The Conception of Buddhist Nirvana — Th. Stcherbatsky (1927)

3 paddrtha — artha = dharma means «any object#, «everytliing»; it contains here an al¬ lusion to the following sunyesu sarvadharmesu , but the predicates of fiuiteness, infinity, identity, otherness, etc., are more particularly aimed at, they are also dharmas.

4 kaScit svnbhavah.

b bhavabhaca-kalpana — bhdvdbhdva-yojana; kalpana. in this context means as much as our judgment.

6 Lit., p. 537.1-2. «How are these views possible? If anything whatever possessed some self-subsistence, by arranging it with existence and non-existence these views would be (possible)#.

7 This identity must evidently be understood in that sense that the Unity of the Absolute is the reality underlying the mirage of plurality.

* Sunya.

8 This refers to the question of identity between the Ego and the body, it is usually for¬ mulated as a dilemma, whereas the antinomies regarding the end and the beginning of existence, as well as the question about existence after Nirvana are formulated in the familiar Indian me¬ thod of a quadrilemma. Thus the consecrated traditional number of 14 insoluble points ( avyakrtavastuni] | concerning the four antinomies is arrived at. In XXYII. 4 ff. the question of personal identity between the present Ego, the past and the future one, is examined in detail with the result that there is neither identity nor otherness.

10 or «without beginning# (SaSvata).

537. 1

537. 3

587. 7 . These fourteen points which (by the Buddha) "were declared insoluble, will never be solved, 1 because (we do not know) what reality in itself is. 2 But those who imagine (some kind) of absolute reality, 3 and, by either exclu¬ ding or asserting 4 it, establish these (dogmatical) theories, they are influ¬ enced by a preconceived bias 5 It prevents them from entering the right Path, leading to the city of Nirvapa, and binds them to the turmoil of phenome¬ nal existence. This should be noted.

XI. Conclusion.

• 537 . ii. An objection is raised. If this is so (will it not be possible to maintain that) Nirvana has been denied by the Buddha? Will not his doctrine be absolutely useless, (this doctrine which) establishes corresponding antidotes for every kind of worldly career in order to enable mankind to reach Nir¬ vana. (It has been established by the Buddha) who watches the infinite hosts of living beings iu their worldly career, who unmistakably knows the real in¬ tentions of all the living world, who is quite given up to his feeling of Great Commiseration, wdio cherishes the denizens of all the three spheres of exi-
• 537 . 14 . stence as only a unique son is cherished! We answ r er. This criticism would be right, if there w r ere any absolutely real 8 doctrine, or if there were any (absolutely real) beings wdiich would attend to this law, or if there were any absolutely real teacher, a divine Buddha. But (since in a monistic Universe that does not exist, we are not hit by your accusation)!

538. 3. XXIV. Our bliss consists in the cessation of all thought,

In the quiescence of Plurality.

To nobody and nowhere no doctrine (about separate elements) 7

By Buddha ever has heen preached!

1 naiva jujyante.

2 asati bhaca-svarupe, lit. «because they are not selfsubsistent things». Here again we must point out a remarkable analogy between Indian and European philosophy with respect to the doctrine of antinomies and their solution. Kant thought that «these questions naturally suggest themselves to the human mind and he inevitably must encounter them», and the expla¬ nation he sought in the fact that the objects of the phenomenal world are not «sellsubsistent things», cp Critique of Pure Reason (transl. by Max Mueller), p. 400.

3 bhava-starupam adhyaropya. 4 tad-vigama-avigamatah.

5 abhiuiviSate. 0 svabhata-rupa.

7 dharma is here used in both senses, a doctrine about dharmas. Not a single one of the Hinayanistic dharmas (elements of existence) has been taught by the real Buddha, since on p. 539. 1—2 it is stated that neither a defiling ( samkleSika ) element i. e., ignorance and desire.

APPENDIX: OANDR AKIrTI’8 COMMENT ON RELATIVITY, XXV 209

In this case how can the reproach made above affect us! Our view 1 is 538. 5. that Nirvana represents Quiescence, i. e., the non-applicability 2 of all the variety of names 3 and (non-existence of) particular objects. 4 This very Quie¬ scence, so far it is the natural (genuine) quiescence (of the world), is called bliss.

The Quiescence of Plurality is also a bliss because of the cessation of speach or because oX the cessation of thought. It is also a bliss because, by putting and end to all defiling agencies, all individual existences 5 are stopped. It is also a bliss because, by quenching all defiling forces, all instinct (and habits of thought) 6 have been extirpated without residue. It is also a bliss because, since all the objects of knowledge have died away, knowledge itself has also died.