enlightenment and time-an examination of nagarjuna's concept of time

22/07/2014 02:59ENLIGHTENMENT AND TIME:<br> AN EXAMINATION OF NAGARJUNA'S CONCEPT OF TIME

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ENLIGHTENMENT AND TIME:<br> AN EXAMINATION OFNAGARJUNA'S CONCEPT OF TIME

ENLIGHTENMENT AND TIME:AN EXAMINATION OF NAGARJUNA'S CONCEPT OF TIME

PRESENTED BY:the Wanderling

by Anthony Birch, PhD

The belief in the independent existence of things in the world is a mainstay of thecommon sense view of life. Trees, flowers, houses, the earth, stars and galaxies exist and willcontinue to exist without us, according to common sense. All these things, and mostimportantly our own conscious lives, however, appear to be caught up in the inexorable flowof time. Common sense readily admits that as time passes, ordinary physical objects, andhuman beings, come and go. It would seem, therefore, that the flow of time is itself the soleunchanging element in an ever-changing universe.

Yet the independent reality not only of physical objects, but the flow of time in which theyappear to be enmeshed, are precisely the common sense conceptions that the Buddhist

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philosophy of the Middle Way seeks to unravel. Indeed, their unraveling is understood to beessential to the attainment of enlightenment, a complete understanding of and spiritual unitywith the universe. Unlike many Western philosophies (including the contemporary scientificview that places the origin of the universe at a point in time), the Middle Way attempts toshow us how to dispense with the concept of the flow of time. Ultimately, the belief in the flowof time, a last refuge of common sense, is to be overcome. How are we to understand thistransformation of a belief that seems so well-grounded not only in common sense but inscience? What religious or philosophic interpretation can we give the concept of time in theMiddle Way?

The purpose of this paper is to investigate Nagarjuna's conception of time and itsrelationship to enlightenment. In order to provide a reasonable limit to the scope of thispaper, I shall confine myself to Nagarjuna's arguments presented in his most famous work theMulamadhyamakakarikas (herein after MMK). I shall divide this examination into threeparts: (1) Nagarjuna's goals, central terms and strategies and how these form a backdropagainst which his conception of time is to be understood; (2) An analysis of the specificarguments Nagarjuna offers in the MMK relating to time and allied topics such as space andmotion; (3) An interpretive account of how one can incorporate Nagarjuna's argumentsconcerning time into an understanding of the enlightenment experience.

I. Nagarjuna's Plan and Purpose

Religion and Philosophy

In approaching Nagarjuna's thought it must be remembered that Nagarjuna's purposeis religious. His primary aim is to inspire an understanding that will lead towardenlightenment. Nagarjuna uses logic and philosophy, but his aim is to indicate truths that liebeyond these abstract disciplines. The arguments presented by Nagarjuna should beunderstood as tools or way stations to be used on the path to enlightenment. The logical, therational, and the philosophic are ultimately transformed to the mystical (Betty p. 139 andStreng p. 181).

Nagarjuna has a secondary purpose that lies behind the MMK, and this also must beunderstood in a religious context: Nagarjuna wanted to refute the materialist ideas of theAbhidharma schools and return Buddhism to what he thought was the Middle Way.Nagarjuna was committed to explaining the radical notion that nirvana and samsara and wereidentical -- an idea that would be quite difficult for many of his contemporaries to accept. Weshould, therefore, regard the MMK as an exercise in both practical polemics and religious



persuasion.

The Meaning of Own-Being

Almost all of Nagarjuna's arguments are structured around the conception of thingswhich are said to have "own-being" (sbavhavah). It is essential that we understand howNagarjuna defines this term. An examination of the text (see in particular verses 7.16, 15.2,15.8 and 15.11) shows that own-being is to be understood as that which is self-identical, existsby itself or through its own accord, and is not dependent on other beings for its existence.From this definition, Nargarjuna believed it followed that things with own-being were eternal.

The basic philosophic argument of the MMK is that there are no "things," either sensibleobjects of the life world or subjective components of the consciousness, which have own-being. All things are, rather, "empty" and without essential nature. They have only relative,dependent being. This applies even to Nirvana, which, because it is not separate andinaccessible, is coincident with the life world.

The Argument Against Causality

Nagarjuna's attempt to show the identity of samsara and nirvana rests on his showing theunintelligibility of causality. Nagarjuna seeks to show that the common-sense view ofcausality involves contradictions. If causality can be shown to be self-contradictory, then the"things" which reputedly participate in the chain of causality either have no own-being or donot participate in causality at all. Let us consider the arguments on causality Nagarjuna offersin Chapter 20 of the MMK. He says:

1. If a product is produced through the aggregate of causes and conditions,and exists in the aggregate, how will it be produced in the aggregate?

2. If a product is produced in the aggregate of causes and conditions and doesnot exist in the aggregate, how will it be produced in the aggregate? (Strengtranslation)

In other words, if a cause C already contains its effect or product E, then cause and effectare essentially identical and nothing is really produced. C and E are really two differentaspects of the same thing. By extension, causality in general, all the "production" in the world,can not be the result of so-called "causes" because the effects that are already contained in thecauses. Following this logic, we might therefore conclude that all the apparent goings-on inthe world, the apparent interrelation of causes and effects, is really a kind of mirage.



On the other hand (verse 2), we might consider that cause and effect are entirelyseparate, but in that case, argues Nagarjuna, "production" again has no meaning. If C and Eare independent events, with separate own-being, then one can not be rightfully said to causethe other. Once again, the world of ordinary experience would need to be reinterpreted andthe meaning of "production" would have to be other than it is, if the separateness of cause andeffect accounted for the goings-on of the world. Nagarjuna summarizes this as follows:

19. Certainly a oneness of cause and product is not possible at all. Nor isa difference of cause and product possible at all.

Let us clarify Nagarjuna's method and aims in these passages on causality. It has beenargued by some (see Waldo, pp. 295-296.) that Nagarjuna's appeal to ordinary meanings usedin these and similar passages throughout the MMK shows us that Nagarjuna is an ordinarylanguage philosopher with a remarkable resemblance to the later Wittgenstein. Both arearguing that language shows us only the interdependence of words, leaving us with essentialambiguities of ultimate reference of words and in a dilemma about what reality is. Asintriguing as this view is, I believe it must be rejected. Nagarjuna's arguments are not aboutlanguage, but about reality (see Anderson, passim). Nagarjuna recognizes the conventionalnature of language, and even denies that his "ultimate" category, "emptiness," should beunderstood as anything other than a convention. The term "emptiness" does not stand for apermanent or transcendent metaphysical reality whose meaning we can grasp byapprehending the reality behind the name. It is precisely because of its ambiguous andsuggestive nature, not in spite of it, that language (and in particular "emptiness") can helpguide us on the path of release.

The argument against the own-being in causality brings us to a consideration of how timefigures in the explanation of events in the world. If causality is not logically comprehensible interms of identity and difference, how are events to be related in terms of time? Would it notbe the case that events could be related as "before" and "after" regardless of the refutation ofthe causality? Thus, it might seem that Nagarjuna's view as so far presented would allow anessentially Humean conception of events: causality is denied but constant conjunction insequential time is asserted. This would allow that time "exists" but events are logicallyindependent. Such a conception, is, of course, one that Nagarjuna would reject. Our next taskis to see how Nagarjuna develops additional arguments concerning time.

II. The Concept of Time



Motion and Space

In our study of time, it will be instructive to first consider the allied topics of motion andspace. We shall consider each in turn.

Contrary to what is often surmised, Nagarjuna does not deny motion (see Kalupahana p. 130and Wayman p. 47). Nagarjuna concludes the chapter on motion with the assertion"Therefore, the process of going, the goer and the destination to be gone to do not exist,"(2.25) but this ostensible denial of motion must be placed in the framework of the ontologyNagarjuna seeks to refute. Here, the moving things denied are those which have own- being.All the previous argumentation in the chapter shows that the motion, the object moved, andthe destination achieved are all relative to each other. As Nagarjuna states, "certainly the actof going is not produced without a goer" (2.6) and "the goer can not come into being whenthere is no going" (2.7). As in the case of causality, Nagarjuna establishes the relativity of twomutually dependent conceptions, i.e. the inapplicability of identity and difference: "Neitherthe identity nor the essential difference is established regarding the two conceptions goer andact of going" (2.21). We may state Nagarjuna's conclusion another way: "motion" can not beconceived apart from objects which move; motion is not an independent category of being. Itis important to note the ground of Nagarjuna's conclusion: "own-being" is self-contradictorywhen it attempts to explain the ordinary perceptible reality of objects in motion. Nometaphysical notions, such as "Motion and its Objects" need be invoked once relativity isrecognized.

Now let us briefly consider Nagarjuna's notion of space in chapter 5 of the MMK. The lineof argumentation is both inventive and quite different than in other sections of the MMK.Nagarjuna asserts as a matter of principle that "in no case has anything existed without adefining characteristic" (5.2). Whatever we regard as existing must be able to be picked out bythe senses or isolated in thought in some way. We can do this only in virtue of some "definingcharacteristic" of the thing under consideration. The problem with "space" is that it has nodefining characteristic, nor can we consider it, as it were, in isolation prior to or apart fromsuch characteristics -- there is "nothing there" for us to consider. It seems we must concludethat space does not exist.

But surely, one might reply,space seems to exist or to have come into existence (5.6). Inthat case, Nagarjuna responds, it must have a defining characteristic. Since we haveestablished that there is none, we shall be forced to conclude that space is both existing andnon-existing. But who can hold that there is an "existing-and-non-existing thing which doesnot have the properties of an existing-and-non-existing thing?" (5.6). We must therefore



conclude space is not existing, not non-existing, nor both existing and non-existing.

Again, "space" has been found to be like "things;" it can not be considered as havingown-being. Nothing positive whatever can be asserted of it. The grounds for this conclusioninvolve both the application of an independent principle of ontology and epistemology as wellas the view of common sense. That Nagarjuna considered this view of space crucial isindicated by the closing verse of the chapter: "But those unenlightened people who eitheraffirm reality or non-reality do not perceive the blessed cessation-of-appearance of existingthings" (5.8). The apprehension of reality from the "blessed" (enlightened) perspective is anappeal to a higher level truth, a distinction not yet formally introduced in the MMK. Thisindicates that the logical arguments about space are transcended in the enlightenedapprehension of reality.

At this point we can summarizeNagarjuna's ontology in the arguments underconsideration (not his entire ontology) as one in which "things," in particular sensible things,have a kind of primary intractability to reason. This intractability arises primarily becausethings are not analyzable in terms of own-being. While we can not say that things "are," wemust acknowledge that they nevertheless "assert" themselves or are present to us in aparticular mode. Nagarjuna will subsequently identify this mode as "empty." Since motion isrelative to things, the only reality we can assert of it is that it is relative. Likewise, Nagarjuna'sview of space is profoundly non-Western. It is not presented as a necessary mode ofapprehension nor as something independent in which objects reside.

Time

Nagarjuna devotes chapter 19 of the MMK specifically to time. Once again, he attemptsto show that time has no self-existence. There is an important difference in his argumentshere however, for rather than developing all four arms of the tetralemma as he so often does,he concentrates only on the denial of time. Without trying to make too much of this fact, Iwish to call attention to it in order to support the idea that time, like space, has a kind ofspecial status for Nagarjuna, at least to the extent of requiring slightly altered forms ofargumentation.

Three arguments regarding time are presented. The first argument is a reprise of theproduction argument and relies on the common-sense view that time is split into past,present and future. Nagarjuna argues if the "parts" of time have own-being, the conception oftime quickly loses its coherence. If "the past" is considered to produce "the present" and "thefuture," the latter two parts would be already "in" the past and could therefore not be properly



said to have separate being. On the other hand, if the present and the future are separate fromthe past, then their very unconnectedness leaves them uncaused, independent and withoutreference to the past. But since the very notions of present and future imply a relation to thepast, this is self-contradictory. Therefore, the present and future do not exist. Neither identitywith nor difference from the past is sufficient to establish the reality of the present and future.In a similar fashion, the independence of any of the parts of time can be attacked on the basisof their inseparability and necessary reference to each other. The past, for example, can not beindependent because it is nonsensical if it does not terminate in the present and future.

Nagarjuna offers a second argument against the reality of time which does not specificallyrely on time being "split." Rather, the objection is framed in epistemological terms:

5. A non-stationary "time" cannot be "grasped" and a stationary "time"which can be grasped does not exist. How, then can one perceive time ifit is not "grasped"?

In other words, if time is acknowledged to be continuously fleeting, there are no absolutestatic components of it that can be experienced (or, perhaps, "grasped" by the mind). If wepropose, as the Abhidharmic metaphysicians held, that there can be a "static moment" oftime, it would no longer count as time. Time in and of itself can never be grasped.

The third and final argument shows that time can not be considered to be a self-existingthing that is somehow not dependent on other existing objects. This is because, as Nagarjunahas shown, there are no independent "objects" in the world, nor could time be itself trulyindependent as long as it remained defined by its relation to such supposed entities. To placethe argument in more contemporary terms, time is not a self-existing substratum or arena inwhich equally independent things endure or independent events occur.

It is important to note that although Nagarjuna denies the independent existence of timein this chapter, he is not, apparently, denying what we might call the unmediated experienceof change. What he does deny is that there is any coherent way of grasping or expressing thisexperience in terms of the flow of an independent substratum to reality. It seems thatNagarjuna's view of time is similar to Augustine's, who remarked that he knew what time wasuntil he was called upon to speak of it. David Kalupahana summarizes Nagarjuna's view herenicely:

Time denied by him is absolute time....This is a rejection not of temporal



phenomena, but only of time and phenomena as well as their mutualdependence so long as they are perceived as independent entities.(Kaluphana, p. 279)

Hence, although Nagarjuna makes no positive assertions regarding time and its relationto things, his view seems open to the interpretation that time and the things that change areessentially "one." We might phrase his view this way: phenomena are always phenomena-in-flux and time is always flux-in-phenomena. There is not a Time and Things that persistthrough it, but only a changing of things that "is" the change over time.

III. Eternity

As we indicated above, all of Nagarjuna's ideas are to be understood within the frameworkof the path toward Enlightenment. Enlightenment means that one understands the equationof samsara and nirvana, or the emptiness of the life world.

Once we see that there are no self-existent things in the universe, we come to regard"things" as "empty" of self-being, relative and dependent. The very emptiness of things, infact, is what makes things be the way they really are. Once we give up the categorization ofthings as being, not-being, both being and not-being and neither being nor not-being, we canbecome open to the true experience of the life world. Finding the emptiness of samsarabecomes finding the emptiness of nirvana. Nirvana has no own-being. Nirvana is not a "thing"to be found "elsewhere." The limits of samsara and nirvana are identical; "there is nothingwhatever that differentiates the two" (MMK 25.19 and 25.20).

If one can see this to be true, it is perhaps not too much to ask that we can imagine thatsurpassing all categories of "thinghood," including space and time, we will be in a position toat least imagine that an experience without reference to them is possible. This may give ussome clue as to the meaning of the Buddhists' reports that enlightenment allows one toexperience a kind of ever present eternity.

The conceptual equation of samsara and nirvana, however, can not do the all of thephilosophic work (let alone the real, practical work of the devotee) of encompassing a newapprehension of time into Enlightenment. This must be done by an inward turn to the self -- arooting out of all notions of the last and most intractable ground of own-being: the notions ofthe substantial self with an eternal soul.

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Nagarjuna closes the MMK with a final chapter reaffirming the "correctness" Buddha'ssilence on the issue of the survival of the soul after death. We can start by considering that theindividual self is either eternal or non-eternal. If the self is eternal, it implies it is identicalthrough a time extending beyond the limits of birth and death. In this case there would be nopast state in which I was different from any future state. Not only would self-development beimpossible, but identity would be continuous. The individual born in this time would have tobe exactly the same as one born countless times before. This contradicts the common sensenotion that I am a unique individual, living at a particular time and place. Thus, it follows thatwhile we can not disprove reincarnation, we can not prove it on the basis of lived experience.Such concerns are hopeless metaphysical speculation which Nagarjuna rejects in the spirit ofBuddha's original teaching.

There is an implied psychological and metaphysical doctrine in this final concern of theMMK, which, along with the previous discussions of motion, space, causality, and the path ofrelease can help us synthesize Nagarjuna's view of time.

(1) Because of self-attachment, there is a strong tendency to hope that a kind ofhypostatized Time (call it Eternity) will provide a last refuge for maintaining our self-identity.This Time will either provide a final home for the soul or will serve as a kind of netherlandapart from the world that souls visit between the cycles of birth and death. Nagarjuna's denialof our knowledge of the self's ultimate destination not only brings us back to the presentreality, but quite significantly, removes the two "ends" of time, the past and the future, fromconsideration. Hence, this feature of Nagarjuna's view anticipates the absorbing concern withthe here and now that became so important to Zen.

(2) Nagarjuna uses ontological principles and logic, but also attempts to return us toimmediate experience. Truly observed, space, time and motion have no own-being. Likewise,perceptible "things" are known to be empty, participating in the empty field of phenomenalbecoming. If we pay attention to things just as they are, we can see them no longer in space ormotion or time. If we can separate them at all, time and the changing thing are merely twoaspects of the same perception. Time itself is never grasped, but changing things continue. Itmight be stated this way: emptiness "becomes" or empties itself in the form of thing-in-motion, thing-in-space, or thing-in-time.

(3) The understanding of time is a kind of spiritual opening. It enables us to face deathwith equanimity. As Dogen says,

Life is a stage of time and death is stage of time, like, for example, winter



and spring. We do not suppose that winter becomes spring, or say thatspring becomes summer. (Waddell, Shobogenzo Genjokoan, p.136)

Although time stages have a before and after, they each have their own integrity. Theenlightened one accepts the integrity of all time stages, as did Hui Neng when he calmlyexplained his coming death to his disciples: "It is only natural that I should go" (Price, p. 106).

There is a further aspect to the spiritual aspect of understanding and experiencing oftime that Nagarjuna seems to indicate. He speaks in several spots in the MMK of the "blessedcessation of appearances" (see discussion of space above and verse 5.8 of MMK) and the"cessation of conditioned elements" (25.24 and 16.4) as results of enlightenment or ofentering nirvana. Undoubtedly, desire ceases in nirvana, but does time cease too? One isreminded of the Zen conception of "walking enlightenment" described in the Sutra of HuiNeng: "Let the essence of mind and all phenomenal objects be in a state of thusness. Then youwill be in samadhi all the time" (Price, p. 80). Samadhi was traditionally conceived to be"timeless," but here it is also present in time. Dogen's view of the eternal present is alsorelated. David Loy interprets the essence of Dogen's eternal present time this way: "[It] iseternal because there is indeed something which does not change: it is always now" (Loy,p.20).

The relation of these conceptions time and enlightenment, which grew out of laterBuddhist thought, to specific passages in Nagarjuna is admittedly speculative, but theirindebtedness to the spirit of Nagarjuna's great masterpiece, I think, is not. In any event, Ibelieve we can only begin to understand Nagarjuna through an authentic struggle tounderstand not only the letter but the spirit of his text. The displacement of the ordinaryviews about the life world, and perhaps more importantly in our times, our scientific views, isa first and most difficult step on the path of the Middle Way.

IV. Conclusion

We shall be very far from understanding Nagarjuna if attempt to understand his logical,epistemological and ontological as abstractions. Nagarjuna's aim is salvation and logic andarguments are merely tools. The path of enlightenment can only be cleared by the use ofargument; it can not be traversed. If space, causality and time are barriers for the ego'srelease, Nagarjuna has attempted to provide us with means to help us remove these barriers.Perhaps the most difficult barrier for many will be the conviction that time moves of its ownaccord and that it limits or constrains the life of the soul not only now but in the hereafter.



Nagarjuna's arguments show us how time, like ordinary things in the life world, can beunderstood as "empty." Once it is understood as empty the burden of time is lifted from thesoul; time ceases and life begins.

THE CODE MAKER, THE ZEN MAKER

SHANGRI-LA, SHAMBHALA, GYANGANJ, BUDDHISM AND ZEN

THE MOBIUS STRIP

SEE ALSO:NAGARJUNA

SUNYATA

RETURN TOALL THINGS ZEN

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anderson, Tyson, "Wittgenstein and Nagarjuna's Paradox," in Philosophy East and West,Vol., 35, No. 2, April 1985.

Betty, L. Stafford, "Nagarjuna's Masterpiece: Logical, Mystical, Both or Neither," inPhilosophy East and West, Vol. 33, No. 2, April, 1983.

Kalupahana, David J., Nagarjuna: The Philosophy of the Middle Way, New York, StateUniversity of New York Press, 1986.

Loy, David, "The Mahayana Deconstruction of Time," in Philosophy East and West, Vol. 36.No. 1, January, 1986.

Murti, T. R. V., The Central Philosophy of Buddhism, London, George Allen and Unwin Ltd,

http://the-wanderling.com/decoder.html

http://the-wanderling.com/mobius.html

http://sped2work.tripod.com/nagarjuna_2.html

http://the-wanderling.com/sunyata.html

http://sped2work.tripod.com/AllThingsZen.html



1960.

Price, A. F. and Wong Mou-Lam, tr., The Diamond Sutra and The Sutra of Hui Neng,Boston, Shambhala, 1985.

Stambaugh, Joan, "Emptiness and the Identity of Samsara and Nirvana," in Journal ofBuddhist Philosophy, Volume II, 1984, pp. 51-64.

Streng, Frederick J., Emptiness: A Study in Religious Meaning, New York, AbingdonPress, 1967.

Waddell, Norman and Abe Massao, tr., "Shobogenzo Genjikoan," in The EasternBuddhist, Vol. 5, No. 2, October 1972.

Waddell, Norman and Abe Massao, tr., "Being Time: Dogen's Shobogenzu Uji," in TheEastern Buddhist.

Waldo, Ives, "Nagarjuna and Analytic Philosophy," in Philosophy East and West, Vol. 28.No. 3, July 1978.

Wayman, Alex, "The Tathagata Chapter of Nagarjuna's Madhymaka- karika," in PhilosophyEast and West, Vol. 38. No. 1, January, 1988.

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ENLIGHTENMENT AND TIME:<br> AN EXAMINATION OFNAGARJUNA'S CONCEPT OF TIME

ENLIGHTENMENT AND TIME:AN EXAMINATION OF NAGARJUNA'S CONCEPT OF TIME



PRESENTED BY:the Wanderling

by Anthony Birch, PhD

The belief in the independent existence of things in the world is a mainstay of thecommon sense view of life. Trees, flowers, houses, the earth, stars and galaxies exist and willcontinue to exist without us, according to common sense. All these things, and mostimportantly our own conscious lives, however, appear to be caught up in the inexorable flowof time. Common sense readily admits that as time passes, ordinary physical objects, andhuman beings, come and go. It would seem, therefore, that the flow of time is itself the soleunchanging element in an ever-changing universe.

Yet the independent reality not only of physical objects, but the flow of time in which theyappear to be enmeshed, are precisely the common sense conceptions that the Buddhistphilosophy of the Middle Way seeks to unravel. Indeed, their unraveling is understood to beessential to the attainment of enlightenment, a complete understanding of and spiritual unitywith the universe. Unlike many Western philosophies (including the contemporary scientificview that places the origin of the universe at a point in time), the Middle Way attempts toshow us how to dispense with the concept of the flow of time. Ultimately, the belief in the flowof time, a last refuge of common sense, is to be overcome. How are we to understand thistransformation of a belief that seems so well-grounded not only in common sense but in

http://the-wanderling.com/wanderling.html

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/tony-birch/11/278/891



science? What religious or philosophic interpretation can we give the concept of time in theMiddle Way?

The purpose of this paper is to investigate Nagarjuna's conception of time and itsrelationship to enlightenment. In order to provide a reasonable limit to the scope of thispaper, I shall confine myself to Nagarjuna's arguments presented in his most famous work theMulamadhyamakakarikas (herein after MMK). I shall divide this examination into threeparts: (1) Nagarjuna's goals, central terms and strategies and how these form a backdropagainst which his conception of time is to be understood; (2) An analysis of the specificarguments Nagarjuna offers in the MMK relating to time and allied topics such as space andmotion; (3) An interpretive account of how one can incorporate Nagarjuna's argumentsconcerning time into an understanding of the enlightenment experience.

I. Nagarjuna's Plan and Purpose

Religion and Philosophy

In approaching Nagarjuna's thought it must be remembered that Nagarjuna's purposeis religious. His primary aim is to inspire an understanding that will lead towardenlightenment. Nagarjuna uses logic and philosophy, but his aim is to indicate truths that liebeyond these abstract disciplines. The arguments presented by Nagarjuna should beunderstood as tools or way stations to be used on the path to enlightenment. The logical, therational, and the philosophic are ultimately transformed to the mystical (Betty p. 139 andStreng p. 181).

Nagarjuna has a secondary purpose that lies behind the MMK, and this also must beunderstood in a religious context: Nagarjuna wanted to refute the materialist ideas of theAbhidharma schools and return Buddhism to what he thought was the Middle Way.Nagarjuna was committed to explaining the radical notion that nirvana and samsara and wereidentical -- an idea that would be quite difficult for many of his contemporaries to accept. Weshould, therefore, regard the MMK as an exercise in both practical polemics and religiouspersuasion.

The Meaning of Own-Being

Almost all of Nagarjuna's arguments are structured around the conception of thingswhich are said to have "own-being" (sbavhavah). It is essential that we understand howNagarjuna defines this term. An examination of the text (see in particular verses 7.16, 15.2,15.8 and 15.11) shows that own-being is to be understood as that which is self-identical, exists



by itself or through its own accord, and is not dependent on other beings for its existence.From this definition, Nargarjuna believed it followed that things with own-being were eternal.

The basic philosophic argument of the MMK is that there are no "things," either sensibleobjects of the life world or subjective components of the consciousness, which have own-being. All things are, rather, "empty" and without essential nature. They have only relative,dependent being. This applies even to Nirvana, which, because it is not separate andinaccessible, is coincident with the life world.

The Argument Against Causality

Nagarjuna's attempt to show the identity of samsara and nirvana rests on his showing theunintelligibility of causality. Nagarjuna seeks to show that the common-sense view ofcausality involves contradictions. If causality can be shown to be self-contradictory, then the"things" which reputedly participate in the chain of causality either have no own-being or donot participate in causality at all. Let us consider the arguments on causality Nagarjuna offersin Chapter 20 of the MMK. He says:

1. If a product is produced through the aggregate of causes and conditions,and exists in the aggregate, how will it be produced in the aggregate?

2. If a product is produced in the aggregate of causes and conditions and doesnot exist in the aggregate, how will it be produced in the aggregate? (Strengtranslation)

In other words, if a cause C already contains its effect or product E, then cause and effectare essentially identical and nothing is really produced. C and E are really two differentaspects of the same thing. By extension, causality in general, all the "production" in the world,can not be the result of so-called "causes" because the effects that are already contained in thecauses. Following this logic, we might therefore conclude that all the apparent goings-on inthe world, the apparent interrelation of causes and effects, is really a kind of mirage.

On the other hand (verse 2), we might consider that cause and effect are entirelyseparate, but in that case, argues Nagarjuna, "production" again has no meaning. If C and Eare independent events, with separate own-being, then one can not be rightfully said to causethe other. Once again, the world of ordinary experience would need to be reinterpreted andthe meaning of "production" would have to be other than it is, if the separateness of cause andeffect accounted for the goings-on of the world. Nagarjuna summarizes this as follows:

19. Certainly a oneness of cause and product is not possible at all. Nor is



a difference of cause and product possible at all.

Let us clarify Nagarjuna's method and aims in these passages on causality. It has beenargued by some (see Waldo, pp. 295-296.) that Nagarjuna's appeal to ordinary meanings usedin these and similar passages throughout the MMK shows us that Nagarjuna is an ordinarylanguage philosopher with a remarkable resemblance to the later Wittgenstein. Both arearguing that language shows us only the interdependence of words, leaving us with essentialambiguities of ultimate reference of words and in a dilemma about what reality is. Asintriguing as this view is, I believe it must be rejected. Nagarjuna's arguments are not aboutlanguage, but about reality (see Anderson, passim). Nagarjuna recognizes the conventionalnature of language, and even denies that his "ultimate" category, "emptiness," should beunderstood as anything other than a convention. The term "emptiness" does not stand for apermanent or transcendent metaphysical reality whose meaning we can grasp byapprehending the reality behind the name. It is precisely because of its ambiguous andsuggestive nature, not in spite of it, that language (and in particular "emptiness") can helpguide us on the path of release.

The argument against the own-being in causality brings us to a consideration of how timefigures in the explanation of events in the world. If causality is not logically comprehensible interms of identity and difference, how are events to be related in terms of time? Would it notbe the case that events could be related as "before" and "after" regardless of the refutation ofthe causality? Thus, it might seem that Nagarjuna's view as so far presented would allow anessentially Humean conception of events: causality is denied but constant conjunction insequential time is asserted. This would allow that time "exists" but events are logicallyindependent. Such a conception, is, of course, one that Nagarjuna would reject. Our next taskis to see how Nagarjuna develops additional arguments concerning time.

II. The Concept of Time

Motion and Space

In our study of time, it will be instructive to first consider the allied topics of motion andspace. We shall consider each in turn.

Contrary to what is often surmised, Nagarjuna does not deny motion (see Kalupahana p. 130and Wayman p. 47). Nagarjuna concludes the chapter on motion with the assertion"Therefore, the process of going, the goer and the destination to be gone to do not exist,"



(2.25) but this ostensible denial of motion must be placed in the framework of the ontologyNagarjuna seeks to refute. Here, the moving things denied are those which have own- being.All the previous argumentation in the chapter shows that the motion, the object moved, andthe destination achieved are all relative to each other. As Nagarjuna states, "certainly the actof going is not produced without a goer" (2.6) and "the goer can not come into being whenthere is no going" (2.7). As in the case of causality, Nagarjuna establishes the relativity of twomutually dependent conceptions, i.e. the inapplicability of identity and difference: "Neitherthe identity nor the essential difference is established regarding the two conceptions goer andact of going" (2.21). We may state Nagarjuna's conclusion another way: "motion" can not beconceived apart from objects which move; motion is not an independent category of being. Itis important to note the ground of Nagarjuna's conclusion: "own-being" is self-contradictorywhen it attempts to explain the ordinary perceptible reality of objects in motion. Nometaphysical notions, such as "Motion and its Objects" need be invoked once relativity isrecognized.

Now let us briefly consider Nagarjuna's notion of space in chapter 5 of the MMK. The lineof argumentation is both inventive and quite different than in other sections of the MMK.Nagarjuna asserts as a matter of principle that "in no case has anything existed without adefining characteristic" (5.2). Whatever we regard as existing must be able to be picked out bythe senses or isolated in thought in some way. We can do this only in virtue of some "definingcharacteristic" of the thing under consideration. The problem with "space" is that it has nodefining characteristic, nor can we consider it, as it were, in isolation prior to or apart fromsuch characteristics -- there is "nothing there" for us to consider. It seems we must concludethat space does not exist.

But surely, one might reply,space seems to exist or to have come into existence (5.6). Inthat case, Nagarjuna responds, it must have a defining characteristic. Since we haveestablished that there is none, we shall be forced to conclude that space is both existing andnon-existing. But who can hold that there is an "existing-and-non-existing thing which doesnot have the properties of an existing-and-non-existing thing?" (5.6). We must thereforeconclude space is not existing, not non-existing, nor both existing and non-existing.

Again, "space" has been found to be like "things;" it can not be considered as havingown-being. Nothing positive whatever can be asserted of it. The grounds for this conclusioninvolve both the application of an independent principle of ontology and epistemology as wellas the view of common sense. That Nagarjuna considered this view of space crucial isindicated by the closing verse of the chapter: "But those unenlightened people who either



affirm reality or non-reality do not perceive the blessed cessation-of-appearance of existingthings" (5.8). The apprehension of reality from the "blessed" (enlightened) perspective is anappeal to a higher level truth, a distinction not yet formally introduced in the MMK. Thisindicates that the logical arguments about space are transcended in the enlightenedapprehension of reality.

At this point we can summarizeNagarjuna's ontology in the arguments underconsideration (not his entire ontology) as one in which "things," in particular sensible things,have a kind of primary intractability to reason. This intractability arises primarily becausethings are not analyzable in terms of own-being. While we can not say that things "are," wemust acknowledge that they nevertheless "assert" themselves or are present to us in aparticular mode. Nagarjuna will subsequently identify this mode as "empty." Since motion isrelative to things, the only reality we can assert of it is that it is relative. Likewise, Nagarjuna'sview of space is profoundly non-Western. It is not presented as a necessary mode ofapprehension nor as something independent in which objects reside.

Time

Nagarjuna devotes chapter 19 of the MMK specifically to time. Once again, he attemptsto show that time has no self-existence. There is an important difference in his argumentshere however, for rather than developing all four arms of the tetralemma as he so often does,he concentrates only on the denial of time. Without trying to make too much of this fact, Iwish to call attention to it in order to support the idea that time, like space, has a kind ofspecial status for Nagarjuna, at least to the extent of requiring slightly altered forms ofargumentation.

Three arguments regarding time are presented. The first argument is a reprise of theproduction argument and relies on the common-sense view that time is split into past,present and future. Nagarjuna argues if the "parts" of time have own-being, the conception oftime quickly loses its coherence. If "the past" is considered to produce "the present" and "thefuture," the latter two parts would be already "in" the past and could therefore not be properlysaid to have separate being. On the other hand, if the present and the future are separate fromthe past, then their very unconnectedness leaves them uncaused, independent and withoutreference to the past. But since the very notions of present and future imply a relation to thepast, this is self-contradictory. Therefore, the present and future do not exist. Neither identitywith nor difference from the past is sufficient to establish the reality of the present and future.In a similar fashion, the independence of any of the parts of time can be attacked on the basisof their inseparability and necessary reference to each other. The past, for example, can not be



independent because it is nonsensical if it does not terminate in the present and future.

Nagarjuna offers a second argument against the reality of time which does not specificallyrely on time being "split." Rather, the objection is framed in epistemological terms:

5. A non-stationary "time" cannot be "grasped" and a stationary "time"which can be grasped does not exist. How, then can one perceive time ifit is not "grasped"?

In other words, if time is acknowledged to be continuously fleeting, there are no absolutestatic components of it that can be experienced (or, perhaps, "grasped" by the mind). If wepropose, as the Abhidharmic metaphysicians held, that there can be a "static moment" oftime, it would no longer count as time. Time in and of itself can never be grasped.

The third and final argument shows that time can not be considered to be a self-existingthing that is somehow not dependent on other existing objects. This is because, as Nagarjunahas shown, there are no independent "objects" in the world, nor could time be itself trulyindependent as long as it remained defined by its relation to such supposed entities. To placethe argument in more contemporary terms, time is not a self-existing substratum or arena inwhich equally independent things endure or independent events occur.

It is important to note that although Nagarjuna denies the independent existence of timein this chapter, he is not, apparently, denying what we might call the unmediated experienceof change. What he does deny is that there is any coherent way of grasping or expressing thisexperience in terms of the flow of an independent substratum to reality. It seems thatNagarjuna's view of time is similar to Augustine's, who remarked that he knew what time wasuntil he was called upon to speak of it. David Kalupahana summarizes Nagarjuna's view herenicely:

Time denied by him is absolute time....This is a rejection not of temporalphenomena, but only of time and phenomena as well as their mutualdependence so long as they are perceived as independent entities.(Kaluphana, p. 279)

Hence, although Nagarjuna makes no positive assertions regarding time and its relationto things, his view seems open to the interpretation that time and the things that change are



essentially "one." We might phrase his view this way: phenomena are always phenomena-in-flux and time is always flux-in-phenomena. There is not a Time and Things that persistthrough it, but only a changing of things that "is" the change over time.

III. Eternity

As we indicated above, all of Nagarjuna's ideas are to be understood within the frameworkof the path toward Enlightenment. Enlightenment means that one understands the equationof samsara and nirvana, or the emptiness of the life world.

Once we see that there are no self-existent things in the universe, we come to regard"things" as "empty" of self-being, relative and dependent. The very emptiness of things, infact, is what makes things be the way they really are. Once we give up the categorization ofthings as being, not-being, both being and not-being and neither being nor not-being, we canbecome open to the true experience of the life world. Finding the emptiness of samsarabecomes finding the emptiness of nirvana. Nirvana has no own-being. Nirvana is not a "thing"to be found "elsewhere." The limits of samsara and nirvana are identical; "there is nothingwhatever that differentiates the two" (MMK 25.19 and 25.20).

If one can see this to be true, it is perhaps not too much to ask that we can imagine thatsurpassing all categories of "thinghood," including space and time, we will be in a position toat least imagine that an experience without reference to them is possible. This may give ussome clue as to the meaning of the Buddhists' reports that enlightenment allows one toexperience a kind of ever present eternity.

The conceptual equation of samsara and nirvana, however, can not do the all of thephilosophic work (let alone the real, practical work of the devotee) of encompassing a newapprehension of time into Enlightenment. This must be done by an inward turn to the self -- arooting out of all notions of the last and most intractable ground of own-being: the notions ofthe substantial self with an eternal soul.

Nagarjuna closes the MMK with a final chapter reaffirming the "correctness" Buddha'ssilence on the issue of the survival of the soul after death. We can start by considering that theindividual self is either eternal or non-eternal. If the self is eternal, it implies it is identicalthrough a time extending beyond the limits of birth and death. In this case there would be nopast state in which I was different from any future state. Not only would self-development beimpossible, but identity would be continuous. The individual born in this time would have tobe exactly the same as one born countless times before. This contradicts the common sensenotion that I am a unique individual, living at a particular time and place. Thus, it follows that

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while we can not disprove reincarnation, we can not prove it on the basis of lived experience.Such concerns are hopeless metaphysical speculation which Nagarjuna rejects in the spirit ofBuddha's original teaching.

There is an implied psychological and metaphysical doctrine in this final concern of theMMK, which, along with the previous discussions of motion, space, causality, and the path ofrelease can help us synthesize Nagarjuna's view of time.

(1) Because of self-attachment, there is a strong tendency to hope that a kind ofhypostatized Time (call it Eternity) will provide a last refuge for maintaining our self-identity.This Time will either provide a final home for the soul or will serve as a kind of netherlandapart from the world that souls visit between the cycles of birth and death. Nagarjuna's denialof our knowledge of the self's ultimate destination not only brings us back to the presentreality, but quite significantly, removes the two "ends" of time, the past and the future, fromconsideration. Hence, this feature of Nagarjuna's view anticipates the absorbing concern withthe here and now that became so important to Zen.

(2) Nagarjuna uses ontological principles and logic, but also attempts to return us toimmediate experience. Truly observed, space, time and motion have no own-being. Likewise,perceptible "things" are known to be empty, participating in the empty field of phenomenalbecoming. If we pay attention to things just as they are, we can see them no longer in space ormotion or time. If we can separate them at all, time and the changing thing are merely twoaspects of the same perception. Time itself is never grasped, but changing things continue. Itmight be stated this way: emptiness "becomes" or empties itself in the form of thing-in-motion, thing-in-space, or thing-in-time.

(3) The understanding of time is a kind of spiritual opening. It enables us to face deathwith equanimity. As Dogen says,

Life is a stage of time and death is stage of time, like, for example, winterand spring. We do not suppose that winter becomes spring, or say thatspring becomes summer. (Waddell, Shobogenzo Genjokoan, p.136)

Although time stages have a before and after, they each have their own integrity. Theenlightened one accepts the integrity of all time stages, as did Hui Neng when he calmlyexplained his coming death to his disciples: "It is only natural that I should go" (Price, p. 106).



There is a further aspect to the spiritual aspect of understanding and experiencing oftime that Nagarjuna seems to indicate. He speaks in several spots in the MMK of the "blessedcessation of appearances" (see discussion of space above and verse 5.8 of MMK) and the"cessation of conditioned elements" (25.24 and 16.4) as results of enlightenment or ofentering nirvana. Undoubtedly, desire ceases in nirvana, but does time cease too? One isreminded of the Zen conception of "walking enlightenment" described in the Sutra of HuiNeng: "Let the essence of mind and all phenomenal objects be in a state of thusness. Then youwill be in samadhi all the time" (Price, p. 80). Samadhi was traditionally conceived to be"timeless," but here it is also present in time. Dogen's view of the eternal present is alsorelated. David Loy interprets the essence of Dogen's eternal present time this way: "[It] iseternal because there is indeed something which does not change: it is always now" (Loy,p.20).

The relation of these conceptions time and enlightenment, which grew out of laterBuddhist thought, to specific passages in Nagarjuna is admittedly speculative, but theirindebtedness to the spirit of Nagarjuna's great masterpiece, I think, is not. In any event, Ibelieve we can only begin to understand Nagarjuna through an authentic struggle tounderstand not only the letter but the spirit of his text. The displacement of the ordinaryviews about the life world, and perhaps more importantly in our times, our scientific views, isa first and most difficult step on the path of the Middle Way.

IV. Conclusion

We shall be very far from understanding Nagarjuna if attempt to understand his logical,epistemological and ontological as abstractions. Nagarjuna's aim is salvation and logic andarguments are merely tools. The path of enlightenment can only be cleared by the use ofargument; it can not be traversed. If space, causality and time are barriers for the ego'srelease, Nagarjuna has attempted to provide us with means to help us remove these barriers.Perhaps the most difficult barrier for many will be the conviction that time moves of its ownaccord and that it limits or constrains the life of the soul not only now but in the hereafter.Nagarjuna's arguments show us how time, like ordinary things in the life world, can beunderstood as "empty." Once it is understood as empty the burden of time is lifted from thesoul; time ceases and life begins.

THE CODE MAKER, THE ZEN MAKER

SHANGRI-LA, SHAMBHALA, GYANGANJ, BUDDHISM AND ZEN

http://the-wanderling.com/decoder.html



THE MOBIUS STRIP

SEE ALSO:NAGARJUNA

SUNYATA

RETURN TOALL THINGS ZEN

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anderson, Tyson, "Wittgenstein and Nagarjuna's Paradox," in Philosophy East and West,Vol., 35, No. 2, April 1985.

Betty, L. Stafford, "Nagarjuna's Masterpiece: Logical, Mystical, Both or Neither," inPhilosophy East and West, Vol. 33, No. 2, April, 1983.

Kalupahana, David J., Nagarjuna: The Philosophy of the Middle Way, New York, StateUniversity of New York Press, 1986.

Loy, David, "The Mahayana Deconstruction of Time," in Philosophy East and West, Vol. 36.No. 1, January, 1986.

Murti, T. R. V., The Central Philosophy of Buddhism, London, George Allen and Unwin Ltd,1960.

Price, A. F. and Wong Mou-Lam, tr., The Diamond Sutra and The Sutra of Hui Neng,Boston, Shambhala, 1985.

Stambaugh, Joan, "Emptiness and the Identity of Samsara and Nirvana," in Journal ofBuddhist Philosophy, Volume II, 1984, pp. 51-64.

Streng, Frederick J., Emptiness: A Study in Religious Meaning, New York, AbingdonPress, 1967.

http://the-wanderling.com/mobius.html

http://sped2work.tripod.com/nagarjuna_2.html

http://the-wanderling.com/sunyata.html

http://sped2work.tripod.com/AllThingsZen.html



Waddell, Norman and Abe Massao, tr., "Shobogenzo Genjikoan," in The EasternBuddhist, Vol. 5, No. 2, October 1972.

Waddell, Norman and Abe Massao, tr., "Being Time: Dogen's Shobogenzu Uji," in TheEastern Buddhist.

Waldo, Ives, "Nagarjuna and Analytic Philosophy," in Philosophy East and West, Vol. 28.No. 3, July 1978.

Wayman, Alex, "The Tathagata Chapter of Nagarjuna's Madhymaka- karika," in PhilosophyEast and West, Vol. 38. No. 1, January, 1988.

enlightenment and time-an examination of nagarjuna's concept of time

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