big fan of interpretations which suggest that our conventional reality is incredibly different from ultimate reality. Vasubandhu's dream analogy comes to mind. It seems unclear from the surface level things I've read on Tsongkhapa whether he subscribed to that view, that conventional reality is just a projection of the mind but there is still a material world in ultimate reality, or whether he affirmed that the conventional world we perceive is really as it seems, just without svabhava applied to it.
Of course, I'm willing to hear him out on whatever point he tries to make, but I think he'd be fighting a pretty uphill battle to challenge the great Yogacara thinkers!
So what was Tsongkhapa's view on external objects? Did he think they were:
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Existent, but in a form very different to what we perceive generally, to the extent that reality as we experience it can be called a projection of the mind.
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Existent, in a form nearly identical to what we perceive, not mentioning the ascription of svabhava of course.
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Something else?
A premature thanks to anyone who can help and an apologies if I'm grossly misunderstanding something. I can't claim to be a scholar.
The Yogacara school of Indian Buddhism was the mind only school of Buddhism. Their core belief was that the world is seen to be a Mental Projection.
This was later elaborated by George Barkley in his Subjective Idealism, and Immanuel Kant with Transcendental Idealism.
In the modern day Quantum Physics states that particles do not exist until they are observed. Everything we see, hear, smell, and touch are Electrical Signals sent to the Mind. That means what we think is out there can never truly be seen. We are only capable of a copy translated by the Mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5b0ZxUWNf0
I guess they would stay that unobserved objects and the connection are a part of the 8th consciousness, and the rest were part of the 6th consciousness. But is that explanation correct?
I ask because much of the writing about Nalanda and associated Indian Mahayana that I have read focusses either upon the tantras or upon Madhymaka Buddhism.
Did the Yogacara school strongly influence Chinese Chan Buddhism and Japanese Zen? Is it worth considering them as idealism?
Yogachara is the idealism that says that the physical world does not exist, and that in fact the whole world exists only in imagination. What does Mahayana Buddhism say about it? thank
> "If nothing is real, there cannot be any ideas . Someone who holds this view is a nihilist, with whom one should not speak or share living quarters".
Sharing living quarters with somebody with different view is bad idea indeed. And it makes marriage impossible.
From a surface level much of the Yogacaran ideas are very similar to many current Mahayana sects and if I'm not mistaken historically Yogacaran ideas fed into many Modern Mahayana sects. Im very interested in how the Yogacarans labelled the human experience and I'm wondering if it would be worth studying Yogacaran thought directly or would it be better to just delve into current sects. Thank You.
What do folks think of this work?
"On the level of Mahamudra, rituals are fully transcended. Saraha says practitioners of mahamudra no longer have to fiddle with mandalas and mantras; they have only to understand the nature of their own mind. Once we have understood that or had some experience of that, we no longer need to concern ourselves with the visualization of deities and that sort of thing."
I've been reading up on these two branches of Buddhist philosophy. Am currently working my through through Nagarjuna's Madhyamaka by Jan Westerhoff, and Living Yogacara by Tagawa Shun'ei. Also skimmed the Madhyamaka article on the SEP, as well as SEP's biographies of Nagarjuna and Vasubandhu. For primary text sources, I'm reading the Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra by Shantideva, and the Chéng Wéishì Lùn by Xuanzang.
From what I've read so far, I get the impression that in history, adherents of these two competing philosophical schools did not like each other. However, I'm unsure on just what the actual disagreement between them was, because as far as I can tell, Madhyamaka and Yogacara talk about completely different things, with no overlap; Madhyamaka being (anti-)ontology, Yogacara being philosophy of mind. Is it more that each school just thought that the other was wasting its time studying pointless stuff? I know that Shantideva makes an argument against Yogacara in Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra chapter 9, but I haven't really been able to wrap my mind around it as of yet.
AFAIK, Madhyamaka no longer exists as an independent sect, but its philosophy was adopted by the Tibetan Buddhist schools. Meanwhile, Yogacara persists in Japan through the Hossō sect, while some of its ideas were adopted by the Pure Land and the Chan sects in East Asia. Is this assessment correct? Thus, if in the future I attend Dharma service at a Tibetan temple, Madhyamaka would be more helpful to me, and likewise for Yogacara and Chan/Pure Land? At this point I haven't found a Buddhist community due to COVID, still studying on my own.
Yogacara has the problem of multiple minds experiencing the same object or inter-subjective agreement. Vasubandhu counters that mass hallucinations caused by the fact they share similar karma, show that inter-subjective agreement is possible without positing real external objects.
How convincing is this defence?
what are some objections to this from a realist?
You may see some telling correlations to many of the meditation guides we use in here.
For more context. This additional video. And a personal search into Yogacara and the nature of self as insight and a practice itself. I also recommend another video of his:
George Lakoff: How Brains Think: The Embodiment Hypothesis
"The Neuroscience of Language and Thought, Dr. George Lakoff Professor of Linguistics
We think with our brains. How is this possible? How can meaningful ideas arise from neurons, even billions of them?"
The Neuroscience of Language and Thought, Dr. George Lakoff
Mirror neurons. Empathy is physical. Another unpopular opinion: science talks embodied consciousness because they/we cannot 'think' without a body. I argue this proves the self is but a process created to manage our functions in the sense of the Lankavatara mind-only proposition. We think, but what we perceive is not the same experienced by the 'mind'. Our mind is the project manager for the body, but an algorithm not an individual. Serving the same function as an existent self, but only 'same as'/"upacāra"(discussed later).
Our relationship with this process, or construct, is what we wish to manage - and the result is a beneficial relationship - not negation or delusion.
The Thirty Verses on Conscious Life by Vasubandhu opens with this word. ātmadharmopacāro.
Atma: a form of atta - related to atman in Sanskrit. This form meaning 'your own self' (there are two selves in Yogacara - but they are the not-self of oneself and the not-self of nature/dharma *thus we must define your self from others since they are identical - we just label them as our own/different).
Dharmo: Dharma - objects, things, the universe as we see it. I liken the use of Dharma to the use of Brahman in Vedanta: it is everything - all items - even the space between is infused with Brahman nature/Dharma thus the two fold meanings present of the teachings, the path, and the conventional.
pacāro- Upacara -VERSE 1 Of Vasubandhu's 30 verses states: "self" & "nature" to be both "upacāra". Upacāra (उपचार).—(l) taking a secondary sense; implication; lit. moving for a sense which is near about; the same as लक्षणा (lakṣaṇā). The word आचार (ācāra) is explained as उपचार (upacāra), employment or current usage, by Patañjali. upacāra : (m.) neighborhood; preparative or preliminary action.
Source: Sutta: The Pa
... keep reading on reddit ➡I'm currently doing some research on the two different schools of Mahayana, and I've read in a couple of places that their views surrounding emptiness were somewhat divergent, so I was wondering what the disagreement is over? Thanks heaps!
"The three natures are these: the first one is in Sanskrit called the parikalpita-svabhāva or the imagined nature, the second one paratantra-svabhāva or the dependent nature, and the third one the pariniṣpanna-svabhāva or the perfected or the consummate nature. The three kinds of emptiness distinguished in the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra are: emptiness with respect to characteristics, emptiness with respect to production, and ultimate emptiness. Now what we need is a good example, so we’re going to take the cup. In particular what we are going to look at is how I actually experience the cup, and I want to do this just in a very ordinary, boring way from the standpoint of modern science for a moment.
So here I am gazing fondly at this beautiful cup, and instinctively I think that I am experiencing immediately an external object that is smooth, round, has beautiful flowers on it, contains water and so forth; and if I asked you, iif I were right you would say: “Yes, you’ve got it exactly!”. But on reflection, even if we haven’t studied a word of Dharma, we know that that’s wrong. I am going to tell you a sad story. In fact here’s what’s happening. Light is bouncing off some object out there, it’s being bent by the lens of my eye, passed through a bunch of liquid in my eyeball, where it’s causing electrical activity among nerve cells on the back of my eye. I’m not making this up: it’s in scriptures that we all trust, the scriptures of modern science!
What then happens? Nerve impulses go up my optic nerve into my brain. They go into my occipital cortex, where various visual processing happens, and they interact with the parts of my brain that are involved with language and with motor control to give me the labeled cup and to get my hand to grasp it. I want to make it clear that in order to see this cup I need some light but it is very dark in my brain. So whatever’s happening in my brain, I don’t have a cup in there; and the cup itself is not penetrating my skull and if it did I’d be in big trouble; so where I take myself to be directly experiencing an external object, all that’s really happening is bunch of complicated brain activity that is generating an image and a word and a bunch of action based upon some electrical activity in the back of my eye caused by some thing or other.
This is actually extremely profound, even though it’s just science, and this is actually what the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra and Vasubandhu are talking about. The imagined nature of the cup,
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I'm looking for a good introduction to the theory of Yogacara. I'm inclined to look for a generalised approach that is scholarly as I am trying to understand its origins and evolution over time rather than, say, an ahistorical practical teaching per se. (Those are easily available from many East Asian schools of Buddhism!) Think "intro to philosophy" and not "guide to practice".
If you know of a work (or works!) that introduces or contrasts Madhyamaka views with Yogacara ones as well, double points!
I was listening to Ethan Nichtern (whom I highly recommend, link below) and he spoke of the Mind-Only tradition of Buddhism. This is the first I heard the term, but everything he said about it really resonated with me. I don't understand how it is different/unique from other traditions.
Can you point me to some good introductory books/sites/speakers on mind-only Buddhism?
http://www.ethannichtern.com/tag/podcast/
Hello everyone, I am back with another question!
I'd like to thank everyone who helped me answer the previous question that I had posted about Madhyamika and nihilism - the answers given helped me a lot to understand its complexities.
I would really appreciate it if I can get pointers on how to answer this question.
Thank you!
A topic I used to spend a long time dwelling on - neurotically, even - was the manufactured debate between yogacara and madhyamaka which is mostly a synthetic proclivity produced over a thousand year after the fact.
Most of this would be circumvented by an understanding of the basic principles of both yogacara and madhyamaka. However these principles were often in short supply due to accumulated debate points and secondary sources glossing from one view or another the original content. In the absence of primarily sourced and unmistaken original principles, this accumulation of secondary distortions only elaborated on itself, as if believing itself and its philosophical postures to be essential to the dharma.
Or as if not practicing what is preached.
These are the two actual main points of yogacara and madhyamaka. The rest is contingent analysis. If these two are fully cognized, the rest is understood as a matter of course.
Yogacara says that the only way any ontology could ever be broached in any sense is through one's own experience - even if one's own experience turns out to have no ontological basis and also collapses as an experience. Otherwise, one refrains from making ontological assertions - the only actual focus is the epistemic representation of things and no-thing in the mind, and the mind's representation of itself, construing this from its base of impressions.
Some people seem to think that yogacara deviates from the pure emptiness presented by the prajnaparamita sutra and expounded in vastly practical eloquence by the madhyamaka shastras. These persons also isolate themselves from the third turning, claiming it to be indefinite and merely expedient in its display of relative truth.
These views, having little hermeneutic value or practical relevance to the practitioner. Instead we will address the open expanse of potential views that is the unity of sattvadhatu and dharmadhatu. In that there are potential views, there is relative truth. In that there is viewlessness, there is absolute truth.
In that there is an absence of ontological ground, there is absolute truth.
In that the absolute ground is identified as this great absence, there is absolute truth. In that this absence, and its absence of itself, is still not seen to exist, the conventional is not sunk to.
The second and third turnings are both conclusive in this point. Yogacara and madhyamaka both span from second to third turnings.
Yogacara makes epistemological statem
... keep reading on reddit ➡As of late, I have found myself circling back to the 'Buddha Path' on my spiritual journey, and in my newest readings of the different "schools" of Buddhism, I came across Yogacara.
Could someone explain this to me in layman's terms? I'm still tender-footed on my path and all of the documents I've read on Yogacara are a bit overwhelming for my poor Buddhist vocabularly.
Is Yogacara actually a separate school of thought? To me, it doesn't seem that it can stand all alone, but is more an integral, constitutive part of Buddhism.
I've just recently started practicing yoga regularly as well, and I suppose that is one reason my interest has been so piqued by Yogacara.
At any rate, I really appreciate any words on the subject! Thank you all so much for such a wonderful subreddit!
When I read the first portion of chapter 1 I was reminded of the poem Song of the Grass Roof Hermitage by Shitou
“Drinking Wine” by Tao Yuanming
>I built my hut amid the throng of men, But there is no din of carriages or horses. You ask me how this can be? When the heart is remote, the earth stands aloof. Plucking chrysanthemums by the eastern hedge, I see afar the southern hills; The mountain air is fine at sunset; Flying birds return home in flocks. In this return lies real meaning; I want to explain it, but I lose the words.
Accompanying proverb:
>The great recluse hides himself in the city markets; the minor recluse hides in the deep mountains.
| Living Yogacara | Song of the Grass Roof Hermitage |
|---|---|
| I built my hut amid the throng of men, But there is no din of carriages or horses. | I’ve built a grass hut where there’s nothing of value. After eating, I relax and enjoy a nap.... The person in the hut lives here calmly, Not stuck to inside, outside, or in between. |
| When the heart is remote, the earth stands aloof. Plucking chrysanthemums by the eastern hedge, | Places worldly people live, he doesn’t live. Realms worldly people love, he doesn’t love. |
| Plucking chrysanthemums by the eastern hedge, I see afar the southern hills; The mountain air is fine at sunset; Flying birds return home in flocks. In this return lies real meaning; | Though the hut is small, it includes the entire world. In ten square feet, an old man illumines forms and their nature.... Perishable or not, the original master is present, not dwelling south or north, east or west. Firmly based on steadiness, it can’t be surpassed. A shining window below the green pines – Jade palaces or vermilion towers can’t compare with it. |
| I want to explain it, but I lose the words. | Just sitting with head covered, all things are at rest. Thus, this mountain monk doesn’t understand at all....If you want to know the undying person in the hut, Don’t separate from this skin bag here and now. |
| The great recluse hides himself in the city markets | When it was completed, fresh weeds appeared. Now it’s been lived in – covered by weeds....Living here he no longer works to get free. Who would proudly arrange seats, trying to entice guests? |
Shitou seems to be expressesing what Tagawa Shun'ei is trying point at, but without the intermediary steps, 'Thousands of words, myriad
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