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Jay Garfield's magisterial translation of Nagarjuna's Mulamadhyamakakarika (The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way) has established itself as the definitive edition of this foundational Indian Buddhist philosophical text. Nagarjuna is the founder - and his work the foundational text - of the Madhyamaka (or Middle Path) school of Mahayana Buddhism, which predominates in Tibet, China, Mongolia, Korea, Vietnam, and Japan. In this book, a companion and supplement to his translation and commentary, Garfield presents fourteen of his essays on Nagarjuna, Madhyamaka, Yogacara and related themes in Buddhist philosophy.
In this volume, Garfield supplements and extends his work on the Mulamadhyamakakarika . He then explores topics in Yogacara philosophy through the works of Vasubandhu and Sthiramati. These discussions focus on Buddhist accounts of the limits of thought and language, of causality, and of the structure of subjectivity. Garfield next addresses the connections and tensions between Buddhist ethics and the liberal democratic discourse of moral and political rights. He concludes by examining the moral and epistemological problems that arise in cross-cultural studies.
The culmination of a decade of research and writing, Empty Words adds new depth to our understanding of Buddhist thought, its relationship to western philosophy, and the nature of cross-cultural scholarship itself.
Empty Words, Jay L. Garfield, Oxford University Press, 306 pages, $56.00
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Contents: Empty Words : Buddhist Philosophy and
Cross-Cultural Interpretation |
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PART I. MADHYAMAKA |
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1. |
Epoche and Sunyata: Scepticism East and West |
3 |
2. |
Dependent Arising and the Emptiness of Emptiness:
Why Did Nagarjuna Start with Causation? |
24 |
3. |
Emptiness and Positionlessness: Do the Madhyamika Relinquish
All Views?
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46 |
4. |
Nagarjuna's Theory of Causality: Implications
Sacred and Profane |
69 |
5. |
Nagarjuna and the Limits of Thought (with Graham Priest) |
86 |
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PART II. YOGACARA |
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Three Natures and Three Naturelessnesses: Comments
Concerning Cittamatra Conceptual Categories |
109 |
7.
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Vasubandhu's Treatise on the Three Natures: A
Translation and Commentary |
128 |
8. |
Western Idealism through Indian Eyes: A Cittamatra
Reading of Berkeley, Kant, and Schopenhauer |
152 |
9. |
Sounds of Silence: Ineffability and the Limits
of Language in Madhyamaka and Yogacara |
170 |
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PART III. ETHICS AND HERMENEUTICS |
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Human Rights and Compassion: Toward a Unified Moral
Framework |
187 |
11. |
Buddhism and Democracy |
206 |
12. |
The ``Satya'' in Satyagraha: Samdhong Rinpoche's
Approach to Nonviolence |
220 |
13. |
Temporality and Alterity---Dimensions of Hermeneutic
Distance |
229 |
14. |
Philosophy, Religion, and the Hermeneutic Imperative |
251 |
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Notes |
261 |
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References |
291 |
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Index |
299 |
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