Abstract

Śāntarakṣita was an important 8th century CE Indian Buddhist philosopher who introduced Indian Buddhism to Tibet and is believed to have created what the Tibetans call the Yogācāra-Svātantrika School of Madhyamaka Indian Buddhism. He composed the "Compendium of Reality" (Tattva¬saṃgraha), which is a comprehensive critical examination of the major Indian philosophical theories of his time. Kamalaśīla was Śāntarakṣita’s eminent disciple who wrote a commentary on the "Compendium of Reality", entitled "Commentary on the Difficult Points of the Compendium of Reality" (Tattva¬saṃgraha¬pañjikā), which we shall call the Commentary. Here we translate and briefly comment upon the Commentary discussion of Śāntarakṣita’s examination in verses 285–310 of the classical Sāṃkhyas’ theory of a self (ātman). Śāntarakṣita, Kamalaśīla, and the Sāṃkhyas all believed that a self is consciousness, but according to Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla, consciousness is a causal continuum of momentary consciousnesses of objects and exists merely by convention; according to the Sāṃkhyas, it is a permanent and partless witness of objects that has independent existence. We give a brief explanation of the Sāṃkhya philosophy, and a brief explanation of the Buddhism of Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla. Then we translate one or more of Śāntarakṣita’s verses on the Sāṃkhya theory of a self, along with Kamalaśīla’s commentary, follow the translation with our own comments upon what is translated, and repeat this sequence until the examination of the Sāṃkhya theory is completed. We expand our comments when dealing with a few basic philosophical issues that arise from the arguments presented in the Commentary. We briefly evaluate the effectiveness of the arguments by Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla and the Sāṃkhya replies as they are represented. The basic philosophical questions upon which we shall comment concern the Sāṃkhya theories that a self is one (eka) in the sense that it has no parts, permanent (nityam) in the sense that it continues to exist without changing in any way, a witness of objects presented to it, and the experiencer of the objects presented to it without being an agent that produces them.