中論 觀合品第十四

Qingmu opens by stating where the chapter comes from: “The preceding ‘Chapter Refuting the Faculties’ explained that seeing, the seen, and the seer are all unestablished. Since these three matters possess no mutually differing dharmas, there is no conjunction.”

Since seeing, the visible, and the seer do not even possess difference, conjunction has nothing to conjoin.

Different Places: What Is Refuted Is Not Distance

“Seeing, the visible, and the seer each occupy a different place; since these three dharmas are thus different, there is never a time when they conjoin.”

Qingmu assigns the positions: “The eye is inside the body and form is outside it”; the self is “said by some to be inside the body and by others to pervade every place.” What is refuted is not near and far but three self-standing essences.

He therefore asks through two gates: “Does one see through conjunction or without conjunction? Neither is so.” Seeing through conjunction would mean that “wherever an object exists, a faculty and a self should be present”; seeing without conjunction fails because “the eye-faculty is here and does not see a distant jar.”

Add Mind, and the Same Difficulty Remains

The questioner changes the claim: “Because the four matters—self, mind, faculty, and object—conjoin, cognition arises.” The respondent tests it through time: “If it arises after seeing, cognition is useless”; “if it arises before seeing, there has been no conjunction”; and “if they arise simultaneously, there is no mutual dependence”—for “the jar exists first, seeing comes next, and cognition then arises.”

The landing point first says, “Since cognition does not exist, seeing, the visible, and the seer do not exist either”—all three are absent together. It immediately continues: “All dharmas in this way are like illusions and dreams and have no determinate marks; how could conjunction exist? Since there is no conjunction, they are empty.” What is absent is the determinate mark; what remains appears like illusion and dream. Nothing is solid enough to be taken up and conjoined.

The Same Measure Extends to the Afflictions

“Defilement, what is defiled, and the defiled one follow the same principle.” Qingmu completes the parallels one by one: “hearing, the audible, the hearer, and the other entrances,” and “anger, what is hated, the angry one, and the other afflictions.”

What is refuted is the threefold structure of subject, object, and possessor—the very seat on which affliction rests.

Conjunction Stands on Difference

“Only differing dharmas should conjoin, yet seeing and the rest are not different; since a mark of difference cannot be established, how could seeing and the rest conjoin?”

Once difference fails to stand, conjunction collapses by itself. Thus, although the chapter is named the refutation of conjunction, it spends its whole course refuting difference.

Difference is spoken relationally: “Apart from a differing dharma, it is not called difference.” Nor does what arises from conditions differ from its cause—“It is like a house that exists because of beams, rafters, and the rest; the house does not differ from the beams and rafters,” for when the beams and rafters are destroyed, the house is destroyed. The fist is the same: “Apart from the difference of the five fingers, a difference of the fist cannot be found.”

Someone appeals to discriminating a general mark, but the respondent turns the claim back: “If so, the mark of difference arises from many conditions.” Within what already differs, “since a differing dharma already exists, what use is a further mark of difference?” Within what does not differ, “if a mark of difference existed within it, it could not be called a dharma that does not differ.” The mark fits in neither place. Thus “since there is no mark of difference, there are no dharmas of this and that,” and “since differing dharmas do not exist, there is no conjunction.”

It Cannot Be Found in Any of the Three Places

“This dharma does not conjoin with itself, and a differing dharma does not conjoin either; the conjoiner, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins are all absent.”

Because it is one, it does not conjoin with itself: “Just as one finger does not conjoin with itself.” Because it is different, it does not need conjunction: “Once difference is already established, no conjunction is needed.”

What matters is that all three places fall together—“the conjoiner, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins cannot be found.” Refute conjunction while secretly retaining a conjoiner or a time of conjunction, and sooner or later the original thing will grow back in that position.

Nāgārjuna Bodhisattva, author; the Brahmin Qingmu, commentator; Tripiṭaka Master Kumārajīva of the Yao Qin, translator. Treatise on the Middle, Scroll Two, “Examination of Conjunction, Chapter Fourteen,” Taishō T30n1564. Paragraph-openers 〔T30 …〕 are page-column-line anchors in the Taishō canon.

I. Opening: Since the Three Matters Are Unestablished, There Is No Conjunction

〔T30 0018c29〕The commentator says: The preceding “Chapter Refuting the Faculties” has already explained that seeing, the visible, and the seer are all unestablished. Since these three matters possess no dharmas that differ from one another, there is no conjunction. The meaning of nonconjunction will now be explained.

The questioner says: Why is there no conjunction among the three matters of the eye and so forth?

II. Verse: The Three Dharmas Each Occupy a Different Place and Never Conjoin

〔T30 0019a02〕The respondent answers as follows.

Seeing, the visible, and the seer each occupy a different place. Since these three dharmas are thus different from one another, there is never a time when they conjoin.

III. Explanation: Different Places, Seeing through Conjunction, and Seeing without Conjunction

Seeing is the eye-faculty, the visible is the form-object, and the seer is the self. These three matters each occupy a different place, so there is never a time when they conjoin. “Occupying different places” means that the eye is inside the body and form is outside it; as for the self, some say it is inside the body, while others say it pervades every place. Thus there is no conjunction.

Furthermore, if one asserts that seeing exists, does one see after conjunction or without conjunction? Neither account can be established. Why? If one sees after conjunction, then wherever a form-object exists, a faculty and a self should exist there at the same time. But this is not so; therefore seeing is not through conjunction. If one can see without conjunction, then although the faculty, self, and form-object each occupy a different place, seeing should occur—but it does not. Why? The eye-faculty is here and does not see a jar in the distance. Thus neither account establishes seeing.

IV. Question and Answer: Self, Mind, Faculty, and Object Conjoin, and Cognition Arises

The questioner says: Because the four matters—self, mind, faculty, and object—conjoin, cognition arises and can know jars, cloth, and all other things. Therefore seeing, the visible, and the seer exist.

The respondent says: This has already been refuted in the “Chapter on the Faculties,” but it should now be explained again. You say that cognition arises because the four matters conjoin. Does this cognition arise after jars, cloth, and other things have been seen, or does it arise before they are seen? If it arises after they have been seen, cognition is useless. If it arises before they have been seen, the four matters have not yet conjoined, so how could cognition arise?

If you say that the four matters conjoin at the same time and cognition arises, this too is wrong. If they arise simultaneously, there is no mutual dependence. Why? The jar exists first, seeing comes next, and cognition then arises. If they are simultaneous, there can be no before and after. Since cognition does not exist, seeing, the visible, and the seer do not exist either. All dharmas in this way are like illusions and dreams and have no determinate marks; how could conjunction exist? Since there is no conjunction, they are empty.

Furthermore:

V. Verse: Defilement, What Is Defiled, and the Defiled One, as Well as the Other Entrances and Afflictions

Defilement, what is defiled, and the defiled one follow the same principle. The other entrances and the other afflictions are all likewise so.

VI. Explanation: Two Lines of Analogy

Just as seeing, the visible, and the seer do not conjoin, defilement, what is defiled, and the defiled one should likewise not conjoin. To speak in this way of the three dharmas—seeing, the visible, and the seer—is also to speak of hearing, the audible, the hearer, and the other entrances. To speak in this way of defilement, what is defiled, and the defiled one is also to speak of anger, what is hated, the angry one, and the other afflictions.

Furthermore:

VII. Verse and Explanation: Conjunction Requires Difference, but the Difference of Seeing and the Rest Is Unestablished

Only dharmas that differ should conjoin, yet seeing and the rest are not different. Since a mark of difference cannot be established, how could seeing and the rest conjoin?

Things are said to conjoin only because they differ from one another, but the mark of difference in seeing and the rest cannot be found; therefore there is no conjunction.

Furthermore:

VIII. Verse and Explanation: No Dharma Possesses a Mark of Difference

It is not only the mark of difference in seeing and the rest that cannot be found; all dharmas whatsoever likewise lack a mark of difference.

It is not only the mark of difference among the three matters—seeing, the visible, the seer, and so forth—that cannot be found. All dharmas lack a mark of difference.

IX. Question and Answer: Difference Exists Dependent on What Is Different

The questioner says: Why is there no mark of difference?

The respondent says:

Difference is different because of another differing dharma; apart from that differing dharma, there is no difference. If a dharma emerges from a cause, that dharma does not differ from its cause.

What you call difference is named difference only because another differing dharma exists. Apart from a differing dharma, it is not called difference. Why? If a dharma arises from many conditions, it does not differ from its cause, because when the cause is destroyed, the fruit is destroyed along with it. It is like a house that exists because of beams, rafters, and the rest. The house does not differ from its beams and rafters, because when the beams, rafters, and the rest are destroyed, the house is destroyed too.

X. Question and Answer: Apart from the Difference upon Which It Depends, No Further Difference Exists

The questioner says: What fault is there if there is a fixed differing dharma?

The respondent says:

If apart from the difference upon which it depends there were still another difference, that difference should exist apart from all other differences as well. Yet apart from the difference upon which it depends, there is no difference; therefore no difference exists.

If a differing dharma existed apart from the difference upon which it depends, then a differing dharma should exist apart from every other difference. In fact, apart from the difference upon which it depends, no differing dharma exists, so no further difference exists. For example, if a difference belonging to a fist existed apart from the difference of five fingers, that difference of the fist should also distinguish it from jars and other things. Yet apart from the difference of the five fingers, a difference of the fist cannot be found. Therefore the fist possesses no differing dharma in relation to jars and the rest.

XI. Question and Answer: A Mark of Difference Cannot Be Found Either in What Differs or in What Does Not Differ

The questioner says: The scripture on which I rely teaches that a mark of difference does not arise from many conditions. A mark of difference exists because a general mark is discriminated, and because a mark of difference exists, differing dharmas exist.

The respondent says:

Within what already differs there is no mark of difference; within what does not differ there is none either. Since there is no mark of difference, there is no difference between this and that.

You say that a mark of difference exists because a general mark is discriminated, and because a mark of difference exists, differing dharmas exist. If so, the mark of difference arises from many conditions. What you describe is therefore precisely a dharma arisen from many conditions, because this mark of difference cannot be found apart from differing dharmas. A mark of difference exists dependent on differing dharmas and cannot be established alone.

No mark of difference now exists within a differing dharma. Why? Since a differing dharma already exists, what use is a further mark of difference? Nor is there a mark of difference within a dharma that does not differ. Why? If a mark of difference existed within a dharma that does not differ, it could not be called a dharma that does not differ. Since the mark exists in neither place, there is no mark of difference. Since there is no mark of difference, there are no dharmas of this and that.

Furthermore, since differing dharmas do not exist, there is no conjunction.

XII. Final Verse and Explanation: Conjoiner, Time of Conjunction, and What Conjoins Are All Absent

This dharma does not conjoin with itself, and a differing dharma does not conjoin either. The one that conjoins, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins are all absent.

A dharma’s own essence does not conjoin with itself, because it is one, just as one finger does not conjoin with itself. Differing dharmas do not conjoin either, because once they differ, the matter of difference is already established and no further conjunction is needed. When the matter is examined in this way, conjunction cannot be found. Therefore the conjoiner, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins cannot be found.

Perhaps no word in everyday speech invites less suspicion than “conjunction.” The eye meets color and seeing occurs; two people come together and something happens. Conjunction appears to be only a connective, not a claim—it says nothing exists, only that this and that have met.

This chapter takes that connective itself as its object of examination.

As the examination proceeds, one discovers that conjunction is not neutral at all. Whenever one speaks of conjunction, one has already silently admitted two things: there are two things able to stand on their own, and they were originally separate. Both admissions hide beneath the word, unnoticed by the speaker. This chapter turns them over and questions them one by one.

Arising from the Preceding Chapter: When Difference Is Already Absent, Where Can Conjunction Be?

The chapter does not begin with a verse but with a statement from Qingmu: “The commentator says: the preceding ‘Chapter Refuting the Faculties’ explained that seeing, the seen, and the seer are all unestablished.”

The preceding chapter has already examined seeing, the seen, and the seer one by one; none can stand. Qingmu then gives the reason for the present chapter: “Since these three matters possess no mutually differing dharmas, there is no conjunction.”

This sentence is the skeleton of the entire chapter. For conjunction to be established, there must first be two different things. Since the three matters do not even possess differences of their own, nothing remains to conjoin. Thus he says: “The meaning of nonconjunction will now be explained.”

The questioner immediately follows: “Why is there no conjunction among the three matters of the eye and so forth?”

The question is concrete. The verse names three matters: “seeing, the visible, and the seer.” Qingmu identifies them at once: “Seeing is the eye-faculty, the visible is the form-object, and the seer is the self.” Eye-faculty, form-object, and seer—the self—plainly look like three different things, standing there distinctly. How could one say they possess no difference? All the questions and answers that follow respond to this one challenge.

Each Occupies a Different Place: What Is Refuted Is Not Distance

The first answering verse says:

“Seeing, the visible, and the seer each occupy a different place; since these three dharmas are thus different, there is never a time when they conjoin.”

Qingmu descends to specific locations: “Seeing is the eye-faculty, the visible is the form-object, and the seer is the self,” and then maps them—“the eye is inside the body, and form is outside it.” As for the self, he does not decide the opponent’s case but preserves two positions: “Some say it is inside the body, while others say it pervades every place.”

At this point a thought can easily arise: does this merely mean that the three are too far apart to touch? If so, the chapter would be an essay about space, and saying that sight reaches a distance would refute it.

Look closely: the verse says, “These three dharmas are thus different.” What is refuted is not nearness or distance, but what the arrangement of “each occupying a different place” presupposes—three independently established essences, each occupying its own place and unrelated to the others. Distance is only one exposed corner of that arrangement. The real difficulty is this: if each is independently established, on what basis can they still conjoin into a single event of seeing?

Qingmu then presses this very difficulty into view. He asks: “Does one see through conjunction or without conjunction? Neither is so.”

First consider seeing through conjunction. If seeing occurs only after conjunction, then “wherever an object exists, a faculty and a self should be present.” Wherever color exists, an eye and a self would have to be there at the same time. The world is plainly not like this.

Then consider seeing without conjunction. If seeing can occur without conjunction, then the faculty, self, and object should see without error while each occupies a different place. Qingmu offers a fact anyone can test: “The eye-faculty is here and does not see a distant jar.”

Both gates collapse. Neither conjunction nor nonconjunction succeeds. This is precisely the chapter’s method: it does not try to prove that “seeing does not exist”; it simply walks down the two roads supplied by the claimant and lets him discover that neither leads through.

Add “Mind,” and the Same Difficulty Remains

The questioner changes his approach. He no longer speaks only of three matters but adds mind: “Because the four matters—self, mind, faculty, and object—conjoin, cognition arises.” His reason is ready at hand: we genuinely know a jar and know cloth; since cognition exists, the four things that produce it must exist.

This reasoning moves backward from the result and appears firm.

The respondent first refers back to the preceding chapter: “This has already been refuted in the ‘Chapter on the Faculties,’ but it should now be explained again.” He does not overturn the previous account; he simply traverses it again from another angle.

This time, the route is time. You say that the four matters conjoin and produce cognition. When does cognition arise?

If it arises only after seeing, “if it arises after seeing, cognition is useless.” The object has already been seen; what purpose does that cognition serve? Cognition arrives too late and becomes a superfluous procedure.

If it arises before seeing, “if it arises before seeing, there has been no conjunction.” The four things have not yet gathered; whence would cognition emerge?

Then say they arise simultaneously. The respondent refuses this too: “If they arise simultaneously, there is no mutual dependence.” What does mutual dependence mean? He immediately explains: “The jar exists first, seeing comes next, and cognition then arises.” The claim that four matters produce cognition depends precisely on a sequence—the object first, then seeing, then cognition. Compress all of them into one time, and the sequence disappears; once sequence disappears, “therefore it arises” becomes empty—what produces what?

None of the three times succeeds. Qingmu therefore gathers the argument: “Since cognition does not exist, seeing, the visible, and the seer do not exist either.”

He then gives the landing point of the passage: “All dharmas in this way are like illusions and dreams and have no determinate marks; how could conjunction exist? Since there is no conjunction, they are empty.”

This sentence must be read carefully. “Like illusion and dream” does not mean that nothing exists; it means “without determinate marks”—no fixed essence can be found. Precisely because nothing possesses a determinate mark, the claim that “two fixed things meet” has no starting point. Conjunction fails not because there are too few things, but because no thing is hard enough to be taken up and conjoined.

The Same Measure Extends to Defilement and Every Subject-Object Division

The next verse extends the point:

“Defilement, what is defiled, and the defiled one follow the same principle; the other entrances and the other afflictions are all likewise so.”

Qingmu fills in the parallels carefully instead of dismissing them with “the rest are the same.” He says, “hearing, the audible, the hearer, and the other entrances,” and again, “anger, what is hated, the angry one, and the other afflictions.”

Why list each group? Because what is refuted is not the eye but a structure—the threefold division into activity, object, and subject. In seeing: seeing, the visible, and the seer. In hearing: hearing, the audible, and the hearer. In defilement: defilement, what is defiled, and the defiled one. In anger: anger, what is hated, and the angry one. Almost every event people experience is divided into three parts in this fashion, and these three are then said to “conjoin” to form the event.

The chapter refutes this division itself. It therefore cannot refute only one group: if it refuted only the eye, the reader could take vision as an exception. Once three or four groups are set out, the measure reveals itself as universal. Defilement and anger matter especially. If the threefold subject-object division were only one epistemological account, perhaps little would be at stake; but the afflictions are established precisely upon these three parts—a defiled one encounters something defilable, and defilement occurs. When the three parts fail, affliction has no seat on which to sit.

The Turn: Conjunction Depends on Difference—What Does Difference Depend On?

The chapter now turns. Its first half examines conjunction; its second half suddenly speaks entirely about difference.

The turning point is this verse:

“Only differing dharmas should conjoin, yet seeing and the rest are not different; since a mark of difference cannot be established, how could seeing and the rest conjoin?”

Qingmu gathers it in one sentence: “Things are said to conjoin only because they differ, but the mark of difference in seeing and the rest cannot be found; therefore there is no conjunction.”

This is the chapter’s pivot. Conjunction has no feet of its own; it stands on “difference.” To say that two things conjoin, one must first say that they are two things—for if they are one, why would conjunction be needed? Thus, once a mark of difference fails to stand, conjunction collapses by itself; there is no need to refute conjunction item by item.

The edge of the treatise immediately widens:

“It is not only the mark of difference in seeing and the rest that cannot be found; all dharmas whatsoever likewise lack a mark of difference.”

Qingmu repeats it exactly: “It is not only the mark of difference among the three matters—seeing, the visible, the seer, and the rest—that cannot be found. All dharmas lack a mark of difference.”

The questioner therefore asks all the way down: “Why is there no mark of difference?”

The four rounds of question and answer below respond entirely to that question.

Difference Exists Dependent upon Difference: House, Beams, and Rafters

The first round says:

“Difference is different because of another differing dharma; apart from that differing dharma, there is no difference. If a dharma emerges from a cause, that dharma does not differ from its cause.”

Qingmu explains the first half: “What you call difference is named difference only because another differing dharma exists. Apart from a differing dharma, it is not called difference.”

The meaning is simple but firm: the word “different” is relational. To call this different always means different from that. Remove that, and this is no longer called different. Difference was never a mark carried on one thing; it is an event only between two ends. Remove one end and difference disappears.

The latter half expresses the same matter from another angle: “If a dharma arises from many conditions, it does not differ from its cause, because when the cause is destroyed, the fruit is destroyed along with it.”

The analogy is ready-made: “It is like a house that exists because of beams, rafters, and the rest. The house does not differ from its beams and rafters, because when the beams, rafters, and the rest are destroyed, the house is destroyed too.”

A house is gathered from beams, rafters, and the rest. If the house truly were something independent of the beams and rafters, it should remain when they were taken apart—but dismantle the beams and rafters, and the house is gone. Thus the house has no essence different from beams and rafters. Whatever emerges from causes and conditions is like this: no true boundary can be found between it and its causes.

Yet conjunction requires exactly that boundary.

The Fist and Five Fingers

The questioner retreats one step: “What fault is there if there is a fixed differing dharma?” Can one not simply admit a fixed difference?

The answer says:

“If apart from the difference upon which it depends there were still another difference, that difference should exist apart from all other differences as well. Yet apart from the difference upon which it depends, there is no difference; therefore no difference exists.”

Qingmu gives a demonstration one can make with one’s own hand: “If a difference belonging to a fist existed apart from the difference of five fingers, that difference of the fist should also distinguish it from jars and other things.”

It makes sense to say that a fist differs from five fingers. But if this “difference of the fist” were a real thing carried by the fist itself, it should hold in relation to anything—the fist should manifest that same difference in relation to a jar. Yet where is the fist apart from the five fingers? “Apart from the difference of the five fingers, a difference of the fist cannot be found.”

This analogy is powerful because it is right in the hand. Close the five fingers and call it a fist; open them and the fist is gone. No thing called a fist subsists apart from the five fingers. The so-called difference of the fist has meaning only when spoken in relation to the fingers; apart from that relation, it disappears.

Yet people habitually take the difference that exists only within a relation as something carried by the thing itself. See another person and feel he is innately separate from oneself; encounter a matter and feel it is simply that way in itself. The analogy of the fist says this: what is “just itself” cannot withstand opening the hand.

Can the Mark of Difference Stand by Itself?

The questioner retreats again, this time bringing forward scripture: “My scripture teaches that a mark of difference does not arise from many conditions. A mark of difference exists because a general mark is discriminated, and because a mark of difference exists, differing dharmas exist.”

His meaning is that a mark of difference does not arise from conditions but is obtained by discriminating a general mark; the mark of difference comes first, and differing dharmas then exist.

The respondent’s verse says:

“Within what already differs there is no mark of difference; within what does not differ there is none either. Since there is no mark of difference, there is no difference between this and that.”

Qingmu first turns the opponent’s words back on him. If you say that a mark of difference exists only through discriminating a general mark, does that not mean the mark of difference arises from many conditions?—“If so, the mark of difference arises from many conditions; what you describe is therefore precisely a conditioned dharma.” You intended to establish a mark of difference that did not arise from conditions; as soon as you state the case, you instead describe it as dependently arisen. One conclusion follows immediately: “A mark of difference exists dependent on differing dharmas and cannot be established alone.”

He then gathers the argument through two gates.

Within a dharma that already differs, there is no mark of difference: “Since a differing dharma already exists, what use is a further mark of difference?” It is already a differing dharma; what work remains for another mark of difference?

Within a dharma that does not differ, there is no mark of difference either: “If a mark of difference existed within a dharma that does not differ, it could not be called a dharma that does not differ.” If a mark of difference truly entered it, it would no longer be nondifferent.

The mark fits in neither place and therefore has nowhere to abide. Qingmu concludes: “Since there is no mark of difference, there are no dharmas of this and that.” Not only does the mark of difference disappear; even the division into this dharma and that dharma disappears with it. This and that were drawn apart by the mark of difference from the beginning.

Thus the chapter returns to its subject: “Since differing dharmas do not exist, there is no conjunction.”

Final Verse: Conjoiner, Time of Conjunction, and What Conjoins Are All Absent

“This dharma does not conjoin with itself, and a differing dharma does not conjoin either; the conjoiner, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins are all absent.”

Qingmu explains it from both sides.

An identical dharma does not conjoin with itself because it is one: “Just as one finger does not conjoin with itself.” Hold one finger out and ask whether it has conjoined with itself—the word “conjunction” loses all use here.

Differing dharmas do not conjoin either, because “the matter of difference is already established and no conjunction is needed.” Once they are already two different matters, difference stands there complete. What further work can conjunction do? If conjunction changes something, they were not originally different in that way; if conjunction changes nothing, conjunction is an empty assertion.

One gate treats identity, the other difference. Once both roads are exhausted, “when the matter is examined in this way, what conjoins cannot be found.”

The final sentence sweeps all three places away at once: “Therefore the conjoiner, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins cannot be found.”

Notice that all three fall together. When refuting conjunction, people often refute only the dharma conjoined while secretly retaining a conjoiner, or they retain “the moment of conjunction.” Qingmu retains none: the one that conjoins, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins are unfindable in all three places. Whenever refutation secretly leaves a position intact, sooner or later that position grows back into the original thing.

What Readers Can Carry Away from This Chapter

First, notice when you say “conjunction.” An eye meets an object, a person meets a person, conditions meet conditions—each time one says conjunction, one has also said, “There are two independently established things.” One does not notice while speaking; looking back makes it visible.

Second, remember that difference is not located in the thing. The fist’s difference exists only in relation to five fingers. Whenever someone or something seems “just that way by nature,” open the hand and look.

Third, do not secretly preserve a position while refuting. “The conjoiner, the time of conjunction, and the dharma that conjoins are all absent”—subject, object, and time must be released together. To retain one place is to retain a seed.

Fourth, refute to the end and speak to the end. Qingmu explicitly says the three are also absent: “Since cognition does not exist, seeing, the visible, and the seer do not exist either.” This sentence cannot be evaded. He immediately states the exact measure of what remains: “All dharmas in this way are like illusions and dreams and have no determinate marks; how could conjunction exist? Since there is no conjunction, they are empty.” The two sentences must be read together. What is absent is the determinate mark and self-essence; what remains is the manifest appearance, like illusion and dream. A fixed seer, a fixed visible, and a fixed conjunction cannot be found, but events are not therefore annihilated.

Carried Forward: Jizang’s Mirror

The meaning above belongs to the chapter itself. What follows is a side illumination from the Sui–Tang Sanlun lineage—a mirror is not the treatise, but another way of reading the same verses.

Jizang’s Commentary on the Treatise on the Middle first places this chapter within the whole treatise. The “Chapter on the Five Aggregates” examined the emptiness of the five aggregates but did not exhaust the meaning; the “Chapter on the Six Faculties” examined the unfindability of the six faculties but likewise did not exhaust it. The present chapter therefore examines faculty and object again through the gate of conjunction. He further classifies the two refutations: the earlier chapter refuted the five aggregates lacking intrinsic nature, while the present one refutes the conjunction of faculty and object through conditions. Thus the preceding chapters refuted real existence, and this chapter refutes provisional existence.

He also gives the chapter a path of practice. Deluded beings take faculty and object as two; therefore they say faculty and object conjoin. From conjunction arise the three poisonous afflictions; from affliction comes karma, and from karma comes the fruit of suffering. When faculty and object are examined as originally without conjunction, affliction does not arise, and therefore there is no karma and suffering. He then explains why a chapter titled the refutation of conjunction spends its entire course refuting difference: conjunction arises from difference; difference is the root of conjunction; where there is no difference, there is no conjunction. Thus difference must be refuted. The preceding chapter refuted difference only briefly; the present chapter extensively refutes the meaning of difference among all dharmas. As for why sentient beings circle through saṃsāra, he attributes it to conscious beings taking the myriad phenomena as different, thereby giving rise to delusion and failing to attain liberation. When this chapter seeks the meaning of difference in all dharmas and finds no path to it, affliction does not arise.

This mirror joins the chapter to the Sanlun lineage’s architecture for ordering earlier and later refutations and distinguishing real from provisional existence. It also aligns the text with the sequence of affliction, karma, and suffering. These classifications and alignments are Jizang’s additions, not the wording of Nāgārjuna’s verses or Qingmu’s prose. The readings are recorded side by side without adjudication, each returned to its own place.