大乘掌珍論

Dàshèng zhǎngzhēn lùn 大乘掌珍論

Mahāyāna Jewel-in-the-Hand Treatise (Karatalaratna / Mahāyānatālaratnaśāstra) by 清辯菩薩 (Qīngbiàn púsà / Bhāviveka, 造) and 玄奘 (Xuánzàng, 譯)

About the work

A two-fascicle Mādhyamaka treatise by 清辯菩薩 Bhāviveka (c. 500–570), translated by 玄奘 in 649 CE — one of his earliest translations following his return from India in 645. T1578 is the second of Bhāviveka’s two surviving Chinese-canon Mādhyamaka treatises, the first being the much larger KR6m0004 Bōrědēng lùn shì 般若燈論釋 (T1566), translated by Prabhākaramitra a generation earlier under Bhāviveka’s other Chinese name 分別明菩薩. The Sanskrit original has not been recovered; the Tibetan tradition does not preserve a separate work corresponding to T1578 (the Madhyamakahṛdaya and Tarkajvālā are not the same work). T1578 is therefore the unique canonical witness to the Karatalaratna.

Structural Division

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Abstract

The opening of T1578 announces the bodhisattva orientation of the work: “Universally for the benefit of all sentient beings, having properly aroused the supreme aspiration to awakening, [the bodhisattva] equally observes the world…” 普為饒益一切有情，正發無上菩提大願，等觀世間… The treatise then sets out a sustained SvātantrikaMādhyamaka argument that all saṃskṛta dharmas (conditioned things) are like an illusion, and all asaṃskṛta dharmas (unconditioned things) are like the sky-flower, with the consequence that emptiness is the universal characteristic of all phenomena. The work uses the svatantra method of supplementing prasaṅga refutation with positive Buddhist inferences, and is the principal Chinese witness to Bhāviveka’s mature doctrinal style.

The title 掌珍 “jewel in the hand” — Skt. karatalaratna — is a Mādhyamaka tradition-trope: the doctrine of emptiness is held in the practitioner’s own hand like a precious jewel, immediately available and luminously self-disclosing. The work is structured around two principal arguments: (1) the svatantra-formulation that all conditioned phenomena are demonstrably empty in virtue of their conditioned character; (2) the corollary that the unconditioned (nirvāṇa, the dharmadhātu, the bodhi-element) is also demonstrably empty in virtue of its non-substantial character. The two arguments are each cast in formal pramāṇa-syllogistic form and amount to an Indian-style pramāṇa-vāda defence of Mādhyamaka against Yogācāra and tīrthika opponents.

T1578 was translated in the second year after Xuánzàng’s return from India and is one of the most carefully constructed of his Mādhyamaka renderings. The translation became the principal Chinese-language source for Bhāviveka’s Karatalaratna doctrine and was extensively cited in Táng-period Mādhyamaka exegetical literature.

Translations and research

• Iida Shotarō. Reason and Emptiness: A Study in Logic and Mysticism. Tokyo: Hokuseido Press, 1980. (Standard English study of Bhāviveka’s doctrinal prajñā and the Karatalaratna tradition.)
• Hattori Masaaki 服部正明. “Karatalaratna-śāstra-tetsugaku” 掌珍論哲学. Bukkyō kenkyū (1955). (Foundational Japanese study of T1578.)
• Ejima Yasunori 江島惠教. Chūgan-shisō no tenkai: Bhavaviveka kenkyū 中観思想の展開: Bhāvaviveka 研究. Tōkyō: Shunjūsha, 1980. (Substantial discussion of T1578 alongside T1566.)
• Frauwallner, Erich. “Bhāvaviveka.” In Geschichte der indischen Philosophie II. Salzburg, 1956. (Includes discussion of the Karatalaratna.)
• Yamaguchi Susumu 山口益. Bukkyō ni okeru mu to u to no tairon 仏教における無と有との対論. Kyōto: Hōzōkan, 1941. (Substantial chapter on T1578.)

Other points of interest

The figure of “the jewel held in the palm” 掌珍 is one of the principal Mādhyamaka metaphors for the doctrine of emptiness; it parallels the Madhyamakāvatāra’s “treasure house” image and the Prajñāpradīpa’s “lamp” image. The work’s compactness and pramāṇa-formal rigour made it widely-cited in Táng-period Mādhyamaka and Fǎxiàng polemics, and it remained one of the principal Chinese-language Mādhyamaka treatises consulted in subsequent East-Asian Buddhist scholarship. A Suí-era tradition of commentary on the Zhǎngzhēn lùn also developed: see KR6m0025 for the surviving Táng-period sub-commentary.

Links

• CBETA
• Kanseki DB
• Dazangthings date evidence (655): [ T ] T = CBETA [Chinese Buddhist Electronic Text Association]. Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經. Edited by Takakusu Junjirō 高楠順次郎 and Watanabe Kaigyoku 渡邊海旭. Tokyo: Taishō shinshū daizōkyō kankōkai/Daizō shuppan, 1924-1932. CBReader v 5.0, 2014. https://dazangthings.nz/cbc/source/1/