"Emptiness of Other" (Gzhan stong) in the Tibetan Mahamudra Traditions

The yoga and meditation techniques of mahamudra, which have recently begun to attract interest all over the world, played an important role in the intellectual history of Tibet, particularly within the Bka` brgyud schools. The methods of employing direct valid cognitions in order to gain immediate access to ones luminous nature of mind prepared the ground for philosophical systems that described the ultimate in positive terms. This approach found doctrinal support in the teachings of the third turning of the wheel of dharma (dharmacakra), which is not only based on the doctrine of emptiness, but also distinguishes between the imputed and the real (i.e., phenomena and their true nature, or adventitious stains and Buddha nature). Some took this third dharmacakra as a teaching of definitive meaning and even stressed the necessity to define its distinction between the imputed and the real in terms of two modes of emptiness: being "empty of an own-being" (rang stong), and "empty of other" (gzhan stong). This mahamudra-based gzhan stong-philosophy started to become systematically presented in the 15th and 16th centuries, a period during which the Bka` brgyud pas gained increasing economic and political power (even ruling central parts of Tibet). This measure of autonomy afforded them the freedom to formulate and defend their mahamudra philosophy against the earlier critique of Sa skya Pandita (1182-1251) and his followers, who had controlled Tibet throughout the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368). The Bka` brgyud pas were subsequently persecuted in the 17th century by the government of the 5th Dalai Lama (1617-1682). Their mahamudra tradition nonetheless survived and spread all over the world, but with diminishing evidence of its rich scholastic and intellectual background. The current state of research provides enough evidence for the existence of a mahamudra-based gzhan stong philosophy that goes back to Maitripa and other Indian masters (even though it was not called gzhan stong). It is thus of great importance and interest to systematically investigate the development of this approach during the 15th and 16th century, when its main proponents had the possibility to freely articulate their positions. The proposed analysis will be based on a careful selection of passages from texts by Gser mdog pan chen Shakya mchog ldan (1428-1507), Karma Phrin las pa (1456-1539), and Kun mkhyen Padma dkar po (1527-1596). Quotations of canonical works in these selected passages will be identified, critically edited, and compared to their Indian original (if available). This will provide the fundamental set of data required to determine within the given time frame whether a gzhan stong position was maintained by the Bka` brgyud pas on the basis of direct mahamudra-experiences of true reality. The project will be conducted with the help of Mag. Martina Draszczyk and Mag. David Higgins (two promising PhD candidates who will hold PhD in hand at the beginning of the project) and in cooperation with the Tibetan scholars Mkhan po Blo bzang (Namo Buddha, Nepal) and Acarya Tshul khrims rgya mtsho (New Delhi, India).

For this project, we initially focused on hitherto untranslated Mahamudra writings by three of the most influential Tibetan Buddhist masters of the post-classical eraKarma phrin las pa (1456-1539), Shakya mchog ldan (1423-1507) and Padma dkar po (1527-92). As a second step, we also included the writing of Karma pa Mi bskyod rje (1507-1554) as his discourses on the topics of buddha nature and Gzhan stong present a so far hardly acknowledged and very fruitful ground for a better understanding of the philosophical hermeneutics and the debates of the post-classical period of Tibet. All these authors, despite certain differences in school affiliations, emphasized the importance of employing direct valid cognition to access the luminous nature of mind and based themselves on Indo-Tibetan exegetical traditions that advocated a positive appraisal of the ultimate. At the same time, however, they regarded the rapprochement between Mahamudra and non-foundationalist strands of Indian Madhyamaka philosophyspecifically, the *Prasa?gika and Aprati??hanavada systemsas critical to their philosophical aims. They each, in their own ways, framed this synthesis in terms of the reconciliation of affirmative (cataphatic) and negative (apophantic) styles of thinking and discourse. Hence, we can broadly describe the philosophy of these post-classical exegetes as a Mahamudra of the Middle Way. The project was conducted in the Department of South Asian, Tibetan and Buddhist Studies at the University of Vienna. Two research trips were undertaken by Dr. Martina Draszczyk (three weeks in 2012) and Dr. David Higgins (three months in 2013) to India and Nepal which provided the opportunity to obtain rare texts essential for our research and to work closely with Tibetan scholars. The majority of the research, however, has been undertaken in Vienna, working closely with Indologists and Buddhologists as well as three Tibetan scholars who held successive positions as lecturers at Vienna University. During the course of the project, my assistants and I had the opportunity to share our research findings at two international conferences at which we hosted panels: The 13th Seminar of the International Association of Tibetan Studies (IATS) in Ulaanbaatar, July, 2013, and the 17th Congress of the International Association of Buddhist Studies (IABS) in Vienna, August, 2014. We have all completed articles for forthcoming conference proceedings in which we summarize the most important findings of our current research. A book entitled Mahamudra and the Middle Way: Post-classical Bka brgyud Discourses on the Nature of Mind, Emptiness, and Tathagatagarbha will distil the results of this FWF project. As there has hitherto been no systematic appraisal of post-classical Bka brgyud Mahamudra philosophies, nor any attempt to trace their evolution and complex relationships with antecedent developments in Indian Buddhism, such a study will be of considerable interest to scholars in Buddhist and Tibetan studies. The book is slated for publication in the Wiener Studien zur Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde (WSTB) series at the University of Vienna.