Professor David Jinadasa Kalupahana (1936–2014)It is with a deep sense of sadness that we received the message of the passing of Professor David J. Kalupahana. Professor Kalupahana lived a life devoted to Buddhist studies. In addition to being a dedicated teacher, he was a researcher and writer with enormous energy. Even after his retirement from active university teaching, he kept on producing works on Buddhist philosophy and attending seminars and conferences on Buddhist studies in various parts of the world. His (...) passing is a loss to the Buddhist academic world.Professor Kalupahana was a former head of the Department of Philosophy, University of Hawai’i, where he served as a professor from 1972. Prior to joining .. (shrink)

A popular view holds that religion necessarily involves a strong, 'non-rational' element. According to this view, which the present study calls the 'transcendent' interpretation of religion, in the heart of religion is the unknowable Transcendent which is ineffable . This view holds that transcendence and ineffability are the key characteristics of any religious experience. ;The problem with this interpretation of religion is that, it undermines the uniqueness of individual religions, and it attributes a uniform philosophy of reality and language to (...) all religions. The present study suggests that such a universal characterization of religion is fundamentally flawed. ;The study develops what may be called the Buddhist 'naturalist' explanation of reality which is based on the Buddhist non-theism and the doctrine of dependent origination, and shows that early Buddhism explains naturalistically not only reality in general but also the religious reality or nirvana. Subsequently, with the assumption that one's conception of reality precedes one's philosophy of language, the study develops what can be called a non-transcendent philosophy of language in early Buddhism. The absence of ineffability is one of the most outstanding characteristics of this philosophy of language. ;This study does not neglect the strong, transcendent interpretation of the Buddhist religious experience that has been proposed by some of the eminent Buddhist scholars on the basis of such matters as the Buddhist four-cornered logic , the 'unanswered questions' and the 'direct and indirect' discourses . But this study questions the soundness of that interpretation and shows how these selfsame issues allow a non-transcendent interpretation. (shrink)

Abhidharmasamuccaya: The Compendium of Higher Teaching by Asanga. Originally translated into French and annotated by Walpola Rahula. English translation by Sara Boin-Webb. Asian Humanities Press, Fremont, CA 2001. xxvii, 327 pp. $75.00. ISBN 0-89581-941-4.

Xuanzang (602–664) is famous for his legendary life, his important translation works, and also his Discourse on the Realisation of Consciousness-Only (Vijñapti-mātratā-siddhi, 成唯識論). This text, which is considered as a synthesis of Yogācāra thought, has been diversely interpreted by modern scholars and is still discussed, in particular about the status of external things. Nevertheless, this issue seems to be of little interest for Yogācāra thinkers compared to other topics such as the Noble Path, or else the three types of wisdom (...) (trividhā prajñā, 三慧): learning (śruta, 聞), reasoning (cintā, 思), and cultivating (bhāvanā, 修). As emphasized in recent research, this topic represents a major issue for Buddhist practitioners. In an attempt to analyse it in Xuanzang’s Discourse, and more generally in Yogācāra thought, this paper will first discuss Asaṅga’s and Vasubandhu’s thought on the three types of wisdom. Secondly, since it is important to replace the three types of wisdom in the general argumentation of Xuanzang’s Discourse, we will present the structure of his text which is modelled on a “path” leading progressively to Supreme Awakening. Then, we will present the main elements of the Noble Path and situate the three types of wisdom into it. Finally, we will explain that Xuanzang follows Asaṅga’s and Vasubandhu’s conceptions and eventually confirm the importance of the three types of wisdom in Yogācāra thought. (shrink)

The doctrine of the “absence of the self” ( anātman ), which is the basis of the ontology of Buddhist schools of all possible orientations, in its application to practical activity implies the existence of such an organizing structure of cognition, which in its essence differs both from the orthodox systems of Indian thought ( āstika ) and from the correlationist ideas of modern transcendental epistemology. The research presents the abhidharma as a genre of Buddhist literature and a discipline of (...) Buddhist system of knowledge (Abhidharma) serves as a cognitive model producing such an image of the world from which the problem of “Self” ( ātman ) is eliminated. Such “elimination” does not mean the destruction of the “I” (ego, personality) at all, but proposes to consider it as an “assemblage”, a composition or autonomous wholeness composed of heterogeneous elements of different natures, each of which in turn is an “assemblage”, the relations between and within the individual “assemblages” being external relations. At the center of the research is the question: is it possible (or how is it possible) to have a strategy of cognition that would not assume as its basis the dichotomy “cognizing subject - cognizable world”, but would have as its goal the transcendence of phenomenal existence. It is argued that Abhidharma/abhidharma is a description of elements shaping the structure of which could be regarded just as such a cognitive strategy. The paper is based on the author’s experience of translating Asaṅga’s Abhidharmasamuccaya (4th century) and a large commentary on it, the Abhidharmasamuccayavyākhyā, attributed to Sthiramāti (6th century). (shrink)

_In his book_ The Yogasūtra of Patañjali: A New Introduction to the Buddhist Roots of the Yoga System_, Pradeep Gokhale reveals a new picture of the Yogasūtra. He shows us, verse after verse, Buddhist influences on this classical text, which is usually seen as rooted in the Sā__ṃ__khya tradition. Gokhale does not merely argue that Patañjali borrows from Buddhist sources; he substantiates his argument with numerous detailed examples, traveling back and forth between Patañjali and Buddhist thinkers such as Asa__ṅ__ga and (...) Vasubandhu. Gokhale further argues that Vyāsa, Patañjali’s most authoritative commentator, makes a __political move in his commentary by distancing Patañjali from the Buddhists and situating him on the “right side” of the philosophical map, namely the __ā__stika side, the side of the loyalists of the Veda. __The implications are __far-reaching. First, __Patañjali and Vyāsa cannot be one and the same person, as claimed by solid Yogasūtra scholars such as Philipp Maas. __Second, the Patañjali of the Yogasūtra cannot be identified with his namesake, the __author of the Mahābhā__ṣ__ya, “The Great Commentary” on some of the themes discussed by Pā__ṇ__ini, the forefather of Indian linguistics. Patañjali, the linguist, is dated to the 2nd or 3rd century BCE; Patañjali of the Yogasūtra would now have to be pushed forward to the 5th century CE as Gokhale implies. Like Daya Krishna before him, Gokhale highlights the contribution of Buddhist texts and thinkers, often undermined or marginalized in the narrative of the history of Indian philosophy, at least as __it is __sketched in India. In this respect, I briefly visit Daya Krishna’s essay “Was Ācārya Śa__ṅ__kara responsible for the disappearance of Buddhist Philosophy from India?” (1999). Finally, I mention Karen O’Brien-Kop’s research. Like Gokhale, she makes an attempt to join the dots between Pātañjala-yoga and the Buddhist Yogācāra._. (shrink)

Aim of the lectures -- Early Brahmanical literature -- Panini's grammar -- A passage from the Chandogya Upanisad -- The structures of languages -- The Buddhist contribution -- Vaisesika and language -- Verbal knowledge -- The contradictions of Nagarjuna -- The reactions of other thinkers -- Sarvastivada Samkhya -- The Agamasastra of Gaudapada -- Sankara -- Kashmiri Saivism -- Jainism -- Early Vaisesika -- Critiques of the existence of a thing before its arising -- Nyaya -- Mimamsa -- The Abhidharmakosa (...) bhasya of Vasubandhu -- The Abhidharmasamuccaya of Asanga and its bhasya -- Bhartrhari -- The problem of negation -- Dignaga and verbal knowledge -- The Bodhisattvabhumi -- Prajnakaragupta -- Indian thinkers and the correspondence principle -- Appendix. The Mahaprajnaparamitasastra and the Samkhya tanmatras. (shrink)

The aim of the article is to define the tendencies of elaboration of ethical problems in early medieval exegetical texts - treatises of post-canonical Abhidharma. Ethics as a specific philosophical discipline concerning morals was not specifically developed because of cosmological character of Buddhist philosophy. Explication of the ethical discourse presented in treatises of eminent early medieval Indian Buddhist exegetics Vasubandhu, Asaṅga and Yaśomitra showed that specific for ethics questions on the highest good, sense of human life, the nature and sources (...) of morals, freedom of will etc. were solved in post-canonical period. According to the religious doctrine they interpreted the highest good as the benefit of liberation from the fetches of suffering. The Buddha’s moral instructions known as prātimokṣa is aimed at the attainment of the highest good. Therefore the essence of morality has nothing to do with saṃsāra, and human society forming and perishing in cosmic cycles cannot be the source of moral norms. According to historiosophical myth, human beings get the first instructions on righteous behavior in deep antiquity from charismatic Universal ruler coming to the world as the forerunner of the Buddha. He explains ontological contrariness of the good and the evil but is not the Teacher of the truth. Freedom of will cannot manifest itself spontaneously in a human being attached affectively to saṃsāra. Such an individual falsely takes his ignorant self-will for the freedom of will. Hearing the sermons of salvific teaching is the condition for the rising of free will impulse. (shrink)

In the first part of this paper I critically examine some of the main interpretations of “classical” Yogācāra philosophy of Maitreya, Asaṅga and Vasubandhu. Among these interpretations, based on extant textual and contextual data, I consider philologically unlikely both metaphysical-idealistic readings, which ascribe to these authors the view that ultimate reality is a mental or subjective stuff, and epistemological-idealistic readings which advocate that either Yogācāra suspends judgment on the existence of the extramental or that it maintains that the extramental exists (...) in itself and ultimately. Instead, I consider more likely the thesis that classical Yogācāra upholds an epistemological idealism that, while admitting epistemological priority of the mental over the extramental, rules out the ultimate existence of both the former and the latter. This exclusion, however, does not amount to the exclusion of every metaphysics, but rather to the adoption of a metaphysics of emptiness conceived, in fact, as absence of the mental/extramental dichotomy. In the second part of the paper this reading of classical Yogācāra is compared with the interpretation of Nāgārjuna’s philosophy that I elsewhere called “realistic antimetaphysical”, and I reach the conclusion that, while with respect to epistemology between early Madhyamaka and classical Yogācāra there is continuity, regarding metaphysics these two schools are deeply distinct and discontinuous: while Nāgārjuna conceives of emptiness as an extinction of any metaphysical view, Yogācāra emptiness actually presents itself as a metaphysical point of view. (shrink)

The paper deals with the early Yogācāra strategies for explaining intersubjective agreement under a ‘mere representations’ view. Examining Vasubandhu, Asaṅga, and Sthiramati’s use of the example of intersubjective agreement among the hungry ghosts, it is demonstrated that in contrast to the way in which it was often interpreted by contemporary scholars, this example in fact served these Yogācāra thinkers to perform an ironic inversion of the realist premise—showing that intersubjective agreement not only does not require the existence of mind-independent objects (...) but is in fact incompatible with their existence. By delineating the phenomenological complexity underlying this account, the paper then proceeds to unpack the emergent Yogācāra account of intersubjectivity, its implications on the understanding of being, the life-world, and alterity, arguing that it proposes a radical revision of the way we conceive of the ‘shared’ and ‘private’ distinction in respect to experiences, both ordinarily and philosophically. (shrink)

In Tibetan monasteries depictions of eight Indian Buddhist philosophers collectively referred to as the “six ornaments and two supreme ones” are often found. These “six ornaments” are Nāgārjuna, Āryadeva, Asaṅga, Vasubandhu, Dignāga, and Dharmakīrti. These paintings are usually grouped around a central representation of Buddha Śākyamuni. This iconographic set gives a straightforward way of dividing Indian Buddhist philosophical thought into four intellectual streams: Abhidharma, Madhyamaka, Yogācāra and what is often referred to as the epistemological‐logical school of Dignāga and Dharmakīrti. Each (...) of these four schools constitutes a philosophical system of considerable complexity dealing with questions in metaphysics, epistemology, the philosophy of logic and language, ethics, and so forth. (shrink)

This Book Is An In-Depth Study Of Buddhist Philosophy In India And Tibet. The Concentration Is On Ontology/Epistemology And, To A Somewhat Lesser Extent, Soteriology. It Is Based On The Writings Of The Buddhist Philosophers Themselves, From The Unknown Authors Of The Pali `Abhidhamma' Books Down To The Present Dalai Lama Of Tibet. It Takes Into Consideration The Work Of Many Twentieth Century Scholars Of Buddhism In Order To Bring Our Knowledge Of Buddhist Philosophy Up-To-Date. An Exhaustive Index (And Glossary) (...) Has Been Prepared In Order To Help The Reader With The Technical Terms Of Buddhist Philosophy.;;The Two Parts And Fourteen Chapters Of The Book Are As Follows: Part I (India): Ch.I: The Theravada. Ch.Ii: The Sarvastivada. Ch.Iii: The Madhyamaka (1) The Prasangikas Nagarjuna And Candrakirti. Ch.Iv: The Madhyamaka (2) The Prasangikas Aryadeva And Santideva. Ch.V: The Madhyamaka (3) The Svatantrikas. Ch.Vi: The Yogacara (1) Two Yogacara Sutras And Asanga And Vasubandhu. Ch.Vii: The Yogacara (2) Dignaga And Dharmakirti. Ch.Viii: The Yogacara (3) Santarakshita And Kamalasila. Ch.Ix: The `Tathagata-Garbha'. Part Ii (Tibet): Ch.X: The Vajrayana, General Features. Ch.Xi: The Nyingmapa. Ch.Xii: The Sakyapa. Ch.Xiii: The Kagyupa. Ch.Xiv: The Gelugpa. (shrink)

Explore the nature of our material world in a unique sourcebook, conceived by the Dalai Lama, collecting the scientific observations found in classical Buddhist treatises. Under the visionary supervision of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics brings together classical Buddhist explorations of the nature of our material world and the human mind and puts them into context for the modern reader. It is the Dalai Lama’s view that the explorations by the great masters (...) of northern India in the first millennium CE still have much that is of interest today, whether we are Buddhist or not. Volume 1, The Physical World, explores of the nature of our material world—from the macroscopic to the microscopic. It begins with an overview of the many frameworks, such as the so-called five aggregates, that Buddhist thinkers have used to examine the nature and scope of reality. Topics include sources of knowledge, the scope of reason, the nature and constituents of the material world, theories of the atom, the nature of time, the formation of the universe, and the evolution of life, including a detailed explanation of the early Buddhist theories on fetal development. The volume even contains a brief presentation on early theories about the structure and function of the brain and the role of microorganisms inside the human body. The book weaves together passages from the works of great Buddhist thinkers like Asanga, Vasubandhu, Nagarjuna, Dignaga, and Dharmakirti. Each of the major topics is introduced by Thupten Jinpa, the Dalai Lama’s principal English-language translator and founder of the Institute of Tibetan Classics. (shrink)

"This book offers a systematic and radical introduction to the Buddhist roots of Pātañjala-yoga, or the Yoga system of Patañjali. By examining each of 195 aphorisms (sūtras) of the Yogasūtra and discussing the Yogabhāṣya, it shows that traditional and popular views on Pātañjala-yoga obscure its true nature. The book argues that Patañjali's Yoga contains elements rooted in both orthodox and heterodox philosophical traditions, including Sāṅkhya, Jaina and Buddhist thought. With a fresh translation and a detailed commentary on the Yogasūtra, the (...) author unearths how several of the terms, concepts and doctrines in Patañjali's Yoga can be traced to Buddhism, particularly the Abhidharma Buddhism of Vasubandhu and the early Yogācāra of Asaṅga. The work presents the Yogasūtra of Patañjali as a synthesis of two perspectives: the metaphysical perspective of Sāṅkhya and the empirical-psychological perspective of Buddhism. Based on a holistic understanding of Yoga, the study explores key themes of the text, such as meditative absorption, means, supernormal powers, isolation, Buddhist conceptions of meditation and the interplay between Sāṅkhya and Buddhist approaches to suffering and emancipation. It further highlights several new findings and clarifications on textual interpretation and discrepancies. An important intervention in Indian and Buddhist philosophy, this book opens up a new way of looking at the Yoga of Patañjali in the light of Buddhism beyond standard approaches and will greatly interest scholars and researchers of Buddhist studies, Yoga studies, Indian philosophy, philosophy in general, literature, religion and comparative studies, Indian and South Asian Studies and the history of ideas."--. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Word and Silence in Buddhist and Christian TraditionsDonald MitchellThe following official statement was written by Buddhist and Christian participants at the end of a very successful encounter at the Asirvanam Benedictine Monastery near Bangalore, India, from July 8 to13, 1998. The conference was organized by the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue (PCID) and was attended by its president, Cardinal Francis Arinze, along with the PCID secretary, Archbishop Michael (...) Fitzgerald, and Fr. Machado, the PCID official for Asia. The conference proceedings will be published in the PCID journal, Pro Dialogo.Buddhist participants included Ven. Dr. Yifa from Fokuangshan in Taiwan, Ven. Bhaddarita Panna Dipa from the World Buddhist Meditation Center in Myanmar, Ven. Geshe D. Namgyal from the Drepung Loseling Monastery representing His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Dr. Asanga Tilakratne of the Institute of Pali and Buddhist Studies in Sri Lanka, Dr. Michio Shinozaki, dean of the Rissho Kosei-Kai Seminary in Japan, and Prof. Yasuaki Nara of Komazawa University in Japan.Christian participants included Fr. Franco Sottocomola of the Seimeizen Center for Interreligious Dialogue in Japan, Fr. Valence Mendis of the National Seminary in Sri Lanka, Fr. Augustine Okumuru, OCD, of Japan, Prof. Donald W. Mitchell of Purdue University, Sr. Iona Misquitta, OSB, and Sr. Teresita D’Silva, OSB, both of the Shanti Nilayam Abbey in Bangalore, and Prof. Michael Fuss of the Gregorian University in Rome.Concluding Statement1. The Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue organized its second international colloquium at the Asirvanam Benedictine Monastery in Bangalore, India, from July 8 to 13, 1998. A small number of Buddhists and Christians from India, Tibet/India, Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, and the United States were invited for a dialogue on the theme of “Word and Silence in Buddhist and Christian Traditions.” This event encounter was in response to a desire expressed at the Pontifical Council’s First Colloquium that was held from July 31 to August 4, 1995, at the Fo Kuang Shan Buddhist Monastery in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. At the end of that first dialogue, the participants expressed the desire to [End Page 187] meet again in a Christian monastery in order to contribute to the deepening of the modern encounter between Buddhism and Christianity.2. The agenda of the meeting included four major topics: Buddhist Enlightenment and Christian Revelation, Sacred Texts in the Buddhist and Christian Traditions, Meditation and Contemplation in Buddhism and Christianity, and Anatta/ Sunyata and Kenosis. The papers were presented on these four topics in a way that fostered the dialogue process itself. In this process, all participants shared and explored their views of the place of word and silence in their respective traditions leading to a greater sense of mutual understanding and appreciation. This meeting proceeded by each side expressing what its own traditions believe, teach, and celebrate. The following points indicate some of the areas that were explored in the dialogue.3. The authority of the early sacred Buddhist texts was decided during the six great Buddhist Councils called for at different periods of time by the Buddha’s disciples after passing into Parinirvana. Theravada Buddhism accepts only the teachings of the Buddha that were declared authoritative during these councils. This early canon includes the discourses of the Buddha (Sutta), the rules for the monastic order (Vinaya), and the higher philosophical teachings (Abhidhamma). While Mahayana Buddhism accepts this early canon, it also accepts and emphasizes other sacred texts, called Sutras, which they believe were also taught by the Buddha. Within Mahayana there arose another tradition called Vajrayana that accepts the canons of both Theravada and Mahayana and adds a new literature called the Tantras, which present Buddhist esoteric teachings. Common to these traditions are the precepts for living the teachings of the Buddha and the authoritative commentaries of the particular traditions. These sacred texts describe the path that leads to the liberation from suffering and the nature and qualities of that supreme condition.In the Catholic tradition of Christianity, it is the teaching authority of the Church that has faithfully received the revealed and inspired texts and has determined their canonicity. The canon of Sacred Scripture consists of two sections: the Old Testament, written in... (shrink)

This book offers a systematic and radical introduction to the Buddhist roots of Pātañjalayoga or the Yoga system of Patañjali. By examining each of 195 aphorisms of the Yogasūtra, along with discussions on the Yogabhāṣya, it shows that traditional and popular views on Pātañjalayoga obscure its true nature. The book argues that Patañjali's Yoga contains elements rooted in both orthodox as well as heterodox philosophical traditions, including Sāṅkhya, Jaina and Buddhist thought. With a fresh translation and a detailed commentary on (...) the Yogasūtra, the author unearths how several terms, concepts, and doctrines of Patañjali's Yoga can be traced to Buddhism, particularly the Abhidharma Buddhism of Vasubandhu and the early Yogācāra of Asaṅga. The work presents the Yogasūtra of Patañjali as a synthesis of two perspectives: the metaphysical perspective of Sāṅkhya and the empirical-psychological perspective of Buddhism. Based on a holistic understanding of Yoga, the study explores key themes of the text, such as meditative absorption, means, supernormal powers, isolation, Buddhist conceptions of meditation, the interplay between Sāṅkhya and Buddhist approaches to suffering and emancipation. It further highlights several new findings and clarifications on textual interpretation and discrepancies. An important intervention in Indian and Buddhist philosophy, this book opens a new way of looking at the Yoga of Patañjali in the light of Buddhism beyond standard approaches, and will greatly interest scholars and researchers of Buddhist studies, Yoga studies, Indian philosophy, philosophy in general, literature, religion and comparative studies, Indian and South Asian Studies, and the history of ideas. (shrink)

: What kinds of comparisons can legitimately be made between Mahāyāna Buddhism and Western ethical theories? Mahāyānists aspire to alleviate the suffering, promote the happiness, and advance the moral perfection of all sentient beings. This aspiration is best understood as expressing a form of universalist consequentialism. Many Indian Mahāyāna texts seem committed to claims about agent-neutrality that imply consequentialism and are not compatible with virtue ethics. Within the Mahāyāna tradition, there is some diversity of views: Asaṅga seems to hold a (...) complex and interesting version of rule consequentialism, whereas Śāntideva is closer to act consequentialism. (shrink)

The Yogacara school of Buddhist thought claims that all language-use is metaphorical. Exploring the profound implications of this assertion, Roy Tzhoar makes the case for viewing the Yogacara account as a full-fledged theory of meaning, one that is not merely linguistic, but also applicable both in the world and in texts.

I reconstruct early Yogācāra theory of no-self based on works by Asaṅga and Vasubandhu. I introduce the idea of the cognitive schema (CS) of the self, a conception borrowed from the developmental psychologist, Jean Piaget. A fundamental CS is a psychological function that guides the formation of perceptions. I propose that Manas can be understood in terms of being the CS of the self, a psychological mechanism from which perceptions of external objects are formed. In addition, I argue that non-imaginative (...) wisdom can be regarded as an experience during which the CS of the self does not function, such that one only possesses pure sensations without perceptions of external objects. After the repeated experience of non-imaginative wisdom, the CS of the self is changed to the purified CS of no-self. It still supports interactions with the external world, but in a way that does not allow the four afflictions (self-delusion, self-belief, self-conceit, and self-love) to arise. (shrink)

Recent decades have witnessed a number of scholarly attempts to illuminate the philosophical affinity between the Madhyamaka and Yogācāra, the two main systems of thought in the Mahāyāna stream of Buddhism. Both schools originated in India in the first centuries of the common era, and had a significant impact on the doctrines of Asian Buddhism in such countries as China, Korea, Tibet, and Japan. Consequently, their views concerning reality have been documented in various textual sources, ranging from early philosophical treatises (...) by their chief founders, Nāgārjuna and Vasubandhu and Asaṅga, to sūtras and later commentaries. These sources indicate that the two schools shared certain core... (shrink)

This is the best book to date on Buddhist theory of perception as found in the Pramänasamuccaya of Dignäga, 480 to 540 A.D. The book offers seventy pages of translation, copious notes, and two Tibetan editions in transliteration of Dignäga's chapter on perception. The translation is strikingly good with the necessary additions carefully bracketed to allow as much as possible a fluent reading if one disregarded the brackets. The translation is a presentation of the theory of perception, an examination of (...) a definition of perception found in a work attributed to Vasubandhu, followed by examinations of non-Buddhist theories of perception: Nyäya, Vaisesika, Sämkhya, and Mïmämsaka. Mistakenly Hattori says, "Unlike his predecessors, Dignäga does not accept the unconditional authority of Scripture." If that were true, then Dignäga's teacher Vasubandhu, his teacher's brother Asanga, the great Nägärjuna, and many other Buddhist scholars who differentiated between scriptures requiring interpretation and those not requiring interpretation would have to be accused of unconditionally accepting all scriptures. Also, he says, "There is a commentary... by the great Tibetan scholar Darma Rinchen. However, I have not utilized it since I thought that the examination of it might serve to clarify only the Tibetan interpretation of Dignäga's thought." Rather, it would seem that this dimly lit field needs as much light as possible even if from the tinted lanterns of Tibet. However, all in all the book is excellent; it is not light reading or even particularly appealing to those whose interest is religious practice.--P. J. H. (shrink)