中論 觀法品第十八

This chapter opens not with a refutation but with a request for directions: “How does one enter?” The answer is one sentence: “By extinguishing attachment to self and what belongs to self, one obtains the emptiness of all dharmas. The wisdom of no-self is called entry.” Entry is not a place; entry is that wisdom.

Both Gates Are Closed, and What Belongs to Self Has Nowhere to Hang

“If the self is the five aggregates, the self undergoes arising and ceasing; if the self differs from the five aggregates, it does not have the aggregates’ character.”

If self is the aggregates, it arises and ceases with them—“because once arisen they deteriorate.” If it differs from them, no one can indicate what it is, since “apart from the five aggregates there is no further dharma.” The same holds across the four kinds of warrant: “Who first saw the spiritual self joined with the five aggregates and then, seeing the aggregates, knew the spiritual self existed?” Sacred testimony is trustworthy because “what sages teach, they first saw with their own eyes and then taught,” yet concerning the spiritual self “there is no one who first saw the spiritual self and later spoke of it.” Thus “when the spiritual self is sought among the four warrants and every warrant, it is unobtainable.”

“If no self exists, how could there be what belongs to self? Because self and what belongs to self are extinguished, this is called obtaining the wisdom of no-self.”

Once self is withdrawn, what belongs to self has nowhere to hang. Cultivation is not esoteric: “By cultivating the factors of the noble eightfold path and extinguishing the causes and conditions of self and what belongs to self, one obtains determinate wisdom of neither self nor what belongs to self.” What is extinguished is not self but the conditions establishing self. When self and what belongs to self are extinguished, the wisdom-eye is no longer obstructed: “Ordinary people cannot see reality because self and what belongs to self obstruct the wisdom-eye.” When appropriations cease, later bodies no longer connect; this is nirvāṇa without remainder. Karma and affliction have another origin: “Afflictions and karmas all arise from conceptual recollection and discrimination.” Thus “Karma and affliction are unreal; upon entering emptiness, conceptual proliferation ceases.” This is nirvāṇa with remainder.

Saying “Self” and Saying “No-Self” Are Both Medicines

“Buddhas sometimes teach self, and sometimes teach no-self; in the true character of dharmas, there is neither self nor nonself.”

Self is taught to establish cause and fruit for those who “do not know to fear wrongdoing.” No-self is taught to dismantle the self that fears its own disappearance for those who “weary of saṃsāra’s suffering yet fear nirvāṇa as eternal extinction.” The medicine changes with the person; the pathology does not. No-self too is spoken in response to self: “Self is determinately unobtainable—how could there be a determinate no-self?” To cling to it is precisely this: “If no-self determinately existed, that would be annihilation and would give rise to craving attachment.”

Mind “arises through conditions by grasping marks,” and therefore “all activities of mind are false; because false, they should cease.” Those attached to dharmas permit only nirvāṇa to be quiescent, and therefore “because those attached to dharmas do not understand, nirvāṇa is used as an analogy.” The four alternatives are the same: elsewhere they are left behind “to refute four kinds of craving attachment”; here they are taught because “within the four alternatives there is no conceptual proliferation, and upon hearing the Buddha’s teaching one attains the path.” The same four alternatives, when grasped, are attachment; when ungrasped, they are a gate.

The Recognizable Character, the One Flavor of Ambrosia

“Known for oneself and not followed from another, quiescent and without conceptual proliferation, without difference or discrimination: this is called true character.”

Even when non-Buddhists display supernormal power or transform their bodies, one still “trusts one’s own mind and does not follow them.” This is not stubbornness; it is seeing for oneself. Quiescence is not blankness of mind: “Because no dharma can be taken or rejected here, it is called the character of quiescence.” Conceptual proliferation has two kinds: “one is the discourse of craving, the other the discourse of views; neither exists here.” When both cease, “there is no conceptual recollection or discrimination and no character of difference; this is called true character.”

Annihilation and permanence are seen by the eye that grasps marks: “You now greedily cling to grasping marks and see the faults of annihilation and permanence in true character.” A dependently arisen dharma is neither identical with nor different from its cause: “If fruit differed from cause, that would be annihilation; if it did not differ, that would be permanence.” It is neither. To penetrate this meaning is “at once to extinguish afflictions and conceptual proliferation and attain the constant bliss of nirvāṇa”; this is called “teaching through the flavor of ambrosia.” One flavor yields three fruits: extinguishing afflictions is called the Śrāvaka teaching; “giving rise to great compassion and the unsurpassed mind is called the Mahāyāna”; when the Buddha’s Dharma has vanished, wisdom born in seclusion is that of a pratyekabuddha. The distinction lies not in several dharmas but in compassionate vow and time.

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

I. Question: If All Is Ultimately Empty, How Does One Enter?

〔T30 0023c16〕The questioner says: If all dharmas are ultimately empty, without arising or ceasing, and this is called the true character of dharmas, how does one enter it?

The respondent says: By extinguishing attachment to self and what belongs to self, one obtains the emptiness of all dharmas. This wisdom of no-self is called entry.

The questioner says: How do we know that dharmas are without self?

The respondent answers with the following verses.

II. Verses: From the Wisdom of No-Self to the Flavor of Ambrosia

If the self is the five aggregates, the self undergoes arising and ceasing. If the self differs from the five aggregates, it does not have the aggregates’ character.

If no self exists, how could there be what belongs to self? Because self and what belongs to self are extinguished, this is called obtaining the wisdom of no-self.

One who obtains the wisdom of no-self is said to contemplate reality. A person who obtains the wisdom of no-self is exceedingly rare.

Because internal and external self and what belongs to self are utterly extinguished and absent, the various appropriations cease. When appropriation ceases, the body ceases.

Because karma and afflictions cease, this is called release. Karma and afflictions are originally unreal; upon entering emptiness, conceptual proliferation ceases.

〔T30 0024a01〕Buddhas sometimes teach self, and sometimes teach no-self. Yet in the true character of dharmas, there is neither self nor nonself.

In what is called the true character of dharmas, the activities of mind and paths of language are cut off. Without arising or ceasing, it is quiescent like nirvāṇa.

All is real; all is unreal; all is both real and unreal; all is neither real nor unreal. This is called the Dharma of the Buddhas.

Known for oneself and not followed from another, quiescent and without conceptual proliferation, without difference or discrimination: this is called true character.

If a dharma arises from a multitude of conditions, it is neither identical with nor different from its cause. Therefore it is called true character, neither annihilated nor permanent.

Neither one nor different, neither permanent nor annihilated: this is called the flavor of ambrosia through which the World-Honored Ones teach sentient beings.

If a Buddha does not appear in the world and the Buddha’s Dharma has already vanished, the wisdom of pratyekabuddhas can still arise from seclusion.

III. Commentary: Whether Self Is Identical with or Separate from the Aggregates, Neither Gate Stands

Some say that a spiritual self exists. There must then be two possibilities: either the five aggregates are the spiritual self, or another spiritual self exists apart from the five aggregates.

If the five aggregates are the spiritual self, that self bears the marks of arising and ceasing, as stated in the verse. If self is the five aggregates, it bears the marks of arising and ceasing. Why? Because once arisen, it deteriorates. Since the five aggregates bear the marks of arising and ceasing, they are impermanent. Since the five aggregates are impermanent, arising and ceasing themselves are likewise impermanent. Why? Because arising and ceasing also deteriorate once arisen and are therefore impermanent. If the spiritual self is the five aggregates, then because the aggregates are impermanent, the self should likewise be impermanent and bear the marks of arising and ceasing. But this cannot be established.

If a spiritual self exists apart from the five aggregates, it has none of the aggregates’ character, as stated in the verse. If the self differs from the five aggregates, it does not have their character; yet apart from the five aggregates there is no further dharma to indicate. If a dharma existed apart from the five aggregates, by what character and as what dharma would it exist?

If one says the spiritual self exists apart from the five aggregates like space, this too cannot be established. Why? The “Examination of the Six Elements” has already refuted it: no dharma exists that can be called space.

IV. The Spiritual Self Cannot Be Found in Any of the Four Kinds of Warrant

If one claims that the spiritual self exists because there is trustworthy warrant for it, this too cannot be established. Why? There are four kinds of trustworthy warrant. First is trust in a present fact. Second is trust in inferential knowledge, as when one sees smoke and knows there is fire. Third is trust in analogy, as when a land has no brass and gold is used to illustrate it. Fourth is trust in what worthy sages teach, as when hells, heavens, and Uttarakuru are said to exist. No one has seen them, but by trusting the words of sages, one knows.

This spiritual self is unobtainable in every trustworthy warrant: it is absent in present facts and absent in inferential knowledge. Why? Inferential knowledge means first having seen and then knowing by analogy. Someone first sees that where there is fire, there is smoke; later, merely seeing smoke, that person knows there is fire. The case of the spiritual self is not like this. Who first saw the spiritual self joined with the five aggregates and then, seeing the aggregates, knew the spiritual self existed?

Suppose one says inferential knowledge has three kinds: as with the original, as with the remainder, and commonly seen. “As with the original” means that one first saw fire with smoke and now, seeing smoke, knows that fire exists as before. “As with the remainder” is like cooking rice: when one grain is cooked, one knows that all the rest are cooked. “Commonly seen” is like seeing a person walk from here to there and thereby seeing that person’s going. The sun is the same: it emerges in the east and reaches the west. Although no one sees it in the act of going, because a person has the appearance of going, one knows the sun also goes. In the same way, suffering, pleasure, hate, love, awareness, and the rest should have something on which they depend—just as seeing subjects lets one know they must depend upon a king.

None of these accounts can be established. Why? The commonly seen warrant is established only because one first saw a person joined with the dharma of going and reaching another place; later, seeing the sun reach another place, one knows there is going. Yet no one has ever first seen the five aggregates joined with a spiritual self and then, seeing the five aggregates, known that self exists. Therefore, the spiritual self is absent from inference through a shared character.

Nor is there a spiritual self in what worthy sages teach. Why? What worthy sages teach, they first saw with their own eyes and then taught. Further, because the other matters taught by worthy sages are trustworthy, one should know that their teachings about hells and the rest are also trustworthy. The spiritual self is not like this: there is no one who first saw the spiritual self and then spoke of it. Therefore, when the spiritual self is sought among the four warrants and every other warrant, it is unobtainable. Because it is unobtainable, it does not exist; hence there is no distinct spiritual self apart from the five aggregates.

V. Cultivating the Noble Eightfold Path and Obtaining Determinate Wisdom of Neither Self nor What Belongs to Self

Further, in the “Examination of the Faculties,” seeing, seer, and visible object have all been refuted; the spiritual self is refuted in the same way. How much less could a spiritual self exist among false conceptual recollections when even coarse dharmas visible to the eye are unobtainable? Thus one knows there is no self.

Only because there is a self can there be what belongs to self. If there is no self, there is nothing belonging to self. By cultivating the factors of the noble eightfold path and extinguishing the causes and conditions of self and what belongs to self, one obtains determinate wisdom of neither self nor what belongs to self.

VI. Nirvāṇa without Remainder

Further, what is called neither self nor what belongs to self is itself unobtainable in the ultimate meaning. Those without self and what belongs to self can truly see dharmas. Because ordinary people’s wisdom-eyes are obstructed by self and what belongs to self, they cannot see reality. Now worthy sages are without self and what belongs to self, and therefore their various afflictions also cease. Because afflictions cease, they can see the true character of dharmas.

Because internal and external self and what belongs to self cease, the various appropriations cease. Because appropriations cease, immeasurable later bodies also all cease. This is called nirvāṇa without remainder.

VII. Nirvāṇa with Remainder

The questioner says: What, then, of nirvāṇa with remainder?

The respondent says: Because the various afflictions and karmas cease, the mind is said to obtain release. These afflictions and karmas all arise from conceptual recollection and discrimination and have no real substance; the various conceptual recollections and discriminations all arise from conceptual proliferation. When one obtains the ultimately empty true character of dharmas, the various conceptual proliferations cease. This is called nirvāṇa with remainder.

VIII. According to Sentient Beings’ Capacities, Buddhas Teach Either Self or No-Self

Such is the dharma of true character. Because Buddhas observe sentient beings with omniscience, they teach them in many different ways: they teach that self exists, and they teach no-self.

To those whose minds are not yet mature, who have no share in nirvāṇa and do not know to fear wrongdoing, self is taught. Some have already attained the path and know that dharmas are empty; for them self is spoken of only as a provisional name, and teaching self entails no fault. Others cultivate such merits as generosity and keeping precepts and weary of the suffering of saṃsāra, yet fear nirvāṇa as eternal extinction; for them, the Buddha teaches no-self.

Dharmas are merely formed by the conjunction of causes and conditions. At arising they arise emptily; at ceasing they cease emptily. Therefore no-self is taught, while self is spoken of only as a provisional name. Those who have attained the path know that no-self does not fall into annihilation; therefore teaching no-self entails no fault.

Thus the verse says: Buddhas teach self and also teach no-self; within reality, they teach neither self nor nonself.

IX. No-Self Must Not Be Grasped as Determinate Either

The questioner says: If no-self is real and self is taught only according to worldly convention, what fault is there?

The respondent says: No-self is taught precisely to refute the dharma of self. Since self is determinately unobtainable, how could there be a determinate no-self? If one grasps that no-self determinately exists, this is annihilation and instead gives rise to craving attachment. As the Prajñā teaches: for a bodhisattva, grasping self is not practice, and grasping no-self is not practice either.

X. In True Character, the Paths of Language Are Cut Off and All Activities of Mind Cease

The questioner says: If neither self nor nonself, neither empty nor nonempty, is taught, what does the Buddha’s Dharma ultimately teach?

The respondent says: The Buddha teaches the true character of dharmas. In true character, there is no path of language, and the various activities of mind cease. Mind arises through conditions by grasping marks and exists because of the fruition of karma from past lives. It cannot truly see dharmas, and therefore the activities of mind are said to cease.

The questioner says: If ordinary people’s minds cannot see reality, the minds of worthy sages should be able to see it. Why say that all activities of mind cease?

〔T30 0025a01〕The respondent says: The true character of dharmas is nirvāṇa. Nirvāṇa is called cessation, and because this cessation tends toward nirvāṇa, it too is called cessation. If mind were real, what need would there be for gateways to release such as emptiness? Among the various meditative absorptions, why would the attainment of cessation rank first? Moreover, all ultimately return to nirvāṇa without remainder. Therefore one should know that all activities of mind are false; because false, they should cease.

The true character of dharmas transcends the various associated mental dharmas. Without arising or ceasing, it bears the character of quiescence, like nirvāṇa.

XI. Why Say “Like Nirvāṇa”?

The questioner says: The sūtras teach that dharmas have always borne the character of quiescence, which itself is nirvāṇa. Why say “like nirvāṇa”?

The respondent says: Those attached to dharmas discriminate two kinds of dharma: the world and nirvāṇa. They are willing to say that nirvāṇa is quiescent but not that the world is quiescent. This treatise teaches that all dharmas are empty of intrinsic nature and bear the character of quiescence. Because those attached to dharmas do not understand, nirvāṇa is used as an analogy. Just as you say nirvāṇa’s character is empty, signless, quiescent, and without conceptual proliferation, so too are all worldly dharmas.

XII. The Four Alternatives Are Skillful Means Adapted to Capacity

The questioner says: If the Buddha teaches neither self nor nonself, while the various activities of mind cease and the path of language is cut off, how can people be made to know the true character of dharmas?

The respondent says: Buddhas have immeasurable power in skillful means, and dharmas have no determinate character. To liberate sentient beings, they sometimes teach that all is real, sometimes that all is unreal, sometimes that all is both real and unreal, and sometimes that all is neither real nor unreal.

All is real because, when the real substance of dharmas is sought, everything enters the one equal character of ultimate meaning—namely, no-character. It is like many streams of different colors and flavors that, upon entering the great ocean, become one color and one flavor.

All is unreal because before dharmas have entered true character, each one examined separately has no reality and exists only through the conjunction of many conditions.

All is both real and unreal because sentient beings are of three grades: higher, middle, and lower. Those of the higher grade contemplate dharmas’ character as neither real nor unreal. Those of the middle grade contemplate all dharmas as real and all as unreal. Those of the lower grade have shallow wisdom and contemplate part of dharmas’ character as real and part as unreal: they regard nirvāṇa, an unconditioned dharma, as indestructible and therefore real, and saṃsāra, a conditioned dharma, as false and therefore unreal.

Neither real nor unreal is taught to refute the two extremes of real and unreal.

XIII. Elsewhere One Leaves the Four Alternatives; Here the Four Alternatives Are Taught

The questioner says: Elsewhere the Buddha teaches departure from neither existence nor nonexistence. Why is neither existence nor nonexistence here said to be the Buddha’s teaching?

The respondent says: Elsewhere this is taught to refute four kinds of craving attachment. Here, however, there is no conceptual proliferation within the four alternatives; on hearing the Buddha’s teaching, one can attain the path. Therefore, neither real nor unreal is taught.

XIV. The Character of True Character: Not Following Another, Quiescent, without Conceptual Proliferation

The questioner says: Now that we know the Buddha teaches through the conditions of these four alternatives, by what character can one who has obtained the true character of dharmas be known? What is true character like?

The respondent says: Such a person can refrain from following another. Not following another means that even if non-Buddhists display supernormal power and say this is the path or this is not the path, one trusts one’s own mind and does not follow them. Even if non-Buddhists transform their bodies and one does not know they are not the Buddha, because one well understands true character, one’s mind cannot be turned.

Because no dharma can be taken or rejected in this true character, it is called the character of quiescence. Because it is quiescent, conceptual proliferation cannot proliferate about it. Conceptual proliferation has two kinds: the discourse of craving and the discourse of views. Neither exists here. Because both kinds of conceptual proliferation are absent, there is no conceptual recollection or discrimination and no character of difference. This is called true character.

XV. A Dependently Arisen Dharma Is Neither Identical with nor Different from Its Cause, and Therefore Neither Annihilated nor Permanent

The questioner says: If dharmas are all empty, does this not fall into annihilation? And does nonarising and nonceasing not fall into permanence?

The respondent says: It is not so. As explained before, true character is without conceptual proliferation, the character of mind is quiescent, and the path of language is cut off. You now greedily cling to grasping marks and therefore see the faults of annihilation and permanence in the dharma of true character. One who obtains true character says that dharmas arise from a multitude of conditions and are neither identical with nor different from their causes; therefore, they are neither annihilated nor permanent. If fruit differed from cause, that would be annihilation. If fruit did not differ from cause, that would be permanence.

XVI. Benefit: The Flavor of Ambrosia and Three Ways of Attaining the Path

The questioner says: If one understands in this way, what benefit is ultimately gained?

The respondent says: If practitioners can penetrate this meaning, then regarding all dharmas they are neither one nor different, neither annihilated nor permanent. In this way, they at once extinguish the various afflictions and conceptual proliferations and attain the constant bliss of nirvāṇa. Therefore, the Buddhas are said to teach sentient beings through the flavor of ambrosia. As people in the world say, one who obtains the heavenly draught of ambrosia is without age, illness, death, or any decline and distress. This dharma of true character is the genuine flavor of ambrosia.

The Buddha taught three modes of true character. If one obtains the true character of dharmas and extinguishes the various afflictions, this is called the Śrāvaka teaching. If one gives rise to great compassion and awakens the unsurpassed mind, this is called the Mahāyāna. If a Buddha does not appear in the world and the Buddha’s Dharma is absent, a pratyekabuddha’s wisdom arises from seclusion.

After a Buddha has finished liberating sentient beings, entered nirvāṇa without remainder, and the teaching left behind has vanished, if someone from a past life is due to attain the path, that person briefly contemplates the conditions for disenchantment, enters the mountain forest alone, withdraws from clamor, and attains the path. Such a person is called a pratyekabuddha.

Across the preceding seventeen chapters, readers have grown accustomed to one kind of ending: this or that cannot be established; this or that is unobtainable. Yet this chapter’s first sentence is not a refutation but a request for directions.

The questioner says: if all dharmas are ultimately empty, without arising or ceasing, and this is called the true character of dharmas, then—“How does one enter?”

It is an excellent question. Emptiness has been understood, but after understanding it, one remains standing in place. Where does the first step fall? If emptiness is only a conclusion, one can do nothing with it.

The respondent gives only one place to begin: “By extinguishing attachment to self and what belongs to self, one obtains the emptiness of all dharmas. The wisdom of no-self is called entry.”

Notice the order. It is not that one first realizes the emptiness of all dharmas and then, incidentally, self disappears. Only after attachment to self and what belongs to self is extinguished does the emptiness of all dharmas come into hand. Moreover, what one enters is not a place; entry is that wisdom—“The wisdom of no-self is called entry.” This sentence sets the direction of the chapter: it is not discussing emptiness but explaining how to walk.

Self and the Five Aggregates: Both Gates of Identity and Difference Are Closed

The questioner next asks: how do we know that dharmas are without self? The verses begin:

“If self is the five aggregates, self undergoes arising and ceasing; if self differs from the five aggregates, it does not have the aggregates’ character.”

Qingmu says the “spiritual self” posited by non-Buddhists can stand in only two ways: either the five aggregates are the spiritual self, or a separate spiritual self exists apart from them.

The first position collapses by itself. The five aggregates arise and cease; Qingmu states it with utter brevity: “because once arisen they deteriorate.” What arises is already deteriorating. If self is the five aggregates, it must arise and cease with them. But something that arises and ceases cannot bear the work non-Buddhists need it to bear—the self that passes from this life to the next and remains the same throughout.

The second position cannot even be stated coherently. If the self differs from the aggregates, it has none of their character; but “apart from the five aggregates there is no further dharma.” Qingmu therefore asks: by “what character and as what dharma does it exist?” If the self is denied the aggregates’ character yet is said to exist, another character must be produced. If none can be produced, “self” is only a name.

Someone tries to rescue it through space: self exists apart from the five aggregates just as space does. Qingmu points back to an earlier chapter. The “Examination of the Six Elements” already said that “no dharma exists that can be called space.” Something unable to stand in its own right cannot provide support.

When both gates of identity and difference are closed, a thing has nowhere to stand. The Treatise on the Middle always tests whether something can be obtained in this way: it does not search for the thing but examines, one by one, every place where it could remain.

No Spiritual Self Can Be Found among the Four Kinds of Warrant

Someone retreats a step. Do not argue from character, but from warrant: because there is trustworthy warrant, the spiritual self exists.

Qingmu lists the four kinds of warrant accepted in his setting: present fact, inferential knowledge, analogy, and the teaching of worthy sages, then searches within each. It is absent from present fact—no one directly perceives a spiritual self.

It is absent from inferential knowledge too. Qingmu states the rule of this gate clearly: “Inferential knowledge means first having seen and then knowing by analogy, as someone first sees fire with smoke and later, merely seeing smoke, knows there is fire.” Inference has a precondition: you must first have directly seen the pair present together. First see fire and smoke together; later, smoke alone can yield the inference of fire. What of the spiritual self? “Who first saw the spiritual self joined with the five aggregates and then, seeing the aggregates, knew the spiritual self existed?” Who, and when, saw the spiritual self and the five aggregates present together? Not once. Since the precondition has never been met, this path has had no starting point from the beginning.

The opponent further subdivides inference into three kinds—as with the original, as with the remainder, and commonly seen—and gives the sun as example. No one sees the sun walking, but one sees it emerge in the east and disappear in the west. Since people have the appearance of going, the sun too is known to go. In the same way, suffering, pleasure, hate, love, and awareness should depend upon something—“as when seeing subjects, one knows they must depend upon a king.”

Qingmu answers with the same measure. What is commonly seen works only because “one first saw a person joined with the dharma of going and reaching another place.” Person and going were first seen together; the aggregates and self have never been so seen. The example changes; the precondition remains the same.

Last comes the teaching of worthy sages. This gate seems strongest. People have not seen hells, heavens, or Uttarakuru, but know them by trusting sacred testimony. Qingmu does not deny the gate. He only identifies the origin of sacred testimony’s trustworthiness: “What sages teach, they first saw with their own eyes and then taught.” Sacred speech is trustworthy not because the speaker has high status but because that speaker first saw. Concerning the spiritual self, however, “there is no one who first saw the spiritual self and later spoke of it.” No one speaks after having first seen it. This gate too therefore cannot produce a self.

After walking all four gates, Qingmu concludes: “Therefore, when the spiritual self is sought among the four warrants and every warrant, it is unobtainable.” He adds another cut. In the “Examination of the Faculties,” seeing, seer, and visible object have already been refuted, so the spiritual self is refuted likewise. “How much less could a spiritual self exist among false conceptual recollections when even coarse dharmas visible to the eye are unobtainable?”

The weight of this entire passage lies not in its conclusion but in its method. It does not announce no-self as dogma; it invites every support needed by “self exists” to appear one by one, then tests whether each can stand.

From Self to What Belongs to Self: The Path Empties All the Way Down

Once self is unobtainable, the verse immediately takes the next step:

“If no self exists, how could there be what belongs to self? Because self and what belongs to self are extinguished, this is called obtaining the wisdom of no-self.”

What belongs to self is “mine” only because that self is first present. Withdraw self and what belongs to self has nowhere to hang. The broad circle of things a person labors to protect are not each guarded separately; all are fastened to that one center. When the center disperses, the whole circle loosens.

The path of cultivation is not mysterious. Qingmu says plainly: “By cultivating the factors of the noble eightfold path and extinguishing the causes and conditions of self and what belongs to self, one obtains determinate wisdom of neither self nor what belongs to self.” No separate contemplation is established; it is the noble eightfold path. Nor is self what is extinguished—self was originally unobtainable and cannot be extinguished. What is extinguished are “the causes and conditions of self and what belongs to self,” the conditions that repeatedly establish self.

The verse next gives this wisdom two names:

“One who obtains the wisdom of no-self is said to contemplate reality; a person who obtains the wisdom of no-self is exceedingly rare.”

One name is “contemplation of reality”—an affirmative judgment rarely seen in the entire treatise: this way of seeing accords with the facts. The other is “rare.” This is not praise but fact. One may understand the sentence “no-self,” yet it is extraordinarily difficult truly to have no center amid events.

One more point must be watched. Qingmu says: “What is called neither self nor what belongs to self is itself unobtainable in the ultimate meaning.” Even neither self nor what belongs to self is unobtainable ultimately. This sentence plants a stake for what follows, preventing one from turning no-self into a new attainment.

Internal and External Utterly Cease: When Appropriation Ceases, the Body Ceases

The verse turns toward fruition:

“Because internal and external self and what belongs to self are utterly extinguished and absent, the various appropriations cease; when appropriation ceases, the body ceases.”

Qingmu’s explanation forms a causal chain. Self and what belongs to self obstruct the wisdom-eye; when that eye is obstructed, reality cannot be seen: “Ordinary people cannot see reality because self and what belongs to self obstruct the wisdom-eye.” Read this slowly. Ordinary people are not eyeless; the eye is covered. What covers it is precisely self and what belongs to self. When these cease, afflictions cease; when afflictions cease, true character appears. Then, “because internal and external self and what belongs to self cease, the various appropriations cease; because appropriations cease, immeasurable later bodies all cease. This is called nirvāṇa without remainder.”

Why does cessation of appropriation mean cessation of the body? Because appropriation is the link fastening one to later existence. For a person without a center, reception no longer congeals into “my suffering and pleasure.” Without congealing, there is no grasping; without grasping, a later body has nowhere to arise. Thus cessation here does not mean destroying the body, but the later segment no longer connects.

Karma and Affliction Arise from Conceptual Recollection and Discrimination

The questioner asks: what of nirvāṇa with remainder?

Qingmu answers: “Because the various afflictions and karmas cease, the mind is said to obtain release.” From where do afflictions and karma come? He traces back two levels: “These afflictions and karmas all arise from conceptual recollection and discrimination and have no reality; the various conceptual recollections and discriminations all arise from conceptual proliferation.”

See the line: conceptual proliferation → conceptual recollection and discrimination → karma and affliction. A person first tells an event into a certain shape within the mind; once told, it is taken as true, and once taken as true, karma and affliction arise. The verse concludes:

“Because karma and afflictions cease, this is called release; karma and afflictions are unreal—upon entering emptiness, conceptual proliferation ceases.”

“Karma and afflictions are unreal”—these four words matter. If karma and affliction really existed, they could only be counteracted one by one, an endless task. Precisely because they arise from that layer of telling, when that layer quiets, they have no support. Qingmu gives exactly this: “When one obtains the ultimately empty true character of dharmas, the various conceptual proliferations cease. This is called nirvāṇa with remainder.”

Nirvāṇa without remainder and with remainder here speak of one event from two ends: one says no later body arises; the other says the mind has obtained release.

Sometimes Self Is Taught; Sometimes No-Self

Here the whole chapter pivots:

“Buddhas sometimes teach self, and sometimes teach no-self; in the true character of dharmas, there is neither self nor nonself.”

How can the Buddha teach both? Qingmu sets out three listeners. Some “do not know to fear wrongdoing” and their minds are immature. To them, self is first taught so they know their actions have an owner and first stand firm in cause and fruit. Others have attained the path and know dharmas are empty; for them, self is merely a provisional name and causes no fault. Still others cultivate such merits as generosity and keeping precepts, yet “weary of saṃsāra’s suffering and fear nirvāṇa as eternal extinction.” For them, no-self is taught precisely to dismantle the self that “will disappear.”

Qingmu states the reason again: “Dharmas are merely conjoined through causes and conditions; at arising, they arise emptily, and at ceasing, they cease emptily.” Between these, there is no one who is born or destroyed.

Teaching self and teaching no-self therefore do not report the structure of the world; each dismantles a particular attachment in a particular person. The third and fourth lines of the verse give the ground: within true character “there is neither self nor nonself.” Neither side is established.

No-Self Is Not Allowed to Become a Determinate Teaching Either

The questioner immediately seizes this point. If no-self is true and self is taught only conventionally, what fault is there?

Qingmu’s answer displays the chapter’s sharpest discernment: “No-self exists because it refutes the dharma of self. Since self is determinately unobtainable, how could there be a determinate no-self?”

The statement of no-self is spoken in response to self. If self determinately existed, refuting it could yield a determinate absence. But since self is determinately unobtainable, the absence opposed to it loses its opponent and cannot stand as a determinate thing. Once words become fixed doctrine, people grasp them. Qingmu directly states the consequence: “If no-self determinately existed, that would be annihilation and would give rise to craving attachment.” To clutch no-self is not release; it is craving another thing. He cites the Prajñā as witness: for a bodhisattva, self is not practice, and no-self is not practice either.

This passage guards the chapter’s gate. The first half expends such effort refuting self; if the reader then enthrones “no-self,” all the preceding work is wasted.

Activities of Mind and Paths of Language Are Cut Off

The questioner retreats to the final step. If neither self nor nonself, neither empty nor nonempty, is taught, what does the Buddha’s Dharma teach?

The answer: “The Buddha teaches the true character of dharmas. In true character, there is no path of language, and the various activities of mind cease.”

Why must the activities of mind cease? Qingmu does not disparage mind; he explains its origin: “Mind arises through conditions by grasping marks and exists because of fruition from past karma; it cannot truly see dharmas.” Mind itself is dependently arisen, and arises by grasping marks—it has already taken a mark the moment it moves. Using something that must grasp marks to see no-character mismatches tool and object.

The questioner objects. Ordinary minds may not see reality, but surely worthy sages’ minds can. Why say all activities of mind cease?

Qingmu gives three pieces of evidence. If mind were real, why use gateways to release such as emptiness? Why, among all meditative absorptions, is the attainment of cessation ranked first? And why does one ultimately return to nirvāṇa without remainder? All three point to one fact, and he concludes: “All activities of mind are false; because false, they should cease.” True character “transcends the associated mental dharmas, has neither arising nor ceasing, bears the character of quiescence, and is like nirvāṇa.”

Why Say Only “Like Nirvāṇa”?

The questioner presses one word. The sūtras say dharmas have always borne the character of quiescence and this itself is nirvāṇa. Why say only “like nirvāṇa” here?

Qingmu answers that this is said for those attached to dharmas. They divide dharmas in two: “They say nirvāṇa is quiescent and do not say the world is quiescent.” They grant the name quiescence only to nirvāṇa. The treatise teaches instead that all dharmas are empty of intrinsic nature and bear the character of quiescence. “Because those attached to dharmas do not understand, nirvāṇa is used as an analogy.”

Thus the word “like” is not a retreat but a bridge built from what the listener already accepts. Since you accept that nirvāṇa is empty, signless, quiescent, and without conceptual proliferation, see the world in that same way: “All worldly dharmas are likewise.”

Here analogy is not rhetoric; it is one rung of a ladder lowered to the listener.

Four Alternatives: Four Teachings within One Sentence

The questioner asks again: if paths of language are cut off, how can people be made to know true character?

The respondent then speaks the famous four alternatives:

“All is real; all is unreal; all is both real and unreal; all is neither real nor unreal—this is called the Dharma of the Buddhas.”

Qingmu assigns each its use. All is real because when the real nature of dharmas is sought, “everything enters the one equal character of ultimate meaning, namely, no-character.” His analogy is “many streams of different colors and flavors entering the great ocean and becoming one color and one flavor.” All is unreal because, before entering true character, every dharma examined separately lacks real substance and “exists only through the conjunction of conditions.” All is both real and unreal because of three grades of sentient beings: “those of the higher grade contemplate dharmas as neither real nor unreal”; the middle grade sees all as real and all as unreal; the lower grade’s wisdom is shallow and can see only nirvāṇa, an unconditioned dharma, as indestructible and real, while seeing saṃsāra, a conditioned dharma, as false and unreal. Neither real nor unreal is taught to refute the two extremes of real and unreal.

Someone asks more sharply: elsewhere the Buddha clearly teaches departure from “neither existence nor nonexistence.” Why is neither existence nor nonexistence here called the Buddha’s Dharma? Qingmu distinguishes them clearly. Elsewhere it is spoken “to refute four kinds of craving attachment.” There the four alternatives are four nests people clutch, and so must be left. “Here there is no conceptual proliferation within the four alternatives, and upon hearing the Buddha’s teaching one attains the path.” Here the alternatives are not clutched; each is a gate leading out.

The same four alternatives, when grasped, are four craving attachments; when not grasped, they are four skillful means. The difference lies not in the sentence but in the listener.

The Character of True Character: Known for Oneself, Not Followed from Another

At last the questioner reaches the root. By what character can someone who has obtained true character be recognized? What is true character like?

The verse answers:

“Known for oneself and not followed from another, quiescent and without conceptual proliferation, without difference or discrimination: this is called true character.”

Explaining “not following another,” Qingmu gives the most difficult circumstance. Non-Buddhists display supernormal power and say this is the path or this is not the path; the practitioner “trusts one’s own mind and does not follow.” Even if non-Buddhists transform their bodies and the practitioner does not know they are not the Buddha, because one “well understands true character, one’s mind cannot be turned.”

We must see that “known for oneself” is not stubborn insistence on one’s own view. It means one has seen for oneself. One who has seen cannot be turned by another’s supernormal display. This is the visible character of true character in a person.

Next comes quiescence. Qingmu says: “Because no dharma can be taken or rejected here, it is called the character of quiescence.” Quiescence is not a blank mind; it means nothing is held that must be taken, and nothing held that must be thrown away.

Next comes absence of conceptual proliferation. Qingmu divides proliferation in two: “one is the discourse of craving, the other the discourse of views.” One clings to what is loved; the other clings to what is seen. The first half of the chapter refutes the discourse of views; this passage guards against the discourse of craving. Even “no-self” can be loved, how much more everything else. When both proliferations are absent, conceptual recollection, discrimination, and the character of difference naturally disappear. This is called true character.

Neither Identical with nor Different from the Cause: Neither Annihilated nor Permanent

The questioner’s last doubt: if all dharmas are empty, is this not annihilation? If they neither arise nor cease, does this not fall into permanence?

Qingmu first identifies the source of the doubt: “You now greedily cling to grasping marks and see the faults of annihilation and permanence in true character.” Annihilation and permanence are not faults within true character; they are what the eye that grasps marks sees.

He then gives an affirmative answer:

“If a dharma arises from conditions, it is neither identical with nor different from its cause; therefore it is called true character, neither annihilated nor permanent.”

Qingmu states the reasoning very plainly: “If fruit differed from cause, that would be annihilation; if fruit did not differ from cause, that would be permanence.” If fruit were wholly different from cause, the cause would be severed with one cut: annihilation. If fruit did not differ at all, the cause would simply be carried unchanged into fruit: permanence. Dependently arisen reality is neither—because not identical, it is not permanent; because not different, it is not annihilated.

Annihilation and permanence entangle people because they first see cause and fruit as two things, then ask whether the two are one or two. Dependently arisen dharmas are not two things of that kind, so the question itself disperses.

The Flavor of Ambrosia and Three Ways of Attaining the Path

The final question asks about benefit. What good comes from understanding this way?

“Neither one nor different, neither permanent nor annihilated; this is called the flavor of ambrosia through which the World-Honored Ones teach.”

Qingmu says that if practitioners penetrate this meaning, then regarding all dharmas they are neither one nor different, neither annihilated nor permanent. They “at once extinguish afflictions and conceptual proliferation and attain the constant bliss of nirvāṇa.” He explains the ambrosia analogy: “As people in the world say, one who obtains the heavenly draught of ambrosia is without age, illness, death, or any decline and distress.” This dharma of true character is the genuine flavor of ambrosia.

The same flavor of ambrosia yields three fruits in different people. “If one obtains the true character of dharmas and extinguishes the afflictions, this is called the Śrāvaka teaching.” “If one gives rise to great compassion and awakens the unsurpassed mind, this is called the Mahāyāna.” If a Buddha does not appear and the Buddha’s Dharma is absent, the pratyekabuddha gives rise to wisdom through seclusion. The final verse addresses this third mode:

“If a Buddha does not appear in the world and the Buddha’s Dharma has vanished, the wisdom of pratyekabuddhas arises from seclusion.”

Qingmu completes the account. After a Buddha enters nirvāṇa without remainder and the teaching left behind has vanished, if someone from a past life is due to attain the path, that person briefly contemplates the conditions of disenchantment and “enters the mountain forest alone, withdraws from clamor, and attains the path. Such a person is called a pratyekabuddha.”

Three fruits, one flavor. The distinction lies not in several dharmas realized but in compassionate vow and time.

What a Reader Can Carry Away from This Chapter

First, know where to enter. Emptiness is not an esoteric principle to penetrate. There is only one entry: “By extinguishing attachment to self and what belongs to self, one obtains the emptiness of all dharmas.”

Second, know that even no-self cannot be clutched. “Self is determinately unobtainable—how could there be a determinate no-self?” The words that refute self are not a new conclusion to enthrone.

Third, know why teachings change. Sometimes self, sometimes no-self, sometimes real, sometimes unreal—the medicine changes, not the pathology. Within true character there is “neither self nor nonself,” and this has never changed.

Fourth, know the character by which to recognize a person. It is not how much one can say, but “known for oneself and not followed from another,” with nothing in the hand that must be taken or rejected.

Carried Forward: Jizang’s Mirror

What precedes is the meaning of the chapter itself. What follows is illuminated from the perspective of the Sui-Tang Three Treatise lineage—a mirror is not the treatise, but another way of reading the same group of verses.

Regarding the opening question “How does one enter?” Jizang’s Commentary on the Treatise on the Middle says that if one establishes the practitioner as what enters and true character as what is entered, these have already become two objects, agent and object. The person who enters and the dharma entered must both be removed; only when ultimately neither remains is it called entry. He further uses this to distinguish the depth of Great and Lesser Vehicle contemplation: Śrāvaka contemplation treats self as skillful means and no-self as reality, while this chapter clarifies that both self and no-self are skillful means and that neither self nor no-self is true. Therefore, bodhisattva contemplation is deeper. As for the four alternatives, he judges them to be skillful gates of true character. By letting the mind range through the four gates, one enters true character: the four gates are function, while not-four is substance.

This mirror connects the chapter to the Three Treatise framework of ranking depth and distinguishing substance and function. Its articulation is Jizang’s addition, not the words of Nāgārjuna’s verses or Qingmu’s extended commentary. The readings are recorded side by side without adjudication, each returned to its own place.